You’re a U.S. history student in Texas — boy, howdy, do you need to know about the Dust Bowl!
Missed the handout? Oops.
Check these sources:
- Surviving the Dust Bowl, at American Experience — this film we saw clips from in class; watch it all (you can watch it online), explore the website; see especially the article on Black Sunday (April 14, 1935); see the article on the exodus from the Great Plains; see the article on how the New Deal and FDR dealt with the events
- The old Soil Conservation Service (SCS) has been renamed the Natural Resources Conservation Service (NRCS) in the Department of Agriculture; see this history of the Dust Bowl at their site. The Dust Bowl was a major spur to the creation of the SCS, and it led to a worldwide search for solutions on how to conserve topsoil from all forms of erosion
- The Dust Bowl, at U.S. History.com
- Dust Bowl and Drought, at the U.S. Drought Mitigation Center
- The story of the famous Dust Bowl film, “The Plow that Broke the Plains”; watch the documentary here, at TopDocumentary.com
- “Voices from the Dust Bowl,” an online exhibit from the American Memory Collection at the Library of Congress
- Weedpatch Camp website: Where did the Okies go? “Published in 1939, John Steinbeck’s novel The Grapes of Wrath drew attention to the hardships faced by the ‘Okies’: poor farmers who moved from the Dust Bowl area to California in search of work. While writing the book, John Steinbeck visited Bakersfield, California and based his book on Arvin Federal Government Camp which he portrayed as ‘Weedpatch Camp.'”This camp exists today and is still used by migrant workers.”
Could we have another Dust Bowl? Have our conservation practices improved enough to prevent another such occurrence? Has the climate changed to make it more likely, or more unlikely, that we’ll see a dust disaster again?
This article help me to understand the Dust Bowl more
By: Ramon Martinez on February 23, 2012
at 8:30 am
Hope that doesnt happen to us one one day amen
By: sergio olivares 5th period on February 23, 2012
at 10:04 am
Helped me understand more about the dust bowl
By: Vicente on February 23, 2012
at 10:11 am
The climate conditions during the Dust Bowl were terribly dry.
By: Omar Soto 7th Period on February 23, 2012
at 1:54 pm
The Dust Bowl was caused from no rain (drought) and from improper, overplowing of the land from farmers. It caused extreme dryness.
By: oscar reyes on February 23, 2012
at 2:00 pm
i think The Dust Bowl was a major spur to the creation of the SCS, and it led to a worldwide search for solutions on how to conserve topsoil from all forms of erosion…..but i need to understand more about this…
By: Steven Quiroz on February 23, 2012
at 2:18 pm
The Dust Bowl was rather dry.
By: Joaquin "Mandingo" Estrada on February 23, 2012
at 5:57 pm
I feel bad for the people who had to suffer through it, hopefully it doest happen again.
By: Alrjandro Ovalle on February 23, 2012
at 11:00 pm
Say dawg ! (: this is jt just living a comment so you can give me a better grade in class? just a normal comment like this one right??.. well girls txt me, take care bye <3
By: sergio olivares 5th period on February 24, 2012
at 9:40 am
The Dust Bowl, I hope it doesn’t happen to us.
By: Christine Alardin on February 24, 2012
at 9:51 am
They suffer through dry climates ect.
By: Lissette Mercado on February 24, 2012
at 10:29 am
The Dust Bowl was very severe, and it impacted mostly everyone in its way. The days were hot and dry and the dust flew all over peoples faces.
By: Adan De Leon 1st period on February 24, 2012
at 10:29 am
The Dust Bowl, it was dry.(;
By: Pablo (ballislife) Chavez 1st on February 24, 2012
at 10:29 am
Dust Bowl?
Is that like Super Bowl?
By: Uriel (based) Macias on February 24, 2012
at 10:30 am
I didn’t know dust bowls were that bad.
By: Samantha Zena 1st on February 24, 2012
at 12:09 pm
This series of events is known as “The Dust Bowl,” with capitals, precisely because it was so bad. Dry seasons come and go, and even droughts. Dust storms are not exactly uncommon. But this was a disaster largely caused by human activities, which joined with particularly nasty weather conditions to produce tragedies of truly epic proportions.
Most dry seasons are not so bad.
By: Ed Darrell on February 24, 2012
at 12:14 pm
I really learned a lot reading this, and watching the video in class.
Thanks for this!
By: Ashley Garcia on February 24, 2012
at 1:09 pm
I do believe we coould have another dust bowl. Our conservation practices have improved but i do not if it is enough to prevent another occurence like the Dust Bowl.
By: Dalia Herrera on February 27, 2012
at 2:00 pm
i hope nothing like dis would ever happen
By: miguel mijares 4th period on February 27, 2012
at 2:48 pm
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By: The Grapes of Wrath « A Film Log on March 30, 2012
at 5:35 pm