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Lesson Topic:
The Great Depression and A Christmas Memory
Grade level: 9
Length of lesson: 20 min.

Stage 1 – Desired Results

Content Standard(s):
I. READING AND LITERATURE: C. Comprehension, D. Literature

Understanding (s)/goals Essential Question(s):

Students will understand:
• How to use historical context
to “read” a text
• The basic situation of the Great
Depression
• How the Great Depression
applies to A Christmas Memory
by Truman Capote
• Why are the characters in the
text so poor
• Why does “Buddy” value
movies so much?
• Why was buying supplies for
fruit cake such a big deal?
• What does the history
surrounding a story matter?

Student objectives (outcomes):

Students will be able to:
• Apply an understanding of history to the reading of a text
• Comprehend a text by knowing something about it already (prior
knowledge)

Stage 2 – Assessment Evidence

Performance Task(s): Other Evidence:
There are no tasks associated with • Class input/discussion
this lesson. It is an introduction to • Answers to teacher’s questions
reading. throughout the lecture

Stage 3 – Learning Plan

Learning Activities:

Intro (1-2 min.)

• You are about to read A Christmas Memory by Truman Capote
• To really understand what is going on in this story you need to know
something about its setting

Body (15-17 min.)

• Write October 29, 1929 on the white board
• What happened on this date – call on any raised hands
• Yes, it is the day the stock market crashed
• Now I will lecture using the following notes stopping every once in a
while to ask a question.
• What I will ask and when I will ask it will depend on the student’s
response to the material
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The Great Depression

• Began in October 29, 1929, yet not the worst crash in history, but one that toppled
the US economy.
o The entire stock market lost about 12% of its value, which is a lot
• What are stocks?
o They are tiny pieces of a company, called “shares” that are sold to
generate money for the company
o These shares are traded between people and supply and demand of
certain stocks makes the price go up and down
o In 1929 the price of all of the stocks in market went down quickly so
quickly the people who keep track of prices could not keep up
• So, what happened?
o Farm income fell by 50% so if your family was living on a farm and it
generated $10,000 a year in profit, you now had to live on only $5,000
o Factories closed, banks (who also invested in the stock market) closed
and the people whose money was being kept in those banks was lost
o Why? Because banks don’t keep everyone’s money all at the same
time they take a little from one customer to give to another and vice versa
o Soon, 25% of the country was without work compared to 4-5% today
• So there were traveling workers who sought work in states other than their own –
a “tinker”
• There were long lines to wait for work
• People where very poor
• President Franklin D. Roosevelt (FDR) –Democrat – won his election bid because
country blamed Hoover/republicans for Depression
• FDR tried to inspire the country by giving his “The only thing to fear is fear itself”
in his inaugural address
• Soon he and his political allies constructed the New Deal which was a set of
legislation that brought us things like the Federal Deposit Insurance Corporation
(FDIC) which ensures that if the banks lose money, you don’t lose yours
• New Deal also brought ideas such as Social Security, and government help for un
employment
• Roosevelt was and is loved by people who were poor and scared by the depression
• Historians claim that the Depression ended in 1939.

• Prohibition was instated from 1920- 1930.

• What does prohibition mean? Prohibition is the legal prevention of the

manufacture, transportation and sale of alcoholic beverages, an extreme law.
People were convinced that alcohol was the cause of everything evil, so why not
get rid of it? There were supporters of this law and non supporters.

• Support came from a number of rural, religious, and business groups these groups
of people were so convinced that alcohol was the cause of virtually all crime that,
on the eve of Prohibition, some towns actually sold their jails.
• Because of prohibition and people still wanting and needing alcohol. There was a
widespread disrespect for law. New York City alone had about thirty thousand
(yes, 30,000) speakeasies. Speakeasies were illegal places to obtain liquor. The
speakeasies got there name because one had to whisper a code word or name
through a slot in a locked door to gain admittance. People who made alcohol for
speakeasy were known as bootleggers and bootleggers made alcohol in homes,
barns, buildings where they could. Bootleggers where know for making what is
called "Bathtub gin", it got its name from the fact that alcohol, glycerin and
juniper juice was mixed in bottles or jugs too tall to be filled with water from a
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sink tap so they were commonly filled under a bathtub tap. Bill McCoy was a
bootlegger well known for selling quality imported goods: the original "real
McCoy."

• Because the smuggling of alcohol could not be prevented, and the illicit
manufacture of liquor sprang up with such rapidity that authorities were unable to
suppress it. There followed a period of unparalleled illegal drinking (often of
inferior and dangerous beverages) and lawbreaking. In 1933 the Twenty-first
Amendment, repealing prohibition, was ratified and it was no longer illegal to
have, or sell alcohol.

Movies
• In the 1930's the motion pictures were the most important entertainment of The
Great Depression. The cost of a movie at this time, 10 cents that’s right only a
dime. Everyone was going to the theaters for some entertainment. During the
depths of the Depression in the early thirties and average of 60 million to 75
million movie tickets were bought each week. Movies helped people forget their
troubles. Many famous movies that we know came out of the great depression,
such as The Wizard of Oz, the Three Stooges and Shirley Temple lifted America's
depression spirits with The Little Colonel, Curly Top, and Heidi. For a long time
during The Great Depression movies were an escape from the Depression's
reality. You might have an extra dime one day, so you'd go to the movies. While
the reality of the Depression seemed inescapable, this short trip to a faraway
land was the thing to do.

Conclusion (1 min.)
The reason we are studying this is because Capote wanted to write stories
that are based on real events even though they’re fictional. The story your
about to read is based on an experience Capote had, but has been
fictionalized to make it a better story. Keep in mind what you’ve learned
here today and as you read try to picture yourself in the story.