Hooverville From Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia Jump to:navigation, search Hooverville near Portland, Oregon A Hooverville was the popular name for shanty towns built by homeless people during the Great Depression. They were named after the President of the United States at the time, Herbert Hoover, because he allegedly let the nation slide into depression. The term was coined by Charles Michelson, publicity chief of the Democratic National Committee.[1] The name Hooverville has also been used to describe the tent cities commonly found in modern-day America. Homelessness was present before the Great Depression, and hobos and tramps were common sights in the 1920s, but the economic downturn increased their numbers and concentrated them in urban settlements close to soup kitchens run by charities. These settlements were often formed on empty land and generally consisted of tents and small shacks. Authorities did not officially recognize these Hoovervilles and occasionally removed the occupants for trespassing on private lands, but they were frequently tolerated or ignored out of necessity. The New Deal enacted special relief programs aimed at the homeless under the Federal Transient Service (FTS), which operated from 1933-35. Some of the men who were forced to live in these conditions possessed construction skills and were able to build their houses out of stone. Most people, however, resorted to building their residences out of wood from crates, cardboard, scraps of metal, or whatever materials were available to them. They usually had a small stove, bedding and a couple of simple cooking implements. Most of these unemployed residents of the Hoovervilles used public charities or begged for food from those who had housing during this era. Democrats coined other terms, 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 an automobile with horses tied to it because the owner could not afford fuel; in Canada, these were known as Bennett buggies, after the Prime Minister at the time. ---------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------- "Hooverville" became a common term for shacktowns and homeless encampments during the Great Depression. There were dozens in the state of Washington, hundreds throughout the country, each testifying to the housing crisis that accompanied the employment crisis of the early 1930s. "Hooverville" was a deliberately politicized label, emphasizing that President Herbert Hoover and the Republican Party were to be held responsible for the economic crisis and its miseries. Seattle's main Hooverville was one of the largest, longest-lasting, and best documented in the nation. It stood for ten years, 1931 to 1941. Click here to see more photographs of Hoovervilles and homeless encampments in Seattle and Tacoma.Covering nine acres of public land, it housed a population of up to 1,200, claimed its own community government including an unofficial mayor, and enjoyed the protection of leftwing groups and sympathetic public officials until the land was needed for shipping facilities on the eve of World War II. Seattle is fortunate to have the kind of detailed documentation of its Hooverville that other cities lack, and we have compiled these unique resources here. Included are photographs, city documents, a 1934 sociological survey of residents, a short memoir written by the former "mayor" of Hooverville, and more. We are grateful to the Seattle Municipal Archives, King County Archives, and the University of Washington Library Special Collections for permission to incorporate materials in their collections. Homelessness LEARN MORE •The Story of Seattle's Hooverville by Jesse Jackson, "Mayor" of Hooverville •Seattle’s “Hooverville”: The Failure of Effective Unemployment Relief in the Early 1930s by Magic Demirel • Hooverville: A Study of a Community of Homeless Men in Seattle by Donald Francis Roy • Seattle Municipal Archives Hooverville Documents Homelessness followed quickly from joblessness once the economy began to crumble in the early 1930s. Homeowners lost their property when they could not pay mortgages or pay taxes. Renters fell behind and faced eviction. By 1932 millions of Americans were living outside the normal rent-paying housing market. Many squeezed in with relatives. Unit densities soared in the early 1930s. Some squatted, either defying eviction and staying where they were, or finding shelter in one of the increasing number of vacant buildings. And hundreds of thousands--no one knows how many--took to the streets, finding what shelter they could, under bridges, in culverts, or on vacant public land where they built crude shacks. Some cities allowed squatter encampments for a time, others did not. Seattle's Housing Politics Click to see google map of shack towns in Seattle area and more photos and descriptions.In Seattle shacks appeared in many locations in 1930 and 1931, but authorities usually destroyed them after neighbors complained. What became the city's main Hooverville started as a group of little huts on land next to Elliott Bay south of "skid road," as the Pioneer Square area was then called. This was Port of Seattle property that had been occupied by Skinner and Eddy shipyard during World War I. Today the nine acre site is used to unload container ships. It is just west of Qwest Field and the Alaska Viaduct. Seattle police twice burned the early Hooverville, but each time residents rebuilt. When a new mayor took office in 1932, owing his election in part to support of the Unemployed Citizen's League, Seattle's Hooverville gained a measure of official tolerance that allowed it to survive and grow. Hooverville's Population Donald Roy created this map of Seattle's Hooverville. Click the image to see a larger version of the map and here to read excerpts from Roy's sociological survey.By 1934 nearly 500 self-built one-room domiciles were "scattered over the terrain in insane disorder," according to Donald Roy, a sociology graduate student who studied the community. He counted 639 residents in March of that year, all but seven of them men. Most were unemployed laborers and timber workers, few of whom had held any jobs in the previous two years. It was a highly diverse population. Most were white with the majority of them foreign-born, especially Scandinavians. Nonwhites comprised 29% of the colony's population, including 120 Filipinos, 29 African Americas, 25 Mexicans, 4 Native Americans, 4 South Americans, and 2 Japanese. Roy found the relaxed social atmosphere remarkable, describing "an ethnic rainbow" where men of many colors intermingled "in shabby comraderie."[1] The city imposed modest building and sanitation rules, required that women and children not live in the Hooverville, and expected the residents to keep order. This was handled by an elected Vigilance Committee-- consisting of two whites, two blacks, and two Filipinos-- led by a white Texas native and former lumberjack named Jesse Jackson, who came to be known as the unofficial "Mayor" of Hooverville. In 1938, Jackson wrote a short, vivid description of the community that we reproduce here. He explained that the population was fluid, as men sold their shacks to newcomers and moved on, and at its maximum during the winter months when it reached as hight as 1,200. He was proud of the self-built community, saying "Hooverville is the abode of the forgotten man." [2] Tacoma's "Hollywood-on-the-Tideflats" was burned by city officials in May 1942, but was soon reoccupied and rebuilt. Courtesy Tacoma Public Library. Click image to see more pictures from the Tacoma Public Library Digital Archives.Other Hoovervilles also developed: one on the side of Beacon Hill where today I-5 passes; one in the Interbay area next to where the city used to dump its garbage; and two others along 6th Avenue in South Seattle. In late 1935, the city Health Department estimated that 4,000 to 5,000 people were living in the various shacktowns.[3] The city tolerated Hoovervilles until the eve of World War II. Early in 1941, the Seattle Health Department established a Shack Elimination Committee to identify unauthorized housing clusters and plan their removal. A survey located 1687 shacks in five substantial colonies and many smaller ones. In April, residents of the main Hooverville were given notice to leave by May 1. Police officers doused the little structures with kerosene and lit them as spectators watched. Seattle's Hooverville had lasted a full decade.[4] Tacoma's Hooverville Shanty towns also appeared in or near other cities. Tacoma hosted a large encampment near the city garbage dump that residents called "Hollywood-on-the-Tideflats." By the end of the decade it covered a six block area and, like Seattle's Hooverville, included a large number of little houses that residents had built out of scrap materials and steadily improved over the years. City officials alternately tolerated and tried to eradicate the shack town. In May 1942, shortly after Seattle destroyed its Hooverville, the Tacoma Fire Department burned fifty of the "Hollywood" shacks. But residents rebuilt and the site remained occupied all the way through World War II. ----------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------