I loved the class, which is quite unusual, because from what I've seen not many people enjoy learning about our history.

I live in Canada, though, and sadly can't write this from the American perspective.?? Sorry about that.

The war had just endedand many veterans were coming home to a huge economic boom in many industries. The trade between the Unites States and Canada was strong because during the war Canada had made important contributions to the war effort. We were rewarded by becoming known as an independent nation, and we received our own seat at the table during the planning and signing of the Treaty of Versailles (the treaty which was made at the end of WWI). Canada is rich with raw materials and from then on we did not need to send for everything from across the Atlantic. Canada now traded goods with someone closer to us.

During the time before the Depression, people went mad-happy with the concept of "buying on margin" -- this happens when you buy a stock and you pay for it later, hopefully by making profit off of that stock. This is quite a great money-making concept when it works, but just before the Great Depression, too many people were using it and finding it backfiring on them. In fact, it's one of the reasons the Depression started.

Other reasons the Depression began:

- Too much reliance on staple products
- The weakness of European economies after the First World War
- Over-dependence on the United States as a market and a source of investment funds
- Over-production of goods, from wheat to manufactured products
- The Canadian economy's reliance on exports
- The stock market crashed

I have already talked about "buying on margin" -- because of this, the stock market crashed worldwide on October 24, 1929, a day that became known as Black Tuesday. This crash was a major result of the Depression and started a decade of pain.

If you did not know this before, well, you know now... mwhaha!

Your (slow) reporter,
FudgyFeud



Note from City Worker Calliope: Though people's not understanding the risk of buying on margin was an important part of the stock market crash, the true root was overspeculation.?? This happens when people invest wayyy too much money in something, way more than it's worth.?? Kinda like the dot-com bubble, actually!?? Only back then, there was no one making rules to control it; can you imagine how bad the dot-com crash could have been without regulation?

Who wants to write an article on this -- either Black Tuesday and the stock market crash of 1929, or the dot-com bubble crash more recently??? What did the government do during the Great Depression to make sure this didn't happen again? I see front page material here...!