What Caused The Dust Bowl Essay - 2374 Words

What Caused the Dust Bowl? One of America’s most beloved books is John Steinbeck’s The Grapes of Wrath. The book portrays a family, the Joads, who leave Oklahoma and move to California in search of a more prosperous life. Steinbeck’s book garnered acclaim both from critics and from the American public. The story struck a chord with the American people because Steinbeck truly captured the angst and heartbreak of those directly impacted by the Dust Bowl disaster. To truly comprehend the havoc the Dust Bowl wreaked, one must first understand how and why the Dust Bowl took place and who it affected the most. The Dust Bowl was the result of a conglomeration of weather, falling crop prices, and government policies. The Dust Bowl, a tragic era†¦show more content†¦For example, in February much of the United States had recorded frigid temperatures and North Dakota hit an all-time extreme record low of minus sixty degrees (Hutchinson, 35) . In contrast to the high temperatures, in the summer of 1936 strong upper-atmosphere high pressure systems locked over North America which caused very high temperatures. All but two states experienced protracted temperatures in excess of 100 degrees. Seventy-five percent of those states experienced temperatures that exceeded 110. The high for Kansas in 1936 was in Alton which reached 121 degrees in July. Conditions were so severe that federal officials warned that America’s agricultural belt was in real danger of being transformed into a desert. The heat wave cost $1 billion in crop and livestock losses. On July 15th of 1936, the Chicago Tribune estimated that 1,000 people a day were dying and continued at that pace for several days. In addition to the extreme temperatures, lack of rain was also a major factor in the Dust Bowl. The 1934 drought was the most devastating in American history. In 1934, twenty-four states suffered sufficiently from the drought. There was no significant amount of rain from 1930 to 1939. The drought was so bad people started to believe they could produce rain. Tex Thorton, in Delhart Texas, believed that if he set off explosions on the ground it would rattle the atmosphere and cause it to rain. He was paid three hundred dollars to set off explosions, butShow MoreRelatedWhat Caused the Dust Bowl?753 Words   |  4 Pagesplowing year after year and the lack of rainfall, the soil was quickly losing its fertility. With unfertile, dry land, the wheat crop started dying, and then blowing away with wind. Due to the improper farming, along with a long drought, dust storms made life in the Dust Bowl very burdensome. During the 1930s, the Great Plains was plagued with a drought, a long period of dryness, which brought demise to many of the farmers in the region. This horrible drought started in 1930, a year that saw heavy rainsRead MoreThe Dust Bowl Essay1436 Words   |  6 PagesIn what was one of the most fertile areas of the United States, one of the Nation’s worst agricultural disasters occurred. No rain came so crops did not grow, leaving the soil exposed to the high winds that hit the area in the 1930s. Stretching over a 150,000 square mile area and encompassing parts of five states—these being Texas, Oklahoma, Kansas, Colorado, and New Mexico—the Dust Bowl was a time where over 100 million acres of topsoil were stripped from fertile fields leaving nothing but barrenRead MoreThe Great Depression And Dust Bowl1165 Words   |  5 PagesDepression/Dust Bowl The ‘Dirty Thirties’ is perhaps one of the most known time periods in American History. During the 1930s, the worst and longest drought occurred in the United States, this was also know as the Dust Bowl. According to Christopher Klein, the Dust Bowl is considered both a man-made and natural disaster. In fact, many events contributed to the Dust Bowl such as poor farming techniques, a severe drought, and economic depression. One of the main causes of the Dust Bowl was the poorRead MoreThe Dust Bowl and Agriculture Essay1070 Words   |  5 Pages One has not experienced the life of living in dirt until he has been in the dust bowl. It was a decade-long dust storm that impacted hundreds of farmers and their farmlands. Hardship was among one of the influences of the storm, which affected both farm workers and city folks. The storm also brought the elements of destruction and darkness, which reigned chaos across the Plains. Together, these issues gave the storm its popular name, â€Å"black blizzard† (Documentary, 2014). Such a name was given dueRead MoreDust Bowl Bt Donald Worster Essay764 Words   |  4 PagesDust Bowl: Donald Worster The 1930s are a decade marked by devastation; the nation was in an economic crisis, millions of people were going hungry, and jobless. America was going through some dark times. But if you were living in Texas, Oklahoma, Kansas (or any of those surrounding states) you had bigger things on your mind than being denied the money in your bank account. From 1935-1939 Winds and dust storms had left a good portion of our country desolate; however our author takes a slightlyRead MoreThe Dust Bowl Of The United States1132 Words   |  5 Pageshardly quintessential. A notable provoker for this adversity was the dust storm known as the â€Å"Dust Bowl†, that lasted until about 1940. The Dust Bowl had consequences all over the United States. Besides causing the largest migration in American history when people began fleeing the midwest, it lead to the deaths of thousands of people and prompted soil conservation campaigns that called forth on the federal government. The Dust Bowl was an entirely avoidable tragedy rooted in greed and ignorance whereRead MoreThe Dust Bowl Of The Great West1172 Words   |  5 PagesLucia Martinez Professor Kim Wombles English 1302 September 21, 2015 The Dust Bowl Imagine a great wall closing in on you with nowhere to run. Imagine sweeping a floor of sand that will never go away. Imagine having a terrible cough that leaves your throat irritated and raw to the point where you are coughing up blood. Imagine the disappointment of realizing a possible rain cloud is really a wall of dust rushing your way. For people living in the Midwest during the 1930s this wasRead MoreThe Dust Bowl And The Great Depression By Margaret Larason1599 Words   |  7 Pages The Dust Bowl and the Great Depression were catastrophic events that occurred in the mid-1930s and affected the Great Plains. One place in particular that suffered was the Oklahoma panhandle. The dust storms were so bad that farmers could not make a living, and the land was almost un-inhabitable. This drove many families to leave the panhandle and flee to places like California. Margaret Larason is a woman who was born in the pan handle before the Dust Bowl and Great Depression, and she even livedRead MoreThe Black Blizzard And The Dust Bowl1570 Words   |  7 PagesDuring the Dust Bowl many people and kids have suffered, many lost their home and their towns got ruined. One of the people who has suffered in the Dust Bowl is Ashton. When Ashton went to his school he was immediately pulled in by his teacher Mrs. Kam. He was then told that the entire middle east was affected by the Dust Bowl and that a black blizzard will hit very soon. Then the winds outside started to get faster, th e windows getting hit by all the dust gathered from the storm, but luckily forRead MoreEffects Of The Dust Bowl On The United States And The Eastern Europe1285 Words   |  6 PagesTeaching environmental responsibility is an important aspect of students’ education. The lesson will focus on studying the consequences of the Dust Bowl and the Chernobyl Disaster on the U.S. and the Eastern Europe. Discovering reasons and analyzing impacts of these catastrophic disasters will help raise students’ awareness and understanding of the importance of making responsible environmental decisions. By instilling in students environmental awareness, the lesson also contributes to building lifelong