The Roaring 20s

News Women Gain Rights, Fashion, and Flappers Prohibition Goes into Effect Benito Mussolini New Prime Minister of Italy Mohandas Gandhi Sent to Jail Hitler and His Beer Hall Putsch Lucky Lindy and the Spirit of St. Louis Sacco and Vanzetti Go to Court Scopes Monkey Trial

1920: 19th Amendment Passed Suffrage granted to women…Britain follows in 1923 Matrimonial Clauses Act…Men and Women Equal in Divorce Women Adopt New Image Short Hair and Skirts Archbishop of Naples (Italy) Blames Earthquake on It Cars Get Electrical Starters…Who Needs a Man Now? Women Smoke in Public and Wear Cosmetics Colleges and High Schools Open to Both Genders

National News, Vol. 1 Women Gain Rights, Fashion, and Flappers Picketing outside of the White House, suffragettes like Alice Paul were arrested and force-fed when they went on a hunger strike. But after the passage of the 19th Amendment, they had their political beaus.

Fashion Fads

Betty Boop Take a Hike

What Was Womanhood?

Were They a Reflection of the Age? Homes Change with Technology Entertainment Goes “Wild” Politics Evolve It’s the Economy, Stupid

Home of the 20s

Leisure Time and Entertainment

Art Changed

Literature of a Lost Generation

Arts Roundup Walt Disney presents Mickey Mouse in Steamboat Willie Earnest Hemingway publishes The Sun Also Rises T.S. Elliot writes free-verse poem, The Waste Land George Gershwin produces Rhapsody in Blue Charlie Chaplin stars in The Kid John Barrymore, Douglas Fairbanks, and Mary Pickford to star in flicks. Dr. Jeckel and Mr. Hyde released. The Jazz Singer, first talkie hits the screen. Europeans Stravinsky, Ravel, Shaw, Huxley, and Joyce redefine music and literature Oh, yeah. In Harlem, NYC, there was a renaissance among the negro folks

The Harlem Renaissance MUSIC ART LITERATURE THEATRE RELIGION POLITICS DANCE

Politics Gets Nastier

Presidents Are Anti-Heroes Warren G Harding Calvin “Silent Cal” Coolidge Herbert Hoover

Tea Pot Dome Scandal

Second Wave of the KKK

1915-1923

The Response

Nativists Oppose Smith in 1924

KKK Anti-Immigration Poster

Immigrants Take a Beating

Red Scare Anti-Immigrant Anti-Socialist Anti-Communist Anti-Catholic Anti-Semitic Anti-Anarchist Anti-Labor Anti-Urban

Response to WASPs—a fading majority

An Appeal to Fear

Pseudo-Nationalistic Themes

American Protection Association Noble men are in our ranks— We are not a band of cranks— We are not a lot of bigots or of fools. But, ye Roman Catholic hordes, We will buckle on our swords, If you dare to meddle with our public schools. Dare to be an A.P.A. Dare to stand alone. Dare to work for freedom’s cause. Dare to make it known. Come ye sons of Uncle Sam, Come join the gallant band. Come unite with us to fight our country’s foe. For our God is with the right. We will conquer by His might, And Slick and wily Jesuit must go.

Excuses, Excuses, Excuses A. Palmer Mitchell, US Attorney-General prosecutes suspected anti-Americans Loyalty questioned of any and all Southern and Eastern European immigrants Stem from Russian Revolution by Bolsheviks (Communists) US troops tried to restore Romanov family after WWI

Economy: From Boom to Bust

COSTS OF THE 20s WAGES (Annual) HOUSING/ FOOD TRANSPORTA-TION COTHING MISC. Laborer $1306 Motel Room $5 per person New Small Car $1000 Man’s Coat $14 Baseball Bat $1.50 Clerk $1647 Deluxe Room $10 pp and up Small Truck $1400 Quality Dress $15 Pencil $ .01 Foreman $2254 Deluxe Dinner Gasoline $ .20 per gallon Man’s Shirt $1 Hardcover Book Carpenter $1808 Good Lunch $ .75 Deluxe Car $7000 Ladies Work Dress $5 3-cell Flashlight $2 Conductor $2971 Loaf of Bread $ .25 Used Car $250 Winter Boots $6 Excellent cigar $ .20 General $6347 Quart of Milk $ .15 Local Bus $ .05 Casual Sports Jacket $12 Mule $100

Era of Conspicuous Consumption

Prosperity Turned Sour America fed the world during the Great War After the War soldiers returned to the fields American goods were less needed Prices decreased Farmers earned less, but had the same expenses Farmed harder, bought less finished products Factories laid off workers or closed City workers has less to spend and repay credit More closures of factories, banks, and stores

Stock Market Crash—October 29, 1929

The Government is Laissez Faire

Then Mother Nature Attacks The Dust Bowl

Ordinary Folks Are Hit Hard

And Still No Government Help to the People

Prohibition Goes Into Effect The “Noble Experiment” Passage of the 18th Amendment (1919) Cure for All Evils of Society Crooked Politicians Child and Wife Abuse Failure of Immigrants to Assimilate Experiment Failure Organized Crime Speakeasies Moonshiners

Motivation: Chicago

Both Sides of the Question Can we legislate morality? Is alcohol a cause or effect of societal problems? How can we predict consequence of rules?

A Long History of Temperance: Carrie Nation Issue of alcohol, drugs, tobacco and gun control is common in reform movements from the Great Awakenings to the present. Usually taken up by WASP women and Fundamentalist groups in the Northeast and the Southern Bible Belt

For Every Action, There is an Equal and Opposite Reaction NYC has 32,000 Speakeasies operating during Prohibition $60,000,000 made in 1927 by Al Capone from bootlegging Smuggling operations brings in booze from Canada, Mexico, and the West Indies Homemade “hooch” from wood alcohol leads to blindness, paralysis, and death

Criminal Activity and Defense Northside Raid Federal Bureau of Investigation Founded

Capone’s Little Italy

On the International Scene

Benito Mussolini in Italy Journalist, teacher, and father of five becomes Europe’s first Fascist dictator—Il Duce King Victor Emmanuel names Black Shirt leader Prime Minister after March on Rome in 1922 Brits and Frogs see peace ahead Italian children recruited for Il Duce

Mohandas Karamchand Gandhi Jailed Gandhi, aka Mahatma “Great Soul”, imprisoned for resisting Brit control of India Pacifist uses non-violence and civil disobedience as protests India Act of 1919 not fast enough for former London law student and South African attorney

Adolph Hitler: Beer Hall Putsch Angry Austrian corporal takes over National German Socialist Workingman’s Party Attempted coup in Bavaria results in arrest of Party’s Fuhrer Speech vows for revenge after Treaty of Versailles leaves Germans in financial woes Writes Mein Kampf in jail

International Dateline Vladimir Ilyich Ulanov Lenin, USSR chief, dies under mysterious circumstance Joseph Stalin becomes Soviet dictator Elizabeth Alexandra Mary Windsor born—baby girl to become future Brit queen Dancer Isadora Duncan suffocated in car accident Egypt granted independence from Brits Lebanon now a republic with dual Moslem/Christian leaders Sun Yat-sen takes over China from Manchu empire Immigrants Houdini and Valentino die in unrelated cases of peritonitis

Lucky Lindy Hops the Big Pond Solo

25 Year-Old Airmail Pilot Reaches France 05/20/1927 Charles Augustus Lindbergh touches down near Paris & meets 100,000 fans 2 French pilots die in earlier attempts June 1928: Amelia Earhart first to repeat feat

Charles Lindbergh’s Spirit of St. Louis Celebrity leads to a fallen hero and the loss of his child

Lindbergh Baby Kidnapped Child taken from home Parents out, babysitter suspected, but cleared Ransom paid, child found dead Bruno Hauptmann accused, found guilty, and executed Kidnapping becomes a federal capital offense

On the Legal Front…

Sacco and Vanzetti Combine a false charge and false witnesses Add Red Scare and Crime for motivation/ impetus Toss in poverty Heat with fear of change Serve on suspicion for anything foreign Isolate as a preservative

The Radical Press Has Its Martyrs

They were convicted and executed. Their charge was murder of a security guard during an attempted robbery Witnesses placed them elsewhere, but their testimony was discredited because of the politics of one of the witnesses. They were convicted and executed.

Monkey Trial in Tennessee

Substitute Bio Teacher Defies Law John Scopes, a PE teacher, treats Darwin’s theory as fact Law demands teacher is incarcerated Fundamentalists and town boosters want a long, hot summer ACLU plot?

Physical Evidence Presented 1920s Revision 19th Century Version

 Darrow v The Great Commoner 

Trial Makes a Mockery of Monkeys

News Briefs Diabetes beaten 1921—Charles Best discovers insulin Albert Einstein awarded Nobel Prize in Physics Immunization against TB Vitamin E found by Evans and Bishop Vitamin C isolated by Szent-Gyorgyl Tutankhamen’s Tomb discovered in Egypt by Charles Carter and George Herbert Henry Ford’s plant rolls Model T out of Detroit BBC created after 1920 radio broadcasts heard Clarence Birdseye finds method to freeze food in the Antarctic John Baird introduces his TV; Charles Jenkins broadcasts in 1927 Alexander Fleming uses mold for penicillin and antibiotics First motel opens in CA Kodak introduces color 16mm film Babe Ruth hits 60 HR

Age of Normalcy End in Sight!

Cause and Effect Victorian, middle-class WASP and rural majority Before the 1920s By the end of the 1920s Victorian, middle-class WASP and rural majority Industrialization was regulated and the primary source of US income World War I left the nation wanting peace and isolationism from foreign entanglements Good and bad were absolutes Hard Times hit every household Role of family and women were changed forever Education was available and expected Cities were increasingly more powerful and exotic European fascism was on the rise

Legacy of the 20s Questioning of gender, generation, and genetics Technology and economics as motivation Debate on the role of government Change from rural to urban as the American way of life Morality is not absolute Hero has many meanings