The Dust Bowl of the 1930s brought more than hard times to America’s Heartland and Southwest. Known as ‘black blizzards,’ dust storms moved across the United States with devastating force. Take a look at these hauntingly eerie images highlighting the horrific weather phenomenon that rocked our nation’s center.
This storm pictured in 1935, was the worst storm of the decade-long Dust Bowl in the southern Plains. Daylight turns to total blackness by mid-afternoon in the Midwestern town of Ulysses, Kansas.“Black Sunday” marked the worst dust storm in US history on April 14, 1935. Stratford, Texas is pictured four days later as the monstrous storm still lingers.Three girls modeling various dust bowl masks to be worn in areas where the amount of dust in the air causes breathing difficulties, circa 1935.Iconic photographer Dorothea Lange captured several photos during the Great Depression like this image of rural Colorado. Lange snapped this photo as a huge, dark dust cloud swarmed over houses in a small Colorado community. The Dust Bowl was a huge contributing factor to our country’s struggle during the Great Depression.A farmer in Garden City, Kansas is pictured with his livestock that starved to death in 1935. With the sand and grit blowing, it was impossible for the cows to graze, and the owner was unable to buy feed for them.Residents watch in awe as a dust storm approaches their homes in Springfield, Baoa County, leaving the town in complete darkness. Dust storms can travel up to 60 miles per hour and the largest of storms can be up to 100 miles wide.In this 1935 photo, a cloud of top soil lumbers across the road near Boise City, Oklahoma. Astonishingly, the cloud of dust is so large, it extends past the frame of the photo.The Texas Panhandle was the center of the Dust Bowl days of the 1930s. Dust storms ravaged the panhandle and were a familiar sight to the residents of the Pampa area. As the wind and dirt would blow, residents would be housebound for days and weeks when the storms were occurring. Early day residents say the homes would be covered with dirt when the storms blew over.On April 15, 1935, the day after the historic “Black Sunday” when 20 of the largest black blizzards hit the US, a Boise City, Oklahoma ranch was engulfed by a wall of particles as dust storms continued to rage across the Heartland.In this April 1938 photograph, a dust bowl farmstead in Dallam County, Texas, shows the desolation produced by the dust and wind on the countryside which added to the problems of the depression in the USA.Clayton, New Mexico was a livestock shipping center across the Texas Panhandle. Clayton saw many dark days like this one pictured on May 29, 1937, which was a relatively common occurrence in the Dust Bowl town.Dunes bank against a fence of a farm home, barn and windmill in Guymon, Oklahoma in the Oklahoma Panhandle on March 29, 1937. Before becoming a part of Oklahoma Territory, this strip known as No Man’s Land was a haven for outlaws and land squatters . Later, during the Great Depression, severe drought and blinding dust storms turned the region into the Dust Bowl.
