Ch. 16-19(F)

Tom Joad is a man with 2 key beliefs. One is that he believes California to be his saving grace for him and his family and that his family means very much to him. Because Tom believes so strongly in California, we can see that he is a persistent person. If he firmly believes in his goal, he will do everything he can to achieve it. In this case that means he will traverse 2000 plus miles in order to get his family to a new land in which they can live a better life. The way he single mindlessly goes to California despite all the rumors that people have said also goes to show that he is a person that is not easily dissuaded. He has proof that California needs worker and while others say that they could not find work, he goes ahead and continues to believe that there will be work because of his evidence. Tom is also very determined to make his way across California forgoing his losses in exchange for an increased pace. When Grampa dies, he continues after a short burial and a prayer wasting no tears. When his brother leaves his family, he is confused yet he does not pay it too much thought. He simply accepts and moves ahead. Just by knowing that Tom is a man that firmly believes that California is the place for his family we can induce that he is a man that has determination, and makes decisions not rashly.

What we can learn from how Tom loves and cares for his family show that he is a man with strong leadership skills and that he is also incredibly intelligent. When his mother gets into a fight with tom and his father, Tom realizes that he needs to back down and offer a more intelligent idea before someone ends up getting hurt. Thus he manages to calm down his mother and resolve the situation, showing leadership skills. He displays the care for his family with his leadership of how he quickly calmed down the situation. This situation also shows his intelligence and decision making skills. Here Tom had a choice, he could have kept on arguing with Ma and eventually someone would have gotten hurt. The first example of intelligence was how he recognized that someone would've gotten hurt if they had kept arguing. The second was that he chose to stop the argument thus preventing the damage from being done. This shows that Tom is an intelligent man with good decision making processes.

Ch.11-15 (D)*

The quote that resonated the most with me was when Casy and Tom were speaking about the man that owned a million acres. They were questioning why the man owned so much land and what was he going to do with it. Casy then says how the land is used as compensation for his happiness, "If he needs a million acres to make him feel rich, seems to me he needs it 'cause he feels awful poor inside hisself." This quote explains to us what it means to be happy.  The unnamed man uses money and land to make himself feel happy. However, if one goes past that surface level of satisfaction, deep down, that man is discontent with his life, as Casy has noticed. The quote teaches us that money and land isn’t everything and that we should always be looking for something that can make us happy. If one would compare this man to the Joad family, the Joads are much happier not because they have land but because they have each other and that seem to be enough for them. The quote goes to show that people are much more important than materials, and happiness often comes in forms of time well spent with others. There are many examples of this nowadays, of how wealth often does not lead to happiness. There are many new stories of the wealthy abusing substances and ending up in very pitiful states. This is caused because those that are wealthy are not happy and have to find a release from their life, which leads them to drugs. The man in this quote does not have a good out look in his life, not realizing that he has many more blessings than others. It reminds me that as a person living in the United states, that I have many more opportunities than those living in Africa or Asia.

Ch. 16-19 (C)

This poem comes from the perspective of a Californian who doesn't want people migrating to his state.  This poem explores the hatred and where it stems from and also of what they will do to the Oklahomans.

Why is it that they come?

So many of them

Some have stayed and others leave

Why are they here,

Did they come for the Jobs?

They must know there are none left

I barely have one and i need it

My neighbors need it

My kin need it

They don't need it

Those Oklahomans, those Okies

They don't belong here

We can't have them taking our jobs

We gotta get rid of those Okies

And so my Kin

My Neighbor

Come to me so as we can rid our land of these people

The Oklahomans

Ch. 11-15 (B)

Highway 66 was important to many immigrants traveling from the central of America to California for they had only that main route.  This road would pass through eight states and traversed two thirds of america.

The significance of the road lies in how many important stops there were to travelers. Those migrating did not have long lasting cars, and thus to replace parts, they had to make sure there were places where one could buy spares. Another important stops were called service stations, where one could buy food and have lodging. Those are incredibly important if one is to undergo a 2000+ mile trip.

An example of a camping trip is seen here where a traveler would stay during the night after a long day journeying. Although it seems barren and not useful, it becomes important to have a designated place to rest, providing a good stopping point for the day and if others stop there, a hub for trade and advice to get through the trip.

Sources: Map, Station Picture, Lodge Picture

Ch.1-10(F)*

In the 1930's machines were still being introduced. Cars and tractors were relatively new and were met with different opinions. Some people like them, others didn't. The Grapes of Wrath explores the opinion of machines in the 1930's through two different viewpoints. One is of a man driving a tractor and another of a man selling cars.

The tractor driver is a man who admires the power that comes with driving the machine. However that power consumes the man who drives the tractor, which is described by Steinbeck,

         "The driver could not control--it straight across the country it went, cutting through a dozen farms and             straight back. A twitch at the controls could swerve the cat', but the driver's hands could not twitch               because the monster that built the tractor, the monster that sent the tractor out, had somehow got into           the driver's hands, into his brain and muscle, had goggled him and muzzled him"(35) 

The idea that is being pointed out by Steinbeck is that while man has made the machines, they are too much for us and that they abuse us. The man who drives the tractor cannot move and not only that, he cannot control the tractor. The tractor had gotten into the man's head and now he can't do anything. This goes to demonstrate the effects of the machines on us, that we cannot handle the appliances we made to help us. 

On the other hand, there is man who adores machines and is instead in control of it, using them to make his money. He would buy used car and sell new ones to others. He is the opposite of the tractor drivers, controlling it instead of having it control him. He appraises cars while thinking to himself, "We aint' sellin' cars--rolling junk. Goddamn it, I got to get jalopies. I don't want nothing for more'n twenty-five, thirty bucks. Sell 'em for fifty,seventy-five" The dealer, uses the machines to his advantage to make profits off of it. This shows that while there are those that are controlled by the new inventions, there are others that can use them to their fullest.

The Grapes of Wrath makes comparisons from new to old when it concerns a new idea. With the introduction of the machine, it compares how people react to it and how they, both use it and are used by it. Both of the examples used describe how men are using the machines to make money, however one is used by it and the other uses it. 

Ch. 1-10(F)

In the Grapes of Wrath, pride is a very important aspect of life. It is rare for one to back down and accept their situation. However, in Tom's case, he is one of the few people who has come to accept his life and swallow his pride. While in jail he states that "I ain't proud like some fellas. I let stuff run off'n me." While Tom is in jail, he learns to accept his time in there. He is not mad at being in jail as he had come to terms with it. He also compares himself to the others, showing how rare it was for someone to swallow their pride and that he was able to. In doing so, he takes pride in that he can swallow his own while others cannot. This in itself is dignity as well, however there are those that cannot back down.

Boy Floyd is someone who had gone to jail as well. However, unlike Tom, Floyd comes back angry, with Ma describing the experience as "An'he was mad. He wasn't no boy or no no man no more, he was jus' a walkin' chunk a mean-mad." Floyd could not accept how he had gone to jail and thus once he had come back he was resentful of the experience. This shows how his pride had been damaged and because he could not accept that damage, it led him going to jail again for he kept fighting the jail in order to regain his pride. The pride shown here is the traditional pride of the 1930's.

 The Grapes of Wrath highlights the how people's standard for pride changes. One shows a man who has learned to accept what had happened to him and the other, a man who continues to challenge what had happened to him to regain his pride. The man who continues to challenge a lost prospect in order to regain his lost pride is the traditional dignity, but that pride develops into a new one, a modern aspect of a man who has accepted his position and takes pride in being able to recognize that.

Ch.1-10(A)*

The Great Depression and The Dust Bowls are the two main events of the 1930's. The Great depression began slightly before the 1930's, in the 1929 October 24th when the stock market crashed. Due to that, people began losing jobs, as companies needed to save money and did so by firing workers. Those that kept their jobs, had their wages reduced dramatically dropping 43% between 1929 and 1933. With the loss in income, families began to starve and thus were forced to split in order to find work. Men would line up outside in order to have a chance at getting a job and many more had to go to soup kitchens just for food.

The Dust Bowl also contributed to the economic downfall of the US. The Dust Bowl were series of dust storms that took place at the turn of the decade and destroyed the crops and the soil of the south. This was very detrimental to the economy and to those farming that region. Croppers were kicked off  the land by the banks that owned the land. This led to a mass migration of those living in the south to move to better places such as California.

All that happened under President Hoover, who did not help the economy. When President Franklin was elected, he began making reforms under the name of the New Deal. It started in 1933 and ended  approximately in 1938, however many programs made then are still in effect today. The New Deal helped assist those living under poor condition, by placing them in welfare programs as well as finding many of them jobs through numerous programs created by the New Deal.

In the Grapes of Wrath, its starts off with the land being already hit by the dust storms. We know this because many of the farmers have already moved out as well as seeing other farmers being kicked off the land. Not to mention, the very beginning of the book has a dust storm taking place, describing how the dust tore everything up and destroying the soil. What the research has shown is that the Grapes of Wrath is a very accurate book when it concerns the the Dust Bowl. Not only that, when Joad is speaking to Muley and they are discussing those that have left, many left to California, including Muley's family. This accurately represents that both families split up to find food and that many migrated to California for survival.



Sources:New Deal, The Dust Bowl,Picture

Ch.1-10(C)

You have been with us from birth to death. You are the one that feeds us and houses us. You are known as the land and now I must say good bye to you. The bank is taking me away from you. When the people in the bank came, they came without mercy. I tried to reason with them; it was pointless. I told them why we should stay, I told them that "Grampa took up the land, and he had to kill the Indians and drive them away. And Pa was born here, and he killed weeds and snakes."(33) Then they told me, we aren't the ones that are taking your land away, its the banks. "They breathe profits; they eat the interest on money. If they don't get it, they die the way you die without air, without side-meat."(32) So those men who i tried to reason with, they did not listen to me. And so again my family and I must say good bye to you. "We measured [you] and broke [you] up. We were born on [you], and we got killed on [you], died on [you]"(33). Those are what makes you our property, that we lived on you, died on you. Those are what gives us the rights to own you, "not a paper with numbers on it"(33).  What we have done for each other, leads me to believe that we are inseparable, both providing for each other .And so now it pains me to leave you and watch you be torn apart by the monsters, the banks. But this is our final farewell. I pray that you will still be intact after those with the banks are done with you.