The Twenties and the Crash of 1929

•Prosperity in the 1920s• The rise of “Big Business”• The rise of consumer culture• The rise of mass culture

•Social Change

• New Woman• Harlem Renaissance

• Reaction to Social Change• Klan• Fundamentalism• The Scopes Trial

• The Crash of 1929• Financial Panic• Causes of the Great Depression• Consequences of the Crash

Prosperity > President Calvin Coolidge, 1924

Prosperity > Bruce Barton, author of The Man Nobody Knows, here with Hollywood producer Cecil B. DeMille, 1920s

Prosperity > Who Prospered in the 1920s?

• 1200 mergers caused the disappearance of over 600 independent enterprises

• top 0.1% of U.S. families in 1929 had combined income as large as bottom 42%

• i. e. approx 24,000 families had combined income as large as 11.5 million poor and lower-class families

• per capita income in the U.S. rose 9% between 1920-1929

• per capita income for the top 24,000 families rose 75%

• 80% of families had no savings

• farmers did not prosper - 1/4 of all employment

• less than 10% invested in the stock market

Prosperity > Welfare Capitalism: Shoe Company’s Billboard Ad, 1923

Prosperity > Comic Strip on Workers Owning Shares, 1929

Consumer Culture > Salaries and Prices in the 1920s

• average US annual salary: $1,236 (approx. $24.00 per week)

• industrial worker $35.00 per week

• store clerk $8.00 per week

• higher salaries but also higher cost of living:

• $8.00 could by only $3.93 worth of 1914 goods.

• Ford Model T car: $290

• Coney Island roller coaster ride: 15-25 cents (beach was free)

• movie ticket: 25 cents (up from 5 cents in 1910s)

• radio set: $25-$100 (making your own was much cheaper)

Consumer Culture > Department Store window in the 1920s

Consumer Culture > Automobile Sales and Registration

Consumer Cutlure > Ford Model T, 1920s

Consumer Culture > General Motors Ad, 1925

Consumer Culture > Cadillac Ad, 1925

Consumer Culture > Ford Model A Ad, 1929

Consumer Culture > Song about Ford Model A, 1928

Have you seen her, Ain't she great?She's something you'll appreciate,I'm sure you understand just what I mean,Ev'ry body, Every where, is falling for her now,I'm talking bout the new Ford and boy it's sure a wow!When you see her, You'll agree,She's just the one for you and me,She's everything that any one could ask,"Sit tin' pretty yes I am, With her I'm always foundYou "ought ta" see her Chassis, it's sure the best a round.

Talk of this and talk of that,Boys you must take off your hat,HENRY'S MADE A LADY OUT OF LIZZIE!Has she plenty, has she much?Got the "tin" you love to touch,HENRY'S MADE A LADY OUT OF LIZZIE!They used to park her in a lot,For that they charged two bits,But now they charge you nothing,And you park her at the Ritz.She once had rattles in her wheel,But now she's full of "sex appeal"HENRY'S MADE A LADY OUT OF LIZZIE!

She's like all the other vamps,Pretty shape and lovely lamps,HENRY'S MADE A LADY OUT OF LIZZIE!Since she's taken on some weight,Honest, folks, she's looking great,HENRY'S MADE A LADY OUT OF LIZZIE!Her dashboard has a clock,That's a hit with all the Scotch,A Scotchman saw the clock,And promptly stopped his watch.You've all heard the Frenchman song,Fifty million cant be wrong,HENRY'S MADE A LADY OUT OF LIZZIE!

Just a girl who knows her stuff,Plenty fast but never rough,HENRY'S MADE A LADY OUT OF LIZZIE!Always tidy, always clean,Faithful as an old Marine,HENRY'S MADE A LADY OUT OF LIZZIE!She's not the kind who tries to getYour money all at once,She only wants ten dollars down,The rest in fourteen months,Good for sister, nice for ma,Ev'rybody rides but Pa,HENRY'S MADE A LADY OUT OF LIZZIE!

Henry’s Made a Lady Out of Lizzie

Mass Culture > Fatty Arbuckle at Coney Island (1917)

Mass Culture > Coney Island Roller Coaster, 1927

Mass Culture > Coney Island Beach, 1924

Mass Culture > Postcard of Chicago Theater, 1930

Mass Culture > Rudolph Valentino in The Sheik, 1921

Mass Culture > Charlie Chaplin, The Rink (1916)

Mass Culture > Stations and Set Ownership

Mass Culture > Farmer listening to the radio, 1920s

Mass Culture > People on a New York sidewalk listening to a football game, 1923

Mass Culture > Charles Correl and Freeman Gosden, 1929

Mass Culture > Movie Theater Poster Announcing Amos’n’Andy

Mass Culture > Amos’n’Andy on Presidential Elections, 1928

Amos: Andy, tell me one thing. Is you a Democrat or is you a Republican?Andy: Well, I was a Democrat . . .Amos: Uh-huh.Andy: But I believe I’ve done switched over to the Republicans now.Amos: Uh, who is the men that is running against each other this here election time. Explain that to me.Andy: Herbert Hoover [inaudible] Al Smith.Amos: Herbert Hoover [inaudible] Smith, huh?Andy: Yeah.Amos: And another thing I wanna ask you. What is the difference between a Democrat and a Republican?Andy: Well, one of ‘em is a mule and the other one is a elephant. That’s the way I get it.Amos: Uh-huh. I don’t know if I was gonna be a Democrat or a Republican, you know?Andy: Well, what was your ancestors?Amos: My aunt didn’t have no sisters.Andy: Oh no, not your aunt’s sisters, your ancestors. I mean, how did your old man vote?Amos: What my papa, you mean?Andy: Yeah, that’s it.Amos: My papa used to always vote for the Democrats.Andy: Yeah, then if I was in your place, I would vote for the Republicans.

New Woman > Magazine illustrations: “Gibson Girls” by Charles Gibson--a beauty standard of the 1900s--and a flapper by John Held, Jr. from the

1920s

New Woman > Working-class women at the turn of the century

New Woman > John Held, Jr.: Flappers have no manners or brains

New Woman > John Held, Jr.: “It’s all right, Santa-- you can come in. My parents still believe in you.”

New Woman > John Held, Jr., dustjackets for F. Scott Fitzgerald novels

New Woman > Film Actress Louise Brooks and a comic strip she inspired

New Woman > Actress Clara Bow, the ultimate flapper in It (1927) and Dangerous Curves (1929)

Harlem Renaissaince > The Crisis Cover, 1929

Harlem Renaissance > The Crisis Ad for Black Swan Records, 1923

Harlem Renaissance > NAACP Anti-Lynching Ad in the New York Times

Harlem Renaissance > Marcus Garvey’s Supporters Parade in Harlem

Harlem Renaissance > Leon “Bix” Beiderbecke, “Sorry,” 1928

Harlem Renaissance > Louis Armstrong, “Weather Bird,” 1928

Klan in the 1920s > Timeline of Klan History

• founded during Reconstruction, collapsed in 1870s

• revived in 1915 (in part because of the movie Birth of a Nation)

• resurgence of popularity in the 1920s, but collapsed again by the 1930s

• again reappears in the 1950s

Klan in the 1920s > Poster for the Film The Birth of a Nation by W.G. Griffith (1915)

Klan in the 1920s > Washington, D.C. Parade against immigration

Klan in the 1920s > Social Movements Supported by the Klan

• prohibition

• anti-immigrant sentiments

• anti-radicalism

• religious fundamentalism

• morality and family values

Fundamentalism > Timeline

• Word coined at around 1910

• Denotes religious groups that take the Bible literally

• Popular and active in the 1920s

• Then the movement retreats from politics until 1980s, in part because of the Scopes Trial

Fundamentalism > Church Membership in 1920s

Fundamentalism > Actor Lionel Barrymore and Modern Christ

Scopes Trial > Cartoon on Evolution

Scopes Trial > William Jennings Bryan’s Cartoon against Modernity, 1924

Scopes Trial > Cartoon comparing Bolsheviks and Scientists, 1925

Scopes Trial > Bryan and Darrow

Scopes Trial > Bryan as Don Quixote

Scopes Trial > Darrow as a Street Player

Scopes Trial > Monkeys Vote on Evolution