US History: Resources by Decade: 1930s

This tumultuous decade is known for the Great Depression and the New Deal programs that helped to end the depression. Chapters discuss these subjects as well as the golden age of radio, gangsters and crime, labor disputes, and events of the time such as the Lindbergh kidnapping.

This important resource provides readers with many new ways to explore the 1930s in American history, as the country was immersed in the Great Depression. The text provides in-depth analysis of forty primary source documents to deliver a thorough examination of this important time in American history.

Probably no decade saw as many changes in the Hollywood film industry and its product as the 1930s did. At the beginning of the decade, the industry was still struggling with the transition to talking pictures. Gangster films and naughty comedies starring Mae West were popular in urban areas, but aroused threats of censorship in the heartland. Whether the film business could survive the economic effects of the Crash was up in the air. By 1939, popularly called "Hollywood's Greatest Year," films like Gone With the Wind and The Wizard of Oz used both color and sound to spectacular effect, and remain American icons today. The "mature oligopoly" that was the studio system had not only weathered the Depression and become part of mainstream culture through the establishment and enforcement of the Production Code, it was a well-oiled, vertically integrated industrial powerhouse. The ten original essays in American Cinema of the 1930s focus on sixty diverse films of the decade, including Dracula, The Public Enemy, Trouble in Paradise, 42nd Street, King Kong, Imitation of Life, The Adventures of Robin Hood, Swing Time, Angels with Dirty Faces, Nothing Sacred, Jezebel, Mr. Smith Goes toWashington, and Stagecoach .

During the 1920s and 1930s, changes in the American population, increasing urbanization, and innovations in technology exerted major influences on the daily lives of ordinary people. Explore how everyday living changed during these years when use of automobiles and home electrification first became commonplace, when radio emerged, and when cinema, with the addition of sound, became broadly popular. Find out how worklife, domestic life, and leisure-time activities were affected by these factors as well as by the politics of the time. Details of matters such as the creation of the pickup truck, the development of radio programming, and the first mass use of cosmetics provide an enjoyable read that brings the period clearly into focus. Centering its attention on the broad masses of the population, this animated reference resource emphasizes the wide variety of experiences of people living through The Roaring Twenties and The Great Depression. Readers will be surprised to discover that some of the assumptions we have about the lives of average Americans during these eras are historically inaccurate. A final chapter provides a unique look at six American communities and gives a vivid sense of the diversity of American experience over the course of these tumultuous years.

Day by Day: The Thirties is a unique, two-volume work that provides researchers of all ages with a complete, accessible chronology of the decade from 1930 to 1939. It documents the major events of the period as they unfolded each day, including the social, economic, political, and cultural issues that defined the decade. Comprehensive coverage is divided into 10 sections: World Affairs; Europe; Africa and the Middle East; The Americas; Asia and the Pacific; U.S. Politics and Social Issues; U.S. Foreign Policy and Defense; Economics and Great Depression; Science, Technology, and Nature; and Culture, Leisure, and Life Style.

During the Great Depression, the American South was not merely "the nation's number one economic problem," as President Franklin Roosevelt declared. It was also a battlefield on which forces for and against social change were starting to form. For a white southern liberal like Jonathan Daniels, editor of the Raleigh News and Observer, it was a fascinating moment to explore. Attuned to culture as well as politics, Daniels knew the true South lay somewhere between Erskine Caldwell's Tobacco Road and Margaret Mitchell's Gone with the Wind. On May 5, 1937, he set out to find it, driving thousands of miles in his trusty Plymouth and ultimately interviewing even Mitchell herself. In Discovering the South historian Jennifer Ritterhouse pieces together Daniels's unpublished notes from his tour along with his published writings and a wealth of archival evidence to put this one man's journey through a South in transition into a larger context. Daniels's well chosen itinerary brought him face to face with the full range of political and cultural possibilities in the South of the 1930s, from New Deal liberalism and social planning in the Tennessee Valley Authority, to Communist agitation in the Scottsboro case, to planters' and industrialists' reactionary worldview and repressive violence. The result is a lively narrative of black and white southerners fighting for and against democratic social change at the start of the nation's long civil rights era. For more information on this book, see www.discoveringthesouth.org.

"The stunning true story of the rise of Nazism in America in the years leading to WWII—and the fearless Jewish gangsters and crime families who joined forces to fight back. With an intense cinematic style, acclaimed nonfiction crime author Michael Benson reveals the thrilling role of Jewish mobsters like Bugsy Siegel in stomping out the terrifying tide of Nazi sympathizers during the 1930s and 1940s. Goodreads Top Nonfiction of 2022 As Adolph Hitler rose to power in 1930s Germany, a growing wave of fascism began to take root on American soil. Nazi activists started to gather in major American cities, and by 1933, there were more than one-hundred anti-Semitic groups operating openly in the United States. Few Americans dared to speak out or fight back—until an organized resistance of notorious mobsters waged their own personal war against the Nazis in their midst. Gangland-style. . . . In this thrilling blow-by-blow account, acclaimed crime writer Michael Benson uncovers the shocking truth about the insidious rise of Nazism in America—and the Jewish mobsters who stomped it out. Learn about: * Nazi Town, USA: How one Long Island community named a street after Hitler, decorated buildings with swastikas, and set up a camp to teach US citizens how to goosestep. * Meyer Lansky and Murder Inc.: How a Jewish mob accountant led fifteen goons on a joint family mission to bust heads at a Brown Shirt rally in Manhattan. * Fritz Kuhn, “The Vest-Pocket Hitler”: How a German immigrant spread Nazi propaganda through the American Bund in New York City—with 70 branches across the US. * Newark Nazis vs The Minutemen: How a Jewish resistance group, led by a prize fighter and bootlegger for the mob, waged war on the Bund in the streets of Newark. * Hitler in Hollywoodland: How Sunset Strip kingpin Mickey Cohen knocked two Brown Shirters’ heads together—and became the West Coast champion in the mob’s war on Nazis. Packed with surprising, little-known facts, graphic details, and unforgettable personalities, Gangsters vs. Nazis chronicles the mob’s most ruthless tactics in taking down fascism—inspiring ordinary Americans to join them in their fight. The book culminates in one of the most infamous events of the pre-war era—the 1939 Nazi rally in Madison Square Garden—in which law-abiding citizens stood alongside hardened criminals to fight for the soul of a nation. This is the story of the mob that’s rarely told—one of the most fascinating chapters in American history and American organized crime." ProQuest Ebook Central description

Amid the deprivation and despair of the Great Depression, Shirley Temple radiated a spirit of optimism and plucky good cheer. Her image appeared in periodicals and advertisements daily; she rivalled Franklin D. Roosevelt and Edward VIII as the most photographed person in the world. For four consecutive years she was the world's box-office champion. John F. Kasson shows how Temple astonished movie veterans, created a new international culture of celebrity and revolutionised the role of children as consumers. Celebrating the prospect of lifting the Depression, tap-dancing across racial boundaries with Bill "Bojangles" Robinson, foiling villains and mending the hearts of the deserving, she personified the hopes and dreams of Americans while working virtually every day of her childhood.

Who was Rosie and who was Mrs. America? They weren't specific individuals; rather, they were symbols that defined perceptions of women during the 1930s and 1940s. the jubilance of the previous decade--the Roaring Twenties--was silenced by the stock market crash of 1929. Now the Great Depression challenged women in their homes, as Mrs. America had to learn how to ''make do'' with less. and as men left for battle fronts, World War II propelled women to take their place in factories, becoming Rosie the Riveter. As girls and women of the 1930s and 1940s searched for their own identities, the media of the times tried to influence their paths. Magazine advertisements and mail-order catalogs showed women how to be both fashionable and frugal. Screwball comedies on the movie screen and the romantic soap operas on the radio portrayed women who took life lightly. But many women ignored these stereotypes and forged paths that women had never pursued before, in careers as pilots, foreign correspondents, musicians, and social activists. Learn more about the images and issues that framed perceptions about women in these difficult decades.