Financial Assistance: A Study of Services Offered to Families in Chronic Economic Need at Bay Shore Family Service, Catholic Charities Diocese of Rockville Centre, New York January to June 1963
Abstract
Background of the Study. On October 24, 1929 the stock market crashed, thus, precipitating the greatest crisis in social welfare this country has ever known. The effects of this calamity are still very evident in the field today. Before the crash social welfare was administered by the various charity organizations throughout the country. These agencies represented the efforts on the part of the community to deal with its social problems. Usually operated under private auspices, they were the forerunners of the present-day family service agencies. These agencies proved quite adequate in handling the normal social problems; that is, until the aforementioned fateful day in October.The immediate unemployment wrought by the Depression and the concomitant economic need soon overwhelmed the existing social welfare agencies. Margaret Rich describes the scene in a typical family agency. "The change in conditions was reflected in the family society's caseload as early as October when the number of applications was 767 as compared with 553 in September; in November it was 1,218; in December, 1,967; in January 1930 it was 2,727 (as compared with 1,000 the previous year); in February it rose to 3459."
Subject Area
Social work|Social studies education|Individual & family studies|Economic history
Recommended Citation
McCue, Brian Patrick, "Financial Assistance: A Study of Services Offered to Families in Chronic Economic Need at Bay Shore Family Service, Catholic Charities Diocese of Rockville Centre, New York January to June 1963" (1964). ETD Collection for Fordham University. AAI30724993.
https://research.library.fordham.edu/dissertations/AAI30724993
