Chapter 21

Question 1

What is meant by a “Bull Market” when it comes to the stock market?

Answer 1

It’s when the value of stock shares are rising, which encourages people to buy stock.

Question 2

Why was the period from 1927-1929 called “The Big Bull Market”?

Answer 2

Because almost overnight stock prices doubled and even tripled, which made people want to buy more and made them feel very wealthy.

Question 3

What does it mean to say the “stock market crashed”?

Answer 3

It’s when people feel the stock prices are too high so they try to sell, but nobody else wants to buy their stock. This causes the value of the stocks to go down, which causes more panic and selling. Eventually people can lose all their money.

Question 4

On what date did the stock market start to crash, and what did it become known as?

Answer 4

October 24, 1929 and it became known as Black Thursday

Question 5

What happened to people who invested in the stock market when it crashed?

Answer 5

A million Americans lost all of their money and were wiped out, financially. Banks also were weakened because they had loaned money to people so they could buy stocks, and now those people couldn’t pay the banks back.

Question 6

The stock market crashed started a period in American history called…?

Answer 6

The Great Depression

Question 7

Who was president when the Great Depression started in 1929?

When the Great Depression started, what did he try to do?

Answer 7

Herbert Hoover

Whent he Great Depression started, he tried to reassure the American people that things were OK

Question 8

What did Herbert Hoover think the top priority of the Federal government should be during the Great Depression?

Answer 8

Hoover believed that the government should help business recover, and that taking care of poor and starving people should be the job of the States

Question 9

How long did the Depression last and how many Americans could not find jobs (meaning they were unemployed)?

Answer 9

The Depression lasted four years from 1929-1933. By March of 1930, 4 million people didn’t have jobs. By 1932 that number was 25 million.

Question 10

What was the Bonus Expeditionary Force (BEF)?

Answer 10

It was a group of about 15,000 former soldiers (veterans) who marched on Washington to protest that they were hungry and didn’t get a promised military cash bonus.

Question 11

How did Hoover react to the Bonus Expeditionary Force march?

What did that do to Hoover’s reputation?

Answer 11

The called in federal troops to remove them from Washington DC.

People believed Hoover was insensitive and cruel.

Question 12

Who was elected president after Hoover, and it what year?

Answer 12

Franklin Roosevelt was elected president in 1933, right at the worst time of the Depression.

Question 13

What disease did Franklin Roosevelt contract when he was younger, and how old was he when he got it?

Answer 13

Franklin Roosevelt contracted polio when he was 39, which forced him to use a wheelchair

Question 14

How long did Roosevelt serve as President, and what made him special about that?

Who was his wife?

Answer 14

Roosevelt was President for more than 12 years in total. He is the only President to have served four terms.

His wife was Eleanor Roosevelt.

Question 15

What did Roosevelt call his plan to help the country get over the Depression?

Answer 15

He called his plan “The New Deal”

Question 16

How did Roosevelt help people get more confidence in banks and the stock market?

Answer 16

He created the “Federal Deposit Insurance Corporation” (FDIC) which insured bank deposits, guaranteeing people that they would never lose their money again. He declared a “bank holiday” where banks shut down until the government could figure out if they were in good shape or not.

He also created the Securities and Exchance Commission to develop rules for the stock market so that a stock market crash could be avoided in the future.

Question 17

Where did homeless people live during the Depression, and how did they find food?

Answer 17

Every city had lots of homeless people who lived in parks, slept in cardboard boxes, and had to go places called “soup kitchens” to find food to eat.

Question 18

What was the Dust Bowl?

Answer 18

The Dust Bowl extended from Canada all the way to Texas and it was the part of the United States where the ground became very dry. This happened because of a long drought (drought means it didn’t rain for a long time) Windstorms would kick up the dirt and cover everything with it.

Question 19

What happened to many farmers during the Depression?

Answer 19

Food prices dropped so they couldn’t make enough money to pay their bills. Some of them threw food away or burned crops trying to drive the prices up, but it didn’t work that well. Many farmers lost their farms because they couldn’t pay the bills, and then moved out west to find jobs

Question 20

New Presidents used to start being President in March. What changed the start date for President to January?

Answer 20

The 20th Amendment

Question 22

What did Franklin Roosevelt create to help put men to work so they could earn money for their families?

What was an important one?

Answer 22

Roosevelt created a number of federal agencies that hired men to work.

An important agency Roosevelt created was the CCC - Civilian Conservation Corps. The CCC hired men to work on outside projects.

Question 23

What was the TVA and what did it do?

Answer 23

The TVA stood for the Tennessee Valley Authority and it was one of the agencies that Roosevelt created to put people to work. The TVA built dams to prevent floods and provide electricity.

Question 24

What did Roosevelt create in 1935 that helped people too old to work, unemployed people, and orphans?

Answer 24

The Social Security Act was created to give money to people that couldn’t work.

Question 25

What were Roosevelt’s “fireside chats”

Answer 25

It was when Roosevelt would get on the radio to talk the American people. It was the first time people felt like a president was “coming into their home” and talking to them. Roosevelt would talk about the problems of the county using words that everyone understood.