1920s

Booming investments: stocks

stock prices tripled in 1929; could buy a stock for $20; stocks weren't backed by anything; everything based off credit; killed us later; 21 ppl in 1921 were millionaires; in 1927 15,000 millionaires (mainly off stocks);

Great actors

Greta Garbo, Rudolph Valentino, Buster Keaton, John Barrymore, Gary Cooper

Types of movies

slapstick (chaplain, Lloyd); swashbucklers like pirates (Douglas Fairbanks); heart throbs were Rudolph Valentino; sex symbols like Greta Garbo; some made it to talkies but many did not (chaplain, Lloyd and Mary Pickford)

Valentine's Day Massacre

some Irish trying to push Capone out of a certain area; Valentine's Day Capone shows up in a restaurant and shoot all Irish mobsters and innocent ppl; in broad day light; didn't care; still couldn't get him for murder; did this all the time; brutal horrible man but ppl thought he was cool bc of the money he gave to charity;

Clara Bow

"The It Girl" for all of the 20s; received over 45,000 letters a week; came from a poor family; made 15 movies in 1 year; everybody's dream; couldn't go anywhere without being stopped; every movie of hers was a hit; was stalked; died after the 20s in a bungalow at a young age; only 2 ppl went to her funeral

Prohibition

lasted 13 yrs (1920-1933); pro: drys; against: wets; Volstead Act: definition of alcohol was anything containing ½%-1%;

Most popular sports

1) baseball: Babe Ruth put baseball on the map; made home-runs cool; before they were "fascist"; hit 60 homeruns in a season; the most homeruns prior was 27; Babe Ruth hit 714 homeruns total; record broken by Hank Aaron; 2) boxing: almost as popular as baseball but harder to see; gloves were a lot thinner; so much more brutal than today; greatest boxer was Jack Dempsey; 3) football

The young have freedom

20s first time when ppl rebelled against parent's morals; "Flappers" wore shorter skirts that showed their knees and ankles and had short hair; drank and smoked in public; very independent; went on dates without a chaperone; outlandish at this time; women didn't wear corsets for the first time;

Ford Model T "The Tin Lizzie"

9,000 made a day; one every 10 seconds; $260 a car at its lowest (1927); 15 mil sold total (broke the bank); made $25,000 profit a day; largest American industry; used steel-15%, glass-75%, rubber-80% in our country; so high off the ground it never got stuck; big problem with cars at this time; could get through mud, puddles, rocks; gas guzzler but gas cost $.04 a gallon; very durable and reliable; Chevy and Chrysler made bigger, faster, stronger cars but ford didn't change; became a huge part of society;

Charlie Chaplain

Chaplain was his own worst enemy; absolute perfectionist; when he was at his peak made the least number of movies; took him a long time to turn out movies bc needed to be perfect; made 83 movies; 4 Oscars; chaplain couldn't be married faithfully to one person; jokes about him; chaplains last child was born when he was 73; movies described as slapstick comedy but have social problems; physical comedy and emotion;

Calvin Coolidge

Harding VP; became presi after Harding died;

Jack Dempsey

Jack Dempsey (greatest boxer in the 1920s; known as the mauler); world heavyweight champion in 1920s; made $300,000 in one fight; first person involved in the first million dollar gate (gate: how much an event makes); fought in a boxing ring in a field with a fence around it (Ne Jersey); charged people to get in; 91,000 ppl came (not all could see; ppl went to say they went); people started building bigger stadiums afterwards; most people listened to boxing matches on radio;

Track

Jesse Owens; one of the fasted men in our history; going to the 1936 Olympics in Germany; Adolf Hitler told his athletes that they were gonna win the Olympics and that Owens couldn't win a medal bc he was black; Owens thought about not going bc of all the hate; ran 4 events (100, 200, high jump, long jump); won gold in 100, 200, high jump; Hitler was beside himself; excited for the long jump bc greatest German athlete was Luz Long from Germany; greatest long jumper in the history of the world; judges for the long jump are German; Owens's coach says Jesse will take a practice run; judges say it counts; 2nd jump he scratched (put his toe on the line); Luz Long is watching (in 1st place); Long says the last jump was amazing; says he doesn't need to be close to the line to beat Long; Owens broke the record on his last jump with his foot like a foot in front of the line; Hitler put Long on the front line when they invaded Poland (he died); he and Owens wrote to each other every week before Long died;

Great black athletes

Joe Louis (best boxer); Jesse Owens (track); Charlie Sifford (Golf); Jackie Robinson (Baseball); Glenn Burke (Baseball)

Greatest boxer in the 1930s

Joe Louis; was a man among boys; no one has ever punched harder than him; probably the greatest of all time; when he retired, became a golfer; broke the color barrier in golf; so hard to break the color barrier bc most ppl couldn't get into country clubs

Fashion

Men: fur coats; Women: flappers

Football

Red Grange (The Galloping Ghost); played for the Bears; 300 rushing yards in a game; made $5,000 a game; NFL allowed blacks to play; 7 blacks in the NFL but by 1928 there were none bc treated so badly; weren't allowed in the huddle sometimes;

Immigration

The US will take a number=to 2% of the population of America from that country; called the Immigration Act; Johnson-Reed Act banned Japan China and Middle east; only allowed 164,667 immigrants a year; our government thought that we had too many southern European ppl in our country (no Greece, Slavs, Italy); allowed this to last until 1965; in 1921 805,000 immigrants came to America; annual quota for Italians was 6,000 a year (1920s);

Charles Lindbergh

US airmail pilot; first person to try transatlantic solo flight non-stop; gonna navigate like Columbus (looking at the stars); no way to talk to him in the air so we don't know what is going on; when he lands in pairs US goes berserk; biggest star of the 20s; gets $25,000 reward; couldn't go anywhere without being hounded by fans; fame has its price; 18.5 month old son is kidnapped; $50,000 of ransom; he had the money so payed the ransom; find his son dead in the woods; criminal was a blue collar guy from Germany; marked the bills; the guy buys gas so they find him and executed him; Lindbergh moves to Europe to get out of the US; died in 1974; on his deathbed he sent 2 letters to two women that he had children with in Europe; after his death the women came out and said they had kids with him;

President Harding dies in office

became president in 1921; seen as worst president of all time; ignored a lot of things that were going on; started off the Great Depression; decided to visit 15,000 miles of land in 1923; wanted to show the west coast that he cares about them; gets sick in Seattle; when he gets to San Fran he has lost 25 lbs, throwing up everywhere and has a fever; got food poisoning from clam chowder; dies in San Fran; a lot of ppl thought his wife poisoned him bc of all the affairs; took his body back on a train

KKK

bigger than ever and came back in the 1920s; now on the Catholics, Jews and immigrants (as well as blacks); grew to 4.5 mil ppl in the 20s; Scandals dropped them to 10,000 members;

Jazz Age

black ppl going from South to North bc they are more appreciated for their skills; a 50 cent gig in south was $200 in north;

Moonshining and bootlegging

bootlegging: brining alcohol from other countries illegally; Canada: whiskey and beer; Mexico: tequila; Bahamas: rum; moonshining: aka "White Lighting"; high-proof (proof: double the alcohol %) distilled spirits; generally produced illicitly; made in the woods where ever there is water; cheaper and stronger; typically made with corn mash as main ingredient and starter; liquor-control laws in US prohibit moonshining;

Jackie Robinson

broke the color barrier in Baseball; played minor league baseball in Montreal; got hate, racism, death threats; played for the Brooklyn Dodger (owned by Branch Rickey); Rickey's idea to integrate baseball; played on a small team with a few black people (black ppl were run off the team); wanted to right his wrong; Robinson wasn't allowed to stay or eat with his team (slept on the bus); teammates wouldn't hang out with him; one day a teammate opens up to him (asks him to take a shower with the team); a manager Phillies making fun of him during a game; one of Robinson's teammates challenges the manager to a fight; two ppl started a petition to not play with Robinson; Rickey traded them to Pittsburg for a bat and some balls; Pee Wee Reese was one of the ppl who didn't sign the petition; grew up in a Kentucky (very racist); publicly was friends on a baseball field with Robinson's while Pee Wee's fam was watching; #42 (Jackie's number) is retired; on Robinson's day everyone in MLB wears #42;

Baseball

color barrier; many great players couldn't play; Josh Gibson (Cool Papa Bell) could have been best catcher; Satchel Page could've been the best pitcher; wasn't allowed to play until he was 60 (had to pitch anywhere he could; had to pitch in the black leagues for cheap);

Motels/hotels

could stay for a day and park your car right next to your room

Grocery stores

easier to ship goods in; easier to carry food out to homes; first two were Piggly Wiggle and Safeway

Jim Braddock

known as a Cinderella man; wasn't great and wasn't paid much; couldn't take care of his family; fought for about $50 a fight; fought with a broken hand bc he couldn't afford the heat; wouldn't hit with his right bc it hurt too much; banned from boxing for 2 years bc he "wasn't fighting enough"; went to the docks to work; some days he worked some days he didn't; one day his manager tells him there is a fight against the #2 in the world; $200 gig; hadn't fought in 7 months; Corn Griffin is the opponent; out of Nebraska; undefeated; Braddock wins; got afford $200 daily to train;

Women' s sports

first started to play in 1920; couldn't play before bc ppl thought if they were hurt they wouldn't be able to have babies; tennis and swimming most popular; Helen Willis best tennis player (31 championships); Gertrude Ederle first to swim the English Channel ever; no contact sports however;

Babe Ruth

grew up in Baltimore; party life (Drank all night, smoked, ate hotdogs all the time during a game); never wanted to run or practice; started as a pitcher (one of the best); Boston traded him to NY; eventually designated hitter; could change a game in one inning; ppl came out just to see him; very generous; would get $100 in singles before games and go to a poor neighborhood, handed each kid a dollar bill; told a cancer kid that he would hit two homeruns for him; called his shot against the Cubs in the world series (1932); having lemons thrown at him by cubs fans; hit him in the back of the neck (no helmets); jeering starting to get to him; had someone run for him after 1st base bc he was so out of shape; died of throat cancer very young; wanted to be a manager after baseball but no one would take him;

Prosperity Decade

industries are making people's lives better and easier; cereal changed people's lives; didn't have to buy ingredients for elaborate meals for breakfast; ads became a thing; washers and dryers invented; vacuum cleaners, toasters and irons also invented;

Five reasons sports flourished in 1920-30s

leisure time: wasn't really leisure time before 1920 (1910; avg American worked 70 hrs a week, 1920; 45 hrs a week), first time in our country when ppl thought it wasn't cool to work all the time (weekends off now); movies invented; previews showed sports game highlights; radio, movies, newspaper: first radio broadcast from Detroit, by 1927 80 mil ppl had one; brought sports and politics into a home and brought families together; commercials became a thing; newspapers improved literacy; sports writers as famous as athletes (gave the athletes their nicknames); made sports more popular bc easier to get info on players; more people living in and around the city that ever before: actually nicer to live around a city than inside (suburbs created); made going to a game easier; strong economy: more ppl making money than ever before; avg household income: 1915, $700; 1920, $2,800; 1925, $3,300; more jobs; labor laws; more money spent on movies, sports, restaurants, cafes; the automobile: The Model T (Henry Ford); 90% had a car; was economical bc Ford made an assembly line to make more jobs and cheaper cars (more people payed a little less, cars made faster and cheaper); 1908, Model T costs $850; 1927, $270; Henry Ford made sure all his workers had a car;

Harold Lloyd

more about physical comedy than social discussion; Charlie chaplain's competitor;

Car businesses

motels/hotels; car repair; gas stations; car insurance; dealerships; delivery; grocery stores

Why it's the roaring 20s

needed heroes after WWI; ppl were upset after WWI; 1920s about entertainment; people partied all the time; women's fashion changed and started smoking in public; unemployment rate in 1920s was 2%; laws to protect workers too

Glenn Burke

only played 1978-1979; pushed out afterwards; gay black man; first played for dodgers and then for the A's; dodger's manager offered him $75,000 to marry a woman; burke refused; traded to the A's; when manager found out he was gay he was let go; played for a gay baseball league and dominated; invented high five during a home-run celebration;

Al Capone

out of Chicago; made $60 mil selling alcohol, $25 mil from gambling and shaking ppl down; owned Chicago and the entire mid-west; worked from fear; killed anyone in the way; drivers, lawyers, connection; had it all; would give money to ppl in need so ppl loved him; when asked what he did for a living he said "I give ppl what they want";

Booming investments: real estate

people made mils $ off of land; bought piece of land; payment due at the end of the month; sold it before then so made free money off of it; ruined our economy; people who did this called "binder boys"; afterwards you needed someone from the government to approve a contract;

Speakeasy

secret gin joints; a place where alcohol was served but illegal; 125 speakeasies in NY; secret knock and password to get in; interracial; open to men and women; women owned a lot of these; hidden in cellars and buildings; cops were payed off to ignore the speakeasys

Bessie Smith

top female jazz artists of 1920s; spoke her mind despite criticism; defends herself;

Elliot Ness

went after Capone; when agents went after or questioned him they were dead the next day; Ness and 3 other guys go after Capone and can't get to him;