On 03/23/2015 10:25 AM, Ed Huntress wrote:
On Mon, 23 Mar 2015 09:22:37 -0500, wrote:
....

Them was tough folks...

I'll say they were tough. We have plenty of Depression-era stories in
my family, but combining it with the Dust Bowl must have made them
epic.

It hardened people in different ways, some became so concerned even
after the era was over they never did recover. I know of an old fellow
only slightly older than grandfather down in the OK panhandle about 40
mi on W from us who never got over the feeling of needing to miser
everything--he never bought any newer or larger equipment nor other
improvements so when there were better years he couldn't take advantage
of them owing to simply being so outdated couldn't do more than just get
by.

OTOH, others like grandfather were exceedingly cautious but didn't let
it scar them permanently to the point of being overly so. He continued
to grow the farm and keep up with changes in production practices and
conservation, etc., and came through in the end, quite successful. As
noted, when I was a little tyke in the 50s things were again in a tough
spell but it wasn't as long a duration and the overall economy wasn't in
a depression so it was a little easier. Mom had a teaching certificate
so she began substitute-teaching in those years to bring in some
off-farm income. In the 30s when she graduated with that degree there
was _no_ teaching position open in the entire state; she ended up here
because the only job she could find was as a secretary in the HS office.

My Depression-era relatives were hard-boiled New Englanders. I never
knew if it was the Depression that boiled them so hard, or if it was
just three centuries of plowing rocks.

I think the far NE'eners are just different, too...there's certainly a
background there of a tough place to make a living that definitely has
an affect and that is/becomes cultural. The Depression undoubtedly
honed it and again as above, everybody reacted differently.

If hadn't had that stretch of 12-15 yrs before that showed what this
ground _can_ produce and was good overall economic time prior to the
30s, we'd not be here now; no way would they have had sufficient
resources to be able to hang on. As it was, I've been told probably
another year or two would've been about the limit of hanging on then
although you can never know how it would've worked out.

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