I was actually surprised awhile ago when I found out how activist Hoover was (which, as you pointed out, FDR built upon). I rather wish Calvin Coolidge had run again in ‘28. He was the last great Conservative President we had (as good as Reagan was, he was never able to shrink the fed gov’t as it badly needed to be) and he’d have never embarked on an activist course. And as I said, we’ve never recovered from this big government obsession. We’d not have a fraction of the problems today had we just left things alone at the time. It’s funny when we all say today we don’t want a Socialist government. But we’ve HAD one for close to 80 years.
Makes sense, what’s so different about the depression that sets it apart from past recessions, the government response is what was different.