The Dust Bowl
Have you ever had trouble breathing in a dusty room? Or perhaps got dirt in your eyes or mouth? People in the Great Plains had to go through that for about eight years during the 1930s in an event called the Dust Bowl. This was an event that horrible for those who lived in the Great Plains and forced people to leave their homes while others died (“Dust Bowl”). The Dust Bowl was a horrible event that millions of American suffered from and we can see today that there are still impacts on the land from it.
Long ago before the 1930s, the Great Plains had rich, fertile soil that basically took thousands of years to get that way (“Dust Bowl”). Taking advantage of the land, cattlemen over-grazed the plains, putting cattle everywhere which fed on the grass that held the rich, fertile, soil in place (“Dust Bowl History”). Soon after that, farmers turned to wheat, because of high prices, and they began to plow up millions of acres to plant it (“The Dust Bowl”) They didn’t just plow up the land, they over-plowed it. So now the plains had lost the grass the held the soil in place and the soil has been over-plowed and the farmers were taking advantage of the land and not even thinking of conserving it. By World War 1, the wheat farmers were doing very well and they went on to plow mile after mile to continue their success but in 1930 little rain fell and ended the wet period that the plains had gone through all this time (“Dust Bowl”). Little did the farmers know, a disaster was knocking on their door.
In 1931 a drought began ,that went on to last eight years, and brought high temperatures and only to make things worse, the wind started to pick up (“Dust Bowl”). Seeing that a drought was present, one third of the farmers left and headed to California (“What Caused the Dust Bowl?”). Looking on, one year later in the middle of the day, the high winds picked up the loose soil from the cleared terrain and developed a 200-mile-wide dust cloud and it swept through the land covering everything in its path in dust (“Dust Bowl”). In 1932, fourteen of these “storms” or clouds were reported while in 1933, 38 were reported (Surviving the Dust Bowl). Sadly, the storms were only getting bigger (Dust Bowl). As these storms went on, 100 million acres of farmland had lost most, if not all, of the topsoil due to the high winds which reached about 60 mph (Surviving the Dust Bowl). Witnesses of these storms referred to them as “Black Blizzards” because of the massive dark cloud that would be headed right for them and a news reporter gave the whole event the name “Dust Bowl” which has stuck all these years (Surviving the Dust Bowl). But the worst part of the Dust Bowl was the impact it had on lives.
Living conditions in the plains were terrible because dust was basically everywhere (“The Dust Bowl”). In some areas dust stood so high to where they couldn’t even open their door and even vehicles were buried in it (“The Dust Bowl”). Avis D. Carlson, a witness of the Dust Bowl, said this in an article “The impact is like a shovelful of fine sand flung against the face” (The Dust Bowl). She went on to say that “We live with the dust, eat it, sleep with it, watch it strip us of possessions and the hope of possessions. It is becoming Real.” (“The Dust Bowl”). The windows and every little crack in a house had to be boarded up or filled to prevent the dust from entering but the storms were so strong that dust still managed to get in. If anyone was caught in one of these storms, they would have to spit out dirt that got in their mouth and sometimes it would even get into their lungs. The condition where people spit up dirt from their lungs was know as dust pneumonia or the brown plague (“Dust Bowl”). Not only were people getting sick, but the animals were too. People sometimes died from being out in a storm too long and that would often be the case because it was so hard to see where you were going because of the darkness (“Dust Bowl”). Herman Goertzen says he remembers chickens going to roost in the middle of the day because the storms made it so dark that the chickens thought it was night (“The Dust Bowl”). Plagues of rabbits and locusts came from the hills because they were starving, so not only did the people of the plains had to deal with dust storms, but now with plagues (“Dust Bowl”). Also, the citizens were starving because of the lack of food sources. Animals were dying from the storms and what crops could they grow? They had nowhere to turn.
By 1935, with little to no rainfall in four years, some people just gave up (“Surviving the Dust Bowl”). They packed up and headed west to California to search for jobs and they had no thoughts of coming back (“Surviving the Dust Bowl”). Along with that businesses and banks were failing, churches shut their doors, and schools were boarded up (“Surviving the Dust bowl”). With these horrible conditions, three quarters of the citizens chose to stay and hoped that something would happen that would bring signs of hope (“Surviving the Dust Bowl”). The impact that the Dust Bowl brought was felt all over America but help had arrived (“The Dust Bowl”).
Hugh Hammond Bennett was one of Franklin Roosevelt's advisors during the New Deal and had background as a soil scientist. In 1934 he was on his way to D.C. to urge Congress to help to people of the Great Plains by passing his innovative plan called the Soil Conservation Act (“The Dust Bowl”). While he was there a dust storm arrived all the from the Plains and covered the sun then he explained to congress, “This, gentlemen, is what I have been talking about” (“The Dust Bowl”). At that time Congress was no longer in doubt after seeing a storm for themselves and the Soil Conservation Act was passed and signed by President Roosevelt. Efforts began to conserve soil and one main approach was to use new methods of farming that had been developed and the farmers tried while getting paid one dollar for every acre that the used new methods on (“Dust Bowl”). The act also called for two hundred million trees to be planted across the Great Plains to protect the land from erosion. By 1938, the soil loss had been reduced by sixty five percent due to the new methods of farming, trees planted, and the Soil Conservation Act as a whole but the drought continued on (“Surviving the Dust Bowl”). In the fall of 1939, the rain finally fell after eight years of drought and people describe as a very emotional time because while rain today doesn’t mean much to us, it meant hope, life, and future for them (“Surviving the Dust Bowl”).
In conclusion, people began to believe that things would never get better and that all hope was lost for them. The Dust Bowl also taught a very valuable lesson and that is not to take advantage of something wonderful and do everything you can to make it last. The event still has positive and negative impacts on America today. One positive impact is the methods of farming that were developed then that have improved and still being used today. On the other hand, the negative impact is the topsoil that is has been lost. To this day the topsoil is not as rich as it once was and that is because it takes nearly a thousand years to develop soil as rich as what we once had. After all is said and done, never take anything for granted because the Dust Bowl was a result of farmers who did.
Works Cited
“The Dust Bowl.” LivingHistoryFarm. Livinghistoryfarm.org, http://www.livinghistoryfarm.org/farminginthe30s/water_02.html. Accessed, 14 Oct, 2016
“Dust Bowl History.” History.com. A&E Television Networks, 2009, http://www.history.com/topics/dust-bowl. Accessed, 14 Oct, 2016
“Dust Bowl.” About. About.com, 15 Apr. 2016
http://history1900s.about.com/od/1930s/a/dust-bowl.htm. Accessed, 14 Oct, 2016
“Surviving the Dust Bowl.” PBS. PBS.org, http://www.pbs.org/wgbh/americanexperience/features/introduction/dustbowl-introduction/. Accessed, 14 Oct, 2016
“What Caused the Dust Bowl?” HowStuffWorks. HowStuffWorks.com, http://science.howstuffworks.com/environmental/green-science/dust-bowl-cause1.htm. Accessed, 14 Oct, 2016