Remembering ‘Black Tuesday,’ Oct. 29, 1929, on Wall Street and a Crowd ‘Wild-Eyed’ With Fear — How Much Worse Could It Get Than Today’s 500-Point Stock Market Drop?

Today’s 504.48-point stock market plunge may stir fears of another “Black Tuesday.” How did New Yorkers react when the market crashed on Oct. 29, 1929? Catherine Gourley writes:

“On that overcast autumn morning in New York City, rumors swirled through the narrow streets like wind. Something had gone terribly wrong. The stock values weren’t just dropping. They were crashing. America’s banks and businesses were losing money. By afternoon ten thousand people had jammed the streets and sidewalks. Some had climbed onto the statue of Alexander Hamilton outside the stock exchange building because it was the only space left to stand and wait. A reporter for the New York Times described the crowd as ‘wild-eyed’ with fear. Men wept. A few days ago they had been wealthy. Now they were penniless.”

Catherine Gourley on “Black Tuesday” in War, Women, and the News: How Female Journalists Won the Battle to Cover the World War II (Atheneum, $21.99, ages 10–14, 2007) www.simonsayskids.com, a nonfiction book about some of the country’s greatest war correspondents.

(c) 2008 Janice Harayda. All rights reserved.