Fact 1: The Great Depression (1929-39) was the deepest and longest-lasting economic downturn in the history of the Western industrialized world. In the United States, the Great Depression be

Fact 2: In the United States, the Great Depression began soon after the stock market crash of October 1929, which sent Wall Street into a panic and wiped out millions of investors.

Fact 3: By 1933, when the Great Depression reached its nadir, some 13 to 15 million Americans were unemployed and nearly half of the country’s banks had failed.

Fact 4: Despite assurances from President Herbert Hoover and other leaders that the crisis would run its course, matters continued to get worse over the next three years.

Fact 5: In 1932, however, with the country mired in the depths of the Great Depression and some 13-15 million people (or more than 20 percent of the U.S. population at the time) unemployed, Democrat Franklin D. Roosevelt won an overwhelming victory in the presidential election.

Fact 6: By 1930, 4 million Americans looking for work could not find it; that number had risen to 6 million in 1931

Fact 7: In the fall of 1930, the first of four waves of banking panics began, as large numbers of investors lost confidence in the solvency of their banks and demanded deposits in cash, forcing banks to liquidate loans in order to supplement their insufficient cash reserves on hand.

Fact 8: As consumer confidence vanished in the wake of the stock market crash, the downturn in spending and investment led factories and other businesses to slow down production and construction and begin firing their workers.

Fact 9: For those who were lucky enough to remain employed, wages fell and buying power decreased.