Chapter 22 – The Roaring Twenties (1919-1929)

Vocabulary

  1. recession - temporary economic slump, milder than a depression
  2. installment buying - buying on credit

3.  stock - the proprietorship element in a corporation usually

divided into shares

  1. bull market - period of increased stock trading and rising stock prices
  2. buying on margin - borrowing money In order to buy stocks
  3. communism - government owns control of economy and politics of country
  4. disarmament - reduction or limitation of armed forces and military weapons
  5. bootleggers - person who smuggles liquor
  6. speakeasy - illegal tavern that served liquor during Prohibition
  7. repeal - to cancel
  8. fad - an activity or a fashion that is taken up with great passion for a

short period of time

  1. flapper - a young, trendy, rebellious woman in the 1920s
  2. jazz - music combined with rhythms of the Caribbean and West Africa

with chants and spirituals from the rural South, and harmonies

from Europe

  1. expatriate - to renounce allegiance and leave one's native country
  2. company union - unaffiliated labor union of the employees of a single firm
  3. sabotage - deliberate destructive and obstructive action
  4. anarchist - person who opposes all forms of government
  5. nativist - person who wanted to preserve US for white American-born

Protestants, and who was opposed to immigration

  1. Prohibition - total ban on the sale and consumption of alcohol
  2. Kellogg-Briand Pact - pact condemning military aggression and outlawed war
  3. Teapot Dome Scandal - biggest scandal of Harding’s Presidency, Albert B. Fall
  4. Warren Harding - 29th President, who’s presidency was marred by scandals
  5. Calvin Coolidge - 30th President, known for his honesty and integrity
  6. Charles Lindbergh - most beloved hero of the 1920s, flew nonstop across the

Atlantic in 1927

  1. Sinclair Lewis - author who wrote about the hypocrisies of middle class culture
  2. Langston Hughes - writer known for his beautiful poems and moving expression of

racial pride

Chapter 22 - The Roaring Twenties (1919-1929)

Section 1 - Adjusting to Peacetime

Obj: scandals that hurt Republicans; Coolidge’s increased policies for prosperity and the role the US played in world affairs

·  World War 1 helped the economy.

·  When it ended, more than 2 million soldiers

·  1920 – for the first time in eight years, a Republican was President, Warren Harding

·  Appointed able men at top Cabinet posts

·  Other posts filled with old friends – “The Ohio Gang”

·  Harding honest and hard-working, but Ohio Gang saw government as a means to enrich them. Many scandals resulted

·  Harding looked at this as a betrayal

·  As more scandals surfaced, Harding became more distressed.

·  1923 – Harding died of a heart attack, many believed that the scandals helped contribute to it.

·  The Teapot Dome Scandal – Teapot Dome, Wyoming – Albert Fall, after leasing two oil executives government land in California and Teapot, became the first Cabinet official ever sent to prison.

·  After Harding’s death, Calvin Coolidge took the oath of office.

·  He set out to repair damage caused by the scandals. He forced officials to resign.

·  Coolidge was re-elected in 1924.

·  His pro-business policies contributed to a period of rapid economic growth. This is referred to as “Coolidge prosperity”

·  1923-1929 – quantity of goods made by industry almost doubled.

·  For most Americans, income rose.

·  Advertising encouraged people to think that happiness depended on owning wealthy, shining new products.

·  Faced with so many goods, people wanted to buy things they could not afford.

·  Installment or credit buying

·  New policy “buy now, pay later”, increased the demand for goods

·  By the end of the decade, consumers owed more than the amount of the federal budget.

·  Economic boom gave stock market a giant boost as well

·  By late 1920s people were investing in stock market more than ever before.

·  People made fortunes overnight.

·  A period of increased stock trading and rising stock price is known as bull market

·  1928-1929 – prices of stocks rose faster than the value of the companies themselves.

·  Experts warned that the bull market could not last forever.

·  Most Americans were happy returning to pre-war isolationism.

·  After war – US trade and investment with Latin America increased.

·  US limited its role in foreign affairs fearing more involvement might push into another war- although at times US did intervene to protect its economic interests.

·  Russia was now the Soviet Union, under Lenin, who created the world’s first communist state. US refused to recognize Lenin’s government.

·  1928 – US and 61 other nations signed Kellogg-Briand Pact – treaty outlawed war

Chapter 22 - The Roaring Twenties (1919-1929)

Section 2 – Changes in American Society

Obj: political changes; Prohibition; how women’s lives changed and how the automobile changes lives; the Scopes Trial

·  January 1919, reformers win when the states ratified the Eighteenth Amendment.

·  One year later, 1920, Prohibition went into effect.

·  Alcoholism declined, but the ban did not work

·  Many Americans found ways to get around the law. Some made their own in homemade stills and others smuggled liquor in from Canada and the Caribbean.

·  Because smugglers sometimes hid bottles in their boots, they became known as bootleggers.

·  Illegal bars opened in nearly every city and town – Speak-easies

·  Speak-easies made drinking and liquor even more popular.

·  Prohibition agents, G-men, were sent out to shut down speak-easies.

·  Prohibition gave a huge boost to organized crime

·  Bootleggers earned big profits and crime became a big business

·  Gangsters divided up cities and forced speak-easy owners in their territory to buy liquor from only them.

·  These profits would be used to bribe police officers, public officials and judges.

·  1933 – the Twenty-first Amendment was ratified, which repealed the Eighteenth Amendment.

·  1920 – the Nineteenth Amendment was ratified, and gave women the right to vote

·  This did not apply to the women of Puerto Rico, but led by Ana Roque De Duprey, fought and succeeded in 1929.

·  1923 – Equal Rights Amendment – Alice Paul called for a new constitutional amendment stating that “equality of rights under the law shall not be denied or abridged by the US or by any state on account of sex” – she worked until her death in 1977, the amendment was passed but never ratified.

·  After the war, women’s roles and ways of thinking had changed. Some worked outside the home – they bought ready-made clothes, bought electrical appliances.

·  Only problem – men still expected women to do their jobs in the home.

·  1920s – more Americans traveled to more places and moved more quickly than ever before because of the automobile.

·  The auto industry spurred growth in related industries such as steel and rubber.

·  Henry Ford’s introduction of the assembly line provided efficiency, which allowed cars to be sold at lower prices, and more people could afford to buy them.

·  By 1929 – some 4 million Americans owed their jobs to the automobiles, directly or indirectly.

·  People worked in steel mills, producing metal parts for cars, others made tires, paint, and glass for cars. Some drilled for oil in the southwest or worked in the oil refineries where crude petroleum was converted into usable gasoline.

·  As a result, states and towns paved more roads, built more highways. Gas stations, garages, car dealers, motels, roadside restaurants all arose due to the automobile industry and the ability to travel.

·  A new mass culture formed due to radio, movies, television and the automobile

Chapter 22 - The Roaring Twenties (1919-1929)

Section 3 – The Jazz Age

Obj: popular fads and fashions; the effect of writes and Jazz music on American culture; Harlem Renaissance; heroes of the 1920s

·  Fad - an activity or a fashion that is taken up with great passion for a short time.

·  1920s fads caught on quickly

o  Flagpole sitting

o  Dance marathons

o  Crossword puzzles

o  Mahjongg

o  The Charleston

o  Flappers

o  Bobbed hair

o  Shorted dresses

o  Red lipstick

o  Smoking cigarettes

o  Speak-easies

o  Driving fast cars

o  Make-up

o  Shorter skirts

o  Jazz music

·  1920s also paved the way for new writers, many horrified with the experiences of WWI criticized Americans for caring too much about money and fun.

o  Ernest Hemingway

o  F. Scott Fitzgerald

o  Sinclair Lewis

o  Edna St. Vincent Millay

o  Eugene O’Neill

·  During the 1920s large numbers of African American musicians, artists and writers settled in Harlem, in New York City. This is referred to as the Harlem Renaissance.

·  During the Harlem Renaissance, young black writers celebrated their African and American heritages, as well as protested prejudice and racism.

·  For the first time, white Americans took notice of black achievements.

o  Langston Hughes

·  Radio, movies and newspapers created celebrities known across the country.

o  Bobby Jones (golf)

o  Bill Tilden/Helen Wills (tennis)

o  Jack Dempsey (boxing)

o  Gertrude Ederle (1st woman to swim across the English Channel)

o  Babe Ruth

·  Americans loved football, but baseball was their real passion

·  The greatest hero of that time was Charles Lindbergh. May 27, he took off from an airport in New York, flew nonstop across the Atlantic Ocean – alone – his plane The Spirit of St. Louis, landed in Paris, France. He was named “Lucky Lindy” and returned to the US a hero.

Chapter 22 - The Roaring Twenties (1919-1929)

Section 4 – The Economy of the 1920s

Obj: Americans who did not share in the prosperity; the Red Scare; limits on immigration; the election of 1928

·  Most Americans in the 1920s were not rich.

·  At the height of “Coolidge prosperity” (1929) more than half American families earned less than $2,000 a year.

·  Farmers and factory workers experienced hardships

·  Most Americans could not afford the bare necessities, let alone invest

·  The economy was in read trouble.

·  Farmers were hit the hardest

·  Labor unions were also a disaster.

·  With war over, workers demanded higher pay, which employers refused to pay, unions launched strikes.

·  Strikes turned public against labor.

·  Employers created company unions, as a result union membership dropped from 1920 to 1929.

·  Without strong unions, labor had little power to win higher wages.

·  During the war, Americans were on alert for enemy spies and sabotage

·  These wartime worries led to a growing fear of foreigners

·  The rise of communism in the Soviet Union fanned that fear.

·  Lenin, called of workers everywhere to overthrow their governments

·  Many Americans saw labor strikes as a start of a communist revolution

·  Anarchists added to the sense of danger. One group even plotted to kill head of Standard Oil, John D. Rockefeller

·  Because many anarchists are foreign born, their attacks led to an outcry against all foreigners.

·  The government took harsh action against both anarchists and communists “Reds”.

·  During the “Red” Scare, thousands of radicals were arrested and jailed. Many foreigners were deported.

·  The Sacco and Vanzetti trial came to symbolize the anti-foreign feeling of the 1920s. Two Italian immigrants and admitted anarchists, but innocent of crimes they were charged with, were judged, convicted and executed.

·  Even though the Red Scare died down, a new move to limit immigration against foreigners was created, it was called nativism.

·  1921 – The Emergency Quota Act – allowed only 3% of the people in any national group already living in the US in 1910 to be admitted. Any country that was the center of anarchism and communism was denied entry, especially Asians.

·  Latin Americans and Canadians were not included in the quota system. As a result, by 1930, more than 1 million Mexicans had crossed the border into the US

·  1917 – The Jones Act – granted American citizenship to Puerto Ricans.

·  Biology teacher, John Scopes taught evolution to his class. Was brought to trial condemning it saying Darwin’s theory denied the teachings of the Bible.

·  Scopes was convicted and fined. – This was known as the Scopes Trial.

·  1915 – Ku Klux Klan – a group of white men in Georgia declared its rebirth.

·  The original Klan had used terror to keep African Americans from voting after the Civil War. The new Klan had a broader aim; to preserve the US for white, native-born Protestants.

·  The waged a campaign, not only against African Americans, but also against immigrants, especially Catholics and Jews.

·  They burned crosses, used whipping and lynching to terrorize immigrants and African Americans.

·  Scandals helped drop membership in the Klan

·  Racial tensions in the North became apparent because many African Americans thought their service during WWI would weaken racism at home.

·  Also the only jobs open to them were the low-paying ones.

·  Whites refused to rent apartments to them.

·  Many blacks from the south moved north near blacks already there.

·  As a result, black populations grew in many northern cities.

·  Whites felt threatened

·  Racial tensions grew

·  1919- less than 8 months after the end of WWI, race riots broke out in several cities. The worst took place in Chicago, leaving 38 dead.

·  Marcus Garvey, led a movement called “Back to Africa”.

·  1928 – Coolidge chose not to run again and Herbert Hoover became president.