Thanksgiving dinner, 1929

[vitanola]

"The Consumerist" has an interesting article regarding Thanksgiving dinner:

http://consumerist.com/2013/11/27/lets-prepare-thanksgiving-dinner-from-1929/

 

[LizzieMaine]

"The Consumerist" has an interesting article regarding Thanksgiving dinner:

http://consumerist.com/2013/11/27/lets-prepare-thanksgiving-dinner-from-1929/

Of course, if you lived near the woods you could go out and shoot your own turkey for the cost of a couple of shells. Industrialized poultry farming such as we have today was in its infancy then -- it didn't really explode until the postwar era, so unless you lived on a farm or, as I say, near the woods, turkey was not a common meal. Most families *only* had it at Thanksgiving and Christmas.

Turkey is dead cheap nowadays -- but a lot of what you're paying for now is water or brine or curing solution or whatever it is they inject into the thing to make it "juicy." The 1929 turkey didn't look as impressive coming out of the oven, but I bet it had a more honest flavor to it.

Other than the bird the big difference seems to be dairy products -- 1929 was before milk subsidies existed, so "market prices" prevailed. Without those subsidies, modern prices would be a lot higher than they are now.

 

[Guttersnipe]

1929 was also the end of a highly inflationary decade followed by a substantial deflationary trend from 1931-1933. If you used 1931-1933 prices and CPI data to find out the cost of a Depression Thanksgiving dinner in 2013 dollars, the results might be quite different.

 

[Stanley Doble]

My mother's side of the family were mostly farmers. In those days poultry was the womens' racket. They all had a hen house for eggs to sell, and they all had a flock of geese, ducks and/or turkeys. These were for the Thanksgiving and Christmas trade and provided the money for the family's Christmas celebration.

Turkey dinner was not universal - many preferred duck or goose for the holidays. But everybody had some kind of celebratory dinner unless they were out and out hobos.

A typical family farm might provide 10 to 20 geese, ducks or turkeys and they were farm fresh, free range and delicious.

By the way they would have considered the menu on the skimpy side. They would have had more variety of vegetables, at least 3 kinds of home made pie and several kinds of home made pickles, sauces and relishes along with a luxury only seen at this time of year, olives.

Note - on re reading, I should make something clear. Turkey was always the Thanksgiving bird but goose and duck were popular for Christmas and New Years celebrations especially among British and European immigrants.

The money from poultry sales went into the women's pocketbooks and was used to buy presents, decorations and special treats for the Christmas season.

 

[vitanola]

1929 was also the end of a highly inflationary decade followed by a substantial deflationary trend from 1931-1933. If you used 1931-1933 prices and CPI data to find out the cost of a Depression Thanksgiving dinner in 2013 dollars, the results might be quite different.

True, if you consider the 'twenties to be the 'Teens. According to the generally accepted BLS figures, $4.28 in 1914 money was the rough equivalent to $100 in 2013. The following figures might give a rough suggestion of inflationary trends during the era. remember that up until 1933 the dollar was pegged to gold at the rate of $20.0/oz, rising to $35/oz after the confiscation of '33.

Equivalent to $100 in 1914 $4.28
1918 $6.47
1920 $8.56
1921 $7.66
1922 $7.19
1926 $7.58
1928 $7.32
1929 $7.32
1930 $7.15
1931 $6.51
1932 $5.87
1933 $5.57
1934 $5.74
1936 $5.95
1939 $5.95

Note that on the whole the decade was remarkably stable after the disinflation of the 1921, particularly considering the great changes taking place in our economy. Manufactured goods (motorcars, farm machinery, tooling, radios, etc) became cheaper year by year, or experienced hedonic improvements (or both) all through the decade. The annual income of an average working-class family dropped from $1,647.34 to $1,489.16 over the course of the decade. The inflation which took place was in financial instruments, most particularly in stocks. Gasoline and oil products remained rather high until the '29, for supplies were initially tight. Electricity fell in price, as did all farm commodities, for in farming country the Depression could really be said to have begun in 1923, with commodity prices dropping steadily from then until the introduction of price support programs under the AAA.

 

[LizzieMaine]

Another point worth remembering is that modern supermarket chains usually use turkey as a loss leader during the holiday season -- that 49-cents-a-pound deal barely covers the wholesale cost of the bird, but the store doesn't care because it's using that price to lure you into the store where they know you'll load up on high-profit items like stuffing, cranberry sauce, pie fillings and all the rest of it. Frozen turkeys are especially popular loss-leader items -- and keep in mind that frozen turkeys weren't available in 1929.

You *could* get a canned chicken in 1929, an actual whole chicken canned in aspic courtesy of the good folks at Hormel Packing Company, but I don't think they ever tried that with turkeys.

(Ah -- I stand corrected. It seems that the CARE organization included whole canned turkeys in their "CARE packages" for European relief between 1948 and 1953. No wonder Europe loves us so.)

 

[bsaguy]

My dad was born in 1927. He grew up in a small Southern textile town. He remembers one year, for Thanksgiving, his mother killed and served Oscar, the family pet chicken. This was for an extended family of probably 6-7 people. His young cousin was so upset about Oscar that he couldn't eat any meat.

My how times have changed.

 

[Gregg Axley]

True, if you consider the 'twenties to be the 'Teens. According to the generally accepted BLS figures, $4.28 in 1914 money was the rough equivalent to $100 in 2013. The following figures might give a rough suggestion of inflationary trends during the era. remember that up until 1933 the dollar was pegged to gold at the rate of $20.0/oz, rising to $35/oz after the confiscation of '33.

Equivalent to $100 in 1914 $4.28
1918 $6.47
1920 $8.56
1921 $7.66
1922 $7.19
1926 $7.58
1928 $7.32
1929 $7.32
1930 $7.15
1931 $6.51
1932 $5.87
1933 $5.57
1934 $5.74
1936 $5.95
1939 $5.95

Note that on the whole the decade was remarkably stable after the disinflation of the 1921, particularly considering the great changes taking place in our economy. Manufactured goods (motorcars, farm machinery, tooling, radios, etc) became cheaper year by year, or experienced hedonic improvements (or both) all through the decade. The annual income of an average working-class family dropped from $1,647.34 to $1,489.16 over the course of the decade. The inflation which took place was in financial instruments, most particularly in stocks. Gasoline and oil products remained rather high until the '29, for supplies were initially tight. Electricity fell in price, as did all farm commodities, for in farming country the Depression could really be said to have begun in 1923, with commodity prices dropping steadily from then until the introduction of price support programs under the AAA.

I've always referred to this site, to find out what money is in today's terms.
http://www.westegg.com/inflation/
Well the wife and I watch a lot of old movies and tv shows.
Some of the old game shows gave away $5,000 dollars and the crowd went wild.
In 1978 (for example) that $5,000 is now worth over $17,000. Okay now I see why they got happy.
Back to 1929....
My 1929 Essex was $650 new, which is now over $8,000 dollars.
Dern it really was a cheap car.
But it was made in FEBRUARY of 1929, before the crash.
Very well made for $650.