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Excerpt (1)GoW
Excerpt (2) GoW

Grapes of Wrath [GoW]
Encarta Entry
Online Resources 
Spark Notes
Character List (web)
Character List (local)

Glossary of People & Places

GoW (zip)

Lesson Plans

CA studies

California (Encarta)

Dust Bowl (Encarta)

CA Historical Society

SF History

Oregon Trail

California from Air (NASA)

CA related stuff UIIb/Br

CA Tourism (link courtesy to Armin Preiskowski)

Song

Get your kicks on Route 66

AD-related materials

Horatio Alger's America

(The Connection)

NPR's The Connection

  Guest: Studs Terkel, Pulitzer Prize-winner and author of "Will the Circle Be Unbroken?"

Star-spangled Banner
Anthem - Background

Steinbeck Links

National Steinbeck Center Salinas

Steinbeck Online Bookstore

San Jose State University - Center for Steinbeck Studies

www.steinbeck100.org

Program Tip

John Steinbeck Revisited
1902 - 2002

Ein Besuch im Steinbeck County (3 Sat Documentary - 10 Oct 2002)
Hint cortesy to Dennis Aretz -  read more ...

Kite Aerial Photography

 Illustration: Hooverville in Seattle 

Today's Highlight in History

On this date in 1964, the TV Show Route 66 rode into the sunset. Since its conception in 1926, Route 66 had permeated every aspect of American culture, from literature to gas station architecture.
One of its most beloved manifestations, the TV show Route 66, had its final airing on this day, bringing an end to the roadside adventures of Buz and Tod in Tod's Corvette. But it also brought an end to an era. Immortalized in Steinbeck's Grapes of Wrath as the "Mother Road," Route 66 was a symbol of opportunity, serving as an escape route from the misery of the Depression-era Dust Bowl. Its two lanes wove in and out of Middle America, connecting hundreds of rural communities to the great cities of Chicago and Los Angeles. And above all, it symbolized the open road and Americana, complete with autocamps, motels, and roadside attractions.

By 1970, nearly all segments of the original Route 66 were replaced by a modern four-lane highway, and the revived Route 66 TV show of 1993 lasted less than a season. America's love affair with the "Mother Road" had come to an end. 

Quote from:
 http://adv-marketing.com/business/td000918.html

Hoovervilles

In the early 1930s shantytowns sprang up in cities across the United States, built by people made homeless by the Great Depression. The areas, like this one in Seattle, were nicknamed Hoovervilles because their inhabitants blamed United States President Herbert Hoover for their plight.

Source: Microsoft Encarta

Excerpts from GoW:

Get Your Kicks on Route 66

(by Bobby Troup - 1946)

Tom Joad - Lyrics as recorded by Woody Guthrie (1940):
Tom Joad got out of the old McAlester Pen;
There he got his parole.
After four long years on a man killing charge,
Tom Joad come a-walkin' down the road .....

  Listen to the song

Springsteen, "The Ghost of Tom Joad" 
   Listen to a sample

places mentioned in Chapter 12 of
The Grapes of Wrath

THE EPIC STORY OF THE JOAD FAMILY'S MIGRATION FROM THE OKLAHOMA DUST BOWL TO THE PROMISED LAND OF CALIFORNIA

In stark and moving detail, John Steinbeck depicts the lives of ordinary people striving to preserve their humanity in the face of social and economic desperation. When the Joads lose their tenant farm in Oklahoma, they join thousands of others, traveling the narrow concrete highways toward California and the dream of a piece of land to call their own. Each night on the road, they and their fellow migrants recreate society: leaders are chosen, unspoken codes of privacy and generosity evolve, and lust, violence, and murderous rage erupt.

A portrait of the bitter conflict between the powerful and the powerless, of one man's fierce reaction to injustice, and of a woman's quiet, stoical strength, The Grapes of Wrath is a landmark of American literature, one that captures the horrors of the Great Depression as it probes into the very nature of equality and justice in America

Route 66

It's hard to think about the Dust Bowl Days and the migrations to California without considering Route 66.  I know, much of the commercialization of the old road now is more or less about the 1950's and 1960's because of the TV series by the same name, but to me, Route 66 was filled with model A's when it was a dirt road.

Cadillac El Dorado: This 1957 Cadillac El Dorado convertible epitomizes the large cars of the “American Dream” era.

Route 66 Links:

www.historic66.com