Frank laughed and stepped forward to kiss his mother-in-law on both cheeks. “Good evening, Babette. You do look wonderful. People are going to wonder who’s the mother and who’s the daughter.”
Babette gave a little laugh and poked his shoulder. “And the stranger has a golden tongue as well.” But she was clearly flattered by the compliment.
Babette Durand Dickerson had been born in Paris to a wealthy, aristocratic family and even had royal blood back in her ancestry somewhere. When Celeste had brought Frank to the mansion that first time, her mother had been markedly cool, not trying in any way to hide her displeasure that her daughter had come home with some cowboy from Hicksville, Utah. Both she and Reginald had fought the courtship and engagement vigorously. It still amazed Frank that Celeste had stood up to them. But then, Celeste was the only child of two very strong-willed people who had doted on her and given her whatever she wanted from the day she was born. And for some reason that still baffled him, Celeste had decided that Frank Westland was the man she wanted to marry. She had threatened to run off and elope if her parents kept fighting it.
In the ensuing years, the attitude of both parents had gradually softened toward Frank. Getting his doctorate under the tutelage of the world-renowned Albert Einstein and now being an associate professor at M.I.T had helped immensely. He wasn’t one of them, but he was no longer an outsider. He knew he had finally been accepted when, about a year after their marriage, Celeste’s mother had asked him to start calling her Babette. And now they were really good friends. They enjoyed each other’s company and they would often banter back and forth, teasing one another.
“We’re on the front row,” Babette said to Celeste. “Our names are on the chairs. You go up. I’ll be right there.”
They had barely sat down before Babette was back with one of the waiters. “Champagne?” she asked, taking one for herself.
Celeste took one as well, but Frank shook his head. “No, thanks.”
Babette cocked her head, her lips forming a pout. “You would turn your nose up at the elixir of the gods? Do you not remember that champagne is a French creation?”
“Yeah,” Frank drawled. “But I prefer American champagne, the elixir of the common man. Otherwise know as beer.” He looked at the waiter. “Is that even a possibility?”
The waiter glanced quickly at Babette, who nodded, and then he said, “Of course. I’ll be right back.”
Celeste just shook her head. “Beer? How plebeian.”
“Hey,” Frank said. “It’s got bubbles too, but mine comes with a head on it.”
7:28 p.m.
Two minutes before the meeting was to start, another couple came in and took the last two empty seats. Immediately the servers and staff exited the room, shutting the doors behind them. All conversation ceased and everyone sat quietly waiting for what was to come next. There were thirty-one people in all. Mostly it was couples, but there were five men who had come alone. There were no unaccompanied women.
Precisely at seven thirty, Reginald stood up. As all eyes turned to him, he smiled warmly and began. “Ladies and gentlemen, friends and associates, welcome. Thank you for being here. We know this is a busy time of the year, but I am confident that before you leave tonight, you will agree that it was well worth your time.”
He sobered. “So, without further ado, let’s get to it. What my two colleagues and I are about to present to you is a unique and, we believe, highly profitable business opportunity. All of you have already signed an agreement of confidentiality and nondisclosure before coming. I remind you that you may discuss the details of this presentation only with people present in this room tonight.”
“Very good,” he said after seeing the people in the room nodding. His two companions sat back, visibly relaxing. “I shall begin with a few preliminary remarks to lay the background for our proposal, and then I shall ask our colleague, Mr. Claude Rutherford, to put forth our proposal to you. When he is done, Mr. Charles Reed Ashbridge will lay out exactly what you will need to do if you have an interest in this opportunity.”
Reginald paused for another moment, looking around at the upturned faces, and then went on. “My friends, the decade in which we now live and which soon will be coming to an end has been labeled the ‘Roaring Twenties.’ It has been a wonderful and sometimes tumultuous time. Many people believe that the world has gone crazy, that the values of previous generations have been tossed aside, and that our culture has slipped from its moorings. I am not one of them.”
Frank’s mind jumped back to five years earlier when he and Celeste had gone to Utah to visit his family. They had arrived shortly after Tina had shocked their father by coming out in a new dress with the hemline above mid-calf. Afterwards, long discussions had followed about the Roaring Twenties and the eroding standards and abandonment of traditional values. Five years later, what had seemed scandalous back then was commonplace now and hardly raised an eyebrow.
“But it is not about changing values that we speak,” Reginald continued. “It is about the rapidly changing economics of our nation as this decade draws to a close. For one thing is certain about the Roaring Twenties: the decade has created two dramatically different economic conditions. I speak of prosperity. And I speak of poverty.” He reached down and picked up a single sheet of paper. “I would like to share some interesting facts that support my assertion, and this shall provide the backdrop for our discussion tonight.
“In 1900, not quite thirty years ago now, not one family in a hundred owned their own horse and buggy. Now more than half of all households have their own cars, and an increasing number have two cars. In 1900, only one in every thirteen homes had a telephone; now it’s one in two. In 1900, modern plumbing and electricity in homes were luxuries only enjoyed by the upper classes. Today, twenty-one million homes are wired, seven million households have electric refrigerators, and twenty-two million homes own radio receivers.” He lowered the paper. “These figures provide evidence of the prosperity America has been enjoying in this decade.”
People were obviously struck by his statistics. Celeste leaned over and said, “I had no idea things were expanding that rapidly.”
Her father continued before Frank could answer. “For centuries, nay, millennia, the fastest way to communicate with someone who lived any distance away from you was by horse. Then came the train, which, early on, traveled at the blinding speed of about seven to ten miles per hour.”
Laughter rippled through the room. “Back then even the experts said that if a human being traveled faster than thirty miles an hour, it would suck the breath right out of him and he would die. I think we can now safely say that is not true.”
More chuckles.
“Now we have laid cables across the bottom of the Atlantic Ocean, and my wife can pick up a telephone and call her mother in Paris.” Reginald pulled a face. “And talk for hours.” More laughter. “I can send a telegram to London in the morning and hear back before the day is over. We can now drive in one day what took a wagon a month.”
As Frank looked around, he was struck by something. He had never thought of Reginald as a people person. He was sober to the point of sourness, formal to the point of stiffness, and reserved to the point of being standoffish. Yet he had some of Boston’s wealthiest, most prominent, and most sophisticated citizens eating out of the palm of his hand. They were loving this.
“Well, I think we can all agree that it is a wonderful time we live in.” Reginald stopped, his eyes moving from face to face. “Or is it?” He turned his paper over. “Here is another side of the Roaring Twenties we don’t talk about in polite company. Our economists are touting our time as a new golden age of prosperity. Which it is . . . for the five percent of Americans who earn thirty-three percent of the income.”
That brought a murmur of surprise. Reginald’s voice went up a notch in volume. “How golden is it when forty percent of American famil
ies are living below the poverty level? Yes! You heard that right. Forty percent of all Americans are too poor to buy the goods and services they see all around them. Most of them are too poor to even buy the necessities of life—food, shelter, and the basic commodities.”
Frank was watching Reginald intently. This was hardly what he had expected. A lecture on the plight of the poor to this group? Was he going to ask for donations? Frank flinched as he saw that his father-in-law was looking directly at him.
“Ladies and gentlemen, I’d like to introduce you to my son-in-law, Frank Westland.” He motioned with his hand for Frank to stand up. “As some of you know, Frank is a physicist who is now a professor at M.I.T. and also teaches some classes at Harvard.”
As Frank got slowly to his feet, he looked down at Celeste and Babette, wondering if they had known this was coming. From their faces, it was clear that they had not.
“Frank,” Reginald continued, “hails from out west. His family owns a prosperous cattle ranch in Utah. Frank, if you don’t mind, may I ask you some questions?”
Frank nodded warily.
“Does your extended family own any automobiles?”
Frank blinked and then nodded again. “Yes.”
“How many, if I may ask?”
“Well, my older brother and my sister and her husband have formed a co-op with my father. Between them they own three automobiles, four farm trucks, and various pieces of farm equipment.”
“Do their homes have indoor plumbing and electricity?”
Where was he going with this? “Of course.”
“Refrigerators?”
“Yes.”
“Telephones, radios, maybe an electric washer and vacuums?”
“Yes to all.” Frank started to sit down, but Reginald motioned for him to keep standing.
“So, my friends, Frank and his family are not some of those I’ve just been talking about. They are a successful, prosperous family, just like we are.”
“Well,” Frank said dryly, “not quite as prosperous as you, Reginald.”
He heard Celeste’s sharp intake of breath beside him. Babette sniggered. And the crowd hooted.
Reginald actually smiled too. “I’ve spoken of Frank’s family to help me make my point. So, Frank, let me ask you this. I was just speaking about people who are not prosperous, who live in extreme poverty right here among us, right here in America. In your opinion, what group of people is most likely to be found in those conditions?”
Now Frank understood, and he answered with a single word. “Farmers.” Then he sat down.
“Yes!” Reginald cried. “Farmers!”
“Is that true?” Celeste whispered to him.
“Yes, very much so,” Frank whispered back.
“Frank—and you can remain seated now—would you say this is because farmers are lazy and slothful?”
Frank bristled a little. “Absolutely not. Farmers are some of the hardest working people I know.”
“Yes, they are,” Reginald agreed. “And some of the most frugal, too. So why are they in this plight, would you say, Frank?”
“Because conditions are tough for farmers right now,” he answered. “Really tough.”
“Thank you, Frank. I wanted these people to hear it from someone who knows.”
And at that moment, Frank realized that this was why he and Celeste had been invited to this meeting. Reginald wanted him there to make his points for him.
Once again Reginald consulted his paper, but after glancing at it, he set it down again. “Let me describe why things are so tough for farmers, as Frank has told us. While the Great War in Europe was a terrible thing, it actually proved to be a boon to the American farmer. Why? Because the government started buying huge amounts of food. First it was to send to our Allies in the war. Later it was to feed the American boys who were sent to France and Belgium. With fat government contracts, the farmers prospered. And with that prosperity, they bought more land. They bought farm equipment. Then they plowed and planted larger amounts of acreage to fill the demand. And they prospered.”
“We did really well in the war,” Frank whispered to Celeste. “Almost every cow we sold was to the government.”
“The explosion in technology blessed the farmers as well. While we were buying automobiles, they were buying tractors, threshing machines, plows, grain drills, harrows. And these machines profoundly transformed the lives of farmers. A tractor could plow more acreage in one hour than a team of horses could do in a day. And it never had to be rested like the teams did. A threshing machine could harvest in one day what it used to take twenty men a week to do. And this increase in production added to their prosperity.” Reginald stopped and let his eyes scan the faces before him. “And what do you think they did with that prosperity?”
“They bought new equipment,” Babette suggested.
“Yes! What else?” No one answered. Reginald looked at Frank again. “What else did the farmer do with his increased earnings?”
Startled, Frank looked up. He had already answered it in his head. “He spent it on his wife and children. He put a new addition on the house. He bought his wife a washing machine. He threw out the old ice box and bought a refrigerator. He had indoor plumbing and electricity installed. He even took his family into town to the movies on weekends and bought them an ice cream cone afterwards.”
Reginald was pleased. “Exactly. He did what all of us did. He used his growing prosperity to raise the quality of life and the standard of living for his family.” There was a long pause. He looked around, his expression somber. “And then—” He sighed deeply. “And then things began to change.”
Chapter Notes
Most of the statistics found in the chapter come from David E. Kyvig’s Daily Life in the United States, 1920–1940.
December 12, 1928, 7:48 p.m.—
New England Colonial Bank and Trust, Boston
Reginald Dickerson was thoughtful now as he went on. “We often think of a financial recession as stemming from a downturn in the overall economy. But in the case of the farmers and ranchers, it was just the opposite. It was the booming economy that brought disaster. Three major factors came together to create unintended consequences.
“Number one, in those prosperous years, as Frank has said, farmers did what most other Americans were doing. They wanted to have a better life. And like most other Americans in the last few years, they didn’t want to wait until they had enough money to pay cash. That could take months or years. So what did they do?”
“They started buying on credit,” a woman called out. “Like most people did.”
“That’s right,” Reginald replied, “and merchants and manufacturers greased the skids to make buying on the installment plan as easy as possible. And bankers, as bankers have done from time immemorial, underwrote it all and charged interest for doing so.”
“I like that arrangement,” another man quipped. The rest laughed. Frank managed a thin smile. Seeing that, Celeste took his hand and squeezed it.
“Farmers were no different than their town and city counterparts,” Reginald went on. “Over the years, they had taken out short-term loans from the banks to buy seed or equipment, then they paid them off when their crops came in. But with these additional items, including new farm equipment, it became common practice to carry their loans over into the next year. Thus they gradually moved from seasonal debt to more long-term debt.”
Frank looked around. This was simple economics, but they were all listening carefully, sensing that his comments had a purpose.
“Then the war ended. Our boys came home. War contracts were canceled. Some farmers saw the demand for their crops drop by thirty, forty, or even fifty percent almost overnight. This situation was further complicated by the fact that with their new equipment and new and better fertilizers, food production went up.”
Reginald looked around at his audience. “Tell me, folks. You’re the economists. What happens when there is more product than there is demand for that product?”
“Prices go down,” the man behind Frank said.
“Not just down,” said another. “They fall like a rock.”
“Yes!” Reginald cried. “And that is exactly what’s been happening in America the last several years. Food prices are down everywhere. We who live in the towns and cities love it. This is wonderful. But for the farmer, this has proved to be disastrous. In the past few years, farm income has fallen sixty percent. Yes! Sixty percent! Think of that in terms of your own situation. What would you do if you were suddenly earning less than half what you were before?”
“They’d have to cut back on the amount of caviar they have at their parties,” Frank murmured to himself. He felt a sharp jab in his ribs and saw that Celeste and Babette were both glaring at him. He realized that he must have spoken louder than he had intended. He raised his hand.
“No, Frank,” Celeste hissed. “Don’t you dare say that.”
But Reginald motioned to him. “Yes, Frank. What do you do?”
“You cut back. You tighten your belts. You eat only one meal a day. Your kids go barefoot. Your motto becomes, ‘Patch it up, wear it out, make it do, or do without.’”
“Do without what, Frank?”
“You do without everything that is not absolutely essential to your existence.”
“Thank you. So now, we have a new set of conditions out there in farm country. As food prices collapsed, many farmers were unable to meet their debt obligations. This wasn’t because they were lazy good-for-nothings. As Frank told us, these are honest, hardworking, decent citizens. They have produced bumper crops, but they’ve either had to sell them for less than what it cost to grow them, or, in many cases, they haven’t been able to sell them at all and have had to leave the food to rot in the fields.”
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