As the Dust Bowl made life increasingly difficult for those living in the central plains, many
people decided to abandon their homes in search of new opportunities.
Who were these people?
Where did they go?
Many left the Dust Bowl region in favor of trying to find a job in the city.
Others decided to leave the area altogether.
Most of those who left had a common destination, California.
Writers of the era observed that the highways between Oklahoma and California resembled
a parade, with a continuous string of cars heading west.
Others compared it to the gold rush of 1849, with millions of migrants moving in search
of a fresh start.
In 1934 alone, Oklahoma lost more than 400,000 people.
That same year, Kansas lost over 200,000.
The plains states as a whole experienced a loss of 2.5 million people.
Oklahoma suffered the most in terms of population loss.
Other states lost 3% or 4% of their population, but some estimates claim that Oklahoma lost
as much as 18% of its total population.
Not all of the Dust Bowl refugees were from Oklahoma, but because so many of them were,
the Californians had a nickname for all of them.
They called them Okies.
Journalist Ben Reddick first used the term "Okie" in his articles after noticing the
'OK' abbreviation on many of the migrant license plates.
Most of these Okies were heading to California because they thought they could find jobs
picking fruit.
After all, California supplied nearly half of the fresh fruit for the entire country.
However, there were multiple downsides to this occupation.
First, there were far more workers than were needed.
With such a surplus of laborers, employers could pay extremely low wages (there was no
minimum wage at that time).
Additionally, many jobs only lasted two or three days, at which point the worker needed
to move on to the next location in order to find more work.
This forced the Okies into a migratory lifestyle, constantly moving on to the next orchard,
grove, or vineyard.
Given the migrant lifestyle and low pay, the Okies lived a very hard, unpleasant life.
They were looked down upon by Californians and many towns refused to permit them entrance.
They were forced to live outside of communities in makeshift villages of shacks and other
poorly built shelters.
These places became known as Little Oklahomas.
Because these communities were filthy, with little proper sanitation and no running water,
diseases such as typhus and diphtheria became widespread.
To help expose the plight of the Okies, a writer named John Steinbeck wrote a book in
1939 titled The Grapes of Wrath.
This novel told the story of Tom Joad and his family as they traveled from Oklahoma
to California and their hardships once they arrived.
Eventually, the U.S. government attempted to help the Okies living in California.
Camps were organized to provide better toilet and bathing facilities as well as community
cooking areas and laundry rooms.
By 1941, there were 13 of these camps across California with about 45,000 people living
in them.
The nickname "Okie" was originally used by Californians as an insult.
In The Grapes of Wrath, the main character Tom Joad observed, "Okie means you're scum."
However, in modern times, many people from Oklahoma have embraced the nickname and use
it with pride, just as a Hoosier from Indiana or a Yankee from New England uses those nicknames.