Exploring American Histories: Printed Page 719

Interpret the Evidence and Put It in Context

Interpret the Evidence

  1. Question

    What does Ann Marie Low’s description of a typical day suggest about the particular challenges women faced during the Dust Bowl era (Document 22.5)?

  2. Question

    Compare the living conditions described by a white southern sharecropper (Document 22.6) to those of the migrant family described by John Steinbeck (Document 22.8). How does the poverty of the two families differ? How would you explain the differences you note?

  3. Question

    Compare the sharecropper’s story (Document 22.6) with the photograph of the Arkansas family (Document 22.7). Do the subjects seem to react to the Great Depression in the same way? Do they seem hopeful or hopeless?

  4. Question

    According to Frank Stokes, how did the fruit packers and grove owners characterize their conflict with the Mexican farmworkers (Document 22.9)? In what ways did their characterization draw on more general conservative criticisms of the New Deal?

  5. Question

    According to the Great Plains Committee testimony (Document 22.10), what role did human-caused factors play in producing the misery that accompanied the dust storms of the early 1930s?

Put It in Context