vestment values fell and the wheels of industry ground to a stop. Millions of people were thrown out of employment.

People in the midwest did not realize that the depression would roll westward and those who did could do nothing to stop it. Our government had not learned the system of controlled economy. Farm commodity prices fell so that top on cattle in the central markets was as low as $5.00, hogs, $2.25, corn 10¢ per bushel.

After a few months banks in the midwest started to fail. the bankers could not liquidate the note pouch fast enough to keep pace with withdrawals of deposits. Stockholders were wiped out, and many business men had to close their establishments.

Then to make bad matters worse, a great drought rolled over our country. The middle west became the "dust bowl." If a shower of rain or a little snow fell it would often leave a deposit of slimy red mud from dust carried up from as far away as Oklahoma and Colorado.

This writer remembers making a trip into South Dakota in the fall of 1931 and saw many abandoned farmsteads, barren fields, Russian thistles and dust blowing across the landscape -- driven by hot winds. In Platte, South Dakota, there were seven grain elevators along the railroad right of way. All were apparently closed so that out of curiosity we inquired if any were being operated. The answer was, "No, they are empty." Upon further inquiry if that many elevators were ever needed the answer was "Yes." The land in this area had been opened for homesteading hardly twenty years before and therefore was new ground, never before tilled until the demand for wheat became so great during the war.

Grasshoppers in this area and Mormon crickets farther west had taken over the country.

At this juncture we were still raising some crops in the Elkhorn Valley. Had anyone told us that such devastation would come to us we would not have believed them. It did come, and 1932, 1933 and 1934 were especially bad when little or no crops (except in low wet ground) were raised.

Then followed foreclosures on farms and homes. Farmers also often suffered the loss of their personal property, also through foreclosure.

Livestock was starving for want of feed so that the Government offered to and did buy surplus stock (hogs and cattle) only to destroy it. Cows brought $10.00 to $15.00 per head and hogs sold for as little as $2.25 per cwt.

Farmers would cut their corn stalks (sometime as early as July) to get the most of its food value before the grasshoppers would devour it or see the fields dry up for want of moisture. there were times when one could look up and see clouds of grasshoppers coming in.

Through the county agent's office, the Government made

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