Preview

The Dust Bowl: A Man-Made Disaster

Good Essays
Open Document
Open Document
315 Words
Grammar
Grammar
Plagiarism
Plagiarism
Writing
Writing
Score
Score
The Dust Bowl: A Man-Made Disaster
In order to prevent crops from dying out or failing the Aeolian processes was to be used for the benefit during a drought spell. The Aeolian processes help transport water during droughts. By being educated on the landscape and wind pattern farmers would have known that tilling and plotting was destroying the soil. By using these processes, the transport of liquid from moist climates at high altitudes leads to runoff and the flow of liquid heads toward low elevation areas (Belnap, Field, Munson 2). Although higher elevations are few and far in-between leveling the land at a higher ground at one end would have drained water into more starved crops during and after the dust storms occurred and possibly managing to support vegetation for a longer period during one of the worst man-made environmental disasters ever recorded. Data has also shown that over the Atlantic Ocean the temperature was much warmer than usual for the season, and climate change was drastically affecting all of North America. However, the Great Plains were so terribly unprepared in their cropping techniques that after the drought took the vegetation, wind erosion destroyed what land was left and subsequently created the Dust Bowl.

You May Also Find These Documents Helpful

  • Satisfactory Essays

    The United States when through the Great Depression for a decade. The primary source “ The Plow that Broke the Plains”, and the secondary source “ The Dust Bowl and the Government Rescue” are similar in some ways, like the author’s purpose. But, they were really different.…

    • 233 Words
    • 1 Page
    Satisfactory Essays
  • Satisfactory Essays

    Dust Bowl Dbq Analysis

    • 64 Words
    • 1 Page

    Another major factor is over cultivation by farmers (DocB). The role it played in the Dust Bowl is the removal of prairie grass which exposed the fine topsoil to the harsh drought. One sheepherder was quoted as saying “Grass is what holds the earth together”. This shows that the over cultivation of prairie grass exposed the topsoil which was dried and turned into dust.…

    • 64 Words
    • 1 Page
    Satisfactory Essays
  • Good Essays

    In 1930 there was lots of bad dust storms in the south west, creating one of the worst natural disasters in history. These storms ruined land, buried roads, ruined car engines, gave people dust pneumonia, and sometimes killed people. People who could get out of the south west packet up and moved. Some more less unfortunate families couldn’t move and had to stay.…

    • 298 Words
    • 2 Pages
    Good Essays
  • Powerful Essays

    Dust Bowl Case Study

    • 1477 Words
    • 6 Pages

    The settlers of this area met with many challenges. The semiarid Great Plains offer lush farm land during wet years but it also alternates between wet years and years of drought. The cold winters initially presented the settlers with challenges. However, the settler’s response to the cold winters ensured their demise when the years of drought presented a new challenge.…

    • 1477 Words
    • 6 Pages
    Powerful Essays
  • Good Essays

    “Originally covered with grasses that held the fine soil in place, the land of the southern plains was plowed by settlers who brought their farming techniques with them when they homesteaded the area.” The Dust Bowl, otherwise known as “The Dirty Thirties”, was made possible by World War I (WWI) and The Great Depression. Wheat was easy to grow and it caused a high demand. Little was known that the misuse of the land would bring upon the greatest influence behind the importance of conserving nature and its importance of carefully using the land. The dust storms were brought on by a mix of natural components and human activities. Thus, the tempests brought on numerous individuals to leave their homes, endure the dust, and lastly change how they…

    • 140 Words
    • 1 Page
    Good Essays
  • Satisfactory Essays

    Not everyone was affected by the Dust Storm in the same way. Thousands of Americans were forced off their land and lost their jobs, but those who worked in other types of jobs were not suffering in the same way. Al and Mae were surrounded by food and were clearly not hungry or else they would have eaten some of it. Families traveling west were starving; people were dying of malnutrition and other forms of neglect. This passage, and chapter, gave the reader a different perspective of the 1930s. The Joad’s story- their thoughts, feelings, and experiences- connected the reader and characters. Because of this connection, a reader can forget how others were experiencing and years; until this point, the world was only filled with despair. The restaurant…

    • 219 Words
    • 1 Page
    Satisfactory Essays
  • Good Essays

    The Dust Bowl of North America was a disaster in the early 1930's when huge parts of the Midwestern and Western farmlands of America became wastelands. This happened due to a series of dry years, which agreed, with the extension of agriculture in unsuitable lands. Droughts and dust storms caused by poor labor practice troubled farms and ranches of the Great Plains; causing a great migration of its people to other, more fertile, lands. The problem had become so great that a nation wide effort was made to resolve the problem. In 1935, big efforts were made by both federal and state governments to develop suitable programs for soil conservation and for the recovery of the dust bowl. Eventually farming became possible again in the Dust Bowl so farmers have learned many lessons from this.…

    • 558 Words
    • 3 Pages
    Good Essays
  • Good Essays

    Farmers were greatly affected by the Dust Bowl. Farmers were already having to deal with issues as such as the Great Depression when the Dust Bowl started. Because of increased farming, dirt was picked up by the wind and blown across the countryside. “With the onset of drought in 1930, the over-farmed and over-grazed land began to blow away.” ( U.S. history.org) With dirt constantly blowing farmers couldn’t farm. Many farmers left their homes and moved away to try to make a better living. “With no chance of making a living, farm families abandoned their homes and land in these areas, fleeing westward to become migrant laborers.” (U.S.history.org)…

    • 228 Words
    • 1 Page
    Good Essays
  • Good Essays

    The Dust Bowl Odyssey

    • 921 Words
    • 3 Pages

    The "Dust Bowl" phenomenon occurred throughout western Oklahoma and Kansas and in the Texas panhandle. Severe drought during the 1930's had led to massive agricultural failures in the Southwest. These areas had been heavily overcultivated by the wheat farmers for the last decades and were covered with millions of acres of loose, uncovered topsoil. Without precipitation the crops withered and died. The topsoil, which did not have any anchoring roots, was picked up by the winds and carried in billowing clouds across the region. Huge dust storms blew across the area, at times blocking out the sun and even suffocating those caught unprepared.…

    • 921 Words
    • 3 Pages
    Good Essays
  • Good Essays

    “Originally covered with grasses that held the fine soil in place, the land of the southern plains was plowed by settlers who brought their farming techniques with them when they homesteaded the area.” The Dust Bowl, also called "The Dirty Thirties", was made conceivable by World War I (WWI) and The Great Depression. Wheat was anything but difficult to develop and it brought on a popularity amongst everyone. Little was realized that the abuse of the area would bring upon the best impact behind the significance of saving nature and its significance of deliberately utilizing the area. The dust storms were brought on by a mix of natural components and human activities. Thus, the tempests conveyed on numerous individuals to leave their homes, persevere through the dust, and lastly change how they cultivated, keeping in mind the end goal to avert comparable characteristic fiascos.…

    • 487 Words
    • 2 Pages
    Good Essays
  • Good Essays

    About eighty-six years ago the Dust Bowl started, lasting eight years (1931-1939). The cause of this traumatic event was that there was a drought. During this drought, there were many strong winds that picked up topsoil that lacked a stronger root system. When the winds picked up this topsoil, it swirled it into dense dust clouds, called “black blizzards”. These dense dust clouds, then became larger, and larger, and larger. Soil was and is very…

    • 619 Words
    • 3 Pages
    Good Essays
  • Satisfactory Essays

    The purpose of our organization was end starvation in the Dust Bowl by telling people to keep their food clean and encourage them to donate to the FSCC, an organization dedicated to distributing food to people and children in need.…

    • 237 Words
    • 1 Page
    Satisfactory Essays
  • Good Essays

    Neolithic farmers did have to irrrigate their crops due to inadequate rainfall. The Fertile Cresent, which is along the Mediterranean coast, receives an adequate amount of rainfall. This is important because the Fertile Cresent provides a fertile plain that can support agricultural, due to the rainfall in the Middle East, over 3/4 receives less than ten inches of rain per year. The summer months are dry because the rain would come in winter, causing farmers to irrigate their crops. Although the annual flooding replenished the soil it removed important boundary markers.…

    • 294 Words
    • 2 Pages
    Good Essays
  • Good Essays

    Dust Bowl Essay

    • 733 Words
    • 3 Pages

    People used the wrong agricultural practices when farming. “With insufficient understanding of the ecology of the plains, farmers had conducted extensive deep plowing of the virgin topsoil of the Great Plains during the previous decade; this had displaced the native, deep-rooted grasses that normally trapped soil and moisture even during periods of drought and high winds.” ("Dust Bowl" ). Farmers didn’t know that deep plowing would cause the area to be too airy and it will get picked up by wind. The farmers should not have kept using these technique after seeing it doesnt work. “After the Land Run of 1889, famers changed the landscape that was…

    • 733 Words
    • 3 Pages
    Good Essays
  • Good Essays

    Causes Of The Dust Bowl

    • 605 Words
    • 3 Pages

    The Dust Bowl began on Thursday, April 18, 1935, it was a huge, black, cloud of dirt, piled up on the western horizon. This storm was enormous and deadly. The Dust Bowl affected Oklahoma, Texas, parts of Kansas, Colorado, and New Mexico. These states were vulnerable to the dust storm due to their lack of rainfall, light soil, and high winds. As a result, soil lacked the the strong roots of grass in order to stay in place, this made it easier for high, hectic winds to get a hold of the soil. Years before the Dust Bowl, ranchers and farmers looking for new land to grow crops and maintain live stock stumble across this land. Hoping to finally settle down and start their business; however, on 1935, the very land that gave them hope, now gave them…

    • 605 Words
    • 3 Pages
    Good Essays