The book “The Worst Hard Times” written by Timothy Egan is a story about the survivors of the Dust Bowl. Throughout the novel, you see several people’s stories and the ups and down they faced leading up to and during the Dust Bowl. You see how these families faced the challenges with their living arrangements, economic struggles, and family fatalities. The main objective of this novel is to show the importance of this historical event that changed the way every single family lived and to show the environmental ignorance people had that helped lead to the results of the Dust Bowl. Egan begins the book following the family of Bam White on their travel to Texas, when they end up getting stuck in Dalhart, a place of flat land, not far from “No
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Unfortunately for him, when the next election came, there was a new president who promised, “Happy Days Are Here Again” (pg.131), this was President Franklin D. Roosevelt. Roosevelt tried to reassure people that their money would be insured. This was the creation of the Emergency Banking Bill, which said the government would insure your money and back your dollars. Next Roosevelt needed to help the farmers, so he added Hugh Bennett to his team, who was there to try and help the farmers, realizes that they needed to make a change in order to see a change. Bennett said, “Americans in the nation’s midsection had farmed to much, too fast. The land could no take that kind of assault” (pg.134). He goes on to say that the greatest grassland in the world had been destroyed and it was the farmer’s fault, but he would do his best to help renew the soil. The hope Americans saw was very temporary because they soon started asking for more, specifically rain and the dust storms were not getting any better. In 1935 everybody had coughs and had trouble breathing. Families like the Shaw family tried anything they could to keep the dust away, especially from their new baby. She tried hanging up wet sheets over the baby’s bed to catch the dust, but nothing really worked. Hazel Shaw’s baby died later that year due to dust pneumonia and her lungs being too full of dust. The worst was yet to
Unfortunately for him, when the next election came, there was a new president who promised, “Happy Days Are Here Again” (pg.131), this was President Franklin D. Roosevelt. Roosevelt tried to reassure people that their money would be insured. This was the creation of the Emergency Banking Bill, which said the government would insure your money and back your dollars. Next Roosevelt needed to help the farmers, so he added Hugh Bennett to his team, who was there to try and help the farmers, realizes that they needed to make a change in order to see a change. Bennett said, “Americans in the nation’s midsection had farmed to much, too fast. The land could no take that kind of assault” (pg.134). He goes on to say that the greatest grassland in the world had been destroyed and it was the farmer’s fault, but he would do his best to help renew the soil. The hope Americans saw was very temporary because they soon started asking for more, specifically rain and the dust storms were not getting any better. In 1935 everybody had coughs and had trouble breathing. Families like the Shaw family tried anything they could to keep the dust away, especially from their new baby. She tried hanging up wet sheets over the baby’s bed to catch the dust, but nothing really worked. Hazel Shaw’s baby died later that year due to dust pneumonia and her lungs being too full of dust. The worst was yet to