My great grandmother died in 1969 at the age of 106. My parents were both
born in 1927 and when I quizzed them about the Great Depression, they told tales
similar to Gene's above. My grandparents (born in the 1890's) said that
being frugal with food, sewing one's own clothes, and very modest holidays had
nothing whatever to do with the Depression, they'd always lived that way. The
thing, they said, was that during the depression no one had any money (compare
this to the bruhaha now of days that all our troubles are that there is no
credit). So I asked my great-grandmother about that and she said, "That had
nothing to do with the Depression, child, no one in these hills ever had any
money!"
The picture I got was that clicking forward in the generations it was the
expectation that was the source of discontent rather than actual deprivation. In
the post-War for Southern Independence era no one expected to be using money
in their day to day goings on. You could go about your daily work weeks on
end and never have silver cross your palm. But when the expectation was that
anything you might need or want could be purchased and then the money dried up,
it was the expectation of that which produced the feeling of deprivation.
Now we (collectively) have gotten ourselves into the unwise position that not
so much having money is they way we conduct business and everyday affairs,
but rather it is having credit. The current panic is over having no more credit.
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