Meaning & use
Hoovervilles
Last updated
Makeshift shantytowns built by homeless and unemployed people during the Great Depression, named in bitter reference to President Herbert Hoover.
See it in a sentence
Families in the Hoovervilles built shacks from scrap wood and cardboard.
Photographs of the Hoovervilles captured the widespread poverty of the 1930s.
A note on using this word
The term mocked President Hoover, whom many blamed for failing to address the economic collapse of the early 1930s.
Words with a similar meaning
shantytowns
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