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President Hoover assured the American nation that economic recovery was on its way, but the president’s optimism was contradicted by makeshift shantytowns, called “Hoovervilles,” that sprang up on the edges of America’s cities. Newspapers used as cover by those sleeping on the streets were “Hoover blankets.” An empty pocket turned inside out was a “Hoover flag,” and jackrabbits caught for food were “Hoover hogs.” Bitter jokes circulated about the increasingly unpopular president. One told of Hoover asking for a nickel to telephone a friend. Flipping him a dime, an aide said, “Here, call them both.”

While Hoover practiced denial, other Americans sought refuge from reality at the movies. Throughout the depression, between 60 million and 75 million people (nearly two-thirds of the nation) scraped together enough change to fill the movie palaces every week. Box office hits such as 42nd Street and Gold Diggers of 1933 capitalized on the hope that prosperity lay just around the corner. But a few filmmakers grappled with realities rather than escape them. The Public Enemy (1931) taught hard lessons about gangsters’ ill-gotten gains. Indeed, under the new production code of 1930, designed to protect public morals, all movies had to find some way to show that crime did not pay.

Despite Hollywood’s efforts to keep Americans on the right side of the law, crime increased. In the countryside, the plight of people who had lost their farms to bank foreclosures led to the romantic idea that bank robbers were only getting back what banks had stolen from the poor. Woody Guthrie, the populist folksinger from Oklahoma, captured the public’s tolerance for outlaws in his tribute to a murderous bank robber with a choirboy face, “The Ballad of Pretty Boy Floyd.” Guthrie sang that there were two kinds of robbers, those who used guns and those who used pens, and he observed that robbers with guns, like Pretty Boy Floyd, never drove families from their homes. Named Public Enemy No. 1, Floyd was shot and killed by police in 1934. His funeral in Oklahoma was attended by between 20,000 and 40,000 people, many of whom viewed Floyd as a tragic figure, a victim of the hard times.