The Roaring Life of the 1920s

U.S. History Chapter 13

Section 1 - Changing Ways of Life

• Many people were living in cities.• The New Urban Scene– Jobs – day. Movies, vaudeville theaters at night.– City life challenging, impersonal.

The Prohibition Experience

• 18th Amendment – banned the manufacture, sale, and transportation of alcohol. Takes affect in January 1920.

• Was unenforceable.• Volstead Act – set up to enforce

Prohibition, underfunded.

Hidden saloons and nightclubs – speakeasies.Bootleggers – smugglers of alcohol.

Organized Crime

• Al Capone – Chicago - 6 years of gang warfare – bootlegging - $60 million/year.

• He killed off his competition while traveling around in his armor-plated car with bulletproof windows.

• “Public Enemy Number One” • Went to jail for tax evasion• Crime’s led to prostitution, gambling, drugs. Harassed

honest merchants in to paying them for protection from other gangs, or they would smash their stores.

• By 1930, the annual “take” for the underworld was between $12 to $18 billion/year.

http://www.nytimes.com/learning/general/onthisday/bday/0117.html

• By mid 20’s only 19% support Prohibition.• 1933 – repealed with the 21st Amendment.

Science and Religion Clash

• Fundamentalism – protestant movement grounded in a literal interpretation of the Bible.

• Rejected Charles Darwin’s theory of evolution• In the South – lots of revivals, led by people

like Billy Sunday and Aimee Semple McPherson

The Scopes Trial

• TN -crime to teach evolution. • ACLU – promised to defend any teacher who

wanted to protest it. – John Scopes– They hired Clarence Darrow as his lawyer. – William Jennings Bryan - prosecutor.

• Scopes Trial – also called the Monkey Trial – role of science and religion in public schools and society.

• Bryan called to the stand as an expert on the Bible. On the stand Bryan admitted the Bible could be interpreted different ways.

• Scopes found guilty, fined $100. Later changed, but law teaching evolution remained in effect.

Section 2 The Twenties Woman

• Women – independent, rejecting the values of the 19th century.

• The Flapper – liberated young women embracing new fashions and urban attitudes. Hats, short dresses, beads, short dyed hair. Smoked, drank, danced. Saw marriage as an equal partnership.

• Casual dating - more acceptable.

Women Shed Old roles at Home and at Work

• New opportunities for women in the workplace– nurses, teachers, librarians, clerical work.

The Changing Family

• Birthrate decreased. More birth control available. Margaret Sanger – founded American Birth Control League.

• Household life easier thanks to things that could be bought in stores.

• Working women jugglinghome and work.

Section 3 Education and Popular Culture

• 1914 – 1 million attending high school• 1926 – 4 million attending high school • Why? High educational standards for

industrial jobs, offering more courses. Also states were requiring young people to remain in school until age 16 or 18.

• Literacy increased as education increased

Radio Comes of Age

• November 1920 – Pittsburgh station KDKA broadcast the new of the Harding landslide. By late 1920s improvements had been made that allowed long-distance broadcasting possible.

• Created the experience of hearing the news together as it happened, like hearing the President speak, or sporting events like boxing or the World Series.

• Families gathered around the radio to listen to programming.

America Chases New Heroes and Old Dreams

• 1929 - $4.5 billion spend on entertainment

• Babe Ruth• Andrew “Rube” Foster – founded

Negro National League• Helen Willis – tennis• Charles Lindbergh - “Spirit of St.

Louis” • Amelia Earhart

Entertainment and the Arts• Movies popular – 1903 –

first movie – The Great Train Robbery.

• First full length movie – The Birth of a Nation (1915)

• First “talkie” – The Jazz Singer (1927)

• George Gershwin – concert musician

• Painters – Edward Hoper and Georgia O’Keeffe

Writers of the 1920’s

• 1920’s – one of the richest eras in literary history

• Sinclair Lewis • F. Scott Fitzgerald • Ernest Hemingway• William Faulkner• Poetry – Ezra Pound and T.S.

Elliot

Section Four – The Harlem Renaissance

• Marcus Garvey – Founded the Universal Negro Improvement Association (UNIA)– Promote African

American businesses– Encouraged followers to

return to Africa• Convicted of mail fraud

and jailed

The Harlem Renaissance

• A literary and artistic movement celebrating African-American culture

• Writers:– Claude McKay– Langston Hughes – poet

• Performers:– Paul Robeson – actor– Louis Armstrong – jazz– Duke Ellington – jazz pianist

and composer– Bessie Smith – blues singer