#70 - Don't Like A Depression

Economy Woes

I turned on the news this morning and allowed myself to absorb some of the devastating facts, that we've been dealing with for months.

More than 2.4 million Americans filed for unemployment last week. 38.6 million filed, in the last 9 weeks.

Depression

On May 9, the New York Times showed these words on their late edition.

I began thinking more and more about the past. How different it was for our country, in the 1930's. Job loss is devastating anytime.

People fretted over the headlines like they do today, but they gathered around the radio for updates from President Roosevelt. 

CBS Sunday Morning on TV

A few weeks ago, I was touched by  piece on the Sunday Morning program. They compared images of the Great Depression, to photos of today.

There were bread lines in the past and drive through food banks, today.

The famous Depression photo of the woman and her children, was similar to this image of a worried woman, today. If both were in black and white, the mask would be the only reminder of the date.

I was moved by the show and ended up calling my dad.

What do you remember?

My Dad was born a year before the Depression started. I asked what he knew about the struggles of their family.

He's told me before about the loss of the family business, that his father worked for. But I he had never talked about anything else. Dad thought a moment.

"Mother got a job for a while." Dad recalled. She sold flour and she actually really liked working." He laughed. Maybe it was a nice getaway from a house with so many young boys.

​"We always had food. No one talked about money worried."

Then he paused on the phone, as if a memory was coming back. 

"We did have fun. We used to go for long drives. My dad would take us in the car out in the country and we'd drive and drive and drive. One time we were gone so long, my brother cried because he thought we were lost!" 

Dad thought that was funny. Then I remembered the summer drives our family of 6 took, on warm summer nights. Dad and I went back and forth a while, remembering the wonderful smells that poured in our open windows... Colonial Bread factory and mowed grass and the greasy aromas from drive-in burger joints!

I like the way our discussion of The Depression ended happy.