A secret gift
Subtitle: how one man's kindness--and a trove of letters--revealed the hidden history of the Great Depression
By: Ted Gup
Publisher: Penguin Press
Published: 2010
Place of publication: New York
Language: eng
Number of pages: 365
ISBN-13: 9781594202704
Subjects: Benevolence; Benefactors; Economic conditions; Biography; History
Other titles: How one man's kindness--and a trove of letters--revealed the hidden history of the Great Depression
Description: The author's grandfather, Sam Stone, placed an ad in the Canton, OH, newspaper shortly before Christmas in 1933, offering cash gifts to seventy-five families in distress. Readers were asked to send letters describing their hardships to a benefactor calling himself Mr. B. Virdot. The author investigates a suitcase full of letters responding to these ads as he learns more about his grandfather's hidden past as well as the suffering and triumphs of strangers during the Great Depression. -- From publisher's description.
Notes: Includes index.
Table of contents: title: A Christmas carol; title: In consideration of the white collar man; title: The bread of tomorrow; title: If I would accept charity; title: Families: the crisis that brought them closer; title: Families: the crisis that pulled them apart; title: An opportunity to help; title: A merry and joyful Christmas; title: True circumstances.