The Stock Market Crash 
7 
wrong, that the market had run into “air pockets” 
with urgent and heavy offerings and a marked absence 
of bids. 
It was confusion worse confounded, the broken- 
down machinery making it as difficult to buy as to 
sell. October 21st was a day of “blind” sales, where 
stocks sold from ten to thirty points below the quota- 
tions recorded on the belated ticker, and with the 
principal selling appearing to come from large opera- 
tors in blocks of from five thousand to twenty thou- 
sand shares. 
On October 28th, the greatest single day’s break in 
the history of the stock market cut many billion dol- 
lars from the market values of securities on the New 
York Stock Exchange and Curb Exchange. General 
Motors lost $1,00,000,000 in value of its 43,500, 
000 shares of stock outstanding. General Electric 
had dropped 120 points from its high to the low of 
the reaction on October 24th, Westinghouse Electric 
& Manufacturing crashed 194 points, American and 
Foreign Power fell 11114 points, American Tele- 
phone and Telegraph sunk 130 points. All groups 
gave way. On October 28th, General Motors again 
broke below 50, while Chrysler, the leader of the 
1928 bull market in motors, found a new low below 
40, off more than 100 points from the year’s high. 
There was heavy selling in the railroad stocks, which 
had thus far resisted the weight of liquidation, and 
wide-open breaks, especially in the higher-priced 
stocks, which had for weeks held steady. Reports 
from commission houses dwelt on the appalling cata-