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Every generation is influenced by their parents. From Baby Boomers (who were largely raised by the Silent Generation) to Gen X (the majority of which were raised by Baby Boomers) to Millennials (raised older Gen X and younger Boomers), their parents left an impact that defined each one. For those raised by the Greatest Generation (those born between 1901 and 1927), their unique upbringings are filled with experiences that are still cherished generations later.

Over on Reddit in a subforum of people born before 1980, member gameboy90 posed the question: "What was it like having a parent who was part of the Greatest Generation (born 1901-1927)?"

Many people raised with parents (and some grandparents) from the Greatest Generation shared their childhood experiences. These are 15 amazing stories from people raised by parents of the Greatest Generation.

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"My folks were born in the late teens/mid-twenties. They met and married during WWII. As a kid growing up in the 1970s, I joked that I was the last kid to be raised in the 1950s, because that's the decade where my parents were really adults and absorbed a lot of their ideas. Neither of them liked to talk much about the past, there wasn't any talk of the depression or the war, but I was told how easy I had it on a fairly regular basis. I was taught to be grateful and how lucky I was. They were fairly distant parents -- I was cared for, but not hovered over in any way. I was regularly kicked out of the house to go entertain myself until the streetlights came on." —localgyro

"One of my parents was part of this cohort and the other parent was just a couple of months too young to technically belong to the Greatest Generation. I heard endless stories about what childhood was like during The Great Depression and the notion of not wasting things was pounded into me. I was taught to not trust the stock market and to not count your chickens before they are hatched. Do people even use that expression anymore?! Both of my parents felt it was important to look one's best in public at all times. I remember my mother wore girdles long after it was fashionable to do so and my father wore undershirts in the hottest of weather." —Woodinvillian


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"My grandparents were greatest generation. Very hardworking. Very stoic. Super secretive. While they weren’t racist, they were prone to using slang like Wop (gpa was Italian) etc. My gma left school in 8th grade to help on the family farm. Gpa made it thru High School and didn’t go to war due to helping the family ice business. Back in the day, they cut ice from the ponds w huge saws and packed it away in sawdust or straw. His brothers went to war though." —apurrfectplace

"I’m not sure you can generalize about a cohort that includes so many millions of people. My parents were born in 24 and 26 and I was born in 52. My father spent WWII In Europe and never would talk much about his experience. My father was a teacher, high school principal and then a college professor. My mother stayed home and raised my brother and I. My parents were hardworking, honest, decent people. They were also progressive, liberal and intellectual and participated in the civil rights marches of the 1960s and later supported my brother and I in our opposition to the Vietnam war." —valisglans

"Both parents were born in the time frame you gave. We are American, and my grandparents were immigrants from Eastern Europe. My father was a WWII infantryman and Purple Heart recipient. He almost never talked about the war, although he did recount his experiences to another family member who was doing a living history project. My Dad apparently lived through some awful times when he served overseas during the war. My mother came from a well to do family, and she never mentioned weathering much hardship during the Great Depression... During these days of Covid-19, I am reminded of my late father’s frugality (which he learned during the Great Depression). I am reminding myself how he never let anything go to waste, and how he would repurpose items around the house, rather than get rid of them if they were at all useful. My parents weren’t hoarders or anything like that (quite the opposite), but they did use items up until they could be used no more. I used to roll my eyes at my dear Dad over that at times, but now of course I see the wisdom in it. My grandparents were all born in the last quarter of the 1800s, and lived through the 1918 pandemic. I wish they were still able to answer my questions about how they survived it, or at least I wish my parents were able to answer my questions regarding my grandparents’ recollections of it." —Hey_Laaady

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"My parents were born in the teens of 1900's. Both to poor, but educated families. Music, art, that sort of thing, that generally pays poorly in good times. But during the depression? Not much at all. Like others in this thread, we were taught to use up everything, don't waste anything. Food was made into leftovers. Clothing was repaired, and passed down from child to child. If we wanted to get rid of something, give it to someone who could use it. Don't leave the lights on. Don't waste water. We also had a vegetable garden, and we kids helped weed it. We snapped and froze beans from it for the winter. We played outside all day in the summer, and came in for supper. Had to be home when the street lights came on. Dad had war stories about WWII which he told often, but never about fighting, but rather about his commanding officer, or something weird that happened. I'm pretty sure he had PTSD, but you bucked up and got on with life. My parents were both really good people. My mother raised us, and my dad 'brought home the bacon'." —sanna43

"Awesome. They loved each other deeply. They loved their siblings, parents, aunts and uncles who we all regularly visited. Mom and Dad were good parents who provided us with love and a good home. Maddening. They were soooooo much older than my friend's parents, still clung to Depression-era frugality, wanted us kids to be independent but NOT IN TROUBLE." —Sunkitteh

"They were the finest people I've ever met: selfless, loving, devoted to family. There will never be another generation like them." —Offthepoint

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"Dad worked a blue collar job and mom was a homemaker. There was always dinner at the dining room table every night. My dad made $85 a week and that was enough to keep a roof over our head and our tummies full. Mom (born 1922) stretched the ground round by putting grated potatoes in it. I don't really remember going without very often. I only remember a pair of shoes I really wanted in the early 70's that we couldn't afford...My dad was born in 1921 and was the strong silent type. Never spoke much nor showed much affection but we knew he loved us. They never fought. I never remember them fighting or hearing them yelling at each other. If there was anything they didn't want us to know they would talk to each other in Spanish. They never taught us girls because we 'didn't need to speak it'. I sure wish they had taught us. Back then it was more about assimilation." —AuntChilada

"Since my folks grew up during the depression, the thriftiness they learned was passed on to us kids. Even in the city, we had a vegetable garden in the 1960s, as well as several fruit bearing trees...We were raised with more discipline than some of our classmates, but less than others. We took responsibility for our actions at early ages and were seen as trouble makers because we didn't deny it when caught red handed." —Swiggy1957

"Lots of great war stories. Lots of lies. Lots of racist beliefs (how come people never mention how racist old people can be?). Generous but highly critical. Intelligent and accomplished. High expectations with little guidance or input. Dad was born in 1913." —aiandi

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"My dad (born 1905 in Buffalo, NY) and my mom (born 1909 in St. Louis, MO) were both children of Polish immigrant parents. My mom graduated from elementary school, but my dad was pulled out of school during his last half of 8th grade so he could go to work at Kutchens Furniture Co. in St. Louis as a woodworker so he could support the family (his dad had died a year earlier). My mom got a job as a seamstress at a clothing company where she worked until she got married. in 1925 my dad obtained employment at Robertson Aircraft Co. at the airport as a mechanic for the air mail airplanes. He became good friends with Charles Lindbergh when Lindbergh was still an air mail pilot. In 1926 he started building his own airplane in his backyard. In 1929, when the stock marked crashed, his airplane was nearly complete. But he had to put a hold on it in order to work crazy hours at Robertson to continue his employment. He and his mother, brother and sister all lived in one house and they raised chickens, rabbits and a vegetable garden in the back yard. Home brewed beer was made along with a concoction of straight grain alcohol colored with tea that they called 'Old Skunk'. The airplane was flown in 1930 but the depression went on, and on and on. Nothing was thrown away since there was always another use for everything. My mom and dad finally met and got married in 1937. A year later I was born and now there were 6 people living in a small 2 bedroom 1 bath house. In 1941 the United States entered the war. My dad was too young for the first world war and too old for the second world war, so he obtained employment with Curtiss-Wright Aircraft Corp. as a loftsman for the wing of the C-46 'Commando' transport aircraft. He remained at Curtiss-Wright until the end of the war. Once married, my mom became the traditional housewife. During my early years we lived like it was still the depression and it was pounded into me on a daily basis. The only good thing that happened during the war years was dad got extra gas ration stamps because he was working in the defense industry. My mom had a foot operated Singer sewing machine that she used for the rest of her life. My dad didn't buy a powered lawn mower - he made one using the motor from a junked motor scooter he found in the junk yard. At dinner time you ate everything on your plate - period! To this day it has been engrained in me - take what you want, but eat what you take. Yes, the Greatest Generation raised a whole different breed of children. When I was growing up, if I needed a whack on my butt I got a whack on my butt. Maybe two whacks! And my teachers could do it too. If the teachers did that today it would be on the 5 o'clock news." —55pilot

"My parents were born in the 1920's. My father was drafted in 1944. He waited out the war in the Philippines. He didn't say much about it. Only that he saw awful things and war is really, really bad. After the war he worked for USPS and met my mother. They moved to NJ and raised 6 kids on a working class salary. My parents were both strict Catholics. It wasn't a very demonstrative relationship. They put a roof over our heads and fed us so we needed to STFU and clean our rooms. My mother was kinder; my father was distant and withdrawn. There was a huge generation gap. They adored clean-cut American entertainment: broadway musicals, Johnny Mathis, Perry Como, etc. Meanwhile, us 60's and 70's kids were all about Black Sabbath and Led Zeppelin. It caused tension. Once we became teens, us boys all grew our hair long. The folks HATED it, but they allowed it because we made a big deal over it and it was the trend at the time. My parents never drank and never used foul language. Cursing was forbidden in the house. Even 'damn' was retconned to 'darn'. Period. No exceptions. Discussions about sex (or indulging in any measure of explicit material) was also utterly forbidden." —CitizenTed

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"My father was born in 26. My mother is a bit too young to meet this criteria. But they were both frugal people. My mother was a bit more sympathetic about it. 'Do you need it, or do you just want it?' My father was more dismissive, in a half joking, half mocking manner: 'you need that like you need a hole in the head', 'I wouldn't kick a dead dog for a truckload of (whatever it was I wanted)', alternatively he 'wouldn't sign his name for a boatload'. If I wanted to see a movie or a concert, he 'wouldn't walk from here to the corner (to see them, even) if they paid him.' At least he was amusing. Last week, he told me about something that would 'hare lip Santa Claus', and I still don't know what that means...My father grew up on a farm. As a boy, he plowed with a mule, and used a carved cypress knee to make holes for the seeds. The old plow was still in storage when I was growing up, and was always more fun for me to climb on and play than the old tractors were. My father says that at school, instead of each kid bringing their own lunch, each person would bring something to add to a pot of soup. I don't know if that was everyday, though. My grandmother had a large garden and also did home baking and canning to sell at the farmer's market. The better stuff always got sold. One of my aunts said they never got any cookies that hadn't burnt. 😕 My father served at the tail end of WW2, in the Pacific." —MetalSeagull

"My parents married after the second world war. My mother had been engaged and her fiancé was killed overseas. They were pretty old for their generation to be getting married. Born in 1919 and 1918 they married in 1950. Being good Catholics they then started having babies. My mother lost four of the pregnancies late term and had four babies eventually. I was born when she was 40 and my younger brother when she was 47 because of the pregnancies and recovery from them. My mother became a teacher and my dad was a draftsman. They never had a mortgage, paid cash for their cars and ALWAYS had a ton of tinned food. If I wanted a ham and cheese sandwich my mother would say no because that was two meals. Ham sandwich and a cheese sandwich. I don't think either of them ever missed a day of work for anything less than a heart attack. Seriously. They just got up every morning and did what the rules said they should do. My dad was an enormously talented man with an incredible intellect and my mother was artistic and romantic. I feel that with the war, service and losses they never got the chance to experience self expression like they may have wanted to. Duty to God and family. They both died young at 61 and 67." —Rosiebelleann

Photo by Sonder Quest on Unsplash

We've been "locked down" for nearly two months, and people are are understandably tired of it. Millions of Americans are out of work, which means many have also lost their employer-provided health insurance. Our economy has slowed to a crawl, businesses are shuttered, and everyone is worried about the sustainability of it all.

"We can't let the cure be worse than the disease," people say. The president himself has repeated this line, the implication being that the impact of the lockdowns will be worse than the impact of the virus. Just today in his press briefing the president mentioned suicides and drug overdoses as tragic consequences of the lockdowns, stating that more Americans could die of those causes than the virus if we fall into an extended economic depression.



Is that true, though? While no one can predict the future, death statistics and economic history in the U.S. do not support that idea at all. Not even close.

Let's start with suicides. During the two worst years of the Great Depression, 20,000 Americans per year took their own lives. That's tragic—but it's nowhere near the number of Americans that have died of COVID-19 just in the past month.

Screenshot via Worldometers

Of course, the U.S. population has nearly tripled since the Great Depression, so we can't compare that number directly. But even if we triple those Great Depression suicides to 60,000 a year to account for population change, that's still not as many Americans as have died of COVID-19 in just the past 5 weeks.

Using a different calculation, there was a 25% increase in suicides during the Great Depression. With ~48,000 suicides in the U.S. in 2018, a 25% increase would also put the annual number at 60,000. No suicide number is a good number, of course. But by no math in the universe is an extra 12,000 deaths per year anywhere near the 80,000 Americans who have died of COVID-19 in the past two months.

Our COVID-19 deaths have averaged around 2000 per day for weeks while under lockdown. At no time in our history, through bad economic depressions and horrific world wars, has 2000 Americans died of suicide per day. Even if our suicide numbers tripled—a 12 times greater increase than during the worst years of the Great Depression—that would still be less than 400 people dying of suicide per day. A terrible number, but not nearly as terrible as 2000 per day.

What about drug overdoses? Well, that's a little trickier to gauge. I've not seen any statistics about drug overdoses during the Great Depression, and we already had an opioid crisis flourishing before the pandemic hit. I imagine it's probably harder for people to get the drugs to feed an addiction right now, so I'm not convinced that there would be an enormous increase in drug overdoses. But for the sake of argument, let's say drug overdoses doubled. Highly unlikely, but let's go with it.

In 2018, the last year for which we have statistics, 184 people per day died of drug overdose. If we double that, we're talking around 370 people per day—still less than one-fourth the number of Americans dying of COVID-19 per day in the past month.

Even added together, those extreme suicide and drug overdose scenarios don't add up to our current COVID-19 situation. And once again—those numbers are with lockdowns in place.

What about starvation, though? Surely millions would die of starvation or malnutrition in a tanked economy, right? Well, no—for a couple of reasons.

1) The reality is if anyone starves to death in the U.S., a country that has the ability to produce more than enough food to feed our population, that's a mismanagement of resources, not an inevitable outcome of an economic crash.

2) Americans didn't die of starvation in large numbers during the Great Depression.

In fact—are you ready for a rather mind-blowing statistic—the overall health of Americans didn't decline during the Great Depression at all. It improved.

People lived years longer during the Depression. Life expectancy rose. Mortality rates dropped in every category (except suicide) across practically every demographic.

In fact, this pattern shows up consistently during economic booms and recessions. More people die—and die at younger ages—during economic booms. Vice versa during recessions. Counterintuitive? Yes. But that's what the data shows. (Here's the 2009 study that shows these trends during the Great Depression.)

We could debate the reasons for this, but it doesn't really matter. The point is, if the "cure" is a lockdown that results in an economic depression and the "disease" is the virus spreading unchecked, we have no evidence that the cure is or could be worse than the disease, at least not in terms of death counts.

Now clearly, there are huge problems with a tanked economy. Mental health issues increase. Life is hard. People struggle and suffer and we certainly should not minimize that. BUT...

Mass death and mass illness also cause suffering and mental health issues, while also hurting the economy.

I've seen people say we open back up, shoot for herd immunity, and just accept the fact that people will die. But that notion completely ignores the economic impact of having a big chunk of the population too sick to work. As we hear more and more people describe their COVID-19 journeys, it's becoming clear that even infected people who don't have to be hospitalized can still be very ill for weeks.

Let's do some quick herd immunity math. Reaching herd immunity means 70% of the population would have to get the virus. (Some say 60%, some say 80 or 90%—let's go with the middle.) That's 229 million people in the U.S. We don't have a good enough hold on this virus to know how many people have already have it or how many would be asymptomatic, but a current guess for asymptomatic cases is 25% to 50%. Let's go with the higher.

That would mean 114.5 million Americans being symptomatically ill. It's impossible to know how severe each person's case would be, but if even half of those with symptoms got flu-level ill, that would be 56 million people too sick to work for weeks. Some would have lingering health issues afterward to boot. What would that kind of mass illness to do to the economy?

And we haven't even gotten to the people dying yet. We don't have an accurate mortality rate, but let's go with a conservative 0.5% death rate (meaning 99.5% of people who get it, survive it). We're still talking 1,135,000 deaths if we shoot for 70% herd immunity at that death rate. That basically means we'd all know people who died of this disease.

I'm pretty sure mass grieving over a huge death toll in a short period of time isn't great for the economy, either. (Perhaps instead of deciding how much death and illness we're willing to tolerate, we could take this opportunity to fundamentally rethink how our economy works? Just a thought.)

Granted, all of these numbers are based on data that keeps changing as we learn more about the virus and its impact. We don't know enough yet to say anything for sure. We don't even know if people are truly immune yet. We do know the virus is real, and that it's more contagious and more deadly than the flu. Everything else is a best guess.

Essentially, there are no good options before us at the moment that don't involve great losses of one kind or another. But by no historical or statistical measure do we have evidence that the cure worse than the disease—at least with the data we have right now.

via USDA

The Dust Bowl was the worst environmental disaster in American history. Throughout the 1930s, severe dust storms ravaged the Great Plains states, claiming thousands of lives and causing over two million people to leave the region.

The devastating storms destroyed farm houses and crops, choked livestock and, at times, blocked out the sun.

Much like the climate crisis we face today, the Dust Bowl was man-made. In the early 1920s, farmers began using new mechanized farming techniques that ripped up the prairie's natural drought-resistant grasses and fertile topsoil.


After a drought struck the region in 1931, huge dust storms known as black blizzards ravaged the plains. By the end of 1935, roughly 35 million acres of farmland had been destroyed and the topsoil covering 100 million acres had blown away.

the Dust Bowl in the Texas panhandle. Library of Congress / Wikimedia Commons

Farmer and sons walking in the face of a dust storm. Cimarron County, Oklahom

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Library of Congress / Wikimedia Commons

Wind erosion carries topsoil from farmland during the Dust Bowl.via NRCS photo Gallery

To provide a natural barrier against the dust storms, President Franklin Roosevelt mobilized the U.S. Forest Service, the Works Progress Administration, and the Civilian Conservation Corps to create a shelterbelt of trees that ran in a 100-mile-wide zone from North Dakota to the Texas panhandle.

via U.S. Forest Service / Wikimedia Commons

The planting began in 1935 in Greer County, in southwestern Oklahoma, and the new trees were very effective at protecting the top soil and stabilizing the land. They also provided a natural barrier for blocking the dust from sweeping across the plains.

U.S. Department of Agriculture


via National Archives

By 1942, 30,233 shelter belts had been planted, stretching over 18,600 square miles, and containing over 220 million trees. It was "the largest and most-focused effort of the [U.S.] government to address an environmental problem," in the nation's history.

RELATED: Planting 1.2 trillion trees could reverse a decade of climate change. Here's how to do it.

Today, the shelterbelt is slowly being removed from the Great Plains. In Nebraska alone, an estimated 57% of "FDR's trees" have been cut down or burned as farmers try to maximize their land for planting.

Could we do it again?

Climate change is an ecological disaster on a scale that dwarfs the Dust Bowl in every way imaginable. However, it seems that in this century, America has lost its ability to do big things.

Planting 220 million trees seems like an impossible feat in a country that has neglected big infrastructure projects for decades.
But if America came together, could we plant enough trees to combat the country's contribution to climate change?

Tom Crowther, a climate change ecologist at Swiss university ETH Zurich estimates that if 1.2 trillion trees were planted across planet Earth, they would absorb 90 billion tons of carbon dioxide.

While that number wouldn't come close to the 1,000 gigatons that must be removed before the effects of climate change begin to reverse, trees are one of the few ways to absorb carbon dioxide from the atmosphere.

RELATED: He photographed Nazi atrocities and buried the negatives. The unearthed images are unforgettable.

Other countries are doing it, why can't we?

The Australian government announced it will plant one billion trees by 2030 and, since 1970, China has planted more than 50 billion in an anti-desertification program known as the "Great Green Wall."

The "Billion Tree" campaign by the UN has already planted 15 billion trees since its inception in 2006.

The American government was once able to do big things and rise to the occasion whether it was the Great Depression, World War II, or the Cold War. Hopefully, that will didn't die with the onset of the new Millennium, and we can come together for the greatest fight of all — the battle to save the planet.

In 1904, a schoolteacher named Lewis W. Hine started photographing immigrants as they arrived at Ellis Island.

Photography turns light into a palpable record of a moment in time, which is incredible when you think about it. And Hine knew just how powerful those moments could be.

An Albanian woman from Italy at Ellis Island in 1905 (left) and an Armenian man in 1926 who was fleeing persecution in Turkey (right). Photos by Lewis W. Hine/The New York Public Library.


Hine was working as a teacher and photographer at the Ethical Culture School in New York City when he started taking his students on field trips to Ellis Island to show them the conditions of millions of immigrants.

He believed that if people could see images of the abuse and injustices that were happening in America, it might make social reform a reality.

And, eventually, his dream started coming true. He's now known for creating images that brought to light scenes of child labor, poor living conditions, unemployment, immigration, and human ingenuity.

After he left his teaching position, he went on to work with the National Child Labor Committee — which lobbied for the abolition of child labor — to document and expose the exploitative practices in the United States. His photos were used in publications all over the world, and they inspired many people to fight for change.

By capturing intangible moments of reality, Hine connected human faces to society's wrongdoings.

Here are some of the thousands of images that Hine took during his life — pictures that brought dignity to millions of Americans and helped enact positive change:

Hine gave voice to the voiceless in an era when communication was limited.

A group of Slavic immigrants at Ellis Island in 1905. Photo by Lewis W. Hine/The New York Public Library.

“There are two things I wanted to do. I wanted to show the things that had to be corrected. I wanted to show the things that had to be appreciated,” Hines said about his work.  

Group of immigrants from Italy at Ellis Island in 1905. Photo by Lewis W. Hine/The New York Public Library.

He followed the immigrant experience to the tenement buildings in major cities and helped expose terrible living conditions.

A mother and her two children live in one room on the top floor of a building in New York. Photo by Lewis W. Hine/The Library of Congress.

His work with the NCLC often required him to sneak into factories and workshops with a disguise to avoid notice.

Two young boys working a spinning frame at a mill in Macon, Georgia, in 1909. Photo by Lewis W. Hine/The Library of Congress.

"There is work that profits children, and there is work that brings profit only to employers. The object of employing children is not to train them, but to get high profits from their work,” Hines said in 1908.

Workers take a break at the Newberry Mills in South Carolina. Photo by Lewis W. Hine/The Library of Congress.

Through reform and laws enacted on the state and federal level, “by 1920 the number of child laborers was cut to nearly half of what it had been in 1910,” according to the National Archives.

Donnie Cole, known as "Our Baby Doffer," hesitantly said his age was 12 when asked by Hine. A doffer is someone who replaces spindles in spinning frames. Photo by Lewis W. Hine/The Library of Congress.

His work with National Research Project of the Work Projects Administration exposed the indescribable conditions of everyday people during the Great Depression.

Callie Campbell, 11 years old, picking cotton in Pottawatomie County, Oklahoma. When asked about her job, she said, "No, I don't like it very much." Photo by Lewis W. Hine/The Library of Congress.

His photos championed hardworking everyday people, which is most vividly shown in his incredible photos of the construction of the Empire State Building.

Two ironworkers connecting beams on the Empire State Building in 1931. Photo by Lewis W. Hine/The New York Public Library.

Hine was a beacon of humanism at a time when the world was rapidly changing. He was a champion for the exploited. He was an activist.

He was also an incredible pioneer of documentary photography in America.

Despite the power of his work, the changing times of the Great Depression stalled interest in his work, and he died in poverty in 1940. Over the years, though, his legacy has grown exponentially since his death. His investigative photos are still a stark reminder of the kinetic effect images can have on society.

By recognizing the need for change and using his photography skills to help usher it along, Hine demonstrated the true power of images.

That's something that inspires me, and other photographers, daily.

His photos are humbling reminders of the struggles of everyday people at the dawn of the modern era. They're a reminder that each of us can change the world, even if it's in a small way. And they're a reminder of the hurdles America has overcome to get to where we are today.