American Dream

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American Dream A legend

• --- Lecture I

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American Dream
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The Beginning of the Country

• Mayflower
• In December 1620, with snow already flying,
  Mayflower dropped anchor off Cape Cod. Fifty men,
  twenty women and thirty-four children driven from
  England finally came to the new land where they
  could enjoy their religious freedom to the full.

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Basic American Beliefs

• We hold these truths to be self-evident,
  that all men are created equal, that they are
  endowed (??)by Creator with certain
  inalienable(?????)rights, that among these are
  Life, Liberty and the pursuit of Happiness.
• ---The Declaration of
  Independence

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Chinese Version

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Six Basic Beliefs

• 1. individual freedom
• 2. self-reliance
• 3. equality of opportunity
• 4. competition
• 5. material wealth
• 6. hard work

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What is American Dream?
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What Is American Dream

• ( Improving financial situation)
• 1. getting out of poverty
• 2. getting good education for kids
• 3. opening ones own business
• 4. getting very rich
• ( Improving social status)
• 5. living upper-class lives
• 6. becoming a senator or something
• 7. becoming the President

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The Great Depression
---From Prosperity to Poverty
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America began the year 1929 flushed with
optimism. Business had never been better the
stock market continued to climb and easy credit
helped a free flow of goods, jobs, and money. It
seemed that America had found the secret of
prolonged prosperity. By autumn, however, clouds
appeared unexpectedly. The Wall Street
stock market crash on Oct. 21, 1929 resulted in
the Great Depression, the worst economic downturn
in the Unites States.
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Americas Retreat

• After WWI USA failed to join the League of
  Nations
• Raised tariffs on European imports
• Restricted European immigration for the first
  time. Quotas already existed for Asian migration
  but European immigration had been uncapped.

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Prosperity The Roaring 1920s

• Mass production developed as business strategy
  to increase output and reduce dependence on
  skilled labor.
• Mass consumption New home appliances flooded
  the market, often offered on credit. Washing
  machines, refrigerators, stoves, dishwashers and
  irons offered people an irresistible chance to
  change their lives.

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Prelude to a Nightmare

• As America prospered the gap between rich and
  poor widened.
• Prices on goods rose but wages did not. Demand
  for goods fell, workers were laid off and the
  downward spiral continued.
• The economy began to slow by 1928.

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Prelude to a Nightmare

• Fierce speculation in the 1920s had lifted the
  stock market to unrealistic heights.
• Investors borrowed large sums of money on
  margin, i.e., without collateral.
• When large numbers of investors began to sell,
  believing that stock prices were inflated, loans
  were called due. Everybody sold and stocks
  plummeted.

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Depression

• Massive Bank Failures
• Deflation (Disaster for those in debt -
  especially farmers)
• Massive unemployment
• Drought - Dust Storms.

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• The trading floor of the New York Stock Exchange
  just after the crash of 1929. On Black Tuesday,
  October twenty-ninth, the market collapsed. In a
  single day, sixteen million shares were
  traded----and thirty billion dollars
  vanished(disappear) into thin air. The "Era of
  Getting Rich Quick" was over. Jack Dempsey,
  America's first millionaire athlete, lost 3
  million. Cynical (suspecting and questioning) New
  York hotel clerks asked incoming guests, "You
  want a room for sleeping or jumping?"

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• I saw and approached the hungry and
  desperate (feeling that one has no hope and is
  ready to do anything to change the bad situation
  one is in) mother, as if drawn by a magnet. I do
  not remember how I explained my presence or my
  camera to her, but I do remember she asked me no
  questions. I made five exposures, working closer
  and closer from the same direction. I did not ask
  her name or her history. She told me her age,
  that she was thirty-two. She said that they had
  been living on frozen vegetables from the
  surrounding fields, and birds that the children
  killed. She had just sold the tires from her car
  to buy food.

There she sat in that lean- to tent with her
children huddled around her, and seemed to know
that my pictures might help her, and so she
helped me. There was a sort of equality about it.
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• Dorothea Lange's "Migrant Mother,"
  destitute (without money, food, a home or
  possessions) in a pea picker's camp, because of
  the failure of the early pea crop. These people
  had just sold their tent in order to buy food.
  Most of the 2,500 people in this camp were
  destitute. By the end of the decade there were
  still 4 million migrants on the road.

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Police Guard the Banks
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Unemployment Line
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Once I built a tower way up to the sun With
bricks and mortar and lime Once I built a
railroad and now it's done Brother, can you spare
a dime? Once in khaki suits, gee we looked
swell Full of that yankee doodle dee dum. Half a
million boots went sloggin' through hell And I
was the kid with the drum! Say don't you
remember? You called me Al. It was Al all the
time. Why don't you remember? I was your
pal. Buddy, can you spare a dime?
They used to tell me I was building a dream. And
so I followed the mob. When there was earth to
plow or guns to bear I was always there right on
the job. They used to tell me I was building a
dream With peace and glory ahead. Why should I be
standing in line Just waiting for bread? Once I
built a railroad, I made it run Made it race
against time. Once I built a railroad and now
it's done Brother, can you spare a dime?
Brother, Can You Spare a Dime?
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Jobs Bureau, L.A.
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The Story of Perseverance

• The Great Depression
• The Retreat of national economy
• The three misplaced men
• The misevaluated horse
• The unfailing perseverance

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Charles Howard
Once the owner of a bicycle shop, Charles
Howard became the most successful Buick dealer in
the West. But cars that brought him success
and fortune ended up stealing the thing he loved
most.
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Tom Smith
A cowboy,Tom Smith has great insights in
horse-raising and horse training. In love with
riding, He seemed obsolete and a walking relic in
the New World.
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Red Pollard
Born in a previously lively and prosperous
family, he was not spared during the harsh time
of the country. Beaten down and determined,
Johnny learned to look out for himself and to
trust no one.
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Seabiscuit
Considered as a lazy, under-weighted and
untalented loser, Seabiscuit was beaten up and
down and had became stubborn and reckless and he
was on his way to be discarded.
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War Admiral
This is a famous horse, which was
seabiscuits rival in the famous match race.
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The match race became much more than a
competition between two champion animals and
their riders --- it grew into a contest of two
worlds the east coast establishment of bankers
and their beautiful horses versus a nation of
downtrodden but spirited have-nots who championed
a ragtag team of three displaced men and their
unlikely challenger.
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Gorge Wolf
Reds friend and fellow jockey, who rode
Seabiscuit after Reds injury. He was called
Iceman.
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Marclela Zabala
Charles second wife and she was the one who
started Charles interest in horse-riding and
horse-racing.
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New Words
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• jockey
• breeze
• hole
• border town
• break
• lead pony

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New Words

• extra
• colt
• furlong
• cart horse
• draw

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Movie Time!