American Progress

by Veda Boyd Jones

Anna slipped off her chair and carried her empty mug to the counter. “I’m going to ask Mother right now if we can have her old magazines.”

  “Great!” Fred said. “Then we can get started on the gifts right away.”

  Anna was filled with happiness as she went to the living room to talk with her mother. It feels good to have a way to make our presents. I’m glad Dot can give her family presents, too.

  CHAPTER 13

  Champion Bakers

  A couple days after Christmas, Dot came over to Anna’s house. “My family loved their presents!” she told Anna.

  Anna grinned. “So did mine.”

  She took Dot into the living room and pointed. “See?”

  Steven and Isabel were putting together their puzzles.

  The girls went up to Anna’s room, where they could visit together without Anna’s brothers and sisters around.

  “Look what I got from Mother and Father,” Anna said. She handed Dot a book.

  “Nancy Drew! Wow, I wish I had a Nancy Drew book.”

  “You can read it when I’m done.”

  “Thanks!”

  Anna flopped down on her bed. “We did a great job with our Christmas presents, didn’t we?”

  Dot sat on the edge of the bed, opening the book. “Uh-huh.”

  “Maybe we can come up with other good ideas. Like, maybe, how your family can make more money.”

  Dot looked up, her green eyes large. “Do you think so?”

  “I don’t know, but we could try. Let’s come up with as many ideas as we can. They won’t all work, but maybe one or two will help a little bit.”

  “Okay.” Dot set the book on the bed beside her.

  “Let’s see.” Anna rested her chin on the palm of her hand. “You could become a bank robber, but so many banks have closed that it wouldn’t be worth the trouble.”

  Dot laughed. She put a hand behind her head and lifted her chin. “I could become a movie star.”

  Anna rolled her eyes. “Except you’d have to pay to go to Hollywood first.”

  “No I wouldn’t. I could ride the rails like Chet.”

  “Maybe you could catch fish in the Mississippi River,” Anna said. “Then you could cook them and sell fish sandwiches.”

  Dot wrinkled her nose. “I’d rather be a movie star, thank you.”

  Anna picked up the Nancy Drew book. “I know! You can be a detective!”

  “Or I could write books. I know! I could write a book about two girls in Minneapolis who are best friends, Dot and Anna, and they solve all the mysteries the police can’t solve.”

  The girls collapsed in a fit of giggles.

  When they finally caught their breath, Dot said, “We need to think of something we can really do or sell.”

  “It’s too bad you can’t make things like Chet.”

  “Did he sell many of his carvings for Christmas?”

  “Quite a few,” Anna told her. “Of course, he had to take time to carve them first. He went house to house to sell them. Sometimes he’d stand on street corners downtown and sell them there to the Christmas shoppers.”

  “That was a good idea. Is he still selling them?”

  “He’s trying, but not many people are buying them now that Christmas is over. Oh, I almost forgot to tell you. Chet’s helping at a soup kitchen, too.”

  “He is?”

  Anna nodded. “Aunt Frances, Fred’s mother, helps at a soup kitchen, you know. One day Chet found out she was going down there to work and asked if he could go along. He said he’d never thought of helping at one of them before. After he went with Aunt Frances, he told the people at the kitchen that he’d like to help any time he needs to eat there. So the people in charge said he could.”

  “I can understand why he’d want to help there,” Dot said. “That way it would be like he was working for his food instead of taking charity.”

  “That’s what Chet said. Father says it shows what a good, responsible person Chet is.”

  “Where is Chet staying now?” Dot asked.

  “When he can’t find another place to stay, he stays at Fred’s house. Fred says Chet is keeping a list of how many nights he stays there and how many meals he eats. Chet told Uncle Richard that when he finds a job, even if it’s when he’s real old, he’s going to pay Uncle Richard back for everything. Chet still spends most days looking for work or selling his carvings.”

  “At least the mayor stopped trying to get missions to stop helping hobos like Chet,” Dot said. “That was a good idea you had, writing to the newspaper.”

  They were quiet for a few minutes, both trying to think up something else for Dot to try.

  “What about baking things?” Anna asked.

  “Mother and I thought of that. Mother said she didn’t think people who can hardly afford bread would want to spend their money on baked goods.”

  “No, I suppose not.” Anna thought a minute longer. “What about baking bread, then? People can buy it in the stores for nine cents a loaf. If you sold it for seven or eight cents a loaf, maybe they’d buy it from you instead.”

  Dot sat up. Her face was filled with excitement. “That’s a great idea!” Then her mouth drooped. “Except I don’t think Mother could afford to buy all the ingredients to make enough bread to sell. I know we don’t have enough in the house right now.”

  “Maybe Mother would loan you the ingredients, or Father might loan you the money for the ingredients.”

  “What if we couldn’t pay it back?” Dot asked. “Then my parents would be upset.”

  “Well, maybe we should ask my mother if we can bake a few loaves. We can try to sell them. If it works, then maybe you and your mother could borrow the ingredients to make more from my mother. After you sold the bread, you could pay my mother back.”

  Dot brightened again. “Like a loan. That might work.”

  They hurried downstairs and asked Anna’s mother.

  “I think that’s a great idea,” Mother said. “You’re welcome to use what we have, as long as you leave us at least one loaf of your bread until we can buy more for the family. You can use our kitchen to bake the bread.”

  Mother’s aprons were huge. The girls had to fold them up around the waist and wrap the ties around them more than once.

  When they’d mixed the dough and the loaves were set along the counter in a row beneath dish towels to rise, Anna said, “It’s a good thing it’s Christmas vacation and we don’t have to go to school. Making bread takes a long time!”

  The kitchen smelled wonderful when the bread baked. “I wish we could eat it instead of sell it,” Dot said grinning.

  Hours after they’d started, when the loaves were baked and cooled, they put the loaves in baskets. Covering the baskets with clean dish towels, they went house to house, offering the bread.

  It was a little discouraging. Not everyone bought the bread. One woman even said, “Are you kidding? I make my own. Doesn’t everyone?”

  “I didn’t think of that,” Dot said as they left the woman’s house. “I guess lots of people make their own instead of buying it at the store.”

  “Not everyone does, or the stores wouldn’t sell it,” Anna reminded her.

  Finally they sold their last loaf. Walking up the steps to Anna’s house, Anna said, “I didn’t know making and selling bread would make my arms and feet so tired!”

  Dot shook the small purse they’d brought along for the money. The coins in it jingled merrily. She grinned. “I don’t feel so tired when I hear that sound.”

  “How did it go?” Mother asked when they entered the kitchen.

  “Good,” Anna told her. “We sold it all.”

  Mother looked at the empty baskets. “So you did. How much did people pay?”

  “Most people paid eight cents a loaf,” Dot said, “but at the end, if people said no, we offered it for seven cents instead. Then the bread sold faster.”

  Dot poured the coins out on the kitchen table. They made a satisfying noise as they piled up
.

  While the girls counted the coins, Mother made a list of all the supplies they’d used to make the bread and how much the supplies cost. When they were done, they compared the cost of the bread to the amount of money they had made.

  “We made fifteen cents!” Dot’s face glowed with excitement. “If Mother and I sold bread, and we made that much every time, it would really help my family!”

  “Do you think your mother will try it?” Anna asked.

  “I think she will if we can afford to buy the ingredients. Maybe we can use the scrip Father makes from Organized Unemployed to buy enough to make the first batch.”

  “If not,” Mother told her, “we will loan you enough to buy the ingredients. Your mother can pay us back some each time you sell a batch. It wouldn’t take long to repay.”

  Dot beamed. “Thanks. I think I’ll go home right away and ask her about it.”

  Please let Dot’s mother say yes, Anna prayed silently as she watched Dot hurry away down the sidewalk.

  Dot’s mother did say yes. “Well, what she really said is that we could try it,” Dot reported with sparkling eyes to Anna and her mother the next day.

  The bread project went great. Dot and her mother and her aunt made the bread and sold it door-to-door like Dot and Anna had done. They sold the bread all of January. Then in February, Dot came to school one morning with tears in her eyes.

  “Even with the bread sales, we don’t make enough to pay our whole monthly mortgage payment,” she told Anna, as they stood in a corner of the hallway, where the other students wouldn’t see her cry. “Yesterday the bank told Father that if he doesn’t pay more money on the mortgage, the bank will take our house away at the end of the month.”

  Anger and frustration flowed through Anna in hot waves. How could this happen? Why doesn’t somebody fix all the things that are wrong in the country so my friends don’t have to leave their homes?

  CHAPTER 14

  A New President

  Every day of February that passed without Dot’s father getting a better job made Anna feel worse. She was frightened for her friend.

  “At least we found one more way to save money,” Dot said, wiping at the tears that streaked her face. “The Salvation Army gives milk to kids, so my nieces and nephews and I go every day with our tin pails. It’s kind of embarrassing, but it tastes good.”

  Sometimes, it seems like I’m sad or scared all the time now, Anna thought as she and Fred walked into her house after school that day in late February. She felt especially bad because Dot had told her that tomorrow the bank would take their house.

  Her father wasn’t working today. Anna could hear him talking to Mother in the kitchen. “He’s home a lot lately,” she whispered to Fred in the hallway while they hung up their coats. “The company keeps cutting back his hours.”

  “My father’s hours aren’t cut back,” Fred said, “but he says there’re more patients every week who can’t pay him. We’ve had to become more careful about money.”

  Anna nodded. “We have, too. Mother keeps trying to find new ways to save money.”

  They stopped talking to listen to her parents. Father’s voice sounded sad.

  It seems like all the adults I know seem unhappy and frightened most of the time, Anna thought, just like me.

  “It seems like everything keeps getting worse,” her father was saying. “The number of families receiving aid from the city has doubled in the last few months. Doubled!”

  Mother sighed. “And we know there are lots of families that qualify for help who aren’t asking for it. Families like Dot’s.”

  “It’s a good thing Richard and Frances let Chet stay with them when he will,” Father said. “The city’s been threatening to close their missions. They say there isn’t enough money to keep them open.”

  Anna and Fred stared at each other, their eyes wide.

  “If the missions close, what will all those homeless men do?” Anna whispered to Fred.

  Fred held out his hands and shook his head. “I don’t know.”

  Anna heard a chair scrape on the linoleum in the kitchen. Then Father said, “There’s still worry over whether the city will have to close the schools soon, too. I’d sure hate to see that happen.”

  Anna and Fred exchanged scared looks. Then they walked into the kitchen.

  “Do you really think the schools will close, Uncle Donald?” Fred asked as he and Anna sat down at the kitchen table across from him.

  “Oh, hi, kids.” Father pushed a hand through his curly hair. “I hope they won’t, but the city is having a hard time paying all its bills. With so many people out of work, the city can’t raise money very easily.”

  Mother set a glass of milk in front of Anna and one in front of Fred. She smiled at them. “I suppose you two would think it fun to have school close.”

  Fred grinned. “Maybe for a few days.”

  “It would be nice to have a vacation,” Anna said, “but I don’t think I’d like it if I knew I couldn’t go back to school. If school stayed closed, how could anyone graduate?”

  “They couldn’t,” Father said.

  “If we don’t graduate, we’ll never be able to go to the university, will we?” Fred asked.

  Father shook his head. “No.”

  “I don’t know what I want to be yet,” Fred said, “but I know I want to go to the university like Larry did.”

  “Dot wants to go to the university, too,” Anna told him. “Or some school where she can learn to be a teacher.”

  “I didn’t know she wanted to be a teacher,” Mother said. “I think she’d be good at that. She likes children, and they like her.”

  Anna nodded. “There’re some kids younger than us who live near her. Their father doesn’t let them go to school. Dot uses her schoolbooks to help them learn their arithmetic and reading.”

  Mother smiled. “How nice of her!” She reached for the newspaper lying on the counter. “I almost forgot to tell you. There’s good news today for Dot’s family.”

  “What?” Anna asked. “They could sure use some good news!”

  Mother laid the folded newspaper in front of her and pointed at a headline. “Governor Olson has stopped all foreclosures in Minnesota.”

  Anna frowned. “What’s a foreclosure?”

  “That’s when a bank takes back a house because the people can’t pay for their loan,” Father explained.

  Anna stared at him, scarcely daring to believe what her parents were saying. “You mean, Dot and her family get to keep their house?”

  Mother smiled. “That’s right.”

  “At least for a while,” Father said. “Of course, one day Mr. Lane will have to pay the bank all the money he owes for the house. But for now, the bank won’t be able to take it away.”

  Happiness flooded through Anna like a river. She grinned so wide her face hurt.

  Fred pounded her on the back. A grin filled his face, too. “How about that for good news, cousin?”

  “It’s the best news I’ve had in my whole life,” she told him.

  On Saturday, Anna’s family went over to Fred’s house for dinner. It was an important day. Franklin Roosevelt was going to take the oath that would make him president.

  While they waited in the living room, Fred’s father shook his head. “The country’s in such a mess, I can’t imagine what FDR can do to help it out, but I hope he thinks of something!”

  FDR was what a lot of people called the new president. They were the initials for his name, Franklin Delano Roosevelt.

  “Things can’t get much worse,” Anna’s father said, “no matter what FDR does. Everything’s gotten worse since Hoover was elected last November.”

  “Can’t deny that,” Fred’s father agreed. “Stock market closed again today. Thirty-eight states have closed all their banks.” He shook his head.

  Thirty-eight states! Fred stared at his father, stunned. All the people in those states who have money in banks must feel as awful as I felt when
my bank closed.

  Finally the inauguration ceremony began. The families listened to the music and to the oath FDR took as the new president. Then it was time for FDR to give his first speech as president of the United States.

  “First of all,” the president’s voice said over the radio in a strong, clear tone, “let me assert my belief that the only thing we have to fear is fear itself.”

  The only thing we have to fear is fear itself? Is that true? Fred wondered. With all the people out of work and all the businesses that are closed and only ten states left that have banks open? It seems to me we have lots of things to be afraid of.

  President Hoover had tried to make businesses and banks better, to keep them open so people’s jobs and money were safe. He hadn’t been able to do it. Nothing he tried worked. Could this new man do anything to make things better?

  Fred forced himself to listen to what FDR was saying. He was talking about the country, saying it had to move together, “as a trained and loyal army willing to sacrifice for the good of a common discipline.”

  When the speech was over, the families listened to another program. Fred was glad Will Rogers was on the radio. Father said Will Rogers was one of the wisest men in America. Fred just thought Will Rogers made true things sound funny, and Fred liked to laugh. He leaned forward when Rogers started to speak.

  “America hasn’t been as happy in three years as it is today,” Will Rogers said. “No money, no banks, no work, no nothing; but they know they got a man in there who is wise to Congress and wise to our so-called big men. The whole country is with him, just so he does something. Even if what he does is wrong, they are with him. Just so he does something. If he burned down the Capitol, we would cheer and say, ‘Well, we at least got a fire started anyhow.’”

  The family was still laughing over what Rogers had said when Fred’s father turned off the radio. “I think almost everyone in the country is willing to work together to get the country on its feet again,” he said, “but I wonder what kinds of sacrifices FDR is going to ask of us.”

  The next day, they began to find out.

  CHAPTER 15