THE ROARING TWENTIES
1920-1929
LEARNING OBJECTIVES
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Analyze the movement toward social conservatism following WWI.
Describe the cultural conflicts over such issues as prohibition and evolution.
Discuss the rise of the mass-consumption economy, led by the automobile industry.
Describe the cultural revolution brought about by radio, films, and changing sexual
standards.
Explain how new ideas and values were reflected and promoted in the American
literary renaissance of the 1920’s.
Explain how the era’s cultural changes affected women and African-Americans.
Analyze the domestic political conservatism and economic prosperity of the 1920’s.
Explain the elements of economic changes of the 1920’s.
List the weaknesses of the American economy in the 1920’s
Discuss the impact of the rise of the city in the 1920’s.
Discuss the main features of the rural reaction of the 1920’s.
Analyze the election of 1928.
Outline the personalities and contributions of the key political figures of the 1920’s.
Discuss policies of the Republican Party during the 1920’s and the successes/failures
of the Democratic Party.
WWI Political Results
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U.S. became world’s economic and political leader
Russian Revolution ultimately instituted communism (tremendous impact on world
politics until 1991)
Britain, France, Austria, and Turkey went into various states of decline
Germany devastated by the Treaty of Versailles (Led to eventual rise of Adolf Hitler
and WWII)
Impact of WWI on American Society
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Women played an increased role in the economy and volunteerism for the war effort
(Gained suffrage in 1920)
Prohibition of Alcohol (1919)
Massive migration of African-Americans to the North (Led to large-scale race riots,
esp. in 1919 “Red Summer”)
Increased nativism (severe immigration laws eventually passed in 1921 & 1924)
Civil liberties suspended during war—Thousands of strikes occurred
Red Scare in 1919: anti-communist crusade
Million of men left home to fight the war in Europe
Volunteerism/patriotism during the war
U.S. returned to isolationism after the war
IMPORTANT PEOPLE
Warren G. Harding
Calvin Coolidge
Clarence Darrow
A. Mitchell Palmer
Sacco & Vanzetti
William Jennings Bryan
John L. Lewis
D.W. Griffith
Al Capone
Bruce Barton
Orville and Wilbur Wright
Cecil B. de Mille
Margaret Sanger
Louis Armstrong
Marcus Garvey
F. Scott Fitzgerald
William Faulkner
James Cox
Herbert Hoover
Frederick W. Taylor
Charles Lindbergh
Guglielmo Marconi
Alice Paul
Langston Hughes
Henry Mencken
Ernest Hemingway
T.S. Eliot
Charles Evans Hughes
Alfred E. Smith
Henry Ford
Charlie Chaplin
Dr. Sigmund Freud
Billy Sunday
Zora Neale Hurston
Duke Ellington
Sinclair Lewis
Albert Fall
Andrew Mellon
IMPORTANT TERMS & EVENTS
“normalcy”
Radical
reactionary
liberal
conservative
Red Scare
Seattle General Strike
Boston police Strike
Steel Strike
United Mine Workers Strike
Palmer Raids
Ku Klux Klan
1921 Immigration Act
1924 National Origins Act
Fundamentalism
Scopes Monkey Trial
18th amendment (Volstead Act) speakeasies
Bootlegging
“trickle down” tax policies
flappers
The Pinciples of Scientific Management LostGeneration
Welfare Capitalism
Harlem Renaissance
“Jazz” music
Teapot Dome Scandal
“Back to Africa Movement”
Fordney-McCumber Tariff
McNary-Haugen Bill
Washington Disarmament Conf.
Clark Memorandum
Dawes Plan of 1924
Kellogg-Briand Pact