Il6 FLIGHT FROM THE CITY 



as I can now learn, he worked steadily month after 

 month, earned high wages, and lived according to the 

 conventional standard of skilled workingmen of his 

 class. The Segerstroms then lived in a home which 

 they had bought for a little down and a little each 

 month; they owned a Ford car; they had the usual 

 kind of furniture in their home, a radio, and all the 

 comforts to which they felt an American standard of 

 living entitled them. They had even managed to save 

 a little money, some of which had been invested in 

 securities recommended to them by the bank in which 

 they deposited their money. 



Then came the crash. Regular employment ended. 

 At the end of the fourth winter of occasional work 

 at odd jobs they had lost their home, lost and sold 

 virtually all their furniture, and when we first heard 

 of them they were living in a rented house in the 

 country without a single modern convenience, and 

 dependent upon the wood which they could cut in 

 the woods about their house for fuel with which to 

 keep warm during the wintry weather in this climate. 

 His wife was working as a maid three days a week, 

 and this managed to bring in just enough cash with 

 which to pay the rent and occasionally buy some 

 groceries. For the rest, they were engaged in a des- 

 perate struggle to get enough odd jobs and occasion- 

 ally a little work at his trade of carpenter to keep the 

 family from descending to the charitable agencies for 

 relief. 



As I write, Mrs. Segerstrom has lost her job as a 



