Robertson and Paulsen

Arthur A. Robertson

After reading Robertson's story I was a little surprised to hear how badly the rich had suffered after the stock market crashed.  I didn't realize how great the effect was of the crash and that it really affected everyone, not just the poor.  It seemed to me that Robertson was lucky and didn't seem to lose that much money.  However, he saw all of his friends lose a lot of money and some of them even comitted suicide.  But when he talked about the suicides he did so without a lot of emotion which was also very surprising.  He talked about it like it was very common and not surprising when a wealthy businessman killed himself because he had lost all of his money.  He says, "Suicides, left and right, made a terrific impression on me, of course."  He claims to have been affected by the deaths, but the next sentence he says, "One day you saw the prices at a hundred, the next at $20, at $15."  He was talking about the stock prices like the fact that they dropped so fast was just as dreadful as the suicides.  He seems to have been very stuck-up and cocky because he did not lose as much as everyone else.

Ed Paulsen

This story was almost a complete contrast to Robertson's recollection of the stock market crash.  Paulsen had no money and no where to live.  It was interesting to hear how he made do by riding on railcars to wherever they would take him.  The car would be his home until the train stopped and he had to find a new train.  This is very depressing to hear right after reading about the wealthy businessmen complaining just about stock prices.  As long as they had a place to live, they shouldn't be complaining because most of the people in their town were homeless and starving to death.  He says, "We crawl into a railroad sandbox, almsot frozen to death."  The living conditions for him was whatever the train had to offer.  He talks about the struggles of trying to find a job, while Robertson talks about the struggles of dealing with low stock prices.  It's sad to see how the two classes have no connection to each other and don't know what the other is doing.