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New World Order Title: FRUGAL LESSONS FROM PEOPLE WHO SURVIVED THE GREAT DEPRESSION Have you ever met someone who was alive during the Great Depression? They are changed people. The Great Depression left a great impression on their thoughts, their styles, and their habits. Many of them hoard money, become pack rats, and in general have trouble parting with anything that may possibly be of use down the road. And who can blame them? I wonder how many times saving the ends of a loaf of bread or scraping the mold off of a brick of cheese meant the difference between eating and going hungry. My grandfather was born in 1928 and grew into a young boy in the aftermath of the US economic collapse. Pop-pop remembers his parents opening up our hay barn for random people to sleep in on cold winter nights. He also remembers that he and his family were “not so bad off”; they were farmers so they had the land and the knowledge to grow most of the food they consumed. In fact, Pop-pop told me that anyone who spent the night in their barn was also given a plate of food for the night, which shows how valuable their garden truly was. His impressionable years during a time of great financial ruin impacted the rest of his life dramatically, from his hoarding of cash and mistrust of companies and banks, to his refusal to use air conditioners and instead spend his summers in sweat-drenched muscle shirts. When he died he left an inheritance for each of his children from a measly family dairy farmer’s income. The Great Depression to frugal people holds the same intrigue as Sedona to New Age people, which is why I have chosen this time period as a small research project for myself. I have read of the bank failures, the stock market crash, the suicides, and the dust bowl, all of which have been written about extensively. But a few burning questions of mine about this time period have never fully been answered: How did people actually survive the Great Depression? What sort of frugal habits came about? I want to learn how people made do with less and how people actually survived the day-to- day with little money. Before I list some of the examples I found during my research, let’s put everyone into the mindset of the Depression era. Imagine this: the stock market has crashed and your money in it is gone. The value on your home has plummeted (that may not be difficult for some to imagine). You see a line forming outside of several banks and begin to wonder if you should get your own money out of them and stuff it into a mattress. Your job cuts your wage by 25%, but you feel fortunate to still have one. Except that six months later consumer demand is a speckle of what it used to be, so your job enforces furloughs. Unfortunately the money you had set aside in your bank is not liquid at the moment due to bank issues. What do you do? Please note: As this article is meant to be useful to everyone as both an eye-opener to how comfortable people of today actually are (even those who call themselves “frugal”, which includes myself), as well as an inspiration to maintain our frugal habits, I left out the heart- breaking and destitute acts committed by families to survive. I don’t wish to sugar coat this time period and the suffering of others, so I’d like to mention that these include eating from the garbage, eating every other day, abandoning families, living in Hoovervilles, etc. Sell Apples on the Street Corner: Pacific Northwest apple growers had a surplus of apples, and decided to sell a crate to unemployed people at $1.75 per crate. Selling the 60-72 apples on the street corner would yield $3.00, and after paying Pacific, a person could reap around $1.25. Roll Your Own Cigarettes Eat Food from the Wild: Such delicacies as blackberries, dandelions, and game were for the taking in the country but not in the city. Other people gathered corn kernels from fields and roasted them over fires, or picked fruit from people’s trees (I am not suggesting you do this). Substitute Other Things for Meat: Families ate more of beans, macaroni and cheese, pancakes, and other gut-filling foods that were less expensive than meats. One type of meat that became popular was sardines: introducing the mashed sardine and mayonnaise sandwich. Family Members Work to Supplement Income: This included mowing lawns, shoveling snow, delivering newspapers, baby-sitting, shoe-shining, passing out ads, selling door-to-door, mining, etc. Repair Your Clothes with Objects around the House: Shoes were often repaired with cardboard, scotch tape became popular, and coats were lined with blankets. Give up Your Telephone: Telephone service declined from 20 million in 1930 to less than 17 million in 1933. Long Distance phone calls dramatically decreased. Postpone Life Decisions: Divorce rates dropped because people could not afford the cost, and they needed one another to survive. People postponed weddings and having children. Practice Out of Your Home: Doctors, dentists, and other professionals who previously rented offices instead moved their practices to their homes. Leave the City: A chunk of people fled the cities and went into farming instead; at least they knew they would eat. Give up Your Car: The bicycle becomes a popular choice for transportation. Make Use of your Neighbor and Vice Versa: After many people’s water was shut off, they looked to neighbors to give them buckets or pails of water for cooking, washing up, etc. People also traded clothes with neighbors. Live/Sleep Elsewhere: People who found themselves without a home, apartment, or bed travelled the streets, slept on other people’s couches, in other people’s garages, in barns, lived in caves, and generally slept wherever they could. Pawn Your Belongings Use Socks as Gloves Trade Work for Food: Can you clean houses, babysit, cook, cut hair, etc.? People would trade their services for food instead of pay. Join a Food Co-Op: A group would purchase bulk food at a discount and split it up. Move in With Other Families
Resources: The Great Depression: A Diary, Benjamin Roth, 2009 Hard Times, Studs Terkel, 1970 American Popular Culture Through the 1930s, William H. Young with Nancy K. Young, 2002 Daily Life in the United States 1920-1940, David E. Kyvig, 2002 Other Articles You May Enjoy: Bahumbug, or Rather ‘Throw it Over the Fence’: My Grandfather Scroodge Personal Finance Lessons from the Great Depression Lessons from the Recession My Grandma was Truly Frugal Post Comment Private Reply Ignore Thread Top • Page Up • Full Thread • Page Down • Bottom/Latest Comments (1-11) not displayed.
Eat Food from the Wild: Such delicacies as blackberries, dandelions, and game were for the taking in the country but not in the city. I've never heard of people eating the tap roots. I didn't know that you could. She was just being sensible, and besides that where exactly would she BUY them if she liked them? lol! I used to have Italian neighbors who made GOOD wine from them. Of course we all have always had the young leafs in salads in the spring. I hate them invading my "yard"/garden but they are useful and delicious if dealt with correctly. There are alot of GOOD edible plants growing wild everywhere, even in cities. IF you know what you are doing. Saving money is only one good reason to use them. Spoiled, stupid and ignorant, brain dead phuckwads, libTURD fools, tools, and idiots, are the real sickness; the messiah "king" obammy and his regime are only the symptoms. #13. To: jwpegler (#11) . Both of my parents lived through those times as children. They never whined about it, or anything else, EVER; (and you had better not in their presence either). They just DID whatever they had to do for the family. They never expected anybody else to do it for them. We were always happy for what we HAD. Spoiled, stupid and ignorant, brain dead phuckwads, libTURD fools, tools, and idiots, are the real sickness; the messiah "king" obammy and his regime are only the symptoms. #14. To: Mad Dog (#13) They never whined about it, Yep, that's the key. Your parents did what they had to do to survive. This is what the human race does -- survive and prosper. That's why we were able to crawl out of the caves and invent the steam engine, airplane, television, microprocessor, etc. Government, by its very nature, destroys human ingenuity and imitative. This is the problem. An ideal form of government is democracy tempered with assassination. -- Voltaire #15. To: Mad Dog, jwpegler (#13) Both of my parents lived through those times as children. Mad Dog, that is the FIRST serious post I have EVER seen you make on the Internet. Your candid and poignant post reflects a remarckable personal characteristic after all this time that I have seen you posting.
#16. To: buckeroo (#15) Mad Dog, that is the FIRST serious post I have EVER seen you make on the Internet. +1 An ideal form of government is democracy tempered with assassination. -- Voltaire #17. To: Mad Dog (#13)
Both of my parents lived through those times as children.
I was in the second grade when it came to an end.
We were always happy ...
We were so poor, that we really didn't know there was a depression. My family produced nearly everything we needed by farming ... my father plowing with oxen. What we didn't produce, we barted for in the small town county seat with what we did produce.
#18. To: harrowup (#9) It sounds like you had it better than my mother's family. "...all of the equations in neoclassical economics are rubbish. The differential equations describe nothing. Economics is not about mathematics, it is about the human being." Sandeep Jaitly #19. To: jwpegler (#14) Government, by its very nature, destroys human ingenuity and imitative. Then why don't we hear more about the fabulous innovations created in cultures less unencumbered by government than ours? "...all of the equations in neoclassical economics are rubbish. The differential equations describe nothing. Economics is not about mathematics, it is about the human being." Sandeep Jaitly #20. To: lucysmom (#19) (Edited) why don't we hear more about the fabulous innovations created in cultures less unencumbered by government I've heard rumors that the inventors of fire and the wheel, did so without government grants.
Obama's watch stopped on 24 May 2008, but he's been too busy smoking crack to notice. #21. To: hondo68 (#20) I've heard rumors that the inventors of fire and the wheel, did so without government grants. Yeah right, they didn't have PhDs did they? I wager you don't know the sheer number of Phd's in government working for the USA on either grants, stipends of full salary/benefits. Look at where America is. The greatest nation on the planet going into free-fall.
#22. To: lucysmom, Gatlin, Mad Dog (#18) It sounds like you had it better than my mother's family. That's what I meant by environment. My parents moved back to the farm in 1931.
#23. To: lucysmom (#6) A friend used to hate it when his aunt came to visit because she'd go for a walk around the neighborhood and dig dandelions out of the neighbor's yards, bring them home, and cook them. So have you ever had dandelion wine??? My uncle used to make it along with a lot of other fruit based wines, it wasn't too bad...... When asked by a Liberal what I bought my Granddaughter for her 1st birthday I replied, "MORE AMMUNITION"!!!! -----------------------------"People sleep peaceably in their beds at night only because rough men stand ready to do violence on their behalf." #24. To: Mad Dog (#13) Both of my parents lived through those times as children. My parents were the same, Mom was born in 1922 and Dad in 1923..... Even though they lived through the rough times they never complained about anything, they did become packrats though...... LOL..... When asked by a Liberal what I bought my Granddaughter for her 1st birthday I replied, "MORE AMMUNITION"!!!! -----------------------------"People sleep peaceably in their beds at night only because rough men stand ready to do violence on their behalf." #25. To: CZ82, Mad Dog (#24) Even though they lived through the rough times they never complained about anything, they did become packrats though...... LOL..... I despise automatic dishwashers and clothes washers. I wash all of my barn clothes and hang them outside to dry and they smell just like what I imagine heaven is and not so coincidentally just like my mother's and my grandmother's laundry smelled on their clotheslines. (I admit my whites are a bit gray, however; happens from washing denim with button downs.) We don't use plastic trash bags. What little 'trash' we have goes into paper grocery bags.
#26. To: CZ82 (#23) So have you ever had dandelion wine??? Nope. "...all of the equations in neoclassical economics are rubbish. The differential equations describe nothing. Economics is not about mathematics, it is about the human being." Sandeep Jaitly #27. To: CZ82 (#24) ...they did become packrats though...... LOL..... My mother was a big time "saver". "...all of the equations in neoclassical economics are rubbish. The differential equations describe nothing. Economics is not about mathematics, it is about the human being." Sandeep Jaitly #28. To: hondo68 (#20) I've heard rumors that the inventors of fire and the wheel, did so without government grants. They would have done it within the framework of one those socialist tribes. A rugged individual was a dead individual in those days.
#29. To: mininggold (#28) socialist tribes. A rugged individual was a dead individual in those days. No creature is going to mess with the inventor of fire! He's still a capitalist, in heaven.
Obama's watch stopped on 24 May 2008, but he's been too busy smoking crack to notice. #30. To: buckeroo (#15) Mad Dog, that is the FIRST serious post I have EVER seen you make on the Internet. Hilariously enough, it probably wasn't true! ------------------------------------- #31. To: Biff Tannen (#30) LOL! What a miserable little cunt you are biffy boy Unlike YOU biffy boy, I tell the truth. Am I supposed to LIE to "impress" gibbering libTURD SCUM such as YOU biffy boy? LOL! Riiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiight ..... LOL! But ... hey ... that's what you libTURD SCUM DO isn't it biffy boy? You have NEVER ever written even one post that had any substance outside of fucking with people who you hate. You pitiful little never done nothing never been nowhere little cunt. Have you ever been married biffy boy? Have you ever had to make a payroll biffy boy? Have you ever PRODUCED anything REAL biffy boy? Have you ever sweated in the fields or factory biffy boy? Have you ever risked your life and everything that you are and have for the USA? Have you ever DONE anything biffy boy except TALK? Have you ever lived in another country biffy boy? Have you ever had to put up or shut up you miserable little cunt? Nah, all you are is a spoiled little cunt whining for more gooberment pork, and trying to give your rights, that others better than you or your ilk could ever be have paid the blood price for, away. YOU and your gibbering libTURD herd rush headlong towards real slavery as if it were your salvation. YOU are the ultimate LOSER biffy boy, and THAT is GOD'S own truth. ROTFLMAOAY!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!! Spoiled, stupid and ignorant, brain dead phuckwads, libTURD fools, tools, and idiots, are the real sickness; the messiah "king" obammy and his regime are only the symptoms. #32. To: jwpegler (#11) The U.S. government is completely out of control. It has to be dismantled. AND it's pretty obvious that it's going to get WORSE before it gets better. Likely WAY worse. Spoiled, stupid and ignorant, brain dead phuckwads, libTURD fools, tools, and idiots, are the real sickness; the messiah "king" obammy and his regime are only the symptoms. #33. To: Mad Dog (#31) Shut the fuck up you retard. If I want to hear anything from you I'll rattle your cage. You don't impress me, or anyone else, with your bullshit. ------------------------------------- #34. To: lucysmom, harrowup (#18) It sounds like you had it better than my mother's family. I understand that I allow my personal dislike for your persona to affect my judgement about your subsequent behaviors. It's human. But it's wrong. But it's very difficult to avoid. You sound pissed when you say that. Newsflash; somebody is always better off than YOU are, just as somebody is always worse off than you are. It's called LIFE. TRY to move forward. The past is GONE, the future is UNKNOWABLE, the NOW is the only place any of us can actually LIVE.
ie. I'm of 100% black Irish blood. SO .... according to that tradition and culture I'm supposed to HATE the English. I mean that I'm supposed to KILL them. MY people weren't fucking kidding about it. BUT, I'M an AMERICAN, free born and raised. What is the point of continuing a "race" WAR that has been going on for over a thousand years? NONE. I understand that no good deed goes unpunished, so I will await my punishment from you with humble acceptance. /F ing NOT In other words I'm sure that I'm wasting my time trying to treat you as a decent person. I'd like to be wrong. BUT ... 62+ years tells me that I'm not. Spoiled, stupid and ignorant, brain dead phuckwads, libTURD fools, tools, and idiots, are the real sickness; the messiah "king" obammy and his regime are only the symptoms. #35. To: CZ82 (#24) Same here except that we moved so often it was very hard to be a packrat. But we dragged about a zillion boxes of books all over this world. The best thing about a box of books is that you can drop it without anybody freaking out. I never heard them ever complain about any part of our lives. They worried of course, but they NEVER whined. Spoiled, stupid and ignorant, brain dead phuckwads, libTURD fools, tools, and idiots, are the real sickness; the messiah "king" obammy and his regime are only the symptoms. #36. To: harrowup, CZ82 (#25) I despise automatic dishwashers and clothes washers. I wash all of my barn clothes and hang them outside to dry and they smell just like what I imagine heaven is and not so coincidentally just like my mother's and my grandmother's laundry smelled on their clotheslines. (I admit my whites are a bit gray, however; happens from washing denim with button downs.) LOL! What's so funny about that is that I'm currently looking to buy a new wringer washer. They still make them, and they are pretty affordable. That way you can do laundry as long as you have water, (even just in buckets). Heck I've used them at camp off of a genset, heating the water over a fire. Mine dry in the cabin loft. They always smell like wood smoke. So I hear ya. Spoiled, stupid and ignorant, brain dead phuckwads, libTURD fools, tools, and idiots, are the real sickness; the messiah "king" obammy and his regime are only the symptoms. #37. To: Biff Tannen (#33) LOL! Hey biffy BOY ... EAT SHIT and DIE! you useless little never been nowhere never done nothing stoopid gibbering libTURD whore. LOL! The only "person" that you could possibly speak for is your foul self, loser. LOL! It cracks me up what a useless, powerless, gibbering little cunt YOU are biffy boy! Is your mother still whoring at the Greyhound Bus station biffy boy? I feel your pain biffy boy. LOL! Spoiled, stupid and ignorant, brain dead phuckwads, libTURD fools, tools, and idiots, are the real sickness; the messiah "king" obammy and his regime are only the symptoms. #38. To: Mad Dog (#32) (Edited) AND it's pretty obvious that it's going to get WORSE before it gets better. I completely agree. There so many distortions in the market right now (all caused by misguided government programs) that it will take a long time to unwind them. Years, if the government stops screwing things up. Decades (or never), if the government continues to attempt to micro-manage the economy. Its sick and wrong. An ideal form of government is democracy tempered with assassination. -- Voltaire #39. To: Mad Dog (#35) Same here except that we moved so often it was very hard to be a packrat. My mom's favorite things to keep were bread bags, paper bags, yogurt cups w/lids, and cottage cheese containers w/lids...... I don't know why because she never ever stored things in them????? When asked by a Liberal what I bought my Granddaughter for her 1st birthday I replied, "MORE AMMUNITION"!!!! -----------------------------"People sleep peaceably in their beds at night only because rough men stand ready to do violence on their behalf." #40. To: CZ82, Mad Dog (#39) My mom's favorite things to keep were bread bags, paper bags, yogurt cups w/lids, and cottage cheese containers w/lids...... I don't know why because she never ever stored things in them????? Ah, ha; but she might. Part of the experience is that there used to be paper drives and can collections during the war. We didn't throw out stuff that could be used for other purposes. Newspapers for insulating walls and ceilings. Can tops for covering a hole in the floor boards so the linoleum wouldn't poke through. With the introduction of plastic containers, they can be used to store things, someday when we need to. We've never had a Tupper-ware party and don't need to buy them either. So, if I want to take some soup to a neighbor who is down, they are free to throw it out if they don't like the fact that it says Sour Cream on the label. We moved about every 4 years in the early years and the moving companies were annoyed that we never needed moving cartons and packing material. I have wardrobe cartons and 50 gallon cardboard drums with lids that used to hold dried milk powder for calves from the 50s and they are just as good now, albeit a little bit graffiti like...and they hold all the packing material. Now, there is one drawback. We have to keep buying bigger houses to store the stuff I can't throw away. One mover and I got into a tussle when he dumped dirt out of a flower urn on the porch. He told me they moved furniture and accessories. If I wanted to move dirt call a gravel truck.
#41. To: jwpegler (#38) There so many distortions in the market right now (all caused by misguided government programs) that it will take a long time to unwind them. Years, if the government stops screwing things up. Decades (or never), if the government continues to attempt to micro-manage the economy. This feral gooberment is insanely addicted to spending other people's money. They, (and those who they grease with said money), are like junkies, they have to hit their own personal bottoms before they will ever even consider changing. They won't stop until they have to. Until the golden goose is DEAD. Then it will be too late. But ... "the big wheel" turns ... Then WE deal with it. There is no stopping it. Human greed is a absolute. The sooner it happens the better. Because then we can get to work without gooberment getting in our shit every time we turn around. They simply won't be able to do it. Spoiled, stupid and ignorant, brain dead phuckwads, libTURD fools, tools, and idiots, are the real sickness; the messiah "king" obammy and his regime are only the symptoms. #42. To: CZ82 (#39) My mom's favorite things to keep were bread bags, paper bags, yogurt cups w/lids, and cottage cheese containers w/lids...... I don't know why because she never ever stored things in them????? LOL! Man I have a pile of such bags n such four feet tall. It's getting time to shift em out to my connex, where I have 50# woven poly dog food bags filled with them. I actually collect a few current glass and metal bottles as design types. An aluminum bottle for "Moose Drool" Beer out of Montana, a lined 1 l. metal Absolute vodka bottle, a kewl thick tapered glass "SVEDKA" vodka bottle, a perfect green w labels San Pellegrino mineral water bottle, ... Nah, I don't know what you're talking about. LOL! Spoiled, stupid and ignorant, brain dead phuckwads, libTURD fools, tools, and idiots, are the real sickness; the messiah "king" obammy and his regime are only the symptoms. #43. To: harrowup, CZ82 (#40) I remember being a wee kid in a very small town in eastern Kansas and the local movie theatre had matinees where you could get in if you "paid" with two or three bread wrappers/bags. Which were used somehow in charity. So we'd buy whatever bread that was accepted was and save wrappers until we had enough for us kids to go to movies. Years later I remember doing the same thing in an even smaller town north of Tulsa, Collinsville, which was a ways from our town, (Owasso), and our schools greatest foe. We did it to get out of town on "dates". The main problem was that the only movie that they ever showed, (for bread wrappers), was "Your Cheating Heart". LOL! I hate that flick to this day. LOL! Spoiled, stupid and ignorant, brain dead phuckwads, libTURD fools, tools, and idiots, are the real sickness; the messiah "king" obammy and his regime are only the symptoms. #44. To: Mad Dog (#42) Nah, I don't know what you're talking about. Some people call it hoarding. I call it conserving. Besides you can't lose anything if you never throw anything out.
#45. To: Mad Dog (#41) They, (and those who they grease with said money), are like junkies, they have to hit their own personal bottoms before they will ever even consider changing. We had an opportunity to make them go cold turkey last week, but we didn't take it. An ideal form of government is democracy tempered with assassination. -- Voltaire #46. To: harrowup (#44) . Yep. I have actually been down to my last plastic bag a couple of times. When that happens it's bad. I do not recommend it. ;^) Spoiled, stupid and ignorant, brain dead phuckwads, libTURD fools, tools, and idiots, are the real sickness; the messiah "king" obammy and his regime are only the symptoms. #47. To: jwpegler (#45)
There is no stopping it with this corrupt system. We have to hit our ACTUAL bottom, and we need to hit it hard. Even then, the libTURD scum and the political establishment will TRY to blame it all on somebody else. Even as it burns down around us all. But the truth of it is ... As we say in the remodeling biz, "FIRST we have to have some DESTRUCTION before we can have some CONSTRUCTION". It will be bad. For EVERYBODY. GOD help us. Spoiled, stupid and ignorant, brain dead phuckwads, libTURD fools, tools, and idiots, are the real sickness; the messiah "king" obammy and his regime are only the symptoms. #48. To: Mad Dog (#47) Even then, the libTURD scum and the political establishment will TRY to blame it all on somebody else.
#49. To: Get Outta Dodge! (#48) . It's what they, (libTURDS), DO. It's what they ARE. A hundred years ago the very same sort of people who now run the political establishment of America, were then considered criminals. And their "base" of useful FOOLS idiots TOOLS and whores would have been considered mentally ill. Friends don't let friends be libTURDS. libTURDISM IS a mental disease. Spoiled, stupid and ignorant, brain dead phuckwads, libTURD fools, tools, and idiots, are the real sickness; the messiah "king" obammy and his regime are only the symptoms. #50. To: Mad Dog (#47) There is no stopping it with this corrupt system. I'm afraid your right and it's going to happen. When a $1 million bill will no longer buy a loaf of bread, maybe the people will wake up demand we follow the Constitution again. An ideal form of government is democracy tempered with assassination. -- Voltaire #51. To: Mad Dog (#46) I have actually been down to my last plastic bag a couple of times. LOL; I don't think we're talking about the same kind of bag...just sayin'.
#52. To: harrowup (#51) I have actually been down to my last plastic bag a couple of times. When that happens it's bad. . LOL! Nah man I recycle all plastic grocery bags by using them for other stuff, like garbage. It's really a drag when you run out of them. I'm not sure WHAT you were talking about ... (Nod nod, nudge nudge.) ;^) Spoiled, stupid and ignorant, brain dead phuckwads, libTURD fools, tools, and idiots, are the real sickness; the messiah "king" obammy and his regime are only the symptoms. Top • Page Up • Full Thread • Page Down • Bottom/Latest |
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