Black Tuesday, Stock Market Crash, October 29th, 1929
The Wall Street Crash of 1929 (October 1929), also known as the Great Crash, and the Stock Market Crash of 1929, was the most devastating stock market crash in the history of the United States, taking into consideration the full extent and duration of its fallout.The crash signaled the beginning of the 12-year Great Depression that affected all Western industrialized countries and that did not end in the United States until the onset of American mobilization for World War II at the end of 1941.The economy had been growing robustly for most of the 1920's. A technological golden age as innovations such as radio, automobiles, aviation, telephone and the power grid were deployed and adopted. Companies that had pioneered these advances, RCA and GM, saw their stocks soar. Investors were infatuated with the returns available in the stock market especially with the use of leverage through margin debt. On October 29, Black Tuesday, the Dow Jones Industrial Average fell 38 points to 260, a drop of 12.8%. The deluge of selling overwhelmed the ticker tape system that normally gave investors the current prices of their shares. Telephone lines and telegraphs were clogged and were unable to cope. This information vacuum only led to more fear and panic. The technology of the New Era, much celebrated by investors previously, now served to deepen their suffering. Black Tuesday was a day of chaos. Forced to liquidate their stocks because of margin calls, overextended investors flooded the exchange with sell orders. The glamour stocks of the age saw their values plummet. Across the two days, the Dow Jones Industrial Average fell 23%. The crash was followed by the Great Depression, the worst economic crisis of modern times
