1920s Quiz Topics

  1. Discrimination–AA faced discrimination in the South due to the Jim Crow laws. Defacto( in fact) discrimination in the North.
  2. Jim Crow page 333 – laws in the South passed to restrict the rights of African Americans – de juro(by law) segregation
  3. Prohibition – made the manufacture, sale, and transportation of liquor illegal in the United States, highlighted the differences in moral values between the urban and rural areas; the 18th Amendment was passed supporting prohibition; the Volstead Act was passed to further define the 18th Amendment; the 21st Amendment overturned it
  4. Organized crime – prohibition contributed to the growth in organized crime by making it easier for bootleggers to branch into other illegal activities, murder and crime rates increased, Al Capone lead a crime ring in Chicago; bootleggers
  5. Teapot Dome Scandal – two officials Edwin Denby and Albert Fall, involved transferring oil reserves from the Navy Department to the Interior Department and then forgot about the Navy’s needs, Harding administration
  6. Economy following WWI – brief recession, followed by economic growth ….leading to the business boom of the 1920s
  7. Automobiles/Henry Ford/ Model T/ Results – stimulated growth in many other industries, price of the Model T was reduced by putting cars on a moving assembly line thus reducing the time it took to make a car, created jobs
  8. Buying stock on the Margin – buying stock with borrowed money, remained profitable as long as stocks continued to rise
  9. Economy under Coolidge– boomed, everyone can be rich and ought to be rich
  10. Isolationism – leaders hoped to avoid war by avoiding close interaction with other nations, disarmament agreements were signed, Ex: Kellogg Briand Act
  11. Scopes Trial–was a clash between religion and science, determining the Constitutionality of teaching the Theory of Evolution; lawyers William Jennings Bryan and Clarence Darrow
  12. Modernism – the growing trend to emphasize science and secular values over traditional ideas about religion
  13. Nativists – felt that native born Americans were superior to immigrants; feared the loss of jobs and damage to America’s traditions from immigration, Ex: Sacco and Vanzetti
  14. Immigration – people that came to America from other countries to create a better life; was restricted from many areas of the world due to fears of communism; quota system was set to limit newcomers
  15. Red Scare – fear of the spread of communism to the U.S., added to Nativist opposition to immigration
  16. “New Woman” - “flappers” rejected the Victorian morality for modern dress and behavior, smoking and short dresses
  17. Consumer economy and women – it made life easier for urban women due to electricity and new inventions
  18. Jazz/Louis Armstrong – an American hybrid of African American and European music forms, known for his ability to play the trumpet and his subtle sense of improvisation
  19. Harlem Renaissance – literary movement that explored the pains and joys of being black in America
  20. KKK – resurgence of membership in the Ku Klux Klan due to concern over immigration, Indiana was the hotbed of membership leading 4 million members nationwide; Americans who opposed the KKK embraced the notion that America was a melting pot
  21. Mass Media – radio, movies, newspaper, literature, paintings created a common culture
  22. Normalcy – people longed for the return to everyday life after WWI, wanted everything to be the same as before the war
  23. Lost Generation – demoralized by the death and destruction of WWII these writers lost faith in the American way of life and expressed this feeling through their writing; F. Scott Fitzgerald and the Great Gatsby
  24. Installment plans –method of purchase in which the buyer makes a small down-payment and then pays off the rest in regular payments until paid in full
  25. Republican decade – all 3 presidents and Congress were controlled by the republicans during the 1920s, (Presidents Harding, Coolidge and Hoover)
  26. Kellogg- Briand Pact – attempted to prevent future war by drawing up a treaty to “outlaw” war, it was ratified by 62 nations
  27. Heroes - were important for showing that moral values still exist; examples Babe Ruth and Charles Lindbergh
  28. Warren G. Harding – as President reduced the regulations on businesses put into place by the progressives
  29. Farmers – as a group suffered economically during the 1920s