"Security values in most instances were not inflated"

"The nation is marching along a permanently high plateau of prosperity"

"any fears that the price level of stocks might go down to where it was in 1923 or earlier are not justified by present economic conditions"

- Irving Fisher, speech to a banking group, Oct. 23, 1929

"This crash is not going to have much effect on business."- Arthur Reynolds, Chairman of Continental Illinois Bank of Chicago, October 24, 1929

Flashback to "Black Thursday," Oct. 24, 1929:

Stocks opened moderately steady in price, but traders whose margins were exhausted began selling heavily... at one o'clock the stock ticker was recording prices from half past eleven... stocks dropped 11% intra-day... After a bankers' consortium sent NYSE Vice President Richard Whitney to the stock exchange floor to offer to purchase in the neighborhood of twenty or thirty million dollars' worth of stock at the previous selling price [most likely above their quotations], the market eventually closed with only a 2% loss.

Ref: Only Yesterday: An Informal History of the 1920's, Frederick Lewis Allen, Chap. XIII.

Not long after, the stock market plummeted in two days of panic: October 28 became known as "Black Monday" (13.47% decline in the Dow), and October 29 as "Black Tuesday" (11.73% decline in the Dow). Between October 23rd and November 13th, 1929, the Dow fell by 39%.

"There will be no repetition of the break of yesterday... I have no fear of another comparable decline."- Arthur W. Loasby (President of the Equitable Trust Company), quoted in NYT, Friday, October 25, 1929

"We feel that fundamentally Wall Street is sound, and that for people who can afford to pay for them outright, good stocks are cheap at these prices." - Goodbody and Company market- letter quoted in The New York Times, Friday, October 25, 1929

"The fundamental business of the country, that is production and distribution of commodities, is on a sound and prosperous basis."- President Herbert Hoover, October 25th, 1929

"They have lost a few tail feathers but in time they will grow again, longer and more luxurious than the old ones." - The Wall Street Journal, between Oct 24 and Oct 29, 1929

"The investor who purchases securities at this time with the discrimination that as always is a condition of prudent investing may do so with confidence." - New York Times, October 28, 1929

6. "This is the time to buy stocks. This is the time to recall the words of the late J. P. Morgan... that any man who is bearish on America will go broke. Within a few days there is likely to be a bear panic rather than a bull panic. Many of the low prices as a result of this hysterical selling are not likely to be reached again in many years." - R. W. McNeel, market analyst, as quoted in the New York Herald Tribune, October 30, 1929

"Buying of sound, seasoned issues now will not be regretted" - E. A. Pearce market letter quoted in the New York Herald Tribune, October 30, 1929

"Some pretty intelligent people are now buying stocks... Unless we are to have a panic -- which no one seriously believes, stocks have hit bottom." - R. W. McNeal, financial analyst in October 1929

7. "The decline is in paper values, not in tangible goods and services... America is now in the eighth year of prosperity as commercially defined. The former great periods of prosperity in America averaged eleven years. On this basis we now have three more years to go before the tailspin." - Stuart Chase (American economist and author), NY Herald Tribune, November 1, 1929

"Hysteria has now disappeared from Wall Street."- The Times of London, November 2, 1929

"The Wall Street crash doesn't mean that there will be any general or serious business depression... For six years American business has been diverting a substantial part of its attention, its energies and its resources on the speculative game... Now that irrelevant, alien and hazardous adventure is over. Business has come home again, back to its job, providentially unscathed, sound in wind and limb, financially stronger than ever before." Business Week, November 2, 1929

"...despite its severity, we believe that the slump in stock prices will prove an intermediate movement and not the precursor of a business depression such as would entail prolonged further liquidation..." - Harvard Economic Society (HES), November 2, 1929

8. "... a serious depression seems improbable; [we expect] recovery of business next spring, with further improvement in the fall." - HES, November 10, 1929

"The end of the decline of the Stock Market will probably not be long, only a few more days at most." - Irving Fisher, Professor of Economics at Yale University, November 14, 1929

"In most of the cities and towns of this country, this Wall Street panic will have no effect." Paul Block (President of the Block newspaper chain), editorial, November 15, 1929

"Financial storm definitely passed." Bernard Baruch, cablegram to Winston Churchill, November 15, 1929

9. "I see nothing in the present situation that is either menacing or warrants pessimism... I have every confidence that there will be a revival of activity in the spring, and that during this coming year the country will make steady progress." - Andrew W. Mellon, U's. Secretary of the Treasury December 31, 1929

"I am convinced that through these measures we have reestablished confidence." - Herbert Hoover, December 1929

"[1930 will be] a splendid employment year." - U's. Dept. of Labor, New Year's Forecast, December 1929

10. "For the immediate future, at least, the outlook (stocks) is bright." - Irving Fisher, Ph.D. in Economics, in early 1930

11. "..'there are indications that the severest phase of the recession is over..." - Harvard Economic Society (HES) Jan 18, 1930

12. "There is nothing in the situation to be disturbed about." -Secretary of the Treasury Andrew Mellon, Feb 1930

13. "The spring of 1930 marks the end of a period of grave concern...American business is steadily coming back to a normal level of prosperity." - Julius Barnes, head of Hoover's National Business Survey Conference, Mar 16, 1930

"... the outlook continues favorable..." - HES Mar 29, 1930

14. "... the outlook is favorable..." - HES Apr 19, 1930

15."While the crash only took place six months ago, I am convinced we have now passed through the worst -- and with continued unity of effort we shall rapidly recover. There has been no significant bank or industrial failure. That danger, too, is safely behind us." -Herbert Hoover, President of the United States, May 1, 1930

"...by May or June the spring recovery forecast in our letters of last December and November should clearly be apparent..." - HES May 17, 1930

"Gentleman, you have come sixty days too late. The depression is over."- Herbert Hoover, responding to a delegation requesting a public works program to help speed the recovery, June 1930

16. "... irregular and conflicting movements of business should soon give way to a sustained recovery..." - HES June 28, 1930

17. "... the present depression has about spent its force..." - HES, Aug 30, 1930

18. "We are now near the end of the declining phase of the depression." - HES Nov 15, 1930

19."Stabilization at [present] levels is clearly possible." - HES Oct 31, 1931

20. "Executive Order 6102 Forbidding the Hoarding of Gold Coin, Gold Bullion and Gold Certificates

By virtue of the authority vested in me by Section 5(b) of the Act of October 6, 1917, as amended by Section 2 of the Act of March 9, 1933, entitled "An Act to provide relief in the existing national emergency in banking, and for other purposes", in which amendatory Act Congress declared that a serious emergency exists, I, Franklin D. Roosevelt, President of the United States of America, do declare that said national emergency still continues to exist and pursuant to said section to do hereby prohibit the hoarding of gold coin, gold bullion, and gold certificates within the continental United States by individuals, partnerships, associations and corporations and hereby prescribe the following regulations for carrying out the purposes of the order...