The 1920s
The Bright Side and The Dark Side
Introduction
Bloodied by the war and disillusioned by the peace, Americans turned inward in the 1920s. Americans denounced "radical" foreign ideas, condemned "unAmerican" lifestyles, and clanged shut the immigration gates against foreign peoples...The boom of the golden twenties showered genuine benefits on Americans, as incomes and living standards rose for many. New technologies, new consumer products, and new forms of leisure and entertainment made the twenties roar. Yet just beneath the surface lurked widespread anxieties about the future and fears that America was losing sight of its traditional ways.
The Bright Side: Sports Heroes!
Sports became big business in the Roaring Twenties. As a full-time player with the Yankees, Babe Ruth hit an incredible 54 home runs in 1920 and he followed that with 59 in 1921. Aside from the Yankees, no team in the major leagues surpassed those figures. Because of illness, he appeared in only 110 games in 1922, but came back to lead the league in home runs again with 41 in 1923 and 46 in 1924.(Facts on File)
The Bright Side: The Model T!
In 1914, Henry Ford turned out his 500,000th Model T. By 1930 his total had risen to 20 million, or, on a bumper-to-bumper basis, more than enough to encircle the globe. A national newspaper and magazine poll conducted in 1923 revealed Ford to be the people's choice for the presidential nomination in 1924. By 1929, 26 million motor vehicles were registered in the United States. (Kennedy; The American Pageant)
The Flapper!
Women's styles changed drastically in the 1920s. In the 20th century, fashion largely broke free from the rigid dress codes and moral constraints that had dominated it in previous centuries. The mass production of clothing allowed fashion to become available to all classes of people rather than to just the wealthy. For the first time, fashion walked the line between high art, in the form of custom-made haute couture, and mass-produced commodity. It also allowed for greater individual style, because people had more purchasing options. Fashion therefore became both an expression of a person's individual style and a vehicle for demonstrating a political stance, a rebellious spirit, or racial, class, or sexual identity. (Facts on File: Clothing and Fashion in the 20th century)