Kids and the great depression
The economic collapse of the 1930s was staggering in its dimensions. Unemployment jumped from less than 3 million in 1929 to 4 million in 1930, 8 million in 1931, and 12 1/2 million in 1932. The depression had a powerful impact on family life. It forced couples to delay marriage and drove the level for the birth rate below the level for the first time in american history. More than 200,000 vagrant children wandered the country as a result of break up of families. A quarter of a million children were homeless, at least one in five were hungry and without adequate clothing,and In some regions, especially coal-mining regions, as many as 90 percent of the children were malnourished.