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American Experience Season 10 Episode 9

Episode Title: Surviving the Dust Bowl
Countries: ,
Airing Date: March 2, 1998
Runtime:60 mins
IMDb Rating:

You can now watch the entire American Experience Season 10 Episode 9 movie online in high-definition quality, complete with English subtitles for a better viewing experience. Best of all, there’s no need to download anything—simply stream it directly from your device anytime, anywhere.

In 1931 the rains stopped and the "black blizzards" began. Powerful dust storms carrying millions of tons of stinging, blinding black dirt swept across the Southern Plains — the panhandles of Texas and Oklahoma, western Kansas, and the eastern portions of Colorado and New Mexico. Topsoil that had taken a thousand years per inch to build suddenly blew away in only minutes. One journalist traveling through the devastated region dubbed it the "Dust Bowl."This episode is the remarkable story of the determined people who clung to their homes and way of life, enduring drought, dust, disease — even death — for nearly a decade. Less well-known than those who sought refuge in California, typified by the Joad family in John Steinbeck's The Grapes of Wrath, the Dust Bowlers who stayed overcame an almost unbelievable series of calamities and disasters.