Dust storm headline montage. Historical montage of newspaper headline clippings detailing the dust storms of the Dust Bowl era. The Dust Bowl, or 'Dirty Thirties', was a period of severe dust storms between 1930 and 1936-40 that were caused by extreme drought and decades of widespread intensive farming and land mismanagement. It caused major ecological and agricultural damage to American and Canadian prairie lands and forced agricultural families to migrate in search of jobs and food. Image from circa 1935-1942.