The stock market collapse in 1929 initiated a cascade of economic effects that devastated American businesses. Millions of Americans lost their jobs, with the unemployment rate reaching as high as 25%, and even those lucky enough to keep their jobs saw their wages and incomes decline by 40%. The result was unprecedented levels of hunger, and the scale of need quickly overwhelmed charities. Images of blocks-long breadlines in cities across the country made hunger visible in ways it had never been before, convincing many Americans that government intervention was needed.
Statistics from the National Bureau of Economic Research.
“The Test of our progress is not whether we add more to the abundance of those who have much; it is whether we provide enough for those who have too little.” – Franklin Delano Roosevelt
The shocking image of the breadline endures in the Franklin Delano Roosevelt Memorial in Washington, DC. The outdoor installation features sculptures of five men waiting in a breadline, alongside a farmer and his wife – symbols for the crisis of the Depression.
Museum Map
WISHING
TREE
The Proof is in Our History
- 1.Welcome
- 2.The Age of Mass Migration - Landing
- 3.The Age of Mass Migration - Main
- 4.Jewish Immigration from Eastern Europe
- 5.Immigration from Europe
- 6.On the Breadline
- 7.Beginnings
- 8.What was the rationale behind the Food Stamp Program?
- 9.Farm Family Portraits
- 10.An Unequal Recovery
- 11.Lunch Counter Student Sit-Ins (Greensboro, NC)
- 12.Televising the War on Hunger - Landing
- 13.Televising the War on Hunger - Main
- 14.CBS’s “Hunger in America”
- 15.President Lyndon B. Johnson
- 16.Senator George McGovern and Senator Robert Dole
- 17.Dr. Jean Mayer and the White House Conference
- 18.Poor People’s Campaign (Springfield, IL)
- 19.Hunger & Charity in the Age of Austerity - Landing
- 20.Hunger & Charity in the Age of Austerity - Main
- 21.Government Cheese
- 22.The Return of the Welfare Queen
- 23.Welfare Reform
- 24.Crises of New Proportions - Landing
- 25.Crises of New Proportions - Main
- 26.COVID-19
- 27.Stories of a Broken Safety Net - Landing
- 28.Stories of a Broken Safety Net - Main
- 29.Wishing Tree
MAZON: A Jewish Response to Hunger