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| 1 | |
Four of the following statements correctly describe conditions in the stock market during the year and a half preceding the Great Crash of 1929. Which is the exception? |
| | A) | There was a widespread speculative fever. |
| | B) | The average price of most stock increased dramatically. |
| | C) | The daily volume of stock traded increased dramatically. |
| | D) | Most brokers required cash payment in full for stock purchases. |
| | E) | Credit was easily obtained to those buying stock. |
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| 2 | |
One of the most important causes of the Great Depression was the fact that during the 1920s |
| | A) | government regulation and trust busting had stifled free enterprise. |
| | B) | there was a fundamental maldistribution of purchasing power. |
| | C) | not enough profits were plowed back into business as new capital investment. |
| | D) | low tariff policies had benefited foreign competitors and seriously damaged domestic industry. |
| | E) | stock prices rose too dramatically. |
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| 3 | |
In much of the 1920s, European nations were able to make their war-debt payments to the United States, and Germany and Austria were able to continue reparation payments by |
| | A) | inflating their currencies. |
| | B) | draining their gold reserves. |
| | C) | expanding exports to the United States. |
| | D) | decreasing imports from the United States. |
| | E) | getting new loans from the United States. |
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| 4 | |
The stock market crash of 1929 |
| | A) | caused the Great Depression. |
| | B) | was a result of the Great Depression. |
| | C) | triggered a chain of events that led to the economic crisis. |
| | D) | had no effect on the onset of the Depression. |
| | E) | caused stock prices to increase dramatically. |
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| 5 | |
At the depth of the Depression in 1932, the unemployment rate in the United States was estimated to have been |
| | A) | 50 percent. |
| | B) | 75 percent. |
| | C) | 25 percent. |
| | D) | 10 percent. |
| | E) | 15 percent. |
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| 6 | |
The Dust Bowl |
| | A) | was caused solely by a particularly bad drought. |
| | B) | was largely a result of farming practices on the Great Plains. |
| | C) | caused the dust from the plains to blow as far as Chicago. |
| | D) | only lasted for about a year. |
| | E) | lasted throughout the Great Depression. |
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| 7 | |
In the early 1930s, the term "Okies" referred to |
| | A) | moonshiners trying to make a living in Appalachia. |
| | B) | oil speculators losing money in the Southwest. |
| | C) | swamp dwellers out of the mainstream in the Deep South. |
| | D) | poor African-American farmers in the South. |
| | E) | dispossessed farmers fleeing the Dust Bowl. |
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| 8 | |
Four of the following statements accurately describe the condition of blacks during the Great Depression. Which is the exception? |
| | A) | The migration of blacks to the North ended abruptly. |
| | B) | Blacks suffered a higher unemployment rate than whites. |
| | C) | Discrimination against blacks increased, particularly in competition for jobs. |
| | D) | Local government and private relief benefits for blacks were smaller than for whites. |
| | E) | Over half the blacks in the South in 1932 were unemployed. |
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| 9 | |
In the 1920s, the great majority of Hispanics in California and the American Southwest originally migrated from |
| | A) | Cuba. |
| | B) | Mexico. |
| | C) | Puerto Rico. |
| | D) | Haiti. |
| | E) | None of the answers is correct. |
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| 10 | |
One effect of the Great Depression on women was to |
| | A) | open up new opportunities for women in the professions. |
| | B) | strengthen the belief that a woman's place was in the home. |
| | C) | drive most women out of the labor force by the time the economic crisis was over. |
| | D) | gain increased public support for such feminist organizations as the National Woman's Party. |
| | E) | encourage women to get out of the home and work to support their families. |
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| 11 | |
Four of the following were effects of the Great Depression on the American family. Which is the exception? |
| | A) | The birth rate declined. |
| | B) | The marriage rate declined. |
| | C) | The divorce rate increased. |
| | D) | Middle-class and working-class families suffered traumatic impact. |
| | E) | Working class families saw what little gains they had disappear. |
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| 12 | |
Popular culture during the Depression era—as manifested by radio, movies, and literature—was generally characterized by |
| | A) | a celebration of affluence. |
| | B) | appeals to prurient interests in sex and crime. |
| | C) | a return to traditional religious values. |
| | D) | a deep social concern to portray the human consequences of the national economic disaster. |
| | E) | upbeat and romantic messages as a sort of escapism. |
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| 13 | |
Four of the following novels manifest an implicit protest against social injustices in then-contemporary American society. Which is the exception? |
| | A) | Erskine Caldwell’s Tobacco Road (1932) |
| | B) | Margaret Mitchell’s Gone with the Wind (1936) |
| | C) | John Steinbeck’s The Grapes of Wrath (1939) |
| | D) | Richard Wright’s Native Son (1940) |
| | E) | James Agee’s Let Us Now Praise Famous Men (1941) |
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| 14 | |
Movie attendance during the Depression |
| | A) | rose throughout the decade. |
| | B) | fell throughout the decade. |
| | C) | rose initially but then fell as the Depression worsened. |
| | D) | fell initially but then rose as the Depression worsened. |
| | E) | stayed the same as before the Depression. |
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| 15 | |
The Popular Front |
| | A) | was a radio show about detectives in New York City. |
| | B) | was a broad coalition of "antifascist" groups on the political Left. |
| | C) | was one of the most successful programs of the New Deal. |
| | D) | was a name given to the Nazi Party by the State Department. |
| | E) | was a popular film staring the Marx brothers. |
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| 16 | |
The Abraham Lincoln brigade was most closely associated with |
| | A) | Coxey's Army. |
| | B) | the Bonus Army. |
| | C) | the Spanish Civil War. |
| | D) | veterans of the American Expeditionary Force in World War I. |
| | E) | The Grapes of Wrath. |
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| 17 | |
The tactics pursued by the American Communist Party between 1935 and 1939 were aimed at developing a broad alliance against |
| | A) | fascism. |
| | B) | Franklin Delano Roosevelt. |
| | C) | racial injustice. |
| | D) | nonpolitical unionism. |
| | E) | Herbert Hoover. |
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| 18 | |
For the eight years immediately before becoming president, Herbert Hoover had been the |
| | A) | vice president. |
| | B) | secretary of state. |
| | C) | secretary of commerce. |
| | D) | speaker of the House of Representatives. |
| | E) | secretary of navy. |
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| 19 | |
The purpose of the Agricultural Marketing Act, proposed by Hoover even before the Great Crash of 1929, was to |
| | A) | aid struggling small farmers during poor harvests. |
| | B) | impose government regulation on the commodities exchange market. |
| | C) | establish quotas for the importation of foreign agricultural products. |
| | D) | promote reciprocal trade agreements with foreign countries for agricultural products. |
| | E) | keep farm prices up. |
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| 20 | |
Hoover's first efforts to control the Depression focused on |
| | A) | a recovery program for the banking industry. |
| | B) | voluntary cooperation by business leaders in restoring the public confidence in the economy. |
| | C) | a massive federal relief bill. |
| | D) | creating millions of federal jobs. |
| | E) | closing all banks. |
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| 21 | |
Hoover's measures to deal with the Depression included support for four of the following. Which is the exception? |
| | A) | A large-scale federal program of direct relief to the unemployed |
| | B) | A system of government home-loan banks to assist mortgage holders |
| | C) | The Reconstruction Finance Corporation to make loans to businesses |
| | D) | The Hawley-Smoot Tariff to protect agriculture from foreign competition |
| | E) | The Agricultural Marketing Act which helped to maintain farm prices |
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| 22 | |
The Reconstruction Finance Corporation was largely ineffective in promoting recovery from the Depression because |
| | A) | the Supreme Court declared it unconstitutional. |
| | B) | its activities did not gain the support of President Hoover. |
| | C) | its programs benefited primarily the small banks and family corporations. |
| | D) | it was underfunded and overcautious in the use of the funds it did have. |
| | E) | it could not raise farm prices. |
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| 23 | |
When it was first organized, how did the Farmers’ Holiday Association seek to gain higher prices for farm products? |
| | A) | By lobbying in Washington |
| | B) | By withholding crops from the market |
| | C) | By running its own candidates for state legislatures |
| | D) | By establishing its own cooperative marketing facilities |
| | E) | By protesting the Hawley-Smoot tariff |
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