Group items tagged

The story takes place during three years of the Great Depression in the fictional "tired old town" of Maycomb, Alabama. The narrator, six-year-old Scout Finch, lives with her older brother Jem and their widowed father Atticus, a middle-aged lawyer. Jem and Scout befriend a boy named Dill who visits Maycomb to stay with his aunt for the summer. The three children are terrified of, and fascinated by, their neighbor, the reclusive "Boo" Radley. The adults of Maycomb are hesitant to talk about Boo and, for many years, few have seen him. The children feed each other's imagination with rumors about his appearance and reasons for remaining hidden, and they fantasize about how to get him out of his house. Following two summers of friendship with Dill, Scout and Jem find that someone is leaving them small gifts in a tree outside the Radley place. Several times, the mysterious Boo makes gestures of affection to the children, but, to their disappointment, never appears in person. Atticus is appointed by the court to defend Tom Robinson, a black man who has been accused of raping a young white woman, Mayella Ewell. Although many of Maycomb's citizens disapprove, Atticus agrees to defend Tom to the best of his ability. Other children taunt Jem and Scout for Atticus' actions, calling him a "nigger-lover". Scout is tempted to stand up for her father's honor by fighting, even though he has told her not to. For his part, Atticus faces a group of men intent on lynching Tom. This danger is averted when Scout, Jem, and Dill shame the mob into dispersing by forcing them to view the situation from Atticus' and Tom's points of view. Because Atticus does not want them to be present at Tom Robinson's trial, Scout, Jem, and Dill watch in secret from the colored balcony. Atticus establishes that the accusers—Mayella and her father, Bob Ewell, the town drunk—are lying. It also becomes clear that the friendless Mayella was making sexual advances towards Tom and her father caught her in the act. Despite significant evidence of Tom's innocence, the jury convicts him. Jem's faith in justice is badly shaken, as is Atticus', when a hopeless Tom is shot and killed while trying to escape from prison. Humiliated by the trial, Bob Ewell vows revenge. He spits in Atticus' face on the street, tries to break into the presiding judge's house, and menaces Tom Robinson's widow. Finally, he attacks the defenseless Jem and Scout as they walk home from the school Halloween pageant. Jem's arm is broken in the struggle, but amid the confusion, someone comes to the children's rescue. The mysterious man carries Jem home, where Scout realizes that he is the reclusive Boo Radley. Maycomb's sheriff arrives and discovers that Bob Ewell has been killed in the struggle. The sheriff argues with Atticus about the prudence and ethics of holding Jem or Boo responsible. Atticus eventually accepts the sheriff's story that Ewell simply fell on his own knife. Boo asks Scout to walk him home, and after she says goodbye to him at his front door, he disappears again. While standing on the Radley porch, Scout imagines life from Boo's perspective and regrets that they never repaid him for the gifts he had given them.

The strongest element of style noted by critics and reviewers is Lee's talent for narration,

literacy rate of about 53 percent (55 percent for males and 51 percent for females) falls well below the 90 percent average literacy rate for Latin American and Caribbean countries

While by the 1930s, diesel engines were revolutionising rail transport, and giving birth to a burgeoning flight industry, on the sea and on rivers, steam was still king. Unlike with trains and aircraft, large ships remained in service for decades, meaning that many of the ships that transported passengers of the 1930s were built as early as the 1850s, and some ships built in the 1930s remain in service today. The steam turbine, first turned to use in seagoing vessels in 1897, was able to produce far more power than a traditional reciprocating steam engine. By the 1930s, all large ships were being built with such engines, allowing unprecedented speeds. For ships built in the thirties, the most popular fuel for running the boilers was no longer coal, but fuel oil. This meant that modern ships could run with a much smaller crew than earlier vessels. A typical small passenger steamer would have no more than a dozen crewmen, including a few stewards and cooks for the care of passengers. Larger vessels of course could have hundreds of crewmen (The Queen Mary, launched in 1936, had over a thousand), and were almost like floating towns, the crew forming their own community below decks.

When we think of the 1930s, the images of the Great Depression leave the impression that nothing good happened because the entire country was focused simply on survival.  But in the area of automobile development, car designs of the 1930s developed some of the most significant new features for automobiles despite economic hard times. As is demonstrated by the popularity of vintage 1930s cars, some of the automobile designs of this period in history were exceptionally artistic and sophisticated.  It is phenomenal that such forward movement in the 1930s car industry occurred in light of how few in this era were privileged enough to be able to buy any kind of transportation at all, much less a new model that had ground breaking design innovation as part of its feature package. 

The result was that 1930s cars not only saw a leap forward in technical design but the styles that were created for this era of car manufacturing were distinctive and imaginative.  At the beginning of the 1930s cars almost universally were made to a four square design that was nothing if not boring.  But as the decade unfolded, some unique designs that we still identify with classic 1930s cars began to become popular. 

The 1930s were an important time for cars in the United States with the introduction of four-wheel hydraulic brakes, radio and heaters. Models began being characterized as more aerodynamic and taking on a smoother shape. This decade of car ingenuity also marked the beginning of V-8, the V-12, and the V-16 engines. Despite the depression of the 1930s and the decline of auto purchases, there were a few models of car that were quite popular.

Buick Series 40

Plymouth Model 30U

At the beginning of the Thirties the American 1930s cars had also foot boards, sunshades on the windscreen of the car, separate drum formed headlights and also rear lights attached to the car by connecting rods. American cars appeared with rounded edges, headlights build within the chassis of the car, but also the driving comfort improved. The radiator grille and shell were titled back slightly, which made the 1930s automobiles looking like more speedier. Affordable security glass was used as windscreens. Low pressure inner tube tires and also windscreen wipers appeared on the American cars during the Thirties mostly as safety measures.

All through the 1930s, GM engineers and designers made continual improvements in 1930's cars' frames, bodies, engines, and transmissions. In 1933, GM added no-draft ventilation to all its cars and developed independent front-wheel suspension. In 1936, Knee-Action suspension made Chevrolets an even smoother ride. All 1937 GM automobiles of the 1930s makes featured an all-steel body and optional windshield defrosters. In 1938, a car radio was introduced as an option on Buicks, and GM’s Harley Earl designed a historic one-off: the Buick Y-Job.

he greatest impact of the streamlined designs was in fact that the 1930's cars became eye catchers. Automobiles of the 1930s became to look like art. Most cars were build on a simple, high, carriage-like chassis rolling on wood-spoke wheels and solid tires. From 1932 on, American cars changed.