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My understanding of the period and events referred to as the Dust Bowl came exclusively from my elementary education and the novels The Grapes of Wrath and Whose Names Are Unknown. In a nutshell, the narrative is that over-farming caused bad conditions throughout the plains making life and farming difficult. That's all basically true, but wow, there's so much more to the story.
The Worst Hard Time gives a more complete story. Over-farming is one thing; completely changing the landscape of thousan ...more
The Worst Hard Time gives a more complete story. Over-farming is one thing; completely changing the landscape of thousan ...more
Intense and visual history of survival that made me acutely aware of how careless we are even now with a limited resource, our soil.
Egan examines the dust bowl era by focusing on the lives of a few select families who lived (well, mostly lived) through it. Along the way he explains things like why the Oklahoma panhandle is a panhandle, why so few people initially settled there, why the government eventually encouraged people to do so, how things went really well for them for a while, and then what happened when the weather and the economy both turned against these settlers. It is a fascinating account, although it is very de
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I read this as part of the Humanities program. I enjoyed the book. It is based on the midwest history that lead to over farming and drought that caused a decade long disaster of dust storms combined with the depression. I have heard stories from my parent who lived in the time, The location was about two hundred miles from where she live. My grand mother was born much closer to the area and there was even a mention of the extremely cold winter before she was born and they moved the 150 miles to
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(Audio version) As someone who has both a background in prairie restoration ecology, and relatives that experienced the "Dirty 30s," I found this book fascinating, and terrifying. From 2010-2013 No-Man's land was perilously close to reliving the dusters that ravaged the Great Plains. Thus, this book is incredibly important because despite the Dust Bowl being the worst man-made environmental disaster in history, many people have forgotten, or are unaware of the ecological devastation that it brou
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The books is about one of the hardest and most depressing times in American history. Not only was the Great Depression taking place at this time but the Midwest became the Dust Bowl. After reading this book there is no doubt in my mind these are the people that earned the name, "The Greatest Generation." This book ties history to the present, and with what we are doing wrong and what we are doing right with agriculture in America's Heartland.
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Nov 03, 2011
Amy
marked it as to-read
Jun 07, 2013
Natalie Moreland
marked it as to-read
Jun 10, 2013
Valerie
marked it as to-read
Sep 17, 2013
Kelly
marked it as to-read
Feb 20, 2014
Jill Pfuetze Schmidt
marked it as to-read
Sep 23, 2014
Rachel Alexander
marked it as to-read
May 01, 2015
Tracy | FrazzledBookworm
marked it as to-read
Nov 23, 2015
Miranda
marked it as to-read
Feb 15, 2019
Megan
rated it
it was amazing
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review of another edition
Shelves:
history,
non-fiction
Sep 28, 2019
Nathan
marked it as to-read
