CHILDHOOD AND THE DEPRESSION

Children in Poverty

The Depression brought extreme poverty to families who were already poor or in low-paid jobs. Children went hungry and contracted disease. Malnutrition was reported to be over 90 percent in the coal-mining regions of Illinois, Kentucky, Pennsylvania, Ohio, and West Virginia. Investigators found Kentucky children so hungry they had begun to chew their own hands. One-fifth of the children in New York City were malnourished. A teacher reportedly told a hungry child to go home and eat, and the child replied, "I can't. This is my sister's day to eat." In some communities children could not go to school because schools closed for lack of funds. Poor children contracted pellagra and rickets, diseases that indicated malnourishment. According to a 1937 Children's Bureau report, many children found themselves, "going for days at a time without taking off their clothes to sleep at night, becoming dirty, unkempt, a host to vermin. They may go for days with nothing to eat but coffee, bread and beans."

Children's Contributions

Children who were over age twelve were often enlisted in their families' efforts to cope with the economic loss of the Depression. Children's labor made a vital contribution to home production. Girls helped their mothers cook, clean, and sew; boys assisted their fathers repairing the house or working the farm; both genders ran errands when necessary. Children also helped supplement family income by earning money at jobs in the community. Children worked as baby-sitters, store clerks, and newspaper boys. Boys (and some girls) were often sent to work as part of migrant labor forces, harvesting crops and returning with their earnings. Most children made these economic contributions to their families while remaining in school; but many high-school dropouts were caused by the need for teenagers to contribute substantial wages to the family income.

Curtailed Childhoods

Performing economically valuable roles at younger ages had positive effects on children growing up in the Depression. "It was an enormously hard life" recalled one child of the Depression, "but there was also a sense of great satisfaction in being a child with valuable work to do and being able to do it well and function in the world." Children who performed economically valuable roles developed sound work habits, reliability, judgment concerning the use of money, awareness of the needs of others, and social independence. The economic need for children's labor presented these children with a moral challenge that called for their best efforts. For boys, who were employed outside the home more often than girls, paid jobs fostered independence and self-direction. Household tasks for girls, on the other hand, brought them closer to the family and kept them involved in domestic tasks. But these Depression children grew up faster than children who were not economically deprived. Childhood as a time of play and leisure was foreshortened for children whose labor was required by their families, and these children entered the adult world, at least in terms of their attitudes. Those who held jobs, boys especially, preferred the company of adults to children; they also identified with adults and aspired to adult status.

A FARM MOB

The 1920s and 1930s were a grueling time for American farmers. Tens of thousands lost their farms. Many blamed uncaring bankers for their plight, and by the late 1920s there was increasing resistance to farm foreclosures. Armed farmers sometimes tried to stop auctions of foreclosed farms by threatening local officials. The New York Times reported one such incident, which occurred on 4 January 1933 in Lemars, Iowa. Carrying a rope, some eight hundred farmers and townspeople gathered at the entrance to the county court-house for the auction of a farm belonging to their neighbor John A. Johnson.

The farm was to be sold to satisfy a $33,000 mortgage held by a New York insurance company. Johnson had defaulted after corn, which cost 80 cents a bushel to raise, had dropped to 10 cents a bushel at the market. Johnson's neighbors did not intend to prevent the sale. They just wanted to be sure that it sold for the full amount of the mortgage so that Johnson would not have sell livestock and other possessions to make up the difference.

The only bid was $30,000, offered by Herbert S. Martin, an attorney representing the mortgage holder. When the crowd insisted that he offer the full value of the mortgage, Martin responded that he was not authorized to go higher. The mob seized Martin, the sheriff, and a judge who threatened to telephone for help, as their leaders announced that they would hang Martin from "the highest tree in Lemars."

"Tar and teather him. Ride him on a rail!" others in the crowd cried.

Martin's neck was saved when he agreed to telegraph the insurance company asking permission to increase the bid to the full amount of Johnson's debt. His wire ended: "Rush answer. My neck at risk."

Once the message was sent, Martin, the sheriff, and the judge were released, a bit bruised but otherwise unharmed. A little while later the insurance company sent a message agreeing to pay the full price.

Source:

"I.ynchmj; Threat Halts Sale of Farm," Xru: Yotk Times, 5 January 19U, p. 14.

Sources:

Glen Elder, Children of the Great Depression: Social Change in Life Experience, (Chicago: University of Chicago Press, 1974);

Steven Mintz and Susan Kellogg, Domestic Revolutions: A Social History of American Family Life (New York: Free Press, 1988).