Black Blizzard Doc on History Channel

Livestock suffered terribly and died agonizing deaths in the fields. Children were felled by "dust pneumonia" and showed up at doctor's doors with lungs filled with black dirt, often times killing them in days.

The freakish heat of Kansas that for two years topped 120 degrees daily caused more problems: The insects of the desert. Centipedes, spiders and locusts plagued everyone in biblical proportions. Homes were covered inside and out with vermin, grime and dirt, and people went mad from the stresses of it.

A ferocious ominous wall of sediment that seemed like a moving mountain range generated enough static electricity to power New York City. It knocked people down when they touched a car door or a fence and lit up the skies. Not until a particularly big black blizzard made it to Chicago, New York and then Boston did the media finally give the decade of hell proper news coverage to the rest of Americans.