Dust Bowl Dbq Analysis

Farmers arrived in the Sothern Great Plains in the 1880s. The land was very cheap there. The farmers lived in soddies. However, the Southern Great Plains rarely got rainfall. Therefore, some farmers and there families moved away. However, the government passed the Enlarged Homestead Act. It said that if anyone could hang on for three years, they would receive 320 acres of land. World War 1 was good for the Plains farmers. The farmers were able to sell wheat at a very high price to Europe. However, there was a downfall. Along with the unemployment during the Great Depression, there were severe dust storms. In the 1930s, more than 3 million people left their farms to get away from the deadly storms. Many more stayed where they were. They covered …show more content…
One reason was that there was just not enough rainfall to sustain the crops. John Wesley Powell says that it is necessary to have 20 inches of annual rainfall in the Southern Great Plains to support farming. Sadly, the average annual rainfall was 17 inches. The Southern Great Plains could not support farming. Therefore, the crops died and more dust storms came (Doc. E). Fred Folkers was barely staying afloat with his horse-drawn plow. The tractor changed everything for him. A tractor could do the work of ten horses! The tractor reduced the time needed to farm an acre of wheat. This meant that he could farm larger farms and grow more wheat. However, it meant that there was a greater loss of short grass. Folkers may have been a great businessman with the efficient machines, but he was destroying the short grass that held the soil in place (Doc. C). Our lives are dependent on grass. Grass is what feeds the cattle that feed us. The short grass prairie covers the soil and holds it in place. It absorbs rainwater and prevents erosion. When farmers plow the fields and don’t get enough rainfall, their crops die. Soon the dry soil with turn into dust and create the dust storms (Doc.