1. The Roaring 1920s
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2. Roaring vs. Turbulent: Conflicts
Struggle between modern and traditional views
Urban vs. Rural living
Religion vs. Science
Changing women’s roles/expectations

3. Where we at? Postwar Trends American public exhausted
Big changes from Progressive Era
Returning soldiers
Unemployment
Took jobs back from women and minorities
Nativism: prejudice against foreign- born people
Isolationism: policy of pulling away from involvement in world affairs

5. Fear of “Communism” Socialism: Communism:
Single party system ruled by dictatorship
No private property
Government ownership of factories, railroads, and other businesses
Communism:
No central government
there is a collective ownership of property and the organization of labor for the common advantage of all members
Karl Marx

6. Fear of “Communism” The Red Scare
Vladimir Lenin and the Bolsheviks overthrew government
Goal: Communism
Fear of government take over
Mitchell Palmer – US Attorney General
Palmer Raids
Hoover and Palmer hunted down
Communists, socialists, and anarchists: opposed all any form of government
No regard for civil liberties
Public did not approve

7. Sacco and Vanzetti Nicola Sacco and Bartolomeo Vanzetti
Convicted of murdering a Massachusetts paymaster and his guard;
The jury and judge were prejudiced because the two were Italians, atheists, anarchists, and draft dodgers

8. The rise of the Klan… again
Ku Klux Klan
100% Americanism
Eventually fell due to money fraud
Disliked:
Jews
Catholics
Blacks
Foreign-born people
Union members
Bootleggers
Revolutionists
Gamblers
Birth control
Adultery
Pacifists
Communists

9. The Quota System 141,000 to 805,000 from 1919-1921 Emergency Quota Act
3% from population living in US during 1910
Established a maximum number of people who could enter the US from each foreign country

10. The American Dream? Immigration Act of 1924 2% of those living in 1890
By 1931, more people left America than came…1st

11. The “Noble Experiment”
18th Amendment (and later, the Volstead Act)
Popular in Midwest and South
Supported by Women’s Christian Temperance Union
Clear statement against immigrants and countries that are a little more free with their booze

12. WCTU

13. Golden Age of Gangsterism
Prohibition led to the rise of gangs that competed to distribute liquor
Gang wars of Chicago in 1920s = 500 murdered
Most famous was “Scarface” Al Capone, who was eventually caught due to tax evasion
Gangs moved to other businesses (prostitution, gambling, and narcotics) and by 1930 they were netting an estimated billion annually

14. Education reform John Dewey Scopes Trial Set forth new principles:
“learning by doing”
“education for life”
Schools were no longer “prisons”
Minimum ages for teens to stay in school
Scopes Trial
Fundamentalism v. science in TN school system
William Jennings Bryan v. Clarence Darrow

15. Mass Consumption economy
Henry Ford
Assembly line
Finished auto every 10 minutes
Model T
“Any color you want, as long as its black.”
More freedom, luxury, and more privacy
Advertising
Persuasion, ploy, seduction, and sex appeal to sell merchandise
In 1925, Bruce Barton’s bestseller The Man Nobody Knows claimed that Jesus Christ was the perfect salesman and that all advertisers should study his techniques.

16. Putting America on Tires
The auto industry spurred 6 million new jobs and took over the railroad as king of transportation
New roads, sale of gasoline, and America’s overall standard of living.
Luxury became necessity
States without auto accommodations suffered population loss.
By 1951 over 1 million people had been killed by auto accidents

17. Humans develop wings
Orville and Wilbur Wright flew the first airplane for 12 seconds over 120 feet
WW 1 used some, but they really “took off” when they were used for mail and transportation.
Charles Lindbergh
Spirit of St. Louis
Child was kidnapped and held for ransom

18. Media Guglielmo Marconi Thomas Edison
Amos ‘n’ Andy, Little Orphan Annie, Lone Ranger
Politicians and sports had to adjust to the new medium
Thomas Edison
The Great Train Robbery

19. Urban thought Birth control Modernist religion Flappers Sigmund Freud
Margaret Sanger, and the National Women’s Party began in 1923 to campaign for an Equal Rights Amendment to the Constitution.
Modernist religion
God was a “good guy” and the universe was a nice place
Flappers
Sigmund Freud
Sexual repression was responsible for most of society’s ills, and that pleasure and health demanded sexual gratification and liberation

20. Literary Liberation F . Scott Fitzgerald: Ernest Hemingway:
captured society as it was
Ernest Hemingway:
rugged American individualism
Sinclair Lewis:
disparaged small America

21. The O.G. I don’t always read books, but when I do…
They are written by Ernest Hemingway.

22. Harlem Renaissance
Originally been developed in the 19th century as an exclusive suburb for the white middle and upper middle classes;
Polo Grounds, Apollo Theater, Harlem Opera House, and other world class.
the once exclusive district was abandoned by the native white middle-class, who moved further north

23. Harlem Renaissance
New “negro” middle class
Rejected blackface and other minstrel traditions

24. Harlem Renaissance Characteristics/Themes:
overt racial pride, who through intellect and production of literature, art, & music could challenge the pervading racism & stereotypes to promote progressive or socialist politics, & racial & social integration.
"uplift" the race
Effects of:
the influence of the experience of slavery and emerging African- American folk traditions on black identity,
institutional racism,
the dilemmas inherent in performing and writing for elite white audiences,
the question of how to convey the experience of modern black life in the urban North

25. Harlem Renaissance
“Sometimes I feel discriminated against, but it does not make me angry. It merely astonishes me. How can anyone deny themselves the pleasure of my company?
It's beyond me.”
---Zora Neale Hurston
Musicians
Writers
Duke Ellington
Zora Neale Hurston
Fats Waller
Langston Hughes
Jelly Roll Morton
Alain Locke
Louis Armstrong