The Roaring Twenties
1920s US Population: 105,273,049
(at beginning of decade)
By the end of the decade:
122,288,177
The U.S. Census Bureau projected
that on Jan. 1, 2014,
the United States population
will be 317,297,938.
Unemployment 1920s:
2,132,000
5.2%
Unemployment
1990s: 5.7%
Unemployment
2003: 6%
Unemployment as of March 2014: 6.6%
1920s life expectancy:
Males: 53.6 years
Females: 54.6 years
For those born in 2010
in U.S.A (of all races):
Males: 76 years
Females: 81 years
1920s number of people in the military:
343,000 (down from 1,172,601 in 1919)
Currently: 1.42 million in active Army, Navy,
Air Force, Marines, Coast Guard
851,000 in Reserves, Army and Air Force National
Guard
Average Annual Salary: $1236
Equivalent today to: $12,741.38
Prior to 1920s:
World War I
US Economy goes Global
Technology takes off
Immigration Act of 1917
Red Scare
Presidents:
Warren G. Harding (1921-1923)
Calvin Coolidge (1923-1928)
United States emerges from WWI as the dominant figure in
World Trade
Much money to be made in investments:
rich get richer.
19th Amendment-Ratified in August of 1920
Ensures no US citizen will be denied the right to
vote based on gender.
Technology brings electricity, gas, and running water
to the cities.
Number of
American
farms with
electricity by
the end of the
decade was:
10%
Number of farms with running water by
the end of the decade was:
33%
Roads that had been paved for motor cars
between cities left small towns isolated from the
rest of the country.
Rural people were also cut off from colleges, which
were becoming more and more necessary as new skills
were required for industry.
Rural America is left behind.
For the first time in American History, more people lived in
urban areas than in rural.
Four million farmers quit in the 1920s to move to urban areas
What else took off in the twenties?
Department stores
Wonder bread
Band-Aids
Velveeta
Advertising billboards and commercials
Wheaties
Kleenex
Macy’s Thanksgiving Day Parade
La-Z-Boy Loungers
Fast Food
Gerber Baby Food
18th Amendment-Ratified
on January 16, 1919
This made illegal: the
manufacture, sale, or
transportation of intoxicating
liquors within, the importation
thereof into, or the exportation
thereof from the United States
and all territory subject to the
jurisdiction thereof for
beverage purposes.
The Volstead Act of 1919 defined alcohol as any
drink having an alcoholic content above 0.5
percent.
This led to the era known as Prohibition.
Its goal, in theory, was to reduce crime,
poverty, the prison systems, death and
disease rate, corruption, and other social
problems.
Many historians believe it was a WASP
backlash to exert superiority over
minorities, a reaction to the overwhelming
immigration of the first part of the century.
Problems:
•Very hard to enforce
•Led to development of organized
crime
By 1925, there were an estimated 100,000
Speakeasies in New York City.
Underpaid police officers were easily bribed into
warning these Speakeasies about raids and feigning
oblivion about the mob.
Speakeasies united citizens of
various ethnic backgrounds when
nothing else could.
The most famous of the Speakeasy of
the 1920s was Al Capone.
THE FLAPPER
 During the 1920s, a
new ideal emerged for
some women: the
Flapper
 A Flapper was an
emancipated young
woman who embraced
the new fashions and
urban attitudes
New found freedom led to the rise of
the so-called “flapper”:
1923-24
1925
1926
Hair gradually became shorter over the course of
the decade.
Picture from a
fashion magazine
circa 1923.
The current generation did not invent
baggy pants.
This is the cover of
a 1925 clothing
company featuring
the latest in men’s
suits.
SECTION 3:
EDUCATION
AND POPULAR
CULTURE
 During the 1920s,
developments in education had
a powerful impact on the nation
 Enrollment in high schools
quadrupled between 1914 and
1926
 Public schools met the
challenge of educating millions
of immigrants
EXPANDING NEWS
COVERAGE
 As literacy increased,
newspaper circulation
rose and masscirculation magazines
flourished
 By the end of the
1920s, ten American
magazines -- including
Reader’s Digest and
Time – boasted
circulations of over 2
million
This issue of Life has a
flapper on the cover.
By 1925, when this
magazine was
originally published,
organized sports were
very popular. College
football was really a
big deal, as was golf
and baseball, but
professional football
was taking off as well.
RADIO COMES
OF AGE
 Although print media
was popular, radio was the
most powerful
communications medium
to emerge in the 1920s
 News was delivered
faster and to a larger
audience
 Americans could hear
the voice of the president
or listen to the World
Series live
While people listened to the premiere jazz musicians
of the day, they danced all kinds of new dances,
including the Charleston.
LINDBERGH’S
FLIGHT
 America’s most beloved
hero of the time wasn’t an
athlete but a small-town
pilot named Charles
Lindbergh
 Lindbergh made the
first nonstop solo transatlantic flight
 He took off from NYC
in the Spirit of St. Louis
and arrived in Paris 33
hours later to a hero’s
welcome
Aviation is huge, due to the war and later,
Charles Lindbergh.
The Jazz Age
The Meaning Of Jazz
• Total improvisational
style, meant liberation
for both the artist and
the audience.
• Expressed the desire
to break with tradition.
– Jazz becomes the
symbol of the new
“American rebel.”
The Jazz Age
Background
• Music form developed in
New Orleans by black
musicians near the turn
of the century.
• A purely American
creation, relied on
traditional black themes
and improvisation.
• Would spread throughout
America and be adopted
by white musicians and
audiences.
LOUIS
ARMSTRONG
 Jazz was born in the early
20th century
 In 1922, a young trumpet
player named Louis
Armstrong joined the Creole
Jazz Band
 Later he joined Fletcher
Henderson’s band in NYC
 Armstrong is considered
the most important and
influential musician in the
history of jazz
AFRICANAMERICAN
PERFORMERS
 During the 1920s,
black performers won
large followings
 Paul Robeson, son of
a slave, became a major
dramatic actor
 His performance in
Othello was widely
praised
EDWARD
KENNEDY “DUKE”
ELLINGTON
 In the late 1920s,
Duke Ellington, a jazz
pianist and composer,
led his ten-piece
orchestra at the
famous Cotton Club
 Ellington won
renown as one of
America’s greatest
composers
BESSIE
SMITH
 Bessie Smith, blues
singer, was perhaps the
most outstanding
vocalist of the decade
 She achieved
enormous popularity
and by 1927 she became
the highest- paid black
artist in the world
Radio
Background
• Developed in the late 1800s, would be used for the military
during World War I.
• First commercial radio station is created in 1920 with
KDKA in Pittsburgh.
KDKA In The Roaring Twenties
http://www.hammondmuseumofradio.org/images/kdka-logo.jpg
Movies
Early Films
•
•
First major film: The Great Train Robbery, 1903.
First major epic: Birth Of A Nation, 1915.
– Directed by D.W. Griffiths, was about the Reconstruction South.
The Great Train Robbery
http://www.pictureshowman.com/images/GTR_Edison_poster.gif
Movies
Early Films
• First talking movie: The Jazz Singer, 1927.
– Stars Al Jolson, sees Jolson in black face in parts.
Scene From The Jazz Singer
http://1.bp.blogspot.com/-hAnGW6Nft04/ThQ0s7B_H8I/AAAAAAAAA8Q/gI-0T2gD29U/s400/TJS.jpg
The Jazz Singer Movie Poster
http://www.georgegroves.org.uk/jazzsinger_files/jazzsingerposter.jpg
ENTERTAINMENT AND
ARTS
Walt Disney's animated Steamboat
Willie marked the debut of Mickey
Mouse. It was a seven minute long
black and white cartoon.
 Even before sound, movies
offered a means of escape
through romance and comedy
 First sound movies: Jazz
Singer (1927)
 First animated with sound:
Steamboat Willie (1928)
 By 1930 millions of
Americans went to the movies
each week
Movies
Early Films
•
•
Other key films.
The Four Horsemen Of The Apocalypse (1920), The Sheik (1921), Robin
Hood (1922), The Thief Of Baghdad (1924), The Torrent (1926), The
Hunchback Of Notre Dame (1923), The Phantom Of The Opera (1925),
Ben-Hur (1925), Wings (1927), Steamboat Willie (1928).
Steamboat Willie
The Sheik
Phantom Of The Opera
http://farm1.staticflickr.com/98/240970989_4461ecb691.jpg
http://www.moviegoods.com/Assets/product_images/1020/144321.1020.A.jpg
http://www.cultmoviez.com/P/slides/POSTER%20%20THE%20PHANTOM%20OF%20THE%20OPERA%20(1925)%20(2).jpg
Movies
Success As An Art Form
• Originally only accepted by
immigrants and low-income
families.
– Most people who could
afford it went to plays,
instead going to
“nickelodeons” = small,
simple theaters charged
five cents for admission
and flourished from
about 1905 to 1915.
Movies
Success As An Art Form
• Developed into an art
form.
– Actors, actresses,
writers, and producers
from Broadway begin to
make the crossover.
• Bring their
professionalism and
training techniques to
the big screen.
– New techniques are
introduced, including
close-ups, panoramic
shots, lighting effects,
and fade-out, capturing
the realism of human
emotion.
Movies
Success As An Art Form
• Targeted themes
popular with the
general public.
– Most of the more
successful movies
incorporated one or
more of the following
themes into the
story: crime, war,
romance, comedy,
and luxury.
Movies
Key Figures Of The Silent & Early Golden Age
• Animator.
– Walt Disney.
Walt Disney & Mickey Mouse
http://www.worldculturepictorial.com/images/content/walt-disney_mickey-mouse.jpg
Movies
Key Figures Of The Silent & Early Golden Age
• Directors, producers, companies.
– Columbia Pictures, RKO, Republic, Metro-Goldwyn-Meyer,
Universal Pictures, United Artists, Warner Brothers, Paramount,
20th Century Fox.
– D.W. Griffith, Cecil B. DeMille, Erich von Stroheim.
D.W. Griffith
Cecil B. DeMille
Erich von Stroheim
http://s3.amazonaws.com/auteurs_production/images/cast_member/13935/original.jpg
http://www.cecilbdemille.com/images/photo.jpg
http://www.filmreference.com/images/sjff_02_img0886.jpg
Movies
Key Figures Of The Silent & Early Golden Age
• Charlie Chaplin.
– Created the character
known as “The
Tramp,” combined
comedy with satire
and realism.
– Key movies included
The Tramp, The Gold
Rush, City Lights,
Modern Times, and
The Great Dictator.
MUSIC AND ART
 Famed composer
George Gershwin
merged traditional
elements with American
Jazz
 Painters like Edward
Hopper depicted the
loneliness of American
life
 Georgia O’ Keeffe
captured the grandeur
of New York using
intensely colored
canvases
Gershwin
Radiator Building, Night,
New York , 1927
Georgia O'Keeffe
Golden Age Of Sports
Emergence Of The Superstar
• Defined.
– Key sports
figures who
dominated their
sports and
captured the
public attention.
Golden Age Of Sports
Boxing: Jack Dempsey
• The “Manassas
Mauler,” dominated
the Twenties with
knockouts.
• Greatest fight:
Dempsey vs.
Tunney.
– Lasted fifteen
rounds, with Tunney
dominating the
bloody bout.
Golden Age Of Sports
Tennis & Golf
• Tennis: “Big
Bill” Tilden.
• Golf: Bobby
Jones.
Big Bill Tilden
http://www.chansons-net.com/tennis/apres14/gbill.jpg
– The Tiger
Woods of the
era, would win
both the
American and
British titles in
1930.
Bobby Jones
http://www.atlantahistorycenter.com/ImagesLive/ProductImage_241S.jpg
Golden Age Of Sports
Swimming: Gertrude Ederle & Johnny Weissmuller
Gertrude Ederle
http://www.54warcorrespondents-kia-30ww2.com/gertrude_ederle_92w.jpg
• Ederle was the
first woman to
swim the
English
Channel.
• Weissmuller
won 5 Olympic
Gold Medals
and 1 Bronze,
would go on to
play the title
role of Tarzan
in 12 movies.
Johnny Weissmuller
http://blog.allanellenberger.com/wpcontent/uploads/weismuller-tarzan.jpg
Golden Age Of Sports
Football: Knute Rockne & Red Grange
Knute Rockne
http://www.motivationalmagic.com/speeches/pics/KnuteRockne.jpg
• College football was
king, not the newly
formed National
Football League.
• People associated
with their alma
mater or their
hometown college.
• Fight songs,
mascots, and
histories begin to
develop.
• Beginning of the
Bowl games
between champions
of opposing
leagues.
Red Grange
http://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/6/6e/Red_Gra
nge_1925.jpg
Golden Age Of Sports
Football: Knute Rockne & Red Grange
• Rockne was the
legendary coach of
Notre Dame,
leading the college
to six national
championships
and a 105-12-5
record before his
untimely death in a
plane crash in
1931.
Golden Age Of Sports
Football: Knute Rockne & Red Grange
• Grange was the most
dominant running
back, perhaps ever.
– Averaged over 10 yards
per carry in college,
setting the then-singlegame record of 268
yards.
– The only player ever to
score four touchdowns
on four consecutive
carries.
– Played for the Bears in
1925, earning $42,000
for his first two games.
Golden Age Of Sports
Baseball: George Herman “Babe” Ruth
• Baseball’s Golden Age.
– Hall of Fame names
included Lou Gehrig,
Walter Johnson, Tris
Speaker, Grover Alexander,
Eddie Collins, George
Sisler, Mickey Cochrane,
Frankie Frisch, Lefty Grove,
Carl Hubbell, Pie Traynor,
Jimmie Foxx, Mel Ott, Paul
“Big Poison” Waner, Lloyd
“Little Poison” Waner,
Dizzy Dean, Rabbit
Maranville, Bill Terry, Ted
Lyons, Max Carey, Edd
Roush, and others.
Golden Age Of Sports
Baseball: George Herman “Babe” Ruth
• Although this was
baseball’s Golden Age
and the largest number
of Hall of Famers came
from this era, none
were bigger than Ruth.
• Known as the “Sultan
of Swat,” is perhaps
the most well-known
sports figure in any
sport ever.
 In 1929, Americans spent
$4.5 billion on entertainment
(includes sports)
 People crowded into
baseball games to see their
heroes
 Babe Ruth was a larger
than life American hero who
played for Yankees
 He hit 60 homers in 1927
Golden Age Of Sports
Baseball: George Herman “Babe” Ruth
• Started his career in Boston as
a pitcher, but had a talent for
hitting home runs.
– Soon moved to the outfield so
that he could play everyday.
– Would be traded to the Yankees
in 1920 by Red Sox owner Harry
Frizzee in order to fund a
Broadway play (which failed in a
week).
– Ruth would go on to lead the
Yankees to seven American
League pennants and 4 World
Series championships.
– The “Curse of the Bambino”
would plague the Red Sox from
1919 until their first World Series
win in 2004.
WRITERS OF THE
1920S
 The 1920s was one of the
greatest literary eras in
American history
 Sinclair Lewis, the first
American to win the Nobel
Prize in literature, wrote the
novel, Babbitt
 In Babbitt the main
character ridicules American
conformity and materialism
WRITERS OF
THE 1920s
 Writer F. Scott
Fitzgerald coined the
phrase “Jazz Age” to
describe the 1920s
 Fitzgerald wrote
Paradise Lost and The
Great Gatsby
 The Great Gatsby
reflected the emptiness of
New York elite society
WRITERS OF THE
1920S
 Edith Warton’s Age of
Innocence dramatized the
clash between traditional
and modern values
 Willa Cather celebrated
the simple, dignified lives
of immigrant farmers in
Nebraska in My Antonia
THE LOST GENERATION
 Some writers such
as Hemingway and
John Dos Passos were
so soured by
American culture that
they chose to settle in
Europe
 In Paris they
formed a group that
one writer called,
“The Lost
Generation”
John Dos Passos self – portrait. He
was a good amateur painter.
WRITERS OF THE
1920
Hemingway - 1929
 Ernest Hemingway,
wounded in World War I,
became one of the best-known
authors of the era
 In his novels, The Sun Also
Rises and A Farewell to Arms,
he criticized the glorification of
war
 His simple, straightforward
style of writing set the literary
standard
THE HARLEM
RENAISSANCE
 Between 1910 and
1920, the Great
Migration saw hundreds
of thousands of African
Americans move north
to big cities
 By 1920 over 5 million
of the nation’s 12 million
blacks (over 40%) lived
Migration of the Negro by in cities
Jacob Lawrence
Harlem Renaissance
Impact Of Ghetto Life: World War I
– Wanted more equality,
freedom, political
participation, and
opportunity.
– Now settled into large,
concentrated
communities that would
be referred to as
ghettoes.
Harlem Renaissance
Impact Of Ghetto Life
• Even though life was hard
in the ghetto, it did produce
some advantages.
– Enabled African-Americans to
elect representatives of their
own by having one solid
voting block.
– Stimulated self-confidence,
offering economic
opportunity, political rights,
and freedom.
– A “black world” where
African-Americans could act
like themselves and develop
their own culture.
Harlem Renaissance
Why Harlem?
• Largest Black city in
the world, would
become the cultural
capital of Blacks, as
well as a place for
Whites to flock to
experience jazz and
other forms of
African-American
culture.
HARLEM, NEW YORK
 Harlem, NY became
the largest black urban
community
 Harlem suffered from
overcrowding,
unemployment and
poverty
 However, in the 1920s it
was home to a literary and
artistic revival known as
the Harlem Renaissance
Harlem Renaissance
Writers
• Expressed a range
of emotions from
bitterness to joy
and hope.
• Included Langston
Hughes, Claude
McKay, and James
Weldon Johnston.
AFRICAN AMERICAN
WRITERS
Mckay
 The Harlem Renaissance
was primarily a literary
movement
 Led by well-educated
blacks with a new sense of
pride in the AfricanAmerican experience
 Claude McKay’s poems
expressed the pain of life in
the ghetto
LANGSTON
HUGHES
 Missiouri-born Langston
Hughes was the
movement’s best known
poet
 Many of his poems
described the difficult lives
of working-class blacks
 Some of his poems were
put to music, especially jazz
and blues
ZOLA NEALE
HURSTON
 Zola Neale Hurston
wrote novels, short stories
and poems
 She often wrote about
the lives of poor,
unschooled Southern
blacks
 She focused on the
culture of the people–
their folkways and values
The End