The Depression decade: thin soup, thick ingenuity, and the New Deal lamp.
Dinner stretches: meatloaf learns to take bread crumbs, the garden goes in the side yard, clothes are turned twice. And yet the kitchen modernizes - the refrigerator retires the ice man and the wringer washer earns its place - because a gadget that saves money wins the argument.
The electric refrigerator - bought on time payments, defended like a family member, the single biggest domestic upgrade of the century so far.
A quarter of the country out of work; the plains blow away in black clouds; families split up to find wages. The porch light stays on for men riding freights.
The Okie family sees the decade from Route 66; the WPA muralist sees it from a scaffold; the banker sees it from a closed bank. Same ten years, three different countries.