The Grapes of Wrath: Steinbeck, Carey McWilliams, and the Committees for Social Change

Abstract For the most part, no one doubted the veracity of John Steinbeck’s story The Grapes of Wrath. They agreed or disagreed with his message and his viewpoint, but they did not doubt the truth of what he wrote. The one glaringly indefensible weakness in his novel appeared to be the tractoring-off scene at the beginning of the book. Many sought to prove that the heavy machinery aspect of what led to the farmers being put off their land did not happen, especially not in the area that Steinbeck used in Oklahoma for his starting point of the Joads’ exodus. Many tried to use this as a wedge to disprove the other “facts” as if this was a nonfiction research book. Even Carey McWilliams, who was in fact a nonfiction researcher and a staunch supporter of Steinbeck and the dispossessed and oppressed people that Steinbeck obviously cared about greatly, went into research mode in Ill Fares The Land, and did not see the proof of the reality behind Steinbeck’s novel. No tractors and no Joads where Steinbeck placed them in The Grapes of Wrath. Neither The Grapes of Wrath by John Steinbeck nor Factories in the Field by Carey McWilliams was directly responsible for causing measurable improvements to happen for the migrant workers, but both more than served their purpose of bringing public awareness to the table, causing widespread as opposed to local scrutiny, in turn resulting in the Tolan Hearings and the La Follette Hearings; this article deals with these themes, focusing mainly on The Grapes of Wrath and the Tolan Hearings. As Susan Shillinglaw wrote, “Steinbeck had not lied.”