When FDR was inaugurated in 1933, the country's prospects were grim. Millions in the work force - one in four - were unemployed. Most of the banks had closed their doors. Business activity was half what it had been in 1929. Crop prices were so low that thousands of farmers could not make a living, and others watched their topsoil erode, dry out, and blow away. The National Recovery Administration, the National Labor Board, the Civilian Conservation Corps, the Works Progress Administration, TVA, Social Security, are some of the New Deal programs Roosevelt enacted. His quiet time at Springwood, where this tulip poplar towers, were rare moments.