The 1920’s in Georgia

EQ How can we describe the impact of the boll weevil and the drought on Georgia?

1. List two ways WWI brought prosperity to Georgia farmers. World War I had created a huge demand for agricultural products to feed America’s expanding military force. Soldiers also needed to be clothed. The war created a great demand for cotton. As a result, cotton prices skyrocketed. By 1916, cotton farmers were being paid three times what a pound of cotton had brought in 1900.

2. What happened to cotton prices when the war ended? Cotton dropped from 35 cents per pound to 17 cents.

3. What is a boll weevil? A small insect that left a path of destruction across the cotton fields of the South The weevil’s larvae could destroy fields of healthy cotton almost overnight. Within 10 years, cotton harvests fell to less than a third of what they would be in a normal year.

4. When was the boll weevil first detected in Georgia? 1913

5. Georgia farmers suffered through one of the worst droughts of the century in 1925.

6. As a result of the drought many farmers abandoned their farms and looked for employment in Atlanta and other large cities. Between about how many farms were lost in Georgia? the loss of 60,000 farms.

7. Tobacco became Georgia’s second most important crop.

8. By 1930, Georgia led the nation in peanut production and a decade later was the leading pecan producer.

9. Farmers also became more involved in growing vegetables, dairies, livestock, and poultry—particularly broilers(chickens produced for eating rather than for egg production).

10. What improvements were made on roads in Georgia in the early 1920s? Thanks to the Federal Aid Road Act of 1916, great improvements were made. By 1922, Georgia’s state road system had over 5,500 miles of roads (though only 166 were paved) plus 1,400 bridges

11. Identify WSB - the South’s first radio station began operation in Atlanta The “Voice of the South” Broadcast weather and cotton market reports Special music programs and story hours for children Went on the air in1922 Operated by the Atlanta Journal It was one of the first radio stations in America to feature programs of country music. People liked to say that WSB’s call letters stood for “Welcome South, Brother!”

12. Identify the Fox- Every Georgia town of any size soon had a motion picture theater. Larger cities had fancy movie palaces, The grandest of all movie palaces was the Fox in Atlanta. 5/segment/the-fox-theatre

13. Identify Ty Cobb- From Royston, Georgia batted over.400 more seasons than any other major league player and was one of baseball’s all-time greats.

14. Identify Theo “Tiger” Flowers- a boxer from Camilla, became the world middleweight boxing champion and first African American to hold that title

15. Identify Bobby Jones- Won one golf championship after another Recognized as the world’s greatest amateur golfer helped to make golf a popular sport in the United States.

16. What was the “Forward Atlanta Commission”? Why was it created? Group of Atlanta business leaders who worked together to find a strategy for promoting the city of Atlanta beginning in 1925

17. Who was Ivan Allen? Atlanta businessman Organized and led the Forward Atlanta Commission in

18. What were the results of the “Forward Atlanta Commission” ? Very successful 700 new firms—mostly branches or assembly plants of national companies—were attracted to Atlanta. As a result, more than 17,000 new jobs were created Annual payrolls totaled $30 million.

19. Atlanta added a new transportation dimension in 1926, when the first regular air mail service in the region began from Candler Field. In 1929, Delta Air Lines (then based in Louisiana) began passenger service between Atlanta and Dallas. The next year, Eastern Air Lines began serving Atlanta with passenger service to and from New York.

20. Wanting to do even better, the city of Atlanta bought Candler Field in 1930 and began building hangars and lengthening runways. siest_airport_in_the_world

21. Atlanta’s airport became the first in the nation to have a passenger terminal.

22. Many years later, it was named the William B. Hartsfield International Airport. The name honored a former mayor of Atlanta who had been one of the earliest and strongest supporters of the airport.

23. In 2004, the facility’s name would change again—this time to Hartsfield- Jackson International Airport after the death of Maynard Jackson, Atlanta’s first African American mayor and a strong supporter of expansion and modernization of Atlanta’s airport.

24. Turn to page 284. Read the highlight article about “The Poppy Lady” Who was Moina Belle Michael? Remembering those in the armed forces with flowers was the idea of Georgian Moina Belle Michael, a Walton County native known today as “The Poppy Lady.”

25. Read page 281. Who was Henry Ford? In 1908, introduced the first edition of the Model T Ford produced over 19,000 Model T Fords. He set up the world’s first automobile assembly line in Detroit, Michigan. Made the car affordable

Moina Michael M I C H A E L

Henry Ford F O R D