Dirty Thirties

My mother grew up during the Great Depression and the Dirty Thirties in Northern Saskatchewan and remembers having nothing to eat but white fish out... more

by Theresa Tahara

Title

Dirty Thirties

Artist

Theresa Tahara

Medium

Photograph - Photography

Description

My mother grew up during the "Great Depression" and the "Dirty Thirties" in Northern Saskatchewan and remembers having nothing to eat but white fish out of the river. When the depression ended, she never ate fish again. This is my interpretation of these hard times and the model is her granddaughter.

The "Dust Bowl", or the "Dirty Thirties", was a period of severe dust storms ("black blizzards" and "black rollers") causing major ecological and agricultural damage to American and Canadian prairie lands in the 1930s, particularly in 1934 and 1936. The phenomenon was caused by severe drought combined with farming methods that did not include crop rotation, fallow fields, cover crops, soil terracing and wind-breaking trees to prevent wind erosion. Extensive deep plowing of the virgin topsoil of the Great Plains in the preceding decade had displaced the natural deep-rooted grasses that normally kept the soil in place and trapped moisture even during periods of drought and high winds.

Uploaded

February 14th, 2013