The attachment of the complete txt novel of the Great Depression has been uploaded to Baidu Netdisk, click to download for free:

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Section 1: From wealth to shabbiness (1)

1 From abundance to shabbiness

In mid-October 1929, what lay before an ordinary middle-class American was a prospect of endless prosperity and prosperity. Last year, President Herbert Hoover, who had just taken office, declared solemnly: Conquering poverty is no longer an unattainable fantasy. “We have not yet reached our goal, but we have the opportunity to continue the policies of the past eight years. Going forward, with God's help, we will soon see that the day is ahead when poverty will be driven out of this country." It was a solemn economic promise mixed with what popular historians would soon call the "American Dream." Even more smugly, Irving Fisher and other economists who knew the secrets of Wall Street assured the public that they were staring at a "permanent plateau" of prosperity.

This fertile upland—more tangible than the "Promised Land" cherished in old Protestant hymns—seemed like the ultimate triumph of an industrial revolution that began during the Civil War. The result of America's latest war has been the power of mass production, mixed with the wonders of new technology. Even now, in the third week of October 1929, Henry Ford is hosting the "50th Anniversary of the Invention of the Electric Light Celebration" with the president and other celebrities in attendance to commemorate the 50th birthdays of Edison and the incandescent light bulb. Motorcycles, bathtubs, refrigerators, and radios are all touchstones of progress. Stimulated by fashion and advertising, keeping up with trends requires nothing less than the latest model.

Marketing pressures and even incentives to buy double luxuries—two cars in each garage—are showing signs of excess in the consumer market, and not because all Americans are greedy. Devouring worldly goods, but because...

It should be the complete book