America in the 1920’s and
1930’s
Women’s Rights
• 19th Amendment is passed in August of
1920 – gave women the right to vote
• Flappers – women who challenged
traditional dress and behavior
Red Scare
• Labor unrest, strikes and violence led
many people to worry about
Communist/Anarchist influence in the US.
• Xenophobia – fear and hatred of
foreigners
• Nicola Sacco/Bartolomeo Vanzetti –
executed in 1927
• American Civil Liberties Union - ACLU
Great Migration
• During the 1920’s, hundreds of thousands
of black southerners began moving to the
North to escape racial prejudice
• Faced opposition from whites concerned
about job losses
• 25 urban race riots during the 1920’s in
the North
1920’s politics
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Warren Harding elected President in 1920
Ohio Gang
Teapot Dome Scandal
Harding dies in 1923 – Calvin Coolidge takes
over
Disarmament – limiting military weapons
Kellogg-Briand Pact – 1928 – outlawed war
Herbert Hoover elected President in 1928
Republican policies were pro-business –
believed that it was not the government’s job
to solve social problems
Country became isolationist again
Prohibition
• January 16, 1920 – 18th amendment is
passed – banned the sale, manufacture,
and transportation of alcoholic
beverages
• Speakeasies – illegal clubs that sold
alcohol
• Bootleggers – alcohol smugglers
• Led to the rise of major criminal
organizations – Al Capone
• December 5th, 1933 – 21st amendment
ends Prohibition
Culture Wars
• Fundamentalism – teaches that the Bible
is literally true and free of error
• 1925 – Scopes Monkey Trial
• Nativism – anti-immigrant feelings
• Emergency Quota Act – 1921 – limited
immigration to 375,000 a year
• National Origins Act – 1924 – favored
European immigrants over other races
Boom Times
• 1920’s – economic growth and business doubled
• Henry Ford – used assembly line techniques to
manufacture large numbers of cars – Model T $290 in 1927
• Mass production methods led to tremendous
business growth and new job opportunities
• Installment plans – customers made down
payments and had a monthly payment after that
Jazz Age
• Fads – Flappers, Marathon Dancing,
Flagpole Sitting
• 1920 – radio programs are aired regularly
for the first time
• Movies were invented in the late 1800’s –
Nickelodeons – early theaters
• 1927 – first movie with sound is released –
“The Jazz Singer”
Famous People of the 1920’s
• Movies – Charlie Chaplin, Rudolph Valentino,
Douglas Fairbanks, Mary Pickford, Greta Garbo
• Sports – Jim Thorpe – Football/Olympics
• Helen Wills – Tennis
• Red Grange – Football
• George Herman Ruth “Babe” – Baseball
• Leroy (Satchel) Paige, James (Cool Papa) Bell –
Negro Leagues Baseball
• Charles Lindbergh – Pilot – first to fly across the
Atlantic – 1927
• Amelia Earhart – Female pilot – disappeared in 1937
Blues and Jazz
• Ragtime, Blues, and Jazz were popular music
styles during the 1920’s
• Ragtime – Scott Joplin
• Blues – W.C. Handy, Bessie Smith
• Jazz – Louie Armstrong, Duke Ellington
• Harlem Renaissance – period of AfricanAmerican artistic growth – Langston Hughes
• Lost Generation – writers disgusted by the
destruction of World War I – Ernest
Hemingway, F. Scott Fitzgerald
• Expatriate – person who leaves their native
country to live elsewhere