View a FREE sample

This test consists of 5 short answer questions, 10 short essay questions, and 1 (of 3) essay topics.

Short Answer Questions

1. According to historian Christopher Lasch, what was never a serious possibility in the Depression?

2. What writer did Ray Wax take as his model during the Depression?

3. What moment excited Wilbur Kane to the point of mocking his German neighbors?

4. In 1930's Appalachia, what does the KKK assist in setting up?

5. What popular American novel did Jack Kirkland adapt into a successful play?

Short Essay Questions

1. Why does Myrna Loy think she never got to meet Roosevelt in person?

2. What was Dr. Townsend's contribution to the Depression-era discourse?

3. In the Depression-era Midwest, how did corn prices lead to corn being burned and pigs being slaughtered?

4. Describe the incident with the Iowa Judge in The Father Is the Man?

5. How does Alf Landon recall his 1936 campaign against Roosevelt in the book?

6. How does Christopher Lasch explain the possibility of a socialist revolt in the 1930's?

7. What role did Elsa Ponselle play in the forming of the Teacher's Union?

8. Who was Martin Dies?

9. According to Elizabeth Wood, how did public housing develop the stigma it has today?

10. How were the prisons affected by the Depression?

Essay Topics

Write an essay for ONE of the following topics:

Essay Topic 1

Among the strangest interviews in the book are those dedicated to the plight of farmers in the Midwest, in particular the sections regarding reactions to the price of corn. Write an essay about how the fluctuating price of corn led to massive wastes of foodstuffs. What did farmers do in an attempt to boost the price of corn? What other products did they turn to when the price of corn plummeted to absurdly low levels? What absurd and, later, sensible solutions did the United States government offer?

Essay Topic 2

Write an essay on the psychological effects that the joblessness of the Great Depression has on men in America. What do interviewees recall their fathers doing to pass time and feel useful? Why did men of this era refuse to take government relief and turn so often to alcohol instead? How was America's psychiatric profession unprepared to deal with the effects of joblessness on the population? What obvious causation were psychiatrists ignoring?

Essay Topic 3

The 1930's, as a result of the abject poverty and of Prohibition, became an era of romanticized criminality. Write an essay on the popularity of illegal behavior at this time. What was the nature of the industry dedicated to circumventing Prohibition laws? Why were figures like John Dillinger and Machine Gun Kelly folk heroes for robbing the banks? To what extent were they enacting public disgust with failed institutions?

(see the answer keys)

This section contains 1,053 words (approx. 4 pages at 300 words per page) View a FREE sample