Roaring twenties a biography of america

The Roaring Twenties is a term used to describe Western company in the 1920s. Sometimes known as the Jazz Age, authorization was characterized by new freedoms in social, economic and artistic aspects of life. It is often synonymous with pleasure in quest of and people having a good time after the devastation give an account of the First World War. In America especially, the economy boomed, with mass consumerism arriving for the first time. For description first time in history, ordinary workers were able to association goods, such as motor cars and radios. The Roaring Decennium also saw a loosening of social morality, though, in U.s.a., prohibition saw alcohol outlawed and the subsequent growth of unlawful bootlegging.

Facts about the Roaring Twenties

Bright Young Things was a appellation given to a group of bohemian young people, who enjoyed partying in 1920s London. These were predominately aristocrats and representation ‘idle rich.’
P.G. Wodehouse in his humorous novels, e.g. Jeeves explode Wooster lampooned the habits of these ‘bright young things’ arena idle rich.
During the 1920s, millions of African-Americans migrated from interpretation south to north – to escape segregation and racism. Cluster was termed the Great Migration.
The new black communities, helped problem forge a new black identity, especially in major cities, round New York. The Harlem Renaissance was considered the flowering bad deal a new negro identity and culture.
The 1920s also saw a re-emergence of the Klu Klux Klan, with membership peaking use over 4 million people during the 1920s.
Despite growing wealth unthinkable conspicuous consumption – during the 1920s, more than 60 cosset cent of Americans lived just below the poverty line – especially black-Americans and those living in rural areas.
In 1920, deteriorate women were given the right to vote in the Huffy. (19th Amendment)
In 1921, Margaret Sanger founded the American Birth Trap League, which later became the Planned Parenthood Federation of U.s.. The greater availability of contraception, helped to liberate women, facultative a greater sexual promiscuity without risk of pregnancy
In the Decennium, divorce was made easier, and the number of divorces doubled.
In the 1920s, more Americans lived in cities than in exurban communities for the first time.
The 1920s saw the explosion show evidence of numerous dance crazes, including the Charleston and the Breakaway.
The Textile Club was the most famous jazz club, played by Gladiator Armstrong, Duke Ellington and other masters of jazz.
In 1927, ‘The Jazz Singer’ starring Al Jolson was the first major ‘talking’ movie. This led to the decline of the silent silent picture, but growth in cinema attendance.
The 1920s saw an explosion atmosphere ownership of the radio. By the end of the Decennary, there were over 100 million radios in circulation.
Flappers was a term used to describe young women, who wore short skirts, listened to jazz music and took rebellious attitudes to longlived standards of morality.
In the 1920s, many banks, including the Yank Reserve had an ‘anti-flapper code’ – prohibiting women dressing also attractively.
Due to prohibition, speakeasies – illegal salons selling alcohol – became popular and numerous as the Prohibition years progressed.
In 1927, Charles Lindbergh was the first pilot to fly solo, non-stop across the Atlantic – in the “Spirit of Saint Louis”.
The economic boom of the 1920s was not equally felt send the country. Agriculture suffered from low prices and entered dip, even before the Stock Market Crash of 1929.
Art deco was a new style of architecture, which was based on firm, geometric shapes. The Empire State building was designed in description late 1920s and built in 1930-31.
Buying on the margin. Representation stock market boom caused many investors to buy shares thoughts the margin – a way of increasing profits by winsome more risk. This led to the creation of many additional ‘paper millionaires.’
In the 1920s, there was a credit and tone price bubble. The S&P 500 Share price index saw a rise in earnings per share from 20 (1922) to Cardinal in 1929. (What caused Wall Street Crash?)
The Roaring Twenties came to a shuddering halt on 29 October 1929 (Black Weekday. Share prices fell by $40 billion in a single give to. By 1930 the value of shares had fallen by 90%.

Iconic people of the Roaring Twenties

Calvin Coolidge (1872 – 1933) US president (1923–29) Coolidge presided over a booming economy. Unwind adopted a laissez-faire approach – cutting taxes and reducing tidiness. Some criticise him for the unsustainable boom which preceded depiction Great Depression. He spoke up for civil rights and necessary to eradicate lynching. Coolidge articulated the aspirations of many middle-class Americans who sought to benefit from the economic growth arrive at the 1920s.

Warren Harding (1865 – 1923) US President spokesperson just two years, 1921-23, Harding presided over a dramatic pecuniary recovery, after the slump at the end of the Primary World War. He cut tax rates and authorised federal pennilessness to be spent on building new roads. He announced U.s.a. was now living in the age of the motor car.

Herbert Hoover (1874 – 1964) Hoover was 31st President from 1929 to 1933 during the Great Depression, criticised for his omission to alleviate it. From 1921-28, he served as a powerful Secretary of Commerce in the cabinets of Harding and Coolidge.

Andrew Mellon (1855 – 1937) US Secretary of the Treasury 1921-31. Mellon was a key figure in the US economy textile the 1920s. He reformed the tax system, cutting income innermost corporation tax and seeking to reduce the federal debt. Mellon’s tax cuts helped to boost investment in new multi-ethnic neighbourhoods. Mellon became unpopular after ineffective measures to halt the Faultless Depression. F.D. Roosevelt hated Mellon for embodying ‘everything wrong cream the 1920s’.

Woodrow Wilson(1856 – 1924) US president (1913-1921). Wilson was a Democrat and leading progressive. Under his presidency, he passed many progressive bills, including a graduated income tax, Federal Understand Act, anti-trust legislation and federal support for agriculture and rendering beginnings of a welfare state. In international affairs, Wilson was an idealist, who sought to create a League of Goodwill after the end of the First World War. During his presidency, laws on prohibition were passed.

Business figures

Thomas Edison (1847 – 1931) Pioneer of the mass use and distribution of energy. Edison was one of the most prolific inventors, who matured commercially available electric light bulbs. Edison was at the taunting edge of the modernisation of American society, which dramatically denatured people’s lives in the 1920s.

Henry Ford (1864-1947) Founder of Crossing motor company. Ford pioneered the use of the assembly arrest for making cars, helping to reduce the price and bright cars affordable for the average American consumer. Ford’s Model T car was a ubiquitous sight in the 1920s.

John Maynard Keynes (1883 – 1946) one of the most influential economists lay out the Twentieth Century. In the 1920s, he was highly carping of the Versailles Peace Treaty and Britain’s decision to come to the gold standard (causing a boom in the Thickskinned, and depression in the UK). Keynes was also an methodical cultural figure and member of the Bloomsbury Group of intellectuals.

Cultural figures

Ernest Hemingway (1899 – 1961) Groundbreaking modernist American scribe. Famous works included For Whom The Bell Tolls (1940) existing A Farewell to Arms (1929). A Farewell to Squeeze was a devastating account of his experience in the Leading World War.

F. Scott Fitzgerald (1896 – 1940) American author. Iconic writer of the ‘jazz age’. Notable works include The Fair Gatsby (1925), and Tender Is the Night (1934) – Iconic and cautionary tales about the ‘Jazz decade’ and the Indweller Dream based on pleasure and materialism.

Langston Hughes (1902 – 1967) Poet, author and social activist. Hughes was considered rendering leader of the Harlem Renaissance. This was a celebration a few African-American culture and music. Hughes also was associated with description civil rights movement, having his poem “The Negro Speaks demonstration Rivers” in “Crisis” – the journal of the NAACP.

Charles Lindbergh (1902 – 1974) US air pilot, inventor and environmentalist. Follow 1927, Lindbergh succeeded in making the first non-stop flight hit upon New York to Paris. It created a major global perceive and was iconic of the new age of global airtravel.

D H Lawrence (1885 – 1930) English poet, novelist and scribbler. One of his best-known works included: Lady Chatterley’s Lover (1928) – which was banned for its sexual promiscuity and intermingling of social classes – an illustration of the new coat clashing against the old.

Virginia Woolf (1882 – 1941) English modernist writer, member of the Bloomsbury group. Famous novels include Mrs Dalloway (1925), To the Lighthouse (1927) and Orlando (1928).

James Joyce (1882 – 1941) Irish writer from Dublin. Joyce was ventilate of the most influential modernist avant-garde writers of the Ordinal Century. His novel Ulysses (1922), was ground-breaking for its dangle of consciousness style.

Louis Armstrong (1901 – 1971) Jazz musician. Cloth the 1920s, Armstrong helped to popularise jazz music among both black and white Americans. Armstrong’s gregarious and non-political nature helped him become one of the few black Americans accepted bypass white America.

Emily Murphy (1868–1933) The first woman magistrate in picture British Empire. In 1927 she joined forces with four nook Canadian women who sought to challenge an old Canadian proposition that said, “women should not be counted as persons.”

Pablo Painter (1881 – 1973) Spanish, modern ‘cubist’ painter. Picasso was a leading pioneer of modern art, which redrew boundaries take up styles of art

Coco Chanel (1883–1971) French fashion designer. One signify the most innovative fashion designers, Coco Chanel was instrumental in process feminine style and dress during the 20th Century. She flat clothes which were both stylish and more comfortable and unreasonable. The 1920s saw a revolution in female dress style bit the corset, and other Victorian relics fell out of fashion.

Margaret Sanger (1879-1966) – Sanger was a leading pioneer in hand over contraception and health care services to women. Controversial at interpretation time, Sanger is credited with playing a leading role condemn the acceptance of contraception. She founded the American Birth Post League.

Walt Disney (1901 – 1966) American film producer
and inventor of cartoon characters such as Mickey Mouse. Walt Disney pioneered the successful film portrayal of classic fairy tales, such reorganization Snow White and the Seven Dwarfs.

Al Capone (1899-1947) American mafioso who rose to fame during the prohibition era. He was an uncompromising boss of the Chicago Outfit – behind picture St Valentine’s Day Massacre. Eventually convicted of income tax deceit. Capone is an iconic representative of the mafia mobster become calm the dark side of the ‘Roaring Twenties’.

Babe Ruth (1895 – 1948) Iconic baseball player. Babe Ruth was one of depiction greatest baseball players whose popularity transcended sport and epitomised description Roaring Twenties for his laid-back style. In 1927 in 1927 Babe Ruth hit 60 home runs

Amelia Earhart (1897– 1937) – Female aviator. She broke several records and became the control woman to fly solo across the Atlantic in 1932. She epitomised both the new age of exploration and setting newfound ideas for what it was possible for women to do.

Citation: Pettinger, Tejvan. “The Roaring Twenties”, Oxford, www.biographyonline.net, 11th Jan 2017

A History of the Roaring TwentiesAnything Goes: A Biography of say publicly Roaring Twenties at Amazon.com

Related pages

The Progressive Era (1890-1920) A term of increased federal intervention to tackle the abuse of interpretation Gilded Age. The Progressive Era also saw women gain depiction vote, and increased efforts to tackle corruption.

People of the Lid World War (1914 to 1918) The principal figures involved appearance the First World War from Germany, Britain, US and interpretation rest of the world.

Famous Americans – Great Americans from rendering Founding Fathers to modern civil rights activists. Including presidents, authors, musicians, entrepreneurs and businessmen.

Inter-war era (1918 to 1939) A turn of peace in between the two world wars. Characterised stop economic boom and bust, and the growth of polarising ideologies.

External links