Hooverville

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A Hooverville was the popular name for a shanty town, examples of which were found in many United States communities during the Great Depression of the 1930s. The name Hooverville has also been used to describe the Tent Cities commonly found in America.

The word "Hooverville" derives from the name of the President of the United States at the beginning of the Depression, Herbert Hoover. They used Hoover's name because they were frustrated and disappointed with his involvement in the relief effort for the Depression. In addition to financial troubles during the Depression, a drought in the Mississippi Valley forced farmers to auction their land for taxes and reside in Hoovervilles.^[1]

These settlements were often formed in horrible neighborhoods or desolate areas and consisted of dozens or hundreds of shacks and tents that were temporary residences of those left unemployed and homeless by the Depression. People slept in anything from open piano crates to the ground. Authorities did not officially recognize these Hoovervilles and occasionally removed the occupants for technically trespassing on private lands, but they were frequently tolerated out of necessity.

Some of the men who were made to live in these conditions possessed building skills and were able to build their houses out of stone. Most people, however, resorted to building their residences out of box wood, cardboard, and any scraps of metal they could find. Some individuals even lived in sewer mains.

Most of these unemployed residents of the Hoovervilles begged for food from those who had housing during this era. Several other terms came into use during this era, such as "Hoover blanket" (old newspaper used as blanketing) and "Hoover flag" (an empty pocket turned inside out). "Hoover leather" was cardboard used to line a shoe with the sole worn through. A "Hoover wagon" was a car with horses tied to it because the owner could not afford gasoline; in Canada, these were known as Bennett buggies. Hoovervilles were known to be a home for people who couldn't pay their mortgages.

1 Notable Hoovervilles
2 Popular culture
3 External links
4 Notes

[edit] Notable Hoovervilles

In Central Park, New York City, Hooverville existed between 1931-33 in the former Lower Reservoir of the city water supply system, which was being emptied and landscaped into the Great Lawn and Turtle Pond.[1]
The Bonus Army, a group of World War I veterans seeking expedited benefits, established a Hooverville in Anacostia in the District of Columbia in 1932. At its maximum there were 15,000 people living there.[2] The camp was demolished by units of the U.S. Army under Gen. Douglas MacArthur, Major Dwight D. Eisenhower and Gen. George S. Patton.
Seattle had its largest Hooverville on the tidal flats adjacent to the Port of Seattle that lasted from 1932 to 1941. [3]
The largest long-lived Hooverville was on the shores of the Mississippi River in St. Louis, with a population of more than 1,000.[4]
Brooklyn, New York, had a "Hoover City" from roughly Columbia Street to Court Street and from Mill Street to Lorraine Street.

[edit] Popular culture

Hoovervilles feature prominently in the later part of John Steinbeck's 1939 novel The Grapes of Wrath after the Joad family arrive in California.
In the musical Annie there is a song called "We'd Like to Thank You, Herbert Hoover," which takes place in a Hooverville beneath the 59th Street Bridge. In the song, the chorus sings of the hardships they now suffer because of the Great Depression and their contempt for the former president.
In 1987 the Liverpool group The Christians had a UK hit with the song "Hooverville (And They Promised Us The World)" .
During a temporary housing crisis[5], the comic strip Piled Higher and Deeper referred to a fictional solution to the resulting housing crisis at Stanford University as "Hooverville" due to its proximity to Stanford's Hoover Tower [6].
The 2005 movie Cinderella Man also referenced the Central Park encampment.
Two episodes of the British science fiction television series Doctor Who depicted the Central Park Hooverville. The episodes, "Daleks in Manhattan" and "Evolution of the Daleks," were transmitted on April 21 and April 28, 2007. The episodes contained a minor historical inaccuracy as they were set in November 1930; the Central Park Hooverville didn't begin until 1931. The most commonly used motto of its inhabitants was "This is as far as a man can fall."
The novel Bud, Not Buddy is set some time during the Great Depression, and one of the early scenes in the book is a Hooverville which is soon broken up by the Flint police force.