Okie - Great Depression Usage

Great Depression Usage

In the mid-1930s, during the Dust Bowl era, large numbers of farmers fleeing ecological disaster and the Great Depression migrated from the Great Plains and Southwest regions to California mostly along historic U.S. Route 66. More of the migrants were from Oklahoma than any other state, and a total of approximately 15% of the Oklahoma population left for California.

Ben Reddick, a free-lance journalist and later publisher of the Paso Robles Daily Press, is credited with first using the term Oakie, in the mid-1930s, to identify migrant farm workers. He noticed the "OK" abbreviation (for Oklahoma) on many of the migrants' license plates and referred to them in his article as "Oakies." Californians began calling all migrants by that name, even though many newcomers were not actually Oklahomans.

Many West Coast residents and some politically motivated writers used "Okie" to disparage these poor, white (including those of mixed American Indian ancestry, the largest tribal group being Cherokees), migrant workers and their families. The term became well-known nationwide by John Steinbeck's novel The Grapes of Wrath.

Will Rogers, a famous movie star with Oklahoma roots remarked jokingly that the Okies moving from Oklahoma to California increased the average intelligence of both states.