In the 1930s the economic crisis known as the Great Depression rippled through the United States, affecting almost all American families. The crash of the New York Stock Exchange in October 1929 marked the beginning of the most severe economic downturn in U.S. history. Thousands of banks closed; manufacturing slowed greatly because no one could buy goods; stores closed; 25 to 30 percent of workers lost their jobs. It would be the middle of 1933 before the government took action to halt the downward spiral and offer some relief. President Franklin D. Roosevelt (1882–1945; served 1933–45) began his term of office in March of that year. In the next one hundred days he and his advisers proposed a series of measures that Congress passed into laws. The new legislation created programs for immediate relief as well as programs that would aid in the gradual recovery of America's prosperity. These programs, known...