There was no net growth in Haralson County's population from 1920 to 1940. Population declined 8.2 percent during the 1920s to 13,263 in 1930. This loss was mostly recaptured during the 1930s when population increased 8.4 percent to 14,377 in 1940- a figure just below the 1920 population.
Dramatic cotton price declines and the threat of the boll weevil had a profound effect on farming from 1920-25. Considerable land was left idle during this period and the number of farms declined. After 1925 cotton briefly regained much of its former importance. Then the Great Depression hit in 1929. Farm prices fell, and many had to stop farming. Haralson County's acreage planted in cotton declined from 24,123 in 1919 to 16,175 in 1924, and then it rebounded to 19,791 acres in 1929. Acreage planted in corn was 20,483 in 1919, 19,668 in 1924, and 16,521 in 1929. The number of farms in the county declined from 2,068 in 1920, averaging 68.7 acres, to 1,841 in 1930, averaging 76.3 acres.
The number of farms increased to 1,982, averaging 74.1 acres in 1935 and then declined significantly to 1,629 in 1940, averaging 90.3 acres. The tenancy rate was 56.3 percent in 1930. It increased to 57.9 percent in 1935 and then declined to 52.7 percent in 1940. New Deal farm programs in the second half of the decade began to help reverse the tenancy rate and number of small farms and forced many tenants and marginal farmers off the land.
Corn production remained fairly stable during the 1930s with 20,743 acres planted in 1934 and 19,113 planted in 1939. Cotton, meanwhile, declined to 12,775 acres planted in 1930 and to 11,745 acres planted in 1939- less than one-half the acreage planted in 1919.
During the period of declining farm employment, manufacturing began to exert a greater impact, with workers off farms supplying much of the labor force. According to the U.S. Census of 1930, an average of 461 persons were employed in manufacturing in Haralson County, up from 360 in 1920. During the 1930s, however, employment in manufacturing more than doubled. In 1940 the U.S. Census reported seven manufacturing establishments in Haralson County, employing an average of 1,012 people.
The main growth in manufacturing came in Bremen, as a clothing industry began to develop during the late 1920s and the 1930s. Mandeville became Bremen Looms in 1924 and Bremen Mills in 1929, making men's shirts. Bremen Mills closed at the end of 1931 and reopened in 1933 as a subsidiary of Cluett and Peabody. In 1928 Sewell Manufacturing Company was established, making men's suits, and in 1935 Hubbard Pants Company was established in Bremen. In Tallapoosa, the cotton mill struggled during the depression and finally closed in c. 1938-39. THe plant was eventually purchased by American Thread Company and reopened on January 1, 1944.
Tallapoosa, Buchanan, and Waco, like the county as a while, Experienced a decline in population during the 1920s. From 1920 to 1930, Tallapoosa's population declined 11.1 percent to 2,417, Buchanan's population fell 12.6 percent to 429, and Waco's population dropped 37.5 percent to 208. Only Bremen experienced population growth in the 1920s. Bremen's population reached 1.030 in 1930, increasing 12.3 percent with no increase in incorporated area.
During the 1930s, Buchanan and Waco regained population. Buchanan's population reached 504 in 1940, slightly surpassing its 1920 population, and Waco's population grew to 304 in 1940, regaining most of the loss from the 1920s. Tallapoosa's population, however, declined another 3.3 percent to 2,338 in 1940.
Most of the county's population growth in the 1930s occurred in Bremen. Again with no increase in its corporate limits, Bremen's population increased 65.8 percent, reaching 1,708 in 1940. Shortly thereafter, on March 18, 1941, the City of Bremen extended its corporate limits from 1,400 to 2,100 yards in every direction from where the Central of Georgia Railoard mainline crossd the Southern Railroad mainline- a 125 percent incease in the incorporated area.