Although the Roosevelt Administration was (whatever its other mistakes) candid about the economic conditions it faced, there was in the ’30s, as there has been over the 2010s in Wisconsin, a delusional impulse to happy talk – regardless of economic conditions – among some politicians and some business groups.
Margaret Bourke-White‘s Kentucky Flood depicts the 1937 contrast between black flood victims in Louisville lining up for food and an advertiser’s happy billboard:
Queue of black residents of Louisville KY waiting for distribution of relief supplies during the 1937 Ohio River flood; photo by Margaret Bourke-White.
This is a powerful photograph that illustrates the point about “happy talk” versus reality.
Thank you for posting it.