Dust Bowl - A 1950s Documentary
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- เผยแพร่เมื่อ 13 ต.ค. 2024
- This "newsreel" like documentary chronicles the Dustbowl with interviews from people (primary sources) who lived through the "dirty thirties." The images linger well after the film ends. An excellent resource to use when studying the Depression era or the "Grapes of Wrath," by John Steinbeck. The film was created as part of "The Twentieth Century" CBS series in the early 1950s with the renown Walter Cronkrite narrating the "text-film."
Proud to be a descendant of such Okies! My grandparents and their 5 children, including my mom, their 2nd oldest, headed for California, where my grandpa worked in the oil fields and my grandma picked oranges, and chopped and picked cotton. All of their children became successful members of society, and most of their 21 grandchildren are college graduates. Not bad for dust-bowl Okies, as Grandpa would say.
Don't be. It was judgement for the massacre of Tulsa. At least 3,000 black men, women and children were massacred and 7,000 missing by your demonic ancestors. Congrats.🤡🙄
Strong people, those Oakies!!
the Mize family, my descendants, are registered in the migrant camps in Weedpatch/Pumpkin center.
I have photos of their sharecroppers cabin in Oklahoma with great grandma butchering the only pig they had left
, as they and all their neighbors were being forced off the land.
They cut the back half of their only car off, used boards of their cabin, and made a platform to sleep with whatever belongings and supplies they had.
They traveled with another family that had a flatbed truck and all of them would gather branches and cut wood to bundle and sell to whoever would buy, along their journey to california to pick fruit.
Some parts of Steinbeck’s book are about my family as he traveled along with them and others.
The book and movie are very accurate as to just how it was for them.
My gandfather said when they went to California, the state wouldn't let them across the state line. When they finally did, they taught the California farmers growing techniques to rotate and save the land, stop draining the minerals and how to conserve water, and the agriculture industry was saved and became the best in the world because of Oakies.
So as you are their descendant, what do you do for a living if I may ask?
The Grapes of Wrath is the most brilliant and moving novel I have ever read. It really affected me profoundly. If you haven't read it I cannot recommend it highly enough.
I am reading it now. Powerful writing.
I am reading it, very good descriptions
Senora Babb who worked with the government relief programs wrote a novel called "Whose Names Are Unknown" about the Dust Bowl with the story centered in the area itself. It wasn't published until about 15 years ago because her publisher didn't think it'd sell in the wake of GoW. It's not quite as good as GoW but it's still a powerful and interesting read from the DB pov rather than California. You might enjoy it; it's available at Amazon.com.
movie was good too.
The crepes of wrath. Got it.
My grandfather was a Swede in NE Nebraska starting in 1911, he owned an IH implement and Blacksmith shop, said he had to keep the tools in a water bucket when servicing machinery in the field, it was so hot in the 30's
Wow
Reitz86 wow
❤️ Nebraska
Our grandparents were some strong willed, tough people. I have all the respect for those people.
My husband's grandparents contributed to the devastation by farming land near Two Buttes, CO in about 1913 (predating the dust bowl). The land was water poor: a reservoir was never enough for the crops. It never should have been farmed. They didnt even have a well but had to go two miles to get water for use in a family of 5. They had a half dugout. We have been there driving between Holly and Two Buttes. It looks to be all range with some cattle now.
You weren't even alive then. So are you just going off of what somebody told you?
@@ScrappingWithDave Kinda how history works...
Dad was stationed in England during this time. We were spared the heart ache and hardships. Pappy Kelly lost his farm. Had it actioned down to the milk buckets.
Parts of this documentary film came from the 1940 cinematic film, "The Grapes of Wrath", directed by John Ford. Gregg Toland was the Director of Photography. A really beautiful film if you get the chance to see it.
Watching it now. Knew Cronkites voice even before i read it there! WOW its so unique. But the starvation killed some. Some of it bad luck most of it man made and political. No one need starve in a world of wasters....this was during a time when white people got the same treatment as foreigners just from being poor and from another state! Glad the book was written and can be read today. The movie is so sad.
@@bramstayer Yes it is, but I have read the book and it even sadder. A part of my accestry
@@drydesert8036 this is happening at any given time in any given place. Just not North America....for awhile...it will return
@@bramstayer The truth is a reality. And yes mother Earth is a never ending story of ups and downs. Once Egypt was a land bountiful fresh water and now much is now desert. The fancies by writers on this media platform and China owned NewsBreak are sometimes rather enjoyable and sometimes at much liberty to exaggerate and right tell us fake news. It's a billion dollar market maybe even more. The AI industry is growing more each day. I'm happy for you and wish you best of luck...
@@bramstayerI learned a lot from reading a book by Timothy Eagan with the title the worst hard time.
It was an excellent book,
My grandfather homesteaded on the Texas panhandle right after world war 1. Because he had injuries from the war he received first homestead rights.
The firm was in the family for almost seven decades. Over half of all the family farms in the Midwest where to corporate farming during the Reagan administration.
Drought is a reoccurring phenomena on the Great plains. As soon as Republicans took power in 1981, they passed a bunch of tax cuts for rich people. Those tax cut suddenly made farmland a great right off. You can make money on your factory and you can make money on your factory farm at the same time and they were basically cancel each other out in terms of tax liability.
All the rich Republicans had to do was wait until there was another drought. Then you don't help the family farmers. many family Farmers go broke at once. Thanks to the law of supply and demand, all those Farmers going broke and losing their firms mean that farmland is dirt cheap. This gives the corporate oligarchs a chance to buy lots of farmland at rock-bottom prices and get tax write-offs for their factories.
I just read " the four winds" so found this really informative
my father grew up in Oklahoma and told me how one of the hired hands died from the dust bowl pneumonia being only 21 years old and in perfect health before that
I miss these kinds of All-American films :(.
We still have so much to learn.
Great documentary, it helped me a lot with my study add made a 100!!
I love it when he says how America is the #1 "next year" country in the world because that's still so true today. Like with all the New Years resolutions like i'm going to work out next year i swear! And we always say that next year will be better.
Why do something today when you can do it tomorrow. At least that's the way I look at it.
Thanks for uploading this docu. It is great historical information.
Excellent documentary...one thing that was not mentioned was that the goverment provided subsidies for the farmers to plant wheat and encouraged the plowing of the grasslands. I believe that the gov't was paying $2.00 a bushel for wheat and so much was planted that eventually a majority of it went to waste. Also did not mention the great rabbitt slaughters of the times. Rabbits were out of control by the thousands. Good stuff enjoyed the show...:)
eyemight the jack rabbits right?
It mentioned the killing of rabbits to keep families fed.
well I was born raised in weedpatch ca.my people came and survived the trip and carried on.we wernt welcome but once we settled we worked hard till we were all strong .my people were hardest honest workers ever, cept forblittle white lightning to ease pain
Interesting comment by the farmer at !0:30. Blowing dust can produce static electricity in the air which can then be conducted by the plants into the ground. Explosive volcanic eruption produce massive electrical discharges due to particle friction.
Also....... it was pretty common to be about 6 feet from a barbed wire fence and
get a Really Bad Shock from
Static Electricity!
(I am the daughter of the
farmer that said his nice
green wheat crop had
turned brown... because of
the Static Electricity.... 👍)
Timestamps
0:44-1:41 -Ranchers, Farmers, Prairie Turf, States
2:07-3:24 -Farming practices, Drought
4:39-7:06-Dust Storms
11:22-13:22 -Migrating West
19:07-21:07 -Farming after the Dust Bowl
this docu. informed mhe alot on our history in the past.
The Grapes of Wrath film was blackballed by many of the dust bowl survivors. My dad was 17 yrs old in 1934. He grew up on the family farm an hour south of Lubbock. Many like him felt like Steinbeck was taking advantage of others misfortune. In the early 1960's, the film made a major network premiere, and yet many still would not watch it. I remember the network (NBC) creating grand announcements during the week regarding the release of the movie for TV. The network made a special intro for "Saturday Night At The Movies" regarding the film calling it monumental and historical. Pop listened to the MC then got up walked over to the TV and turned the channel to the other station we received. He would not watch it! Years later the film was again aired. This time he watched it with me. He sat there glued to the screen, never speaking. We later talked. He told me stories about sand, sand, and more sand.
This episode of "The Twentieth Century" firs aired February 7, 1960 on CBS.
I used to watch this every Sunday afternoon around 4 or 5pm. Hard to believe that a docu series would air at that time when all you have today is sports and "reality" shows even on stations like History and TLC.
Amen.
educational and informative, thanks for uploading. Thanks for uploading this docu. It is great historical information. .
You might want to find and watch: "The Dust Bowl" by Ken Burns (in two episodes) if you still are interested in knowing why it happened. I won't list the causes here, though it is tempting :) Good luck to you!!
Thank you SO much for this excellent recommendation - I love a Ken Burns Documentary and never knew he did one on The Dust Bowl! I managed to find it on YT but won't link to it as these things have a way of "disappearing". Thank you again x
caused by the worldwide mud flood
Watched this from the UK have a lot to learn
Docs like this show precisely why minimal till farming and #nodig home gardening should become the normal practice to prevent soil erosion from ploughing and intensive monocultures.
Thanks for uploading this nice doc. :)
Wheat was artificially highly priced at $2/bushel during WW1 and the government was pushing to settle this area during the 10's. The 20's were nice and wet as well and wheat was still $1 until 1929-30 when the depression hit and it dropped to $0.25. The farmers just plowed up even more land to cover the low prices and then the rain stopped. We learned about no-till and contour farming during this time as well as why certain grasses and plants are native to an area.
In the book, The worst hard time, a natural and political history of the dust bowl, by Timothy Egan, an award-winning writer, mr. Eagan how agronomists and other scientists of that time thought that the wet years mentioned in this film were brought about by all the extra plowing. They thought that the more dust particles were in the air, the more it would rain.
We now know that is wrong, but they had no way of knowing it was wrong at the time
If I may add to the exelent comment above; Farmers, by no fault of their own ,were plowing with the grooves of thr land. These were different times than the ones we live in today,where farmers are studied in what it takes to be a farmer.....Oh Yea... God Bless U All
Great coverage by brave photographers.A human made catastrophe.
seen any indepth root cause studies? I have heard everything from bad government policies pushed to farmers, bad products from manufacturers, and also farmer greed. well, then also drought
educational and informative, thanks for uploading
They's still searching for my poor old pappy's bones out there. He was drinking moonshine and chasing tumble weeds when he got caught in one of them dust storms. Ain't nobody ever seen him since.
My grandmother started walking 5 miles every day.
Now 3 years later nobody knows where the hell she is...
Imagine coming from a family of tumbleweed rustlers 😂
A perfect storm really, a prolonged drought, the plowing up of millions of acres that were bare because the seeds did not sprout, and relentless winds.
UtahAgClassroom
...and higher than normal temperatures... hence the winds. Not man made !
@@5p1tf1r33 It was ALL manmade. Europeans came in and turned the tallgrass prairie into farmland. A tragic and ignorant mistake. Buffalo good = cattle bad. The list is long and it's ALL manmade. Tallgrass has deep roots and keeps the soil in place, then they came in and turned it all over? Completely nuts. A lesson in stupidity.
sounds familiar...monsanto, greed, cruelty...evil seems that the stories repeat again but with different names...
@@Anthony-hu3rj so higher than normal temperatures was man-made in the 1930"s?
How?
@@Anthony-hu3rj since we still have cattle and farmers, I guess we worked it out. Seen any indepth cause studies?
It's a pretty good documentary though I think it would bore some. If you're really into history I think you would like it too. I really liked the interviews with the survivors of the time.
@@nikaa4329 people defintily died
Remember it is 1950, a "primary source" from that time period...we have learned a lot about soils since then, we can make it better and improve what we have. But if all we have left is subsoil to work with it takes a major effort to build that type of soil, and considering the location it may not be practical.
Thanks for sharing
The Grapes of Wrath : Never before our after such a true story of inhumanity of american lives being brought out before us. A story of truth of the actual lives of our countryman during the depression and dust bowl year's. God bless the people who spoke the truth of life's hardships to our families across this nation... As an American I feel this in my heart about the people living in make shift shanty housing, most are of good health and not of want for a job. In my whole long life I have never been able to say I could not find a job here in America, Never. And even with the covid-19 virus I have seen jobs left vacant. And even when jobs became even more available at greater pay I have watched people leave jobs vacant saying it wasn't safe enough to work. All the while a whole nation worked around these non-workers. My ancestors would be ashamed of such socialist claiming benefits for not working an honest day in supporting of themselves and families. Men and women existing but not working because of our run away social system causing the social decay of life across America. Yeah I could put most if not all blame on laziness and females creating of society of unwed baby making relying on solely on now tax payer government relief monies. But it would not be fair because I know it have become a way of life if it were not supported by blood sucking politicians. Especially from own party. "Gone with the Wind" The shattered hopes of a better life here in America...
You are forgetting that most of the😮 farmers that had to leave were tenant farmers. They did not have a choice about leaving. They were thrown off the land.
Unless you yourself where a tenant farmer looking for work during the dust bowl, you'd really don't have a leg to stand on criticizing others
As for your complaining about unwed mothers, those women did not get pregnant by themselves. What are you doing about the father's who get the women pregnant? And what are you doing to protect abortion rights so dap those babies you don't want aren't born?
@@MadronaxyzVery well said! Thank you for being a critical-thinker! ✌️!
@@Madronaxyzwomen know the stakes are higher for them should they become pregnant. Therefore they bear more responsibility for not becoming pregnant until they want a child and have found the right person to have one with. Then if she wants to abort their child the father has no say in it whatsoever. A little caution from both parties would result in far less abortions but abortions are basically used as contraceptives in this day and age. Essentially murdering children but women call it a fetus or clump of cells as a play on words to excuse what will one day be considered one of the most disgusting and barbaric practices that humans will have ever fought to preserve. All for eliminating the consequences of sexual promiscuity for women we murder the unborn. How humanity has fallen.
thank you
Dust from the dustbowl settled on destinations as far as ships in the Atlantic, and even on FDR's desk in the Oval Office.
My late mother, born in '31, and my late father, born in '29, certainly remembered this. He went into land management, getting separate degrees in biology and agriculture. My mother talked him out of that career and he died a broken, impoverished man.
+CuteCatFaith
Er, what did he end up doing?
My mom was 13 and 14 when the great dust storms carried the dust east; living in eastern Illinois they were pretty hard hit with the falling dust and sand. My dad was a tree planter with the CCC in the mid-30s but he died when I was real young so I never got to hear many of his stories.
My dad lived in Detroit and would tell us about those days when the sun was dimmed and it look like twilight on otherwise clear afternoons. That dust sure traveled.
a little slow but I love the interviews
Some of the hottest temperatures were recorded during this time.
Not just hot records but sustained heat.
But these records are no longer regarded and cannot be used for historical time lines, because it doesn't make global warming look good.
Love this is online.
History
I Have A Question ⁉️..
I realize not many have commented here in awhile..
But I'm hoping someone sees this, and can help me..
My question❓
What film, or movie depicts the great depression best of all⁉️
In your opinion❓
Unfortunately, and shamefully, I just don't know much about the great depression, but I feel that this is a big part of our history, and of great importance for everyone to know‼️
🤷🤷 Ik that there is "La familia" on YT that is about how they used to deport mexicans & mexican Americans, even if they were a citizen or not to mexico cuz they blamed them along with African American for taking scares jobs. But just youtube everything and you'll find out everything. But just so you know, its just people being ignorant & greedy
Wowww! History!!!
Stewart's IB English class where you at?!!!!!
StevenTrinh ayyy
brings me right back to 9th grade.
My paternal grandparents
With my aunt and seven uncles
Left Kentucky and followed The Okies and Arkies
To Central California San Joaquin valley
In 1935
If y’all want to learn more about the dust bowl y’all should read the book “The Worst Hard Time”, it’s really good and gives lots of stories of people who lived during the dust bowl
Y'all ???
Thanks. It sound real good.
Yeah, did that one, pretty tough read, gave it to Steve Earle when I saw him at a concert one time.
My family were in Muskogee, Oklahoma during the Dustbowl years and owned the Dodge Agency, they tald me lots of people lost everything , I was boen 1949,
My teacher is making me watch this
Its real interesting.
Good for your teacher!
It will happen again. Now those farmers have irrigation. Those aquifers will run dry and the same thing will happen.
constance montfort Mc
homesteader fifty w/ ricky & martha
Plus people today generally are less prepared, because they have forgotten and lost so many old fashioned skills. Add to that how families are not as united, and neighbors may not be as cooperative and loving as they used to be. Very sad.
Their sin was thinking everything was exploitable and inexhaustable, even with inductrialized mechinery
Michæl Gilbert Clements I read somewhere last week big farms , in an attempt to corner the soybean market, used Monsanto suicide seeds and their chemicals. First one failed,then a second chemical also failed. So now they are using an older chemical, dicamba. They used it on crops before it was legalized. Monsanto sold it when it had not been approved.
One million acres have been affected. That is one million acres of ground sprayed with poison.
The article covering this is by Boyce Upbolt, in the new republic.com
Seriously. They were not that educated back then.
@@pamelabaker2097 still aren't.
Your comment was the only one with any obvious truth to it! They still pretend not to know the works of their hands and the hands of their forefathers.
@12:05 that man saying "We might as well hit them in the head, they aren't worth nothin'. Was meaning profit from the action, he could see they were all holding out for each other at the actions. LOL. A starving cow who was so loved they didn't eat her or want to lose her. Probably had kept her for milk for the youngens. A family pet if ever I've seen one. They probably didn't really notice it as much as an outsider would. When you see them everyday you don't notice the change is as bad as it's gotten. So very sad. If it wasn't my personal history I don't think I would be able to sit thru this. Maybe just listen, no pics.xo
I want the music, where can i hear it?
HI, I,m Troy McClure. You might remember me from such educational films as "Syphilis, it's nothing to clap about".
An extreme drought. Blaming the farmers… Ridiculous of people to think those plants would have survived that and prevented this.
Who else is watching this for school?
So depressing. ..😢😢😢
😭
Good old days.
California's "anti-okie" law was declared unconstitutional in Edwards v. California, 314 U.S.160 (1941).
to be fair, those who settled those lands in the dust bowl areas often had 10 kids. my kin did and, by looking at the censuses, so did many others. All things we do have an impact, have results
Was this Oklahoma?
@2:15 what neato music! Makes me think of industriousness!
2:15 yw
Right outside of this one-church town, there's a gold dirt road to a whole lotta nothing, got a deed to the land but it ain't my ground, this is God's Country
Excellent. Take care of the Earth and she'll take care of you.
Painful as it was, something had to be done. CAL brought some relief, but no permanent cure. A Ford or Hudson could be depended on in most cases.
Like the movie interstellar. I build garden boxes. Good thing asthma wasnt as common as it is today.
The film mentions Government subsidies 11 minutes into the program.
I wonder what it was like in the dust bowl
Go into a 🏜️ storm in the middle of the ☀️
and-lets-not-forget-woody-guthrie-the-dust-bowl-songs-and-the-town-of-guthrie-okla
When farmers plowed the land, they unleashed lots of dust. Plus droughts and diseases made it hard for many people. Some people fled it for California, others stayed, and sadly, some had died from the diseases
bob-dylan-was-a-friend-of-woody-and-visited-him-when-he-was-dieing-in-the-hospital-in-ny-they-played-sang-songs-togather-bob-even-wrote-a-poem-and-songs-about-him-i-think-he-really-missed-woody-----rip
“The Natural Economic Order” by SILVIO GESELL praised by Einstein, H G Wells, Irving Fisher and many others was the solution to the problems caused by the Great Depression. And it’s also the solution to the many economic problems throughout this world today.
The best popcorn is fried in bacon grease !!! Cornmeal mush is good sliced & fried & covered in pancake syrup.
This video mostly blames the farmers. It was weather and ecoomics.
As someone above pointed out, the government wanted this land developed. They were encouraging production of wheat, and fixing prices. Then when it went bad, they pressured farmers to sell, and move off the land. The ones that stayed eventually recovered.
Yip greed then desolation about sums it up , but we never learn and it'll carry on happening due to short memories .
Como se cria um deserto...
very sad, this wasnt the only time we had to wear masks... if you know what I mean
Both parents lived through the dust bowl ..most of the country was oblivious to the conditions.
Walter Kronkite was around before man walked the Earth.
Great video, some Woody Guthrie, Dust Bowl Ballads could have came in handy i reckon.
The grandkids and great-grandkids of the Okies are now migrating out of California. This time with money and raising the price of housing in Texas, New Mexico, Idaho, Montana, etc. Ironic, but the natives are restless and cursing those new, wealthy migrants.
Note that the film is dated 1960...in Roman numbers...
That dog better just be sleeping… 3:52
Then came Monsanto.
Loved the real people in this film , real men and real women who were tough as nails and the salt of the earth and went to California but what a mess California is now ! These people would have a harder time today with all the crazy anti business laws
Go back where you came from,head east,when you hit the Atlantic keep right on going.
👍
Taken for granted. As with the earth .
Good.
Cribbed a bit from Pare Lorentz here...
Who else is here for an assignment in history class.
Here is a clip from a great interview I conducted recently with a woman who recalls the dust bowl very well: th-cam.com/video/aH4XY3sMLro/w-d-xo.html
🌾
Well yeah, the ones that stayed probably got the land that the poor farmers left.the one's that have more always have a better chance
This is apocalypse.
Greed created the dust bowl, Americans
So very date for the land of the management ,,,didn't we learn anything ,,,,well didn't we .
How did this happen before global warming? 🤦🏼♂️
Climate change started the moment of the industrialized revolution when we started polluting the air. Also this was mostly man made & the main reason why there are now tree breaks between fields.
@@MeriLizzie were u there? You have been brainwashed?
@@d-rocky615 that’s what history says. That this was man made by multiple causes, all man made. And the world has been warming since the industrialized revolution. Science has proven this. Why would I need to be there?
or the coming ice age. (that was the in thing back around 1970s)
I have never seen cows hurry thru dusty dirt to govel for food, cows were sold for five cents a head? I'm so sorry Poppy & Polly my Great Grandparents, so glad I got to know you, can't wait to see you when I get home to Heaven also.x So they bought them cheap the neighbors did so the greedy couldn't come in and take all they had by action. That was super smart people, proud of their intelligence and we know how much all people love their animals. Back then for life, food, family.
well guess what, those who learned were shunned here in east NM and northwest TX. many left. the dust bowls that they thought were a thing of the past have happened in about 5 yr cycles every since the 1930s. why? because the majority of the land did not recover. east NM east colrado and muct of the TX panhandle is scarred beyond repair. great dunes were deposited from colorado to south east nm and all over the grasslands to the near east. and on main culprit was a falt rejection and denial of the the programs put in place by the Roosevelt administration. a resistance against anyone who carried the title of environmentalist. and finally, a complete ostracization and shunning of anyone who put their cycled out farm land into the Conservation Reclamation Project. These programs were developed where farmers were paid to not farm their land and instead ceded and seeded many sections of their land back to native and recalmation grasses. Paid to let the grasses grow wild again, these land owners in some cases were driven out and seen as weaklings who lost the great fight against nature. It was this "fight" and ultimate dischord with the natural world that caused the greatest man made natural disaster in the recorded history. Doughts still come. Grass still grows. but the great vast swaths of blow sand and dunes do not support life of ANY kind. The water table in the Ogallala aquifer hsa dropped more than 25 feet since 1960. the land will never be fully resored as long as there are people there who thing they are fighting against nature. they will lose.
A poignant example of reaping what you sow.
lots of Dogs and kittens died during the dust bowl!
"Damn sod busters"