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This website provides the history of sharecropping and tenant farming. It also provides details on the hierarchy of society during the great depression. With migration of African Americans came a surge in need of poor white farmers who took on the job of farming on land which they did not own. Many times, sharecroppers would end up working under contract for years without pay in any form. This way of life was only the beginning of social stratification.

Even though farmers suffered from low prices, many were still in better shape than city dwellers. Farmers could at least grow their own food unlike people in the cities. Farmers banded together like a labor union to prevent various products like milk from reaching towns and cities in order to raise the prices. The effort did not really have any effect on prices. The government stepped in to pass a bill to help the farmers to reduce production and surplus products. Limits on sizes of crops and herds that farmers could produce were set and farmers that agreed to limit production were paid subsidies.

This is a comprehensive photo gallery of images from the Dust Bowl. It shows in great detail and visualizes the hardships that farmers faced during the Great Depression as the weather prevented agriculture. The dust storms are very well documented in these photos.