The devastating famine that descended on Soviet Russia in 1921 was the worst natural disaster in Europe since the Black Plague in the Middle Ages. Half a world away, Americans responded with a massive two-year relief campaign, championed by a new secretary of commerce, “the Great Humanitarian” Herbert Hoover. The nearly 300 American relief workers, “Hoover’s boys,” would be tested by a railroad system in disarray, a forbidding climate and — being among the first group of outsiders to break through Russia’s isolation following the Bolshevik Revolution — a ruthless government suspicious of their motives.
Priests stand outside awaiting food ration in Ufa, Russia.By the summer of 1922, Americans were feeding nearly 11-million Soviet citizens a day in 19,000 kitchens. THE GREAT FAMINE: AMERICAN EXPERIENCE from producer Austin Hoyt (GEORGE H.W. BUSH: AMERICAN EXPERIENCE) tells this riveting story of America’s engagement with a distant and desperate people — an operation hailed for its efficiency, grit and generosity — within the larger story of the Russian Revolution and the roots of the U.S.-Soviet rivalry that would dominate the second half of the 20th century.
Monday at 9 p.m. on PBS-HD.
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