What did I know about America’s economic tradition before my recent library discovery of “Essays on the Great Depression” by Ben Bernanke, current chairman of the Federal Reserve?

For one, the first Great Depression — after the 1873 financial crisis — was related to the end of the Civil War, as previously described by economist John Chown, who documented post-war measures to establish a bimetallic standard for sound money.

The measures of 1873 were followed by the long recession known (at least to historians writing before 1931) as ‘the Great Depression.’

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