Nonfiction NAR

NONFRI ATIVE
reads CTION
lik
but it’s e fiction
all tru
e

Surviving the biggest dust storm

GARY HANNA; COURTESY OF HATTRUP FAMILY (CATHERINE HATTRUP)

C
AS YOU READ What were the causes and effects of Black Sunday?

in American history atherine Hattrup believed the world

BY LAUREN TARSHIS was coming to an end.
It was Sunday, April 14, 1935, and
Catherine, 9, was enjoying a quiet
afternoon at her grandmother’s house in
Hodgeman County, Kansas.
Catherine Hattrup, age 5

4 SCHOLASTIC SCOPE • MARCH 2017 SCOPE.SCHOLASTIC.COM • MARCH 2017 5
 TORN FROM THE EARTH
Newly arrived farmers tore out
about 5.2 million acres of tall
prairie grass—an area roughly
the size of Massachusetts—to
make room for wheat crops. Soon,
almost no prairie grass remained.
NATIVE AMERICANS
Though weather on the Southern Plains
was extreme, the Native Americans who
lived there respected the area’s wildness.
One Comanche chief praised it as a place
“where the wind blew free and there was
nothing to break the light of the sun.”

Suddenly, Catherine’s of life. The colossal dust storm of roasting summers, and bone-dry lands and lured white settlers to acres of grassland had been turned 17 miles from the town of Kinsley,
grandmother rushed inside April 14, 1935, was caused not by periods of drought. the area with offers of free or very into wheat farms. Kansas. One of seven children,
the house. “Oh my!” she cried. nature but by another destructive The Southern Plains was a harsh inexpensive land. Catherine dreaded “girl chores”

LIBRARY OF CONGRESS (NATIVE AMERICANS); COURTESY OF THE KINSLEY PUBLIC LIBRARY

“There’s a terrible black cloud. And force: humans. environment, to be sure, but for Not surprisingly, settlers arrived A Hopeful Time like laundry and cooking; she loved
I have no idea what it is!” To understand what happened, thousands of years, nature had by the thousands. Catherine’s The new farms flourished—at riding horses and following her

ARCHIVE (TOWN); JAMES STEINBERG/SCIENCE SOURCE/GETTY IMAGES (PLAINS)

For hundreds of miles around, we need to go back in time to existed in balance. The people grandfather was one of them. He first. The years between 1910 and father out into the fields. She and
tktktktkt Usam, si
people gazed up at the same when Kansas and the surrounding who lived in the area, members of came from Ireland around 1890, 1930 were unusually wet on the her brothers and sisters attended
unt. Vel ea sitias
horrifying sight: a mountain areas were mostly empty Native nations like the Comanche eager to start a new life as a farmer plains, and with such plentiful rain, a one-room schoolhouse 3 miles
maximped quaspiendi
of boiling blackness churning wilderness. The region, known as and Kiowa, left the prairie grasses in this promising new land. crops grew quickly. Towns, stores, from their farm.
sunt ationsed maios
through the sky. the Southern Plains, contains parts mostly untouched. Before settlers could plant and churches sprouted up almost Catherine’s childhood was

(2026.17) (TRACTOR); JIM McMAHON/MAPMAN® (MAP)

doluptius expla
Was a violent thunderstorm of Kansas, Colorado, Texas, New crops, they had to remove the as swiftly as the wheat. a happy one, but hard times

INSTITUTE FOR REGIONAL STUDIES/NDSU/FARGO

closing in? Was a massive tornado Mexico, and Oklahoma. Millions Ripping Up the Grass prairie grasses to make room. It It was during this hopeful time loomed—hard times from which
about to strike? and millions of acres of tall prairie By the late 1800s, much of turned out that the grasses weren’t that Catherine was born, in 1925. few on the plains would be spared.
No. It was a dust storm—the grasses once covered this flat and the Southern Plains had been indestructible after all. Using axes, Catherine’s father grew wheat
biggest in U.S. history. Three treeless part of the country. transformed. sharp-bladed plows, and their bare and raised cattle on a farm about Dreams Turned to Dust
hundred thousand tons of Those prairie grasses seemed The U.S. government wanted hands, farmers ripped The problems for plains farmers
dried-up soil had been swept into almost indestructible. Some types to fill up the American wilderness the grasses from the Area of the
began in 1930, when America faced
the air, forming a swirling cloud stretched 6 feet tall, with tightly with towns and cities and farms. It earth. Within two
The greatest damage
a crisis that would become known
Dust Bowl Nebraska Iowa
of dust wider than the state of woven roots that reached 9 feet forced Native Americans from their decades, millions of 1931-1940 as the Great Depression. Banks
Utah
Colorado
Indiana. That cloud was speeding down into the earth. The hardiest California Kansas around the country ran out of
Kinsley Mo.
over the land at 65 miles per hour, grasses could withstand money, and millions of people lost
Los Angeles New Mexico
Oklahoma
wreaking havoc wherever it went. the pounding hooves of City their jobs. Farmers on the plains

PA
Arizona Albuquerque
Oklahoma Ark.

CI
And it was headed straight for buffalo that stampeded were hit especially hard because

FIC
Catherine and her grandmother. across the plains. The the price of wheat plummeted.

OCE
Scale of Miles
MEXICO Texas
roots could survive the This meant farmers earned far less
0 100 200

AN
Nature in Balance fires ignited by lightning for the crops they grew. Suddenly,
Extreme weather events like strikes. Most important, BRAND-NEW TOWNS families like Catherine’s struggled
tornadoes and hurricanes are those grasses could Catherine grew up near Kinsley, Kansas to pay their bills.
(left), one of many towns that sprang
natural disasters—events in nature endure the area’s brutal The economic hardships
that result in great damage or loss weather: frozen winters,
up on the Southern Plains as settlers
Only portions of the
moved to the area.
original route remain.
were just the beginning. 

6 SCHOLASTIC SCOPE • MARCH 2017 SCOPE.SCHOLASTIC.COM • MARCH 2017 7

 The year 1932 brought a second breeze blew through the air. black. Farmers staggered blindly Lightning flashed; thunder
and even more frightening crisis: a Few could have imagined the through their fields. Cars crashed. sounded. Neighbors desperately
drought. The rain simply stopped. horror that was about to strike. Whether anyone died because covered their windows with damp
All spring, day after day after day, That morning, Catherine went of the storm is unknown, but sheets to try to keep out the black
the sky stayed blue. Then came to church with her family, then hundreds were rushed to hospitals dust—but the storm was too strong.
the summer and with it, blistering to her grandmother’s house. with a condition called “dust “I really did think the world
heat. Crops withered. Without the She loved her days with her pneumonia,” caused by the dust was coming to an end,” Catherine
protective layer of prairie grass, soil grandmother, who spoiled her with they had inhaled. recalls.
dried up and was carried away by freshly baked bread slathered with But of course it did not, and
the wind. On windy days, the air butter and homemade grape jelly. Hardships and Hope Catherine and her family made it
turned gritty with dust, the sky a Catherine and her grandmother More than 80 years later, at through. There was even a bright
dirty brown. were enjoying the pleasant the age of 91, Catherine can still side to Black Sunday. The storm
This dust permeated everything. afternoon—until the black cloud remember the terror of the day was so catastrophic that it forced
Catherine’s mother would rinse the appeared on the horizon. that became known as “Black the country to face this fact:

COLLECTION (CHILDREN WITH COVERED FACES)

COURTESY OF JOYCE UNRUH/GREEN FAMILY
family’s dust-coated plates before A dust storm of unequaled Sunday.” She remembers how she Humans had broken the prairie.
meals and lay a cloth across the power and size—stretching 200 huddled with her grandmother Now it was up to humans to fix it.
food, keeping it covered right up miles wide and 8,000 feet into through the hours-long storm, how In the coming years, millions
to the moment that everyone was the sky—raced across the earth, they prayed together. They could of trees and prairie grasses were
ready to take a bite. chasing thousands of terrified only imagine what was happening planted across the plains. Farmers
The dusty winds were nothing birds and animals. The storm, in the world beyond, where the learned how to farm in a way that
compared with the storms that far bigger than any that had dust was so thick even car lights was kinder to the environment
came next: enormous clouds come before, turned the day couldn’t shatter its darkness. and protected the land. The
roiling with dust and dirt. These weather shifted, and by the late
storms snuffed out the sun and 1930s, the drought was over. There
dumped piles of dirt big enough to has never been another dust storm
bury animals, destroy crops, and as massive as Black Sunday.
fill basements. People caught in After the storm, many people
a dust storm would choke as dust not so for everyone. During left the plains, but Catherine and
rushed up their noses. The swirling this period, many people her family remained. Catherine

COURTESY OF THE CROWLEY COMPANY/LIBRARY OF CONGRESS (DUST MOUNTAIN);

HASKELL PRUETT COLLECTION/OKLAHOMA HISTORICAL SOCIETY (FOOD STORE)
grit would rake across their skin lost everything. As the land later married, had five children,
like millions of tiny claws. turned to dust, so did their and settled not far from the
As time went on, the storms dreams. By 1935, tens of Hattrup family farm.
became increasingly frequent. thousands of people had The dusty days of her childhood
Many people began to understand abandoned their farms. MOUNTAINS OF DUST had many hardships. But days like
that removing all of that prairie Those who stayed hoped and Raging dust storms buried houses Black Sunday taught Catherine
under towering piles of dirt, some
grass had been a terrible mistake. prayed for better times. as high as 20 feet. The dust seeped
lessons that have stayed with her
But nobody could agree on what to underneath doors and through cracks always.
do about it. Meanwhile, life grew The Black Cloud in window frames, ruining everything “I learned that even when
inside. The dust was especially
more desperate for those living on On the morning of April 14, dangerous for children
and older things didn’t work out quite
the plains. 1935, it seemed those better times people, who often became ill with right,” Catherine
Catherine’s family was lucky. might have arrived at last. For the “dust pneumonia.” At right, three
says, “I should
TURN
Kansas kids protect themselves by THE PAGE
Money was scarce, but there was first time in weeks, the blue sky wearing goggles and homemade masks be thankful for to read
always food on the table. This was wasn’t swirling with dust. A sweet on their way to school. everything.” • more. 

8 SCHOLASTIC SCOPE • MARCH 2017 SCOPE.SCHOLASTIC.COM • MARCH 2017 9

Newspaper Article
November 7, 2016

Choking on Smog in Delhi

As the air turns and a three-day closure of about their health problems.
1,800 public schools. On Monday, Anumita Roychowdhury, who
toxic, residents the city government released a list of runs the air pollution program

struggle to breathe health guidelines, advising citizens

to wash their eyes with running
at the Center for Science and
Environment, said that sense
water and to go to a hospital if they of urgency would have to be
were experiencing symptoms like sustained if the city were to impose
By ELLEN BARRY “breathlessness, giddiness, chest changes, such as restrictions on
NEW DELHI, INDIA—For days, pain, and chest constriction.” car travel. “This has to translate to
many in Delhi have been living as if According to Bhargav Krishna, very strong support for very hard
under siege, trying to keep the dirty who manages the Public Health decisions,” she said.
air away from their children and Foundation in India, these First, though, people here
older parents. emergency measures are decent. must get through the next few
But it is not easy. WORST IN WINTER But, he says, “They’re not solving the days. Sherebanu Frosh, who lives
Open a window or a door, and Cars, power plants, long-term problem” of air pollution. south of Delhi, said she and her
the haze enters the room within construction, and crop children were “cowering by our
burning, as well as burning
seconds. Outside, the sky is white, “We Wear Masks” air purifiers,” which had become
trash for warmth, all
the sun a circle so pale that you Changing weather conditions are overloaded. “So we’re putting both
contribute to Delhi’s air
can barely make it out. The smog pollution. The air quality is likely to disperse the dense cloud of our purifiers in one room and
is acrid—eye-stinging and throat- worst in winter, when cold pollutants over the next few days. spending the day there,” she said.

FROM THE NEW YORK TIMES, NOVEMBER 7, 2016. COPYRIGHT 2016

burning. And it is so thick that it polluted air can get trapped But the next few days will also put “If we leave, we wear masks.”
near the ground. Breathing

BY THE NEW YORK TIMES COMPANY. USED BY PERMISSION.

is being blamed for a 70-vehicle more pollution into the air. As it Jessica Farmer, whose children
polluted air can lead to lung
accident north of the city. turns cold, Delhi’s poor will burn attend the American Embassy
and heart disease.
trash, including plastic and rubber, School in Delhi, said she had
A Crisis for warmth. Fireworks will be set off moved five purifiers into three
In past years, Delhi’s for the Hindu festival Diwali. And rooms of her house. Still, the
roughly 20 million then there are the regular sources concentration of PM 2.5 in some
residents shrugged off Delhi of paper,” said Amaan Emergency Measures of pollution, including cars and places remained at 300, five times
U.S.
wintertime pollution as Ahuja. “You can literally SHUTTERSTOCK (PAPER); JIM McMAHON/MAPMAN® (MAP) On Sunday, Delhi’s chief construction. the recommended limit.
fog. Over the past week, see smoke in the air, minister announced a series of Public anger over Delhi’s air is “We can’t go outside, to malls
EQUATOR
however, they viewed it and when you breathe, emergency measures, including more palpable than in previous or movies where the air is not
RAJAT GUPTA/EPA/NEWS.COM (CHILD ON BIKE);

INDIA
as a crisis. you can smell it, too. We a five-day stop on construction, a years. People are also more likely purified,” Ms. Farmer said. “How
Levels of the most are trying to keep the 10-day closure of a power plant, to identify pollution as the cause of can one live like this?” •
dangerous particles, kids indoors with all the
called PM 2.5, soared. In some more than two packs of cigarettes windows closed.” WRITING CONTEST
places, the level of PM 2.5 in the air a day. Tulika Seth described her
How can efforts to improve human life lead to harming human life? How can we fix
was more than 16 times the limit “There is so much smog family’s life over the past week as
the problems we create? Support your answer with details from “Black Sunday” and
that India’s government considers outside that today, inside my “unnatural and disturbing.” Asked GET THIS
“Choking on Smog in Delhi” as well as your own ideas. Send it to AIR CONTEST. Five
safe. The damage from sustained house, I felt as though someone where she lived, she responded, winners will each get The Storm in the Barn by Matt Phelan. See page 2 or details. ACTIVITY
exposure is the same as smoking had just burned a few sheets “a gas chamber.” ONLINE

10 SCHOLASTIC SCOPE • MARCH 2017 SCOPE.SCHOLASTIC.COM • MARCH 2017 11