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Bonus Army veterans encamp with their families near Johnstown, PA, fall, 1931.
flipFlip to Bonus Army volunteers voting to go home, Ideal Park near Johnstown PA, August 3, 1932.
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Bonus-seeking veterans encamp with their families.

Credit: Image donated by Corbis - Bettmann

In the fall of 1931, hundreds of veterans and their families camped near Johnstown, PA, on their way to Washington D.C. The next summer, more than 20,000 Bonus Marchers converged on Washington, D. C. to demand immediate payment of the Soldiers" bonus promised to men who had served in the armed forces during World War I. In the next four years unemployment in Pennsylvania would rise from 11.8 to close to 40 percent.

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