Chapter 22 A New Urban Culture

Introduction: Quality of life improved btwn 1900-1920 Jobs were plentiful More and more people were entering professions (doctor, lawyer, teacher, engineer Growing middle class Mass production came with mass consumption

Production and Consumption Business firms spent $95 million on advertising in 1900, by 1920 more than $500 million Using new marketing techniques, they developed modern concepts of market testing and research Sampling customers Mass production swept the clothing industry Americans dressed better than any people ever before Using lessons learned making uniforms during the Civil War Clothing manufacturers developed standard clothing and shoe sizes Clothing prices dropped “off the rack” clothes lessened distinctions between rich and poor Wages 1900-$418 year, by 1920-$1342 a year Middle class grew, & the rich grew richer 5% of the population received almost 1/4th of all income In 1900

Living and Dying in an Urban Nation 1920-median age 25 (it is now 35) Immigration accounted for part of the populations youthfulness Most immigrants were young Medical advances/better living conditions/higher birth rate/immigration Death rate dropped Life expectancy rose from 49-56 years (wt women) and 47-54 years (wt men), 33-45 yrs for blacks Infant mortality remained high; nearly 10% (white) and 20% (minority) Fewer people survived beyond middle age-in 1900, the death rate among people between 45-65 was more than twice the modern rate 4% of the population was older than 65 (13%today)

Demographics of the City Systematic socioeconomic segregation, usually in “rings” Innermost ring-immigrants Circled by the working class Remaining rings with rising affluence towards wealthy suburbs Giant Industrial Cities New York, Chicago, Philadelphia Product: textiles to structural steel All connected with the railroad Modern Urban Zoning Residential, Industrial & open area for residential businesses Result: powerful social repercussions Extended racial segregation

Popular Pastimes Due to a decrease in the length of the work week, greater leisure time was available to workers Baseball entrenched as the “national pastime”-attendance doubled 1903-1920 Movie theaters opened everywhere Admission 5 cents 1915-DW Griffith, produced the first movie spectacular “The Birth of the Nation” Adopted new film techniques Closeups Fadeouts Artistic camera angles Staged battle scenes

“Birth of a Nation”

Vaudeville Increasingly popular after 1900, reached maturity in 1915 Drew from the immigrant experience Voiced the variety of city life and included slapstick comedy Skits, songs, comics, acrobats, and magicians Music during this timeframe was strongly influenced by the African American experience Ragtime and Jazz Louis Armstrong Bessie Smith “Empress of the Blues”

Writers of the Progressive Era Ezra Pound-poet Poets task was to capture fleeting images in verse Robert Frost North of Boston 1915 Carl Sandberg Chicago poems 1916 T.S. Eliot Love Song of J. Alfred Prufrock in “Poetry”

Experimentation in the arts Ferdinand “Jelly Roll” Morton Music, pianist George Bellows Painter: “Realist” captured the color and excitement of the tenements Isadora Duncan & Ruth St Denis Dance. Departed from traditional ballet, “Listen to the music in your soul” T.S. Eliot Poet: rejected traditional meter and rhyme as artificial constraints

A ferment of Discovery and Reform Manners and Mores change slowly, yet in these two decades sweeping change was underway The ferment of progressivism reshaped the country Reform burst forth People built playgrounds Restructured taxes Regulated business Altered political systems Opened kindergartens Improved factory safety Across all walks of life people were experiencing a sense of excitement and discovery Racism, repression, and labor conflict was still present but their was also talk of hope, progress and change People felt that they could make a difference and in doing so they became the progressive generation