During the darkest years of the Great Depression, Americans didn't just lose jobs, homes, and savings—they lost faith in the systems meant to protect them. Out of that desperation emerged a strange and deeply revealing phenomenon: penny auctions.

On courthouse steps and dusty town squares, neighbors gathered as foreclosed farms, homes, and equipment were auctioned off—often for just a few cents. But these weren't ordinary sales. Communities quietly conspired to sabotage the auctions themselves, intimidating outside bidders and ensuring property could be returned to its original owners for pennies on the dollar.

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