Roaring 20’s

Roaring 20’s

From Boom to Bust

Mass Media and Communications

• How do you find out what’s going on in the world? ( News, fashion, music, etc..)

• The 1920s was in many respects the first decade of our modern era. Even as cultural issues divided Americans from different regions or economic levels, technology was beginning to break down other barriers.

Mass Media and Communications

• Radio: Broadcast jazz and Fireside Chats (along with phonograph, radio broke barriers)

• Movies: Provided escape from Depression-era realities

• Newspapers and magazines: Shaped cultural norms and sparked fads

How did the radio impact

America?

800 stations by 1929 = 10 million families

The Radio

Leisure Time

• The growth of cities changed leisure patterns.• The average workweek changed from seven

days 70 hours to five days 45 hours. • Salaries and wages also were on the rise.• Movies, radio, and phonographs allowed

people to escape their problems and brought about a similar culture.

• The radio and movies reached all parts of the world.

–Lowered cost by using mass production

–assembly line–1 worker = one task–All parts interchangeable –More than one made at a time–Faster = Cheaper

Henry Ford

Wanted to build a car that his employees could afford

Model T $290 in 1920

1914: 500,000 car

1930: 30 million cars!

The Impact of the Automobile Industry

ProsperityThe 1920s was a period marked by:

A return to isolationism Less government intervention. music, art, literature, sports

flourish New consumer goods Prohibition- speakeasies,

bootleggers Flappers A change in American values and

way of life. Higher wages & more job

opportunities

Early 20’s: Return to Normalcy

• Belief that America needed to return to a “normal life” after the war

• Normalcy=Pre-Progressivism:• Political Corruption• Anti-Immigration• Laissez-faire• Isolation• Fundamentalism (Religious)

Political Corruption

• President Harding’s presidency is marked by scandal

• Teapot Dome Scandal: Government officials gave government land to oil company.

• Prohibition: Smuggling alcohol and speakeasies appear and government officials are bribed and corrupted.

• The age of Al Capone – well known gangster

The Red Scare• Revolution in Russia brought the Communists to power.

• Many Americans, frustrated by big business owners, joined the Communist Party.

• Thousands of strikes in 1919 and 1920

• Bombs were sent to government and business leaders.

Anti-Immigration

• Cause: Red Scare – Belief of the early 20’s that Communists would try to take over the U.S.

• A. Mitchell Palmer – leader of Red Scare• Open immigration: Rise of new Ku Klux Klan• New Immigrants most affected by the Red

Scare• Return of Nativism• KKK grows to over 5 million people

The KKK Rises Again

Wantagh, LI

Babylon, LI

Mineola, LI

Washington, D.C.

• The Ku Klux Klan rises to power again – believed in 100% Americanism

Targeted:• Blacks• Immigrants• Jews• Roman Catholics

KKK in Washington 1925

Effects of Anti-Immigration

• Court Case: Sacco & Vanzetti – two radical Italian immigrants were arrested, convicted, and executed for murder.

Sacco and Vanzetti (1927)

• Anarchist Italian immigrants convicted of murder

• Not given fair trial• Executed • Cleared of charges in 1977

Effects of Anti-Immigration

• Immigration controls:• Emergency Quota act (1921) & National Quota Act (1924)• Limit the number of

Immigrants from “dangerous” countries.

Laissez-faire

• Return the powerof big business

• Government crackdown onlabor unions-labor unions seenas communist supporters

Global Policies

• The United States hope to become isolationist again.

Small Towns v Big Cities• 1920 Census• >50% of all

Americans lived in Cities• Farmers less

Important

Fundamentalism

• Religious movement of the era thathoped to restore themorality of America

• Supporters: Rural areas

Scopes Monkey Trial

• Evolution vs. The Bible• Science: City• Bible: Rural• Evolution is Darwin’s Theory that man evolved

over time from monkeys• The Bible teaches creationism – God created

man and all the world

SCOPES TRIAL

In March 1925, Tennessee passed the nation’s first law that made it a crime to teach evolution

John Scopes arrested

Scopes was a biology teacher who dared to teach his students that man

derived from lower species

Fundamentalism

• Scopes Monkey Trial – a science teacher from Tennessee wanted to teach evolution but the school would not allow it and he sued

• ACLU – American Civil Liberties Union backed the teacher

• William Jennings Bryan represented the creationist

• Clarence Darrow represented the evolutionist

Scopes Trial

• Fundamentalists believed the Bible was literally true and without error.

• They rejected Darwin’s theory of evolution• Evolution – human beings had developed

from lower forms of life over the course of millions of year

• The creationists won the trial, but because of the trial, the Fundamentalists fell out of favor

Scopes was found guilty and fined $100

Scopes Monkey Trial

Prohibition

• The 18th amendment – banned the production and sale of alcohol

• The Volstead Act – enforcing Prohibition became the responsibility of the U.S. Treasury Department

• Granted federal and state governments the power to enforce Prohibition

PROHIBITION18th

Amendment in 1920

illegal to make, sell or transport liquor

Prohibition lasted from 1920 to 1933 when it was repealed

by the 21st Amendment

Prohibition• Speakeasies – secret bars where you could buy

alcohol• Crime was glamorized and became big business.

Some gangsters had enough money to corrupt local politicians. (organized crime)

• Al Capone – one of the most successful and violent gangsters of the time

• Bonnie and Clyde, Baby Faced Nelson, John Dillinger all famous during this time period.

• The Twenty-first Amendment ended Prohibition

The Speakeasy

Al Capone Bootlegged whiskey from Canada. ran a network of 10,000 speakeasies made $60 million in bootlegging. He killed off the competition (literally)Rise of organized crime and the Mob

•Prohibition caused a RISE in crime and lawlessness, not a decrease.•21st Amendment repeals Prohibition.

Why Prohibition Failed?

1.Unpopular

2.Led to organized crime

3.Death due to poor quality alcohol

4.Under funded and hard to enforce

1500 agents were responsible for enforcing

Al Capone

THE TWENTIES WOMAN After World War I,

Americans were looking for a little fun in the 1920s

Chicago 1926

Why were women able to become more independent after WWI?

19th Amendment (1920)

Traditional Role of Women

• Flappers: A young woman with short skirts and rouged cheeks who had her hair cropped close in a style known as a bob.

• Women gained the right to vote with passage of the nineteenth amendment.

THE FLAPPERA Flapper was a

young woman who embraced the new fashions and urban attitudes.

Wanted independence

Rebelled against traditional roles

Cultural Innovations

• Talking picture – The Jazz Singer – was produced and the golden age of Hollywood began.

• Mass media – radio, movies, newspapers, and magazines aimed at a broad audience – did more than just entertain.

• They helped to broaden people’s interests and fostered a sense of shared national experience

African American Culture

• The Great Migration – hundreds of thousands of African Americans move from the rural South to industrial cities in the North

• Harlem Renaissance – African Americans created an environment that stimulated artistic development, racial pride, and a sense of community.

• Langston Hughes (writer), Louis Armstrong (trumpet player), Duke Ellington (bandleader)

Harlem Renaissance In the 1920s it was home to a literary and artistic revival known as the Harlem Renaissance

WHAT MADE THE HARLEM RENAISSANCE POSSIBLE?

Between 1910 and 1920, the Great Migration saw hundreds of thousands of African Americans move north to big cities

Migration of the Negro by Jacob Lawrence

Harlem Renaissance• Writers

– Langston Hughes (Poet)– Zora Neale Hurston (Writer)

• Famous Jazz Musicians– “Duke” Ellington – Louis Armstrong – Bessie Smith

• Cotton Club: famous Jazz Club in Harlem– Blacks usually denied admission

Notables

• Charles Lindbergh – first to fly across the Atlantic• Babe Ruth – may be the best known baseball

player• Henry Ford – the assembly line, his most

important invention, also developed the Model T ford.

• Welfare capitalism – Companies allowed workers to buy stock, participate in profit sharing, and receive benefits such as medical care and pensions.

Notables

• Open shop – a workplace where employees were not required to join a union.

• In 1920 Westinghouse Company broadcast one of the first public broadcast in history

• 1926 National Broadcasting Company (NBC) established a permanent network of stations to distribute daily programs.

• 1928 Columbia Broadcasting System (CBS) assembled a coast-to-coast network of stations