1. The New Era 1920s

2. Life cover, July 1, 1926
Life cover,
July 1, 1926
"One Hundred and Forty-three Years of LIBERTY and Seven Years of PROHIBITION."
(Private Collection)
Life cover, July 1, 1926
On the one hundred and fiftieth anniversary of the Declaration of Independence, Life magazine presented this cover, which parodied the famous painting, the Spirit of '76. The Spirit of ‘26 depicts an uninhibited flapper, a jazz saxophonist and drummer, and banners with the snappy sayings of the day. The caption reads: "One Hundred and Forty-three Years of LIBERTY and Seven Years of PROHIBITION." (Private Collection)
Pageant 13e
Copyright © Houghton Mifflin Company. All rights reserved.

3. GUIDING QUESTIONS
What aspects of life created the reputation of the “Roaring 20s”?
In what ways and to what degree were the 1920s a period of tension between new and changing attitudes on the one hand and traditional values on the other.
(Consider Race relations, immigration/ nativism, role of women, consumerism)
1986 DBQ

4. GUIDING QUESTION
In what ways did economic conditions and development in the arts and entertainment help create the reputation of the 1920s as the Roaring Twenties?
(1999)

5. BUSINESS BOOM

6. BUSINESS PROSPERITY productivity: up 50% unemployment: 4-9-12%?
ECONOMIC PROSPERITY:
productivity: up 50%
unemployment: %?
real income: up 25%
standard of living:
indoor plumbing
central heating
electricity (2/3 by 1930)
Gross National Product,
Unemployment,
Faragher, Out of Many, 3rd Ed.; GNP & Unemployment: Brinkley 10e
CAUSES OF BUSINESS PROSPERITY:
Increased productivity (scientific management, machinery)
Increased use of oil and electricity
Favorable government policy (tax breaks, antitrust)

7. Automobiles & Industrial Expansion
Henry Ford
‘fordism’
1913: car=2 yrs wages
1929: 3 mos. wages
1913: 14 hours to build a new car
1928: New Ford off assembly line every 10 seconds
Ford Highland Park assembly line, 1928
(From the Collections of Henry Ford Museum & Greenfield Village)
Ford: Brinkley 11e
Ford Highland Park assembly line, 1928: Pictured here is the assembly line for Model-A Fords, at Ford's main assembly plant in Assembly line workers quickly perform the same task on car after car as the chassis moves past them at the rate of six feet per minute. Ford pioneered the assembly line as a way to reduce both cost and dependence on skilled workers. He paid the highest wages in Detroit but required complete obedience from his workers, even to the point of prohibiting whistling while at work. (From the Collections of Henry Ford Museum & Greenfield Village) Pageant 13e
" Trying out the new assembly line“; Detroit, Michigan, 1913
“Trying out the new assembly line“ Detroit, 1913
Henry Ford ( )

8. Auto Manufacturing
Roark, American Promise 3e from

9. PROBLEMS FOR WORKERS Income Distribution, 19291%
40% of all U.S. families lived on >$1,500 per year – in poverty range 5%
29%
65%
Source: Historical Statistics of the United States, Colonial Times to 1970
Source: Historical Statistics of the United States, Colonial Times to 1970

10. PROBLEMS FOR FARMERS Mechanization Farm income down 66%
Wessels Living History Farm, York, Neb.; Brinkley 11e
TILLING ONE ACRE OF LAND
1900: 90 mins. using 5 horses
1929: 30 mins. using a 27-hp tractor
2000: 5 mins. using a 154-hp tractor
PRODUCING 100 BUSHELS OF WHEAT ON 5 ACRES
1890s: labor hours
1930: labor hours

11. SOCIETY, CULTURE & VALUES

12. Farm vs. Nonfarm Population, 1880-1980
1920 CENSUS:
First time majority of U.S. population in urban areas (towns 2500 or greater)
1920: More workers in factories than on farms
1930: Still 44% live in rural areas
Jones, Created Equal

13. Nash

14. CONSUMERISM (electric) appliances automobiles
advertising (image vs. utility)
buying on credit
chain stores
Faragher, Out of Many, 3rd Ed.; Brinkley 11e IR
General Electric ad; Electric appliances became commonplace in the 1920s and advanced the consumer economy. Note here the obvious link between a daughter and her mother, whose domestic tasks appear to be made easier and more appealing by an electric range, a vacuum cleaner, and an iron. (Picture Research Consultants & Archives)
Pageant 13e
Consumer Debt, 1920–1931
General Electric ad (Picture Research Consultants & Archives)

15. CONSUMERISM: Impact of the Automobile
Increase in sales:
million registered; million registered (=almost one per family)
Passenger Car Sales,
Replaced the railroad as the key promoter of economic growth (steel, glass, rubber, gasoline, highways)
Daily life: commuting, shopping, traveling, “courting”
Passenger Car Sales, – Pathways Guide to essentials
Nantasket Beach – Pageant 13e
Filling Station, Maryland in 1921

16. Impact of the Automobile: Trains and Automobiles, 1900-1980
Jones, Created Equal
Jones, Created Equal

17. Automobiles & Consumerism
Dodge advertisement photo, 1933
Ford ad- Henry Ford constantly worked to reduce car prices on his cars. He also promoted installment buying, promising in this ad that "with even the most modest income, [every family] can now afford a car of their own." This ad also encouraged impulse buying: "You live but once and the years roll by quickly. Why wait for tomorrow for things that you rightfully should enjoy today?" (Library of Congress) [Pageant 13e]
DODGE PHOTO: Nickolas Muray. Dodge, 1933.; PBS American Photography
< Ford ad: “Every family -- with even the most modest income, can now afford a car of their own."
“Every family should have their own car. . .You live but once and the years roll by quickly. Why wait for tomorrow for things that you rightfully should enjoy today?"
(Library of Congress)
Copyright © Houghton Mifflin Company. All rights reserved

18. CONSUMERISM & Automobiles
Ford Motor Company showroom 1925
Brinkley 11e IR; Ford showroom - wadsworth
Chevrolet Advertisement 1925
CONSUMERISM & Automobiles

19. July 4, Nantasket Beach, Massachusetts, early 1920s
Wadsworth.com

20. MASS CULTURE: Radio New mass medium Networks: NBC (1924), CBS (1927)
1920: First commercial radio station
By 1930: over 800 stations & 10 million radios
Networks: NBC (1924), CBS (1927)
Farm family listening to their radio - By George W. Ackerman, probably Ingham County, Michigan, August 15, National Archives and Records Administration, Records of the Extension Service (33-SC-14524c)
Map: Spread of Radio - Henretta, America’s History 4e from
The Spread of Radio, to 1939

21. ROLE OF WOMEN: the “New Woman”
“pink collar” jobs
Wadsworth; Table: Nash; Women in Workforce Graph: Martin, America and its Peoples
Women’s fashions, 1920
Women in the Workforce,

22. SOCIAL & CULTURAL CONFLICTS

23. Religion “modernists” “fundamentalism” Scopes Trial
American Journey Online

24. SOCIAL & CULTURAL CONFLICTS: Prohibition
“wets and dries”
Al Capone
Wadsworth
Anti-Saloon League at Washington, D.C., Dec. 8, 1921 (Library of Congress) brinkley
Government agents breaking up an illegal bar during Prohibition
Alphonse “Scarface” Capone

25. SOCIAL & CULTURAL CONFLICTS: Xenophobia and Racial Unrest
National Origin Act of 1924: limited number of immigrants entering the US
Number of Immigrants and Countries of Origin, and
Jones, Created Equal (both)
Percentage of Population Foreign Born,

26. Immigration,
Brinkley 11e

27. SOCIAL & CULTURAL CONFLICTS: Xenophobia and Racial Unrest
Birth of a Nation - D.W. Griffith
“new” Ku Klux Klan
Leo Frank
Poster: Birth of a Nation - D. W. Griffith's epic film glorified the racist Ku Klux Klan. President Woodrow Wilson called it "history written with lightning." (Picture Research Consultants & Archives) [Pageant 13e]
Klan Initiation – IRC – Brinkley 11e
Ku Klux Klan initiation, The Klan opposed all who were not “true Americans”. (c) 2000 IRC
(Picture Research Consultants & Archives)

28. African American Population, 1920
Faragher, Out of Many, 3rd Ed.;

29. Ku Klux Klan
Ku Klux Klan pamphlet: "America for Americans" - Pageant 13e
Poster for the Milwaukee KKK inviting citizens to a summer 1924 rally -
Copyright 1997 State Historical Society of Wisconsin
(mid-1920s)
(Private Collection)

30. Ku Klux Klan Ku Klux Klan parade in Washington, D.C., Sept. 13, 1926
Klan Parade (leaders) - Pageant 13e; Klan Parade (wide view) -
Ku Klux Klan parade in Washington, D.C., Sept. 13, 1926

31. BUSINESS – FRIENDLY GOVERNMENT

32. BUSINESS – FRIENDLY GOVERNMENT
Calvin Coolidge
“The business of America is business”
Coolidge, Coolidge first pitch – both wadsworth
President Calvin Coolidge
Coolidge throwing out first pitch 1924

33. BUSINESS – FRIENDLY GOVERNMENT
Herbert Hoover
Al Smith
1928 Election - Brinkley 10e;
Hoover – Wadsworth.com
Herbert Hoover
Election of 1928

34. Hoover, Ford, Edison, and Firestone Feb 11, 1929
Description: President Herbert Hoover, Henry Ford, Thomas Edison, and Harvey Firestone at Edison's 82nd birthday. Ft. Myers, Florida, February 11, Keywords: industry Credit: Herbert Hoover Library

35. The Great Crash Stock Market Prices, 1921–1932
New York Times, Friday, October 25, 1929
Stock Market Prices - Faragher, Out of Many, 3rd Ed.;
Stock Market crash--curb scene October 24, As the stock market tumbled on October 24, 1929, a crowd of concerned investors gathered outside the New York Stock Exchange on Wall Street, unprepared for an unprecedented economic decline that would send the country into a tailspin for the next decade. (Corbis-Bettmann) [Pageant 13e [History Companion]
New york Times - Brinkley 11e IR
Stock Market Prices, 1921–1932
Stock Market crash: October 24, 1929 (Corbis-Bettmann)

36. SOURCES
Brinkley, American History: A Survey
Kennedy, American Pageant 13e (History Companion)
Faragher, Out of Many, 3rd Ed.;
Jones, et al., Created Equal
Nash
America: Pathways to the Present