Chapter 22: The Great Depression Flashcards

Vocabulary flashcards covering the key terms, people, events, and concepts from Chapter 22: The Great Depression.

Herbert Hoover

The Republican candidate who gained the presidential nomination in $1928$ and favored Prohibition.

Al Smith

The $1928$ Democratic presidential nominee, a Catholic from New York who was known as wet for opposing Prohibition.

Wet vs. Dry

The Prohibition debate in the $1928$ election, where candidate Al Smith opposed Prohibition (wet) and Herbert Hoover favored it (dry).

Bull market

A market condition in which a majority of stock values continue to rise over a long period of time.

Stocks

Shares of companies sold to the public at a risk for profit or potential losses based on a company's success.

Buying on MARGIN

Purchasing stock with a small down payment in cash as low as $10\text{\%}$ while borrowing the rest on loan with interest.

Margin Call

A demand by a stockbroker for an investor to repay a loan immediately if a stock started to fail.

BLACK THURSDAY

The stock market collapse on 10/21 when market plunges triggered simultaneous margin calls.

BLACK TUESDAY

The deeper stock market dive occurring the week after Black Thursday where over $\$30\text{ billion}$ was lost in one day.

Bank runs

Panicked attempts by depositors to clear their money out of banks, forcing $10\text{\%}$ of US banks to close.

Overproduction

A key cause of the Great Depression where efficient machines led to mass production in factories and agriculture beyond what Americans could purchase.

Shantytowns or Hoovervilles

Makeshift villages of shacks built on unused public land by evicted families who could not pay rent or mortgages.

Hobos

Unemployed and homeless individuals who wandered the country by hitchhiking or sneaking onto train boxcars.

The Dust Bowl

An environmental disaster starting in $1932$ where cleared land and drought turned soil to dust, affecting the plains from North Dakota to Texas through $1937$.

Okies

Dust Bowl migrants who moved westward, named after those who traveled from Oklahoma to California.

The Grapes of Wrath

A novel written by John Steinbeck portraying the journey and struggles of an Oklahoma family traveling to California during the Dust Bowl.

HARDTIMES

A $1970$ novel by Studs Turkel encapsulating various perspectives of life during the Great Depression.

Snow White and the Seven Dwarfs

The first animated film developed by Disney in $1937$.

Public works program

Government-financed building projects urged by Hoover to create jobs during the Great Depression.

Hoover Dam

A major public works project created during the Great Depression that supplies electricity to California, Nevada, and Arizona.

Reconstruction Finance Corporation (RFC)

An organization created by Hoover to lend money to banks, railroads, and agricultural institutions.

Emergency Relief & Construction Act

Legislation signed reluctantly by Hoover to supply direct aid and jobs to the impoverished.

Bonus Army

A group of WWI veterans who marched to Washington to lobby for the early distribution of a service bonus due in $1945$.

Franklin Delano Roosevelt

The popular Democratic governor of New York who won the presidential election of $1932$ by pledging a New Deal for America.