This Week in the Great Depression: Echoes

Welcome to "This Week in the Great Depression." It's the fall of 1931, and Britain just weeks ago abandoned the gold standard. Nervous dollar holders have made a raid on U.S. bullion, with almost $450 million earmarked for shipment in less than a month.

Rumors from Berlin suggest that the Soviet Union is about to default on many millions in deutsch mark debt for equipment and materiel shipped east in the 1920s. Worse, Germany's guarantees against nonpayment are worthless, as its coffers are nearly empty. Apparently, the USSR won't transfer any funds that are due to the U.K., France and the U.S. either. Britain's Malayalam Plantations recently announced they had begun closing all their rubber estates in South India due to low prices, keeping their "valuable European staff" while dismissing local workers who had tended their 19,000-acre sites.