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The Great Depression in the Americas (1929-1939)
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Stock Market Crash of 1929
A signal of weakness in the economy and also preceded the Great Depression, the Stock Market Crash occured on October 24, 1929. While things seem to be safe and stable once again, five days later October 29, 1929 was the day known as Black Tuesday. Fear rose amongst people and with this the stock market collapsed as selling prices increased while the prices of the stocks dropped. This is a cause of the Great Depression however it is not the sole cause. -
Richard Bedford Bennett attempts to inspire confidence
The people wanted R.B. Bennett to take more action to fight against the Great Depression. Bennett after winning the election took office during the Depression, which left him in a bad situation. He increased trade with Britain, increased tariffs, and attempted to imploy a relief system. These included the later problematic Royal Twenty centers. William Lyon Mackenzie King would later take office. -
Julio Prestes wins the election of 1930
With a close election between Vargas and Prestes, Prestes comes on top with a narrow win. With Prestes's win came the protection of foreingn investments to the investors from other countries. Despite the popularity of Vargas, he was defeated and the things he was against came together. Near the end of his term, the economy had suffered greatly and their federal reserves were lowered. -
Implementation of President Hoover's Hawley-Smooth Tariff Act
Passed some time in June of 1930, President Hoover attempted to combat the Great Depression with the Hawley-Smooth Tariff Act. This was in an attempt to save domestic procedures as tariffs was established to a very high and protective manner. This act had dire consequences as tariffs worldwide also increased and foreign trade with the United States decreased as a result. This only strengthened the economic turmoil of the Great Depression. -
British North America Act
The Canadian Policy that the president William Lyon Mackenzie King hid behind during the Great Depression. He would look to Britain and the United States in order to create policies for the people of Canada. He was a passive leader and did not take active action against the Great Depression. With this he failed to inspire confidence and would not win the next election. -
Vargas's Revolution
With the terrible situation in Brazil, Getulio Vargas took advantage and led multiple revolutions in order to gain power. On October 24 a Revoluntionary Junta was formed and on November 4 he became president. Tried to diversify country’s economic production and used ISI boost economy. Introduced coffee burning and also Increased cotton and livestock production. Due to his charisma and policies, Brazil got out of the Great Depression somewhat quickly and they became more independent. -
The First Bank Run
One year after the Stock Market Crash, in the fall of 1930, confidence in the banks decreased. This led to the first bank run in Nashville, Tennesse were a crowd of people needed their deposits as they fear they would not be able to regain their savings due to the situation of the Great Depression. The bank needs to sell their assests in order to meet demand, suffering not only losses financially but also put banks in a perdicament where the bank might lose their economic stability. -
The Construction of the Hoover Dam is complete
The Hoover Dam was approved by the Hoover administration in 1928. The plan was to create the dam in order to create hydroelectirc energy and to create an irrigation system in the MidWest area of America. It costed lives and a lot of enngineering techniques but the Hoover Dam was finally constructed. This had boosted employment due to it being a public work and would later become a landmark -
Hoover introduces Volunteerism
Hoover took a passive role in the government's actions in the economy. He did little to support the people and stated that he needed the people of America to help one another. He stated he needed people to volunteer to assist the public and the economy will recover due to hard work from the people. This inactive role as president made people dislike him and influenced his loss in the 1932 election against Franklin Delano Roosevelt. -
The Establishment of the Concordancia
The coalition of different faction party of independent socialists, president Justo, the radicals, PAN conservatives was known as the Concordancia. On September 6, 1930 General Uriburu went against the Yrigoyen government. After this Uriburu forced elections in order to have a new president. This was the birth of the Concordancia as they held their power and position with electoral fraud and corruption of government. -
The Implementation ISI in South America
ISI stands for Import substitution industrialization and refers to the replacing imports with home made goods. With this, many countries applied this policy in South America during the Great Depression. Brazil and Argentina used this to become more self-sufficient and did not depend on trade from foreign countries. This boosted both economy and industry of these some of South American countries were brought out of the Great Depression due to the implementation of ISI. -
Implementation of the New Deal
The first time Roosevelt mentioned the New Deal was in his campaign speech. After winning the vote for the democratic party, he promised to give the people a New Deal during the Great Depression. In an active role of government, opposite of Hoover, the New Deal was a group of economic programs to build a foundation of recovery for Americans. It was active federal government in the rebuilding of the economy, and this gave hope to citizens. -
The Concordancia introduces Public Works
To fight off unemployment in Argentina the leader in Argentina copied the idea the Americans had used, introducing public works. With this they were able to construct a large amount of roads and create a solid infrastructure in Argentina. With this they did not need to use the British railways and also increased the independence of Argentina as a nation. -
Franklin Delano Roosevelt's First Fireside Chat
Franklin Delano Roosevelt was the first president to utulize the radio in order to communicate with the people. He was very popular and was seen as a personal and caring individual, as when he spoke it seemed as he was talking everyone at heart. They were called "Fireside Chats" because Roosevelt would talk over radio and calm the people like a real fireside chat. His first "Fireside Chat" restored confidence in the banking system and explained the new system to the people, giving them hope. -
Roca-Runciman Pact of 1933
An economic pact between Argentina and Great Britain that put economic restrictions to try to restore the good economic relations between the two countries. Argentina needed to protect British companies from the nationalization of Argentina and prioritize British goods while Britain needed to preserve Argentine goods. It also put restrictions on the Argentine currency and protected the British investments of Argentina, -
Dust Bowl
In the MidWest of America, due to the agricultural practices of farmers and mulitple generations of using sand, winds picked up topsoil and created "dust tornados." The Dust Bowl ruined the livelihood of many farmers and forced them to leave because it was hard to breathe in and they received little profits for their crops. Exemplified the Great Depression as dreary and terrible for people and unemployment increased from this. -
On-to-Ottawa Trek
Due to unemployment in Canada many citizens took up a march ad left the Royal Twenty Center, where the people would only receive twenty cents per day. In protest they took the trip to Vancouver to protest these horrible conditions, which led to unrest in the people and eventually the Regina Riot. When the people could not take anymore they needed to do something about it so they went to stand up against the Bennett government. -
William Lyon Mackenzie King Returns With a Second Term
Despite being elected once again, King really did not have a plan to fight the Depression but he did protest against the New Deal Bennett proposed. His slogan "King or Chaos" helped him win, he once again hid behind the British North America Act and had really not take an active role in society. The passive form of government hurt the economy and it would take World War II to rescue Canada from the grasp of the Great Depression. -
Regina Riot
Due to unrest in Canada, the people became angered and feared no change would happen. Eventually this tension would break out into violence between the Mounties and the protesters in Regina. The Mounties used tear gas and pistols against the people. and with this a total of one hundred twenty protestor and citizens were arrested. The police report stated only thirty nine citizens were injured and there was one dead policemen yet the records were changed. -
Franklin Delano Roosevelt Earns a Second Term
Franklin Delano Roosevelt not only won the election, he won with a landslide victory. With this win he wanted to increase his New Deal policies effect on the country, but he was limited by the Supreme Court. This would lead to the Court-packing Scandal later in February of that year. Although the New Deal programs had passed with sucess some of his more "radical" ideas were not accepted, two of which were his two core ideas. -
The Court-packing Scandal of Franklin Delano Roosevelt
Directly after President Roosevelt won his election for his second term, his frustration with the Supreme Court grew. He wanted to implement his two key programs of the New Deal to help spur national recovery however did not have the ability to as the justices saw his policies as too radical. He therefore asked to increase the number of justices in the Supreme Court, democratic men, so that his policies would not be rejected from the justices. He was denied and this was seen as a power grab. -
The Recession of 1937
The overall contribution to the economy were not enough to stop the recession from taking hold. Manufacturing levels fell, the GDP, gross domestic product, declined, and the growth of the economy went into reverse. This was a turning point during Roosevelt's term, and there was a fear that inflation would take place. In return to stop this, Roosevelt increased the government spending. -
Construction of Mount Rushmore
Constructed via public works, men sculpted the faces of past presidents who were symbols of American greatness onto a mountain in Georgia. This had a surge of employment as people worked with drills and dynamite to carve the faces correctly onto the mountain. This public work would symbolize American pride and would become a part of the legacy of the Great Depression and Franklin Delano Roosevelt's presidential term.
