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Hard Times: An Oral History of the Great Depression
From the Pulitzer Prize–winning author of The Good War : A masterpiece of modern journalism and “a huge anthem in praise of the American spirit” ( Saturday Review ).
In this “invaluable record” of one of the most dramatic periods in modern American history, Studs Terkel recaptures the Great Depression of the 1930s in all its complexity. Featuring a mosaic of memories from politicians, businessmen, artists, striking workers, and Okies, from those who were just kids to those who remember losing a fortune, Hard Times is not only a gold mine of information but a fascinating interplay of memory and fact, revealing how the 1929 stock market crash and its repercussions radically changed the lives of a generation. The voices that speak from the pages of this unique book are as timeless as the lessons they impart ( The New York Times ).
“ Hard Times doesn’t ‘render’ the time of the depression―it is that time, its lingo, mood, its tragic and hilarious stories.” ―Arthur Miller
“Wonderful! The American memory, the American way, the American voice. It will resurrect your faith in all of us to read this book.” ― Newsweek
“Open Studs Terkel’s book to almost any page and rich memories spill out . . . Read a page, any page. Then try to stop.” ― The National Observer
In this “invaluable record” of one of the most dramatic periods in modern American history, Studs Terkel recaptures the Great Depression of the 1930s in all its complexity. Featuring a mosaic of memories from politicians, businessmen, artists, striking workers, and Okies, from those who were just kids to those who remember losing a fortune, Hard Times is not only a gold mine of information but a fascinating interplay of memory and fact, revealing how the 1929 stock market crash and its repercussions radically changed the lives of a generation. The voices that speak from the pages of this unique book are as timeless as the lessons they impart ( The New York Times ).
“ Hard Times doesn’t ‘render’ the time of the depression―it is that time, its lingo, mood, its tragic and hilarious stories.” ―Arthur Miller
“Wonderful! The American memory, the American way, the American voice. It will resurrect your faith in all of us to read this book.” ― Newsweek
“Open Studs Terkel’s book to almost any page and rich memories spill out . . . Read a page, any page. Then try to stop.” ― The National Observer
462 pages, Paperback
First published January 1, 1970
997 people are currently reading
6710 people want to read
About the author
Studs Terkel
76 books416 followersLouis "Studs" Terkel was an American author, historian, actor, and broadcaster. He received the Pulitzer Prize for General Non-Fiction in 1985 for "The Good War", and is best remembered for his oral histories of common Americans, and for hosting a long-running radio show in Chicago.
Terkel was acclaimed for his efforts to preserve American oral history. His 1985 book "The Good War: An Oral History of World War Two", which detailed ordinary peoples' accounts of the country's involvement in World War II, won the Pulitzer Prize. For "Hard Times: An Oral History of the Great Depression", Terkel assembled recollections of the Great Depression that spanned the socioeconomic spectrum, from Okies, through prison inmates, to the wealthy. His 1974 book, "Working" also was highly acclaimed. In 1995, he received the Chicago History Museum "Making History Award" for Distinction in Journalism and Communications. In 1997, Terkel was elected a member of The American Academy of Arts and Letters. Two years later, he received the George Polk Career Award in 1999.
Terkel was acclaimed for his efforts to preserve American oral history. His 1985 book "The Good War: An Oral History of World War Two", which detailed ordinary peoples' accounts of the country's involvement in World War II, won the Pulitzer Prize. For "Hard Times: An Oral History of the Great Depression", Terkel assembled recollections of the Great Depression that spanned the socioeconomic spectrum, from Okies, through prison inmates, to the wealthy. His 1974 book, "Working" also was highly acclaimed. In 1995, he received the Chicago History Museum "Making History Award" for Distinction in Journalism and Communications. In 1997, Terkel was elected a member of The American Academy of Arts and Letters. Two years later, he received the George Polk Career Award in 1999.
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October 31, 2022
Lots and lots of stories about what life was like during the Great Depression but no real structure and the stories become extremely repetitive in this very long book which could have used an editor. Terkel finds some real gems in this retelling of the 1930's in the United States, but oh so many of the narrators repeat the same anecdotes.
These interviews were done in 1968 and most of these stories sound like they have been greatly rehearsed over the decades and may have been influenced by the passing of time. Terkel also has some interviews with youngsters in 1968 about the meaning of the hard times and trying to bring the danger of a new depression to America. The youngsters are clearly being mocked by Terkel, making fun of the naive comments. Terkel seems to be particularly obsessed with apple selling on the streets and men who jumped out of the windows during the 1930's.
There are many better books on the Depression that bring to the reader the perspective needed to this fascinating decade in American history.
These interviews were done in 1968 and most of these stories sound like they have been greatly rehearsed over the decades and may have been influenced by the passing of time. Terkel also has some interviews with youngsters in 1968 about the meaning of the hard times and trying to bring the danger of a new depression to America. The youngsters are clearly being mocked by Terkel, making fun of the naive comments. Terkel seems to be particularly obsessed with apple selling on the streets and men who jumped out of the windows during the 1930's.
There are many better books on the Depression that bring to the reader the perspective needed to this fascinating decade in American history.
March 7, 2020
Helen pulled off the side of the road whenever she saw a bag that had been thrown out some car window, especially if it looked like it contained clothing. If it did, she would rip off the zippers and the buttons and save them for a time when she needed to sew a button or a zipper on clothing for herself or her four sons. It was the early 1960s, and she had been through the Great Depression. She was my first mother-in-law and we lived with her briefly as she tried to feed her us all, even her mother, on what little welfare money she had coming in each month. Sometimes hard times just produces more hard times.
Stud Terkel wrote the history of the Great Depression though the eyes of those living it. He went around the country interviewing people. Their stories are hard to read, and when Studs Terkel writes about those who lived high on the hog, it infuriates me. Obviously, we are not all in this together, as the saying goes.
At one point in this book I realized that this was a dog eat dog world, a clique that I have not heard of in years or even thought of, but one that came to mind when I read about the insurance salesman that would go door to door trying to sell insurance to people who were desperately poor, not even considering that they couldn't afford it or even caring. Why? Because he also needed work. As a salesman he was trained to make the deal: "Now you come up to me. You're gonna sell me. I'm really worried, I say to you: 'I'd love to buy your insurance, but I'm so frantic, I just can't--" The response is so simple: 'That's exactly why you need it.' I'd close in on you."
People were thrown out of their homes with their furniture left outside on the streets. In some places, neighbors would come and help by taking the furniture right back into the houses. Cars were abandoned on the streets, businesses closed their doors, lines of people shuffled as they slowly made their way to the beginning of the bread lines, a thousand men would fight like a pack of wolves to be able to get one of the 3 jobs that was being offered them on the waterfront, rat poison was often added to trash cans to keep the desperately poor out of them, vagrants were arrested, and some of the wealthy, after losing money, were throwing themselves out of windows, or shooting their families and then hemselves, and on top of all of this, preachers were blaming the poor for their condition. Sin, they said?
John Steinbeck wrote a book about it, "The Grapes of Wrath," and others wrote songs: These books and songs were considered by the Republicans to be anti-capitalist:
"Brother, Can You Spare a Dime," lyrics by Yip Harburg, music by Jay Gorney (1931)
They used to tell me I was building a dream, and so I followed the mob,
When there was earth to plow, or guns to bear, I was always there right on the job.
They used to tell me I was building a dream, with peace and glory ahead,
Why should I be standing in line, just waiting for bread?
Once I built a railroad, I made it run, made it race against time.
Once I built a railroad; now it's done. Brother, can you spare a dime?
Once I built a tower, up to the sun, brick, and rivet, and lime;
Once I built a tower, now it's done. Brother, can you spare a dime?
Once in khaki suits, gee we looked swell,
Full of that Yankee Doodly Dum,
Half a million boots went slogging through Hell,
And I was the kid with the drum!
Say, don't you remember, they called me Al; it was Al all the time.
Why don't you remember, I'm your pal? Buddy, can you spare a dime?
Once in khaki suits, gee we looked swell,
Full of that Yankee Doodly Dum,
Half a million boots went slogging through Hell,
And I was the kid with the drum!
Say, don't you remember, they called me Al; it was Al all the time.
Say, don't you remember, I'm your pal? Buddy, can you spare a dime?"
"Millions experienced a private kind of shame when the pink slip came. No matter that others suffered the same fate, the inner voice whispered, 'I'm a failure.'" Some just wrote those songs and made money.
One man said, "Have you ever seen a child with rickets? Shaking as with palsy. No proteins, no milk. And the companies pouring milk into gutters. People with nothing to wear, and they were plowing up cotton. People with nothing to eat, and they killed the pigs? If that wasn't the craziest system in the world...and people blamed themselves, not the system."
In mid-1950s where I grew up, I used to go down to the river, and one day I came upon a hobo camp. No one was around, but I saw a large pot of stew sitting over a cold fire just waiting for them to return. I quickly left.
In earlier times, when I was 7 years old and lived in Porterville, CA in our empty hotel building, I used to go through the garbage cans in the alley just for the fun of it. I found a bag of stale cookies one time that a store had thrown out. I put them on a little crate in that alley because I had the idea of selling them to a hobo the next day since they often walked through the alley. The next morning they were gone. I remember making a peanut butter and jelly sandwich for a hobo that had knocked on our door. They are gone but not forgotten.
In the depression they burned fields of oranges, and when one man tried to take one before it caught on fire, and he was shot to death. Rotten bananas set on the docks in New Orleans. It is now 2016. I frequent a grocery store where farmer's can get the throw-away food for their animals, and this for free if they sign a card saying that they are a farmer. I once saw two large cases of wonderful tomatoes, that just didn't sell and asked why they were not giving it to the poor. The reason: It could make them sick. No, it wouldn't, but I just quietly walked away and thought about it. I came back a minute later because I am on that farmer's list since I feed my feral groundhogs in the summertime with just a few pieces of fruit of vegetables that I find there. But when I asked for the tomatoes, I was told that one of the workers just took them out to the garbage bins. They were afraid that I would get them and give them away, which I would have. They didn't even wait for a farmer to come in later that day. That was one of the few times that the food thrown away was perfectly good. Everyone must have been growing their own tomatoes that year.
I also know of a farmer that gets the throw away farmer's food at that store and takes it home and cans it for themselves. What nutritional value does it have when they throw it out because it is limp? Not much. We have not progressed much in our society when people are not taken care of properly, when some people where I live even go to the Farmer's Co-Op to buy animal products for their family because it is cheaper--the grains, the molasses?
Helen used to cook for all of us. She had left her husband and didn't want to be found, so it was all up to her and her welfare check. One day her son came into the house and said, "What are we having for dinner? Beans and potatoes again?" "No," said his mother Helen, "Today, we are having potatoes and beans." I remember laughing at that. I also remember canned milk warmed up with water and cocoa and some sugar to make it palpable because their well water had so much iron in it. And I remember those stewed tomatoes with dried breads cubes and sugar.
Another depression song:
I'm just like Job's turkey,
I can't do nothing
by gobble,
I'm so poor, baby,
I have to lean
against the fence to
gabble.
Yeah, now, baby, I
believe I'll change
town,
Lord, I'm so low
down, baby,
I declare I'd looking
up at down.
The men in the mine, baby,
They all looking down at me...
~~Big Bill Broonzy
"Autopsies have been confirmed that many miners die of heart failure when coal dust clamps the small arteries in their lungs in a stiff unyielding cast which eventually puts a critical load on their hearts."
Al Capone set up soup kitchens, so he wasn't all bad. William Randolph Hearst gave truckloads of food away, so he wasn't all that bad either and maybe never was. Just wondering: Is this why the SLA, in the 70s in Berkeley, kidnapped Patty Hearst and asked her father to deliver truckloads of food to people? I was there, but I won't digress.
"Can you imagine women and children riding boxcars? The conductor wanted to find out how many guys were in the yards, so he would know how many empty boxcars to put onto the train. Of course, the railroad companies didn't know this." They were going other places looking for work that probably wasn't there. Some people cared for others; some didn't. It often depended on the amount of greed a person had or maybe just the lack of compassion.
Hoover set up camps for the homeless. During the recent crash in 2008, I saw photos of other camps. Hoover's was called Hooverville. One man during the depression had this to say: "I saw Hoovervilles--out the train windows. It was appalling to look at, even through train windows. But it didn't touch me." This was the lack of compassion that I am talking about, but even more so, the lack of action. An action that at least some wealthy people took.
And this same man goes on: "It was a magnificent time for me. There was certainly not lack of girls. (Laughs.) I'm awful glad I was young at that time."
Helen used to have only $35 a week to feed us all. I would go the market with her. I remember hot dogs. That is all I remember. But she must have also bought those beans, stewed tomatoes, potatoes and day old bread. She knew how to shop to make ends meet. And when we moved out and my husband at the time was working she wouldn't accept money from us because the welfare office might find out. You couldn't even give her food. She was that honest. I also remember her nursing her last baby until he was five years old.
Some say that Roosevelt ended the depression because of all the programs that he created; some say that the war ended it. For Helen it ended a different way. She moved back to Arkansas just as I was divorcing her son. I learned that her
ex-husband had found her there, thanks to the welfare office, and they made him pay her all of the back pay. She then went to nursing school and graduated with high honors. A few years after becoming a nurse she died of cancer.
When I see a photo that Dorothea Lange took during the depression, it always reminds me of Helen. It is the hair style, the wrinkles, her being old before her time, but maybe it was because I was so young that she looked so old, but I knew that having worked in the fields most of her life had aged her. This is the photo that reminds me of her:
And this is all I have to remember her by, these few harsh realities. I never faced hunger, just bad food. I consider myself fortunate. Many aren't.
Stud Terkel wrote the history of the Great Depression though the eyes of those living it. He went around the country interviewing people. Their stories are hard to read, and when Studs Terkel writes about those who lived high on the hog, it infuriates me. Obviously, we are not all in this together, as the saying goes.
At one point in this book I realized that this was a dog eat dog world, a clique that I have not heard of in years or even thought of, but one that came to mind when I read about the insurance salesman that would go door to door trying to sell insurance to people who were desperately poor, not even considering that they couldn't afford it or even caring. Why? Because he also needed work. As a salesman he was trained to make the deal: "Now you come up to me. You're gonna sell me. I'm really worried, I say to you: 'I'd love to buy your insurance, but I'm so frantic, I just can't--" The response is so simple: 'That's exactly why you need it.' I'd close in on you."
People were thrown out of their homes with their furniture left outside on the streets. In some places, neighbors would come and help by taking the furniture right back into the houses. Cars were abandoned on the streets, businesses closed their doors, lines of people shuffled as they slowly made their way to the beginning of the bread lines, a thousand men would fight like a pack of wolves to be able to get one of the 3 jobs that was being offered them on the waterfront, rat poison was often added to trash cans to keep the desperately poor out of them, vagrants were arrested, and some of the wealthy, after losing money, were throwing themselves out of windows, or shooting their families and then hemselves, and on top of all of this, preachers were blaming the poor for their condition. Sin, they said?
John Steinbeck wrote a book about it, "The Grapes of Wrath," and others wrote songs: These books and songs were considered by the Republicans to be anti-capitalist:
"Brother, Can You Spare a Dime," lyrics by Yip Harburg, music by Jay Gorney (1931)
They used to tell me I was building a dream, and so I followed the mob,
When there was earth to plow, or guns to bear, I was always there right on the job.
They used to tell me I was building a dream, with peace and glory ahead,
Why should I be standing in line, just waiting for bread?
Once I built a railroad, I made it run, made it race against time.
Once I built a railroad; now it's done. Brother, can you spare a dime?
Once I built a tower, up to the sun, brick, and rivet, and lime;
Once I built a tower, now it's done. Brother, can you spare a dime?
Once in khaki suits, gee we looked swell,
Full of that Yankee Doodly Dum,
Half a million boots went slogging through Hell,
And I was the kid with the drum!
Say, don't you remember, they called me Al; it was Al all the time.
Why don't you remember, I'm your pal? Buddy, can you spare a dime?
Once in khaki suits, gee we looked swell,
Full of that Yankee Doodly Dum,
Half a million boots went slogging through Hell,
And I was the kid with the drum!
Say, don't you remember, they called me Al; it was Al all the time.
Say, don't you remember, I'm your pal? Buddy, can you spare a dime?"
"Millions experienced a private kind of shame when the pink slip came. No matter that others suffered the same fate, the inner voice whispered, 'I'm a failure.'" Some just wrote those songs and made money.
One man said, "Have you ever seen a child with rickets? Shaking as with palsy. No proteins, no milk. And the companies pouring milk into gutters. People with nothing to wear, and they were plowing up cotton. People with nothing to eat, and they killed the pigs? If that wasn't the craziest system in the world...and people blamed themselves, not the system."
In mid-1950s where I grew up, I used to go down to the river, and one day I came upon a hobo camp. No one was around, but I saw a large pot of stew sitting over a cold fire just waiting for them to return. I quickly left.
In earlier times, when I was 7 years old and lived in Porterville, CA in our empty hotel building, I used to go through the garbage cans in the alley just for the fun of it. I found a bag of stale cookies one time that a store had thrown out. I put them on a little crate in that alley because I had the idea of selling them to a hobo the next day since they often walked through the alley. The next morning they were gone. I remember making a peanut butter and jelly sandwich for a hobo that had knocked on our door. They are gone but not forgotten.
In the depression they burned fields of oranges, and when one man tried to take one before it caught on fire, and he was shot to death. Rotten bananas set on the docks in New Orleans. It is now 2016. I frequent a grocery store where farmer's can get the throw-away food for their animals, and this for free if they sign a card saying that they are a farmer. I once saw two large cases of wonderful tomatoes, that just didn't sell and asked why they were not giving it to the poor. The reason: It could make them sick. No, it wouldn't, but I just quietly walked away and thought about it. I came back a minute later because I am on that farmer's list since I feed my feral groundhogs in the summertime with just a few pieces of fruit of vegetables that I find there. But when I asked for the tomatoes, I was told that one of the workers just took them out to the garbage bins. They were afraid that I would get them and give them away, which I would have. They didn't even wait for a farmer to come in later that day. That was one of the few times that the food thrown away was perfectly good. Everyone must have been growing their own tomatoes that year.
I also know of a farmer that gets the throw away farmer's food at that store and takes it home and cans it for themselves. What nutritional value does it have when they throw it out because it is limp? Not much. We have not progressed much in our society when people are not taken care of properly, when some people where I live even go to the Farmer's Co-Op to buy animal products for their family because it is cheaper--the grains, the molasses?
Helen used to cook for all of us. She had left her husband and didn't want to be found, so it was all up to her and her welfare check. One day her son came into the house and said, "What are we having for dinner? Beans and potatoes again?" "No," said his mother Helen, "Today, we are having potatoes and beans." I remember laughing at that. I also remember canned milk warmed up with water and cocoa and some sugar to make it palpable because their well water had so much iron in it. And I remember those stewed tomatoes with dried breads cubes and sugar.
Another depression song:
I'm just like Job's turkey,
I can't do nothing
by gobble,
I'm so poor, baby,
I have to lean
against the fence to
gabble.
Yeah, now, baby, I
believe I'll change
town,
Lord, I'm so low
down, baby,
I declare I'd looking
up at down.
The men in the mine, baby,
They all looking down at me...
~~Big Bill Broonzy
"Autopsies have been confirmed that many miners die of heart failure when coal dust clamps the small arteries in their lungs in a stiff unyielding cast which eventually puts a critical load on their hearts."
Al Capone set up soup kitchens, so he wasn't all bad. William Randolph Hearst gave truckloads of food away, so he wasn't all that bad either and maybe never was. Just wondering: Is this why the SLA, in the 70s in Berkeley, kidnapped Patty Hearst and asked her father to deliver truckloads of food to people? I was there, but I won't digress.
"Can you imagine women and children riding boxcars? The conductor wanted to find out how many guys were in the yards, so he would know how many empty boxcars to put onto the train. Of course, the railroad companies didn't know this." They were going other places looking for work that probably wasn't there. Some people cared for others; some didn't. It often depended on the amount of greed a person had or maybe just the lack of compassion.
Hoover set up camps for the homeless. During the recent crash in 2008, I saw photos of other camps. Hoover's was called Hooverville. One man during the depression had this to say: "I saw Hoovervilles--out the train windows. It was appalling to look at, even through train windows. But it didn't touch me." This was the lack of compassion that I am talking about, but even more so, the lack of action. An action that at least some wealthy people took.
And this same man goes on: "It was a magnificent time for me. There was certainly not lack of girls. (Laughs.) I'm awful glad I was young at that time."
Helen used to have only $35 a week to feed us all. I would go the market with her. I remember hot dogs. That is all I remember. But she must have also bought those beans, stewed tomatoes, potatoes and day old bread. She knew how to shop to make ends meet. And when we moved out and my husband at the time was working she wouldn't accept money from us because the welfare office might find out. You couldn't even give her food. She was that honest. I also remember her nursing her last baby until he was five years old.
Some say that Roosevelt ended the depression because of all the programs that he created; some say that the war ended it. For Helen it ended a different way. She moved back to Arkansas just as I was divorcing her son. I learned that her
ex-husband had found her there, thanks to the welfare office, and they made him pay her all of the back pay. She then went to nursing school and graduated with high honors. A few years after becoming a nurse she died of cancer.
When I see a photo that Dorothea Lange took during the depression, it always reminds me of Helen. It is the hair style, the wrinkles, her being old before her time, but maybe it was because I was so young that she looked so old, but I knew that having worked in the fields most of her life had aged her. This is the photo that reminds me of her:
And this is all I have to remember her by, these few harsh realities. I never faced hunger, just bad food. I consider myself fortunate. Many aren't.
August 9, 2015
I've been meaning to read this for many years. It was written in 1970, but still seems fresh and relevant. It is said that human memory only lasts about 1 generation, or 80 years. After that, subsequent generations must relearn what has been forgotten. It is now a little more than 80 years since the inception of the Great Depression, and it appears we're destined to make many of the same mistakes that were made way back then.
Anyway, the overall theme of virtually every one of the people Terkel interviewed is that they have been scarred. While a few people like Clement Stone look back fondly, most people would never ever want to go through another one. I think many of the hoarding issues you see with older folks are a direct result of the poverty inflicted during the Great Depression. My own folks were children growing up then, and they still look back at the 'dirty 30s' in horror.
Very powerful book. The various people all vividly remember those days. The book does a compelling job of telling what actually happened back then rather than something that has been filtered by historian. In other words, 'primary source' history. Highly recommended, and kind of scary.
Anyway, the overall theme of virtually every one of the people Terkel interviewed is that they have been scarred. While a few people like Clement Stone look back fondly, most people would never ever want to go through another one. I think many of the hoarding issues you see with older folks are a direct result of the poverty inflicted during the Great Depression. My own folks were children growing up then, and they still look back at the 'dirty 30s' in horror.
Very powerful book. The various people all vividly remember those days. The book does a compelling job of telling what actually happened back then rather than something that has been filtered by historian. In other words, 'primary source' history. Highly recommended, and kind of scary.
July 16, 2008
This is a great collection of reminiscences from those who lived through the Depression. What was striking to me was the variety of experience - I know it should be obvious, but I kind of thought that EVERYONE was dirt poor and riding the rails, and of course that's not true. The Depression affected everyone, but in different ways - and that really comes through here. I would say this is an absolute must-read for anyone studying or curious about the Depression.
October 5, 2024
Studs Terkel interviews people from all walks of life, focusing on their experiences with the Great Depression. Some people were involved with government at the time. Others were active with labor unions. Some people were farmers. Others were simply trying to find work and food for their families.
I am fascinated with the stories people told in this book. It was surprising to hear some people sharply criticize FDR, to learn that many people were beginning to lean toward Communism and Socialism, to discover that some initiated schemes designed to circumvent creditors attempting to take people's farms and other possessions.
I am fascinated with the stories people told in this book. It was surprising to hear some people sharply criticize FDR, to learn that many people were beginning to lean toward Communism and Socialism, to discover that some initiated schemes designed to circumvent creditors attempting to take people's farms and other possessions.
October 22, 2011
Reading this book was like reading a very great novel: the sort of novel that is long and complicated in structure, weaving many stories together into the same story, bringing many characters together in such a way that the reader becomes invested in all of their lives and senses that not only are these characters part of the story, but everyone around them depends on its outcome. And the meaning of the story will change the reader's life too.
If really good oral history were more common, it might be better to say of a great novel that it reminds one of great oral history. Because great novels capture real human emotions and reactions at some momentous time -- oral histories do the same, with the emotions and reactions filtered only through memory, not a writer's imagination, and therefore are even closer to truth.
At one point I would have been skeptical that "ordinary" people, interviewed about their own lives, could utter anything as profound, moving, or even truthful than the inventions of the greatest creative writers. I know better now. As the authors of another wonderful book based on oral histories (Like a Family: The Making of a Southern Cotton Mill World) said, "We had learned from experience to trust the interpretive authority of ordinary people."
Of course, Studs Terkel is the element that transforms this book from a very powerful collection of primary sources into a work of history of literary quality. First of course, he is the one who found the people to interview (those who in the Depression who had been everyone from the struggling poor, to mob members, to government officials and social workers, to rich people who remember the New Deals with hostility), and who--obviously with consummate skill--persuaded them to speak. And then he cut and arranged his material, not as a straightforward narrative, or a chronological history of the Depression, or as a series of arguments, but as chapters of contrasting voices with common identifiable themes. The chapters themselves--I will need to re-read the book someday to understand how he ordered them, but after the first reading I have only the silly mystical idea that he couldn't have arranged them any other way.
In any other book I would have wanted a lot of information about how the author chose interviewees, conducted interviews, and compiled the material, so that I could evaluate it for bias. Terkel doesn't do this at all in Hard Times. He refers to the questions of what the book is for and how to evaluate its truthfulness in about two paragraphs at the very beginning. His own words are limited to this introduction (which mostly gives some of his own memories of the Depression) and a few italicized, conversational interview questions. Even the footnotes sometimes required to explain a detail are written as much as possible in the interviewee's own words.
Once I got into it, I didn't want Terkel to have explained himself. I figure I can read about his method in his autobiography (P.S.: Further Thoughts from a Lifetime of Listening). But in Hard Times, Terkel can just sit back and let the people tell their own stories, and that's exactly how it ought to be.
If really good oral history were more common, it might be better to say of a great novel that it reminds one of great oral history. Because great novels capture real human emotions and reactions at some momentous time -- oral histories do the same, with the emotions and reactions filtered only through memory, not a writer's imagination, and therefore are even closer to truth.
At one point I would have been skeptical that "ordinary" people, interviewed about their own lives, could utter anything as profound, moving, or even truthful than the inventions of the greatest creative writers. I know better now. As the authors of another wonderful book based on oral histories (Like a Family: The Making of a Southern Cotton Mill World) said, "We had learned from experience to trust the interpretive authority of ordinary people."
Of course, Studs Terkel is the element that transforms this book from a very powerful collection of primary sources into a work of history of literary quality. First of course, he is the one who found the people to interview (those who in the Depression who had been everyone from the struggling poor, to mob members, to government officials and social workers, to rich people who remember the New Deals with hostility), and who--obviously with consummate skill--persuaded them to speak. And then he cut and arranged his material, not as a straightforward narrative, or a chronological history of the Depression, or as a series of arguments, but as chapters of contrasting voices with common identifiable themes. The chapters themselves--I will need to re-read the book someday to understand how he ordered them, but after the first reading I have only the silly mystical idea that he couldn't have arranged them any other way.
In any other book I would have wanted a lot of information about how the author chose interviewees, conducted interviews, and compiled the material, so that I could evaluate it for bias. Terkel doesn't do this at all in Hard Times. He refers to the questions of what the book is for and how to evaluate its truthfulness in about two paragraphs at the very beginning. His own words are limited to this introduction (which mostly gives some of his own memories of the Depression) and a few italicized, conversational interview questions. Even the footnotes sometimes required to explain a detail are written as much as possible in the interviewee's own words.
Once I got into it, I didn't want Terkel to have explained himself. I figure I can read about his method in his autobiography (P.S.: Further Thoughts from a Lifetime of Listening). But in Hard Times, Terkel can just sit back and let the people tell their own stories, and that's exactly how it ought to be.
June 4, 2017
Other reviewers really seem to love this book, but I found it PAINFULLY slow. Maybe the whole "oral history" thing just doesn't appeal to me. I found the 3-page vignettes too short and unedited to be terribly descriptive -- much less insightful. I kind of just felt like I was reading a 1970's version of a "#greatdepression" Twitter feed. Too spasmodic for me.
March 17, 2016
Studs Terkel's "Hard Times" is one of those great reminders that no matter how much progress is made in America things never really change. It is a collection of interviews in the late 1960's with people of all ages and classes about what they remember or have been told about the Great Depression. The results are like asking people today about the 1980's, certain things stick out because they affected you directly but everything else is a bit fuzzy. It all depends on where you were before the crash. People who were already broke barely noticed, middle class people who speculated on the stock market got hit the hardest and the rich just kept on getting richer. Sound familiar?
The stories leap off the page in the teller's voices. Terkel does little editing and does not insert himself too often, only to nudge the speaker along. It is fascinating reading about a time that has been mythologized almost beyond historical reality.
The stories leap off the page in the teller's voices. Terkel does little editing and does not insert himself too often, only to nudge the speaker along. It is fascinating reading about a time that has been mythologized almost beyond historical reality.
December 5, 2016
Per adulti.
La Fallaci, in Intervista con la storia, scrive che ogni giornalista è in realtà uno storico. Balle. Lei non era una giornalista pura: raccogliendo le risposte alterava il fenomeno mentre lo misurava, come direbbe uno scienziato. Il tono delle risposte dipendeva fortemente dal grado di simpatia che provava per il soggetto. Da Khomeini non ottiene risposte, e se ne vanta: quella non è un' intervista, è performance politica.
Il giornalismo puro esiste, ed è impersonato da Studs Terkel. Terkel fa un mestiere che sarebbe stato impossibile per la Fallaci, che consiste nell'offrire totale libertà di parola all'intervistato e totale libertà al lettore. Senza. Alcuna. Riserva. In Hard times, di stronzi ce n'è a bizzeffe, di ipocriti gonfi di retorica, mucchi. Tanti poveracci, qualche illuminato progressista, qualche sincero progressista. Tanti onesti liberali conservatori. Onesti innanzitutto nel senso che si dichiarano onestamente tali: si trovano davanti uno che ascolta, riporta e non giudica, e loro parlano e parlano, liberamente. È sorprendente la semplicità con cui quest'uomo tira fuori la merda e l'oro dagli intervistati. Terkel raccoglie dati, è questo il suo mestiere.
Al lettore il compito di specularci sopra, in piena libertà.
Altrove vedo un'ansia didascalica: giornalisti cui preme avvertire il lettore che l'intervistato è uno stronzo, o un corrotto, o un grand'uomo. Sinceramente, non ne sento granché il bisogno, d'esser trattato da bambino.
Ecco: questo è un libro per adulti.
La Fallaci, in Intervista con la storia, scrive che ogni giornalista è in realtà uno storico. Balle. Lei non era una giornalista pura: raccogliendo le risposte alterava il fenomeno mentre lo misurava, come direbbe uno scienziato. Il tono delle risposte dipendeva fortemente dal grado di simpatia che provava per il soggetto. Da Khomeini non ottiene risposte, e se ne vanta: quella non è un' intervista, è performance politica.
Il giornalismo puro esiste, ed è impersonato da Studs Terkel. Terkel fa un mestiere che sarebbe stato impossibile per la Fallaci, che consiste nell'offrire totale libertà di parola all'intervistato e totale libertà al lettore. Senza. Alcuna. Riserva. In Hard times, di stronzi ce n'è a bizzeffe, di ipocriti gonfi di retorica, mucchi. Tanti poveracci, qualche illuminato progressista, qualche sincero progressista. Tanti onesti liberali conservatori. Onesti innanzitutto nel senso che si dichiarano onestamente tali: si trovano davanti uno che ascolta, riporta e non giudica, e loro parlano e parlano, liberamente. È sorprendente la semplicità con cui quest'uomo tira fuori la merda e l'oro dagli intervistati. Terkel raccoglie dati, è questo il suo mestiere.
Al lettore il compito di specularci sopra, in piena libertà.
Altrove vedo un'ansia didascalica: giornalisti cui preme avvertire il lettore che l'intervistato è uno stronzo, o un corrotto, o un grand'uomo. Sinceramente, non ne sento granché il bisogno, d'esser trattato da bambino.
Ecco: questo è un libro per adulti.
January 23, 2023
Studs Terkel was one of the finest oral historians of the past century. In this book, he brings into fresh vividness through a variety of interviews, the lives of people who lived through the Great Depression, as well as those people, who, although, were not alive at the time of the Great Depression, were, nevertheless, impacted by it through their parents (survivors of the Great Depression). All in all, a wonderful, sobering book.
March 28, 2020
An extraordinary, varied, moving constellation of voices and stories. Hard Times was on my radar when I lived in Chicago years ago (before I had Goodreads), and I have my friend John in Texas to thank for telling me it was the perfect book to read right now, as unemployment rapidly escalates and the future seems uncertain in the United States. He said it's "excellent to be reminded that if they survived, we can." I reflected a lot on my grandparents, family lore my parents shared with me and my brother, and through them all the ways in which the Great Depression formed aspects of my personality and behavior. It's a powerful national portrait, which I highly recommend.
January 8, 2025
I don't say this about most books, but for this book: Everyone can and should read this book. To quote Newsweek: "The American memory, the American way, the American voice."
March 18, 2025
Essential reading. The voices Terkel captures transcend history: this is poetry. An overwhelming, multitudinous song of life and memory.
March 18, 2016
The amazing thing about this book is the impression I get that we are, in fact, living these times all over again. For instance, the notion that the "1 Percent" controlled 80% of the wealth was invoked by Huey Long. The only difference was that mainstream politicians like Roosevelt were genuinely fearful of a revolution. Therefore, the WPA was enacted almost overnight.
Terkel includes every conceivable type of character for this survey (about 70% of whom resided in the Chicago area) including gangsters, artists, newspapermen, show girls, bankers, union organizers, congressmen, sharecroppers and others who rode boxcars in search of work (capturing their unique slang and way with words). He also included a few who were not affected or who actually made huge fortunes as a result of bad times. The level of commitment and organization of the ordinary citizen - in organizing strikes and protests -- is truly remarkable considering there were no hand-held mass communication devices available (there wasn't even electricity in many rural areas).
There's no doubt many were on the brink of starvation. However, a genuine sense of camaraderie was evident then that absolutely does not exist today. Granted, these interviews were conducted in the late 1960s when almost everyone was living more comfortably. Those who were in their 20's at the time were more likely to recall it as a grand adventure. Yet, this adds another interesting aspect in that the teen-age (and slightly older) children of these same subjects knew almost nothing other than "it was a bad time, my old man doesn't like to talk about it." One of the few college-age students who did possess a sophisticated understanding -- the son of a prominent self-made business leader -- became a spokesman for the Weathermen (and is probably now one of the 1%). It is pretty clear why the generation gap in the 1960s was so extreme.
Terkel includes every conceivable type of character for this survey (about 70% of whom resided in the Chicago area) including gangsters, artists, newspapermen, show girls, bankers, union organizers, congressmen, sharecroppers and others who rode boxcars in search of work (capturing their unique slang and way with words). He also included a few who were not affected or who actually made huge fortunes as a result of bad times. The level of commitment and organization of the ordinary citizen - in organizing strikes and protests -- is truly remarkable considering there were no hand-held mass communication devices available (there wasn't even electricity in many rural areas).
There's no doubt many were on the brink of starvation. However, a genuine sense of camaraderie was evident then that absolutely does not exist today. Granted, these interviews were conducted in the late 1960s when almost everyone was living more comfortably. Those who were in their 20's at the time were more likely to recall it as a grand adventure. Yet, this adds another interesting aspect in that the teen-age (and slightly older) children of these same subjects knew almost nothing other than "it was a bad time, my old man doesn't like to talk about it." One of the few college-age students who did possess a sophisticated understanding -- the son of a prominent self-made business leader -- became a spokesman for the Weathermen (and is probably now one of the 1%). It is pretty clear why the generation gap in the 1960s was so extreme.
January 30, 2016
In this book, Terkel relays oral histories of people who were exposed to the Depression including farmers, politicians, industrialists, African Americans, artists. You name it, it's in there. It is history through the eyes of the common and not-so-common man.
It strikes me that a book like this would be highly unlikely to be published today - - in the days where YouTube and blogging provide thousands of first person accounts of the world around us. Available in seconds.
I thought that this book would be truly fascinating, but because I didn't really know enough (or recollect enough history classes) about the Depression, I found myself constantly distracted by the many acronyms for government programs. Some of the folks really told about what life was like in and interesting way, but others reminded me of old, boring people who just were telling dull, tangential stories.
All in all, I think if the author had prefaced his chapter with some analysis of the group of people he was talking to and some historical facts, I would have loved the book. But the standalone oral histories didn't quite do it for me.
Nonetheless, I would read more Terkel, but if I selected one of his books that focused on a historical event, I'd read a background book first on the event so I was a little more educated before delving into the histories.
It strikes me that a book like this would be highly unlikely to be published today - - in the days where YouTube and blogging provide thousands of first person accounts of the world around us. Available in seconds.
I thought that this book would be truly fascinating, but because I didn't really know enough (or recollect enough history classes) about the Depression, I found myself constantly distracted by the many acronyms for government programs. Some of the folks really told about what life was like in and interesting way, but others reminded me of old, boring people who just were telling dull, tangential stories.
All in all, I think if the author had prefaced his chapter with some analysis of the group of people he was talking to and some historical facts, I would have loved the book. But the standalone oral histories didn't quite do it for me.
Nonetheless, I would read more Terkel, but if I selected one of his books that focused on a historical event, I'd read a background book first on the event so I was a little more educated before delving into the histories.
September 24, 2019
This book, from 1970, is a fantastic glimpse into the real lives of people who both lived through the Great Depression and whose who were indirectly affected by it. It is the direct memories of real people, from the poorest to some of the most wealthy. From seemingly insignificant people to some who worked closely with our country’s top leaders. The real, raw stories about life during the late 1920s and through the 1930s are heartbreaking and at the same time amazingly encouraging tales of the human spirit. I am a better U.S. citizen for having read this compilation by Studs Terkel.
August 9, 2011
This was such an amazing book. I'd never read a written documentary before, but after having read this book I would have gladly read more. This was one of my assigned books for summer homework for my Junior AP English class, and definitely the best one I had to read. It's gritty and *real.* Considering today's economic and political climate, it should probably be a required read.
April 30, 2013
Humanity during the Depression era, as recalled by important people, the average Joe and many in between. The pages weave between touching moments and heartbreaking tragedy. It's also striking to notice many similarities between the Depression of the 30's and the recession of the late 2000's. Overall an interesting read and a nice reminder of perspective in our own lives.
January 19, 2019
A must read, especially in the wake of the Great Recession and the right wing turn the world has taken. Published in 1970 about people living through the 30s, the relevancy of this book is shocking. It's also wonderful to hear so many diverse voices speak out about their experiences at the time. Terkel's work as an oral historian and curate could not be bettered.
May 18, 2012
This book should be required reading for everyone over the age of 25.
July 20, 2018
At 462 pages, Hard Times is a comprehensive undertaking, offering a 360-view of the Great Depression and the people who suffered, prospered and otherwise lived through it. Studs Terkel sets the gold standard for oral history. The book is just the "best of" interviews with a huge swath of people with memories of this time period, organized by chapters about farm life, city life, wall street, politicians, miners, labor organizers, preachers, radicals, factory workers, students, sales men, housewives, professors, celebrities - you name it!
The weakness of the work is it intentionally offers no history beyond personal recollection, and interviewees often use terms unfamiliar to contemporary readers. For instance, in this book NRA stands for National Recovery Act, not the rifle association. People also often refer to well-known men of the time, like Father Coughlin, whose work isn't addressed until later in the book.
The strengths of the book are how adeptly Terkel captures the way people speak - accents, word choices, attitudes, prejudices are all captured - and that he includes such a vast array of people, from Pauline Kael to Cesar Chavez, to members of the Hoover and Rosevelt administrations and their opposition. Descriptions of how policy makers, ministers and ordinary people (and even gangsters!) rose to the challenge of saving the nation are inspiring. But as America accelerates its wealth disparity, it serves as a chilling reminder of how bad things can get when masses of people cannot earn a living, and warns that the next generation will have quite a different mindset when hard times come.
The weakness of the work is it intentionally offers no history beyond personal recollection, and interviewees often use terms unfamiliar to contemporary readers. For instance, in this book NRA stands for National Recovery Act, not the rifle association. People also often refer to well-known men of the time, like Father Coughlin, whose work isn't addressed until later in the book.
The strengths of the book are how adeptly Terkel captures the way people speak - accents, word choices, attitudes, prejudices are all captured - and that he includes such a vast array of people, from Pauline Kael to Cesar Chavez, to members of the Hoover and Rosevelt administrations and their opposition. Descriptions of how policy makers, ministers and ordinary people (and even gangsters!) rose to the challenge of saving the nation are inspiring. But as America accelerates its wealth disparity, it serves as a chilling reminder of how bad things can get when masses of people cannot earn a living, and warns that the next generation will have quite a different mindset when hard times come.
November 19, 2024
689 pages is a lot. But worth it.
I picked this up during the election cycle, because when things are uncertain and wild, I find myself comforted by remembering what all folks have survived before me. Hard Times served that function very well as Trump won round 3.
What I love about reading Studs Terkel is how random it all is. There are themes, and it’s clear he’s working from a set of questions that people riff on. But it’s so Everyman — maids and hookers and executives and farmers and miners and salesmen and politicians and artists and white folks and black folks and a couple Asians and moms and dads and wives and whatever. Talking money and poverty and sex here and there and jobs and pride and Dems vs Republicans and socialists and communists and Hoover and Roosevelt and the WPA, and each and every possible take on the best and worst ideas and what worked and what didn’t. Bank holidays, farmer’s holidays, the war saved us, the war didn’t save us, labor had a heyday, labor got co-opted by the Democrats and undercut the radicals, it was a simpler time, riding the rails, it was a worse time in every way, etc.
During election years, we spend so much energy building teams, and then you get reminded how deeply weird and diverse humans really are. It’s a wonder anything works. I wish there was a Studs Terkel capturing the ridiculousness of now, in this way.
I picked this up during the election cycle, because when things are uncertain and wild, I find myself comforted by remembering what all folks have survived before me. Hard Times served that function very well as Trump won round 3.
What I love about reading Studs Terkel is how random it all is. There are themes, and it’s clear he’s working from a set of questions that people riff on. But it’s so Everyman — maids and hookers and executives and farmers and miners and salesmen and politicians and artists and white folks and black folks and a couple Asians and moms and dads and wives and whatever. Talking money and poverty and sex here and there and jobs and pride and Dems vs Republicans and socialists and communists and Hoover and Roosevelt and the WPA, and each and every possible take on the best and worst ideas and what worked and what didn’t. Bank holidays, farmer’s holidays, the war saved us, the war didn’t save us, labor had a heyday, labor got co-opted by the Democrats and undercut the radicals, it was a simpler time, riding the rails, it was a worse time in every way, etc.
During election years, we spend so much energy building teams, and then you get reminded how deeply weird and diverse humans really are. It’s a wonder anything works. I wish there was a Studs Terkel capturing the ridiculousness of now, in this way.
October 24, 2021
I didn’t like it that much. This is the fourth book on this time period (the 30s) that I’ve read this year and the others were much better. I just didn’t like the oral history part very much; to me, there were lots of irrelevant details that could have been left out/ trimmed to make it more concise and tight. It was very slow. I feel like it would have been better as a Ken Burns documentary but with a LOT of editing for relevance, as well as bleeping out language. Also, I had to google a lot of the terms and people mentioned in there (case in point the NRA during the New Deal was completely different than the NRA now). Also I had to google who Coughlin was, etc. I felt like there should have been more introductory remarks about things like that.
June 3, 2022
If you're not familiar with the work of Studs Terkel, you don't know what you're missing. A consummate journalist and interviewer (recordings of which are available at studsterkel.wfmt.com), Terkel defined the genre of Oral History. He also inspired me by his answer to a reporter's question in the year before his death at the age of 96 when he said, "My epitaph? My epitaph will be 'Curiosity did not kill this cat.'"
January 7, 2019
Reading a history of the Great Depression is educational. Reading an oral history of the same period puts a human face on a trying time in American history.
June 9, 2024
A complete view of an inexplicably under-discussed decade that made modern America, though the focus on Chicago, the New Deal, and the left is built for my interests in particular.
June 29, 2025
The content was interesting. I would say the book could be organized better and cut down a bit
March 26, 2020
The literary equivalent of a great big Frederick Wiseman documentary. At first viewing, it appears that Wiseman, to quite Jamie S. Rich, clearly has never met a reel of footage he didn’t love. At first glance, the same seems true of Terkel and his interviews, but the further you go the clearer it becomes how much care was put into the selection and order of presentation of these people’s stories. The cumulative impact once you reach the end is tremendous.
April 10, 2014
An amazing book filled with voices of its time - both the years of the Depression AND 1969-1970, when Mr. Terkel did his interviews.
In 1969-1970 I was a teenager and so my review reflects both the Depression and the late 1960's. First off, the number of people (who Terkel interviewed) who complained about the 'present time' (69-70), and waxed nostalgic for the 1920's and 30's? Amazing. Yes, amazing that in a time period, the 60's, when most the middle class people who wanted to work were working, when few in that group had to worry about their next meal (I never did and I was raised working-middle class), that there was this huge group of people complaining...
About the young. About how if there is another Depression, (and many were certain there'd be one), it would be all anarchy and chaos. Also, amazing how many older people, survivors of the Depression, hated the government, hated the Democrats, hated Roosevelt. It is astonishing how many people, once they hit 40 and above, had nothing but contempt for: government, young people, anyone who is different than them. They also hated the rich, unless they were rich and then they hate the poor and anyone who's on welfare. They hate union workers, unless they are themselves one, and nobody works as hard or suffers as much or deserves more than them. This is an endless sort of tirade-from-the-old that is as eternal as society and civilization itself. (Didn't the elders gripe about the young back in the days of Socrates?)
There are different voices, of course. Those who witnessed immense suffering and thanked the government for jobs, for assistance, etc. But I clearly remember my own grandfather having that same cantankerous 'voice.' He, who fed his family by working for the WPA, later blasted the Democrats and Roosevelt and staunchly voted Republican in his later years. What gives? Hey? I don't get it.
So instead of taking away a picture of the Depression years from those who lived through it, I took away a series of oral interviews with a lot of cranky older people, who believed that only those who suffered - and suffered like themselves - are good people. And wow, the interviews with the rich? "Oh, no, we never saw breadlines. Oh no, beggars on the street? Truthfully, my father did all right in the 30's." How oblivious so many of the wealthy were and are to this day.
Diatribe over. I am an older person myself now, but hopefully not so bad as to 'bad mouth' anyone under the age of forty. I read this oral history to get a better view of the Depression. I did. I will admit, I did. But I also got a better view of the narrow-minded and ill-natured older folk who I grew up with...
I pray I never become one of them.
In 1969-1970 I was a teenager and so my review reflects both the Depression and the late 1960's. First off, the number of people (who Terkel interviewed) who complained about the 'present time' (69-70), and waxed nostalgic for the 1920's and 30's? Amazing. Yes, amazing that in a time period, the 60's, when most the middle class people who wanted to work were working, when few in that group had to worry about their next meal (I never did and I was raised working-middle class), that there was this huge group of people complaining...
About the young. About how if there is another Depression, (and many were certain there'd be one), it would be all anarchy and chaos. Also, amazing how many older people, survivors of the Depression, hated the government, hated the Democrats, hated Roosevelt. It is astonishing how many people, once they hit 40 and above, had nothing but contempt for: government, young people, anyone who is different than them. They also hated the rich, unless they were rich and then they hate the poor and anyone who's on welfare. They hate union workers, unless they are themselves one, and nobody works as hard or suffers as much or deserves more than them. This is an endless sort of tirade-from-the-old that is as eternal as society and civilization itself. (Didn't the elders gripe about the young back in the days of Socrates?)
There are different voices, of course. Those who witnessed immense suffering and thanked the government for jobs, for assistance, etc. But I clearly remember my own grandfather having that same cantankerous 'voice.' He, who fed his family by working for the WPA, later blasted the Democrats and Roosevelt and staunchly voted Republican in his later years. What gives? Hey? I don't get it.
So instead of taking away a picture of the Depression years from those who lived through it, I took away a series of oral interviews with a lot of cranky older people, who believed that only those who suffered - and suffered like themselves - are good people. And wow, the interviews with the rich? "Oh, no, we never saw breadlines. Oh no, beggars on the street? Truthfully, my father did all right in the 30's." How oblivious so many of the wealthy were and are to this day.
Diatribe over. I am an older person myself now, but hopefully not so bad as to 'bad mouth' anyone under the age of forty. I read this oral history to get a better view of the Depression. I did. I will admit, I did. But I also got a better view of the narrow-minded and ill-natured older folk who I grew up with...
I pray I never become one of them.
December 7, 2015
Simultaneously an enjoyable read and a long slog.... the small font didn't help my presbyopia... and the collage-like nature fought my latent desire for the comprehensive review... yet the fragmentary interview style gave the work a unique ground's eye perspective on history... of which there were many... both from people who were there... rich, poor, and between... and those who came later and only learned of the Depression from their parents or the media... and with some famous names like Myrna Loy, Alf Landon, Saul Alinsky, "Country" Joe McDonald, and Pauline Kael... many bureaucrats at various levels in the New Deal apparatus... and a whole bunch of "nobody's" throwing in their more than two cents... at times funny and shockingly candid... but often matter-of-fact and sad.. and with many themes still relevant to our current 1%-er society and the recent banking crisis... the same arguments still being made on either side (progressive/socialist versus free-market capitalist; stimulus versus austerity)....
The book was initially published in 1970. But the forward added in 1986 was particularly prescient about the coming market crash of 2008 and makes for a chilling read:
".....'Business Week' (Sept 1985) is singularly less sanguine. A cover story is called 'The Casino Society'.... it explodes: 'No, it's not Las Vegas or Atlantic City. It's the US financial system. The volume of transactions has boomed far beyond anything needed to support the economy. Borrowing -- politely called leveraging -- is getting out of hand. And futures enable people to play the markey without owning a single share of stock. The result: the system is tilting from investment to speculation'.... In 1929, it was strictly a gambling casino with loaded dice. The few sharks taking advantage of the multitude of suckers... Frenzied finance that made Ponzi look like an amateur.... Regulations that came into being after the Crash of '29 have been loosened more than somewhat. Especially for our banks."
And bear in mind that this 1986 foretelling precedes the repeal of the 1933 Glass-Steagall Act that reached its culmination in the late 90's under President Clinton.... This is a highly worthwhile read....
The book was initially published in 1970. But the forward added in 1986 was particularly prescient about the coming market crash of 2008 and makes for a chilling read:
".....'Business Week' (Sept 1985) is singularly less sanguine. A cover story is called 'The Casino Society'.... it explodes: 'No, it's not Las Vegas or Atlantic City. It's the US financial system. The volume of transactions has boomed far beyond anything needed to support the economy. Borrowing -- politely called leveraging -- is getting out of hand. And futures enable people to play the markey without owning a single share of stock. The result: the system is tilting from investment to speculation'.... In 1929, it was strictly a gambling casino with loaded dice. The few sharks taking advantage of the multitude of suckers... Frenzied finance that made Ponzi look like an amateur.... Regulations that came into being after the Crash of '29 have been loosened more than somewhat. Especially for our banks."
And bear in mind that this 1986 foretelling precedes the repeal of the 1933 Glass-Steagall Act that reached its culmination in the late 90's under President Clinton.... This is a highly worthwhile read....
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