It was interesting to read a story about the great depression from a view of someone who was very wealthy during the time. Although he had a lot of money he still knew the dangers of what was happening with the economy. Robertson's idea that people were buying on hope interested me because it shows how people were so wrapped up in the idea of becoming rich, that they invested money they didn't have. People would pay a little in hopes to make a lot and when the stock market crashed, many people could not pay back the money they owed. Robertson's opinion about how the economy crashing was handled was that the banks shouldn't have been the ones to gain control of large businesses. Robertson felt that although banks were being given money from the government, they were not capable of running a business they didn't know a lot about. "One of my friends said to me, 'If things keep on as they are, we'll all have to go begging.' I asked, 'Who from?'" (101). Robertson recognized that everyone was affected by the stock market crash and soon there would not be anyone to borrow money from.
Heline's story shows how farmers were affected by the depression. People like Heline that were farmers and lived in rural areas suffered greatly during the depression. They rarely could sell their crops and didn't receive help from the government at first like the banks were. Heline and his neighbors felt that the second world war was the answer to the failures they were facing on the farm. They felt that the war was creating more jobs and agricultural problems were being fixed. "The rank-and-file people of this state - who were brought up as conservatives, which most of us were - would never act like this. Except in desperation" (122). Heline states that desperation caused people to act out in the depression. People were so desperate to provide for their families that most were willing to do whatever it took to start getting money again.
I too read both of these stories and I was very interested in the great contrast that they represented of this time period. I liked how you compared the stories of both men and showed how they both had some similarities. Like in the quote you used from the Arthur Robertson interview that explains how even the wealthy didn't have anybody to turn to for economic support during the Great Depression.
ReplyDeleteIn the two interviews that you read, I see an emerging theme of diffusion of blame. In your comments on both stories, you talked about the ways people were affected by the Great Depression. It is very interesting to me that these two men's stories are so similar even though their statuses in American society were so different, Robertson was a wealthy urban businessman and Heline was a rural farmer, but they both expressed their frustrations as being directly influenced by the banking system. I thought it was really interesting that you were able to highlight these similarities in such contrasting stories.
ReplyDelete