Describe each picture. What might each represent about the 1920’s?

Unit 4—Chapter 7The Roaring Twenties

CSS 11.5

Part OneNormalcy and the Booming Economy

11.5.7 Discuss the rise of mass production techniques, the growth of cities, the impact of new technologies (e.g., the automobile, electricity), and the resulting

prosperity and effect on the American landscape. EQ: How did the booming economy of the 1920’s lead to changes in American

life?

The Automobile Drives Prosperity

• Henry Ford (1863 – 1947)• combined mass production with

high wages• tried to pay his workers enough

that they could buy his cars• $5 a day in 1914• set very high standards on the work

and lives of his workers

“I will build a car for the great multitude. It will be large enough for the family, but small enough for the individual to run and care for. It will be constructed of the best materials, by the best men to be hired, after the simplest designs that modern engineering can devise. But it will be low in price that no man making a good salary will be unable to own one-and enjoy with his family the blessing of hours of pleasure in God's great open spaces.”

The Automobile Drives Prosperity

• The Model T, 1908• marketed to the middle class• cost $850 in 1908 but price

dropped to $295 by 1927• car ownership went from 10%

of American families in 1919 to 56% in 1927

• over 15 million were produced• "Any customer can have a car

painted any color that he wants so long as it is black."

The Automobile Drives Prosperity

• the automobile changed the entire nation1. stimulated economic growth

• resources, roads, service stations, diners, motels, insurance

2. freedom of movement• unlike the train, you could go wherever you wanted

whenever you wanted3. helped create “urban sprawl”

• spread cities out to the suburbs

Mass Production

Assembly Line• techniques to produce goods in

large numbers were popularized by Henry Ford

• standardized parts • the assembly line • lowered cost of production• provided lots of jobs that required

little expertise• made things affordable that had

been too expensive for average people • a Model T rolled off the assembly line

every three minutes• a Model T could be made in 93

minutes

A Bustling Economy

• Consumerism• money saved during WWI, was now

spent on new, affordable goods• vacuum cleaner, electric iron, electric

washing machines, radios, refrigerators

• Advertising• used scientific techniques to play on

peoples desires and fears

• Installment Buying• consumers could make a small down

payment and then pay monthly payments

• people could own products that they otherwise could not afford

Listerine's new ads featured forlorn young women and men, eager for marriage but turned off by their mate's rotten breath. "Can I be happy with him in spite of that?" one maiden asked herself. In just seven years, the company's revenues rose from $115,000 to more than $8 million.

The Stock Market

Bull Market• a period of rising stock

prices• 4 million Americans

owned stock by 1929• economists claimed that

the value of stocks would always rise

The Stock Market

Buying on Margin• the buyer paid 10% down and

had months to pay the rest• the stock was the collateral for

the loan• people figured that by the time

the money was due they could sell the stock for a profit• this is allowed more people

to buy stock• This is a REALLY, REALLY, REALLY bad idea!!

People paid 10% of stock price, and could “make payments” on the rest, causing them to buy more than they could afford.

“We in America are nearer to the final triumph over poverty than ever before in the history of any land. We have not yet reached the goal—but . . . we shall soon, with the help of God, be in sight of the day when poverty will be banished from this nation.”

—Herbert Hoover, 1928

EQ:

• How did the booming economy of the 1920’s lead to changes in American life?