The Red Scare In 1917, Russia pulled out of WWI due to its own revolution at home. A party known as the Bolsheviks took over and installed a socialist.

The Red Scare• In 1917, Russia pulled out of WWI due to its own

revolution at home.• A party known as the Bolsheviks took over and

installed a socialist gov’t (one in which the state owns most property, regulates the economy, and runs most of the major industry).

• They modeled their ideas after Karl Marx and believed their gov’t would lead to communism (system in which people in society cooperate and own property mutually, thereby making gov’t unnecessary).

The Red Scare• Bolsheviks believed that in order for their plan to

work, workers in other countries should establish socialist gov’ts as well.

• This greatly alarmed people in the US!• Business leaders, gov’t officials, and many

citizens feared that a revolution would occur in the US.

• This led to a period known as the Red Scare, in which people became fearful of anyone who might be a communist or a threat to US freedom.

The Palmer Raids and other Anti-Communist Measures

•Hysteria grew when a series of bombings occurred in the spring of 1919.

•The Post Office intercepted several packages addressed to leading politicians and businessmen, (including Supreme Court Chief Justice Oliver Wendell Holmes, J.P. Morgan, and John D. Rockefeller) that were set to explode when opened.

•One bomb exploded outside the home of the Attorney General, A. Mitchell Palmer.

•Palmer sets up an anti-radical division of the Justice Department, appoints J. Edgar Hoover to direct what becomes the Federal Bureau of Investigation (FBI)

A. Mitchell Palmer

Oliver Wendell Holmes

J.P. Morgan

John D. Rockefeller

Immigration Restrictions

• The Red Scare and suspicions about immigrants led to a new rise of nativism (opposition to immigration).

• As a result, citizens pressured the gov’t to place restrictions on immigration.

• Congress passed a temporary limit to the # of people who could come to the US in 1924 and permanent bans occurred in 1929.

Immigration Restrictions

• These laws were designed to allow more immigrants to come from Western Europe and fewer to come from Eastern Europe and Asia.

• These laws also did not address immigration from the Western hemisphere, so the # of Hispanic Catholic immigrants increased drastically.

Ku Klux Klan (KKK)

• Meanwhile, the Ku Klux Klan (KKK) also saw a resurgence due to its willingness to expand its attacks.

• They targeted African Americans, Jews, Catholics, Communists, and foreign immigrants.

• They grew to be a national, rather than just a Southern, force of hatred.

“Return to Normalcy”• After WWI, people in the US wanted a return to

the security they had felt before the fighting began.

• In 1920, Warren G. Harding was elected as president of the US.

• Harding won much of his support by stating that the nation needed a “return to normalcy.”

• In reality, the 1920s would be a decade of great change and innovation prior to one of the most challenging times in US History.

Warren G. Harding29th President

Calvin CoolidgeHarding’s VP30th President

The Roaring Twenties

• Roaring Twenties is a phrase used to describe the 1920s, principally in North America, that emphasizes the period's social, artistic, and cultural dynamism.

• This time period is also known as The Jazz Age or the Golden Twenties.

• One key figure of the time was Henry Ford.

• He was not the first to invent the automobile, but he was the first to perfect and successfully market it.

• In 1907, Ford sold 30,000 of his first, mass-produced car, the Model T.

• What really made a difference for Ford were his views of mass production.

• Ford wanted to produce enough automobiles that he could afford to sell them at greatly reduced prices, allowing almost anyone to afford his cars.

• To achieve this goal, Ford relied on the assembly line, which allowed employees to stay in one spot while the assembly line brought the parts to them.

• Ford decided to pay his workers $5 per day wage, which he hoped would allow his workers to also buy a car.

• He also started the 40-hour work week, which would become the standard work week.

•Influenced economic prosperity

•Encouraged growth of suburbs

•Changed patterns of leisure - road trips and vacations become commonplace

•Affected patterns of crime

•Ford Model T was the most popular – around 17 million were produced between 1907 - 1926

•Jazz was the musical innovation of the decade!

•Started in New Orleans with African rhythms and songs, followed the Mississippi to northern cities.

•Both black and white music lovers frequented nightclubs to hear Louis Armstrong (a trumpet player and singer from New Orleans), Duke Ellington, Billie Holiday and others.

Tin Pan Alley

• As music continued to increase in popularity during the era, some musicians and songs became very famous.

• Tin Pan Alley is the name given to the collection of New York City-centered music publishers and songwriters who dominated the popular music of the United States in the late 19th century and early 20th century.

• One of the most famous musicians and songwriters associated with Tin Pan Alley was Irving Berlin.

• He composed over 3000 songs during his career!

Irving BerlinJewish American composer and songwriter of over 3000songs including, "God Bless America", "White Christmas", "Anything You Can Do", "There's No Business Like Show Business"

George GershwinComposer and pianist

Scott JoplinComposer and pianist“King of Ragtime”

Johnny MercerNative of Savannah, GASongwriter and SingerCo-founder of Capitol Records“Moon River” and more

•An increase in black racial pride and awareness led many black intellectuals to produce works of art portraying the daily lives of working class African Americans.

•Langston Hughes wrote memorable poetry, short stories, and plays.

•Many other black painters, dancers, and musicians also produced enduring works of art.

•Because much of this took place in New York, it became known as the Harlem Renaissance.

Jeunesse by Palmer Hayde

I, too, sing America.

I am the darker brother.They send me to eat in the kitchenWhen company comes,But I laugh,And eat well,And grow strong.

Tomorrow,I'll be at the tableWhen company comes.Nobody'll dareSay to me,"Eat in the kitchen," Then.

Besides,They'll see how beautiful I am And be ashamed -

I, too, am America.

“I saw no curse in being black.”

Author of Their Eyes Were Watching God

Radio and Movies

• Two of the most important developments in media were the radio and movies.

• Long before television, radio became the first source of mass communication and entertainment available to people in their own homes.

• Radio united the nation as people enjoyed the same shows and heard the same news reports.

• It also transformed politics by giving leaders direct access to large numbers of people.

•Radio- 1st commercial station broadcasts in 1920

•Radio stations feature news, sports events, variety entertainment and live musical broadcasts.

•By 1929, 40 % of American households owned radios.

•New leisure time initiates the building of playgrounds, parks, swimming pools, golf courses, tennis courts, and ball fields.

Radio and Movies

• The movie industry also boomed during this time.

• The 1920s was largely dominated by silent movies but saw the introduction of movies with sound, called “talkies.”

1920s Actors and Actresses:Douglas Fairbanks, Mary Pickford, Rudolph Valentino, John Barrymore, Greta Garbo, Clara Bow, Charlie Chaplin etc.

Percentage of American Families OwningVarious Appliances, 1920 and 1930

60%26%Automobiles

40%<1%Radios

30%9%Vacuum cleaners

24%8%Washing machines

8%<1%Mechanical refrigerators

68%35%Home lighting with electricity

42%1%Central heating

51%20%Inside flush toilets

19301920

W: 472

•Flashy new dress, bobbed hair and cosmetics

•liberated lifestyle

•often seen smoking, drinking, dancing, and attending lively parties

•most middle class women continued to stay at home as housewives and mothers

•some began to find careers

18TH AMENDMENT

Prohibits the manufacture, transport and sale of liquor after January 16, 1920.

The Volstead Act

was enacted by Congress to

ensure the proper enforcement of

Prohibition.

•Gov’t hires only 1,500 agents to enforce Prohibition.

•Ordinary people defied the law, many making bathtub gin at home.

•Churches could still use wine for sacramental purposes and doctors could prescribe alcohol for medicinal reasons

Gangsters,

Bootleggers,

and

Speakeasies

become a part of the Prohibition culture.

Prohibition was a constitutional amendment that prohibited the use of alcohol. Prohibition, in many ways, led to the rise of organized crime as they filled the void and supplied a product that was illegal but the public wanted.

There was a place in America during Prohibition, where people gathered to drink and dance and forget their woes. Would-be customers were often met at the door of an unmarked building by steely eyes peering through a small slot. Once inside, these ordinary folks carried on with reckless abandon and rubbed shoulders with notorious gangsters like Al Capone and John Dillinger.

They called this place a speakeasy.

Al Capone

Organized crime creates criminal empires like Chicago’s Al Capone. Gangsters use violence in competition for the illegal alcohol trade. Al Capone was a Chicago gangster who made a fortune during prohibition smuggling and distilling alcohol. The money generated by this illicit business eventually became a corrupting influence on the government.

Other 1920s Gangsters include:Charles “Lucky” LucianoGeorge “Bugs” Moran“Dutch” SchultzDean O’BanionJohnny TorrioJim Colosimo

Special Law Enforcement Agents were needed to investigate and bring charges against the power of organized crime.

•Prohibition is difficult to enforce.

•Crime has increased.

•Prohibition is clearly not working.

Repeals - or cancels the 18th Amendment.

Ends Prohibition.

•Presidents Harding, Coolidge, and Hoover favored Big Business

•Economy grows as factories use new machinery and switch to electric power

•Raised tariffs

•lower taxes for wealthy

With more money to spend people invested on the stock market.

Mass production: cars, radios, refrigerators.People could buy on credit. There is massive consumer spending.

Confidence that Prosperity was here to Confidence that Prosperity was here to stay!!stay!!

The Soaring Stock Market

•American industry booms, price of shares move up•Investors sell their shares at higher prices and make huge profitsGet Rich, Quick!!•More people invest, pushing prices higher•People buy “on the margin”Let’s get RICH!!!!RICH!!!!

Signs of Trouble•50% of American families earned less than $2000 a year.•American Industry was producing too many goods.•Farmers - crops prices had dropped.•Coal miners - oil replacing coal as major source of energy.•Textile industry - fashions dictated less fabric.•Unions - had little power to help laid off workers.•Business held down workers wages - less buying power - decline in demand for products like cars, appliances, and homes.•Production slows - more workers lose jobs.•American banks suffered when European nations failed to pay back $$ borrowed after WWI.

...“been in Sorrow’s kitchen and licked all the pots. Then I have stood on peaky mountains wrapped in rainbows.” Zora Neal Hurston

A most fitting description of

the Roaring Twenties.

What happens next?