Community Corner

Today in U.S. History: Dust Storm Carries Millions of Tons of Dirt Across Eastern Part of Country

The Dust Bowl had its biggest storm on this day in 1934.

On this day in 1934, a huge dust storm carried millions of tons of Great Plains dirt across the entire eastern U.S. The dense clouds reached major east coast cities from Boston to Atlanta, according to the History Channels' website.

Across the plains, a long and terrible drought had killed crops in the field and turned previously abundant farmlands into a vast and arid wasteland. In Oklahoma, this was the time of the great Dust Bowl and the down fall of thousands of farming families into poverty and homelessness, the subject of John Steinbeck’s "Grapes of Wrath".

The plow had gone in too deep in turning under the grasslands of the Great Plains into wheatlands. Mother Nature was fighting back. Beginning in 1932, dust storms increased in frequency in the country. This day in May 1934 produced the largest of them all, lifting 350 million tons of dirt skyward. New Yorkers were choking on the dust, and dirt accumulated on the decks of ships hundreds of miles offshore in the Atlantic.

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The great drought and its associated dust storms continued until 1939, but May 11, 1934 saw the greatest storm of all.

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