Name: Betty June Randolph Born: 1924 Age: 90
“Give a man a dole,” he observed, “and you save his body and destroy his
spirit. Give him a job and you save both body and spirit.” (Roosevelt)
The new deal changed several aspects of their lives. The new deal not only gave people jobs but helps them keep their houses, and provide them with social security. Art boomed as the new deal as people built dams and murals. The Federal Art Project (FAP) was created in 1935 to provide work relief for artists in various media--painters, sculptors, muralists and graphic artists, with various levels of experience. Their job was “to give work to artists by arranging to have competent representatives of the profession embellish public buildings.”
People who had already suffered from the great depression received help from the FERA and the HOLC. The FERA also known as the Federal Emergency Administration, sends funds to local relief agencies. The HOLC refinanced mortgages of middle income home owners. The most important though is the CCC which put 2.5 million unmarried men to work. Sparky Hall was a young boy during the new deal and he said that “Looking at the big picture, the most valuable asset of the CCC presence was to have several million men ready to jump into a military uniform who had already been trained in how to live the military life in a camp setting and could start learning the combat phase from the start.” (Hall in Keynes)
A travelling salesman by the name of Ben Isaacs describes his ordeal.
"All or a sudden, in the afternoon, October, 192...I was going on my business and I heard the newspaper boy calling , running around the streets and giving news and news: stock market crashed, stock market crashed, stock market crashed.
[...]
We lost everything.
We tried to struggle along living day by day. Then I couldn’t pay the rent. I had a little car, but I couldn’t pay no license for it. I left it parked against the court. I sold it for $15 in order to buy some food for the family. I had three little children. It was a time when I didn’t even have money to buy a pack of cigarettes, and I was a smoker. I didn’t have a nickel in my pocket.
Lotta people committed suicide, pushed themselves out of buildings and killed themselves, ‘cause they couldn’t face the disgrace. Finally, the same thing with me.
I went to the relief and they, after a lotta red tape and investigation, they gave me $45 a month. Out of that $45 we had to pay rent, we had to buy food and clothing for the children. So how long can that $45 go? I was paying $30 on the rent. I went and find another a cheaper flat, stove heat, for $15 a month. I’m telling you, today a dog wouldn’t live in that type of a place. Such a dirty,
filthy, dark place.
Wherever I went to get a job, I couldn’t get no job. I went around selling razor blades and shoe laces. There was a day I would go over all the streets and come home with fifty cents, making a sale. That kept going until 1940, practically. 1939 the war started. Things start to get a little better. My wife found a job in a restaurant for $20 a week. Right away, I sent a letter to the relief people: I don’t think I would need their help anymore. I was disgusted with relief, so ashamed. I couldn’t face it anymore.
Today we live far away from the rest of our friends. Depression days, that time, we were all poor. After things got better and people became richer and everyone had their own property at different neighborhoods, we fall apart from each other." (Isaacs)
Another man, Sam T. Mayhew, an African American who worked in a cotton mill, listed the kind of relief he received from the government.
"Since February, I've been getting a little relief help from the government. Everything they've give me since my first trip to Jackson I've set down in this little book; it starts out with 24 pounds of flour, 5 pounds of butter, 3 pounds of prunes, and beans and ends up with 17 grapefruits and 3 pounds butter which is all they give me last week. I figured up hat the government has give me since February--counting flour at 75 cents, butter at 30 and so forth -- and it comes to exactly $14.60. I've estimated that is just one fourth of what we ought to live on, to eat." (Mayhew)
It is clear these were not affluent relief programs, and while to many it seemed like very few, these programs saved lives, and allowed people just enough to lift them rom destitution, to give them the strength to find work.
The new deal changed several aspects of their lives. The new deal not only gave people jobs but helps them keep their houses, and provide them with social security. Art boomed as the new deal as people built dams and murals. The Federal Art Project (FAP) was created in 1935 to provide work relief for artists in various media--painters, sculptors, muralists and graphic artists, with various levels of experience. Their job was “to give work to artists by arranging to have competent representatives of the profession embellish public buildings.”
People who had already suffered from the great depression received help from the FERA and the HOLC. The FERA also known as the Federal Emergency Administration, sends funds to local relief agencies. The HOLC refinanced mortgages of middle income home owners. The most important though is the CCC which put 2.5 million unmarried men to work. Sparky Hall was a young boy during the new deal and he said that “Looking at the big picture, the most valuable asset of the CCC presence was to have several million men ready to jump into a military uniform who had already been trained in how to live the military life in a camp setting and could start learning the combat phase from the start.” (Hall in Keynes)
A travelling salesman by the name of Ben Isaacs describes his ordeal.
"All or a sudden, in the afternoon, October, 192...I was going on my business and I heard the newspaper boy calling , running around the streets and giving news and news: stock market crashed, stock market crashed, stock market crashed.
[...]
We lost everything.
We tried to struggle along living day by day. Then I couldn’t pay the rent. I had a little car, but I couldn’t pay no license for it. I left it parked against the court. I sold it for $15 in order to buy some food for the family. I had three little children. It was a time when I didn’t even have money to buy a pack of cigarettes, and I was a smoker. I didn’t have a nickel in my pocket.
Lotta people committed suicide, pushed themselves out of buildings and killed themselves, ‘cause they couldn’t face the disgrace. Finally, the same thing with me.
I went to the relief and they, after a lotta red tape and investigation, they gave me $45 a month. Out of that $45 we had to pay rent, we had to buy food and clothing for the children. So how long can that $45 go? I was paying $30 on the rent. I went and find another a cheaper flat, stove heat, for $15 a month. I’m telling you, today a dog wouldn’t live in that type of a place. Such a dirty,
filthy, dark place.
Wherever I went to get a job, I couldn’t get no job. I went around selling razor blades and shoe laces. There was a day I would go over all the streets and come home with fifty cents, making a sale. That kept going until 1940, practically. 1939 the war started. Things start to get a little better. My wife found a job in a restaurant for $20 a week. Right away, I sent a letter to the relief people: I don’t think I would need their help anymore. I was disgusted with relief, so ashamed. I couldn’t face it anymore.
Today we live far away from the rest of our friends. Depression days, that time, we were all poor. After things got better and people became richer and everyone had their own property at different neighborhoods, we fall apart from each other." (Isaacs)
Another man, Sam T. Mayhew, an African American who worked in a cotton mill, listed the kind of relief he received from the government.
"Since February, I've been getting a little relief help from the government. Everything they've give me since my first trip to Jackson I've set down in this little book; it starts out with 24 pounds of flour, 5 pounds of butter, 3 pounds of prunes, and beans and ends up with 17 grapefruits and 3 pounds butter which is all they give me last week. I figured up hat the government has give me since February--counting flour at 75 cents, butter at 30 and so forth -- and it comes to exactly $14.60. I've estimated that is just one fourth of what we ought to live on, to eat." (Mayhew)
It is clear these were not affluent relief programs, and while to many it seemed like very few, these programs saved lives, and allowed people just enough to lift them rom destitution, to give them the strength to find work.