Women of the Great Depression: The Challenges

Women of the Great Depression

By: Anne

The Great Depression

Women and Employment

• In response to the devastating experiences, people took up writing to the governments to try and plead their case. Women were among those that pleaded for help and relief. The letters portray that the problems they had were “different than those of men.” They were more vulnerable because “they had fewer opportunities for employment. Jobs, when they could be obtained, paid less than what men could earn.” Unable to break the barrier to a larger workforce, women struggled to come to grips with their positions that seemed so immovable.

Failure of the New Deal

• Many claim that the New Deal, Roosevelt’s Alphabet Soup, would create jobs that would revolutionize the country with employment. However, the women in Florida demonstrate a very different case. When the W.P.A. set up jobs, mostly sewing, many women went to work for them to bring in any income they could. However, the New Deal soon failed them and they were laid off. Mrs. Lois Bryrd Godwin wrote, “75 women were laid off on our project…and [she] was one of them.”

“Migrant Mother” by Dorothea Lange

http://www.pbs.org/wgbh/americanexperience/features/general-article/dustbowl-great-depression/