Federal Writers' Project – Life Histories/2020/Summer II/Section 10/Nora Oates

Overview
Nora Oates was a tourist house owner and corset saleswoman during the Great Depression. Oates was interviewed by Mary P.Brown for the Federal Writers’ Project on June 23, 1939.1

Early Life
Nora I. Oates was born on June 24, 1886, in Concord, NC.2 She worked more than twelve hours a day at a cotton mill from the age of ten until the age of twenty-eight.3 Within three months of meeting, she was married to Mitchell Oates at the age of fifteen and discovered just as quickly that he was in poor health which would burden them for the rest of his life.4  Oates became the predominant wage earner as her husband was unable to work full-time, and the economic downturn of the Great Depression pressured many women to enter the workforce.5 Her only son, raised by her mother, died at eighteen months old which pushed her to dedicate herself completely to her work.6

Adult Life and Career
After Mitchell managed to get a job as a motorman, the couple moved to Charlotte, NC, and was able to afford a nice funeral for their son and pay off their existing loans.7 Even though they lived a stable life, Oates missed the thrill of working. Taking out a $100 loan in her own name, Oates invested in the corset business which boomed shortly after.8 She became a saleswoman for Spencer Corsets which covered the price of seven cars and part of a house.9  As time went on, bills from the hospital, nurses, doctors, and Mitchell’s funeral service piled up faster than their increased income could support.10 Oates lost her house and was unable to repay her debts until opening up a tourist house.11  She rented a house on Main Street where she would lease rooms to visitors and sell corsets to passersby.12  With no children or a husband, Oates sought more stability and adopted a young girl.13  She was able to send her daughter to beauty school where she then became the manager of a local store.14  Oates died on May 6, 1961, in Charlotte, NC.15

Women in the Workforce
Pre 1930 it was stigmatized for married women to have a job even more so if the wife was the breadwinner of the household. However, the stock market crash of 1929 resulted in millions of unemployed Americans many of which were industrial workers. As manual labor jobs became scarce, traditionally women’s professions grew.16 Teaching and domestic service fields were less impacted by the stock market and workers made lower salaries.17  Therefore, more companies would hire more Americans at a lower wage. Millions of women entered the workforce with the new impetus of supporting their families.18 The series of projects from FDR’s New Deal created many more jobs and in turn, more opportunities for women. Although more women were employed than ever before, most businesses preferred to hire men to maintain the status quo.19 The jobs available to women through the New Deal were limited to housekeeping roles and the Civilian Conservation Corps even had a policy against hiring women.20  As white women took precedence over women of color, the job market thinned for Black and Mexican-American women. Most African-American families had multiple incomes prior to economic depression, and the influx of white women left them more disadvantaged than before.21 Mexican-American women were discriminated against because most Americans felt that immigrants with children would stay in the United States when there are already too few jobs to go around.22  The old adage, “Use it up, wear it out, make it do, or do without” came from this time where women had to become resourceful to save money within the home.23

1930s Mortgage Crisis and The Great Depression
Prior to the Stock Market Crash of 1929, “balloon mortgages”, mortgages where the principal and the interest were paid back in full at the end of a three to five-year loans term, were popular but as The Great Depression caused millions of Americans to lose their jobs, the unpaid mortgages left borrowers in permanent debt.24 In order to stay afloat, many resorted to borrowing money. As people borrowed more than they could pay back, not enough currency was circulating in the economy otherwise known as illiquidity. Although few Americans trusted banks enough to deposit money during this time, the demand for funds remained. Banks saw this as an opportunity to regain national trust by providing citizens with the funds to survive the crisis.25  The installment of the Federal Housing Administration created a protection program for lenders in which they would always get the principal amount of the loan back even in the case of default.26  This allowed banks to take on more risk than before and ultimately pushed the country further into a depression.27  In order to take out a sizable loan, the borrower would have to make a fifty-percent down payment which was not readily available at the time, so the debtor would often take out a second mortgage on their home to afford the downpayment.28  The second mortgage came with much higher interest rates and shorter time repayment plans making it even more challenging to pay off the original loan.29  For this reason, foreclosure rates skyrocketed and banks were not getting enough return.30 Overall, banker’s acceptances on loans increased despite increased amounts of missed payments and liquidity risk.31  The mortgage crisis stemmed from the leniency on loan approval and the burden of debt affected the borrowers rather than the banks.