Hard Times: An Oral History of the Great Depression

“Hiram (Chub) Sherman”

Sherman, 60, Broadway actor and member of the Council of Actors Equity, recalls the tremendous disparity between places the Depression barely touched, such as Newport, Rhode Island, and places such as New York City, where he experienced “rock-bottom living” (363).

Beginning in 1936, Sherman worked for the Federal Theater, a WPA project. He also took part in Marc Blitzstein’s Cradle Will Rock, a “revolutionary piece” for its “attack on big business and the corruption involved” (365). Government officials shut down the performance by closing the theater, so the actors and producers improvised at an empty theater and received a rousing ovation from an impromptu audience. When they tried to take Cradle Will Rock on the road, however, to the steel town of Bethlehem, Pennsylvania, they found that the workingmen had no interest in the play. Thanks in part to his work on the controversial play and in part to his involvement with the equity council, Sherman was branded a Communist and blacklisted.

“Neil Schaffner”

In 1925, Schaffner and his wife Caroline organized the Schaffner Players, a traveling “tent dramatic company”, which toured first Iowa and later the Midwest (368).

Schaffner recalls July 6th, 1930 as the date on which audiences stopped showing up to performances; he still does not know when everything suddenly came to a halt.