The Great Depression

ETHS Content Essays, Primary Sources, and Student Activities

Cumberland Homesteads

Key Words: Cumberland Homesteads, Eleanor Roosevelt, New Deal, Cumberland Plateau

Great Smoky Mountains National Park

Key Words: Great Smoky Mountains National Park, Franklin Roosevelt, Civilian Conservation Corp, Great Depression

Tennessee Valley Authority and the New Deal

Key Words:  Tennessee Valley Authority, New Deal, Franklin Roosevelt, Norris Dam, Great Depression


The Great Depression Additional Resources

The Great Depression Activities

Norris Dam Primary Source Sets:

Graves Removal

Difficulties of Displacement

On the Farm

Stooksbury Family Relocation

TVA and the New Deal Lesson Plan
Herbert Hoover Rugged Individualism vs FDR First Inaugural 
Years of Dust, Death and Destruction Lesson Introduction
Years of Dust, Death and Destruction Activity Cards

New Deal Political Cartoons

Family Removal Chart (TVA)

The Grapes of Wrath Excerpts

The Great Depression Web Links

The Great Depression and New Deal

Primary source set on New Deal in Tennessee

Library of Congress: New Deal

Primary Source set and Teacher’s Guide from Library of Congress on New Deal

Tennessee State Museum: Great Depression

Resources on The Great Depression from the Tennessee State Museum

Photographs: Smokys

Digital collection of photographs by the Thompson Brothers on the Great Smoky Mountains National Park

Justice.Gov

Excellent article of the history of eminent domain in the United States

Currents of Change

This website was developed by TVA and has great resources including images and interviews for teaching about TVA and the New Deal

National Archives Exhibit

Exhibit from National Archives Atlanta on TVA

The Grapes of Wrath Lesson Plan

The Great Depression ETHS Articles

Tennessee Valley Authority and the New Deal

“Arthur E. Morgan’s Ethical Code for the Tennessee Valley Authority.” Ed. by Roy Talbert, Jr.The East Tennessee Historical Society’s Publications 40 (1968): 119-127.

“Families of the Norris Reservoir Area: The photographs of Marshall Wilson.” Tennessee Ancestors 3, no. 2 (August 1987): 74-88.

Lowitt, Richard. “ ‘Present at the Creation’: George W. Norris, Franklin D. Roosevelt, and the TVA Enabling Act.” The East Tennessee Historical Society’s Publications 48 (1976): 116-126.

McDonald, Michael J. and John Muldowny. “Reburying the Dead: Disinterment and Reinterment at TVA’s Norris Dam.” The East Tennessee Historical Society’s Publications 47 (1975): 118-138.

Purcell, Aaron D. “Power to the People: David Lilienthal Founds TVA’s Electric Power Policy, 1933.” The Journal of East Tennessee History 70 (1998): 90-108.

Rogers, Michael. “TVA Population Removal: Attitudes and Expectations of the Dispossessed at the Norris and Cherokee Dam Sites.” The Journal of East Tennessee History 67 (1995): 89-105.

Talbert, Roy, Jr. “Arthur E. Morgan’s Social Philosophy and the Tennessee Valley Authority.” The East Tennessee Historical Society’s Publications (1969): 86-99.

Additional Related Articles:

Walker, Melissa. “Making Do and Doing Without: East Tennessee Farm Women Cope with Economic Crisis, 1920-1941.” The Journal of East Tennessee History 68 (1996): 8-30.