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Walter Cunningham's Negative Effects On Young Children During The Great Depression

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The Great Depression had a very negative effect on young children scarring them for life. Ninety-nine percent of children in coal mining areas were underweight. Children were starved, forced to move a lot, or had to live with complete strangers just to get by. However, this insane lifestyle hurt these people into adulthood with some of them becoming pack rats or even drug addicts. While some children were unaffected by the Depression, others were starving, working to support their families, and missing an early education during the most important times of their lives. TO KILL A MOCKINGBIRD (SCOUT) As a native to the region, Jean Louise Finch (Scout) speaks with a Southern accent. Scout is normally very brash with her speech as shown in her …show more content…

She has short dark hair and usually wears overalls which are normally muddy. She wears sneakers and long socks. Walter Cunningham is a elementary school aged boy who lives on a farm in Old Sarum,Maycomb County,Alabama. Walter Cunningham has been poor most of his life. Walter had to skip a lot of school in order to help his family's farm and is often getting diseases like hookworms(Lee 26). Walter Cunningham's dietary habits were never developed correctly because of his lack of money. This is shown when Walter who has no concept of how to eat properly and drowns his food in syrup(Lee 32). Walter is shown having no food at all and no one in the class questions it except Ms. Caroline who is new(Lee 26). This shows that the Maycomb County regulars are accustomed to the Cunninghams not having food meaning it is normal. The Cunninghams have no money. This is made explicitly clear to us when Scout recalls Atticus doing some legal work for Walter Cunningham Sr and Mr. Cunningham having to pay Atticus in Hickory Nuts and Firewood(Lee 27). These frequent payment continue until Atticus says it’s enough. Also it is stated that the reason why they don’t have any money is because the stock market crash hit them the hardest(Lee …show more content…

For some people, the only sense of happiness they got was going to a show which a lot of kids couldn’t even afford. Most people who grew up in Chicago in the Great Depression did not even remember holidays. There was no point, you didn’t get anything, nothing changed; it was just a day off of work you did not want because there was no pay. Also TB (Tuberculosis) was happening in the most unhygienic places so Chicago got hit hard with that ,too. Before the Great Depression, famous people like Louis Armstrong and Ida B. Wells lived there. It was a hotspot for famous people. One upside to living in Chicago in the Great Depression is that it brought people together and made them love each

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