Effect On The Environment
As many as 5,000 heat related deaths were reported. Many people suffered from heat stroke and heat exhaustion, particularly the elderly. Unlike today, air conditioning was in the early stages of development and was therefore absent from houses and commercial buildings. Many of the deaths occurred in high population density areas of Chicago, Detroit, St. Louis, Milwaukee, Cleveland, Toronto and other urban areas. Farmers across the continent saw crop failure, causing corn and wheat prices to rise quickly. Droughts and heat waves were common in the 1930s. The 1930s are remembered as the driest and warmest decade for the US (the Dust Bowl years) and the summer of 1936 was the most widespread and destructive heat wave to occur in the Americas in centuries.
Read more about this topic: 1936 North American Heat Wave
Famous quotes containing the words effect and/or environment:
“Whenever any form of government shall become destructive of these ends, it is the right of the people to alter or to abolish it, & to institute new government, laying it’s foundation on such principles & organising it’s powers in such form, as to them shall seem most likely to effect their safety & happiness.”
—Thomas Jefferson (1743–1826)
“White males are the most responsible for the destruction of human life and environment on the planet today.”
—Robin Morgan (b. 1941)