100 years of financial disasters
This isn't the first financial meltdown, and it won't be the last. But we are a fast-learning species, and we've figured out a few ways to cope along the way.
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Outcome: Congress established America's first true central bank, the Federal Reserve System, in 1913 in the hope of preventing such panics.
NEXT: Great Depression
Last updated October 14 2008: 10:02 AM ET