what was the dust bowl in america

Full Answer

What was life like during the Dust Bowl?

The Dust Bowl was the name given to the drought-stricken Southern Plains region of the United States, which suffered severe dust storms during a dry period in the 1930s. As high winds and choking dust swept the region from Texas to Nebraska, people and livestock were killed and crops failed across the entire region.

What was the long term effect of the Dust Bowl?

The Dust Bowl: The Worst Environmental Disaster in the United States

• The Dust Bowl Causes and Effects. In the summer of 1931, rain stopped falling and a drought that would last for most of the decade descended on the region.
• Frequency and Severity of Storms. The weather got worse long before it got better. ...
• Black Sunday. ...
• Disaster Gives Way to Hope. ...
• Looking Ahead: Present and Future Dangers. ...

What were the causes of the Dust Bowl?

The biggest “proximate cause” of the drought remains unidentified, the report found, and it was most likely the result of random natural weather and climate variability.

What happened after the Dust Bowl?

What happened after the Dust Bowl ended? Rain falls, but the damage is done Although it seemed like the drought would never end to many, it finally did. In the fall of 1939, rain finally returned in significant amounts to many areas of the Great Plains, signaling the end of the Dust Bowl. Click to see full answer.

What was the Dust Bowl and what caused it?

Economic depression coupled with extended drought, unusually high temperatures, poor agricultural practices and the resulting wind erosion all contributed to making the Dust Bowl.

Was the Dust Bowl man made?

The Dust Bowl was both a manmade and natural disaster. Lured by record wheat prices and promises by land developers that “rain follows the plow,” farmers powered by new gasoline tractors over-plowed and over-grazed the southern Plains.

Why was the Dust Bowl so important?

The era became known as the legendary Dust Bowl. The Dust Bowl brought ecological, economical and human misery to America during a time when it was already suffering under the Great Depression. While the economic decline caused by the Great Depression played a role, it was hardly the only guilty party.

What was the Dust Bowl and when did it happen?

1930 – 1936Dust Bowl / Period

How did they stop the Dust Bowl?

Although it seemed like the drought would never end to many, it finally did. In the fall of 1939, rain finally returned in significant amounts to many areas of the Great Plains, signaling the end of the Dust Bowl.

How long did Dust Bowl last?

The Dust Bowl, also known as “the Dirty Thirties,” started in 1930 and lasted for about a decade, but its long-term economic impacts on the region lingered much longer. Severe drought hit the Midwest and southern Great Plains in 1930. Massive dust storms began in 1931.

Are dust bowls still occurring today?

But in some places in the world there are huge new dust bowls forming now that dwarf the U.S. Dust Bowl of the 1930s. One is in Africa, south of the Sahara. There is a strip of land going across Africa with relatively low rainfall and a lot of cattle and goats.

Can the Dust Bowl happen again?

Such conditions could be expected to occur naturally only rarely – about once a century. But with rising concentrations of greenhouse gases in the atmosphere, dust bowl conditions are likely to become much more frequent events.

Who benefited from the Dust Bowl?

The shift particularly benefited Dust Bowl farmers, and nearly all participated. AAA payments became the major source of farm income by 1937. One of President Roosevelt's personal favorites among the New Deal programs was the Civilian Conservation Corps (CCC).

How did the Dust Bowl affect people?

The land became almost uninhabitable, and over two million people left their homes throughout the course of the dust bowl in search of a new life elsewhere. Many ended up nearly starved to death and homeless. Some of the states severely affected were Oklahoma, Kansas, Texas, New Mexico, and Colorado.

Who did the Dust Bowl affect the most?

The areas most affected were the panhandles of Texas and Oklahoma, northeastern New Mexico, southeastern Colorado, and southwestern Kansas. The Dust Bowl was to last for nearly a decade [1].

What state was most affected by the Dust Bowl?

As a result, dust storms raged nearly everywhere, but the most severely affected areas were in the Oklahoma (Cimarron, Texas, and Beaver counties) and Texas panhandles, western Kansas, and eastern Colorado and northeastern New Mexico.

Why was the Dust Bowl the first man made disaster?

The Dust Bowl was a man-made environmental disaster. It unfolded on the nation's Great Plains, where decades of intensive farming and inattention to soil conservation had left the vast region ecologically vulnerable. A long drought in the early and mid-1930s triggered disaster.

Who was blamed for the Dust Bowl?

Experts have blamed the original Dust Bowl events on a combination of climate and agricultural drivers. Beginning in the 1920s, croplands across the Great Plains expanded massively—thanks in large part to mechanized farming and easy plowing.

Can the Dust Bowl happen again?

Such conditions could be expected to occur naturally only rarely – about once a century. But with rising concentrations of greenhouse gases in the atmosphere, dust bowl conditions are likely to become much more frequent events.

Could the Dust Bowl have been prevented?

Unfortunately, the Dust Bowl could have been avoided if the settlers had recalled the dry history of the area, had used different farming methods, and had not overplowed and overgrazed the land.

Where is the Dust Bowl?

Dust Bowl, section of the Great Plains of the United States that extended over southeastern Colorado, southwestern Kansas, the panhandles of Texas and Oklahoma, and northeastern New Mexico. Abandoned farmstead in the Dust Bowl region of Oklahoma, showing the effects of wind erosion, 1937.

What is the Dust Bowl poster?

Dust Bowl: USDA poster. A U.S. Department of Agriculture poster from the Dust Bowl era urging farmers on the Great Plains to plant windbreaks (also known as shelterbelts) to halt erosion. U.S. Department of Agriculture. Get a Britannica Premium subscription and gain access to exclusive content. Subscribe Now.

What were the shelterbelts in the Dust Bowl?

The wind erosion was gradually halted with federal aid. Windbreaks known as shelterbelts—swaths of trees that protect soil and crops from wind—were planted, and much of the grassland was restored. By the early 1940s the area had largely recovered. Dust Bowl: windbreaks.

What was the song that characterized the Dust Bowl?

Their plight was characterized in songs such as “Dust Bowl Refugee” and “Do Re Mi” by folksinger Woody Guthrie, an Oklahoman who had joined the parade of those headed west in search of work. That experience was perhaps most famously depicted in John Steinbeck’s novel The Grapes of Wrath(1939).

How many people fled the Plains?

…whole area into a vast Dust Bowl and destroyed crops and livestock in unprecedented amounts. As a result, some 2.5 million people fled the Plains states, many bound for California, where the promise of sunshine and a better life often collided with the reality of scarce, poorly paid work as…

How many trees were planted in the 1935 shelterbelt?

A swath of three-year-old trees forming a windbreak (also known as a shelterbelt), part of a 1935 federal project that saw the planting of some 200 million trees in a 100-mile wide (160-km), 1,000-mile (1,600-km) long barricade meant to halt the wind erosion that had decimated a section of the Great Plains known as the Dust Bowl.

Who was the woman who left the Dust Bowl?

Dorothea Lange —Farm Security Administration/Office of War Information/Library of Congress, Washington, D.C. (reproduction no. LC-USF34-T01-016453-E) Thousands of families were forced to leave the Dust Bowl at the height of the Great Depression in the early and mid-1930s.

What was the Dust Bowl?

The Dust Bowl was a period of severe dust storms that greatly damaged the ecology and agriculture of the American and Canadian prairies during the 1930s ; severe drought and a failure to apply dryland farming methods to prevent the aeolian processes (wind erosion) caused the phenomenon. The drought came in three waves: 1934, 1936, and 1939–1940, but some regions of the High Plains experienced drought conditions for as many as eight years.

Where was the Dust Bowl in 1935?

A dust storm approaches Stratford, Texas, in 1935. The Dust Bowl area lies principally west of the 100th meridian on the High Plains, characterized by plains which vary from rolling in the north to flat in the Llano Estacado.

How much dust did the Dust Bowl remove?

Beginning on May 9, 1934, a strong, two-day dust storm removed massive amounts of Great Plains topsoil in one of the worst such storms of the Dust Bowl. The dust clouds blew all the way to Chicago, where they deposited 12 million pounds of dust (~ 5500 tonnes).

How much did the Dust Bowl cost in 1936?

The Dust Bowl forced tens of thousands of poverty-stricken families, who were unable to pay mortgages or grow crops, to abandon their farms, and losses reached $25 million per day by 1936 (equivalent to $470,000,000 in 2020).

Why did farmers not get credit in the Dust Bowl?

A second explanation is a lack of availability of credit, caused by the high rate of failure of banks in the Plains states. Because banks failed in the Dust Bowl region at a higher rate than elsewhere, farmers could not get the credit they needed to obtain capital to shift crop production. In addition, profit margins in either animals or hay were still minimal, and farmers had little incentive in the beginning to change their crops.

What caused the Great Plains to become dry?

After fairly favorable climatic conditions in the 1920s with good rainfall and relatively moderate winters, which permitted increased settlement and cultivation in the Great Plains, the region entered an unusually dry era in the summer of 1930. During the next decade, the northern plains suffered four of their seven driest calendar years since 1895, Kansas four of its twelve driest, and the entire region south to West Texas lacked any period of above-normal rainfall until record rains hit in 1941. When severe drought struck the Great Plains region in the 1930s, it resulted in erosion and loss of topsoil because of farming practices at the time. The drought dried the topsoil and over time it became friable, reduced to a powdery consistency in some places. Without the indigenous grasses in place, the high winds that occur on the plains picked up the topsoil and created the massive dust storms that marked the Dust Bowl period. The persistent dry weather caused crops to fail, leaving the plowed fields exposed to wind erosion. The fine soil of the Great Plains was easily eroded and carried east by strong continental winds.

How did the Dust Bowl affect Kansas?

Developed in 1937 to speed up the process and increase returns from pasture, the "hay method" was originally supposed to occur in Kansas naturally over 25–40 years. After much data analysis, the causal mechanism for the droughts can be linked to ocean temperature anomalies. Specifically, Atlantic Ocean sea surface temperatures appear to have had an indirect effect on the general atmospheric circulation, while Pacific sea surface temperatures seem to have had the most direct influence.

How many people fled the Dust Bowl?

The Okie Migration: Throughout the 1930s, 2.5 million people fled the Dust Bowl states (map below). Most traveled west, especially to California, looking for work in one of the largest migrations in United States history. The people who migrated, called “Okies” regardless of whether or not they were from Oklahoma, had lost everything, so most were poor. They faced discrimination, menial labor and poor wages in the places they moved to. Without a workforce, the economies of the states they left behind were completely devastated. The Grapes of Wrath (1939) by John Steinbeck tells the story of the Joad family, who flee Oklahoma during the Dust Bowl.

When was the Dust Storm of 1935?

The worst dust storm occurred on April 14, 1935, a day that was nicknamed “Black Sunday.”

What was the Great Depression?

The Great Depression: The Great Depression was a severe worldwide economic crisis that began with the stock market crash in 1929. Wheat prices in the United States plummeted, so farmers in the Great Plains had to plow up more grassland and plant more wheat just to make a profit. This further contributed to the environmental degradation brought on by the Dust Bowl.

When did the Dust Bowl happen?

The drought is the worst ever in U.S. history, covering more than 75 percent of the country and affecting 27 states severely. June 28, 1934.

What was the worst blizzard in the Dust Bowl?

Black Sunday. The worst “black blizzard” of the Dust Bowl occurs, causing extensive damage. April 27, 1935. Congress declares soil erosion “a national menace” in an act establishing the Soil Conservation Service in the Department of Agriculture (formerly the Soil Erosion Service in the U.S. Department of Interior).

How much topsoil was there in 1935?

December 1935. At a meeting in Pueblo, Colorado, experts estimate that 850,000,000 tons of topsoil has blown off the Southern Plains during the course of the year, and that if the drought continues, the total area affected would increase from 4,350,000 acres to 5,350,000 acres by the spring of 1936.

What was the date of the 1935 drought?

April 8 , 1935. FDR approves the Emergency Relief Appropriation Act, which provides $525 million for drought relief, and authorizes creation of the Works Progress Administration, which will employ 8.5 million people. April 14, 1935. Black Sunday.

What was the purpose of the 1935 drought relief program?

January 15, 1935. The federal government forms a Drought Relief Service to coordinate relief activities. The DRS buys cattle in counties that are designated emergency areas, for $14 to $20 a head. Those unfit for human consumption – more than 50 percent at the beginning of the program – are destroyed.

How many acres of land were destroyed in 1934?

December 1934. The “Yearbook of Agriculture” for 1934 announces, “Approximately 35 million acres of formerly cultivated land have essentially been destroyed for crop production…. 100 million acres now in crops have lost all or most of the topsoil; 125 million acres of land now in crops are rapidly losing topsoil….”.

When was the first soil erosion control camp in Alabama?

The Farm Credit Act of 1933 establishes a local bank and sets up local credit associations. June 18, 1933 . The Civilian Conservation Corps opens the first soil erosion control camp in Clayton County, Alabama. By September there will be 161 soil erosion camps. September 1933.

Where did the Dust Bowl refugees come from?

Many, but not all, of the Dust Bowl refugees hailed from Oklahoma. As they flooded the West Coast in large numbers in search of jobs, they were given the disparaging nickname “Okies.”. 8. The federal government paid farmers to plow under fields and butcher livestock.

What diseases did the Dust Bowl suffer?

The swirling dust proved deadly. Those who inhaled the airborne prairie dust suffered coughing spasms, shortness of breath, asthma, bronchitis and influenza. Much like miners, Dust Bowl residents exhibited signs of silicosis from breathing in the extremely fine silt particulates, which had high silica content.

What was the name of the storm that hit the Atlantic Ocean?

Christopher Klein. 1. One monster dust storm reached the Atlantic Ocean. While “black blizzards” constantly menaced Plains states in the 1930s, a massive dust storm 2 miles high traveled 2,000 miles before hitting the East Coast on May 11, 1934. For five hours, a fog of prairie dirt enshrouded landmarks such as the Statue of Liberty and the U.S.

Did farmers flee the Dust Bowl?

Most farm families did not flee the Dust Bowl. John Steinbeck’s story of migrating tenant farmers in his Pulitzer Prize-winning 1939 novel, “The Grapes of Wrath,” tends to obscure the fact that upwards of three-quarters of farmers in the Dust Bowl stayed put. Dust Bowl refugees did not flood California.

Was the Dust Bowl a natural disaster?

The Dust Bowl was both a manmade and natural disaster. Beginning with World War I, American wheat harvests flowed like gold as demand boomed. Lured by record wheat prices and promises by land developers that “rain follows the plow,” farmers powered by new gasoline tractors over-plowed and over-grazed the southern Plains.

How many acres were covered in the Dust Bowl?

At its worst, the Dust Bowl covered about 100 million acres in the Southern Plains, an area roughly the size of Pennsylvania. Dust storms also swept across the northern prairies of the United States and Canada, but the damage there couldn't compare to the devastation farther south.

Why did people flee the Dust Bowl?

More than a quarter-million people became environmental refugees —they fled the Dust Bowl during the 1930s because they no longer had the reason or courage to stay. Three times that number remained on the land, however, and continued to battle the dust and to search the sky for signs of rain.

What was the worst environmental disaster in the United States?

The Dust Bowl: The Worst Environmental Disaster in the United States. South of Lamar, Colorado, a large dust cloud appears behind a truck traveling on highway 59, May 1936. PhotoQuest/Archive Photos/Getty Images. Many accidents and natural disasters have done serious environmental damage to the United States.

How did the Dust Bowl affect the Southern Plains?

On the Southern Plains, the sky turned lethal. Livestock went blind and suffocated, their stomachs full of fine sand. Farmers, unable to see through the blowing sand, tied themselves to guide ropes to make the walk from their houses to their barns. It didn't stop there; the Dust Bowl affected all people.

How did the Dust Bowl affect people?

It didn't stop there; the Dust Bowl affected all people. Families wore respiratory masks handed out by Red Cross workers, cleaned their homes each morning with shovels and brooms, and draped wet sheets over doors and windows to help filter out the dust. Still, children and adults inhaled sand, coughed up dirt, and died of a new epidemic called "dust pneumonia."

What are the most important environmental disasters?

Some of the most famous events include the 1989 Exxon Valdez oil spill, the 2008 coal ash spill in Tennessee, and the Love Canal toxic dump disaster that came to light in the 1970s. But despite their tragic consequences, none of these events come close to being the worst environmental disaster in the United States. That grave title belongs to the 1930s Dust Bowl, created by the drought, erosion, and dust storms (or "black blizzards") of the so-called Dirty Thirties. It was the most damaging and prolonged environmental disaster in American history.

What would happen if the Great Plains ran out of water?

If the water runs out, there won't be any for the cotton or the inexpensive clothing, and the Great Plains could be the site of yet another environmental disaster.

What was the Dust Bowl?

Jacob Miller - June 29, 2017. The Dust Bowl was a series severe dust storms that affected 100,000,000 acres of the American prairie caused by drought and poor farming techniques. Drought plagued the Mid-West from 1934 to 1940. In order to plant crops, farmers removed the deep-rooted grasses which kept the soil moist during periods ...

Where was the Dust Bowl in 1935?

Title: Dust bowl farmer driving tractor with young son near Cland, New Mexico. Dorothea Lange. Photo of a dust storm in Tyrone, Okla., taken on April 14, 1935. The Dust Bowl of the 1930s sent more than a million residents of the area to California.

How many people moved out of the Plains?

Families across the prairie were displaced by the drought and storms. Between 1930 and 1940 3.5 million people moved out of the Plains states, most of whom went to California. Dust Bowl. Dallas, South Dakota 1936. Wikimedia.

What was the name of the storm that blew away the soil in Chicago?

During the drought, the exposed, plowed soil blew away in huge dust clouds called ‘black blizzards’ or ‘black rollers’ . On May 9, 1934 there was a storm so severe that 12 million pounds of dust was deposited in Chicago.

What did the Federal Government do to help the Mid West?

The Federal Government encouraged settlement and development of the Mid-West. The Homestead Act of 1862, the Kinkaid Act of 1904, and the Enlarged Homestead Act of 1909 offered large tracts of land to settlers willing to move to the Great Plains.

Why did farmers remove grasses?

In order to plant crops, farmers removed the deep-rooted grasses which kept the soil moist during periods of little rain and high wind. The dehydration of the soil was exacerbated by more astringent farming techniques from newly developed mechanized farming machinery such as the tractor and combine.

Why did the government believe that rain follows the plow?

After an unusually wet and fertile season in the 1920s the government and climate scientists propagated the theory that ‘rain follows the plow’ in order to speed migration west. This theory states that human habitation and agricultural development permanently changes the climate in arid regions, making them more humid.

Overview

Government response

Geographic characteristics and early history

Drought and dust storms

Human displacement

Long-term economic impact

Influence on the arts and culture

Changes in agriculture and population on the Plains

What Happened?

How Is This Related to Climate?

• The Dust Bowl was one of the worst droughts and perhaps the worst and most prolonged disaster in United States history. It affected Kansas, Oklahoma, Texas, New Mexico and Colorado, known as the Du...

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References and Additional Resources