Poverty had plagued Appalachia for many years but was not brought to the attention of the rest of the United States until 1940, when James Agee and Walker Evans published "Let Us Now Praise Famous Men", a book that documented families in Appalachia during the Great Depression in words and photos. In 1963, John F. Kennedy established the President's Appalachian Regional Commission. His successor, Lyndon B. Johnson, crystallized Kennedy's efforts in the form of the Appalachian Regional Commission, which passed into law in 1965.