Huge dust storm hits Springfield, Colorado during the Dust Bowl. In 1931, the middle of the U.S. was hit by a long-term drought that brought fear in handfuls of dust. Rain stopped falling from the skies over the Great Plains, and crops died. Then, the "black blizzards" began, as dust from over-plowed and over-grazed fields blew across the land. By late spring of 1934, the Dust Bowl drought was named the worst in our country's history, severely drying out 27 states and three-fourths of the country. By the time it ended in 1939, the U.S. economy had been devastated.