U.S. History Honors
1920s Unit Test
Rev. 3-12-15
I. Multiple Choice
1. The Red Scare of 1919-1920 was provoked by
A. the wartime migration of rural blacks to northern cities.
B. the strict enforcement of prohibition laws.
C. the public’s association of widespread strikes across the U.S. with its fear of revolution.
D. the fear that communists in Russia were on the verge of invading the U.S.
2. The Ku Klux Klan of the 1920s was a reaction against
A. capitalism.
B. new immigration laws passed in 1924.
C. race riots.
D. the forces of diversity and modernity that were transforming American culture.
3. Each of the following can be accurately said of the “noble experiment” of prohibition except that it
A. led to a steep rise in organized crime.
B. had positive intentions but unintended consequences.
C. met its greatest resistance in eastern cities.
D. was observed and obeyed by almost all Americans.
4. The trial of John Scopes in 1925 centered on the issue of
A. progressive education.
B. the right of parochial schools to exist.
C. teaching evolution in public schools.
D. prayer in public schools.
5. The prosperity that developed in the 1920s
A. was accompanied by major consumer debt.
B. led to a growing level of saving by the American public.
C. enabled labor unions to gain strength.
D. closed the gap between rich and poor.
6. Each of the following helped to make the prosperity of the 1920s possible except
A. government stimulation of the economy.
B. increased productivity of consumer economy.
C. the development of assembly-line production.
D. advertising and credit buying.
7. The automobile revolution resulted in all of the following except
A. access to new and diverse forms of leisure activity.
B. the growth of suburbs.
C. the increased dependence of women on men.
D. altered youth sexual & dating behavior.
8. The general policy of the federal government toward industry in the 1920s was
A. a weakening of federal regulation and hands off approach to business.
B. an emphasis on federal regulation rather than state and local controls.
C. an emphasis on vigorous antitrust enforcement rather than on regulation.
D. a turn toward direct federal control of key industries like the railroads.
9. The popular 1920s practice of “buying on margin” reflected Americas’
A. Commitment to moral virtue and dignity.
B. “Get rich quick” attitude.
C. Distrust the federal government.
D. Demand for safe and secure investments.
10. Which Harlem Renaissance writer rose to fame by utilizing dialect and “everyday themes” to gain
international acclaim?
A. Louis Armstrong
B. Josephine Baker
C. Langston Hughes
D. Marcus Garvey
11. Each of the following represent philosophies of the decade of the “Roaring Twenties” except
A. the widespread fears and concern over “foreigners”.
B. the development of a mass media culture.
C. an intense sense of American optimism and enthusiasm.
D. the re-emergence of large-scale progressive social reform efforts.
12. Which of the following statements reflects a major demographic development during the 1920s?
A. Suburban populations were leveling off or in decline.
B. Industries were rapidly decreasing their levels of production.
C. Americans were moving to rural farms in large numbers.
D. African-Americans begin to populate urban centers through the Great Migration.
13. The rapid development of the mass media during the 1920s
A. promoted a mass migration to rural areas.
B. encouraged Americans to work longer hours.
C. promoted the creation of a national culture.
D. simplified life for most Americans.
14. The 1920s are sometimes called the "Roaring Twenties" because
A. foreign trade prospered after World War I.
B. the United States assumed a leadership role in world affairs.
C. political reforms made government more democratic.
D. widespread social and economic change occurred.
15. In the United States, the decade of the 1920s was characterized by
A. a willingness to encourage immigration to the United States.
B. increased consumer borrowing and speculation in economic affairs.
C. the active involvement of the United States in European affairs.
D. major reforms in national labor legislation.
16. Many Americans believed that Sacco and Vanzetti were executed because they were
A. trying to impress Soviet leaders.
B. Communist agitators who helped organize strikes.
C. responsible for setting off bombs that damaged A. Mitchell Palmer’s home.
D. immigrants with radical beliefs during the Red Scare.
17. The Palmer raids were organized to root out groups whose activities
A. targeted racial and ethnic groups.
B. posed a clear danger to the country.
C. upset President Coolidge.
D. did not make a profit or help society.
18. Much of the economic growth of the 1920s was based on
A. increased trade with other nations.
B. the mass production of new consumer products.
C. rising prices of agricultural products.
D. the rapid development of the West.
19. Which one of the following is NOT true of Jazz music?
A. its roots are in African slave songs
B. it’s the only true form of American music
C. all other forms of American music copy jazz
D. its musicians were given proper credit & compensation
20. Flappers frequently danced the Charleston, a new dance that embodied the spirit of
A. the Suffragettes.
B. the Jazz Age.
C. the Lost Generation.
D. Prohibition.
21. The 1925 trial of John Scopes reflects the conflict between
A. science and religion.
B. isolation and international involvement.
C. traditional roles and new roles for women.
D. Prohibition and organized crime.
22. National prohibition, as authorized by the 18th amendment, stated that
A. Americans must be 18 years old to purchase alcoholic beverages.
B. only imported alcoholic beverages would be sold.
C. alcoholic beverages could be sold only in government-run stores.
D. the manufacture and sale of alcoholic beverages was banned.
23. What was a major result of Prohibition in the United States during the 1920s?
A. restriction of immigration.
B. growth of communism.
C. destruction of family values.
D. increase in organized crime.
24. The Harlem Renaissance of the 1920s can best be described as
A. an organization created to help promote African-American businesses.
B. a movement that sought to draw people back to the inner cities.
C. a relief program to provide jobs for minority workers.
D. a period of great achievement by African-American writers, artists, and performers.
25. Civil Rights leaders like ML King and Jesse Jackson have beliefs that can be traced to which 1920’s
leader?
A. BT Washington
B. Marcus Garvey
C. Web DuBois
D. Duke Ellington
26. The national GNP grew in the 1920s as consumers
A. carefully conserved electricity.
B. invested most of their money in government bonds.
C. learned to ignore advertisements.
D. began to demand more consumer goods purchased on credit.
27. How did life change for American women in the 1920s?
A. Many women felt freer to experiment with bolder styles and manners.
B. Married women were more content to stay home and take care of their husbands.
C. Most women grew long hair and stopped using makeup.
D. Women began to dominate the work force, often taking leadership positions.
28. During the 1920s, controversies concerning the Scopes Trial, Prohibition and Flappers were all signs of
disagreement over
A. the return to normalcy.
B. traditional values and changing lifestyles.
C. causes of the Great Depression.
D. the benefits of new technologies.
29. The main problem faced by American manufacturers in the 1920s involved
A. Increasing the level of production
B. Developing expanded markets of people to buy their products
C. Reducing the level of government involvement in business
D. Developing technologically innovative products
30. Which of the following best describes the governmental philosophy of the 1902’s?
A. The monopolies must be eliminated!
B. The only thing we have to fear is fear itself!
C. The best government is the one that governs the least!
D. The world must be made safe for democracy!
31. Which one the following names is NOT paired correctly with their profession?
A. Charles Lindbergh – Aviator
B. Alice Paul - Suffragette
C. Duke Ellington – Actor
D. Jack Dempsey - Boxer
32. Which concept is NOT associated with the “flappers” of the 1920’s?
A. Boyish “bob” haircuts.
B. Slinky, short skirts with beads and sequins.
C. Gaudy and garish application of make-up.
D. Responsible social and moral convictions
.
33. What do the following headlines from the 1920s illustrate:
“Public Ignores Prohibition Restrictions”
“Evolution and Creationism Debated in Scopes Trial”
“Women Bring Change to the Industrial Workforce”
A.
B.
C.
D.
conflict between traditional and modern values.
trend toward mass consumption of consumer goods.
hostility of certain groups toward ethnic minorities.
debate over the role of government in the economy.
34. Due to the problems associated with alcohol and the success of the suffrage movement, America will pass
with two amendments?
A. 17th & 18th.
B. 18th & 19th.
C. 19th & 20th.
D. 20th & 21st.
35. Who were the main targets of the Ku Klux Klan’s hatred and/or terror?
A. white fundamentalists
B. police officers and city officials
C. African Americans, Catholics, Jews, and immigrants
D. gamblers, gangsters, and prostitutes
The Avant-Garde—questions 36-38
Few decades have produced as many great works of art, music, or literature as the 1920s. At the decade's
beginning, American culture stood in Europe's shadow. By the decade's end, Americans were leaders in the
struggle to liberate the arts from older canons of taste, form, and style. It was during the 1920s that Eugene
O'Neill, the country's most talented dramatist, wrote his greatest plays, and that authors William Faulkner,
Ernest Hemingway, F. Scott Fitzgerald, and Thomas Wolfe published their first novels.
American poets of the 1920s, such as Hart Crane, E. E. Cummings, Countee Cullen, Langston Hughes, Edna
St. Vincent Millay, and Wallace Stevens, experimented with new styles of punctuation, rhyme, and form.
Likewise, artists like Charles Demuth, Georgia O'Keeffe, and Joseph Stella challenged the dominant realist
tradition in American art and pioneered non-representational and expressionist art forms.
The 1920s marked America's entry into the world of serious music. It witnessed the founding of 50 symphony
orchestras and three of the country's most prominent music conservatories--Julliard, Eastman, and the Curtis
Institution. This decade also produced America's first great classical composers, including Aaron Copland and
Charles Ives, and saw George Gershwin create a new musical forms by integrating jazz into symphonic and
orchestral music.
World War I had left many American intellectuals and artists disillusioned and alienated. Neither Wilsonian
idealism nor Progressive reformism appealed to America's post-war writers and thinkers who believed that the
crusade to end war and to make the world safe for democracy had been a senseless mistake. "Here was a new
generation…" wrote the novelist F. Scott Fitzgerald in 1920 in This Side of Paradise, "grown up to find all
Gods dead, all wars fought, all faiths in man shaken…" (page 180)
During the 1920s, many of the nation's leading writers exposed the shallowness and narrow-mindedness of
American life. The United States was a nation awash in materialism and devoid of spiritual vitality, a
"wasteland," wrote the poet T.S. Eliot, inhabited by "hollow men." No author offered a more scathing attack
on middle class boorishness and smugness than Sinclair Lewis, who in 1930 became the first American to win
the Nobel Prize for Literature. In Main Street (1920) and Babbitt (1922), he satirized the narrow-minded
complacency and dullness of small town America, while in Elmer Gantry (1922) he exposed religious
hypocrisy and bigotry.
As editor of Mercury magazine, H.L. Mencken wrote hundreds of essays mocking practically every aspect of
American life. Calling the South a "gargantuan paradise of the fourth rate," and the middle class the
"booboisie," Mencken directed his choicest barbs at reformers, whom he blamed for the bloodshed of World
War I and the gangsters of the 1920s. "If I am convinced of anything," he snarled, "it is that Doing Good is in
bad taste."
The writer Gertrude Stein defined an important group of American intellectuals when she told Ernest
Hemingway in 1921, "You are all a lost generation." Stein was referring to the expatriate novelists and artists
who had participated in the Great War, only to emerge from the conflict convinced that it was an exercise in
futility. In their novels, F. Scott Fitzgerald and Hemingway pointed toward a philosophy now known as
"existentialism"--which maintains that life has no transcendent purpose and that each individual must salvage
personal meaning from the void. Hemingway's fiction lionized toughness and "manly virtues" as a
counterpoint to the softness of American life. In The Sun Also Rises (1926) and A Farewell to Arms (1929),
he emphasized meaningless death and
the importance of facing stoically the absurdities of the universe. In the conclusion of The Great Gatsby
(1925), Fitzgerald gave pointed expression to an existentialist outlook: "so we beat on, boats against the
current, borne back ceaselessly into the past.
http://www.digitalhistory.uh.edu/database/article_display_printable.cfm?HHID=457
36. According to the passage, during the 1920s American artistic culture
A. flourished and came into its own.
B. remained inferior to European culture.
C. produced little of value.
D. was in bad taste.
37. The passage describes artists and intellectuals of the 1920s as
A. highly idealistic.
B. believers in progressive reform.
C. disappointed by the failure of the ideals of the War era.
D. optimistic about the future of America.
38. According to the reading, writers during the 1920s generally
A. praised the accomplishments of Americans and American life.
B. found great meaning and purpose in the values of American life.
C. believed that American society was superior to all others.
D. were highly critical of American values that dominated in the decade.
39. All of the following are by-products of the mass production of the automobile by Henry Ford EXCEPT
A. A reduction in the cost of the car due to his assembly line increasing supply.
B. The development of new dating and adolescent behaviors.
C. A need for highways and gas stations to promote safe, efficient transportation.
D. The creation of environmental controls and restrictions on pollution.
40. The biggest change in Hollywood coming from the film “The Jazz Singer” was
A. the introduction of color.
B. the use of advertising posters.
C. the rise of vaudeville.
D. the introduction of sound.
II. Essay
Directions: Choose ONE of the following prompts and write an essay that provides detailed and accurate
information. Explain the significance of the terms and topics as they have related to our unit on the “Roaring
20s.” Be sure to define your terms (don’t assume that I know what you mean by a term or phrase you might
use). Write neatly and legibly, using grammatically correct and complete sentences on lined paper.
1) What were the two new types of women to develop during the 1920’s? Be sure to include their differences
in fashion and philosophy while concluding with their impacts and accomplishments on society.
2) Explain how the adjective ‘Roaring’ best describes the life and times of the 1920’s. Be sure to emphasize
the fads and heroes of the era and how their accomplishments helped shaped a generation and a nation.
3) A wise Social Studies teacher once said, “ The 1920’s embody some of the most liberal and most
conservative events in our history all in the same time period.” Pick three liberal and three conservative
events and explain how the event was so “old” or “new” school in its impact upon the nation.
4) Describe what you think were the most significant reasons for hope and the most significant reasons for worry
related to the American economy at the end of the 1920s.