Hey Brother, Can You Spare A Dime?
by Joseph Concannon
The backdrop is the Great Depression in the 1930s that led to the development of homeless settlements in the country’s major cities—or “Hoovervilles,” an allusion to the then U.S. President Herbert Hoover. Living in tents and shacks, these communities rapidly developed in New York City, especially in Central Park’s then empty reservoir and Riverside Park, but disappeared along with the crisis, writes Diane Jeantet of City Limits magazine back in 2013.
