Hard Times: An Oral History of the Great Depression (1970)

Hard Times: An Oral History of the Great Depression (original: 1970/ latest edition: 2005) is a telling of the oral history of the Great Depression written by Studs Terkel. It is a firsthand account of people of varying socio-economic status who lived in the United States during the Great Depression.

The first edition of the book was published in 1970. The 1986 print included a new introduction by Terkel. The latest edition was published in 2005.

Chapters

Foreword, January–February 1986

A Personal Memoir (and parenthetical comment)

Book One

The March

The Song

Sgt. Pepper’s Lonely Hearts Club Band

Hard Travelin’

The Big Money

Man and Boy

God Bless’ the Child

Bonnie Laboring Boy

Three Strikes

Book Two

Old Families

Member of the Chorus

High Life

At the Clinic

Sixteen Ton

The Farmer is the Man

Editor and Publisher

Book Three

Concerning the New Deal

An Unreconstructed Populist

Peroration (Includes interview with Hamilton Fish III)

Scarlet Banners and Novenas

The Doctor, Huey, and Mr. Smith

The Circuit Rider

The Gentleman from Kansas (Interview with Alf Landon)

A View of the Woods

Campus Life

Book Four

Merely Passing Through

Three O’Clock in the Morning

A Cable

Book Five

The Fine and Lively Arts

Public Servant – The City

Evictions, Arrests, and Other Running Sores

Honor and Humiliation

Strive and Succeed

Epilogue

The Raft

A Touch of Rue

Literary significance and reception

Hard Times is known for providing an equal representation of experiences across a broad spectrum of socio-economic status, interviewing famous and influential people as well as others from a range of cultural and ethnic backgrounds. It has been called "A true classic! Exceptional oral history of a wide strata of Americans caught up in the 'hard times' of the Great Depression."