The US government estimated its farmers would produce 7.3 billion bushels of corn in 1988. Instead, they produced only 4.9 billion bushels, coming in a staggering 33 percent below expectations. In Illinois alone, farmers lost 44 percent of their expected yield.
Those losses were the result of the severe drought and associated heat wave that dealt a heavy blow to agriculture and related industries across central and eastern states. It caused 7,500 fatalities, according to NOAA, and $78.8 billion in damages. At its peak, it covered 36 percent of the US (compared to the Dust Bowl's 70 percent), and led to extensive forest fires across the West, including a series of catastrophic fires in Yellowstone National Park.
When the 2012 drought rolled around, many compared it to the devastation of 1988.
