While the Clock Ticked: A Dixonian Portrayal of the Great Depression

by Brandon Booth

No author who wrote during the most distressful times of American history--the Great Depression--can escape the issue Americans faced at hand: loss of fortunes, bank failures, job losses, bread lines. John Steinbeck portrayed the stark realities of the Depression by writing about a family migrating west because they lost their land to a dust bowl. F. Scott Fitzgerald honed in on economic class difference in his novel The Great Gatsby. Those authors told it like it was. What about Franklin W. Dixon? The average reader at first glance might overlook such hardships. Therefore Dixon paints a rosy picture of the era: nice house, roadster, friends not hard up for
money but for ice cream, hungry for adventure. But Dixon does not forget that this is the Great Depression. That comes out in the plight of the principal outlandish characters in While the Clock Ticked, Dalrymple and Applegate.

Dalrymple is a shrewd banker. He had his head above water right from the beginning of the Great Depression. He saw alot of banks fail because customers and failed businesses could not pay their loans. Dalrymple’s bank was not going to fail. He
would not lend Amos Wandy money for some gimmick. Dalrymple could see Wandy’s freelance project was not going to pay dividends. Bombarded with requests for
loans, Dalrymple would lock himself in the secret room at a dilapidated house. “I am a busy man, and when I leave the bank and return to my house at Lakeside, business matters often follow me.” (Dixon, 1932, 30). He was that desperate to return to the secret room after several death threats. Although he stated that he had no intention of occupying the house, he could risk losing his Lakeside home in the event of a bank failure.

Hurd Applegate is a victim of the stock market crash. Though he is still living at the Tower Mansion, he has almost no money. Gone are the days when the Tower
Mansion was the masterpiece mansion of Bayport. He had to fire Henry Robinson, the caretaker from the first tome “The Tower Treasure” because he could no longer pay him. “[The Hardys] were near Hurd Applegate’s house and they saw that he was out mowing
his lawn.” (Dixon, 125). Applegate's only asset left are his stamps that someone someday would buy. But he got gypped by Jensen.

How could the reader not notice the distress of Applegate and Dalrymple during the Depression era? Applegate accused Dalrymple of stealing his stamps. Characters get angry and say things they don’t mean to say. Dixon chose subtle ways to paint the stark realities of the Great Depression. Way to go Dixon.