How It Was Way Back When

Some might see it as ironic that most of those with insights on how to cope with the sort of unraveling that is taking place now have moved on to the next life.

Nonetheless, there are some people living nowadays who were around 80 or so years ago. Individuals who understand what it's like to live in dire poverty. Who know how to scrimp and save. Who are familiar with the social consequences of a calamitous downturn in the economy.

In "Memories of the Depression Still Sear," the Wall Street Journal speaks with a few of these old-timers about how it was way back when.

As hard times return, witnesses to the 1930s recall lessons they learned

When the Great Depression hit, people came to the front porch of William Hague's home near Pittsburgh pleading for food. One well-dressed young woman asked Mr. Hague's mother if she would hire her for $2 a week. Why would she work for so little? his mother asked. "We have nothing to eat at home," she replied.

Mr. Hague, 89, was just 10 years old during the Crash of 1929. His father was a prosperous small-town lawyer and the family led a relatively privileged life during the Depression years. Yet even as Mr. Hague found success as an editor and author he says he remained careful about food and money. He monitors the news intently, on the lookout for signs of "trouble." Now that trouble has come, he says he wonders if younger generations have the mettle to survive tough times.

"We had unlimited prosperity for more than 60 years," says Mr. Hague, who lives in an independent senior residence on Manhattan's East Side. "I don't know if people are ready for hard times."

There are 11.5 million Americans who are 80 and older, according to the U.S. Census Bureau. The period from the Crash of 1929 to the start of World War II shaped their lives, affected how they raised their children, and influences their reactions to today's economic turmoil.

The memories aren't all negative. For many, President Franklin D. Roosevelt "was like a god," recalls Mr. Hague, and there was hopefulness amid the desperation. "People had confidence in the American way -- which I am not sure they have now."

James Dickinson, 87, is Mr. Hague's friend and neighbor at the James Lenox House. Mr. Dickinson once worked on Wall Street, and for him the recent stream of economic calamities has been like watching a "horror movie," he says. "The horror is the people being pushed into unemployment," he says. "Bank managers, mutual-fund managers, hedge-fund operators, technical support people -- the horror is there are no jobs for these people."

Mr. Dickinson also grew up near Pittsburgh, but in an impoverished household where his widowed mother had to scrape by with help from relief. As a boy, he would accompany his mother as she stood on lines to get government food relief. The supplies were barely enough to live on: powdered milk, dried fruits, margarine, raisins, he recalls. Often, he found himself with men who had lost jobs in the steel mills and were devastated at being dependent on handouts.

Mr. Dickinson went on to work in Wall Street brokerage houses, he says, and retired as a manager of human resources. He says during the last five years, he annoyed his friends with repeated warnings that a day of reckoning was coming.

'This recession is like a picnic compared to what we had back then," says Dorothy Womble.

Mrs. Womble, 89, lives at a residence for low-income seniors and the disabled in New York's Harlem neighborhood. She grew up in a small house on a dirt road in Winston-Salem, N.C. People around her were so poor, she says, "They couldn't even get money to get seeds" to plant vegetables.

She can still picture the strangers who wandered through with nothing but a bundle on their backs. Her family also struggled, though her dad was able to hold onto his job on the railroads. Even so, says Mrs. Womble, no matter how little people had, they shared it with one another -- and that is one of her defining memories of the period, as much as the dire poverty. Her mother, for instance, used to share precious supplies of flour.

When FDR was elected in 1932, there was a "big jubilee" in the neighborhood, Mrs. Womble says. "It wasn't a big celebration like it was on 42nd Street" in New York this year, she says. But when people heard Roosevelt became president, "everybody came out and they were laughing and clapping their hands."

Her neighbor at Logan Gardens, Gloria O'Loughlin, 88, was a girl in Harlem during the Great Depression but has the same memory of people giving each other what they could. "If you were sick, they helped you. If you were hungry, they'd feed you. That was the Harlem I knew," she says.

Ms. O'Loughlin, one of the first women to drive a yellow cab in New York City, was born in Harlem and says she plans to die there. The Depression hit the neighborhood hard. While unemployment in the U.S. was about 25%, it was closer to 50% in Harlem. All over the streets, she saw men selling apples for five cents each.

At home, there was barely enough to eat. Her mother baked "Johnny Cakes," a kind of pancake made with flour and yeast and served with butter. It was a way to fill an empty stomach and stave off hunger. "You got used to eating what you got," Ms. O'Loughlin says starkly.

To survive, her family received a form of welfare that entailed standing on lines for supplies. Simply being on the line was embarrassing, and she and her sister used to argue about whose turn it was to go.

Marion Leonard, 99, was shielded from the worst of the Great Depression. Still, in 1931, she took a sailing trip around Puget Sound on a yacht belonging to her husband's uncle. From the boat, she could see hordes of unemployed men standing at the dock staring and staring at her. Ms. Leonard recalls she ran and hid in a stateroom out of embarrassment. She also witnessed great poverty as she drove across the country with her new husband in a $100 Ford.

Ms. Leonard still recalls how kind people were as she and her husband drove from town to town -- people were anxious to rent rooms for a couple of dollars, both because they needed the money and because they wanted to help. The experiences helped compel her to devote her life to social change and environmental activism.

Now, living in Vermont, she thinks only someone in Roosevelt's mold can rescue America from its slump. "I keep thinking, why doesn't someone do what Roosevelt did -- shut down and start from scratch and give everyone jobs," she says. "He put a lot of people -- young people, older people -- immediately in jobs. There were artists painting murals inside post offices and young kids out in the woods clearing away the brush."

Farmer Richard G. Hendrickson, 96, has been predicting another Great Depression for years, even decades. He warned family members and friends that America's profligate ways would bring back the hard times he had experienced in the 1930s when he watched his father almost lose the family farm.

He repeated the dire prediction so frequently, says his wife, Lillian, 90, his own children thought he was "getting old."

Mr. Hendrickson lives today on a farm in Bridgehampton, N.Y., a short walk from the one his family nearly lost. He can easily conjure up the day seven decades ago his dad faced financial ruin because of debt he had incurred on the farm. Three men in fancy "business suits and vests" descended on his family's property: The president of the local bank, the president of the lumber company, and the head of the feed company.

With his father in the room, the men sat silently in the living room for what "seemed like an eternity," Mr. Hendrickson says. Though shy, he decided to make a bold personal appeal. "If it makes any difference, I like outside work," he remembers saying. "And I think if we are given some more time, I believe we can keep our head above water and make the farm pay." He then stood up and walked out.

His father later got a loan from a bank in Springfield, Mass., he remembers, and the farm stayed with the family.

Bridgehampton, Mr. Hendrickson says, was a farming community so breadlines weren't an issue. Even so, there were signs of widespread misery. At one point, he recalls, the government set up a Civilian Conservation Corps encampment about a mile and a half from the farm. Men of varying ages lived in communal housing and were given jobs as part of Roosevelt's efforts to get the country working again. The men, who typically wore overalls, were a moving sight, and stood out in the small farming community.

One Sunday, he and his first wife picked up one of the CCC workers and drove him to church. He told them he had come all the way from Michigan.

Long after the Depression, Mr. Hendrickson worked as if he were about to lose the farm. For years, he worked seven days a week, his only son, Richard H. Hendrickson, 68, says. The elder Mr. Hendrickson worked day, evening and night.

Mrs. Womble's son, Larry Womble, believes that his mom's Depression-era experiences, as well as those of his grandparents, deeply influenced the way he was brought up. Being frugal was a cardinal value, as was avoiding excess. But so was sharing with those who had even less.

"As a little boy I used to hear them in the room talking about how they were able to survive the Depression," says Mr. Womble, a Democratic state representative in Winston-Salem. "We shared whatever we had. When people didn't have rent money, we took up donations and helped them pay the rent, when someone died without a burial, we took up a collection."

His grandparents and mom would often cite a favorite proverb: "They used to say, 'Even in good times, a squirrel will hide his nuts because wintertime is coming.' "

Comments

[Cornholio]

People that are hoping Obama is another Roosevelt are going to be sorely disappointed. Out here in BumPhuk where I live I'm surrounded by these elder statesmen. Life is the same for many working hard even in their eighties. Now, just like then the bankers that caused the problem threw their greed which caused the crash will once again enslave the masses.

[roger]

Back in the 60's if you talked depression you where considered a NUT
IF you mentioned that even GM could go belly up some day the answer
was they are to big impossible,the real smart ones would tell you
WE have learned how to control & fine tune the economy (its hard not to laugh)

[Abraham]

Americans aren't as kind or unified as they were in the 30's. We also have many less skills. How many of us have gardens, sew clothes or preserve or can what we grow. Just about everything we eat or wear is dependent upon a spiderweb of transportation. Americans also have much less social inhibition. Ever see thirsty people fight for water after a hurricane? Face it, most of us are soft, lazy and unprepared for an hour without I-Pods, Blackberries or cell phones.

[Anon]

(A poster at Mish's blog posted about his own depression experience.)

The effects of the Hoover Depression in one middle-class family:
By "grafonola"
http://globaleconomicanalysis.blogspot.com
Wednesday, November 12, 2008 2:34:13 PM

(Part 1)


Father was not much invested in stocks. He was conservative, and was saving by buying bonds. He mortgaged the house in 1927 to raise cash to buy a small interest in the company that he managed.

The craziness of the market in 1929 made no real impression on us. Life went on just as before.

In 1930, father bought sister a new car when she graduated from school. I remember it vividly, it was a Ford sport coupe, in Washington Blue with Bronson Yellow wire wheels.

By the spring of 1931, things were not going so well at the plant. In March wages were cut by 20%. Brother was laid-off, as the new company policy was to save work for family men whose wives and children were not working.

Father let the furnace man and yard ,man go. I had to take care of the furnace each morning and evening, a job that I loathed.

Mother stopped paying the kitchen girl, who offered to stay on for just room and board. Mother agreed, but took on more of the workload herself, as she did not think it right to work a girl to death for nothing.

Father and his managers, clerks and foremen went on half-pay in May. Business deteriorated further, in summer wages were cut by another 15%, and in October hours were cut to 20 a week, in order to enable the firm to spread around the little available work amongst the men with families.

Women, who worked in the radio department doing delicate assembly were let go unless they were breadwinners. Single women and men were all let go.

In the fall of 1931, my oldest brother came home with his wife and children. He had been working as an accountant for a large bank that failed in 1930, and had not been able to find any other work.

Father tried to sell the cottage and could not. He moved my other older brother and his family into it. It was a nice place in summer but, as it was not weatherized, it must have been pretty uncomfortable in a Michigan winter..

(Part 2)

Around Christmas time, the family of our kitchen girl lost their place. We let them set up housekeeping in the haymow of our carriage house. A little beaverboard, and some printed cotton curtinas, a stove and a bit of paint made a pretty cozy home.

In the spring of 1932, my brother William went West on the rails looking for work. He bummed it on freight trains. He found some kind of work in Colorado, and wired us that he would come home after the job. he finished work at the end of January, 1933. He was coming home when a railroad man in Wyoming found him frozen in a freight car. He still had the money that he made, about $120.00, pinned inside his shirt, so the police said was that a railroad policeman had clubbed him, closed the door on the freight car, and left him to freeze.

Around this time, the mortgage on our house was to be re-written. In those days, most mortgages were written for a period of 5 years. the mortgagor generally paid only interest, and then paid off the principal at the end of the term. Any shortage of principal would be rolled over. This time the bank called the mmortgage due. Were it not for the bank holiday, and the HOLC, which put us into a modern 20 year mortgage, and allowed us to pay interest only for several years. were it not for this intervention, we would have lost our house.

by February of 1933 father's company closed. we had by now, no money, and and four families, with eighteen mouths to feed

He sold sister's practically unused car for $40.00. When he purchased it three years earlier, it cost $550.00. He got $10.00 for the eight cylinder Paige, and kept the Dodge Victory Six, which he drove for the rest of his life.

Mother opened up the living room as a tea-room, my brother and I moved into the garage and my sister moved out to the cottage so that we could take in 5 paying boarders in our two rooms, at $7.00 a week each for room and food. Our tabs at the butcher's and grocer's were pretty long in those days. Mother made filling but cheap food, heavy on starch, most of the meat was reserved for the boarders.

Father never worked a managerial job again. The Depression pretty well defeated him. In the mid 1930's my brother and I got on the CCC, and my married brothers got on the WPA.

We could not have survived without the HOLC, the CCC and the WPA.

Father was proud that he never went on relief, but things were pretty desparate for a while.

Father finally found work sweeping, wiping and polishing up in a local electric light plant. When the plant was closed as obsolete during the War, he retired. He passed on at the age of 84 in 1952.

(Part 3)

Jekyll Island 7:

you posted:

grafanola, what's your reference for those stories?

My memory, and our family papers. After I retired, I took over the house that I was born in from my older sister, and so we have many of the bills and papers going back to the turn of the last century. I even have the bill for my delivery, on 11/04/21 ($35.00)

TinHat:

You posted:

"Grafonola,
Thank you for telling us about your experiences during that time. It brought tears to my eyes."

Nothing to cry about, really. We did much better than many others in our town. Father was old, and could not adapt, but except for William, who was a bit of a thrill-seeker, and I suspect used the Depression as an excuse to see the world we all survived, and lived full, fairly happy lives.

It is really amazing what one can do when faced with necessity.

It is the folks who are forty-five to sixty this year for whom I fear. Many will be unable to adapt to new, straitened circumstances. The young will always be able to make it.

[Anon]

(More complete; I left an earlier comment out.)

The effects of the Hoover Depression in one middle-class family:
By "grafonola" in comment to blog
http://globaleconomicanalysis.blogspot.com
Wednesday, November 12, 2008

(Part 1)

In answer to your question about the effect of the depression upon the middle class, i have distinct memories of the effect on my family, having been born in November of '21.

Father was the manager of a small manufacturing plant in a mid-sized Michigan town. The firm produced both low-tech (zinc-aluminum die castings) and high-tech (radio receivers) products. By 1927 we were quite prosperous. As I recall in 1927 and 1928 father made around $10,000, a pretty substantial sum, indeed. in those days the president of a small bank was lucky to get a salary of $5,000.00. We laved in a large (18 rooms at the time, 16 rooms today, I retired to the same old house) comfortable, but old (built before the War of the Rebellion) home. In those days Old houses certainly did not fetch a premium price. I believe Father paid around $3,700 for the place in 1908.

We lived pretty well in the 1920's. Mother had a farm-girl who lived with us to help in the kitchen and help with cleaning, and a washerwoman would come by on Mondays to do the laundry and hang out the clothes. We had a part-time fellow who took care of the yard and cars, (an 8 cylinder Paige and a Dodge Brothers 6) another fellow would come by in the spring to take down the storm windows, and put up the screens and awnings and we had a Furnace Man who would come over at 5:00 every morning and shake the grates, remove the clinkers, get the fire started and pile enough coal for the day's heating. In the evening he would come and do the same thing before bed-time.

We had electric light (rather expensive at 35 cents/KWH), an electric range for use in warm weather (VERY expensive at the electric rates of the time), and all of the consumer appliances practically as soon as they were introduced, a couple of Victrolas (the older machine was upstairs in sister's room) , a radio (actually, a new radio just about every season starting in 1922), a vacuum sweeper, electric percolator, toaster, and all of those other little novelties.

We had a lake cottage where thee family stayed from Memorial day to Labor Day. Father would stay in town, and drive out on weekends.

Sister had gone away to Chicago for school, one brother went to father's Alma mater, and another went to work at father's plant. In 1929 there were three children of grade-school age. All-in-all a pretty pleasant life. This would change.

(Part 2)

Father was not much invested in stocks. He was conservative, and was saving by buying bonds. He mortgaged the house in 1927 to raise cash to buy a small interest in the company that he managed.

The craziness of the market in 1929 made no real impression on us. Life went on just as before.

In 1930, father bought sister a new car when she graduated from school. I remember it vividly, it was a Ford sport coupe, in Washington Blue with Bronson Yellow wire wheels.

By the spring of 1931, things were not going so well at the plant. In March wages were cut by 20%. Brother was laid-off, as the new company policy was to save work for family men whose wives and children were not working.

Father let the furnace man and yard ,man go. I had to take care of the furnace each morning and evening, a job that I loathed.

Mother stopped paying the kitchen girl, who offered to stay on for just room and board. Mother agreed, but took on more of the workload herself, as she did not think it right to work a girl to death for nothing.

Father and his managers, clerks and foremen went on half-pay in May. Business deteriorated further, in summer wages were cut by another 15%, and in October hours were cut to 20 a week, in order to enable the firm to spread around the little available work amongst the men with families.

Women, who worked in the radio department doing delicate assembly were let go unless they were breadwinners. Single women and men were all let go.

In the fall of 1931, my oldest brother came home with his wife and children. He had been working as an accountant for a large bank that failed in 1930, and had not been able to find any other work.

Father tried to sell the cottage and could not. He moved my other older brother and his family into it. It was a nice place in summer but, as it was not weatherized, it must have been pretty uncomfortable in a Michigan winter..

(Part 3)

Around Christmas time, the family of our kitchen girl lost their place. We let them set up housekeeping in the haymow of our carriage house. A little beaverboard, and some printed cotton curtinas, a stove and a bit of paint made a pretty cozy home.

In the spring of 1932, my brother William went West on the rails looking for work. He bummed it on freight trains. He found some kind of work in Colorado, and wired us that he would come home after the job. he finished work at the end of January, 1933. He was coming home when a railroad man in Wyoming found him frozen in a freight car. He still had the money that he made, about $120.00, pinned inside his shirt, so the police said was that a railroad policeman had clubbed him, closed the door on the freight car, and left him to freeze.

Around this time, the mortgage on our house was to be re-written. In those days, most mortgages were written for a period of 5 years. the mortgagor generally paid only interest, and then paid off the principal at the end of the term. Any shortage of principal would be rolled over. This time the bank called the mmortgage due. Were it not for the bank holiday, and the HOLC, which put us into a modern 20 year mortgage, and allowed us to pay interest only for several years. were it not for this intervention, we would have lost our house.

by February of 1933 father's company closed. we had by now, no money, and and four families, with eighteen mouths to feed

He sold sister's practically unused car for $40.00. When he purchased it three years earlier, it cost $550.00. He got $10.00 for the eight cylinder Paige, and kept the Dodge Victory Six, which he drove for the rest of his life.

Mother opened up the living room as a tea-room, my brother and I moved into the garage and my sister moved out to the cottage so that we could take in 5 paying boarders in our two rooms, at $7.00 a week each for room and food. Our tabs at the butcher's and grocer's were pretty long in those days. Mother made filling but cheap food, heavy on starch, most of the meat was reserved for the boarders.

Father never worked a managerial job again. The Depression pretty well defeated him. In the mid 1930's my brother and I got on the CCC, and my married brothers got on the WPA.

We could not have survived without the HOLC, the CCC and the WPA.

Father was proud that he never went on relief, but things were pretty desparate for a while.

Father finally found work sweeping, wiping and polishing up in a local electric light plant. When the plant was closed as obsolete during the War, he retired. He passed on at the age of 84 in 1952.

(Part 4; Misc Responses)

Jekyll Island 7:

you posted:

grafanola, what's your reference for those stories?

My memory, and our family papers. After I retired, I took over the house that I was born in from my older sister, and so we have many of the bills and papers going back to the turn of the last century. I even have the bill for my delivery, on 11/04/21 ($35.00)

TinHat:

You posted:

"Grafonola,
Thank you for telling us about your experiences during that time. It brought tears to my eyes."

Nothing to cry about, really. We did much better than many others in our town. Father was old, and could not adapt, but except for William, who was a bit of a thrill-seeker, and I suspect used the Depression as an excuse to see the world we all survived, and lived full, fairly happy lives.

It is really amazing what one can do when faced with necessity.

It is the folks who are forty-five to sixty this year for whom I fear. Many will be unable to adapt to new, straitened circumstances. The young will always be able to make it.

“Middle:

My old family home, in which i still live, is a 5000, square foot 1840's Greek Revival.

“Method man:

Living is cheap these days.

Eggs and chickens are less than half what they cost in the post-war years. Bread is as cheap, electronics are the same in dollars, and hence are far cheaper today. Housing, on the other hand has skyrocketed. The boom in house prices does indeed coincide with the coming of the two-income family.

Note, too, that we are no longer satisfied with the homes which were perfectly adequate fifty or sixty years ago. the Cape Cods and Ranches that most of my generation raised their families in are today considered to be too small. Odd that back in the 1960's, when heating oil was 10 cents/gallon a 3000, square foot house with 9 ft ceilings was considered to be a big, drafty barn. In the years after the Energy crisis, although oil and gas was mush more expensive, everyone had to have 3000+ sq/ft homes with cathedral ceilings in their Great rooms and 2 storey entrance halls.

The $7,700 ($66,000 in 2007 dollars) three bedroom 1150 square foot cape that one of my brothers built after the war was a perfectly pleasant place in which to raise a family, as was the 1600 square foot rancher built by another brother in 1961 for $18,300 ($125,550). Prices are pretty close to current price per square foot.

We sent our wives to work for what? More house? 3 televisions? Fulfillment? Only one of these is valid reason to deprive our children of a stay-at-home parent.

[Gavel Down]

We sent our wives to work for what? More house? 3 televisions? Fulfillment? Only one of these is valid reason to deprive our children of a stay-at-home parent.

Gosh, it's almost like your wives are beasts of burden you own, with no real desires of their own.