To Kill A Mockingbird Chapter 2 Analysis

The 1920’s was practically the spending period for America, we had just gotten out of a war and the citizens thought they could buy all these luxuries (refrigerators or radios for example) and say they’ll pay the bank back, but never really did. According to PBS.org; on October 24, 1929 the stock market had crashed, leaving all the rich people broke and the poor people dead broke. When March of 1930 came around already more than 3.2 million people were unemployed. While business owners were hit hard, farmers were probably hit the hardest during the depression because they were the ones growing and selling the food for Americans, so when the bank closed down the farmers couldn’t get loans to purchase more crops or land to harvest the crops.
“As the Cunningham’s had no money to pay a lawyer, they simply paid us with what they had. ‘Did you know,’ said Atticus, ‘that Dr. Reynolds works the same way? He charges bushels of potatoes for delivery of a baby…’ as said in Chapter 2 of To Kill a Mockingbird. This connects to the historical reality at the time because, it is true many folks did have to pay for things with food or belongings because they had no money. Many people may argue however, saying that “oh city folks didn’t have to worry about that problem as much as country folks because it’s the farmers who had to deal with that.” While it is true that farmers were the main ones with that issue that is because they were the people hit hardest by the stock market crash, so they had to pay with whatever they had instead of money. In chapter 2 once again in the novel they say; “‘Not exactly. The Cunningham’s are country folks, farmers, and the crash hit them the hardest.’ Atticus said professional people were poor because the farmers were poor…” That statement proves the fact that country folk were hit the hardest during the depression resulting in them needing to give food as a payment instead of
“‘Burris Ewell remember? He just goes to school the first day. The truant lady reckons she’s carried out the law when she gets his mane on roll-’” as said in chapter 3, page 40 of To Kill a Mockingbird. This ties into the reality of it all because families did pull their kids out of school just so the kids could worry about working and getting food/money instead of an education. Many families at the time would argue to the fact that they’re children need to be in school worrying about getting their education because the families believed the children need to worry more about getting money in for their families. However, it can be argued that children needed to be kept in school and getting an education because it was the law and in order for them or their families to not get into any trouble they needed to stay and go to school. In the book Atticus says; “‘There are ways of keeping them in school by force, but it’s silly to force people like the Ewells into a new environment…’” That statement proves that people like the Ewells were so used to staying out of school to work for the family that there was basically no point in trying to keep them in, the truant didn’t even bother