Episode 1 of The Dark Years begins at the end of the Roaring '20s in the newsrooms of the Toronto Daily Star, a big city newspaper whose popularity comes from its appeal to "the little guy." Reporters at the newspaper shed light on "The Dark Years" by collecting stories and anecdotes from the ordinary people who lived through the daily hardships, humiliations and hungers that defined the Great Depression. Events commented on in this episode include: Prime Minister Mackenzie King and his friendship with Joseph E. Atkinson, the call for unemployment insurance, Prime Minister R.B. Bennett's tenure as prime minister, Gordon Sinclair's interview with Hitler, relief and unemployed camps, the emergence of the Communist party in Canada and the riot at the Kingston Penitentiary. The series gives excellent background material for literature set in the Depression because it effectively illustrates the political issues and social life of the day.