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Huge amounts of economic growth after the onset of the stock market and an explosion of consumerism. -Mark McGuire

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The Roaring Twenties: Definition and Facts | HISTORY

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The Roaring Twenties were a period of rapid economic growth and social change. Read about flappers, Prohibition, the Harlem Renaissance and more.

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S.L.

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Essex County Digitized Newspapers

Please note: The New Jersey State Library may not have access to any of the commercially accessible papers listed below. They are presented here for your information only. Please check with your local public library to see if they subscribe to the database listed. NJSL's collections can be found here: NJSL Newspaper Guide

Belleville

Newark

Jewish Chronicle
(1921 - 1943)

Commercial Access via America's Historical Newspapers;
Commercial Access via Genealogy Bank

Newark Daily Advertiser
(1832 - 1866)

Commercial Access via America's Historical Newspapers;
Commercial Access via Genealogy Bank;
Commercial Access via Local Historical Newspaper Archives

Free Access via Chronicling America

Morning Edition:
Free Access via Chronicling America

Preceded by the Evening Star and Newark Advertiser, proceeded by Newark Star and Newark Advertiser

Urban League of Essex County Newsletter
(1971 - 1972)

Free Access via the Newark Public Library

Incomplete, 4 issues. Alternate name is The Bulletin

Last updated October 27, 2021

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Research Guides: New Jersey Digitized Historic Newspapers: Essex County

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American Sports in the 1920s for kids: Pictures of Famous Sports Stars
The photographs and pictures of the famous stars of sports in the 1920s are a useful addition to the facts sheet. The names of the famous sports stars are Gene Tunney, Babe Ruth, Satchel Paige, Jack Dempsey, Johnny Weissmuller and Joe Lewis.

Gene Tunney

Babe Ruth

Satchel Paige

Jack Dempsey

Johnny Weissmuller

Joe Lewis

Facts about Sports in the 1920s for kids The following fact sheet contains interesting facts and information about Sports in the 1920's for kids.

Facts about Sports in the 1920s for kids

Sports in the 1920s Fact 4: College Sports for Men: The vast majority of College students in the 1920's were men and its history dated back to 1859. The first Sporting favorites at college included baseball and football but the range soon extended to include athletics, gymnastics and basketball. Spectators and gate receipts became a regular part of college games..

Sports in the 1920s Fact 8: Spectator Sports and Stadiums: Spectator sports such as basketball, baseball and boxing reached new heights of popularity in the 1920s and massive stadiums were built in cities to cater for the increasing interest of people who wanted to watch and enjoy the excitement of spectator sports.

Sports in the 1920s Fact 9: Madison Square Garden: Madison Square Garden was originally an indoor arena as a theater, for concerts and also housed a restaurant. Madison Square Garden was rebuilt in 1925 in order to hold popular sporting events such as boxing, basketball and ice hockey. Madison Square Garden rebuilt in 249 days at the cost of $4.75 million by boxing promoter Tex Rickard.

Sports in the 1920s Fact 10: The Yankee Stadium: The Yankee Stadium, located in the Bronx, in New York City was built in 1927 as a ballpark for baseball. The Yankee Stadium was built from 1922 - 1923 for $2.4 million ($32 million equivalent today). Yankee Stadium officially opened on Wednesday, April 18, 1923, with the Yankees' first home game, against the Boston Red Sox. It was given the nickname, "The House That Ruth Built" in reference to Babe Ruth, the legendary baseball superstar whose popularity coincided with the opening of the stadium and the winning successes of the Yankees.

Sports in the 1920s Fact 12: National Air Races: The National Air Races, also known as Pulitzer Trophy Races, began in 1920 when publisher Ralph Pulitzer sponsored an air race on Long Island, New York in an effort to promote aviation. Refer to Early US Aviation

Sports in the 1920s Fact 13: Baseball's World Series: Baseball's World Series was broadcast on radio for the first time in October 1921
and Americans listened to the thrilling radio commentary as the New York Giants defeated the New York Yankees.

Refer to Sports in the 1920s Fact 16: Discrimination and Prejudice: There was Discrimination and Prejudice in every aspect of the 1920's sporting arenas, just as in every other aspect of American society. Racial prejudice against African Americans were prevalent as was discrimination from the "New Immigrants" from South-western Europe such as Italy, Greece and Poland . The infamous Jim Crow Laws restricted whites and blacks from playing baseball, basketball and football together. Black boxers were even forbidden from sparring with white boxers. Old Immigrants vs New Immigrants and Jim Crow Laws for facts and info. The pride inspired by the Harlem Renaissance inspired African Americans to excel in the American sporting arena.

: Women had also been treated as 'second class citizens'. However times were changing in the 1920's. Women gained the right to vote in 1920 and the Roaring Twenties saw the emergence of Sports in the 1920s Fact 17: Women Flappers who challenged traditional ideas in social conventions and influenced women's fashion - including sporting attire for women.

knickerbockers and baggy trousers came into vogue enabling women to enjoy comfortable sports clothing for golf and and the new rage for bicycling. Famous fashion designer Jean Patou introduced styles suited to outdoor fashion and women's sportswear. He moved fashion towards the natural and comfortable clothes and became famous for his daring sleeveless and knee-length tennis dress that he designed for Suzanne Lenglen, the legendary French tennis champion. For more facts refer to Sports in the 1920s Fact 18: Fashion and Sportswear for Women: Women's fashion changed and short 1920's Fashion for Women.

Sports in the 1920s Fact 19: Fashion and Sportswear for Men: Sports and leisure influenced fashion and sportswear for men. New, casual attire like jumpers, jodhpurs, plus-fours and knickerbockers. College sporting stars inspired the widespread fashion of 'letterman sweaters'. For more facts refer to 1920s Men's Fashion.

Sports in the 1920s Fact 21: The Harlem Renaissance: The Harlem Renaissance was a period during the 1920s when African-American achievements in art, literature and music flourished. The Harlem Renaissance was important because it inspired an explosion of pride and was perceived as a new beginning for African Americans and led to many achievements by African American sports heroes..

Continued...

Facts about Sports in the 1920s for kids

Facts about Sports in the 1920s for kids The following fact sheet continues with facts about Sports in the 1920s for kids.

Facts about Sports in the 1920s for kids

Sports in the 1920s Fact 36: Jack Dempsey: Jack Dempsey was a famous boxer who held the title of world heavyweight champion
from 1919 until 1926, when he lost it to Gene Tunney. When Jack Dempsey attempted to win back the
title in 1927, the publicity and enthusiasm for the boxing rematch reached such a frenzy that just one store sold $90,000 worth of radios, a massive sum at that time, in the two weeks leading up to the rematch. 74 radio stations carried the Dempsey-Tunney bout to an audience of nearly 15 million listeners. Jack Dempsey was the first to earn $1,000,000 for one boxing match.

Facts about Sports in the 1920s for kids

American Sports in the 1920s Facts for kids: List of Famous American Sports Stars in the 1920s Many of the names of Famous American Sports stars are detailed on the following list.

List of Famous American Sports Stars in the 1920s

Gertrude Ederle ● Red Grange ● Gene Tunney ● Jack Dempsey ● Babe Ruth ● Bill Tilden ● Knute Rockne ● Betty Robinson ● Lou Gehrig ● Walter Hagen ● Bobby Jones ● Helen Wills ● Jesse Owens ● Henry McDonald ● Johnny Weissmuller ● Joe Lewis ● Oscar Charleston ● Satchel Paige ● Walter "Toots" Wright ● Al "Runt" Pullins

List of Famous American Sports Stars in the 1920s

Facts about Sports in the 1920s for kids
For visitors interested in the history of life in America during the 1920's refer to the following articles:

American Sports in the 1920s for kids
The article on American Sports in the 1920s provides detailed facts and a summary of the important events and people in the history of the United States - a crash course in American History. The following video will give you additional important facts, history and dates about the personal and political lives of all the US Presidents.

Sports in the 1920s

● Interesting Facts about Sports in the 1920s for kids and schools and sports stars
● The History of Sports in the 1920s in America for kids
● History of Sports in the 1920s and famous and sports stars
● List of names of famous Sports in the 1920s
● Fast, fun Facts about Sports in the 1920s and sports stars
● Sports in the 1920s and sporting heroes
● Fast, Fun Facts about the Sports in the 1920s and sports stars for schools, homework, kids and children

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Sports in the 1920s: Baseball, Boxing, Football Sports Stars ***

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Find a summary, definition and facts about the Sports in the 1920s for kids. Interesting facts about Sports in the 1920s, names of sports celebrities and events. Short facts about Sports in the 1920s for kids, children, homework and schools.

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Golden age in African American culture, characterized by literature, music, stage performance, and art. -Mark McGuire

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Harlem Renaissance - Definition, Artists & How It Started | HISTORY

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The Harlem Renaissance marked a golden age in Black culture.

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Mackenzie Danzig

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To properly answer the question "What did women and men wear in the 1920s?" would depend on what they were doing, with whom, and at what time of day. Here you will learn about the types of clothing women and men wore for specific occasions. Follow the links within for even more 1920s fashion history.

Something that stands out to me about vintage fashion prior to the '60s is how often wealthy men and women changed clothing in one day. There was an outfit for every time of day, every type of outing, and every type of party. Add to that specific types of clothing for your age, class, and occupation, and you have one huge wardrobe!

Each type of clothing in a 1920s closet had a certain set of guidelines as to when they were to be worn. What were the "rules" for morning dress, afternoon dress, and evenings? What about going to school or working?

First, let's explore women's clothing. For men's 1920s fashion, read this article.
1920s Fashion Trends for Women

Below-knee length drop-waist dresses with a loose, straight fit.

Beaded evening dresses inspired by "flappers."

Mary Jane or T-strap heel shoes.

Casual sport golf knickers, argyle socks, blouse and tie.

Cocoon fur coats and fringe wraps.

Cloche hats and short bobbed hairstyles.

Bead or feather headbands for evenings.

Long pearl necklaces, bold Art Deco colors, faux gemstones.

Small beaded purses held pretty makeup compacts and cigarette cases.

1920s House Dresses

While at home in the company of just family, clothing was at its most comfortable state.

The housewife wore a simple cotton dress, thick black cotton stockings, and low heel Oxfords. Dresses were colorful plaids, checks, stripes, or solid colors with pretty embroidery and trim such as lace or rick rack. Housedresses often had white collars.

A woman's apron was usually handmade. The housedresses and aprons were basic, yet durable enough for the rigors of 1920s household chores (vacuums, washers, and irons were just entering the marketplace). For the very poor, a cotton housedress was the only outfit for the day.
Shop 20s house dresses/day dresses.
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1920s Women's Work Clothing

Women in manual labor such as factory work, sewing, nursing, maids or nannies, and foodservice were required to wear specialty uniform coat/smock or apron over a cotton house frock. Girls who worked as shop assistants had to dress a little nicer, with a daytime dress or a uniform of shirtwaist dress with a white collar.

Even while working at a silk mill, young women took the time to stay on the fashion trend. Here a worker in 1924 has the latest bobbed haircut and what appears to be canton silk (silk and cotton) blend dress with an embroidered waistband.

For women who worked professional jobs- such as teachers, secretaries, journalists, and telephone operators- a modest day dress or skirt and blouse set was worn. A three-piece suit could also be worn.

1920s Traveling Clothes

Traveling in the 1920s was a dirty affair. Cars were dusty, trains were hot, and buses were so packed with commuters that people were bound to be a wrinkled mess by the time they arrived at their destination. For those reasons, 1920s traveling clothes, for both men and women, were simple suits, a sturdy overcoat, a comfortable hat, leather gloves, a leather purse or luggage, and low profile shoes.

Colors were neutral greys, browns, and blues that showed the least amount of dirt possible. Materials that wrinkled, like linen and cotton, were avoided and instead knit, wool, or sturdy cotton blends were preferred.

If travel required an overnight stay, a woman would have packed a conservative tailored pajama or nightgown. She was sure to pack all of her own toiletries so she would not inconvenience the host!

1920s Street Wear, Daytime Clothes

When a woman was done with her housewife chores, it was time to run some errands while her husband went to work. Clothing was still simple but of a higher quality than cotton prints. A walking suit ( skirt, blouse and sweater) paired with a sturdy pair of mid-heel Oxfords, Mary Janes, or T-Strap shoes is the most utilitarian of the daytime dress.

A tailored dress made of a silk blend crepe or wool was also appropriate. These dresses featured a natural waist sash in the early 20s that gradually moved down into a drop waist with a thin belt by 1926. Dresses fit loose and usually slipped on overhead.

A small collar or wide open flat collar with a bow tie at the neck was essential to the '20s wardrobe. Details were added to the dress that elongated the body such as vertical pintucks, a long necktie, a row of buttons, and pleated, draped or tiered skirts.

Colors for city folk were a bit on the drab side: black, navy, grey, tan, and olive green. Country folk and seaside dwellers liked color: white in summer, yellow, red, blue, and light grey year-round. The difference between city and country clothing in Europe was far more pronounced than in America. Americans loved to disobey fashion "rules" and wore whatever color they personally liked. See 1920s fabrics and colors in fashion.

Learn more about daytime 20s dresses here or shop daytime appropriate dresses online.

Accessories with a suit or dress would coordinate, but not match, a woman's outfit, and were kept simple. Jewelry was left at home, but a cloche hat and gloves were essential. Stockings were matte and only semi-sheer at the most, in black or tan.

The hat is one accessory that women never left home without. There were hats for summer (woven straw, cotton) and winter (felt or hand sewn cloche hats). Hat trends included the tricorn when the Three Musketeers movie was popular, turban for fancy afternoons and evenings, the beret for the young lady, and a wide brim sun hat for garden parties.

The most iconic hat was the cloche, meaning "bell" because it was shaped with a round crown and a small brim. Women often had to tilt their head back to see clearly while wearing a cloche. Hats had less decoration than they did in previous years, but were still quite pretty with a bow, flower or Art Deco shape on one side.

Read more about women's 1920s hats. Shop 1920s style hats.

1920s Church Clothing / Special Events

Surprisingly, wearing Sunday's best was not part of the '20s culture unless a woman was poor and only had one nice outfit- then, certainly, she MUST wear that to church. Otherwise, whatever she wore for streetwear / afternoon attire she also wore to church, as long as it was modest with long sleeves and a below the knee hemline.

If a sleeveless dress was worn, a light shawl, wrap or jacket acted as a light coverup. Simple, non-distracting clothing was appreciated in church. Women were required to wear a hat, gloves, and a matching purse. These three accessories polished her look and gave her permission to add personality to an otherwise conservative dress.

Shop 20s dresses - day, party and evening styles all together. Over 500 choices!

Daytime or afternoon styles dresses may be more difficult to buy than a beaded flapper dress. Read these articles to help you find or make the perfect dress:

1920s Afternoon Tea Dresses, Party Dresses

A woman's most common social activity was having tea with friends. Tea parties could be semi-formal or formal. A tea dress was an afternoon dress made of lighter, brighter materials and more trim. The afternoon dress was a thing of sophisticated beauty. White dresses worn in summer were very attractive, while pastels or rich jewel tones offered variety in the other seasons.

Shoes and accessories were more dramatic, too. Shoes would be slip on pumps or one strap Mary Jane heels in medium or high height. Stockings would be sheerer and in white or colors to match the dress. Gloves would also match or be white (and were taken off to eat, smoke or use the restroom). A hat would be whatever is most becoming to the dress, such as a feather trim sun hat or decorative cloche. Carrying a parasol was a popular beach or summer party accessory.

Learn more about dressing in afternoon party dresses.

If a woman is to host the tea, then etiquette calls for her to NOT wear a hat and to keep her dress long and elegant. I don't quite understand the no hat rule, other than it just sets her apart from the sea of hatted guests. Instead, I imagine she would have had her hair styled specially for the occasion.

1920s Shoes

Women's shoes became more delicate and pretty over the roaring '20s decade, simply because they were more visible under short dresses. For daytime use, the low heel lace-up Oxford shoe in brown, white or black was worn every day. For something a little nicer when going out or dressing up, it was the classic Mary Jane heel with a single strap across the front.

The late 1920s T-strap heel is the most famous evening shoe because the two straps held onto the foot while dancing the Charleston. They often came in black and gold or silver with hand-painted heel designs that stood out on the dance floor. Straps and buckles were also decorated on fancier models.

There were basic slip-on pumps, low heel pumps with toe buckles inspired by colonial-era shoes, and multi-strap heels in the early '20s as well.

While flats were uncommon, you can find Mary Jane and T-strap shoes in the low heel or flat sole, as well as wide and narrow shoes and even specialty dance shoes.

For sportier occasions, the two-tone Oxford ( saddle shoes? yes) or classic Keds white sport sneakers were best for playing on grass or dirt. Hiking boots were very tall lace-up boots. Granny boots with a French heel were still worn by many mature women instead of shoes.

Learn about the history of 1920s shoes or shop for 1920s style shoes (USA) and UK here.

1920s Casual Outfits / Knitwear

Those college kids get to have all the fun fashions. Being away from parents (who did their laundry) and in a fashion-forward subculture, college kids wore sportier clothing such as knit dresses, knee length knit suits, knit sweaters, knit vests, knit socks, knits gloves... knit knit knit!

They wore cotton, linen, silk, and rayon dresses, too, but knitwear was sportswear and sportswear was what every trendy college kid was wearing.

As for shoes, you guessed it, sporty two-tone Oxfords, T-straps, and pumps were in vogue, and flashy satin sandals were out.

In winter, wearing a raccoon coat was high fashion! Fur collar cocoon-shaped coats were also trendy and a bit more affordable.

A sorority girl living in a community house needed a lounging robe or house jacket and slippers to remain modest. Her busy school schedule did not excuse her from changing clothing several times a day.

"Each girl's wardrobe should contain an extra dress or two which can be worn to meals. At breakfast and lunch, the girls will of necessity wear the dresses they wear to class. At dinner time they should change into something different. They will find themselves fresher in appearance and will be more sociable if they take time to change clothes before the evening meal." (Textiles and Clothing / by Elizabeth Sage.)

1920s Women's Sportswear

Specific sports called for different types of clothing; however, there were two primary sets. The first set was worn by golfers, tennis players and other ladylike sports. It consisted of a long or tea-length skirt, long sleeve blouse and a loose-knit vest or sweater. A thin belt tied the waist in.

A low heel Oxford or flat saddle shoes were best on grassy surfaces. It is a look similar to the college style above.

The second look was for more vigorous outdoor activities, such as hiking, riding, camping, and fishing. Instead of a skirt, women wore wool knickers (also called plus fours, togs, breeks or jodphurs). They were wide and baggy around the hips with a button cuff below the knee.

Women also wore thick stockings or knee-high argyle socks with a pair of flat Oxfords. A button-down shirt with collar and a skinny black tie gave a nod to menswear. Knit vests, pullover sweaters, and long cardigans added warmth. Many men did not appreciate this masculine look, but young adventurous women loved it.

Being able to wear pants (knickers) and "men's" clothing gave freedom to a new generation of women who embraced non-traditional roles. See more non-flapper outfit ideas here.

The all-white tennis outfit was another popular summertime outfit while playing or watching tennis and other sports.

1920s Beach Attire / Vacations

Weekends and vacations were a new trend in the 1920s. Beachside destinations were the most popular, and one where casual comfort was of the utmost importance. White or navy dresses with a nautical or sailor theme ( middy top and pleated skirt) were what all classes would wear.

Upper classes in the late 1920s began wearing a pants ensemble called beach pajamas. They were inspired by Asian prints with wide legs and a kimono-style top or jacket, they were one of the few times women could wear pants. Read about the this and other types of women's 1920s pants here.

Some women wore beach pajamas while lounging at home or playing a game of mahjongg. Miss Fisher wears quite a few flowing wide-leg pant and kimono coat ensembles while solving murder mysteries.

Shop 1920s pants and beach pajamas.

1920s Dinner & Dancing Outfits

Like tea parties, dinner with friends or going out to a restaurant would have been semi-formal or formal. If the occasion was semi-formal, then an afternoon dress/tea dress attire was all she would have needed.

Evening dresses were made of fine materials like silk, chiffon, taffeta and light velvet. They were usually sleeveless for young women or had long sleeves for older women. Dresses featured the iconic '20s drop waist with layers or tiers of fabric creating some fullness from the waist down.

Beaded dresses were the most glamorous and the most expensive. Some had fringe or metal sequins, but this was quite rare. The short fringed flapper dress is a '20s myth. Real flappers wore knee-length or longer gowns that swished and swayed while dancing to jazz music.

Shop 1920s party dresses- flapper dresses or long, formal evening gowns.

For more dresses in the UK, look at these and for AU/ NZ try these 20s dresses.

Hats were not appropriate for eveningwear unless it was a turban. Headbands, crowns, and hair combs were more appropriate in the first half of the decade, none in the second half.

The evening purse, too, would have been of a formal nature and made of sequins, gold mesh, glittering beads, or other colorful materials.

It would have also been wise to wear a matching dress jacket, fringe evening shawl, or fur wrap to a formal affair. Jewelry was minimal, perhaps a long bead or pearl necklace, drop earrings, and a bracelet were optional. Accessories such as long gloves, a hand fan, fringe shawl or boa, and cigarette holder were also glamorous additions.

1920s Mature Women's Fashion

Not everyone was a bright young thing in the 1920s, nor did they want to wear the latest fashion of drop-waist dresses. Many mature women continued to wear the fashions of 10 years prior to the 1920s. This meant long, modest, waistless tunic dresses, in dark rich fabrics.

Tall lace up boots or strappy heels were more comfortable for women who grew up wearing them. Hats were larger as well, not the helmet cloches of the roaring twenties.

For the mature women who chose to dress more modern, there were styles that were modest and simply decorated. Lane Bryant was one of the first mail-order catalogs to design garments for the mature, plus size and maternity market.

Most of the Lane Bryant fashions were modeled after the same designs worn in the mainstream, however, designs were usually of solid colors or small all-over prints with vertical lines created by long pleats, long lapels, and narrow belts.

Long sleeves and matching jackets were usually paired with straight-line dresses. These style details elongated the body and looked flattering on women of all shapes and ages. That doesn't mean you, as a modern woman, will be happy in the 1920s style dress, but half the battle is choosing the right design and making small alterations to enhance the '20s fit. Learn more with this free eBook.

Shop plus size dresses and mature women's dresses with sleeves.

More 20s Outfit Ideas

Read 10 easy 1920s costume ideas that are simple to put together from things you already own. Day and evening dresses, casual clothing, gangster girls, garden party, DIY, thrifted and more.

Ten 1920s Outfit ideas - Looks inspired by the 1920s costumes in the Downton Abbey TV series. Day, sporty, summer and winter looks.

How to dress like a 1920s flapper - Love the iconic flapper girl costume? Read this article for tips on staying authentic yet fun!

Non-flapper outfit ideas - Simple dresses, separates, pants, sportswear and non-beaded eveningwear outfits.

1920s Outfit Inspiration- Women 20s Costume Ideas

One Hour Dress Tips and Reviews - Sew a basic dress in only 2 hours. See many examples of how to adapt this vintage 1924 pattern into day and evening looks. This article on accessorizing a plain dress will help too.

20s costumes - cheaper Halloween costumes are affordable and fun! Look here for gangster girl costumes

More articles on 1920s fashion history can be found here.

What are you going to wear?

So there you have it. Any other type of activity you might encounter was usually determined by the time of day and the indication of formality. So, next time you head to a daytime tea party you will know to wear an afternoon dress or, for men, a summer white suit. For Gatsby's lavish affair, bare your arms and party like it is the day before prohibition starts!

Need help? Contact us anytime.

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What Did Women Wear in the 1920s? 20s Fashion Trends

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What did women and men wear in the 1920s? That depends of where you were going. A tea party, work, school, running errands, at home and church clothing.

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1900-1920 - AP U.S. History Timelines - Study Notes

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100% Free AP Test Prep website that offers study material to high school students seeking to prepare for AP exams. Enterprising students use this website to learn AP class material, study for class quizzes and tests, and to brush up on course material before the big exam day.

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S.L.

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About Sabin Arnold von Sochocky

The eldest son of Rev. Josyp Sokhotsky and Emilia Petrushevych was Savyn Sokhotsky.

Dr. Savyn Sokhotsky completed his medical studies and obtained a PhD in Europe and was a chemical scientist and inventor. He came to the United States in 1906 and worked in his own established company "Radium Luminous Corporation" in New York. He died on November 14, 1928 at his home in East Orange, New Jersey after a long and difficult ailment, and as one of the first victims of radium poisoning.

Sabin von Sochocky discovered a luminous paint formula that included radium. In 1913, in order to finance his medical research he developed a radium paint and sold some 2,000 radium dial watches. Dr. Sochocky is quote as saying in 1921 that "the time will doubtless come when you will have in your own house a room lighted entirely by radium. The light, thrown off by radium paint on walls and ceiling, would in color and tone be like soft moonlight."

From 1917 to 1926, the U.S. Radium Corporation was located at the intersection of High and Alden Streets in Orange, New Jersey. Dr. Sabin Arnold von Sochocky and Dr. George S. Willis founded the company in 1917. The Radium Corporation was engaged in the extraction and purification of radium from carnotite ore to produce luminous paints, which were produced under the brand name 'Undark'. As a defense contractor, U.S. Radium was a major supplier of radioluminescent watches to the military. Their plant in New Jersey employed over a hundred workers, mainly women, to paint radium-lit watch faces and instruments.

In the US, the first company to produce radioluminescent paint was the Radium Luminous Material Corporation in Newark New Jersey (Changed their name to United States Radium Company in 1921). It was founded in 1914 by Sabin von Sochocky and George Willis, both physicians. Their operations expanded tremendously when the United States entered World War I, and in 1917 they moved from Newark to Orange, New Jersey. They also got into the business of mining and producing radium. In 1921, they changed their name to the U.S. Radium Corporation.

The brand name for the radioluminescent paint produced by US Radium Corporation was "Undark." Standard Chemical Company used the name "Luna" and the Cold Light Manufacturing Company, a subsidiary of the Radium Company of Colorado, made "Marvelite."

During World War I, the U.S. Radium Corporation was a major supplier of luminous watches to the military. However, a major setback for the Corporation occurred when a number of dial painters died from what appeared to be a variety of unrelated health causes. It was later learned that the deaths were due to radiation contamination associated with exposure to radium, one of the prime ingredients of the luminescent paint. A major route of exposure was ingestion, as the dial painters used their mouths to form a point on the radium-tainted paintbrushes, enabling them to paint the small numbers on the watches. The dial painters were some of the first victims of radioactive poisoning. Earlier, Marie Curie, who first discovered radium in 1898, died from leukemia, which in all probability was caused by her long exposure to radium. Sabin Von Sochocky discovered a luminous paint formula that included radium and founded a company that sold luminous clock and watch dials. He died from aplastic anemia, also likely caused by radium exposure.

He died November 14, 1928 at the age of 45 at his house in East Orange, New Jersey after a long and difficult illness with his teeth and fingers all gone, as one of the first researchers and victims of radium poisoning. He became poisoned still in 1925 with his own invention of painting the dial numbers and indicators on watches with radium paint, that made them visible even in complete darkness. It was used in "glow-in-the-dark" paint for many years in the early part of the 20th century, until about 1960 or so.

Ingested radium was responsible for the deaths of many dial painters (people who painted the dials on watches and clocks) during the 1920s and 30s. These dial painters were using their lips and tongues to "point" the brushes they were using to paint the dials, and thus repeatedly swallowed a small amount of the radioactive paint.

Ingested radium is extremely dangerous, as elemental radium behaves much like calcium and thus is a "bone seeker"; it goes straight into the bones, and from there causes bone cancer. Many of the painters suffered from massive jaw cancers, as the radium tended to go into the teeth and jaw areas. Bone sarcomas were quite common, and the bones also became very brittle over time.

In the Radium Corporation company, five women and Dr. Edward Lehman, a U.S. Radium's chemist,

(a partner with Dr. Sokhotsky) were poisoned. The Radium Girls, as they became to be known as, were women subjected to radiation exposure at the United States Radium Corporation factory, in Orange, New Jersey, beginning during World War I, five of whom gained notoriety for their efforts in challenging their employer in court. The five women, and many of their co-workers and radium paint plant workers from across North America, died from radiation exposure during the course of the litigation.

Dr. Harrison Stanford Martland, who treated Dr. Sochocky, confirmed that large doses of radium had gone straight to his bones, and that there was no known cure for this ailment. Nevertheless, Dr. Sochocky, who was himself a medical doctor, believed that he would gradually get better. The infusion of blood (13 times) did not produce any positive results, and furthermore, with radium poisoning came other additional ailments and complications that hastened his tragic end.

During summer holidays, Dr. Sochotsky would travel every year for a few weeks of rest to Placerville, Colorado, where he conducted intense terrain research with the aim of uncovering an iron ore that would be complimentary with the production of radium. And indeed, he was successful in uncovering such a property and purchased it quite inexpensively. The minerals, that he found in Colorado, he would send for recasting in laboratories at the Radium Corporation in New Jersey.

Leading up to his illness, Dr. Sochocky was a wealthy man, but the ensuing tragedy as a result of the poisoning of his workers, of Dr. Lehman and eventually of himself, and the 3-year medical treatments swallowed up all of his wealth. The five "Radium Girls" agreed that each would receive $10,000 and a $600 per year annuity while they lived, and that all medical and legal expenses incurred would also be paid by the company. The agreement also stipulated payment for all future medical expenses, which would be determined by an impartial panel of physicians.

The right of individual workers to sue for damages from corporations due to labor abuse was established as a result of the Radium Girls case (though the combined settlement for the Radium Girls was only $10,000). In the wake of the case, industrial safety standards were demonstrably enhanced for many decades. The case led to passage of a congressional bill, in 1949, which made all occupational diseases compensable, and extended the time during which workers could discover illnesses and make a claim.

Dr. Sochocky took an active role in the life of the Ukrainian colony in New York, in an environment that espoused the formation of a Ukrainian State in Europe. Within this community came the idea of creating a Ukrainian bank for future trade transactions between Ukraine and the United States. Dr. Sochocky was enraptured with this possibility, and readily joined the action by heading the committee that took on the project of realizing a Ukrainian Bank in the U.S. The treasurer of this committee was Dr. Semen Demydchuk who looked after the payment of membership dues. The action dragged on for a long time and finally ended with nothing, as Ukraine's independence dreams were defeated. Dr. Sochocky had extensive ties and friendships with influential Americans and with the press and on many occasions would inform them about Ukrainian issues. He was highly regarded by the American inventor Thomas Edison, who because of his stinginess did not believe in giving Christmas presents, but would always send Dr. Sochocky a little something during the Christmas Holidays.

Dr. Savyn Sochocky was married to Martha Chornij and had one daughter Stefania, who married Gury. she also has an only child daughter Savyna, who married Ropke.

The story of the workers was immortalized in the poem "Radium Girls" by Eleanor Swanson, and is included in her collection, A Thousand Bonds: Marie Curie and the Discovery of Radium (2003).

Writer D.W. Gregory also reincarnated the story of Grace Fryer through her award-winning play Radium Girls, which premiered in 2000 at the Playwrights Theatre of New Jersey in Madison, New Jersey.

Note: The Rodovid I notes that Dr. Savyn Sokotsky died "immediately upon arrival in America" but this note is wrong.

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Genealogy for Sabin Arnold von Sochocky (1883 - 1928) family tree on Geni, with over 250 million profiles of ancestors and living relatives.

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informational website on the effect of the great depression in New Jersey and its industries. -BH

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informational website on the effect of the great depression in New Jersey and its industries. -BH

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-- Great Depression The

The October 1929 stock market crash signaled the beginning of the Great Depression which would continue until the outbreak of World War II. At its depth, the jobless in New Jersey ranged between a quarter to a third of its workforce, with African American unemployed estimated at over half of workers. New Jersey per capita income fell from $839 in 1929 to $433 in 1933 and some 140 banks closed between 1928 and 1933.

Confronted with sharply reduced revenue, the state government cut its budget from $34.5 million in 1931 to $19.7 million in 1933. Municipalities were forced into bankruptcy as their principal source of revenue, the local property tax, plummeted with the decline in real estate prices. The difficult fiscal situations of some cities were exacerbated by the debt which had been incurred during the optimism generated in the 1920s; both Atlantic City and Asbury Park opened new convention halls in 1929 and 1930 and faced the need to pay off their debt through the Depression. Lacking enough cash to pay their bills and their employees, some towns were forced to issue scrip--future promises to pay when they could. The chief executive of New Jersey Bell Telephone volunteered to chair the state's emergency relief board, submitting a report to the Governor in 1933 that recommended providing state funds to assist some 100,000 families unable to pay their rents and facing eviction.

Protest march of unemployed in Camden in 1932. Image: National Archives

-- Roosevelt and The New Deal

In 1932, New York Governor Franklin D. Roosevelt declared his candidacy for president, winning the nomination at the Democratic National Convention in Chicago. Jersey City Mayor Frank Hague had been a supporter of one of Roosevelt's principal opponents, Al Smith, the party's 1928 nominee and former New York governor who had backed Hague's election as vice chairman of the Democratic National Committee.

After Roosevelt's nomination, however, Hague quickly shifted his loyalty from Smith to Roosevelt, hosting the nominee in a campaign kick-off tour on August 27 through New Jersey culminating in a rally at Sea Girt which drew an estimated 100,000 persons, most of whom were brought by train and bus from Hague's strongholds in North Jersey. Hague's demonstration to Roosevelt of his political strength later helped make him the conduit in the state for implementation of Roosevelt's New Deal policies, which included financing for many jobs projects under the Works Progress Administration.

New Jersey WPA projects included construction of the Lincoln Tunnel, Jersey City Armory, additions to the Jersey City Medical Center, Roosevelt Park in Edison, Roosevelt Stadiums in Jersey City and Union City, Rutgers Stadium, and Hinchliffe Stadium in Paterson. Many schools and post offices also were built throughout the state.
​

In other areas of the state, Roosevelt's Civilian Conservation Corps established nine camps with 1,800 men between the ages of 17 and 25 employed in state forests and parks cutting trees, clearing trails and performing other tasks. Workers also were offered educational programs and vocational training; nationally, over 40,000 illiterate men were taught to read and write through the CCC.

Jersey Homesteads - The New Deal under FDR also initiated an experimental community--the establishment in 1937 of the borough of Jersey Homesteads, a few miles from Hightstown in Monmouth County. The town was founded, along with others in the nation, as a cooperative farming and garment manufacturing community comprised of two-hundred homes, along with a community building which soon became a school and a small retail store to sell garments made in the factory and serve as a grocery store for the residents. The project was developed by FDR's Resettlement Administration to resettle Jewish garment workers and their families from tenement housing in New York City and Philadelphia, giving them jobs on the farm or the garment factory and homes allocated through a lottery in return for a payment of $500.

The design of the project, surrounded by a green belt of farms and open space and the single-story homes with flat roofs and white cement block walls, followed the Bauhaus style of land use and building features first introduced by German architects. The activities and governance of the community were conducted on a cooperative basis, which led to some critics suggesting the town was a socialist experiment following the Soviet Communist model. On November 9, 1945, the borough's name of Jersey Homesteads was changed to Roosevelt in honor of FDR, who had died earlier in the year in April. The Jersey Homesteads cooperative model soon proved unable to compete with other factories and farms, and after the federal government withdrew its support, the the land and homes were sold for private ownership.

While Jersey Homesteads did not succeed as a commercial venture, it would have a lasting legacy as a center for the arts. Early residents included the painter, sculptor and photographer Ben Shahn, known for his works of social realism pursuing his left-wing political views, who first joined the community in 1937 with his partner and later wife, Bernarda Bryson Shahn, a painter and lithographer. Other writers, musicians and poets of many establishing Roosevelt's continuing reputation today as an artists' colony are the painter and wood engraver Jacob Landau; sculptor Leonid Siveriver; painter Gregorio Prestopino; wood engraver Stefan Martin; and photographers Edwin and Louise Rosskam.

​﻿ -- Refugees and the Nazis ﻿

The 1930's also saw the Roosevelt administration's attempts to restore economic health begin to compete with concerns over the deteriorating overseas situation. Refugees from the Nazis began to come to New Jersey, although federal quotas on immigrants to avoid competition for scarce jobs during the Depression prevented many from entering the country. In 1930, The Institute for Advanced Study was founded in Princeton, with financial support from Newark retailer Louis Bamberger and his sister Caroline Bamberger Fuld, as a center for theoretical research and to provide a haven for Jewish scientists fleeing the Nazis. Three years later, Albert Einstein emigrated to join the Institute's permanent faculty, and in 1939 Einstein wrote a letter to Roosevelt advising him of research which could lead to development of an atomic bomb.

Like other areas of the country, New Jersey also included groups openly sympathetic to the anti-Semitic campaign of the Nazis. The German American Bund, an organization promoted by Hitler, maintained several chapters in the state and built Camp Nordland, a 200-acre retreat in Andover Township where it held rallies drawing crowds up to 10,000 and conducted youth training programs. The radio program of Father Edward Coughlin, a Catholic priest who attacked Jews and the Roosevelt policies, continued to be broadcast by a Newark radio station long after most other stations had cancelled Coughlin's program.

Apart from the economy and the deteriorating situation in Europe, the 1930s also saw a series of diverse events which brought national attention to New Jersey.

-- Lindbergh kidnaping

​On March 1, 1932, Charles A. Lindbergh, Jr., the 20-month old son of Anne and the famed aviator Charles Lindbergh Sr., was kidnapped from the second-floor bedroom of the Lindbergh home in East Amwell. After an extensive search in which the senior Lindbergh and Herman Norman Schwarzkopf, the superintendent of the New Jersey State Police, took leading personal roles, the child's body was found in woods in Hopewell Township about 4.5 miles south of the Lindbergh home, with his death attributed to a skull fracture. In 1935, after his conviction in "the trial of the century" held at the Hunterdon County Court House in Hopewell, Bruno Richard Hauptmann, a German immigrant living in the Bronx, was executed for the child's death.

-- Morro Castle

In 1934, the passenger liner Morro Castle, sailing to New York City from Havana, caught fire on September 8 off the New Jersey coast, resulting in 137 deaths of passengers and crew. The ship later came aground off the Convention Hall in Asbury Park, remaining there for six months and attracting thousands to view the ship before the hulk was towed away and scrapped. The cause of the fire was never `determined.

​-- War of the Worlds

On October 30, 1938, director and actor Orson Welles broadcasts the radio play War of the Worlds describing a landing of Martians in Grovers Mill in West Windsor, which produces panic among those believing it is an account of a real event.

​-- Hindenburg disaster

In 1937, the German airship Hindenburg is consumed by fire as it hovers to land on May 6 at the Lakehurst Naval Air Station in Ocean County. Thirty-six people die (13 passengers; 22 crew; and one ground worker). The trip from Germany was intended to be the first of ten round trips between Europe and the United States that were scheduled for the ship's second year of commercial service.

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New Jersey History: Great Depression and the 1930s

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Great Depression The The October 1929 stock market crash signaled the beginning of the Great Depression which would continue until the outbreak of World War II. At its depth, the jobless in New Jersey ranged between a quarter to a third of its workforce, with African American unemployed estimated at over half of workers.

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A.R

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It's not surprising that there has been a resurgence of interest in the economics of the Great Depression--and not just because of the economic meltdown we've experienced over the past months. So much of what happened back then shaped economic policy, financial markets and even the way we thought about the economy for decades to come. Equally important, however, and much less discussed, is the decade prior to the Great Depression. This was a period of remarkable transformation, both economic and social. That the decade gave rise to a number of misguided policy responses (by both the Hoover and Roosevelt administrations) says a lot about how little influential people at the time understood what was driving that transformation.

The 1920s were a period of dramatic technological change that transformed the fundamental structure of the economy, altered the nature of the family and challenged the social norms of the 19th century. I stress technology, because it was technological change that improved the economic welfare of many. So it is a mistake, a hyperbolical gesture, to view the 20s as one of those regular episodes of excess that seem to mark American economic life. When the Depression hit, a lot of the policy responses were aimed at trying to turn back the clock--not on excess, but on the changes brought by technology. Those attempts failed because it was all but impossible to do.

The technological revolution of the 1920s was driven by the continued development and widespread adoption of the internal combustion engine, the development of electrical machinery and the spread of electrification to households and manufacturing. This great transformation led to a rise in productivity in the agricultural sector that remade society. It changed productivity in the household, and altered fundamentally the size and organization of households and the lives of women. And it improved productivity in the manufacturing sector to an extent that raised living standards for many and changed both the rewards, and the nature, of work.

By the early 1920s, the agricultural sector in the U.S. was suffering. Productivity in agriculture had increased throughout the period of the First World War as American farmers increased their yields with more intense cultivation aided by gasoline-powered tractors. The increasing mechanization of agricultural production meant that a farmer who required 40 to 50 hours of labor to grow 100 bushels of wheat in 1890 could do it with only 15 to 20 hours by 1930.

The increased productivity and yields meant that prices were depressed and rural incomes suffered. Many farmers faced foreclosure because of debts they had incurred to expand and mechanize. The problems in the agricultural sector provided further impetus for the rural-urban migration that was already underway.

Technology also had a profound impact on household production--the set of tasks that are necessary to run a household and maintain a family. In 1907, only 8% of households had electricity. By 1930, 68.2% were electrified. There were also corresponding increases in the availability of central heating, running water and indoor plumbing. These innovations made possible the adoption of new technologies for household production--washers, electric irons, refrigerators and so on. The effect of these changes on the household have been studied by Jeremy Greenwood and his co-authors. They were dramatic. In 1900, they estimate, household production required 58 hours a week. By 1975 the estimate is 18 hours per week. By liberating women from much of the drudgery of basic household work, these innovations increased the time available for leisure, education and for work in the market sector. These changes, together with the shift from a rural to an urban economy, caused changes in the size of families.

The most dramatic productivity changes were in the manufacturing sector. The introduction of electrically driven machinery to the manufacturing process had dramatically accelerated productivity in the 1920s. By 1929, more than 70% of the industry was powered by electricity. The iconic symbol of this productivity boom was the Model T Ford which, by 1928, rolled off the assembly line every 10 seconds. Before World War I, a Ford would cost the equivalent of two years' wages for the average worker. By the late 1920s it took about three months' earnings.

The increased productivity increased incomes and led to the mass production of automobiles, consumer durables, the radio, motion pictures and many other things that changed the nature of everyday life. Household credit expanded to facilitate the purchase of all these new durable goods.

Along with the rise in productivity in the manufacturing sector, so, too, was there a rise in the compensation of executives. The data tend to be somewhat anecdotal, but suggest that executive compensation rose sharply in the 1920s and that incentive-based compensation in the form of bonuses and stock ownership became more common. And there were some excesses. One case that provoked public outrage was that of Eugene Grace, the president of Bethlehem Steel, when it was revealed that he received a base salary of $12,000 and a bonus of more than $1.6 million in 1929. Even Babe Ruth provoked a bit of a backlash by holding out for a higher salary in 1930--all of $80,000. When asked why he should be making $5,000 more than President Hoover, he reportedly replied, "I'm having a better year than he is."

The increase in the rewards to skilled labor and the returns to ability led inevitably to a rise in inequality. It is one of the well-known characteristics of technological revolutions that a different set of skills are required. The rewards that accrue to the people who have those skills lead to a rise in inequality. As I reported a few weeks ago, the share of income earned by the top 10% peaked at close to 50% in 1928. It did not reach that level again until 2006.

This is a cursory account of what happened during what was a great decade of economic progress. There are some striking parallels to the decade preceding our recent financial crisis. The policy responses that created the most trouble in the 1920s and 1930s--that made the Depression "great"--were those that tried to undo the inevitable consequences of technological progress: trying to keep prices from falling, trying to keep wages high, and demonizing those who gained great wealth from the revolution in technology.

Let's hope we have learned that we need to understand what got us here and not simply try to turn back the clock. Let's also hope we have learned to dig deeper into the facts behind economic change, rather than revert to catchy but insubstantial slogans. Had Roosevelt understood the issues surrounding technology and social transformation more clearly, perhaps we wouldn't have the Great Depression as an economic bogey to react against today.

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It's not surprising that there has been a resurgence of interest in the economics of the Great Depression--and not just because of the economic meltdown we've experienced over the past months. So much of what happened back then shaped economic policy, financial markets and even the way we thought about the economy for decades to come.

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Teagan Murphy

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ISOLATIONISM AND INFIGHTING
PROHIBITION
GOVERNMENT AND BUSINESS
GOVERNMENT AND AGRICULTURE
NATIONAL POLITICS: THE ELECTIONS OF THE 1920S
THE TEAPOT DOME SCANDAL
THE HALL-MILLS MURDER CASE
BUCK V. BELL: EUGENICS AND PUBLIC POLICY
THE LEOPOLD AND LOEB CASE
RACE RELATIONS
THE SACCO AND VANZETTI CASE
ISOLATIONISM AND INFIGHTING

During 1918 and 1919, Democratic president Woodrow Wilson (1856-1924) stressed the importance of international peace. He emphasized a no-guilt peace settlement, and he urged the development of a League of Nations to resolve disagreements without violence. These principles, outlined in Wilson's Fourteen Points, a list of postwar goals, failed to gain U.S. support. By war's end, Congress had a Republican majority which defeated the president's aims for international relations. Despite Wilson's involvement in the negotiations and his firm support of the Treaty of Versailles, which formally ended World War I, the United States never signed the treaty and did not become a member of the newly established League of Nations.

As the new decade began, the Republican Party moved into the executive branch of government with the nation's enthusiastic election of Republican Warren G. Harding (1865-1923) to the presidency in 1920. The changing character of government was a reflection of the public's move backwards into isolationism and provincialism (a limited or unsophisticated outlook). After several years of participating in international warfare, the public pulled back from the world, as an injured animal retreats into a corner to lick its wounds. Additionally, Americans retreated from one another, with a growing distrust for people different from themselves.

The country became divided along sharp political, religious, and ethnic lines. One of the greatest wedges driving Americans apart was the fear of communists, a hysteria which became known as the Red Scare. On January 2, 1920, U.S. Attorney General A. Mitchell Palmer (1872-1936) instructed federal agents to raid pool halls, restaurants, and private homes in thirty-three cities. More than four thousand people were arrested as alleged communists and radicals. Casting aside civil liberties, Palmer detained many suspects without proper warrants. The Palmer raids resulted in the imprisonment and deportation of many foreign-born residents and instilled in Americans a national hysteria. Many feared that a "red menace," or communist enemy, was living among them.

At the time, there were three separate communist parties within the United States. All were blamed for a downturn in the economy, when in fact the industrial and business problems at the start of the 1920s could be traced to the shift from a wartime to a peacetime economy. As organized labor pushed for wage increases and improved working conditions, it was the communists whom Americans blamed for labor disputes. Additionally, during 1919 bombs were sent to thirty-six U.S. government officials; these actions also were blamed on the communists and radical groups. By the end of 1920, however, the violence had subsided, and Americans began realizing that the "red scare" was exaggerated.

Nevertheless, the fear of "different" people continued to pervade public opinion throughout the decade. Immigrants were perceived by many Anglo-Saxon Protestant Americans in two ways: as competitors in the postwar slumping job market who would work for low wages, and as radical outsiders bent on destroying the American way of life. The image of the United States as a safe harbor for foreigners had been destroyed. In 1921, legislation began to limit the steady flow of foreigners into the United States. That year, an emergency immigration restriction act held the number of immigrants to 355,000 per year. Each foreign country was assigned a quota: 3 percent of the number of people from that country already in the United States according to the 1910 census.

As the economy recovered, American businesses needed immigrants as cheap labor. Still, the public's negative view towards foreigners did not change. Racial theorists began to spout ideas that white Anglo-Saxon Americans were superior to the mix of immigrants of various races and ethnicities whose characteristics and cultures were stirred into one great American "melting pot." Many influential Anglo-Saxon Americans listened to these theories and pressured Congress to pass further legislation to restrict immigration. In 1924, Congress passed the National Origins Act which further limited the number of Europeans entering the United States to 150,000 per year. The quota for each nation was lowered to 2 percent of foreign-born persons from that country who already lived in the United States at the time of the 1890 census. That change especially affected the number of southern and eastern Europeans who could enter, since many from countries in those regions had not arrived in the United States until after 1890. In an additional attempt to exclude those who were different, the federal government enacted a law during the 1920s to keep out all Asian immigrants.

The public's fear of foreigners provided fertile ground for the revival of the Ku Klux Klan (KKK), a white supremacist organization. Part of the motivation for the resurgence of the Klan lay with widespread beliefs of Anglo-Saxon racial superiority; part lay with the popularity of the epic film The Birth of a Nation (1915), which glorified the Klan's activities. The new KKK did not limit its violence and intimidations to African Americans in the South. Klan members also targeted Catholics, Jews, and immigrants. The U.S. House of Representatives investigated Klan activities, but very little came of the inquiry, due to the supremacist group's sweeping power. During the early 1920s Klan support of political candidates influenced many elections. Later in the decade, however, the authority of the Klan diminished because the majority of Americans did not share the KKK's hatreds. Furthermore, publicized murders by Klan members eventually were recognized as gruesome and repulsive crimes.

PROHIBITION

The Volstead Act, passed in 1919, codified the newly ratified Eighteenth Amendment to the U.S. Constitution which banned the production, transportation, and sale of intoxicating liquor in the United States. Intoxicating liquor meant any drink containing at least 0.5 percent alcohol, thus placing beer among the forbidden beverages. Existing supplies of intoxicants could be used only for medicinal and religious purposes.

William Allen White (1868-1944), a leading spokesperson for liberal Republicanism in the Midwest, was the owner and editor of the Emporia Gazette in Kansas. Although he ran a small town newspaper, he had a large readership because his editorials were syndicated throughout the nation. White condemned the activities of the Ku Klux Klan in a public letter to Herbert Bayard Swope (1882-1958), editor of the New York World, on May 18, 1921.

White wrote, "American Institutions, our courts, our legislatures...are strong enough to keep the justice and goodwill in the community. If these are not, then the thing to do is to change these institutions...but legally. For a self-constituted body of immoral idiots who would substitute the Ku Klux Klan for the process of law to try to better conditions is a most un-American outrage, which every good citizen should resent.... The picayunish cowardice of a man who would substitute Klan rule and mob law for what our American fathers have died to establish should prove what a cheap outfit the Klan is."

Prohibition split the nation into two groups: the mainly Anglo-Saxon Protestant middle class who were pleased to have a "dry" nation and the ethnic and immigrant working class who were anti-Prohibitionists. Many Americans who did not agree with the Volstead Act supported illegal

"speakeasies," which were concealed bars run by members of organized crime syndicates. Many of the gangsters who ran the speakeasies became rich from selling "bootleg gin." One of the most notorious of the "bootleggers" was Al Capone (1899-1947) who provided illegal liquor to the Chicago area. Organized crime was rampant throughout the nation, and the government could not supply enough police to shut down the illegal liquor trade. Many gangsters and innocent bystanders were maimed or killed in street shootouts among rival gangs.

During the decade, Governor Alfred E. Smith (1873-1944) of New York was one of many outspoken opponents of Prohibition. Smith argued that Prohibition was sparking the spread of organized crime, was an unnatural lifestyle for many Americans, and was difficult to enforce. Anti-Prohibitionists attempted to convince the government that taxes on legally manufactured intoxicating liquors would boost the economy. Eventually, the Volstead Act was repealed by the enactment of the Twenty- First Amendment, and Prohibition ended in 1933.

GOVERNMENT AND BUSINESS

As the decade began, the U.S. economy was in a short-lived recession. Inflation (the continuing rise in the general price of goods and services because of an overabundance of available money) was under control, but the unemployment rate stayed between 3 and 4 percent. From 1922 through 1927, the economy grew at a healthy rate of 7 percent per year. Industry and manufacturing increased as demand and consumption grew.

Republican presidents Warren G. Harding, Calvin Coolidge, and Herbert Hoover took the stance that government should not intervene in the business of big business. In fact, in 1925 Coolidge declared, "The business of America is business. The man who builds a factory builds a temple. The man who works there worships there." Material success became a measuring stick for a person's leadership ability. Being poor implied that a person had not taken advantage of opportunities. Therefore, business leaders were viewed as respected national leaders. It was this philosophy that drove Secretary of the Treasury Andrew W. Mellon (1855-1937) to keep out of the way of big business. Mellon discouraged government spending, and he cut taxes. He felt that removing the tax burden from the wealthy would spark industrialists to expand manufacturing, and eventually their gains would trickle down to provide more jobs to the labor class.

The U.S. Commerce Department, which Hoover headed before becoming president, emphasized a balance of unregulated business interests with humanitarian values. Hoover relied on corporate leadership to promote efficiency and self-regulation. Meanwhile, unions were losing members and power. In 1920 unions boasted 5.1 million members; by 1929 they had only 3.6 million. Without government regulation, businesses were not obligated to give benefits to their employees. Throughoutthe 1920s, owners offered laborers "welfare capitalism," a paternalistic system of services that pacified many employees. However, these benefits were only voluntary packages which often were reduced or rescinded by owners when employees tried to use them.

GOVERNMENT AND AGRICULTURE

Farmers suffered during the 1920s. Production was high, but so were production costs. Many farmers incurred huge debts. Surpluses abounded, and the price of commodities (products of agriculture) remained low. Meanwhile, the costs of land, machinery, equipment, labor, and transportation all rose. These imbalances destroyed farmers' profits.

The supply of farm products outstripped the demand. That problem was not easily detectable at the time, however. The agricultural community instead pinned its failure to make profits on insufficient credit, high interest rates, inadequate tariffs (duties on imported or exported goods), and a decline in international trade. As the nation's population poured out of the countryside into the cities, rural farming areas lost the attention of government. Even so, some congressional leaders tried to deal with farm problems during the decade. During President Harding's administration, a "farm-bloc" was organized to exert pressure to legislate the farmers out of their predicament. This caucus (a group that unites to promote a cause) advocated extending generous credit to farmers, combined with high tariffs and cooperative marketing. While these proposals treated the symptoms, they did not solve the long-term problems of the farmers.

Then George N. Peek (1873-1943) of the Moline Plow Company suggested a plan to achieve economic equality for agriculture by adjusting farm prices to match the more prosperous farm period of 1909 to 1914. Congress adapted Peek's idea into a federal price support system for agricultural products. The McNary-Haugen Bill was argued for three years, and when it finally reached President Coolidge's desk in 1927, he vetoed it. When President Hoover came into office, however, he signed into law subsequent farm-related legislation. The Agricultural Marketing Act followed Hoover's guidelines for self-help, as opposed to federally legislated assistance for farmers. The bill did not bring effective results, however, and farmers faced many more years of unresolved problems.

NATIONAL POLITICS: THE ELECTIONS OF THE 1920S

Throughout the decade, the Republican Party controlled the federal government. The three U.S. presidents to follow Democrat Woodrow Wilson (1856-1924) into office were all Republicans. Both houses of Congress had gained Republican majorities by the end of the 1910s. During the 1920s, some Congressional seats would return to Democrats, but Republicans maintained the majority vote.

During the final months of his second term, incumbent President Wilson was embittered by the lack of Congressional support for his post- World War I international peace plan. In his frustration, he delayed announcing his candidacy for a third term. His hesitation made other potential Democratic candidates reluctant to come forward, not wanting to challenge a seated president. Having suffered two strokes, Wilson needed to face the fact of his failing health. Still, he did not step down.

By the time the Democratic National Convention began in San Francisco on June 28, 1920, Wilson still had not decided whether to seek a third term. Among other Democrats who were running were Secretary of the Treasury and Wilson's son-in-law William McAdoo, Governor James M. Cox of Ohio, Attorney General A. Mitchell Palmer, Governor Alfred E. Smith of New York, and Senator Carter Glass of Virginia. After several ballots, Cox finally gained the nomination. The Assistant Secretary of the Navy, Franklin Delano Roosevelt (1882-1945), was the vice-presidential nominee.

The Republicans chose Warren G. Harding (1865-1923) and Calvin Coolidge (1872-1933) as their presidential and vice-presidential nominees. Rather than wage a campaign on the issues, Harding chose to run on the basis of his image. Campaigning from his front porch in Marion, Ohio, he presented himself as a down-home man wanting peace and "normalcy" for the United States. A former newspaper publisher, Harding enlisted the support of 90 percent of newspaper editors across the country. Coolidge was a quiet man who followed Harding's lead, campaigning for patriotism and common sense in government. The Republican ticket won a landslide victory, capturing 404 electoral votes to just 127 for the Democrats.

Harding's ineffectiveness during his first two years in office sparked an outpouring of Democratic voters during the interim elections of 1922. Democrats retained all their congressional seats and gained an additional seventy that had been held by Republicans. Still, the Republicans made up the majority.

Harding's sudden death in August 1923 had placed Calvin Coolidge in the Oval Office. He ran for reelection in 1924 as the Republican incumbent. Charles G. Dawes (1865-1951), a conservative who opposed organized labor, ran as Coolidge's vice president.

Uplifted by the results of the congressional elections of 1922, Democrats hoped for a presidential victory in 1924. Unfortunately, their most promising candidate, William McAdoo (1863-1941), was involved in the Teapot Dome scandal and connected to the Ku Klux Klan, a group which attracted many rural dwellers but was shunned by urbanites. McAdoo's opponent for the Democratic nomination was Alfred E. Smith (1873-1944). The two fought for the nomination but neither could get the necessary twothirds majority. Finally, a compromise candidate was chosen on the 103rd ballot: John W. Davis (1873-1955), a lawyer and former U.S. ambassador to Great Britain. Davis ran on "The American Creed" platform, which minimized government intervention in business and was similar to Coolidge's position. Davis' vice-presidential running mate was Governor Charles W. Bryan (1867-1945) of Nebraska.

A third party candidate, Senator Robert La Follette (1855-1925), left the Republican Party to run on behalf of the Progressive Party. That party's campaign platform opposed monopolies and called for public ownership of water power, the nationalization of railroads, increased taxes of the wealthy, and an end to child labor. La Follette distanced himself from the Communist Party and denounced the Klan. Davis, too, denounced the Klan. Only Coolidge refused to take a stance on the KKK. Coolidge returned to office with 382 electoral votes; Davis won 136 electoral votes from the solid Democratic South. La Follette carried only Wisconsin but received 17 percent of the popular vote nationwide.

Women Succeed in Joining the Electorate

The Nineteenth Amendment to the Constitution was passed in June 1919 and ratified by the states by August 1920. It reads, "The right of citizens of the United States to vote shall not be denied or abridged by the United States or any State on account of sex."

At first, many women were hesitant to exercise their right to vote. Of those who did, the majority timidly echoed the political leanings of their husbands or other family males. To bring females to the polls, the League of Women Voters, founded in 1920, disseminated educational pamphlets about upcoming elections and encouraged women to actively participate in politics. After their initial reluctance, women enthusiastically began to participate in the electoral process.

Congressional elections brought the Democrats seven new seats. Coolidge experienced some embarrassment when his fellow Republican, Senator William Butler (1861-1937) of Coolidge's home state of Massachusetts, and the only candidate with whom he personally campaigned, was defeated. Despite the Democratic gains, however, Republicans still held the majority of votes in Congress.

The economy was booming, yet Calvin Coolidge refused to run for reelection in 1928. Endorsing the current president's policies, Herbert Hoover (1874-1964) of California stepped forward to seek the presidency. He was nominated on the first ballot at the Republican Party's national convention. Charles Curtis (1860-1936) of Kansas was his vice-presidential running mate.

The divided Democratic Party realized it would be necessary to win the electoral votes of New York, so the Democrats chose New York's Governor Alfred E. Smith as their candidate. Because Smith was an Irish Catholic running for a job that previously had been won only by Protestants, he was controversial. Additionally, Smith was a liberal who opposed Prohibition. Many in the party hoped that conservative Democrat McAdoo would come forward to oppose Smith, but he did not do so. Smith ran with vice-presidential nominee Joseph T. Robinson (1872-1937) of Arkansas.

Smith urged voters to reopen immigration and repeal Prohibition. Although he stressed the separation of church and state, many Americans saw his Catholicism as troublesome. Some viewed him as a radical with leanings toward New York's corrupt Tammany Hall political machine, a loyalty he did not deny. Americans even criticized his wife for lacking social graces and talking too much!

In the end, Republican Hoover won the election with an impressive 444 electoral votes. Smith garnered the support of only eight states with a total of eighty-seven electoral votes. Despite the disappointing outcome, Smith actually won 41 percent of the popular vote and helped advance Democratic Party policies in a number of cities.

THE TEAPOT DOME SCANDAL

Although several scandals burdened the presidency of Warren Harding, the most highly publicized was the Teapot Dome controversy. The situation involved three U.S. Naval oil reserve stations that President Wilson had set up for government use only. Two of them were in California, and one was in Teapot Dome, Wyoming. In 1921, Secretary of the Interior and anticonservationist Albert B. Fall (1861-1944), arranged with Secretary of the Navy Edwin Denby (1870-1929) to have the rights to the naval oil reserves transferred to the Department of the Interior. Fall then quietly granted drilling rights at one California station to Edward L. Doheny (1856-1935), owner of the Pan-American Petroleum and Transport Company. Fall licensed the rights to drill at Elk Hills, California and at Teapot Dome to Harry Sinclair (1876-1956), owner of the Mammoth Oil Company.

After several conservationists heard about Fall's covert maneuvers, they asked assistance from Senator La Follette to launch a congressional investigation. Private hearings were followed by public hearings. Eventually, Fall resigned his position and then Harding died, diminishing the urgency of the investigation. However, the scandal did not remain dormant for long. When Fall began spending large sums of money, his friend Doheny admitted he was the source of "loans" to the former interior secretary. National attention was placed on the scandal, and several top Republicans resigned from their respective offices.

State trials proved that Fall had accepted bribes. He became the first cabinet member to serve a prison sentence for wrongdoing, but Sinclair and Doheny were acquitted. In 1924, Coolidge established the Federal Oil Conservation Board (FOCB) to promote the preservation of government oil supplies, and Hoover later announced the "complete conservation of government oil in this administration."

Reapportionment

By 1920, the U.S. census showed that for the first time, more Americans were living in cities than in rural areas. Because the population had shifted dramatically to urban centers, a need arose for reapportionment (a reconfiguration of congressional districts). Congress failed to pass a vote to adjust seats, particularly due to the strenuous opposition of rural-based congressmen who feared they would lose their positions. Not until 1929 would Congress pass a bill authorizing the president to reapportion districts if Congress failed to do so.

THE HALL-MILLS MURDER CASE

The decade was sprinkled with well-publicized crimes. Among the most notorious was the Hall-Mills murder case. On September 16, 1922, the mutilated bodies of a man and woman were spotted underneath a crabapple tree near New Brunswick, New Jersey. The man was Reverend Edward Wheeler Hall (1881-1922), a married man and rector of a fashionable Episcopalian church in New Brunswick. The woman was Eleanor Mills (c. 1888-1922), a married woman and member of the church choir. Their love letters were scattered around the murder site. Hall's widow and her brothers were heirs to the multimillion dollar Johnson and Johnson pharmaceutical company fortune. At first, the investigation was bungled and no charges were brought. Then in 1926, the case was reopened during a circulation war between two New York City tabloid newspapers. A pig farmer known as "The Pig Woman" claimed to have seen a couple struggling with a heavyset woman, like Mrs. Hall, and three men, possibly Mrs. Hall's two brothers and a cousin, on the night of the murder. In the end, all the defendants were acquitted. They sued one of the tabloids for $3 million in damages and were awarded an out-of-court settlement.

BUCK V. BELL: EUGENICS AND PUBLIC POLICY

During the decade, a number of social commentators decried babies being born to people of inferior genes. Their reasoning was based on the science of eugenics (the improvement of the hereditary quality of the human race through selective breeding practices). People who believe in this science discount any role environment might play in determining a person's characteristics and behavior.

"Feeble-minded" women of child-bearing age often were placed in mental institutions or involuntarily sterilized. In 1924, Carrie Buck (1906-1983), a poverty-stricken white teenager subsequently deemed mentally retarded, was described as "morally delinquent" after becoming pregnant as a result of being raped. In January 1925 she bore a daughter who was adopted and subsequently developed into a healthy and mentally competent woman. After the birth Carrie was scheduled for sterilization surgery. On the basis of derogatory remarks made about Buck's parents, a court case followed. Buck's lawyer claimed her impending sterilization was the result of social prejudice. The case eventually went before the U.S. Supreme Court, which ruled on May 2, 1927, that Buck's forced sterilization was legal and necessary for the general public good. After the decision, twenty states instituted eugenics laws. Four decades later, the decision was reversed.

THE LEOPOLD AND LOEB CASE

On May 21, 1924, Nathan Leopold (1904-1971) and Richard Loeb (1905-1936), two academically brilliant teenagers from wealthy Jewish families in Chicago, lured fourteen-year-old Robert Franks (1910-1924), into their automobile. After bludgeoning him to death, they half-buried his body in a railway culvert (a transverse drain) at a public park. They then called Frank's parents to ask for $10,000 in ransom for the return of their son. The murderers imagined they had carried out the "perfect crime."

Unfortunately for them, Loeb had left his prescription sunglasses near the body. Renowned attorney Clarence Darrow (1857-1938) defended the teens, who had confessed but appeared arrogant during the trial. Believing that neither Leopold nor Loeb had any sense of right or wrong, Darrow set out to prove that his clients were indeed guilty, but insane. He did so in order to save the two men from the death penalty. Darrow's approach worked, and Leopold and Loeb were given life sentences. In 1936, Loeb was killed during a prison brawl. In 1958, Leopold was paroled. He married in 1961 and died ten years later.

The Schwimmer Case: No Citizenship for Conscientious Objectors

In August 1921 Professor Rosika Schwimmer (1877-1948), a Hungarian Jew, entered the United States to take a teaching position at the University of Chicago. After five years as a resident alien, she applied for U.S. citizenship. On the application form, Schwimmer, a noted pacifist, answered no to a question about being willing to bear arms during any future national emergency. Because of this response, she was denied citizenship by the U.S. Department of State. Schwimmer sued the federal government, and on April 12, 1929, the U.S. Supreme Court ruled against her. Justice Pierce Butler (1866-1939) spoke for the majority by declaring, "The influence of conscience objectors against the use of military force in defense...of our Government is apt to be more detrimental than the mere refusal to bear arms."

RACE RELATIONS

In February 1925, Ossian Sweet (1895-1960), an African American physician, moved with his family to a white neighborhood in Detroit, Michigan. Neighbors protested the presence of a black family by vandalizing the Sweet home. Sweet surrounded his family with black bodyguards and announced that he owned an arsenal of weapons. On September 9, a riot ensued with whites storming the front porch of the Sweet residence and smashing several windows. The Sweets fired guns into the mob; one rioter was killed. Sweet claimed that he had given warning. The Sweets and their bodyguards were charged with murder and armed assault. The National Association for the Advancement of Colored People (NAACP) raised $75,000 for the defense expenses. Arthur Garfield Hays (1881-1954) and Clarence Darrow were the defense lawyers, and the jury was racially mixed. By pointing out conflicts in onlookers' accounts, Darrow discredited several witnesses. Meanwhile, the prosecution was unable to prove the murder was premeditated. No convictions were made. The Sweet trial was an exception to the many "Jim Crow" convictions of the period.

In 1925, a Chinese American student was denied entrance to a white high school in Mississippi on the basis of her race. She was instructed to apply to the inferior quality "colored" high school in the next county. Her family's lawyer argued that the girl did not belong in the "colored" school, stating that "Colored describes only one race, and that is the Negro." In late 1927, the U.S. Supreme Court ruled unanimously that "colored" referred to "all members of the brown, yellow, red, and black races."

THE SACCO AND VANZETTI CASE

On April 15, 1920, the paymaster of a factory in Massachusetts was robbed of more than $15,000 and killed, along with another victim. The armed robbers later were described by witnesses as "two short, dark, foreign types." The next month, state police picked up two Italian immigrants in a raid: Nicola Sacco (1891-1927) and Bartolomeo Vanzetti (1888-1927). Both were anarchists and union organizers. Police found a gun in Sacco's possession, and ballistic experts later claimed that bullets fired from the gun matched those found in the victims. At the subsequent trial, several witnesses identified the immigrants as the criminals, but most of the evidence was circumstantial. Sacco and Vanzetti were found guilty and sentenced to death by electrocution.

Their lawyer managed to delay their death for several years, during which time many American liberals and intellectuals protested the arrest and conviction of the anarchists as a "political prosecution" indicative of anti-immigrant, anti-establishment feelings. Eventually the U.S. Supreme Court ruled against a stay of execution, and in 1927 Sacco and Vanzetti were electrocuted. In 1977, Massachusetts Governor Michael Dukakis (1933-) issued a proclamation essentially absolving Sacco and Vanzetti of the crime.

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and law: topics in the newsisolationism and infightingprohibitiongovernment and businessgovernment and agriculturenational politics: the elections of the 1920sthe teapot dome scandalthe hall-mills murder case

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The 1920s Government, Politics, and Law: Topics in the News

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The 1920s Government, Politics, and Law: Topics in the NewsISOLATIONISM AND INFIGHTINGPROHIBITIONGOVERNMENT AND BUSINESSGOVERNMENT AND AGRICULTURENATIONAL POLITICS: THE ELECTIONS OF THE 1920STHE TEAPOT DOME SCANDALTHE HALL-MILLS MURDER CASE Source for information on The 1920s Government, Politics, and Law: Topics in the News: U*X*L American Decades dictionary.

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Mackenzie Danzig

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As we humans move along in the concept of time, eras and lives - we tend to romanticize past decades by literature, movies and modern interpretations of past clothes and trends. The period between 1920-1930 is perfect example of this. We view it as a period of glam, parties, sequins and champagne. This was, of course, only a fragment of people's life - but nevertheless a picture we like to talk about. Here's the fashionable life of the 1920s:

The Society during 1920 - 1930

Following the ending of WWI in 1918, the world tried to recover as smoothly as possible. This also meant the somewhat closing of the 19th century and the old hierarchical society. People no longer relied on the life before the war but began new ways of life with education, the middle class and entertainment for all social classes. Enjoying life through parties, music, dance and eventually movies would grow to become a more democratic matter. There was a new optimism in life and belief in the future. Therefore the nickname The Happy 20s/The Roaring 20s.

Society grew immensely with automobiles, sound movies, telephones, Hollywood, literature, aviation, music and dance. For instance, it was in the 1920s Jazz emerged as well as the Charleston dance. Hollywood began to expand with new technologies and movie stars such as Clara Bow. As a contrast to the prior society, where Art Nouveau was leading (a style close to the nature with the shape and ideals), Art Déco and the geometric styles took place. Gone was the nature (kind of) and here was the future of edge. The optimism of life would end in 1929 with the crash of Wall Street and years of "societal depression" would follow.

Style of the 1920 - 1930

Even though fashion progressed from corsets to liberation of them, the first 20 years, the 1920s would consolidate the new fashion with full force. Gone was the deforming of women's bodies and here was a new ideal of a loose silhouette. The loose silhouette was accompanied with skirts hitting knee-length (had never been shorter in history), and simple blouses and cardigans. The new style went in line with the new activities where on needed more functional clothes for sports, driving cars and work. It was a slight difference between daywear and evening with the former being more simplistic and the latter going full decoration with sequins and feathers. The day was functional and the night was entertainment.

Especially the style of the evening is something we adore the 1920s for. The evening dresses were delicate, romantic and detailed with embellishment, sequins, patterns, fringe and feathers. The neckline was rather low, the silhouette was straight and the loose skirts made room for dancing. These traits were joint for women in general but flappers in specific. The latter group, the flappers, took it to the "extreme" with even shorter lengths, more fringe, sequins and all things that added to the glam. Flapper girls were considered outrageous and had, according to society, loose morals for being out dancing, entertaining themselves and not being too specific about the etiquette of norms and sexuality.

The clothes between 1920 - 1930

The clothes between 1920-1930 mainly consisted of skirts, dresses, coats and blouses. As with previous decades, the change here was in the details. For instance, the length of the clothes hit right below the knees, and the hips were often marked with a simple belt. The clothes often included details of Art Déco with stripes, triangles and lines creating geometrical patterns. V-shaped necklines were still popular, being in line with the defined lines of Art Deco. The daywear was rather functional and often in dove colors such as brown, grey, blush or dove blue. The clothes were styled with petite hats, gloves and matching coats. Pants for women became more common, even though it didn't reach daywear quite yet.

For the evenings the dresses were still the main attraction. Often being a bit longer than daywear and more sophisticated in terms of transparent fabrics, ruffles and decorative details. The dresses were styled with a longer necklace that emphasized on the long and rectangular silhouette. A headband with embellishment and matching gloves to the dress - were both common accessories for the evening. Fur was also trendy and often served as a detail on coats and accessories.

Beauty between 1920 - 1930

The beauty of the decade was revolutionary in many ways. For first time in centuries, women began wearing visible and dramatic makeup. This was still centered to a small group, mainly Hollywood, performers and it-girls. To be underlines though is that the makeup look still underlined the liberation of the years. A dark smokey eye, thin eyebrows and dark lips were ideal. A pointy mouth was also trendy, with defined lines. For ultimate chicness the makeup look should be accompanied with the new haircut the Bob.

The Bob ended just below the ears and was often cut edgy and sharp (matched Art Déco here too). It framed women's faces in a bold and defining way. Most of all though, the bob went against the norm of women having long hair or wigs in previous centuries. The new hairdo was sharp, fierce and statement of women's independence. It was controversial as few, but women loved it. Read more here.

For the daily life the makeup was rather anonymous with perfect skin, blushy cheeks and some enhancement of the lashes. It looked pretty natural and was kept quite true to women's natural features. Read more here. Same goes for the more conservative women that didn't get their haircut, instead they styled the hair to look like a short haircut in the front, but the rest of the hair was tied up in a bun.

Spotlight of 1920 - 1930

If was no one else than Mademoiselle Chanel herself. She redefined fashion in her own way by the launch of the LBD in 1926, pants for women, Poiret was the king of fashion in the previous decade it was about time the fashion world got a queen. That queen perfume (Chanel No 5!) and a practical fashion for the everyday life. Her fashion was simple, black and white, inspired by menswear and a welcoming feature to the new life. Her solo fashion career actually began in the 1910s but her ideas and design got their lasting breakthrough in the 20s. It might have been a man that liberated women from their boxed-in fashion, but it was surely a woman that would keep the train going.

Other defining designers of the decade are Madeleine Vionnet and Jean Patou that both contributed to the era. More about Vionnet here.

Transition to 1930s

The 20s hit the start button of the new way of life, a life that would continue into the 1930s. The fashion would become even more practical with the depression and financial crash in 1929. Even though the 1920s can appear more liberal, in a fashion context, its main effect for the later decades was that it pushed the boundaries of design and style. So the experimenting with fashion and de-dramatizing of new looks- will forever be one of the greatest accomplishments of the decade. So hands down and hat off to the cultural revolution of the 1920s!

Next week it's time for the 1930s and a decade that often seems forgotten in fashion history. But how about Hollywood glam, elegant evening gowns Elsa Schiaparelli? Yup, I'm here for it!

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20th Century Fashion History: 1920 - 1930 | The Fashion Folks

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As we humans move along in the concept of time, eras and lives - we tend to romanticize past decades by literature, movies and modern interpretations of past clothes and trends. The period between 1920-1930 is perfect example of this. We view it as a period of glam, parties, sequins and champagne.

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sofia

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During the 1920s, three Republicans occupied the White House: Warren G. Harding, Calvin Coolidge, and Herbert Hoover. Harding was inept, Coolidge was mediocre, and Hoover was overcome by circumstances he neither understood nor could control. Harding's campaign slogan, "A return to normalcy," aptly described American politics for the entire period. The nation turned away from the reforming zeal of the Progressive Era and the moral vision of Wilson's wartime leadership toward a government whose domestic economic policies opposed federal regulation and encouraged business expansion.

The Harding administration. Although he was affable and popular, Harding's naivete made him a disaster as president. Mindful of his own weaknesses, he tried to select the best men possible for his cabinet, with Charles Evans Hughes as Secretary of State, Henry C. Wallace as Secretary of Agriculture, Herbert Hoover as Secretary of Commerce, and Andrew Mellon as Secretary of the Treasury. These men were responsible for the accomplishments of Harding's brief administration, which included stimulating business growth, cutting taxes, and negotiating disarmament treaties.

Several of Harding's other appointments left much to be desired, however, and resulted in major scandals that rocked the government. Charles Forbes, for example, headed the newly formed Veteran's Bureau, even though he had carefully avoided the draft. He was convicted of fraud and related felonies involving the agency's hospital construction funds. Meanwhile, Secretary of the Interior Albert Fall was at the center of the Teapot Dome scandal, in which he secretly leased naval oil reserves at Teapot Dome, Wyoming, and Elk Hills, California, to private companies headed by Edward Doheny and Harry F. Sinclair in return for no‐interest, noncollateral "loans." After resigning his office, Fall was convicted of bribery, and the government canceled the leases. The administration was further disgraced when Attorney General Harry M. Daugherty was implicated in a bribery case involving an official in the Alien Property Office and indicted but acquitted for taking money from liquor dealers evading Prohibition. Harding was not directly involved with the corruption, and he died in office (August 2, 1923) before the charges against his appointees became public.

Coolidge and the election of 1924. Harding's vice president, Calvin Coolidge, came to national attention in 1919 when, as governor of Massachusetts, he ended the Boston police strike. Coolidge did not believe the president should take an activist role in government, and he was as opposed to the regulation of business as Harding had been. His famous quip "The business of America is business" summed up the Republican creed of the 1920s. An honest if taciturn man who had no connection with the scandals of his predecessor's cronies, Coolidge was the Republican choice for president in 1924. The Democrats found it harder to choose a candidate.

The two main Democratic contenders mirrored the split in American society that existed during the '20s. William Gibbs McAdoo represented the rural, Protestant, and "dry" (pro‐Prohibition) parts of the country, while the urban, immigrant, and "wet" (anti‐Prohibition) population supported Alfred E. Smith, the Irish‐American, Roman Catholic governor of New York. With neither candidate able to sway enough votes, the Democratic convention compromised on the conservative Wall Street lawyer, John W. Davis on the 103rd ballot. The election picture was complicated somewhat by Robert LaFollette's revival of the Progressive party, which organized a coalition of farm groups and unions, such as the American Federation of Labor (AFL). Davis was strong only in the South and LaFollette took his own state of Wisconsin; Coolidge won decisively in both the popular and electoral vote.

The election of Hoover. When Coolidge decided not to run for a second term in 1928, the Republicans nominated Herbert Hoover. Even though he had never held elective office, Secretary of Commerce Hoover had a distinguished career in public service and was well regarded for his work with the Food Administration and in relief efforts after the war. The Democrats, operating with a stronger urban wing than in the previous election, nominated Governor Al Smith for a second time. With the country still riding the high tide of prosperity that the Republicans took full credit for, Hoover was nearly impossible to beat, especially with Smith's serious drawbacks as a candidate. The Democratic Party's platform supported Prohibition, but Smith favored the repeal of the Eighteenth Amendment. Additionally, anti‐Catholicism remained a factor in American politics. Many Protestant churches, both fundamentalist and mainstream denominations, urged their parishioners to vote their faith. The combination of Prohibition and religion cost Smith several states in the Deep South and contributed to Hoover's landslide victory.

A closer look at the election results gave the Democrats some hope for the future. Although they did not add any electoral votes to his column, Western farmers abandoned their traditional home in the Republic party and supported Smith. Massachusetts, Rhode Island, and the nation's 12 largest cities that voted Republican in 1924 also switched allegiance four years later. This trend suggested that with a candidate who did not have Smith's obvious weaknesses, the Democrats might be able to forge a winning coalition by holding on to the Deep South and building a stronger base in the urban Northeast and Midwest.

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With the end of World War I and the passage of the Eighteenth Amendment, Americans entered the distinctive 1920s — an era of Republican leadership, nation

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Errin

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Women's 1920s Makeup: An Overview - Hair & Makeup Artist Handbook

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Classic 1920s makeup included a smooth complexion, rosy cheeks, dainty cupid lips, and skinny brows. Makeup took off and women embraced it.

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Antonia Mille

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Mackenzie Danzig

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The roaring 20s brings about thoughts of a more glamourous time; men and women dressed fashionably no matter the occasion. Back then however, the dawn of the 20s brought about a simpler way of dressing compared to before World War 1. Fashion of the 1920s isn't what the costume aisle would have us believe even though those flashy costumes are fun.

While we can't expect people to be dressed to the nines Great Gatsby style, here are some ways to bring a bit of 1920s flair to the roaring 2020s.

Women in the 1920s changed outfits frequently throughout the day: house dresses, day dresses, evening gowns, cocktail dresses, tea dresses, and more! The idea of one outfit stretching from day to night like we do today didn't exist in the roaring 20s. We all have clothes hanging in our closets we would love to wear more, so seize the opportunity! If you have an outing after work, plan a separate outfit to either go home and change into or change at work. Running errands and then meeting friends for coffee? Plan a little extra time to change.

Fashion in the 1920s can be characterized by its geometric patterns and angular shapes, the main components of art deco, as well as and dresses with a loose, straight fit. The roaring 20s were also the rise of separates, leaving more room for women to customize their outfits than before when dresses were their only options. Dresses and skirts stopped at the knee in most cases, unless the occasion called for formal evening wear.

https://www.thereformation.com/products/pratt-skirt?color=Black&via=Z2lkOi8vcmVmb3JtYXRpb24td2VibGluYy9Xb3JrYXJlYTo6Q2F0YWxvZzo6Q2F0ZWdvcnkvNWE2YWRmZDNmOTJlYTExNmNmMDRlOWNh

Pair a baggy knit sweater with a skirt or take the dress route paired with a flowy shawl. Don't be afraid of patterns, layering, or mixing textures. Beading, lace, silk, furs, feathers, satin, fringe and diaphanous fabrics are your friend!

https://www.modcloth.com/shop/dresses/betsey-johnson-daring-in-dots-sequin-midi-dress-in-black/169729.html

https://www.swarovski.com/en-CA/p-5464169/Lucky-Goddess-Pierced-Earrings-Multi-colored-Gold-tone-plated/

Time to embellish your roaring 20s inspired outfit! Cloche hats and headbands were all the rage, as well as drop earrings and long necklaces. The art deco geometry was present in jewellery as well. As hemlines rose, so did the importance of one's shoes. Gone were the days of floor-length dresses sweeping the ground as women walked.

Layer strands of beads together, bonus 20s points for peals! Geometric earrings and bracelets will be an excellent match. Before you go, slip into a pair of t-strap heels, and you're ready to step out in style.

Outfits from the roaring 20s may be glamourous, but we can all agree we've made some significant improvements to our way of life since. Instead of wishing to go back in time, weave some 1920s style into your wardrobe to make 2020 your most fashionable year yet.

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The roaring 20s brings about thoughts of a more glamourous time; men and women dressed fashionably no matter the occasion. Back then however, the dawn of the 20s brought about a simpler way of dressing compared to before World War 1.

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Teagan Murphy

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Popular music and culture - Popular entertainment - WJEC - GCSE History Revision - WJEC - BBC Bitesize

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1 2 3 Page 3of 3 Some referred to the 1920s as The Roaring Twenties . At the time, business was booming - many Americans were developing a taste for a new, faster lifestyle. Modern music became popular as a result of developments in the media (radio, records and films).

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S.L.

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Twenties fashion is often remembered for its glitz and glamour, though underlying this was a move toward simplicity in dress. For women, this meant shorter skirts and simple shapes, while men enjoyed casual suits.

At the dawn of the 1920s, the world was still reeling from the First World War. The conflict, which ended just over a year before the new decade began, had a fundamental and irreversible effect on society, culture, and fashion. Essential to these new styles was a simplicity that had not previously been seen in women's fashion. Dress historian Jayne Shrimpton writes in Fashion in the 1920s:

"The development of a more convenient, modern female wardrobe was a major trend of the 1920s and was achieved through the progressive simplification of dress as the decade advanced - a rejection of formality and multiple layers, in favour of comfort and a lighter, more natural effect." (13-14)

This simplicity created the popular tubular " la garçonne " look that dominated much of the decade. Also known as the flapper, the look typified 1920s dress with a dropped waist and creeping hemlines that could be created in economical fabrics. Coco Chanel helped popularize this style (Fig. 1) and was a prominent designer during the period. Both waistlines and hemlines followed similar, though inverse, projections throughout the decade, as waistlines dropped until 1923 before beginning to rise again in 1928; while hemlines rose until 1926, when they started to fall again (Pel 51).

Evening dresses sometimes still nearly reached the ground, though many of the popular styles followed the hemline trends of daywear, as demonstrated in the difference between a 1924 evening dress (Fig. 2) and an evening dress from 1929 (Fig. 3). While simplicity in construction was key to both daywear and eveningwear, the latter benefited from ornate decoration: beadwork, sequins, and embroidery all helped create the glamorous nighttime looks of the decade, like this yellow evening dress made of silk and rhinestones (Fig. 2).

Though this was one of the more popular styles, it was by no means the only. In fact, a style popularized by Jeanne Lanvin could not be further from this "androgynous" look. Instead, these dresses had long, full skirts, sometimes even with panniers, like this black and silver "Robe de Style" dress shown here (Fig. 4). They were feminine and romantic, like the pastel dress designed by Lanvin in 1922, accessorized with a straw hat itself removed from the brimless cloche hats that were popular during the twenties (Fig. 5). Lanvin's dresses were starkly different from the shapeless silhouettes of the flapper, though some interpreted this style with her own feminine twist (Fig. 6).

Another trend for women that enjoyed massive popularity in the twenties was that of sportswear worn as daywear. Sportswear had long been an acceptable form of casual wear for men, but in the 1920s, it also became acceptable for women. The popularity of sports clothes in the 1920s is often attributed, like many of the most popular styles of the twenties, to Coco Chanel, but designers such as Jane Regny and Jean Patou also contributed to the sportswear trend. Patou's yellow skirt and sweater set show how much tennis clothes influenced design (Fig. 7).

Tennis was the most popular sport for women and thus the most popular inspiration for fashion. Indeed, one of the most popular fashion stars of the early twenties was tennis star Suzanne Lenglen whose short sleeved, pleated tennis dress and bandeau were created for her by Patou (Pel 14). Her style both on (Fig. 8) and off the court (Fig. 9) inspired the masses. Shrimpton writes, "By the late 1920s, following her lead and embracing wider fashion trends, sleeveless, knee-length shift-like tennis dresses were fashionable" (59). So popular were elements of these sports clothes that in a 1928 issue of The Tatler, M.E. Brooke wrote, "Sports clothes have been developed to such an extent that they may go to lunch at the fashionable restaurants; as a matter of fact they are often worn until the hour of cocktail" (Brooke 276).

Fashion in the 1920s was all about the whole look and there were trends in how the body itself was fashioned. The simple lines and androgynous shapes of fashion looked best on bodies free from curves. Through exercise, diet, and various shaping undergarments, women attempted to achieve this look. The sporting look also helped facilitate a mode for suntanned skin. Many women cut their hair into a bob, a popular hairstyle that emerged early in the decade. Hairstyles kept getting shorter first with the shingle and then with the Eton crop, but like hemlines, as the decade drew to a close, women were starting to grow their hair longer again. The cloche hat became an extremely popular accessory that looked best with these short hairstyles.

While the designers mentioned above created and sold their styles, as did department stores and the like, the simplicity of the prevailing mode throughout the twenties made it easy for women of all means to recreate those styles at home. This, combined with inspiration taken from typical working-class girls' attire and the use of materials such as jersey and artificial silk, led to what has been deemed a "democratization of fashion" in the 1920s. Anyone could achieve the fashionable look even if it meant the simple lines were created with a less expensive material and made at home rather than in an atelier. This phenomenon is studied by fashion historians but was also felt during the period. In her book Success Through Dress, The Hon. Mrs. C.W Forester declared, "Dress is now no sign of social status; in fact, rather the contrary" (62).

As womenswear valued simplicity in the 1920s so, too, did menswear. Men moved away from starched collars and formal three-piece suits during the day. Instead, they adopted soft collars and one- or two-button suit jackets often worn without a waistcoat as seen in the different styles shown on the fashion plate in figure 1. Pinstripes were popular, as were British wools and English tailoring. Martin Pel writes that "British men were perceived to be sartorially the most elegant, and fashionable men hoped to emulate the style and heritage of Savile Row and the English elite" (28). Popular materials were tweeds and flannels, depending on the season (Shrimpton 31).

The most significant development in men's fashion occurred in two unique kinds of trousers: the Oxford bags and the plus-fours. Oxford bags grew in popularity around 1924-25 when undergraduates at Oxford adopted these wide-legged trousers. Though the origin of the style is contentious, it is generally agreed that it derived from the trousers that rowers on Oxford's crew teams pulled on over their shorts, and you can see how The Bystander satirized this in 1924 (Fig. 2). The original style was about 22 inches wide at the bottom, several inches wider than the average men's trouser leg. Oxford undergraduates began wearing these around the university and soon the style spread. As the style spread, so too did the width of the trouser legs until at one point they reached up to 44 inches wide. The trousers were made out of flannel and came in a variety of colors. They were mostly worn by youths - perhaps the male counterparts of the flapper - and became a favorite of Britain's "Bright Young People," a group of wealthy, aristocrats known for their antics in London's nightlife.

The other development in menswear in the twenties was the plus-fours. Plus-fours developed out of ordinary knickers - short-legged trousers that gather around the knee - and like Oxford bags were a bit baggier version of their precursor. They had four extra inches of material (hence the name) but instead of extending the trouser leg, they still fastened around the knee and the extra material hung over the band, creating the baggy look as seen at a racecourse in 1920 (Fig. 3). Often worn with a sweater, plus-fours were popular golf attire, but much like how tennis-wear crept into casual womenswear, this style was also popular daywear for men, as was tennis-wear for men, too. You can see the casual way men dressed to play tennis, though some still wore ties in 1920 (Fig. 4).

Though many men looked to Britain generally for their sartorial inspiration, one man stuck out for his influence: Edward, Prince of Wales. Though later a controversial figure, in the twenties, the Prince of Wales was the good-looking, well-dressed son of the king who was often seen at parties in London. He had the reputation of a playboy but he was also known for his fashion sense and many men on both sides of the Atlantic aspired to dress like him. Though often photographed in morning suits and tuxedos, he was also a big fan of the plus-fours mentioned above, often wearing them with argyle sweaters and socks both on and off the golf course. This portrait from 1927 showed him in this attire (Fig. 14). He was the epitome of the English style that men looked to in the 1920s.

Like womenswear, the look had to be completed. Men generally wore their hair short and covered with a hat: popular styles included the felt hat, the fedora or trilby, flat caps or the straw boater depending on the season and the man's status. Men moved away from uncomfortable lace-up boots and preferred lower-cut oxfords or brogues (Shrimpton 33-34).

Children's wear in the 1920s benefited from new technology and research into children's development (Shrimpton 49). Freedom of movement and comfort were prioritized as the layers of previous decades came off and, much like womenswear and menswear, simplicity became key as seen in the simple styles that home-sew patterns offered (Figs. 2 & 4).

Young girls wore simple loose dresses often made in cotton or linen, though velvet, like this coat, was popular for special occasions (Fig. 1). The length of the dresses varied by age getting longer as the girls got older (Shrimpton 49). Peter pan collars, smocking, patterned fabrics, and embroidery were all popular in girls' clothing throughout the decade (Shrimpton 49). Many styles looked to womenswear for inspiration, though in the twenties, children's wear was not just a miniature version of adult clothing (Grindstaff). There were modifications, but many popular styles for women in the decade already looked girlish, so it made sense to dress girls in similar styles.

Like girls' clothing, the length of a boys' trouser was determined by his age. Young boys wore shorts with a tunic or sweater, while older boys began wearing long trousers, often with similar tops. Like men, Fair Isle sweaters and blazers were popular for young boys, with blazers often a required component of a school uniform, like the uniforms worn by the young boys below (Fig. 4). Like both womenswear and menswear, boys' clothing was inspired by sportswear as the flannel trousers and woolen blazers of cricket and tennis became acceptable daywear for boys (Shrimpton 51). Uniforms were literally topped off with caps that looked inspired by cricket, like this one below, as well (Fig. 6).

The most important development in babywear during the decade was the rise of the romper which we might now refer to as a onesie, an example seen on the smallest model above (Fig. 3). Shrimpton writes:

"Rompers (first offered by Harrods in 1919) were revolutionary new garments - like small boiler suits, they had long sleeves, a yoked bodice and short knickerbockers. Made in plain, easily laundered fabrics, these were convenient for mothers and enabled much more freedom of movement for babies at the crawling stage and toddlers than traditional cumbersome petticoats." (47)

This new simplicity in dress reached nearly everyone: from women to men, young boys to young girls, and even the tiniest members of society.

Events:

1920 - The 19th Amendment to the US Constitution gives women the right to vote. Some believe that the women's rights movement affected fashion, promoting androgynous figures and the death of the corset. The Prohibition Era begins in the US but is largely ignored by fashionable young men and women of the time. "Flappers" dance the night away to jazz tunes at illegal speakeasies.

1922 - Howard Carter and George Herbert, 5th Earl of Carnarvon, discover the tomb of Ancient Egyptian ruler Tutankhamun. Fashion designers are inspired to use moths from ancient cultures in their creations.

1923 - The Broadway show Runnin' Wild includes the popular tune 'The Charleston'. It becomes a dance craze, requiring low-waisted dresses with fullness at the hemline to kick up the heels.

1924 - The diplomatic visit of Edward, Prince of Wales to the US popularizes a kind of short breeches for men- plus fours.

1925 - Fashion designers make up a large number of the artists who display their luxury wares at the "Exposition Internationale des Arts Décoratifs et Industriels Modernes" in Paris, which gave art deco its name.

1926 - The ideal haircut for showcasing cloche hats- the fashionable Eton crop- is first mentioned in The Times. It is popularized by Josephine Baker, an African American expatriate singer, dancer, and entertainer, who becomes an overnight sensation at the Foiles Bergere music hall.

To discover primary/period sources, explore the categories below.
Have a primary source to suggest? Or a newly digitized periodical/book to announce? Contact us!

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Twenties fashion is often remembered for its glitz and glamour, though underlying this was a move toward simplicity in dress. For women, this meant shorter skirts and simple shapes, while men enjoyed casual suits. At the dawn of the 1920s, the world was still reeling from the First World War.

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Maddie

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How the way we dress for work has changed over the last 100 years

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Pantsuits dominated the ’70s, and the ’90s spawned the “business casual” look. Here’s the complete evolution of workplace fashion.

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by Barrett A. Silverstein
Reprinted with permission from the Tar Heel Junior Historian. Spring 2004.
Tar Heel Junior Historian Association, NC Museum of History
Related Entry: How the Twenties Roared in North Carolina
Have you ever heard the phrase "the roaring twenties?" Also known as the Jazz Age, the decade of the 1920s featured economic prosperity and carefree living for many. The decade began with a roar and ended with a crash.

To paraphrase Charles Dickens in A Tale of Two Cities, "It was the best of times, and sometimes it was the worst of times."

The 1920s was a decade of change, when many Americans owned cars, radios, and telephones for the first time. The cars brought the need for good roads. The radio brought the world closer to home. The telephone connected families and friends. Prosperity was on the rise in cities and towns, and social change flavored the air. A substantial growth of industry occurred in North Carolina, especially in the areas of tobacco, textiles, and furniture. Some rural farmers were leaving their farms in order to receive a regular paycheck in the factories. Unions were on the rise. Women shortened, or "bobbed," their hair, flappers danced and wore short fancy dresses, and men shaved off their beards.

In 1920 the average life span in the United States was about fifty-four years, whereas today it's about seventy-seven years. In 1920 the average time a student spent in school each year was 75 days, and today it's about 180 days.

In 1920 the Eighteenth Amendment to the U.S. Constitution was passed, creating the era of Prohibition. The amendment forbade the manufacture, sale, or transportation of alcoholic beverages. Many people ignored the ban, however. In 1933 the amendment was abolished, and it became the only Constitutional amendment to be repealed.

The 1920s began with the last American troops returning from Europe after World War I. They were coming back to their families, friends, and jobs. Most of the soldiers had never been far from home before the war, and their experiences had changed their perspective of life around them. After seeing Europe, they wanted some of the finer things in life for themselves and their families.

Two events in 1920 kicked off the era of change that Americans experienced. On August 18 the Nineteenth Amendment was passed, giving women the right to vote. And on November 2 the first commercially licensed radio broadcast was heard, from KDKA in Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania. In North Carolina, women voted for better roads and better education for their children. And radio became a family experience. Everyone would gather around the radio and listen to the news, the comedy shows, and the music. The first North Carolina radio station, WBT, started broadcasting in Charlotte in 1922.

Musical styles were also changing in the 1920s. In 1922 Louis Armstrong started improvising and adding personal musical variations with his trumpet, playing in a style known as jazz. In 1925 the flappers found a new dance craze, called the Charleston. In 1927 The Jazz Singer became the first successful "talking picture." Before that time, motion pictures had been silent. In 1928 Mickey Mouse first appeared in the cartoon Steamboat Willie, and in 1929 Popeye first appeared in the comic strip Thimble Theater.

Aviation represented another area in which things were changing quite rapidly, helped by advances and improvements in aircraft during World War I. Up to this time only a few daredevils and barnstormers had flown. In 1924 the United States Air Service circumnavigated the world in airplanes, just twenty-one years after Orville Wright flew the first powered plane for only forty yards here in North Carolina. On May 20-21, 1927, Charles Lindbergh flew solo from New York to Paris, and on June 17, 1928, Amelia Earhart became the first woman to fly across the Atlantic Ocean. Before the decade was over, commercial passenger air travel had begun.

In 1924 Congress passed a law that made all American Indians citizens of the United States. The Fourteenth Amendment had already given African Americans citizenship in 1866. Yet segregation, or separation of the races, continued to be practiced in North Carolina and in the South. Modern civil rights laws for minorities were still many years away.

As mentioned in the beginning of this article, the decade also represented the worst of times. In 1921 a revival of the white supremacist group the Ku Klux Klan (KKK) took place. The KKK was targeting Catholics, blacks, and Jews with its terrorism.

Here in North Carolina, Thomas W. Bickett was the governor until 1921. He was followed by Cameron Morrison, the "Good Roads governor," whose efforts in transportation had a lasting impact on the state.

In the mid-1920s, citizens debated Charles Darwin's controversial evolution theory, as did most people throughout the nation. The Scopes "monkey trial" in Tennessee gained national attention in 1925.

That same year, Edna Ferber was living in Bath when she wrote her Pulitzer Prizewinning book, So Big. The following year, she wrote Show Boat, a story about people she met at the John Adams Floating Theater on the Pamlico River. Show Boat became the basis for the popular musical of the same name. North Carolina native Paul Green won a Pulitzer Prize in 1927 for his play In Abraham's Bosom. And Asheville's Thomas Wolfe published his book Look Homeward, Angel in 1929.

Toward the end of the decade in October 1929, the stock market crashed, and America's invested wealth suddenly lost $26 billion in value. Prosperity had ended. The economic boom and the Jazz Age were over, and America began the period called the Great Depression.
Barrett A. Silverstein, a retiree of IBM Corporation, volunteers for both the North Carolina Museum of History and the North Carolina Museum of Natural Sciences. He is also a volunteer instructor for classes in popular music and radio at North Carolina State University's Encore Center.
The 1920s represented an era of change and growth. The decade was one of learning and exploration. America had become a world power and was no longer considered just another former British colony. American culture, such as books, movies, and Broadway theater, was now being exported to the rest of the world. World War I had left Europe on the decline and America on the rise. The decade of the 1920s helped to establish America's position in respect to the rest of the world, through its industry, its inventions, and its creativity.

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by Barrett A. Silverstein
Reprinted with permission from the Tar Heel Junior Historian. Spring 2004.
Tar Heel Junior Historian Association, NC Museum of History

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https://www.google.com/url?sa=i&url=https%3A%2F%2Fwww.mookychick.co.uk%2Falternative-beauty%2Fmake-up-tips%2F1920s-makeup-how-to.php&psig=AOvVaw0AzxdeINW5Ny5rPwtddwAw&ust=1665866392914000&source=images&cd=vfe&ved=0CAkQjRxqFwoTCKiZ9ofK4PoCFQAAAAAdAAAAABAN

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Antonia Mille

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Edwardian Makeup - 1900's and 1910's

By the beginning of the 1900's Makeup Era, women sought after a 'pale look'. Lemon juice either consumed or applied as a face tonic was a popular method of achieving this feminine complexion. Society hostesses sought to hold on to their youth. To cater for this demand or perhaps to encourage it - exclusive beauty salons sprouted up in major cities.
Theda Bara - The 1910's Eye look Anna Pavlova in 1915
Edwardian Women and Cosmetics.

To have a tan, was to suggest that a lady was of a lower class, who worked the land. Women of the 'better class' remained indoors or in the shade for most of their day.

Edwardian women loved facials and spent many hours massaging and applying creams to their face to keep their skin soft and supple. Cosmetics, by the turn of the century, consisted of little pots of rouge for cheeks, eyes and lips along with blotting papers.

1900's makeup - 1900 to 1919

1914 Looks - Earl Christy
Download original makeup and beauty guides from the golden eras.
The more daring women would mix up dyes from cosmetic preparations created at their chosen pharmacy. Edwardian Makeup was very much a DIY affair, and the objective was to create an effect of youthful beauty without anyone knowing you were wearing makeup.

Gallery - 1900's Makeup Looks

To be seen as actually 'wearing' makeup was only reserved to women of the stage, or the street! Searching for cosmetics was quite a furtive affair, with concealed backdoor entrances provided for an elite clientele.

Selfridge's and the Birth of the Cosmetics Counter

Gordon Selfridge in Oxford Street, London, launched his 'cosmetics counters' in 1909. Women, consequently could openly experiment with cosmetics before having to buy them. This simple marketing ploy became a worldwide phenomenon and the age of cosmetics was born.

Vintage Era Makeup from Besame Cosmetics

We love this Edwardian lipstick from Besame Cosmetics. NB. It comes in a conventional lipstick, but lip rouge came mostly in pots until the late 1910's.

Gallery - Early Photos of Women Applying Makeup

Famous 1900's Makeup brands

While there were many notable perfumers such as Houbigant (1775) Rimmel (1834), Bourjois (1863), Shiseido ( 1872), Ponds (1872), Richard Hudnut (1888), they dealt mostly in skincare and of course female fragrances ; it was the early 20th century that saw some real innovators in makeup and beauty emerge such as Helena Rubinstein (1903), Papier Poudre ( 1903), Coty (1904), Princess Pat (1907), Harriet Hubbard (1907), Max Factor (1909), L'Oréal (1909), Elizabeth Arden (1910) just at the tail of the Edwardian era. The First World War and the advent of Hollywood movies saw names such as Lady Esther, Inc (1913), Cutex Nail Polish (1914), Maybelline (1915) , Dorothy Gray (1916), and Marie Earle (1918). All these notable names helped change the way women thought about themselves.

The Key Makeup Looks of the Edwardian

The term makeup still only belonged to the domain of stage actresses. A woman could not be seen to be wearing anything other than her natural face! That being said, the main component in any Edwardian ladies bag was rouge, which came in pots of varying sizes.This rouge could be applied to cheeks, forehead and just a stain on the lips as opposed to 'lip shaping'.

Excellent recreation of the Edwardian Gibson Girl look by stylist Allison Lowery. Visit her Gallery for more vintage era recreations.

Gibson-Girl Hair and Makeup. The foundation look was very much 'non tan' and a woman who had color was considered to be of a questionable class.

Foundation - Moisturize, powder, rouge and then powder again.

Powder - a popular choice for the woman on the go - was 'papier poudre' which resembled roll up cigarette paper.

Eyes - post of grey,brown and lemon colored paste applied very slightly on the lids.

Lips - a light stain to create a 'bitten lip' effect as apposed to 'painted'.

Early 20th Century Makeup Innovators

The first real innovations in the development of modern beauty cosmetics for women emerged in the 1910's, during and after the First World War. Max Factor, who had opened his salon in LA in 1909, was already making a name for himself with his work in the young Hollywood studio system. He helped create the screen siren looks of among others - Theda Bara, with her heavily kohl-ed eyes in the first screen version of Cleopatra in 1917.

Gallery - Cosmetic Patents 1900 to 1919

The impact these films had on women was considerable, and the early flappers of post war Europe began to use more eye makeup when out partying. The Ballet Russes phenomenon in London in 1911 also inspired both Helena Rubinstein and Elizabeth Arden to develop eye makeup. It was the decade which introduced the first 'cake' mascara from Maybelline.

The brand name was inspired by the sister of founder Tom Lyle Williams. He had frequently watched Maybel concoct her own eye and lash makeup from Vaseline and ash. The final perfected brand he launched in 1917 was a cake mascara or Mascaro as it was known then, made from a type of soap - sodium stearate.

Gallery - Makeup Adverts from 1900 to 1919

In 1914 - Max Factor introduced pancake makeup along with the first commercial eye shadows made from henna extracts. The Hollywood vamp look helped sell these new products and it is no coincidence that most early makeup advertising appeared in movie magazines like Photoplay.

Who invented the Lipstick

The metal Lipstick tube was allegedly invented in 1915 by Maurice Levy. We are searching for definitive patent proof on this still. A clever push up stick of lip color inside a metal bullet-like cartridge tube. Cosmetics and Skin traced this claim to a 1957 article - but there are no patents or ads in existence to prove this assertion.

Collecting Vintage Compacts suggests that the true inventor may have been a William Kendell - who designed metal cases for the French cosmetics brand Mary Garden by Rigaud. I tend now to agree that the metal lipstick tube probably originated in France and that the Levy claim is shaky at best. He was not an inventor but an investor whose only apparent brand during the 1910's was Hygienol - a powder puff - launched in 1916 - and not a metal case in sight!

On the other hand there are numerous Mary Garden ads showing various metal cases for rouge etc and this one from 1917 that certainly looks like a lipstick tube. The mystery remains !
© - Stevie McGlinchey - Glamourdaze.com Further Reading: Short History of 20th Century Makeup
A History of 1920's Makeup.
History of 1930's Makeup.
A History of 1940's Makeup.
History of 1950's Makeup.
Up to the First World War, lip colors came in little tubs or sticks wrapped in paper and were made from various shades of carmine, a red colorant taken from cochineal beetles. Soon all the cosmetic names like Max Factor, Helena Rubinstein, Elizabeth Arden and Coty began to produce their own ' lipsticks' incorporating their own secret recipes and colors. It wasn't until the 1920's that the real commercial success of these 'handy' cosmetics for began to take off across the world.

A Concise Illustrated History of Fashion - 1900 - 1919
Concise Illustrated History of Fashion - 1920 - 1929
A Concise Illustrated History of Fashion - 1940 - 1949

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Patent Images - via Google Patents
Plus - the excellent - Collecting Vintage Compacts
2 patents by J Komorous - 1231383 and 1158935

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The History of 1900's Makeup - 1900 to 1919 | Glamour Daze

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By the beginning of the 1900's Makeup Era, women sought after a 'pale look'. Lemon juice either consumed or applied as a face tonic was a popular method of achieving this feminine complexion . Society hostesses sought to hold on to their youth.

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A.R

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19th Amendment to the U.S. Constitution: Women’s Right to Vote (1920)

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EnlargeDownload Link Citation: Joint Resolution of Congress proposing a constitutional amendment extending the right of suffrage to women, approved June 4, 1919.; Ratified Amendments, 1795-1992; General Records of the United States Government; Record Group 11; National Archives. View All Pages in th…

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1920s-makeup-history

Concise illustrated history of 1920's Makeup styles and cosmetics. Where to buy vintage inspired makeup.

Those cosmetic innovations of the 1910's heavily influenced 1920s makeup. Lipsticks, eye-shadows, mascara and pan-sticks etc from brands like Maybelline and Max Factor were now to be seen on dressing tables and handbags across America and Europe.

In Japan, still not under the spell of fascism, Shiseido was producing their own unique beauty products for the 'modern Japanese woman'. The 1920s was the era of the Flapper, a time when nice girls could be bad - at least in the evenings!

Makeup played a huge part in helping women recover from the horrors of the war. Now they could assert their new sense of feminine power. Helena Rubinstein famously said "If you can show me a woman who doesn't want to look young and beautiful - well, I'm afraid she isn't in her right mind. Women all want it - and we admit that they do !"

1920's Makeup Tutorials
Download original 1920's makeup and beauty tutorials from the golden eras. Learn from a genuine 1920's society girl how women really wore their makeup in the 1920's.

1920's makeup tutorials - Download direct to your device

1920s Makeup Products

Besame Cosmetics, founded by Gabriela Hernández is by far the leading purveyor of vintage style cosmetics today. We love their beautiful shades of vintage inspired lipsticks. Their 1920's cake mascaras, in black and brown, are so authentic and beautifully packaged.

Dark defined lashes were a must for actresses and showgirls. Besame Cosmetics 1920s cake mascara will bring out the flapper in anyone. It comes in authentic cake style, in a tin that you won't want to throw away. Add to that a delightful applicator brush and you're set for creating those steaming eyes of the 1920's flapper.

Gallery - Makeup Mirror - Women of the 1920's

In 1909 Gordon Selfridge had opened the first cosmetics counter to allow women to 'try before you buy' and by the 1920s, every pharmacy and department store in the world had makeup counters. The earlier stigma attached to makeup and 'harlots' was gone. Women felt at ease perusing the latest powders, vanishing creams, pan sticks, lipsticks and mascaras. The original name was mascaro !

Maybelline Mascara advert 1920's

Hollywood stars like Clara Bow made the cupids bow lip - a self shaping lipstick developed by Helena Rubinstein - popular and the image of the 1920s woman with her bow lips and dark eyes peering out from under her cloche hat has defined the look to this day. Shaping the mouth became a major pastime for women. Metal lip tracers being sold to help achieve the perfect pout. The defining 1920s makeup look was a youthful glow to contrast the ivory pale skin. This was achieved using creams, rouge papers and various foundation liquids.

Gallery - The Makeup Looks of the 1920's

1920's Make-up for Women of Color

Women of color - 1920's makeup

Kathy Lee Peiss in her book Hope in a Jar noted:
"If pale and creamy was the desired skin, the solution for white women lay in an array of powders, paints, and bleaches. But what were the ramifications for black women? Peiss examines the hair and skin products sold and marketed to black women. Two of the largest companies within the black community did not sell hair straighteners or bleaches."

The Key Makeup Looks of the 1920's

The 1920's woman was the first to truly create an artificial face. Startling eyes, scarlet lips and a pale pallor - thanks to buckets of powder resembling that of a corpse.The consumer boom in makeup - simplified women's requirements and a handbag carried all any daring flapper needed. Cake mascara - applied with a brush and the ever present push up tube lipstick.

Mae Murray -1920's makeup look - cupids bow lips

Eyes - kohl eye shadow for the more daring girls

Eyebrows - Plucked for the first time and drawn downward towards the temple.

Lips - lips were smaller than the natural outline and fashioned into the 'cupid's bow' shape.

Lashes - mascara was the new rage and no woman could resist enhancing her lashes.

Rouge - Applied in circles rather than angular. The effect was a rounded face.

Nails - The big name was Revlon and the popular style was the 'moon manicure' leaving the tip in painted.

1920's Flapper makeup - Tia Semer-Glamourdaze

Gallery - Makeup Adverts of the 1920's

Contrary to popular belief the art of plucking eyebrows did not take off until the early 1930s, again to some extent popularized by Hollywood bombshells such as Jean Harlow and Myrna Loy.
No - the 1920's look for the most part was one of femininity and beauty routine - day and night.

Most women did not go for the so called flapper look - but instead the idea of facial contouring was gaining interest and soon 1920s makeup and beauty books displaying detailed tutorials for women were being sold. One notable makeup tool that appeared in the 1920s was eyeliner - inspired by the huge interest in all things Egyptian, following the discovery of the tomb of Tutankhamun.

The First "Swivel" Lipstick

Now a staple in every woman's handbag, the lipstick tube - purportedly invented in 1915 - with a side lever to push up the lipstick, was challenged by a patent by a James Mason Jr in 1923 - with his "swivel lipstick container".

1923 - first swivel lipstick

Gallery - Cosmetic Patents of the 1920's

A Popular makeup brand which made its mark in the 1920s was Tre-Jur - under the lead of cosmetic entrepreneur Albert Mosheim. Other notable makeup brands who joined the ranks of Tre-Jur, Max Factor, Coty, Rubinstein and Arden in the 1920s included Tangee Lipsticks (1922), Peggy Sage (1925), Charles of the Ritz (1926) and Bonnie Bell (1927), Kissproof (1927)
© 29/05/2012 - Stevie McGlinchey - Glamourdaze.com Further Reading: A Concise Illustrated History of Fashion - 1900 to 1919
The Concise Illustrated History of Fashion - 1920 to 1929
Concise Illustrated History of Fashion - 1940 to 1949
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Vintage Makeup Guides - The 1920's Look.
Cosmetics in the 1920s.
Pinterest - 1920s makeup & Beauty
An Original Flapper's Guide to 1920s Makeup.
Makeup - Women's studies.
The 1920s Image - Review.
Classic Beauty - The History of makeup.

Patent Images - via Google Patents
Plus - the excellent - Collecting Vintage Compacts
(2 patents by Mosheim - 1357412 and 1498475.
Gordon - 1419671, Miles - 1451740 and Kasdan - 1503955)

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The History of 1920s Makeup - 1920 to 1929 - Glamour Daze

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Concise illustrated history of 1920's Makeup styles and cosmetics. Where to buy vintage inspired makeup. Those cosmetic innovations of the 1910's heavily influenced 1920s makeup. Lipsticks, eye-shadows, mascara and pan-sticks etc from brands like Maybelline and Max Factor were now to be seen on dressing tables and handbags across America and Europe.

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sofia

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As segregation tightened and racial oppression escalated across the United States, some leaders of the African American community, often called the talented tenth, began to reject Booker T. Washington's conciliatory approach. W. E. B. Du Bois and other black leaders channeled their activism by founding the Niagara Movement in 1905. Later, they joined white reformers in 1909 to form the National Association for the Advancement of Colored People (NAACP). Early in its fight for equality, the NAACP used the federal courts to challenge disenfranchisement and residential segregation. Job opportunities were the primary focus of the National Urban League, which was established in 1910.

During the Great Migration (1910-1920), African Americans by the thousands poured into industrial cities to find work and later to fill labor shortages created by World War I. Though they continued to face exclusion and discrimination in employment, as well as some segregation in schools and public accommodations, Northern black men faced fewer barriers to voting. As their numbers increased, their vote emerged as a crucial factor in elections. The war and migration bolstered a heightened self-confidence in African Americans that manifested in the New Negro Movement of the 1920s. Evoking the "New Negro," the NAACP lobbied aggressively for a federal anti-lynching law.

In 1933, President Franklin D. Roosevelt's New Deal provided more federal support to African Americans than at any time since Reconstruction. Even so, New Deal legislation and policies continued to allow considerable discrimination. During the mid-thirties the NAACP launched a legal campaign against de jure (according to law) segregation, focusing on inequalities in public education. By 1936, the majority of black voters had abandoned their historic allegiance to the Republican Party and joined with labor unions, farmers, progressives, and ethnic minorities in assuring President Roosevelt's landslide re-election. The election played a significant role in shifting the balance of power in the Democratic Party from its Southern bloc of white conservatives towards this new coalition.
See timeline for this period
NAACP Founder William English Walling

William English Walling (1877-1936) was a prominent socialist and journalist. He was a founder of the Intercollegiate Socialist Society, the Women's Trade Union League, the Social Democratic League, and the NAACP. In 1908 he traveled to Springfield, Illinois, to investigate a recent race riot in which whites had targeted blacks. In his article, The Race War in the North, Walling declared: "the spirit of the abolitionists, of Lincoln and Lovejoy, must be revived and we must come to treat the negro on a plane of absolute political and social equality." He appealed for a "large and powerful body of citizens to come to [blacks] aid." The article aroused the conscience of Mary White Ovington, who wrote a letter to Walling offering her support.

NAACP Founder Mary White Ovington

Mary White Ovington (1865-1951), a social worker and freelance writer, was a principal NAACP founder and officer for almost forty years. Born in Brooklyn, New York, into a wealthy abolitionist family, she became a socialist while a student at Radcliffe College. Ovington befriended W.E.B. Du Bois in 1904, when she was researching her first book, Half a Man (1911), about black Manhattan. In 1906 she covered the Niagara Movement and the Atlanta anti-black riot for the New York Evening Post. Ovington played a crucial role in the NAACP's evolution. She recruited women into the ranks, mediated disputes, and guided the transition to black leadership. She served as secretary (1911-1912), acting secretary, treasurer, and board chairman.

The Pink Franklin Case

The NAACP undertook its first major legal case in 1910 by defending Pink Franklin, a black South Carolina sharecropper accused of murder. When Franklin did not show up for work after receiving an advance on his wages, a warrant was sworn for his arrest. Armed policemen arrived at Franklin's cabin before dawn to serve the warrant and shots were fired, killing one officer. Franklin, who claimed self-defense, was convicted and sentenced to death. The NAACP interceded and Franklin's sentence was commuted to life in prison. He was set free in 1919. In this letter, Albert Pillsbury, an attorney and NAACP founder, recommends an appeal to South Carolina Governor Martin F. Ansel.

Arthur Spingarn NAACP Lawyer

Favorable publicity generated by the Pink Franklin case attracted new supporters to the NAACP. Among them were Joel E. Spingarn (1875−1939), chairman of the Department of Comparative Literature at Columbia University, and his brother, Arthur (1878-1971), a lawyer, shown here. In January 1911, the NAACP organized its first branch in Harlem with Joel's help. The branch established a vigilance committee, which became the National Legal Committee, to deal "with injustice in the courts as it affects the Negro." Arthur worked pro bono because the NAACP could not afford to hire attorneys on a regular basis and often convinced other prominent lawyers to volunteer their services. He served as the chairman of the committee until 1939. Members of the committee also included future Supreme Court Justice Felix Frankfurter and prominent black lawyer Charles Houston.

Author Toni Morrison Interviewed by Camille O. Cosby in 2004

Author Toni Morrison (b. 1931) describes the ordeals of her parents in the segregated South and why they fled to Ohio in an interview conducted by Camille O. Cosby for the National Visionary Leadership Project in 2004.

A. Philip Randolph on Marcus Garvey

Civil rights leader and labor activist A. Philip Randolph (1889-1979) recalls the appeal after World War I of the "Back to Africa" movement of Black Nationalist leader Marcus Garvey (1887-1940). The excerpt was included in NBC's The American Revolution of '63, broadcast September 2, 1963.

Report from the Detroit Branch of the NAACP

The Great Migration brought thousands of black Southerners to the North faster than the region could assimilate them. They were confronted with discrimination, socially sanctioned segregation, and racial violence born of white resistance. The majority who went to Michigan settled in Detroit to work in the auto industry, which was willing to hire black workers for lower wages. The NAACP founded a branch there in 1912. This monthly report notes the efforts of the Ku Klux Klan to set up a chapter in Detroit, segregation in Eastern High School, and the refusal of a drug store soda fountain counter to serve black customers.

Blues Musician "Big" Bill Broonzy Interviewed by Alan Lomax in 1947

Blues musician "Big" Bill Broonzy (1893-1958) recalls the brutal racism that African American veterans of World War I faced when they returned home from fighting for their country in an interview conducted by Alan Lomax (1915-2002) in 1947.

Walter Francis White NAACP Leader

Walter White (1893-1955) was reared and educated among Atlanta's black middle class. After graduating from college in 1916, he became an insurance salesman and secretary of the local NAACP branch. In 1918 the NAACP hired White as assistant secretary at the national office on the recommendation of his mentor James Weldon Johnson. White won international acclaim for his crusade against mob violence, personally investigating forty-one lynchings and eight riots.

He identified himself as an African American but had a complexion so light that he could pass for white. He infiltrated violent mobs in the South and became an eyewitness to numerous lynchings. In 1931 he succeeded Johnson as NAACP secretary, and led the organization during its most dynamic decades of growth. Under his leadership, the NAACP initiated a sustained legal campaign targeting segregation and disfranchisement in the South, developed an alliance with organized labor, and established a strong lobbying presence in the nation's capital, which would prove critical for the enactment of civil rights legislation.

Walter White's Personal Tragic Story of the Segregated South

NAACP leader Walter White (1893-1955), interviewed by NBC radio host Mary Margaret McBride, tells of the death of his father in an Atlanta Jim Crow hospital and his inspiring last words. The program was broadcast live on December 26, 1947.

The NAACP Flag

In conjunction with its 1920 antilynching campaign, the NAACP began flying this flag from the windows of its headquarters at 69 Fifth Avenue each time a lynching occurred in the United States. By the late 1920s, ninety-five percent of lynchings occurred in the South. The words "A Man Was Lynched Yesterday," are stitched to both sides of the flag. The threat of losing its lease forced the NAACP to discontinue the practice of flying the flag in 1938. This original canvas flag is housed with the NAACP Records in the Manuscript Division, Library of Congress.

Nixon v. Herndon (1927) and Nixon v. Condon (1932)

In 1923 the Texas legislature passed a law that barred blacks from participating in the Democratic primary. Because the Democratic Party was the dominant political party in Texas, black voters were therefore denied participation in the electoral process. The NAACP secured a plaintiff, Dr. L. A. Nixon of El Paso, to contest the law. In 1927, the Supreme Court ruled in Nixon v. Herndon that the so-called "white primary" law violated the equal protection clause of the Fourteenth Amendment. The Texas legislature then passed a new law allowing the Democratic Party State Executive Committee to establish voting qualifications limiting eligibility to whites. In 1932, the Supreme Court struck down the law in Nixon v. Condon. Undeterred, the Texas Democratic Party banned blacks from membership once again.

The Joint Committee on National Recovery

Cartoonist Clifford Berryman depicts President Franklin D. Roosevelt singing about economic recovery and New Deal programs. By mid-year of his first term, Roosevelt had overseen the passage of bills designed to counteract the Depression, including the Agricultural Adjustment Act that paid white farmers not to produce crops. This left black sharecroppers unemployed. In 1933, the efforts of attorney John P. Davis and economist Robert C. Weaver to secure the full inclusion of blacks in New Deal programs led to the establishment of the Joint Committee on National Recovery (JCNR) in Washington, D.C. This coalition of twenty civil rights groups was formed to educate African Americans about new federal programs and protest discrimination in New Deal programs.

Dr. Mary McLeod Bethune Civil Rights Activist

Educator and activist Mary McLeod Bethune (1875-1955) was a prominent advisor on race matters to President Franklin Roosevelt's Black Cabinet. A daughter of former slaves, she would become one of the most respected figures in the civil rights movement. Bethune founded the Daytona Normal and Industrial Institute in 1904, which later became Bethune-Cookman University.

Bethune was also the founder and president of the National Council of Negro Women and established its national office in Washington, D.C. She became one of the prominent figures in the National Association of Colored Women, where she would continue to campaign for the rights of all Americans. In 1936 President Franklin Roosevelt appointed Bethune as the director of the Division of Negro Affairs of the National Youth Administration. She served as a leading member of Roosevelt's unofficial "Black Cabinet." Members of the Cabinet were responsible for developing and advancing many civil rights strategies.

NAACP's Chief Strategist Charles Hamilton Houston

Charles Hamilton Houston was the chief strategist of the NAACP's legal campaign that culminated in the Brown v. Board of Education decision. Born in Washington, D.C., he earned a J. D. S. degree at Harvard in 1923, where he studied under Felix Frankfurter. As vice dean of Howard Law School, Houston trained a generation of civil rights lawyers. In 1934 the Joint Committee of the NAACP and the American Fund for Public Service retained Houston to direct a legal campaign against discrimination in education and interstate transportation. Houston wrote this memorandum, in which he advocated using the $10,000 funds to fight "the more acute issue of discrimination in education." Houston devised a systemic assault on the "separate but equal" doctrine by using test cases focused on graduate and professional schools.

A. Philip Randolph

A. Philip Randolph (1889-1979) was an early practitioner of the civil disobedience-nonviolent direct action tactics and black mass grassroots organization that became synonymous with the civil rights movement. A fervent labor unionist, he began organizing workers while a college student. In 1917 he became the cofounder and editor of the Messenger, a black socialist magazine. In 1936, he cofounded the National Negro Congress, a coalition of 585 organizations. The Brotherhood of Sleeping Car Porters' victory of a collective bargaining agreement was recognized in 1937 and launched Randolph's career as a national civil rights leader. Randolph played a key role in the formation of the Fair Employment Practices Committee (1941) and the desegregation of the U.S. armed forces. In 1963, he conceived and directed the March on Washington for Jobs and Freedom. He served as the first black vice president of the AFL-CIO from 1957-1968. In 1965, he founded the A. Philip Randolph Institute with Bayard Rustin, another nonviolent, direct-action strategist.

NAACP Special Counsel Thurgood Marshall

Baltimore native Thurgood Marshall graduated from Howard Law School in 1933 and joined the NAACP as assistant counsel in 1936. Marshall created its Legal Defense and Educational Fund, Inc. in 1939 to litigate cases and raise money exclusively for the legal program. Marshall's team of lawyers, Robert L. Carter, Jack Greenberg, Constance Baker Motley, and Franklin Williams, led the legal campaign against discrimination from 1938 to 1961. The NAACP won twenty-seven of thirty-two cases it argued before the Supreme Court. Marshall's greatest victory was the 1954 Supreme Court landmark decision in Brown v. Board of Education. In 1967, President Lyndon B. Johnson nominated Marshall to the Supreme Court.

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The Civil Rights Act of 1964: A Long Struggle for Freedom The Segregation Era (1900-1939)

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As segregation tightened and racial oppression escalated across the U.S., black leaders joined white reformers to form the National Association for the Advancement of Colored People (NAACP). Early in its fight for equality, the NAACP used federal courts to challenge segregation. Job opportunities were the primary focus of the National Urban League.

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Mackenzie Danzig

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Western fashion in the 1920s underwent a modernization. Women’s fashion continued to evolve from the restrictions of gender roles and traditional styles of the Victorian era.[1] Women wore looser clothing which revealed more of the arms and legs, that had begun at least a decade prior with the rising of hemlines to the ankle and the movement from the S-bend corset to the columnar silhouette of the 1910s. Men also began to wear less formal daily attire and athletic clothing or ‘Sportswear’ became a part of mainstream fashion for the first time.

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khaliah. W

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The cheeseburger is an American favorite of undetermined origin. Several candidates can claim they invented this classic, but the truth is hidden.

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history of south orange from southorange.org -BH

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history of south orange from southorange.org -BH

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South Orange Avenue, an Indian trail, served as the main thoroughfare. But in 1705, road statutes required landowners to maintain the first primitive highways. These included Main Street and Valley and Ridgewood roads. Washington and his troops often traversed the latter during the American Revolution.

The mode of transportation graduated from horseback, to ox-cart, to stage coach. Then in 1836, the Morris and Essex Railroad developed a single track between the Village and Orange and operated a horse-drawn cart. A year later the line was extended and two cars were pulled by a wood-burning steam locomotive. The advent of the railroad established South Orange as a suburb of Newark and a summer resort. Just after the railroad was continued through to Hoboken in 1868, the Village began its rapid transformation from a rude settlement of farms and mills to a polished residential railroad suburb of New York and Newark.

Swamps were drained, roads were constructed and gas lines were laid in the 1890s. Sewers and running water were later added. Street lamps in the town's center burned sperm oil until 1860 when gas service became available. Electric power was brought into the Village about 1888, although most of the streets are still lit by gas lamps. The first telephone exchange was opened in Orange on December 6, 1879. In 1899, a Village central office was established.

The transition of South Orange from vast farm lands to a prestigious residential community is due in large part to the vision of one man, New York attorney John Gorham Vose. Taken with the rich mountain scenery, he purchased a home on Scotland Road in 1858. In 1862, he began to buy large plots of land to begin his conversion. As building got underway, Villagers took great interest in the development of each magnificent home. In just a few years, 175 acres between Scotland Road and Center Street were complete. Vose christened the area Montrose. Other successful businessmen, Turrell, Kingman, Connett, Mead, Speir, and Mayhew, also bought farms, carved out streets, and helped change the face of the community.

The Village Hall, built in 1894, housed the fire department until 1930 when it was moved to Sloan and First Streets. The police department then moved from its 1872 building just west of the railroad into the newly vacated space in Village Hall. In March, 1972, a separate police station and Municipal Court building on South Orange Avenue was completed.

The first U.S. Post Office was opened in 1841 in Freeman's Store at 71 South Orange Avenue but the Postmaster reported "receipts so dreadfully small" that business was suspended. In 1843, another office was opened to serve the thirty families nearby. In all, six different sites were used until 1937 when our present first class Post Office was opened on Vose Avenue in a new building of its own. Free mail delivery started in 1899.

Built about 1680, the Stone House is the oldest in the Village and is still standing on South Orange Avenue near Grove Road. The colonial house at 167 North Ridgewood Road was built by Henry Squier in 1774 and acquired by William Redmond when he bought the Squier farm in 1850. Later the house was leased to a dairyman named Flood who pastured his cows in what is now Meadowland Park. Flood's Hill in the park, used for winter coasting, was named for this family. William Redmond built the brownstone mansion for his home which is used today by the Orange Lawn Tennis Club. Another landmark, said to have been built around 1830 and standing until after 1881 when it was destroyed by fire, was The Mountain House, a fashionable water-cure supervised by two physicians, where spring water piped down the mountain to it, was thought beneficial. A large wooden structure with two wings, set in spacious grounds on Ridgewood Road, at the foot of the present Glenside Road, the hotel accommodated 150 guests. Mr. Lord of Lord & Taylor owned it in 1850 and leased it to G. Baird. The Eclipse Stage Line operated in 1830 between the hotel and Newark. Today the sole reminders of the resort are Mountain Station and Mountain House Road, both established to accommodate hordes of visitors who once flocked here.

South Orange was part of Newark until 1806, when what is now the Oranges and Maplewood were set off as "Orange Township." The name Orange came into use in the second half of the 18th century, and was officially adopted by a meeting of the inhabitants in 1780. The name South Orange first appeared in print in a newspaper ad in 1793 in "Wood's Gazette." It replaced such old names as Chestnut Hill and the Mountain Plantation.

Village government has changed dramatically from theocracy to democracy since the 1600's. In 1776, there were only a cluster of houses, a grist mill, a black-smith shop, a store or two and a tavern but South Orange inhabitants were united in defense of home and country. In 1872, civic indifference reached a peak when only 235 votes were cast in a presidential election. Population has steadily increased: 7,200 in 1920, 13,000 in 1928 and over 16,300 in 1995. The creation of the South Orange Township by an act of the New Jersey Legislature in 1861, led to the granting of the Village Charter in 1869, but not until 1872 was it given authorization to levy taxes and borrow money. In 1904, complete separation of Village and Township was effected by action of the State Legislature, after South Orange had agreed to remain in the school district. A copy of the 1869 Charter and its amendments, variances and supplements was printed in 1906. In November, 1977, South Orange voters passed a new Charter for South Orange and changed its name to The Township of South Orange Village.

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South Orange Avenue, an Indian trail, served as the main thoroughfare. But in 1705, road statutes required landowners to maintain the first primitive highways. These included Main Street and Valley and Ridgewood roads. Washington and his troops often traversed the latter during the American Revolution.

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A.R

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The 1920s is the decade when America's economy grew 42%. Mass production spread new consumer goods into every household. The modern auto and airline industries were born. The U.S. victory in World War I gave the country its first experience of being a global power. Soldiers returning home from Europe brought with them a new perspective, energy, and skills. Everyone became an investor thanks to easy access to credit. That hidden weakness helped cause the Great Depression.

Key Takeaways

Economic Growth and Output

The economy grew 42% during the 1920s, and the United States produced almost half the world's output because World War I devastated large parts of Europe. New construction almost doubled, from $6.7 billion in 1920 to $12 billion in 1926. Aside from the economic recession of 1920 and 1921, when by some estimates unemployment rose to 11.7%, for the most part, unemployment in the 1920s never rose above the natural rate of around 4%.

Per-capita GDP rose from $6,460 to $8,016 per person, but this prosperity was not distributed evenly. In 1922, the top 1% of the population received 13.4% of total income. By 1929, it earned 14.5%.

The United States transformed from a traditional to a free market economy. Between 1920 and 1929, farming declined from 13% of the economy to 10.3%, and the portion of the population living on farms fell from 30.1% to 25.2%. At the same time, new inventions sent the manufacturing of consumer goods soaring. According to a presentation by the California State University, Northridge, real gross domestic product was as follows:

1920: $687.7 billion

1921: $671.9 billion

1922: $709.3 billion

1923: $802.6 billion

1924: $827.4 billion

1925: $846.8 billion

1926: $902.1 billion

1927: $910.8 billion

1928: $921.3 billion

1929: $977.0 billion

Stock Market

After dropping by more than 32% in 1920, the Dow Jones Industrial Average jumped from a value of 63.9 points in August 1921 to a high of more than 381 points before the market crashed in October 1929.

One reason for the boom was because of financial innovations. Stockbrokers began allowing customers to buy stocks " on margin." Investors only needed to put down 10-20% of the price of a stock and brokers would lend them the remaining 80-90%. Buying on margin enabled investors to purchase more stock than they could previously afford and, subsequently, realize higher gains if the stock price went up. This same innovation became a weakness when stock prices fell during the 1929 stock market crash.

Only one-third of the nation's 24,000 banks belonged to the Federal Reserve System. Non-members relied on each other to hold reserves. That was a significant weakness. It meant they were vulnerable to the bank runs that occurred in the 1930s.

Another weakness was that banks held fictitious reserves. Checks were counted as reserves before they cleared. As a result, these checks were double-counted by the sending bank and the receiving bank.

Timeline of Events

1920: A recession began in January. The highest marginal tax rate was 73% for those earning more than $1 million. Almost 70% of federal revenue came from income taxes.

1921: Warren Harding became president. The recession ended in July without any intervention. Congress increased the corporate tax rate from 10% to 12.5%. The Emergency Immigration Act restricted the number of immigrants to 3% of the 1910 U.S. population.

1922: Harding reduced the top income tax rate from 73% to 58%.

1923: Vice President Calvin Coolidge became president after Harding died from a heart attack while on a speaking tour in San Francisco. His motto was "The business of America is business." The Supreme Court revoked the minimum wage for women in Washington, D.C. A recession began in May. The stock market began a six-year bull run.

1924: The recession ended in July. The Revenue Act of 1924 lowered the top rate to 46%, according to the Tax Foundation.

1925: Top tax rate lowered to 25%. The corporate tax rate increased to 13%. Secretary of Commerce Herbert Hoover warns Coolidge about stock market speculation. Most countries returned to the gold standard. More than 25% of families owned a car.

1926: A mild recession began in October. The corporate tax rate increased to 13.5%. Robert Goddard invented the liquid propulsion rocket, creating a U.S. advantage in defense. More than 2 million farmers moved to the cities, but only 1 million city folk moved to rural areas.

1927: The recession ended in November after the Fed lowered the discount rate from 4% to 3.5% in September. Charles Lindbergh flew solo from New York to Paris on May 20-21.

1928: Stock prices rose 39%. To stop speculation, the Fed raised the discount rate from 3.5% to 5%. It also sold securities to banks as part of its open market operations. That removed cash from their reserves. Other countries responded by raising rates, even though they were still rebuilding from World War I.

1929: Herbert Hoover became president. He lowered the top income tax rate to 24% and the top corporate tax rate to 12%. The Great Depression began in August, as the economy started shrinking. In September, the stock market reached its peak. The stock market crashed on Oct. 24. During those same months, the Graf Zeppelin completed the first around-the-world flight.

Why Are the 1920s Known as the "Roaring Twenties"?

U.S. prosperity soared as the manufacturing of consumer goods increased. Washing machines, vacuum cleaners, and refrigerators became everyday household items. By 1934, 60% percent of households owned radios. By 1922, 60 radio stations broadcast everything from news to music to weather reports. Most of them used expanded credit offered by a booming banking industry.

The airline industry literally took off. In 1925, the Kelly Act authorized the Post Office to contract out airmail delivery. In 1926, the Air Commerce Act authorized commercial airlines. From 1926 to 1929, the number of people flying in planes increased from 6,000 to 173,000. World War I had hastened the development of the airplane. Many returning veterans were pilots eager to show off their flying skills with nationwide "barnstorming."

The auto industry also greatly expanded due to Henry Ford's mastery of the assembly line. A Model T only cost $300. Also, more families could buy on credit. By the end of the decade, 23 million cars were registered. For the first time, women got behind the wheel.

The expansion of the auto industry created an economic benefit for all. Governments spent billions of dollars to build new roads, bridges, and traffic lights. Gas stations, motels, and restaurants sprang up to service drivers who now covered longer distances. The insurance industry added expensive protection for the vehicles and their owners. Banks also profited by lending to new car owners.

What Else Happened?

On January 16, 1920, the Volstead Act prohibited the sale, manufacture, or transport of any alcoholic beverages. That led to an underground economy dominated by gangsters like Chicago's Al Capone.

On August 18, 1920, women won the right to vote in America. That's when the states ratified the 19th Amendment to the Constitution. That empowerment trickled down to many levels of society. So-called flappers cut their hair, dressed in less constrictive clothing, and became financially independent.

Frequently Asked Questions (FAQs)

What investment decisions destabilized the economy during the 1920s?

How did the overproduction of goods in the 1920s affect consumer prices and the economy?

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The Economy in the 1920s and What Caused the Great Depression

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The 1920s is the decade when America's economy grew 42%. Mass production spread new consumer goods into every household. The modern auto and airline industries were born. The U.S. victory in World War I gave the country its first experience of being a global power.

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Maddie

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by Kyna Morgan, Aimee Dixon

In the first decades of the twentieth century, five African-American women filmmakers helped to establish the US cinema industry and to better the representation of African-Americans on film. Hailing from different regions of the country, from Kansas City, Missouri, to Montclair, New Jersey, to Washington DC, they were geographically separated but united by a belief that the motion picture was socially transformative. Some tried to make a living for a short time from their film work while others seemed to have made one motion picture and disappeared from the field altogether. These women wanted to present a vision of the life of African Americans that was authentic, and in attempting this they were often entrepreneurial, arranging theatrical exhibition and distribution or taking film prints directly to audiences themselves in order to reach more communities. Apart from their risk-taking and trailblazing, their efforts to shift the prevailing view of African Americans is what binds them, marking their achievements as emblematic of a movement to establish the validity of the lives of African Americans. While the recent wave of interest in African-American director-producer Oscar Micheaux and the "race movie" makers of his time has helped to confirm and affirm the existence of black independent filmmakers in the silent era, the resulting research largely uncovered only the men involved.

Taking a second look, however, we discover not just African-American giants but women involved with their husbands in creative teamwork-best exemplified by Micheaux's second wife, Alice B. Russell, and Eslanda Robeson, the wife of singer, stage and screen actor, and activist Paul Robeson.

Who was the "First" African American Female Filmmaker?

However, with the exception of Eloyce King Patrick Gist, who has received some critical attention for her work making 16mm educational religious shorts and Zora Neale Hurston, known primarily because of her work as a writer and ethnographer, African-American women filmmakers have not come to the attention of historians. Yet in their own time the achievement and consequently the attribute "first woman filmmaker" was important to the African-American press. The press claimed on separate occasions a year apart that both Tressie Souders and Maria P. Williams, also both from Kansas City, Missouri, should be acknowledged as the "first."

It could also be argued that the first female filmmaker of African-American descent was Madame E. Touissant Welcome, born Jennie Louis Van Der Zee, sister of famed photographer James Van Der Zee. She directed a film of black soldiers from World War I, part of a twelve-part documentary produced in partnership with her husband, E. Touissant Welcome, for the Touissant Motion Picture Exchange (Dixon 20). Thus, in retrospect we see not just individuals but a group of women, all breaking barriers of different kinds.

That the black community pinned their hopes on such women is suggested by the title of a 1921 article in The Competitor: "Our Growing Importance in the Amusement World." Here, author Birdie Gilmore is mentioned as having had her Jungle God produced by the Delsarte Film Company and reference is made to another story accepted by the Metro Company (38). In 1915, the Chicago Defender mentions the "three-reel drama" Shadowed by the Devil in their section "Among the Movies" (5). The feature-length Shadowed by the Devil was the only product of Chicago's Unique Film Company, which may have been founded by husband and wife producers. Mrs. M. Webb is the source of the original story for the film directed by her husband, Miles M. Webb (Sampson, 183). Considered together, Tressie Souders, Maria P. Williams, Eloyce King Patrick Gist, Alice B. Russell, Eslanda Robeson, Mrs. M. Webb, Birdie Gilmore, Madame E. Touissant Welcome, and Zora Neale Hurston all deserve recognition and a firm place in the history of silent cinema.

Drusilla Dunjee Houston's 1902 Answer to Dixon and Griffith

Drusilla Dunjee Houston, who wrote a screenplay she titled "Spirit of the South: The Maddened Mob," should also be added to this group as an African-American woman who wanted to make a difference in the era of the silent film. Houston's screenplay, most likely the earliest African-American response to Thomas Dixon and D. W. Griffith's The Birth of a Nation (1915), but never produced as a motion picture, represents one woman's almost decade-long documentation of the destructive race-based social ideas espoused by Thomas Dixon in his novels, staged plays, and later The Birth of a Nation. These ideas represented a violent social stratification taking root in the American West and throughout the country.

The recent repatriation to the US of 35mm prints of Oscar Micheaux's silent-era Within Our Gates (1920) and Symbol of the Unconquered (1920), from archives in Spain and Belgium respectively, has helped to revive historical interest in early African-American independent filmmaking, as documented in the Oscar Micheaux and His Circle touring catalogue (xxiii). These fortunate discoveries have also inspired new hope that more motion pictures, if only in fragments, may be found. We continue to search for clues to the existence of other "lost" titles as well as evidence that helps us to fill in the sketchy figures of these women who took up producing, acting, directing, and writing in an earlier age of institutionalized racism.

See also: Alice B. Russell, Eslanda Robeson, Zora Neale Hurston, Tressie Souders, Maria P. Williams, Eloyce King Patrick Gist, Drusilla Dunjee Houston

Bibliography

Allen, Derek. Works Progress Administration Recorder. Federal Writers Project, 1936. University of Oklahoma Libraries, Western History Collections.

"Among the Movies." Chicago Defender (20 November 1915): 5.

Bowser, Pearl, Jane Gaines, and Charles Musser, eds. Oscar Micheaux and His Circle: African-American Filmmaking and Race Cinema of the Silent Era. Bloomington: Indiana University Press, 2001.

Brooks-Bertram, Peggy Ann. "Drusilla Dunjee Houston: Uncrowned Queen in the African American Literary Tradition." Unpublished PhD. Dissertation. State University of New York at Buffalo, 2002.

Brooks-Bertram, Peggy and Barbara A. Seals Nevergold, eds. Uncrowned Queens: African American Women Community Builders of Oklahoma, 1907-2007. Master Plan Project, Oklahoma Centennial, vol. 4. Tulsa: Uncrowned Queens Publishing, 2007.

Carson, Warren J. "Hurston as Dramatist: The Florida Connection." Zora in Florida. Ed. Steve Glassman and Kathryn Lee Seidel. Orlando: Board of Regents of the State of Florida, 1991.

The Chicago Defender (24 March 1923): 6.

Dixon, Aimee. "The Historiography of Early African-American Women in Film." MA thesis. Columbia University, 2010.

Duberman, Martin. Paul Robeson. New York: Alfred A. Knopf, 1988.

Dunjee, Roscoe. "Men and Women Who Make the Black Dispatch." Oklahoma Black Dispatch (2 Jan. 1920): n.p.

Fleener-Marzec, Nickieann. D.W. Griffith's The Birth of a Nation: Controversy, Suppression, and the First Amendment as it Applies to Filmic Expression, 1915-1973. New York: Arno Press, 1980.

Gibson, Gloria J. "Cinematic Foremothers: Zora Neale Hurston and Eloyce King Patrick Gist." Oscar Micheaux and His Circle: African-American Filmmaking and Race Cinema of the Silent Era. Ed. Pearl Bowser, Jane Gaines, and Charles Musser. Bloomington: Indiana University Press, 2001. 195-209.

Gillespie, Michele K. and Randal L. Hall, Eds. Thomas Dixon Jr. and the Birth of Modern America. Baton Rouge: Louisiana State University Press, 2006.

Green, J. Ronald. With a Crooked Stick: The Films of Oscar Micheaux. Bloomington: Indiana University Press, 2004.

------. With a Crooked Stick: The Films of Oscar Micheaux. Bloomington, Indiana: Indiana University Press, 2004.

Haynes, Rosemary, and Brian Taves. "Moving Image Section-Motion Picture, Broadcasting, and Recorded Sound Division: Introduction." American Women: A Library of Congress Guide for the Study of Women's History and Culture in the United States. Library of Congress, 2001. http://memory.loc.gov/ammem/awhhtml/awmi10/index.html.

Houston, Drusilla Dunjee, "Building the Home, The Companions of Our Children." Oklahoma Black Dispatch (15 June 1922): n.p.

------. "The Days on Reconstruction," Oklahoma Black Dispatch (29 October, 1938): n.p.

------. "Spirit of the Old South: The Maddened Mob. " Unpublished screenplay (1909-1933).

------. Wonderful Ethiopians of the Ancient Cushite Empires, Book I. Oklahoma City, OK: Universal Publishing Company, 1926.

------. Wonderful Ethiopians of the Ancient Cushite Empires, Origin of Civilization from the Cushites, Book II: Buffalo: Peggy Bertram Publishing, 2007.

Hurston, Zora Neale. "Fannie Hurst, by her ex-amanuensis." Saturday Review of Literature 16 (9 October 1937): 15-16.

Lant, Antonia, ed. Red Velvet Seat: Women's Writing on the First Fifty Years of Cinema. New York: Verso, 2006.

Love, Theresa R. "Zora Neale Hurston's America." Zora Neale Hurston. Harold Bloom, ed. New York: Chelsea House Publishers, 1986.

McGilligan, Patrick. Oscar Micheaux: The Great and Only: The Life of America's First Black Filmmaker. New York: Harper Collins, 2007. 223, 346.

Micheaux, Alice. Letter to Ethel Micheaux. 7 Jan. 1948. Richard Grupenhoff Private Collection.

"Motion Picture News." Chicago Defender (24 March 1923): 6.

Musser, Charles. "Troubled Relations: Paul Robeson, Eugene O'Neill, and Oscar Micheaux." Paul Robeson: Artist and Citizen. Ed. Jeffrey C. Stewart. New Brunswick: Rutgers University Press, 1998. 81-103.

Norfolk Journal and Guide (5 May 1923): 1.

Nevergold, Barbara A. Seals, and Peggy Brooks-Bertram, eds. Uncrowned Queens: African American Women Community Builders of Oklahoma, 1907-2007. Master Plan Project, Oklahoma Centennial, vol. 4. Tulsa: Uncrowned Queens Publishing, 2007.

"Our Growth and Importance in the Amusement World." The Competitor 3, no. 4 (June 1921): 38.

Robeson, Eslanda. Diary (20-29 March 1930). Yale University, Beinecke Rare Book and Manuscript Library, New Haven.

------. Paul Robeson, Negro. New York: Harper and Bros., 1930.

Robeson, Marilyn. "Eslanda Cardozo Goode Robeson." Footsteps vol. 5, no. 2 (2003): 22. http://connection.ebscohost.com/c/articles/11378557/eslanda-cardozo-goode-robeson

Sexton, Jamie. "Borderline (1930)." BFI: Screenonline. n.d. n.p. http://www.screenonline.org.uk/film/id/443504/

Silverstein, Louis. "Louis Silverstein's H. D. Chronology, Part Four (1929-April 1, 1946)." Ed. H. Hernandez. 2006. http://www.imagists.org/hd/hdchron4.html

Sampson, Henry T. Blacks in Black and White: A Source Book on Black Films. Metuchen: Scarecrow Press, 1995.

Stewart, Jeffrey C., ed. Paul Robeson: Artist and Citizen. New Brunswick: Rutgers University Press, 1998.

Welbon, Yvonne. "Sisters in Cinema: Case Studies of Three First-Time Achievements Made by African American Women Feature Film Directors in the 1990s." PhD dissertation, Northwestern University, 2001.

Williams, Maria P. My Work and Public Sentiment. Kansas City: Burton Publishing, 1916.
Archival Paper Collections:
Misc. archival materials. Black Film Center/Archive, Indiana University Bloomington.

Paul Robeson Papers, Yale University, Beinecke Rare Book and Manuscript Library.

Richard Grupenhoff Private Collection.

Citation

Morgan, Kyna; Aimee Dixon. "African-American Women in the Silent Film Industry." In Jane Gaines, Radha Vatsal, and Monica Dall'Asta, eds. Women Film Pioneers Project. New York, NY: Columbia University Libraries, 2013. <https://doi.org/10.7916/d8-vt0f-1758>

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African-American Women in the Silent Film Industry

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by Kyna Morgan, Aimee Dixon In the first decades of the twentieth century, five African-American women filmmakers helped to establish the US cinema industry and to better the representation of African-Americans on film. Hailing from different regions of the country, from Kansas City, Missouri, to Montclair, New Jersey, to Washington DC, they were geographically separated but united by a belief that the motion picture was socially transformative.

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S.L.

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To print the story please do so via the link in the story toolbar.

Here you'll be seeing the most purchased products in the 1920s, with a brief description about the product itself and its effects on the American society, mainly how that has reflected upon us today as consumers.

Therefrom, the consumer culture in the 1920s has really impacted upon the American society which can be seen today due to the modern lifestyles specifically when you see advancements in technology, preference towards leisure over hard work and personal freedom. Combined there were social, political and economic changes within the society that brought drastic changes with the community and how people interacted. However, the focus here is on consumer culture when American's were at that wealthy stage in life purchase all these new and expensive products for their homes. Most of the indicated products that I've mentioned in my timeline are the ones that would be used on a daily basis in an average middle class homes. The mass production brought many useful inventions like the Model T automobile which was new form of efficient transportation and other kitchen appliances like the refrigerator, toaster, dishwasher, vacuum and washing machine. All of these products were invented at one point as a new thing, but as generations go on there has been advancements with these machinery where these same products today are in much better condition.

References -

"1920's." Home, inventionswithtrippandzach.weebly.com/1920s.html.

"Early Electric Irons." Early Electric Irons, Self-Heating Flat Irons, Sad Irons, www.oldandinteresting.com/vintage-electric-irons.aspx.

"History of the Toaster." Overstock.com, www.overstock.com/guides/history-of-the-toaster/.

History.com Staff. "Henry Ford." History.com, A&E Television Networks, 2009, www.history.com/topics/henry-ford.

History.com Staff. "Model T." History.com, A&E Television Networks, 2010, www.history.com/topics/model-t.

"Impact on America." Sewing Machine, sewingmachine.umwblogs.org/the-sewing-machine-its-impact-on-america/.

"Impact." Vacuum Cleaner, vacuumcleaner.umwblogs.org/impact/.

"John Logie Baird and Television." History Learning Site, www.historylearningsite.co.uk/inventions-and-discoveries-of-the-twentieth-century/john-logie-baird-and-television/.

"Laundry." Appliancesconnection, www.appliancesconnection.com/dishwasher-history.html.

"Lee De Forest." Wikipedia, Wikimedia Foundation, 15 June 2018, en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Lee_de_Forest.

Society, "Television's Impact on American, and Culture.". "Television's Impact on American Society and Culture." Gale Library of Daily Life: Slavery in America, Encyclopedia.com, 2018, www.encyclopedia.com/arts/news-wires-white-papers-and-books/televisions-impact-american-society-and-culture.

"The History of the Refrigerator: Staying Cool Throughout the Ages." FindingDulcinea, www.findingdulcinea.com/features/science/innovations/great-inventions/the-refrigerator.html.

"The True History of the Sewing Machine." Patches From the Past, www.historyofquilts.com/sewmach.html.

"Washing Machine." Wikipedia, Wikimedia Foundation, 15 June 2018, en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Washing_machine.

Therefrom, the consumer culture in the 1920s has really impacted upon the American society which can be seen today due to the modern lifestyles specifically when you see advancements in technology, preference towards leisure over hard work and personal freedom. Combined there were social, political and economic changes within the society that brought drastic changes with the community and how people interacted. However, the focus here is on consumer culture when American's were at that wealthy stage in life purchase all these new and expensive products for their homes. Most of the indicated products that I've mentioned in my timeline are the ones that would be used on a daily basis in an average middle class homes. The mass production brought many useful inventions like the Model T automobile which was new form of efficient transportation and other kitchen appliances like the refrigerator, toaster, dishwasher, vacuum and washing machine. All of these products were invented at one point as a new thing, but as generations go on there has been advancements with these machinery where these same products today are in much better condition.

References -

"1920's." Home, inventionswithtrippandzach.weebly.com/1920s.html.

"Early Electric Irons." Early Electric Irons, Self-Heating Flat Irons, Sad Irons, www.oldandinteresting.com/vintage-electric-irons.aspx.

"History of the Toaster." Overstock.com, www.overstock.com/guides/history-of-the-toaster/.

History.com Staff. "Henry Ford." History.com, A&E Television Networks, 2009, www.history.com/topics/henry-ford.

History.com Staff. "Model T." History.com, A&E Television Networks, 2010, www.history.com/topics/model-t.

"Impact on America." Sewing Machine, sewingmachine.umwblogs.org/the-sewing-machine-its-impact-on-america/.

"Impact." Vacuum Cleaner, vacuumcleaner.umwblogs.org/impact/.

"John Logie Baird and Television." History Learning Site, www.historylearningsite.co.uk/inventions-and-discoveries-of-the-twentieth-century/john-logie-baird-and-television/.

"Laundry." Appliancesconnection, www.appliancesconnection.com/dishwasher-history.html.

"Lee De Forest." Wikipedia, Wikimedia Foundation, 15 June 2018, en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Lee_de_Forest.

Society, "Television's Impact on American, and Culture.". "Television's Impact on American Society and Culture." Gale Library of Daily Life: Slavery in America, Encyclopedia.com, 2018, www.encyclopedia.com/arts/news-wires-white-papers-and-books/televisions-impact-american-society-and-culture.

"The History of the Refrigerator: Staying Cool Throughout the Ages." FindingDulcinea, www.findingdulcinea.com/features/science/innovations/great-inventions/the-refrigerator.html.

"The True History of the Sewing Machine." Patches From the Past, www.historyofquilts.com/sewmach.html.

"Washing Machine." Wikipedia, Wikimedia Foundation, 15 June 2018, en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Washing_machine.

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Copy of Copy of Popular Products in the 1920s

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Here you'll be seeing the most purchased products in the 1920s, with a brief description about the product itself and its effects on the American society, mainly how that has reflected upon us today as consumers. 1905 - Invented by Earl Richardson the first electric iron.

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Teagan Murphy

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Art Deco, also called style moderne, movement in the decorative arts and architecture that originated in the 1920s and developed into a major style in western Europe and the United States during the 1930s. Its name was derived from the Exposition Internationale des Arts Décoratifs et Industriels Modernes, held in Paris in 1925, where the style was first exhibited. Art Deco design represented modernism turned into fashion. Its products included both individually crafted luxury items and mass-produced wares, but, in either case, the intention was to create a sleek and anti-traditional elegance that symbolized wealth and sophistication.

The distinguishing features of the style are simple, clean shapes, often with a "streamlined" look; ornament that is geometric or stylized from representational forms; and unusually varied, often expensive materials, which frequently include man-made substances (plastics, especially Bakelite; vita-glass; and ferroconcrete) in addition to natural ones ( jade, silver, ivory, obsidian, chrome, and rock crystal). Though Art Deco objects were rarely mass-produced, the characteristic features of the style reflected admiration for the modernity of the machine and for the inherent design qualities of machine-made objects (e.g., relative simplicity, planarity, symmetry, and unvaried repetition of elements).

Among the formative influences on Art Deco were Art Nouveau, the Bauhaus, Cubism, and Serge Diaghilev's Ballets Russes. Decorative ideas came from American Indian, Egyptian, and early classical sources as well as from nature. Characteristic motifs included nude female figures, animals, foliage, and sun rays, all in conventionalized forms.

Most of the outstanding Art Deco creators designed individually crafted or limited-edition items. They included the furniture designers Jacques Ruhlmann and Maurice Dufrène; the architect Eliel Saarinen; metalsmith Jean Puiforcat; glass and jewelry designer René Lalique; fashion designer Erté; artist-jewelers Raymond Templier, H.G. Murphy, and Wiwen Nilsson; and the figural sculptor Chiparus. The fashion designer Paul Poiret and the graphic artist Edward McKnight Kauffer represent those whose work directly reached a larger audience. New York City's Rockefeller Center (especially its interiors supervised by Donald Deskey; built between 1929 and 1940), the Chrysler Building by William Van Alen, and the Empire State Building by Shreve, Lamb & Harmon are the most monumental embodiments of Art Deco. During the 1930s the style took over South Beach in Miami, Florida, producing an area known as the Art Deco historic district.

Although the style went out of fashion in most places during World War II, beginning in the late 1960s there was a renewed interest in Art Deco design. Into the 21st century Art Deco continued to be a source of inspiration in such areas as decorative art, fashion, and jewelry design.

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Art Deco | Definition, Characteristics, History, Artists, Architecture, & Facts

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Art Deco, movement in decorative arts and architecture in Europe and the United States during the 1920s and '30s. Its distinguishing features include simple, clean shapes, often with a streamlined look; ornament that is geometric or stylized from representational forms; and unusually varied materials.

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Mackenzie Danzog

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"And for every Fitzgerald Flapper of the twenties there were countless fatigued and undernourished textile mill operators and migratory fruit pickers and mining town and ghetto housewives who never knew the life of Zelda Fitzgerald."

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Monty Turner

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NFL’s 1st decade was the 1920s, when teams came and went

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The 1st decade of the NFL: a time when many teams came and went in the 1920s

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An article detailing the facts about the prohibition, which began in 1920 and ended in 1933 - Jace Furman

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The Prohibition Era began in 1920 when the 18th Amendment to the U.S. Constitution, which banned the manufacture, transportation and sale of intoxicating liquors, went into effect with the passage of the Volstead Act. Despite the new legislation, Prohibition was difficult to enforce. The increase of the illegal production and sale of liquor (known as "bootlegging"), the proliferation of speakeasies (illegal drinking spots) and the accompanying rise in gang violence and organized crime led to waning support for Prohibition by the end of the 1920s. In early 1933, Congress adopted a resolution proposing a 21st Amendment to the Constitution that would repeal the 18th. The 21st Amendment was ratified on December 5, 1933, ending Prohibition.

Origins of Prohibition

In the 1820s and '30s, a wave of religious revivalism swept the United States, leading to increased calls for temperance, as well as other "perfectionist" movements such as the abolitionist movement to end slavery.

In 1838, the state of Massachusetts passed a temperance law banning the sale of spirits in less than 15-gallon quantities; though the law was repealed two years later, it set a precedent for such legislation. Maine passed the first state prohibition laws in 1846, followed by a stricter law in 1851. A number of other states had followed suit by the time the Civil War began in 1861.

Did you know? In 1932, Franklin D. Roosevelt defeated the incumbent President Herbert Hoover, who once called Prohibition "the great social and economic experiment, noble in motive and far reaching in purpose." Some say FDR celebrated the repeal of Prohibition by enjoying a dirty martini, his preferred drink.

By the turn of the century, temperance societies like the Woman's Christian Temperance Union (WCTU) were a common fixture in communities across the United States. Women played a strong role in the temperance movement, as alcohol was seen as a destructive force in families and marriages.

In 1906, a new wave of attacks began on the sale of liquor, led by the Anti-Saloon League (established in 1893) and driven by a reaction to urban growth, as well as the rise of evangelical Protestantism and its view of saloon culture as corrupt and ungodly.

In addition, many factory owners during the Industrial Revolution supported prohibition in their desire to prevent accidents and increase the efficiency of their workers in an era of increased industrial production and extended working hours.

Volstead Act

In 1917, after the United States entered World War I, President Woodrow Wilson instituted a temporary wartime prohibition in order to save grain for producing food. That same year, Congress submitted the 18th Amendment, which banned the manufacture, transportation and sale of intoxicating liquors, for state ratification. Though Congress had stipulated a seven-year time limit for the process, the amendment received the support of the necessary three-quarters of U.S. states in just 11 months.

Ratified on January 16, 1919, the 18th Amendment went into effect one year later, by which time no fewer than 33 states had already enacted their own prohibition legislation. In October 1919, Congress put forth the National Prohibition Act, which provided guidelines for the federal enforcement of Prohibition. Championed by Representative Andrew Volstead of Minnesota, the chairman of the House Judiciary Committee, the legislation was more commonly known as the Volstead Act.

Enforcement of Prohibition

Both federal and local government struggled to enforce Prohibition-Hoover's "noble experiment"-over the course of the 1920s. Enforcement was initially assigned to the Internal Revenue Service (IRS), and was later transferred to the Justice Department and the Bureau of Prohibition, or Prohibition Bureau.

In general, Prohibition was enforced much more strongly in areas where the population was sympathetic to the legislation-mainly rural areas and small towns-and much more loosely in urban areas. Despite very early signs of success, including a decline in arrests for drunkenness and a reported 30 percent drop in alcohol consumption, those who wanted to keep drinking found ever more inventive ways to do it.

Organized Crime

The illegal manufacturing and sale of liquor (known as "bootlegging") went on throughout the decade, along with the operation of " speakeasies " (stores or nightclubs selling alcohol), the smuggling of alcohol across state lines and the informal production of liquor ("moonshine" or "bathtub gin") in private homes.

In addition, the Prohibition era encouraged the rise of criminal activity associated with bootlegging. The most notorious example was the Chicago gangster Al Capone, who earned a staggering $60 million annually from bootleg operations and speakeasies.

Such illegal operations fueled a corresponding rise in gang violence, including the St. Valentine's Day Massacre in Chicago in 1929, in which several men dressed as policemen (and believed to be associated with Capone) shot and killed a group of men in an enemy gang.

When Did Prohibition End?

The high price of bootleg liquor meant that the nation's working class and poor were far more restricted during Prohibition than middle or upper-class Americans. Even as costs for law enforcement, jails and prisons spiraled upward, support for Prohibition was waning by the end of the Roaring Twenties. In addition, fundamentalist and nativist forces had gained more control over the temperance movement, alienating its more moderate members.

There were also many unintended consequences of Prohibition: Some cash-strapped restaurants shuttered their doors since they could no longer make a profit from liquor sales. Thousands of people died each year from drinking cheap moonshine tainted with toxins. And revenues shrank for many states that had previously relied on liquor taxes to fund roads, schools and other public benefits.

With the country mired in the Great Depression by 1932, creating jobs and revenue by legalizing the liquor industry had an undeniable appeal. Democrat Franklin D. Roosevelt ran for president that year on a platform calling for Prohibition's repeal, and easily won victory over the incumbent President Herbert Hoover.

FDR's victory meant the end of Prohibition, and in February 1933 Congress adopted a resolution proposing a 21st Amendment to the Constitution that would repeal the 18th. The amendment was submitted to the states, and in December 1933 Utah provided the 36th and final necessary vote for ratification. Though a few states continued to prohibit alcohol after Prohibition's end, all had abandoned the ban by 1966.

Sources

Prohibition: A Case Study of Progressive Reform. Library of Congress.
Unintended Consequences of Prohibition. PBS: Prohibition.
Alcohol Prohibition Was a Failure. Cato Institute.

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Prohibition: Years, Amendment and Definition - HISTORY

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The Prohibition Era began in 1920 when the 18th Amendment outlawed liquor sales per the Volstead Act, but in 1932 the 21st Amendment ended Prohibition.

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Mackenzie Danzig

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What Men REALLY Wore In The 1920s | Gentleman’s Gazette

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The Roaring Twenties is synonymous with partying and elegance, but is the glitz and glam true for 1920s menswear? Here’s what men really wore!

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Errin

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Unlik e the women in the suffrage movement previous to the 1920's, women during this decade were carefree and enjoyed having fun. Flappers were characterized as middle-class, single, and reckless women who lived in the Northern cities. These flappers broke away from traditional American values into something new after WWI that society had not witnessed before. Most of these young women had stable jobs, such as clerks because phones were being used more and operators were needed. Women were also in sales because the increase in department stores demanded more. Flappers, however, are recognized more for their nightlife in the city.

Flappers could be found in speakeasies, jazz clubs, and vaudeville shows. Despite Prohibition which made alcohol illegal to manufacture and sell, women still drank alcohol more than ever. They also smoked which was usually just for men and took part in sexual experimentation. Flappers were considered rebellious and scandalous which dismayed parents. The flappers were also known for their style of dancing which was clashed with the past generations. Flappers were a fan of cars and actually drove them even though they could be dangerous because they were about taking risks. This new, young generation lived a different lifestyle than those before them.

The flappers had a unique style of clothing that asserted their independence during the 1920's. Women's hair was cut to their shoulders which became known as the "bob", they walked in high heels, and their skirts and dresses came to the knee. Some of these flappers stopped wearing their corsets when they danced because they could dance more comfortably to the upbeat music of the Jazz Age without them. Make-up also became popular with women which increased sales. Clara Bow wore the classic flapper look in Hollywood. Flappers declined starting with the Great Depression, but their influence can be seen in today's women.

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Flappers - United States Takes on the World

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Unlik e the women in the suffrage movement previous to the 1920's, women during this decade were carefree and enjoyed having fun. Flappers were characterized as middle-class, single, and reckless women who lived in the Northern cities. These flappers broke away from traditional American values into something new after WWI that society had not witnessed before.

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Jovi

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Grace Fryer

The Grace Fryer Scholarship is dedicated to the Radium Girls - the women of the 1920s who worked as dial painters in Illinois and New Jersey and succumbed to the often deadly side effects of working with radium, a material that was then instrumental in making watch dials glow. To encourage precision, these women were instructed to point the radium-lined brushes using their lips. The Radium Girls suffered horrific side effects from radium poisoning and many lost their lives.

Fryer (1899 - 1933), a dial painter in New Jersey who was poisoned by the element, spearheaded a long, arduous fight against their employer to acknowledge the deadly repercussions of using radium and demanded compensation for the women who often unknowingly fell prey. Fryer spent years fighting for the Radium Girls and their case would go on to gain national media attention and establish legal precedents, having tremendous labor rights impacts and ushering scientific advances.

DETAILS

Any female student who has been accepted or is currently studying at a full-time watchmaking school in the U.S. is eligible for the Grace Fryer Scholarship. Prospective students may also apply, with the understanding that the scholarship is contingent on their enrollment at a full-time watchmaking school. The scholarship is awarded every April. Awards up to $5,000 are available.

To apply, students should email a letter in PDF form to the Trustees of the Horological Society of New York that includes a biography, explanation of their motivation to study watchmaking and an explanation of how this scholarship would benefit the applicant. A resume is required, and reference letters are recommended. The application period is January 1 to March 1 of every year.

Donor

The Grace Fryer Scholarship for Female Watchmaking Students is made possible by a generous donation from an anonymous donor.

AWARDEES

2022

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Grace Fryer Scholarship - Horological Society of New York

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The Grace Fryer Scholarship is dedicated to the Radium Girls - the women of the 1920s who worked as dial painters in Illinois and New Jersey and succumbed to the often deadly side effects of working with radium, a material that was then instrumental in making watch dials glow.

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1920 – Tennis players, Toronto Tennis Club

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1920 – Tennis players, Toronto Tennis Club

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Teagan Murphy

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Mission Revival Style 1890s - 1920s (U.S. National Park Service)

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Antonia Mille

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At the Sesquicentennial, President Dwight D. Eisenhower was invited and wrote the following about Orange: Orange, New Jersey, has origins in Connecticut's New Haven Colony. The area was situated in the northeast portion of a land grant conveyed by King Charles II of England to his brother James, Duke of York. In 1664, James conveyed the land to two proprietors, Lord John Berkeley and Sir George Carteret. Since Carteret was the Royal Governor of the Isle of Jersey, the territory became known as "New Jersey." In 1666, 30 of New Haven's Puritan Congregationalist families took the perilous journey by water to found "a town on the Passayak" River in order to escape religious persecution. They arrived on territory now encompassing Newark, the four Oranges, and other nearby municipalities. Previously referred to as the "Mountain Society" area, the name Orange was first used and adopted by the settlers in 1780. It was derived from the name of England's ruling house, the House of Orange.

Orange was initially the agricultural portion of the City of Newark, and remained such until November 27, 1806, when the territory now encompassing all of the Oranges was detached, thus creating the Township of Orange by an act of the New Jersey State Legislature. On Tuesday, April 7, 1807, the first government was elected at a town meeting. Samuel D. Day was elected as the first Chairman of the Orange Township Committee. On January 26, 1860, Orange was then incorporated as the Town of Orange. As a result of achieving status as a town, Orange was permitted to establish fire, police, street and other town departments. On March 13, 1860, Dr. William Pierson was elected as the first Mayor of the Town of Orange. Almost immediately, the new town began fragmenting into smaller independent communities primarily because of local disputes about the costs of establishing the new departments. The other areas separated from the Town of Orange on various dates: South Orange was organized on January 26, 1861; Fairmount (later to become part of West Orange) on March 11, 1862; East Orange on March 4, 1863; and West Orange (including Fairmount) on March 14, 1863. April 3, 1872, Orange was officially incorporated as a city by an act of the New Jersey State Legislature. It then became known as the City of Orange Township.

Orange was connected with the metropolitan area markets as early as 1705. Orange lay on the Mt. Pleasant Turnpike, the main road from Newark to Morristown, and ultimately to Easton, Pennsylvania. Therefore, the town became a busy thoroughfare for travelers, and hotels abounded due to the advent of stagecoach travel. Initially, the stagecoach was the primary method of transportation, and then omnibuses of the Eclipse and the Morris & Newark Lines serviced Orange. The Morris & Essex Railroad arrived in Orange in November 1836, its first cars drawn by horses. On October 2, 1837, the first steam locomotive appeared, and the horses were, with minor exception, relegated to pasture. The "M&E" later became a vital part of the Delaware, Lackawanna, & Western Railroad (DL&W) and survives today as NJ Transit's busy Morristown Line. Trolley cars appeared much later, with the Orange and Newark Horse Car Railroad Company running its first car up Main Street in May 1862. The Orange Crosstown Line, eventually extending from Morris Street, Orange, to Bloomfield, was started in June 1888.

The first electric trolley in the State of New Jersey operated over a section of this line. Eventually all of the trolleys, and the buses that replaced them, became part of the sprawling Public Service Coordinated Transport System.

Due to the proximity to a network of rivers, canals, railroads, and street trolley cars, Orange was an industrial city from the outset. Early settlers found a profuse growth of hemlock trees, an ideal supply of tannic acid for the tanning industry, and boot and shoe-making factories soon flourished. Hat-making was the essential industry, and can be traced to 1792. Hat making had emerged as Orange's dominant industry by the 1850s.

Prominent hatters, including the Stetsons, relied largely on Irish, German, and later Italian workers to staff their factories. Hatting peaked in the 1890s. By 1892, 21 firms were engaged in that trade, employing over 3,700 people in plants valued at nearly $1.1 million. Nearly 4.8 million hats left Orange that year alone, bound for all four comers of the globe.

Beer was also major revenue producer in Orange beginning in the 1890s when the three Winter Brothers of Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania, arrived in the city and built the first brewery. The Orange Brewery was constructed in 1901 at a reported cost of $350,000. The production of beer ceased with prohibition in 1920, and after the repeal of the Holstead Act in 1933, the brewery was sold to John F. Trommers of Philadelphia. Trommers brewed beer under that label until 1950, when the concern was again sold to Liebmann Breweries, Incorporated, which bottled Rheingold. Eventually, after several additional owners, the plant was closed for good in 1977.

With the advent of the profitable shoe and hat-making factories, wealthy industrialists fashioned large airy country homes in sections, North of Main Street, that took advantage of access to the railroads and the mineral springs of West Orange. The city was once known as a health resort, due to its fine climate and the medicinal qualities of the water in this area. In 1850, with the influx of factory workers, housing construction significantly increased the density of housing in the area. By 1900, a thriving immigrant working class culture existed. Factory employees generally resided in multiple-family dwellings surrounding a small business district. The next major residential development occurred during the post-World War I period in the Seven Oaks section. This area is surrounded by the Colgate Estates and in proximity to the Highland Avenue Rail Road Station. Seven Oaks is still noteworthy as having the highest quality of housing and neighborhood amenities in Orange.

During the late 1800s and early 1900s, a very active labor movement was evolving which resulted in frequent labor disputes that sometimes had negative impacts on businesses. By 1921, only five hat-making firms were left, and by 1960, all had departed for places such as Norwalk and Danbury, Connecticut. As the hat-making industry declined, Orange's manufacturing economy shifted toward electrical supplies, pharmaceuticals, calculating machines, boxes, and radium watch dials. Other significant businesses emerged out of this industrial re-structuring. Major firms located in Orange were the Monroe Calculating Company, manufacturers of the patented adding machines of the same name, and the Bates Manufacturing Company, producers of office accessories such as staplers and stampers.

The United States Radium Company was a notorious resident of Orange. This firm refined ore and extracted radium used to make luminous paint for dials and hands of watches and other indicators. Orange became notable for the "Radium Girls" lawsuit brought against the company in 1927. Aided by the New Jersey Consumers League, five women contended that their work conditions and their subsequent failing health were directly linked and requested that each woman receive $25,000 for damages. The case was eventually settled with much publicity with each woman receiving $10,000 and a $600 per year annuity while they lived. Although the women were not awarded the full damage amount, the case brought national attention to worker conditions and public health issues.

Local history has always been very important to the City of Orange Township's residents. Presidents, presidential candidates, and governors have attended prior anniversary celebrations. Orange threw a big party on its Centennial in 1807, and another when it celebrated it and it's Sesquicentennial in 1956 with much fanfare.
"Living in one or our leading residential areas adjacent to the metropolitan centers of the middle Atlantic seaboard, you provide a splendid example of modern community life. Your public services and neighborly spirit are an example to the Nation" ( Clark, Eleanor Sterling. Orange, New Jersey. Orange, NJ: Orange Publishing Company, 1956.).

Between 1950 and the 1990s, as a result of Interstate 280 and urban renewal programs, but primarily due to the major shift in growth from the cities to suburbs, Orange lost population so that 1990 it had declined to 29,000. In 1982, citizens voted overwhelmingly to change the designation of Orange from a city to a township, thereby making it eligible for National Revenue Sharing funds. In 1985, the State of New Jersey named Orange as a State Urban Enterprise Zone, creating tax breaks and investment incentives.

Orange has made great strides with these resources and in the year 2000, for the first time in fifty years, Orange gained almost 3000 in population; reaching almost 33,000. For the next twenty-five years, to 2030, Orange is projected to continue to gain population. The City of Orange Township is supporting these positive forecasts with major planning initiatives to generate new housing and economic growth in the City. As we approach the 21st Century, Orange continues to rely on the strengths that have historically made it great location for residential and commercial development: a small-sized, densely populated, centrally located municipality with a highly efficient transportation network that links train, bus, and regional highway access. Perched on the brink of its brighter future, we hope that a look at Orange's past can provide some valuable lessons for the present and the future.

Orange has produced such notables as baseball's Monte Irvin and Heavyweight Boxer Tony Galento. Actor William Bendix lived and worked here for a short while. It was once the hat-making capital of the United States, as several brothers founded the "No-Name Hat Company," before one of them moved on to make fedoras in Philadelphia under the family name, "Stetson."

Orange continues to make history with respect to old traditions and with new firsts. In June 2003, the City was once again honored by a Presidential visit, when George W. Bush came to Orange as part of an initiative to highlight the importance of small businesses to community development. In May 2005, the City assigned its first female motorcycle police officer; and in January 2006, the City appointed the first woman judge to sit on the bench of the Orange Municipal Court. In March 2006, the first female and the first Latino police officers in the City of Orange were promoted to the rank of Lieutenant.

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At the Sesquicentennial, President Dwight D. Eisenhower was invited and wrote the following about Orange: Orange, New Jersey, has origins in Connecticut's New Haven Colony. The area was situated in the northeast portion of a land grant conveyed by King Charles II of England to his brother James, Duke of York.

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As the 1920s came roaring in, the United States was experiencing a time of economic prosperity. With that prosperity came a desire for convenience and more leisure time. For this reason, many inventions in the 1920s are related to entertainment and making domestic life easier. These inventions not only drastically shaped the 1920s but shaped the world as we know it today.

Check out these seven 1920s inventions that are still used today.

1. The Electric Automatic Traffic Signal

Garret Morgan is credited with inventing the first electric automatic traffic signal in 1923. Although other types of traffic signals were in use since 1868, Morgan's design used a T-shaped pole and had three positions. The patented design was sold to General Electric for $40,000.

According to the United States Access Board, the United States had roughly 300,000 traffic lights in 2018. Just imagine how many are in use across the whole world!

2. Quick-Frozen Food

Can you imagine not having a pack of frozen peas in the freezer just when you need it? Or how about a frozen pizza for when a craving hits? Well, frozen veggies and food as we know them today haven't always been a staple in every home! Clarence Birdseye invented and offered Americans the first quick-frozen foods in the 1920s after noticing how good a fish kept if it was frozen quickly rather than slowly.

3. The Band-Aid®

Earle Dickson, a Johnson and Johnson employee, created the first adhesive bandage for small wounds in 1920. Dickson invented the special bandage for his wife, Josephine, who seemed to cut and burn herself regularly while cooking. Now, she could easily dress a wound herself.

Johnson and Johnson mass produced machine-made Band-Aids® in 1924. Over time, these bandages have evolved to be made in a variety of shapes and sizes and in various materials. Some have added medication, and they can be a favorite decorative "sticker" to many children around the world!

Over 100 billion Band-Aids® have been made.

4. Water Skis

In 1922, Ralph Samuelson created a new sport-water skiing! It quickly became a favorite summer pastime. Samuelson first used a pair of boards as skis and a clothesline as a towrope. He tried his idea on Lake Pepin in Lake City, Minnesota, where his brother pulled him in a boat that reached 20 mph. It took him a bit of time to perfect the best position for skimming the water, but once he did, he never looked back!

Samuelson spent the next 15 years performing water skiing shows and teaching other people the skill.

5. Electric Blender

Are you a fan of milk shakes? The first electric blender made its appearance in 1922.

Stephen J. Poplawski is credited for the electric blender that was first used for making milk shakes and malts. In 1932, Poplawski received patents for a blender that worked well for fruits and vegetables.

The electric blender made cool creamy treats and pureed fruits and veggies easily. It quickly became a popular kitchen appliance in most homes.

6. Television

Oh, what would we do without the greatest pastime in this day and age-and yes, I'm talking about binge-watching the television. Inventors Philo Taylor Farnsworth, John Logie Baird, and Charles Francis Jenkins are credited with the idea and creation of televisions as we know them today.

Before electronic television, there was mechanical television. The world's first electronic television is credited to Philo Taylor Farnsworth in 1927. Though other mechanical television inventors such as John Logie Baird and Charles Francis Jenkins had successes in television technology, Farnsworth's invention is considered the direct ancestor of our modern electronic television.

Some estimates say there are as many as 120.6 million TVs in homes across America today!

7. Vacuum Cleaner

Though the first vacuum cleaner can be traced back to about 1860, it was in the mid-1920s that the vacuum became much more efficient and easier to use. In fact, in 1920 Air-Way Sanitizer of Toledo, Ohio, introduced a vacuum cleaner with a disposable bag. In 1926, the popular vacuum company Hoover developed a positive agitation system that greatly increased dirt removal efficiency. Cleaning household carpets became a lot easier and much faster.

Today, vacuum cleaners come in all sorts of varieties such as cordless, upright, central, wet and dry, and even robotic! What do you think was your grandmother's favorite 1920s invention? You can learn more about your ancestors in the 1920s by finding them in the 1930 United States census records. Find them now!

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Seven Inventions from the 1920s That We Still Use Today * FamilySearch

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As the 1920s came roaring in, the United States was experiencing a time of economic prosperity. With that prosperity came a desire for convenience and more leisure time. For this reason, many inventions in the 1920s are related to entertainment and making domestic life easier.

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What men really wore in the Roaring 20s

Any discussion of 1920s men's fashion needs to start with some cultural context. The Roaring 20s were a time of great political, economic, and social change in the United States. After World War I came to an end in 1918, society started to speed up. People gained newfound freedoms, and they had money to spend on fashion, entertainment, and household goods.

The year 1920 also marked the start of the Prohibition era and the rise of nightclubs, speakeasies, and notorious gangsters like Al Capone. All in all, there was a huge shift from previous decades, not just in society but in fashion. The Roaring 20s dress brought about iconic and timeless styles, many of which helped shape those that exist today.

How did men's fashion change in the 1920s?

The Roaring 20s were a time of prosperity, fun, and individual freedom for both the elite and the working class. It also marked the rise of consumerism. Since fashion reflects the period, it's no surprise that men's and women's styles started highlighting these changes.

In the 1910s, the working class wore durable, sturdy clothes that would last a long time. Most people opted for the clean-cut look, too.

By the start of the 1920s, though, styles had become more relaxed than ever before. More manufacturers constructed clothes with softer fabrics and slightly looser fits. Formal wear became more diverse, elegant, and glitzy, though it was still functional.

Wealthy women opted for shorter skirts, cocktail dresses, and flapper dresses, the latter of which was first popularized in European fashion. Elite men still wore tailored suits as before, but there were several notable changes.

For one thing, much of 1920s men's fashion was influenced by the rise of gangsters. This included the notorious Peaky Blinders, a street gang from Birmingham, England that made many iconic styles such as three-piece suits and flat caps trendy.

Gone were the shoulder pads and stiff fit of the previous decade. These were replaced with form-fitting suit jackets with gently sloped shoulders and tailored suits with cuffed pants that creased in the front for a stronger silhouette.

The 1920s were also a time for casual dress. As menswear became less regimented, leisure clothes and sportswear made their debut.

This meant sweaters, plus-fours, and other wide or baggy pants, workwear pants, jumpers, caps, and an array of accessories people could wear to express themselves. Sports attire in particular had to be fashionable enough and still practical for the upper and middle classes to wear.

For the young, educated man, suit jackets and matching ties were still on trend, but they weren't as restrictive. More casual 1920s men's dress also included cardigans, knitted pullovers, and ankle socks. Men also switched over to button-down shirts with detachable collars and started wearing bow ties and a greater assortment of hats, including fedoras.

In terms of fabrics, the 1920s saw a slight departure from the previous decade. Clothes were still made from natural fibers like cotton, wool, linen, and silk, but synthetic materials like rayon also became more commonplace. At the same time, new textile production techniques saw more medium-weight as opposed to heavy-weight clothes, a greater variety of knits, and softer textures.

Many people consider the Roaring 20s to be the start of today's seasonal fashion cycle. No longer did people have to wear the same clothes for years on end. Instead, there was a greater variety of patterns, shapes, styles, and colors than ever before. Because of this, they could change their style as they saw fit to keep up with the latest fad.

Misconceptions about 1920s men's fashion

If you've ever read Fitzgerald's The Great Gatsby, you probably know the Roaring 20s for being a wild, glamorous, carefree time. After all, the 1920s were an age of postwar optimism and people had more freedom and a lot to celebrate.

In the United States, menswear had started to move away from the traditional khaki and neutral tones of browns and greens to bolder hues and distinct patterns. This meant brighter suits, lighter colors, more colorful shirts, and casual clothing options.

But not everyone spent all their free time at speakeasies or wore cocktail dresses and looser suits. Nor did everyone have the funds for such things.

During the Roaring 20s, styles from all over the world - particularly Europe - were making their way across the ocean. Although leisure attire gained traction, formal styles were still very much in vogue.

For example, men's formal evening wear often included a tuxedo, top hat, and leather oxford shoes. For formal and semi-formal settings, men would often wear tweed, herringbone, or pinstripe suits in navy blue, gray, or brown colors. Older gentlemen in particular still preferred the classic top hat over the fedora or derby hat, too.

Along with this, one of the biggest misconceptions about the Roaring 20s dress is that it was all about style and glam. In reality, while it was definitely diverse, it was still highly practical and refined.

If you're looking for a more accurate depiction of men's formalwear during this time, check out Downton Abbey. Certain aspects, such as the hat styles and slim, tapered pants were also prominent in the United States at the time.

Men's Clothing in the 1920s

If you're interested in replicating the classic, timeless designs of the Roaring 20s dress in the United States, here are some ideas.

Suits

Men's suits in the 1920s looked very similar to those that exist today. At the start of the decade, they had a slimmer fit and simpler design. By the end of the decade, they'd become looser and more colorful.

Many men still preferred the traditional tuxedo or three-piece suits for formal get-togethers and evening events. Suits often had micro patterns or black and white pinstripes as inspired by the gangsters of the time. Popular colors included blue, gray, brown, and ivory.

That said, suits also came in bolder patterns like plaid, herringbone, and wide stripes. In the early 1920s, the jazz suit also became popular amongst men who wanted a long, slim shape.

Most three-piece suits were double-breasted, but there were also single-breasted options. The suit jacket was higher waisted than before and had wide pointed lapels to emphasize the shoulders and waist. It also featured a three- or four-button closure down the front. Suit pants were flat in the front, had tapered legs, and a thinner waistline.

Styles changed by the season and age. In summer, for example, college students and barbershop singers often opted for a striped or navy blazer with white pants rather than a full suit.

In terms of fabric, wool, flannel, linen, tweed, and blends were still quite common.

Shirts

Men's button-down shirts typically had a solid color, such as pastel, or boasted contrasting vertical stripes. These shirts also had a rounded collar that let the wearer show off their tie and was detachable for easy cleaning. Sophisticated men would also sometimes add a pin to the collar.

In the late 20s, most shirts had matching collars that were either solid or striped. Some casual shirts didn't have a collar at all and came in neutral and pastel colors like lilac or sky blue. Around this time, plaid and candy stripe shirts also became trendy.

Younger gentlemen often wore shirts constructed from softer fabrics like cotton. It wasn't uncommon to find more casual garments with a turndown collar, single cuff or cufflinks, or single barrel cuffs with a button. Shirts could be either partial or full button downs.

To the club or in warmer weather, men would sometimes wear Peaky Blinders shirts, or penny collar shirts. These were made-to-measure and flattered the wearer's frame.

Short-sleeve shirts weren't very common yet in the Roaring 20s, so men would roll up their sleeves on hot days. The overall fit is still considered fairly modern, aside from the detachable stiff collar.

Pants

Most men's pants consisted of cotton or wool. They were typically tight at the waist but still wider than before. Pants tended to have straight or cuffed legs and were neither skinny nor especially long. The waistband was higher and held up with button suspenders or a belt. Around this time, the single pleat became popular in the United States, since it gave pants a nice crease that remained even when the wearer moved or sat down.

Around the end of the 1920s, Oxford bags made their way to North America. These pants were looser than standard options and wide-legged for a comfortable fit, making them especially popular amongst college students and younger men.

Low rise pants hadn't yet made an appearance in the country, but there were still a lot of fun patterns and colors for the fashion-forward. This included stripes, checks, herringbone, plaid, and tweed. Popular colors were gray, white, black, beige, and khaki.

Waistcoats and Vests

Unlike in the 1910s, the Roaring 20s dress did not mandate waistcoats and vests. However, they were still rather prominent, but with a lower cut. Typically, they were buttoned up high and had notch lapels or, by the end of the decade, no lapels.

Most waistcoats and vests were slim-fitting. They also had long, pointed tips and a deeper front than before to show off the shirt and tie beneath.

Vests had pockets in the front and were typically single breasted, though some sophisticated gentlemen still preferred double breasted ones. Members of the working class couldn't always afford a three-piece suit, so they'd instead pair a nice vest with matching pants.

These garments came in solid colors like black, blue, or gray and often boasted geometric or colorful patterns. Some were tweed or knitted. Men who wanted a more casual or sporty aesthetic would often wear a pullover knit vest over a shirt.

Outerwear

Outerwear like jackets and overcoats tended to match the suits and pants. For example, if the suit was fitted at the waist, so too was the coat. And if the suit or pants were wider and looser, the outerwear would have a similar fit.

Men's coats often reached below the knee and had broad shoulders and wide lapels. Some were fitted at the top and roomier at the waist and hips to flatter any frame. Although outerwear could be nearly any fit and style, one particularly trendy option was the straight hanging coat, which did not cinch at the waist.

In general, outwear was less colorful than shirts or pants. Initially, they came in neutral colors like brown or black. However, darker colors like navy blue became popular when the British trend came to the United States since they were considered flattering to nearly anybody. These colors were also more similar in aesthetic to those worn by the Peaky Blinders gang.

Formal outwear could be either double or single breasted. More luxurious garments featured a simple silk lining as opposed to the previously popular bulky fur lining found in tweed and wool coats.

Generally, outerwear was on the heavier side and fit closer to the body than most modern attire. Wool coats were highly durable and had a coarse finish. In warmer weather, people opted for silk-lined jackets with cotton or linen sleeves since they were lighter and less stiff. These jackets sometimes had a cutaway front that was mostly square.

Men's Shoes in the 1920s

During the Great Gatsby era, the Oxford shoe took the United States by storm as a more comfortable alternative to other formal options. Other popular options included wingtip shoes, patent leather shoes, two-tone sports shoes, high-cut work boots, and winter boots.

In terms of material, most men's shoes were constructed of a mix of leather and canvas. However, some shoemakers started to incorporate reptile skin in their designs. Regardless of material, most shoes came in different shades of white, black, or brown.

Men's Accessories in the 1920s

Hats

There was no shortage of hats in the 1920s. For formal occasions, gentlemen would often wear top hats paired with a matching tuxedo. These top hats were typically made from Buckham, which made them sturdy. Some were collapsible, while others were stiff.

Middle-class men would frequently wear fedoras and bowler (or derby) hats as a more casual alternative to top hats. These came in dark colors for winter and light colors for summer. Fedoras also had a wide brim and had a downward shape in the front and back. The younger crowd typically rolled the sides upward; older men would turn one side of the brim up and keep another side down.

Another casual option was the skimmer hat or boater. These stiff hats were commonly made from thick straw and worn in summer and were best for outdoor use. Most were tan or light brown.

Other options included tweed caps, which were also used for sports such as golf, and various flat hat styles like the newsboy and ivy caps. Newsboys and similar sports caps were usually floppy as they did not have a stiff brim. They were also constructed from wool or cotton and came in lighter colors. Some even featured a checkered or plaid pattern.

Towards the end of the 1920s, hats came in more unique and bolder colors. For example, bowler hats could be blue or green. Regardless of style and color, the hat was meant to complement the outfit.

Pocket Squares

Pocket squares were often made from silk or linen. They were meant to elevate the wearer's suit and add to the overall look by adding a flair of color.

Older, wealthier men were rarely seen without a pocket square. Some would opt for solid colors, while others went with bolder or art deco designs. Whatever else, the pocket square would match the tie, hat band, or shirt color.

Watches

Although the Roaring 20s dress still featured pocket watches, companies like Elgin National Watch Company and Rolex came on the scene. Rolex began making luxury wristwatches for the elite and produced the first waterproof timepiece made with precious metals, a screw-down crown, and a case back. Elgin National Watch Company, meanwhile, manufactured timepieces for the average working man.

Cartier Tank also started producing wristwatches in the 1920s, which were made popular due to prominent movie stars such as Clark Gable and Rudolph Valentino wearing them in their films.

Eyewear

It was considered fashionable to wear glasses during the 1920s. One popular style was pince-nez, rimless glasses that sat on the bridge of the nose. These came with a cord that would drape down one side and attach to the wearer's clothes. Older, sophisticated gentlemen like President Theodore Roosevelt wore these, specifically those constructed with a gold or wire frame.

Round spectacles were also quite popular and eventually paved the way for oval and octagonal shapes. For a sportier look, eyewear brands started making thicker frames that came in various colors such as dark brown, black, or tortoiseshell. Rimmed glasses tended to be heavy, though there were rimless options, too, which were lighter.

Eyewear was about more than just the aesthetic, though. Special lenses were made to reduce the glare of the sun and protect the wearer's eyes.

Ties and Neckwear

Neckties gained a lot of popularity around the 1920s. More than that, the options expanded to include horizontal stripes, plaids, and solid colors like purples, pinks, and grays. Bow ties also became more varied to give the wearer more freedom of expression. Along with this, the European trend of diamond patterns and paisley prints made their debut in United States menswear.

In general, neckties were made from fine silk or knit wool, depending on the season and occasion. Scarf ties, which were tied in a Windsor knot and worn under the sweater, were also common and were originally constructed from silk or rayon.

For many men, collar pins and clips were another way to change up the look of their neckwear. However, it was not until around the late 1930s or early 1940s that neckwear really began to diversify.

Men's Formalwear in the 1920s

Whether they were attending a ball, enjoying an elegant dinner party, or getting married, most men wore either a black or dark navy suit or tuxedo in the Roaring 20s. The tuxedo tailcoat, which featured a tail at the back and came as a fitted jacket, was still very prominently used for formal events. Formal three-piece suits were longer than they had been in previous decades and were slightly less structured to allow for more movement and comfort.

Sophisticated gentlemen typically combined their suit or tux with an elegant top hat that matched their aesthetic. In some cases, they would also wear a luxury watch and a carefully folded pocket square to go in their suit pocket. White ties were prominent for formal and special occasions, but black ties also started gaining traction.

For slightly less formal events, men would sometimes choose a dinner jacket instead of a three-piece suit while women might wear a cocktail dress. Along with this, the formal day dress that had been popular in the past became reserved for special occasions. The look of it changed to feature fewer buttons and higher-waisted pants.

Several luxury menswear brands like Gucci were established in the 1920s as well. Gucci, in particular, began designing and producing an haute couture style for the upper class. These garments were custom-fitted for the elegant, sophisticated man.

Men's Casual Dress in the 1920s

In terms of casual wear, men started to wear more sweaters, especially on colder days. Thanks to the influence of sports and leisure clothes, casual dress often featured knickerbockers and plus-fours, even for those who did not play sports.

Casual shirts were typically worn unbuttoned and had brighter or striped prints. Younger adults started wearing softer, attached collars or went for collarless garments, as in the case of the henley shirt.

Students at the University of Oxford started wearing Oxford bags, which were very wide and much baggier than most men's pants. Younger men also started switching to jeans, thanks to Levi Strauss & Co's popularization of denim.

For the most part, older gentlemen were still primarily influenced by pants from the Edwardian era (1901 to 1910). Their casual pants were fairly slim, high-waisted, straight-legged, and tapered at the bottoms.

Men's Grooming in the 1920s

The Roaring 20s saw a few changes in terms of men's grooming regimens. For one thing, sideburns were cut higher than before. For another, hair was kept to a medium length.

Trendy styles at the time included the comb-over, a single part in the hair, or an entirely slicked back look. This was true whether the man wore a hat or not, though college-age men started deviating slightly from these looks.

In many cases, men would use certain oil products to keep their hair in place throughout the day. Many of these styles were easier for those who had straight hair. Men like Charlie Chaplin had wavier hair and, though they would still follow the grooming trends, they tended to achieve a wilder or somewhat mussed up look.

When it came to facial hair, opinions had changed in the 1920s. Having any kind of facial hair, but especially a beard, was often seen as unsanitary. However, older men could sometimes get away with a well-groomed, carefully trimmed mustache as it made them look older, wiser, and wealthier.

1920s Men's Fashion Icons

The 1920s had a rise of men's fashion icons, including:

Mr. Douglas Fairbanks

Fairbanks was a major movie star and was considered both Hollywood royalty and an "all-American" man. He invented the action hero we know today. His most iconic style was Tom Ford's slim-fit bib front cotton shirt, a checked wool suit jacket, tailored pants, and a ribbed silk tie.

Rudolph Valentino

A superstar due to his role in The Sheik, Valentino best symbolized masculinity in the 1920s. He popularized the slicked-back hairstyle called the "Vaselino" and tended to have a sophisticated look.

Al Capone

Not only was Al Capone one of the most notorious gangsters of all time, but he also had a highly distinctive style. He would often wear dark or lime-colored three-piece suits, luxury brown or black oxfords - some of which had wingtips - and a tailored jacket with patch pockets. He also boasted a classy fedora or boater hat, buttoned barrel cuffs, a tie, a white pocket square, and a lot of bling.

F. Scott Fitzgerald

Renowned author Fitzgerald was known for his work, The Great Gatsby, as well as for depicting the flamboyance of the Jazz Age. He often wore smart, plaid or flannel suits with wide notched lapels, ties of different lengths, patterns, and shapes, and a contrasting pocket square.

Humphrey Bogart

Bogart was a prominent American film and stage actor, particularly in crime dramas, but he was also instrumental in making double breasted suits popular. He tended to wear different ties and bowties, a fedora, trench coat, and crisp, sharp suits.

Fred Astaire

Viewed as one of the best dancers in all of film history, Fred Astaire had a unique style that included custom tailored suits in conservative colors, silk handkerchiefs as belts, and roomy jackets that still had a refined shape. He wasn't afraid of mixing things up though, for he also often sported bold patterns and colorful outfits that always managed to look sophisticated.

Cary Grant

British-American actor and popular icon Cary Grant often donned a more casual look with tailored pants, crisp white shirts, and various knitwear. He tended to avoid hats since he believed they were unflattering for his face shape.

Gary Cooper

Known for his understated acting technique and enduring style, Cooper was a leading man in many Hollywood films. He often wore wide, tailored pants and relaxed blazers, but he was also right at home in three-piece suits.

Where to buy 1920s men's fashion?

You can get 1920s inspired menswear from many places, including Amazon, Etsy, eBay, and many specialty stores.

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Many men's luxury brands today also design and manufacture garments that would fit right in with the Roaring 20s era. This includes brands like Tom Ford and Gucci, though much of what you'll find on their website caters to the modern age. That said, if you're looking for accessories like timepieces or pocket squares, you should be able to find something there.

However, if you're looking for something specific, your best bet is to shop at a ready-to-wear or made-to-measure store. These establishments emphasize quality and tailor every item to the wearer's preference. Plus, since the garments are custom-made, you can get unique patterns, colors, and even fabrics.

1920s Men's Fashion Bottom Line

The 1920s were often known as the Jazz Age or the Roaring 20s and for good reason. They were a time of prosperity, change, and freedom for many people in the United States. Not only did men and women have more disposable income at their fingertips, but they also had more opportunities to express themselves through fashion.

1920s men's fashion was largely inspired by the rise of gangsters like the Peaky Blinders and various European trends. While many gentlemen still wore smart, tailored suits, the decade saw a rise in diverse attire from leisure day clothes to sportswear.

This meant more patterns, bolder colors, and different cuts than ever before. It also meant changes in fabrics - rather than the stiff, coarse construction used before, many garments became softer, more comfortable, and roomier.

Many clothes were still heavier than what you'd find today, including suits, overcoats, pants, and jackets. However, a lot of the modern fashion trends that currently exist are still based on those that became popular in the United States a century ago. The pinstripe suit and silk-lined coats, for example, started trending in the Roaring 20s.

If you're looking for more inspiration for 1920s dress, look no further than Fitzgerald's The Great Gatsby or Downton Abbey. And, if you're interested in recreating one of the many trends of the 1920s today, check out a made-to-order shop or specialty brand online.

Thanks, as always, for reading.

Stylishly Yours,

Angela Mae
He Spoke Style

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The Ultimate Guide to 1920s Men's Fashion

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What men really wore in the Roaring 20s Any discussion of 1920s men's fashion needs to start with some cultural context. The Roaring 20s were a time of great political, economic, and social change in the United States. After World War I came to an end in 1918, society started to speed up.

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The 18th amendment, passed in 1920, banned the manufacture, sale, and transportation of liquors and drinkable alcohol. This led to a period of speakeasies, rum runners, and a huge increase in illegal production and sale of alcohol in the united states. This created a crime and mob culture within the nation, the most famous perpetrator being Chicago gangster Al Capone. -Mark McGuire

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The Prohibition Era began in 1920 when the 18th Amendment to the U.S. Constitution, which banned the manufacture, transportation and sale of intoxicating liquors, went into effect with the passage of the Volstead Act. Despite the new legislation, Prohibition was difficult to enforce. The increase of the illegal production and sale of liquor (known as "bootlegging"), the proliferation of speakeasies (illegal drinking spots) and the accompanying rise in gang violence and organized crime led to waning support for Prohibition by the end of the 1920s. In early 1933, Congress adopted a resolution proposing a 21st Amendment to the Constitution that would repeal the 18th. The 21st Amendment was ratified on December 5, 1933, ending Prohibition.
WATCH: Rumrunners, Moonshiners and Bootleggers on HISTORY Vault
Origins of Prohibition

In the 1820s and '30s, a wave of religious revivalism swept the United States, leading to increased calls for temperance, as well as other "perfectionist" movements such as the abolitionist movement to end slavery.

In 1838, the state of Massachusetts passed a temperance law banning the sale of spirits in less than 15-gallon quantities; though the law was repealed two years later, it set a precedent for such legislation. Maine passed the first state prohibition laws in 1846, followed by a stricter law in 1851. A number of other states had followed suit by the time the Civil War began in 1861..

Did you know? In 1932, Franklin D. Roosevelt defeated the incumbent President Herbert Hoover, who once called Prohibition "the great social and economic experiment, noble in motive and far reaching in purpose." Some say FDR celebrated the repeal of Prohibition by enjoying a dirty martini, his preferred drink.

By the turn of the century, temperance societies like the Woman's Christian Temperance Union (WCTU) were a common fixture in communities across the United States. Women played a strong role in the temperance movement, as alcohol was seen as a destructive force in families and marriages.

In 1906, a new wave of attacks began on the sale of liquor, led by the Anti-Saloon League (established in 1893) and driven by a reaction to urban growth, as well as the rise of evangelical Protestantism and its view of saloon culture as corrupt and ungodly.

In addition, many factory owners during the Industrial Revolution supported prohibition in their desire to prevent accidents and increase the efficiency of their workers in an era of increased industrial production and extended working hours.

READ MORE: See All the Crafty Ways Americans Hid Alcohol During Prohibition

Volstead Act

In 1917, after the United States entered World War I, President Woodrow Wilson instituted a temporary wartime prohibition in order to save grain for producing food. That same year, Congress submitted the 18th Amendment, which banned the manufacture, transportation and sale of intoxicating liquors, for state ratification. Though Congress had stipulated a seven-year time limit for the process, the amendment received the support of the necessary three-quarters of U.S. states in just 11 months.

Ratified on January 16, 1919, the 18th Amendment went into effect one year later, by which time no fewer than 33 states had already enacted their own prohibition legislation. In October 1919, Congress put forth the National Prohibition Act, which provided guidelines for the federal enforcement of Prohibition. Championed by Representative Andrew Volstead of Minnesota, the chairman of the House Judiciary Committee, the legislation was more commonly known as the Volstead Act.

Enforcement of Prohibition

Both federal and local government struggled to enforce Prohibition-Hoover's "noble experiment"-over the course of the 1920s. Enforcement was initially assigned to the Internal Revenue Service (IRS), and was later transferred to the Justice Department and the Bureau of Prohibition, or Prohibition Bureau.

In general, Prohibition was enforced much more strongly in areas where the population was sympathetic to the legislation-mainly rural areas and small towns-and much more loosely in urban areas. Despite very early signs of success, including a decline in arrests for drunkenness and a reported 30 percent drop in alcohol consumption, those who wanted to keep drinking found ever-more inventive ways to do it.

Organized Crime

The illegal manufacturing and sale of liquor (known as "bootlegging") went on throughout the decade, along with the operation of " speakeasies " (stores or nightclubs selling alcohol), the smuggling of alcohol across state lines and the informal production of liquor ("moonshine" or "bathtub gin") in private homes.

In addition, the Prohibition era encouraged the rise of criminal activity associated with bootlegging. The most notorious example was the Chicago gangster Al Capone, who earned a staggering $60 million annually from bootleg operations and speakeasies.

Such illegal operations fueled a corresponding rise in gang violence, including the St. Valentine's Day Massacre in Chicago in 1929, in which several men dressed as policemen (and believed to be have associated with Capone) shot and killed a group of men in an enemy gang.

When Did Prohibition End?

The high price of bootleg liquor meant that the nation's working class and poor were far more restricted during Prohibition than middle or upper class Americans. Even as costs for law enforcement, jails and prisons spiraled upward, support for Prohibition was waning by the end of the Roaring Twenties. In addition, fundamentalist and nativist forces had gained more control over the temperance movement, alienating its more moderate members.

There were also many unintended consequences of Prohibition: Some cash-strapped restaurants shuttered their doors, since they could no longer make a profit from liquor sales. Thousands of people died each year from drinking cheap moonshine tainted with toxins. And revenues shrank for many states that had previously relied on liquor taxes to fund roads, schools and other public benefits.

With the country mired in the Great Depression by 1932, creating jobs and revenue by legalizing the liquor industry had an undeniable appeal. Democrat Franklin D. Roosevelt ran for president that year on a platform calling for Prohibition's repeal, and easily won victory over the incumbent President Herbert Hoover.

FDR's victory meant the end for Prohibition, and in February 1933 Congress adopted a resolution proposing a 21st Amendment to the Constitution that would repeal the 18th. The amendment was submitted to the states, and in December 1933 Utah provided the 36th and final necessary vote for ratification. Though a few states continued to prohibit alcohol after Prohibition's end, all had abandoned the ban by 1966.
READ MORE: The Night Prohibition Ended
Sources

Prohibition: A Case Study of Progressive Reform. Library of Congress.
Unintended Consequences of Prohibition. PBS: Prohibition.
Alcohol Prohibition Was a Failure. Cato Institute.

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The Prohibition Era began in 1920 when the 18th Amendment to the U.S. Constitution, which banned the manufacture, transportation and sale of intoxicating liquors, went into effect with the passage of the Volstead Act. Despite the new legislation, Prohibition was difficult to enforce.

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Black Codes and Jim Crow

The first steps toward official segregation came in the form of " Black Codes." These were laws passed throughout the South starting around 1865, that dictated most aspects of Black peoples' lives, including where they could work and live. The codes also ensured Black people's availability for cheap labor after slavery was abolished.

Segregation soon became official policy enforced by a series of Southern laws. Through so-called Jim Crow laws (named after a derogatory term for Blacks), legislators segregated everything from schools to residential areas to public parks to theaters to pools to cemeteries, asylums, jails and residential homes. There were separate waiting rooms for whites people and Black people in professional offices and, in 1915, Oklahoma became the first state to even segregate public phone booths.

Colleges were segregated and separate Black institutions like Howard University in Washington, D.C. and Fisk University in Nashville, Tennessee were created to compensate. Virginia's Hampton Institute was established in 1869 as a school for Black youth, but with white instructors teaching skills to relegate Black people in service positions to whites.

The Supreme Court and Segregation

In 1875 the outgoing Republican-controlled House and Senate passed a civil rights bill outlawing discrimination in schools, churches and public transportation. But the bill was barely enforced and was overturned by the Supreme Court in 1883.

In 1896, the Supreme Court ruled in Plessy v. Ferguson that segregation was constitutional. The ruling established the idea of "separate but equal." The case involved a mixed-race man who was forced to sit in the Black-designated train car under Louisiana's Separate Car Act.

Housing Segregation

As part of the segregation movement, some cities instituted zoning laws that prohibited Black families from moving into white-dominant blocks. In 1917, as part of Buchanan v. Warley, the Supreme Court found such zoning to be unconstitutional because it interfered with property rights of owners.

Using loopholes in that ruling in the 1920s, Secretary of Commerce Herbert Hoover created a federal zoning committee to persuade local boards to pass rules preventing lower-income families from moving into middle-income neighborhoods, an effort that targeted Black families. Richmond, Virginia, decreed that people were barred from residency on any block where they could not legally marry the majority of residents. This invoked Virginia's anti-mixed race marriage law and was not technically in violation with the Supreme Court decision.

Segregation During the Great Migration

During the Great Migration, a period between 1916 and 1970, six million African Americans left the South. Huge numbers moved northeast and reported discrimination and segregation similar to what they had experienced in the South.

As late as the 1940s, it was still possible to find "Whites Only" signs on businesses in the North. Segregated schools and neighborhoods existed, and even after World War II, Black activists reported hostile reactions when Black people attempted to move into white neighborhoods.

Segregation and the Public Works Administration

The Public Works Administration's efforts to build housing for people displaced during the Great Depression focused on homes for white families in white communities. Only a small portion of houses was built for Black families, and those were limited to segregated Black communities.

In some cities, previously integrated communities were torn down by the PWA and replaced by segregated projects. The reason given for the policy was that Black families would bring down property values.

Red-Lining

Starting in the 1930s, the Federal Home Loan Bank Board and the Home Owners' Loan Corporation conspired to create maps with marked areas considered bad risks for mortgages in a practice known as "red-lining." The areas marked in red as "hazardous" typically outlined Black neighborhoods. This kind of mapping concentrated poverty as (mostly Black) residents in red-lined neighborhoods had no access or only very expensive access to loans.

The practice did not begin to end until the 1970s. Then, in 2008, a system of "reverse red-lining," which extended credit on unfair terms with subprime loans, created a higher rate of foreclosure in Black neighborhoods during the housing crisis.

Housing Segregation

In 1948, the Supreme Court ruled that a Black family had the right to move into their newly-purchased home in a quiet neighborhood in St. Louis, despite a covenant dating back to 1911 that precluded the use of the property in the area by "any person not of the Caucasian race." In Shelley v. Kramer, attorneys from the National Association for the Advancement of Colored People (NAACP), led by Thurgood Marshall, argued that allowing such white-only real estate covenants were not only morally wrong, but strategically misguided in a time when the country was trying to promote a unified, anti-Soviet agenda under President Harry Truman. Civil rights activists saw the landmark case as an example of how to start to undo trappings of segregation at the federal level.

But while the Supreme Court ruled that white-only covenants were not enforceable, the real estate playing field was hardly leveled. The Housing Act of 1949 was proposed by Truman to solve a housing shortage caused by soldiers returned from World War II. The act subsidized housing for whites only, even stipulating that Black families could not purchase the houses even on resale. The program effectively resulted in the government funding white flight from cities.

One of the most notorious of the white-only communities created by the Housing Act was Levittown, New York, built in 1949 and followed by other Levittowns in different locations.

Segregation in Schools

Segregation of children in public schools was struck down by the Supreme Court as unconstitutional in 1954 with Brown v. Board of Education. The case was originally filed in Topeka, Kansas after seven-year-old Linda Brown was rejected from the all-white schools there.

A follow-up opinion handed decision-making to local courts, which allowed some districts to defy school desegregation. This led to a showdown in Little Rock, Arkansas, in 1957, when President Dwight D. Eisenhower deployed federal troops to ensure nine Black students entered high school after Arkansas Governor Orval Faubus had called in the National Guard to block them.

When Rosa Parks was arrested in 1955 after refusing to give up her bus seat to a white man in Montgomery, Alabama, the civil rights movement began in earnest. Through the efforts of organizers like Dr. Martin Luther King Jr. and the resulting protests, the Civil Rights Act was signed in 1964, outlawing discrimination, though desegregation was a slow process, especially in schools.

Boston Busing Crisis

One of the worst incidents of anti-integration happened in 1974. Violence broke out in Boston when, in order to solve the city's school segregation problems, courts mandated a busing system that carried Black students from predominantly Roxbury to South Boston schools, and vice versa.

The state had passed the Elimination of Racial Balance law in 1965, but it had been held up in court by Irish Catholic opposition. Police protected the Black students as several days of violence broke out between police and Southie residents. White crowds greeted the buses with insults, and further violence erupted between Southie residents and retaliating Roxbury crowds. State troopers were called in until the violence subsided after a few weeks.

Segregation in the 21st Century

Segregation persists in the 21st Century. Studies show that while the public overwhelmingly supports integrated schools, only a third of Americans want federal government intervention to enforce it.

The term "apartheid schools" describes still-existing, largely segregated schools, where white students make up 0 to 10 percent of the student body. The phenomenon reflects residential segregation in cities and communities across the country, which is not created by overtly racial laws, but by local ordinances that target minorities disproportionately.

Sources

Stamped From the Beginning: The Definitive History of Racist Ideas in America by Ibram X. Kendi, published by Bodley Head.
The Case for Reparations by Ta-Nehisi Coates, The .
Dismantling Desegregation by Gary Orfield and Susan E. Eaton by the New Press.

Fact Check

We strive for accuracy and fairness. But if you see something that doesn't look right, click here to contact us! HISTORY reviews and updates its content regularly to ensure it is complete and accurate.

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Segregation in the United States - Meaning, Facts. & Legacy

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After the United States abolished slavery, Black Americans continued to be marginalized through Jim Crow laws and diminished access to facilities, housing, education-and opportunities.

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Antonia Mille

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Credit... The New York Times Archives

This is a digitized version of an article from The Times's print archive, before the start of online publication in 1996. To preserve these articles as they originally appeared, The Times does not alter, edit or update them.

Occasionally the digitization process introduces transcription errors or other problems; we are continuing to work to improve these archived versions.

ORANGE, N.J. - On the site of the old United States Radium Corporation plant here, state officials have found traces of radiation - the legacy of an earlier and more naïve era.

The officials say the radiation levels are not dangerous to the workers at the electronics company now on the land where the Radium Corporation stood. But the site is unusual because, unlike most of the other sites now being re‐examined by worried officials, the radioactive waste here does not date from the 1950's, when the first atomic‐power plants were commissioned, or even from the 1940's, when the first atomic bomb was built. It is one of very few in the country left over from the 1920's and 30's, when radium was enchantingly mysterious.

Radium's discoverer, Marie Curie, was still alive; women wore eye shadow laced with radium to make their lids glow in the dark; dial watches flared with a faint radium green, instead of blinking digital red, and surgeons first planted radium‐impregnated needles in cancerous tissue, calculating that they would kill more cancer cells than they would create.

Radium was a fairy‐tale substance, and it was handled, casually. Women who painted the watch faces and gunsights at the United States Radium Corporation plant tipped their brushes on their tongues. Doctors touted radium as a miracle drug for arthritis and gout and prescribed Radithor elixir or injections of the metal's salts. Patients bought chunks of radioactive ore that vaporized dangerous radon gas in their homes.

Plant's Founder Died, Too
The ore‐processing and watch‐painting buildings at Alden and High Streets here were torn down in 1929, after dial painters who worked there developed radiuM poisoning and died of bone cancers traced to the radium paint they had ingested. By that time the plant's founder, Dr. Sabin A. von Sochocky, who had spent his last years working with medical detectives on the effects of radium on his employees, had died as a result of the radiation‐ as Madame Curie would die five years later.

But radium has a half‐life of 1,622 years, and chunks of the material, left in the rubble when the plant was razed, have continued to emit radiation up through the floors of the new buildings, which house an electronics' company, an auto‐body shop, a restaurant and a gas station.

The New Jersey Department of Environmental Protection and the. Federal

Environmental Protection Agency made a complete survey of the T & E Electronics Company, Gary's Auto Body Shop, the Orange Bowl Luncheonette and the C & T Exxon Station last month after preliminary surveys for gamma radiation in March found them to be slightly above normal for the area.

The site's potential as a radiation hazard emerged during a check in a Las Vegas, Nev. library of old records of companies in the radium‐extraction business, investigators said.

The results of the complete survey are not in yet, but the preliminary sur‐. vey found levels 10 to 20 times higher than that of normal background radiation in gamma rays inside the electronics shop, and higher ones next to the railroad tracks behind it, which suggested that ore had been spilled as it was carried into the processing building.

The agencies, in an attempt to pinpoint the whereabouts of the radiation sources, set up Reuter‐Stokes gammaray monitors and radon‐gas monitors in a grid pattern around the buildings and dug soil samples to see if any solid sources of radioactivity‐ old ore or extracted metal under the floor or ore dust in the walls - were near workers, and whether the radioactive gas was drifting around the buildings.

An investigator said that a couple of pieces of radioactive material, "obviously molded into some shape, but I don't know what," were found in a box in a little‐used storeroom.

Radioactive material gives off gamma rays that can travel long distances, but do little damage; larger alpha particles, which can tear up cell nuclei, but can travel only a few inches, and radon gas, which drifts like any other gas, but decays, in turn, like radium, giving off its own gamma rays and alpha particles. The longevity of a radioactive substance is measured in its half‐life - the amount of time it takes for half the atoms to disintegrate. The second survey by the environmental agencies tested for overall doses of gamma rays and for the site of any alpha emitters that might get into the lungs of workers, such as radon gas or radioactive dust particles.
Maximum Allowable Exposure
"If the numbers are what I expect after our preliminary survey, they'll need some remedial action at the site," said Paul Giardina, head of the radiation branch of the E.P.A.

Under Federal regulations, 500 millirems a year is the maximum allowable dose that a site may expose the general public to, but that figure is considered to be well belovi safe levels. Workers in uranium mines, nuclear‐poWer plants and other industry. jobs may be exposed to 5,000 millirems a year before they must be moved to another job.

In the preliminary survey, the Radium Corporation site had isolated spots of 400 to 600 microrems an hour behind the plant and spots up to about 200 inside, according to state officials.

For a worker to stay below 500 millirems a year, he would have to make sure his expoture on the job would stay bplow roughly 200 microrems an hour, Mr*Giardina said. He added that because no one stood directly over the hot spots, keeping exposures low should not be difficult.

"Depending on what we find, T & E might be able to get away with just putting hi better air‐conditioning to blow out the radon gas," Mr. Giardina said.. Stronger remedies might include washing radioactive dust out of the walls, or tearing up the floor where old radium ore had contaminated the foundations.
Union Leader's View
"One of the really unfair things is that these, companies had nothing to do with it, it Mr. Giardina said.

Leonard Box, president of T & E, which makes semiconductors and other electronics parts, refused to speak with a reporter or let him into the plant, a two‐story cinder‐block building covered in flaking white paint.

Arnold H. Ross, president of Teamsters Local 97, which represents the employees of 'T & E, said: "There's no question that we're concerned for them, but the state has told us that there's no immediate problem. The employees haven't complained. We complained about it. We found out from Mi. Box when he called to tell us about it. He was afraid he might have to go out of business - just extending us a courtesy.

"We've got a good relationship with him. He spends as much time inside that building as his employees do. It's a marginal operation, not General Motors, you know."

Behind the plant, where the rusting tracks of the old Erie Lackawanna run along Wigwam Creek to the Alden Coal Company, an employee sat before a box that looked like a pizza oven and is called a plating stove.

"Nobody knows too much about it," he said. "They said it was O.K. Lenny Box talked to some of the employees, I think. I don't know. Is it dangerous?"
The New York Times/Larry C. Morris Children playing on railroad tracks at the site of the old United States Radium Corporation plant in Orange, N.J. Radium residues left there date from the 1920's.

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Radiation Found at Site of Radium Plant Dating From the 1920's (Published 1979)

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NJ officials have found traces of radiation on land in Orange where US Radium Corp stood in 20's and 30's; land is now site of T&E Electronics Co and auto body shop, a luncheonette and a service station; illus (M)

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https://besamecosmetics.com/blogs/blog/10-astonishingly-strange-beauty-rituals-from-the-1920s

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The 1920's seemed like the height of glamour - fringe dresses, sequins, feathers, bold eyes, and bolder lips! But it wasn't always so glamorous. In fact, some of the strange beauty rituals from the 1920s were downright astonishing and not in a good way! Here are some of the stranger things from the world of cosmetics 100 years ago.

1. Eyebrows? Shave 'Em!

Cara Delevingne would have had a hard time with brows if she were a performer in the 1920s. It was fashionable to have pencil thin brows - literally. Because the 20s brow style was so thin, most film and stage performers just shaved their brows off completely! Then, they could pencil on the thin, curved brow shape with none of that pesky natural hair to get in the way. And we thought the 90s were bad for over plucking!

2. Eyeshadow Right Up To the Brow

Now, you can find about 10,000 Youtube videos to show you how to do a proper cut crease eyeshadow look. But in the 20s, it was a lot simpler. Just use one color shadow and cover the whole eyelid all the way up to the brow!

Women could choose from mostly dark eyeshadow shades like charcoal grey, brown, deep purples, some greens, and indigo blue. For the most part, eyeshadow was only for special occasions or heading out to a speakeasy. When they did go out, women matched their shadow shade to their dress color and really piled it on.

3. Long Lashes Care of Mascara and Spit

Tube mascara wasn't available until the 50s, so women of the 20s had to use cake mascara to darken their lashes. This little black cake was essentially soap and black coloring, not something we'd want to put near our eyes today. To make it worse, you had to add water to activate the cake and lots of women chose to use the most convient source of water - spit!

Cake mascara became known as "spit black" because so many women would either spit on the cake or stick their tongue on it to activate the mascara. Licking a bar of black soap seems like a pretty dismal way to get fuller lashes!

If you're a Bésame Cake Mascara user, don't worry. We don't use anything like soap in our cosmetics. In fact, if you wanted to lick the cake, it would be perfectly safe. Though, we definitely don't recommend it!

4. The Paler the Better

No need to get a tan in the 20s, pale was in! Actresses in particular often thought that ultra pale makeup made them look younger on camera. Since film at the time was very high contrast, using makeup that was closer to a natural skin tone often made faces look dirty or highlighted imperfections. So, they piled on the greasepaint.

Though actors liked being extra pale, makeup artists tried to dissuade actors from going for the ghostly look. In A Condensed Course in Motion Picture Photography (as found on Cosmetics and Skin ) of 1920, the author wrote, " Some actresses think that the lighter they can make themselves the more youthful they appear whereas they only succeed in making themselves look like billiard balls."

5. Cold Cream As Foundation

Even outside of stage and screen, women mostly had to accept an extra pale complexion if they were wearing makeup. They didn't have the wide array of foundations we have now. They just had cold cream and powder. White powder.

To try to even out skin tone, women would apply cold cream then cover that cream in nearly white powder. Add this pasty visage to the pencil thin brows and heavy eyeshadow that was popular at the time and you've got a pretty shocking look! A lot closer to Whatever Happened to Baby Jane? than The Great Gatsby.

6. Smooth Out Your Skin With Mercury!

Gourad's Oriental Cream promised to beautify the skin and work almost by magic. Sadly, the cream had no magic and lots of mercury. This smoothing cream contained calomel, a mercury compound that would poison the wearer over time. Though women could wear the cream once or twice without ill effects, over time they might develop dark rings around the eyes, loose teeth, and black gums!

The cream was available for decades, but the FDA started to regulate cosmetics in 1938. Calomel was no longer allowed, which means we'll never again experience the "magic" of mercury-filled makeup. Or figure out what color "Rachel" cream was.

7. Why Use Rouge? Tattoo Your Cheeks!

The idea of permanent blush is still a little scary. But going under a tattoo gun in the 1920s seems utterly horrifying! In the Pathé newsreel above , a woman consults a doctor (maybe?) to get her cheeks flushed permanently. He puts on a dark powder, uses electric needles to apply, and in a few days she's healed! We don't really get a before and after shot, but hopefully the woman was happy with her new blush tattoo.

Tattooed makeup certainly wasn't a common practice in the 1920s, but it shows how the desire to "look good" at any cost has been around for more than 100 years.

8. Amazing, Color Changing Lipstick

The idea of color changing lipstick seems very modern and still pretty magical (check out our Ink & Paint Lipstick for some real color changing wizardry). But lipstick that changes based on a persons pH has been around since the 20s.

Tangee built their brand on color shifting products. Their lipstick looked tangerine colored in the tube (hence the Tangee name), went on clear, and transformed to a natural "your lips but better" shade that was slightly different on every person. One hundred years later, color changing lipstick continues to amaze.

9. Just Paint Half the Nail

Who says you need to paint of every nail? In the 1920s, it was popular to leave the "moons" (the half circle by the cuticle) and tips of the nails blank, while painting the middle only. Basically, they'd paint an arched stripe across the nail and call it a day. It may not look like our modern manicure, but it would save a lot of money on nail polish!

Though you might think it was invented for Instagram, some ladies of the 20s had detailed nail art. It wasn't common, but this Pathe newsreel shows a women getting a detailed manicure with a butterfly, star, question mark, and a lady's face on each nail. It's more daring than most nail art today!

10. Don't Make Your Baby Ugly!

In the 1920s, it wasn't just women that had to worry about their beauty, but babies, too! Mothers were told to "think pretty thoughts" so they would have a pretty child. If their thoughts turned ugly, then they'd have an ugly baby. Obviously, over the years we learned that this isn't true. Firstly, your thoughts don't affect a baby's looks. Secondly, there's no such thing as an ugly baby! Thankfully, pregnant women no longer have to monitor their every thought and we don't have to worry about starting a beauty routine in the womb.

The 1920's were a fascinating (and strange) time for makeup, but all of cosmetics history is full of captivating detail! To find out more about cosmetics through time, check out Classic Beauty: The History of Makeup.

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10 Astonishingly Strange Beauty Rituals from the 1920s

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The 1920's seemed like the height of glamour - fringe dresses, sequins, feathers, bold eyes, and bolder lips! But it wasn't always so glamorous. In fact, some of the strange beauty rituals from the 1920s were downright astonishing and not in a good way!

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ZIO >:D

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Technology has greatly improved over the last century, and the form of many products has changed massively from what they used to be. Household items, vehicles, as well as everyday objects, are not even close to what they used to be like in the 1900s. Check out 35 everyday items from the early 20th century and see just how different they look today!

Kids always love to have a good time romping around outdoors, which is why playgrounds have been popular for a very long time. In these two pictures, we can see the difference between a playground in the 1900s and a modern playground. The toys at the old playground are made almost entirely of metal, as well as being dangerously high.

The modern ones are however safer, made with metal, plastic, and other materials that are relatively safer. They also come in bright colors that are perfect for attracting kids.

Drills in ancient Rome? No, this is not another Ancient Aliens episode. Manual drills were, in fact, used in ancient Rome, as archaeologists can attest. Their shape was very different from the drills of today, and their use, no doubt by slaves, involved a lot of physical effort.

Modern-day drills are a huge work-saving tool and are being created by their manufacturers in ergonomic shapes and with many added functionalities - torches, percussion, etc.

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35 Everyday Items From the Early 1900s vs How They Look Today

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Technology has greatly improved over the last century, and the form of many products has changed massively from what they used to be. Household items, vehicles, as well as everyday objects, are not even close to what they used to be like in the 1900s.

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20's working class women makeup styles (I tried)

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20's working class women makeup styles (I tried)

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1920s-makeup-history

Concise illustrated history of 1920's Makeup styles and cosmetics. Where to buy vintage inspired makeup.

Those cosmetic innovations of the 1910's heavily influenced 1920s makeup. Lipsticks, eye-shadows, mascara and pan-sticks etc from brands like Maybelline and Max Factor were now to be seen on dressing tables and handbags across America and Europe.

In Japan, still not under the spell of fascism, Shiseido was producing their own unique beauty products for the 'modern Japanese woman'. The 1920s was the era of the Flapper, a time when nice girls could be bad - at least in the evenings!

Makeup played a huge part in helping women recover from the horrors of the war. Now they could assert their new sense of feminine power. Helena Rubinstein famously said "If you can show me a woman who doesn't want to look young and beautiful - well, I'm afraid she isn't in her right mind. Women all want it - and we admit that they do !"

1920's Makeup Tutorials
Download original 1920's makeup and beauty tutorials from the golden eras. Learn from a genuine 1920's society girl how women really wore their makeup in the 1920's.

1920's makeup tutorials - Download direct to your device

1920s Makeup Products

Besame Cosmetics, founded by Gabriela Hernández is by far the leading purveyor of vintage style cosmetics today. We love their beautiful shades of vintage inspired lipsticks. Their 1920's cake mascaras, in black and brown, are so authentic and beautifully packaged.

Dark defined lashes were a must for actresses and showgirls. Besame Cosmetics 1920s cake mascara will bring out the flapper in anyone. It comes in authentic cake style, in a tin that you won't want to throw away. Add to that a delightful applicator brush and you're set for creating those steaming eyes of the 1920's flapper.

Gallery - Makeup Mirror - Women of the 1920's

In 1909 Gordon Selfridge had opened the first cosmetics counter to allow women to 'try before you buy' and by the 1920s, every pharmacy and department store in the world had makeup counters. The earlier stigma attached to makeup and 'harlots' was gone. Women felt at ease perusing the latest powders, vanishing creams, pan sticks, lipsticks and mascaras. The original name was mascaro !

Maybelline Mascara advert 1920's

Hollywood stars like Clara Bow made the cupids bow lip - a self shaping lipstick developed by Helena Rubinstein - popular and the image of the 1920s woman with her bow lips and dark eyes peering out from under her cloche hat has defined the look to this day. Shaping the mouth became a major pastime for women. Metal lip tracers being sold to help achieve the perfect pout. The defining 1920s makeup look was a youthful glow to contrast the ivory pale skin. This was achieved using creams, rouge papers and various foundation liquids.

Gallery - The Makeup Looks of the 1920's

1920's Make-up for Women of Color

Women of color - 1920's makeup

Kathy Lee Peiss in her book Hope in a Jar noted:
"If pale and creamy was the desired skin, the solution for white women lay in an array of powders, paints, and bleaches. But what were the ramifications for black women? Peiss examines the hair and skin products sold and marketed to black women. Two of the largest companies within the black community did not sell hair straighteners or bleaches."

The Key Makeup Looks of the 1920's

The 1920's woman was the first to truly create an artificial face. Startling eyes, scarlet lips and a pale pallor - thanks to buckets of powder resembling that of a corpse.The consumer boom in makeup - simplified women's requirements and a handbag carried all any daring flapper needed. Cake mascara - applied with a brush and the ever present push up tube lipstick.

Mae Murray -1920's makeup look - cupids bow lips

Eyes - kohl eye shadow for the more daring girls

Eyebrows - Plucked for the first time and drawn downward towards the temple.

Lips - lips were smaller than the natural outline and fashioned into the 'cupid's bow' shape.

Lashes - mascara was the new rage and no woman could resist enhancing her lashes.

Rouge - Applied in circles rather than angular. The effect was a rounded face.

Nails - The big name was Revlon and the popular style was the 'moon manicure' leaving the tip in painted.

1920's Flapper makeup - Tia Semer-Glamourdaze

Gallery - Makeup Adverts of the 1920's

Contrary to popular belief the art of plucking eyebrows did not take off until the early 1930s, again to some extent popularized by Hollywood bombshells such as Jean Harlow and Myrna Loy.
No - the 1920's look for the most part was one of femininity and beauty routine - day and night.

Most women did not go for the so called flapper look - but instead the idea of facial contouring was gaining interest and soon 1920s makeup and beauty books displaying detailed tutorials for women were being sold. One notable makeup tool that appeared in the 1920s was eyeliner - inspired by the huge interest in all things Egyptian, following the discovery of the tomb of Tutankhamun.

The First "Swivel" Lipstick

Now a staple in every woman's handbag, the lipstick tube - purportedly invented in 1915 - with a side lever to push up the lipstick, was challenged by a patent by a James Mason Jr in 1923 - with his "swivel lipstick container".

1923 - first swivel lipstick

Gallery - Cosmetic Patents of the 1920's

A Popular makeup brand which made its mark in the 1920s was Tre-Jur - under the lead of cosmetic entrepreneur Albert Mosheim. Other notable makeup brands who joined the ranks of Tre-Jur, Max Factor, Coty, Rubinstein and Arden in the 1920s included Tangee Lipsticks (1922), Peggy Sage (1925), Charles of the Ritz (1926) and Bonnie Bell (1927), Kissproof (1927)
© 29/05/2012 - Stevie McGlinchey - Glamourdaze.com Further Reading: A Concise Illustrated History of Fashion - 1900 to 1919
The Concise Illustrated History of Fashion - 1920 to 1929
Concise Illustrated History of Fashion - 1940 to 1949
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Vintage Makeup Guides - The 1920's Look.
Cosmetics in the 1920s.
Pinterest - 1920s makeup & Beauty
An Original Flapper's Guide to 1920s Makeup.
Makeup - Women's studies.
The 1920s Image - Review.
Classic Beauty - The History of makeup.

Patent Images - via Google Patents
Plus - the excellent - Collecting Vintage Compacts
(2 patents by Mosheim - 1357412 and 1498475.
Gordon - 1419671, Miles - 1451740 and Kasdan - 1503955)

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The History of 1920s Makeup - 1920 to 1929 - Glamour Daze

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Concise illustrated history of 1920's Makeup styles and cosmetics. Where to buy vintage inspired makeup. Those cosmetic innovations of the 1910's heavily influenced 1920s makeup. Lipsticks, eye-shadows, mascara and pan-sticks etc from brands like Maybelline and Max Factor were now to be seen on dressing tables and handbags across America and Europe.

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Monty Turner

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Teagan Murphy

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Actual Real Live Marie Curie interview (not clickbait!!!)

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Actual Real Live Marie Curie interview (not clickbait!!!)

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Mackenzie Danzig

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Marie Curie Answers The Web's Most Searched Questions And Gets Utterly Disappointed

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Errin

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During the 1920s, three Republicans occupied the White House: Warren G. Harding, Calvin Coolidge, and Herbert Hoover. Harding was inept, Coolidge was mediocre, and Hoover was overcome by circumstances he neither understood nor could control. Harding's campaign slogan, "A return to normalcy," aptly described American politics for the entire period. The nation turned away from the reforming zeal of the Progressive Era and the moral vision of Wilson's wartime leadership toward a government whose domestic economic policies opposed federal regulation and encouraged business expansion.

The Harding administration. Although he was affable and popular, Harding's naivete made him a disaster as president. Mindful of his own weaknesses, he tried to select the best men possible for his cabinet, with Charles Evans Hughes as Secretary of State, Henry C. Wallace as Secretary of Agriculture, Herbert Hoover as Secretary of Commerce, and Andrew Mellon as Secretary of the Treasury. These men were responsible for the accomplishments of Harding's brief administration, which included stimulating business growth, cutting taxes, and negotiating disarmament treaties.

Several of Harding's other appointments left much to be desired, however, and resulted in major scandals that rocked the government. Charles Forbes, for example, headed the newly formed Veteran's Bureau, even though he had carefully avoided the draft. He was convicted of fraud and related felonies involving the agency's hospital construction funds. Meanwhile, Secretary of the Interior Albert Fall was at the center of the Teapot Dome scandal, in which he secretly leased naval oil reserves at Teapot Dome, Wyoming, and Elk Hills, California, to private companies headed by Edward Doheny and Harry F. Sinclair in return for no‐interest, noncollateral "loans." After resigning his office, Fall was convicted of bribery, and the government canceled the leases. The administration was further disgraced when Attorney General Harry M. Daugherty was implicated in a bribery case involving an official in the Alien Property Office and indicted but acquitted for taking money from liquor dealers evading Prohibition. Harding was not directly involved with the corruption, and he died in office (August 2, 1923) before the charges against his appointees became public.

Coolidge and the election of 1924. Harding's vice president, Calvin Coolidge, came to national attention in 1919 when, as governor of Massachusetts, he ended the Boston police strike. Coolidge did not believe the president should take an activist role in government, and he was as opposed to the regulation of business as Harding had been. His famous quip "The business of America is business" summed up the Republican creed of the 1920s. An honest if taciturn man who had no connection with the scandals of his predecessor's cronies, Coolidge was the Republican choice for president in 1924. The Democrats found it harder to choose a candidate.

The two main Democratic contenders mirrored the split in American society that existed during the '20s. William Gibbs McAdoo represented the rural, Protestant, and "dry" (pro‐Prohibition) parts of the country, while the urban, immigrant, and "wet" (anti‐Prohibition) population supported Alfred E. Smith, the Irish‐American, Roman Catholic governor of New York. With neither candidate able to sway enough votes, the Democratic convention compromised on the conservative Wall Street lawyer, John W. Davis on the 103rd ballot. The election picture was complicated somewhat by Robert LaFollette's revival of the Progressive party, which organized a coalition of farm groups and unions, such as the American Federation of Labor (AFL). Davis was strong only in the South and LaFollette took his own state of Wisconsin; Coolidge won decisively in both the popular and electoral vote.

The election of Hoover. When Coolidge decided not to run for a second term in 1928, the Republicans nominated Herbert Hoover. Even though he had never held elective office, Secretary of Commerce Hoover had a distinguished career in public service and was well regarded for his work with the Food Administration and in relief efforts after the war. The Democrats, operating with a stronger urban wing than in the previous election, nominated Governor Al Smith for a second time. With the country still riding the high tide of prosperity that the Republicans took full credit for, Hoover was nearly impossible to beat, especially with Smith's serious drawbacks as a candidate. The Democratic Party's platform supported Prohibition, but Smith favored the repeal of the Eighteenth Amendment. Additionally, anti‐Catholicism remained a factor in American politics. Many Protestant churches, both fundamentalist and mainstream denominations, urged their parishioners to vote their faith. The combination of Prohibition and religion cost Smith several states in the Deep South and contributed to Hoover's landslide victory.

A closer look at the election results gave the Democrats some hope for the future. Although they did not add any electoral votes to his column, Western farmers abandoned their traditional home in the Republic party and supported Smith. Massachusetts, Rhode Island, and the nation's 12 largest cities that voted Republican in 1924 also switched allegiance four years later. This trend suggested that with a candidate who did not have Smith's obvious weaknesses, the Democrats might be able to forge a winning coalition by holding on to the Deep South and building a stronger base in the urban Northeast and Midwest.

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With the end of World War I and the passage of the Eighteenth Amendment, Americans entered the distinctive 1920s — an era of Republican leadership, nation

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(Photo of the bottle of Radithor by Carl Willis/iStock/The Washington Post illustration)

Not long ago, curator Natalie Luvera began to worry about the strangest item in the National Atomic Testing Museum's collection of artifacts - a tiny 1920s device designed to restore lost manhood by irradiating the manliest of human body parts.

Was the gold-plated "scrotal radiendocrinator" still dangerous after nearly a century? Luvera tested it with a Geiger counter, got a worrisome reading and called in a radioactivity response team to double-check. "They came down and said, 'Nope, you shouldn't have that here.' "

To the curator's relief, the team banished the intimate irradiator to a desert grave. It's now buried with other atomic waste at a disposal site near Nevada's infamous Area 51, the secretive military facility near Las Vegas associated with UFO conspiracy theories. But countless similar artifacts remain in museums, private collections and junk drawers, all reminders of our bizarre and sometimes-fatal love affair with what many believed to be the healing powers of radioactivity.

So about Area 51 and all those UFO conspiracy theories . . .

Some are stored carefully by museums and interested hobbyists who snap them up in online auctions. Others lurk under our noses until they're discovered.

"There are loads of these items still out there, including in people's basements and in their homes," said Carl Willis, a nuclear engineer in Albuquerque who collects radiation artifacts.

The Las Vegas museum's scrotum irradiator, for example, was uncovered by a man who discovered it in a relative's possessions and carefully donated it to the museum in a lead-lined suitcase.

Now, of course, we know about the true dangers of radioactivity. But during the early decades of the 20th century, not long after its discovery, radiation was hot in more ways than one.

"There was this sense that radiation is a very powerful but poorly understood force in the universe, and maybe it's the ultimate healing force," said Cleveland radiation oncologist Roger Macklis, who has studied radiation quackery.

It didn't take long for hucksters to turn radiation into a must-have. In the United States and Europe, radioactive products from the 1920s through the 1940s included toothpaste, hair cream, cosmetics and even suppositories. All are collectibles today among hobbyists who are fascinated by the American obsession with radiation.

Some "radium" products actually included radium and set off Geiger counters, then and now. Others didn't, but their makers still tried to capitalize on the hoopla around the supposed powers of radiation.

"During this period of history, the price of radium was quite high," Willis said. "Inexpensive radium remedies might contain none at all, and the assumption was that the consumer would have no expectation or capability of verifying the claim."

In Albuquerque, for example, the National Museum of Nuclear Science & History's collection includes radium-free products such as Radium Brand Creamery Butter, Radium Spot Remover and Radium Hand Cleaner, with a worrisome motto ("Takes Off Everything But the Skin").

Other products included only a bit of radium. For example, Willis's collection includes a tube of hemorrhoid cream called Klein's Radium Salve.

"A product like that was not radioactive due to any underlying theory of how radioactivity might help somebody," Willis said. "It had some radium in it so they could say it was radioactive."

But other products packed an actual punch of radioactivity - and still do. "The more expensive offerings could contain a lot of radium, possibly measured and verified by some respected independent technical authority," Willis said.

Take the scrotal radiendocrinator that Willis owns, for instance. Unlike the Las Vegas museum, he has not disposed of this unusual artifact. He bought it in 2015 for $650 from an auction of scientific antiques in Pittsfield, Mass.

"I had a friend who lived in the area go and check it out and make sure it was authentic and in good condition, not damaged or destroyed or without the active material," he said.

As Willis's blog explains, the device's radioactivity comes from tiny pieces of paper "uniformly loaded with radium sulfate." They're enclosed in a small, embossed metal case that's about the size of a credit card and includes a mesh window.

The device, intended to be placed in a special jockstrap, sold in the 1920s for as much as $1,000. "Wear at night," the instructions suggested. "Radiate as directed."

Willis said his device still gives off a tremendous amount of radiation, about 1,000 times the amount emitted by a 20th-century "radium watch" that glows in the dark thanks to radium paint. That is enough radioactivity to potentially cause temporary sterility, cancer and burns if used as directed, he said.

"The peak activity would have occurred when the device was a mere 3.5 years old, but it is still perfectly capable of literally tanning someone's hide if they wear it as directed for a week," he said.

While he doesn't use it for its original purpose, Willis does store the scrotal radiendocrinator in an outbuilding. "It's in a bunch of plastic bags inside a hermetically sealed plastic container, which I keep in an inch-thick lead box surrounded by lead bricks."

The device was the brainchild of an extraordinary quack named William J.A. Bailey, who liked to describe radiation as "eternal sunshine." He also hawked bottles of Radithor - "certified radioactive water" - that were touted as a cure-all for disorders such as impotence and fatigue.

"Bailey was a true believer, somebody who thought genuinely that his products were medically beneficial," Willis said. But they could actually kill, as a middle-aged New York tycoon named Eben M. Byers discovered after guzzling multiple bottles of Radithor a day. In 1932, he died of radium poisoning that ravaged his jaw, skull, brain and internal organs.

As Cleveland oncologist Macklis wrote in a 1993 Scientific American article, the death of Byers sparked a federal investigation and "helped to create the presumption that medicines are dangerous until proved safe."

The "healthy" reputation of radiation had already suffered another serious blow when young women began dropping dead of radium poisoning in New Jersey, the victims of their work - carefully painting the dials of radium watches.

Products from the era are easy to find today. Radium water crocks, pottery that was fired with radioactive material and designed to irradiate drinking water overnight, sit in museum collections from the District to Minneapolis and Portland, Ore. Even the National Atomic Testing Museum in Las Vegas has a "Radium Ore Revigator" with an inscription that touts it as "the perpetual health spring in your home."

While curator Luvera is hesitant about the risk of radioactive artifacts, she's comfortable storing the jug since it emits radiation only if its top is removed. It's not normally displayed to the public.

She recently showed it to a reporter who took care not to fill it or follow the instructions: "Drink freely when thirsty and upon arising and retiring. Average six or more glasses daily."'

Federal officials accused the Revigator manufacturer of false advertising in the early 1930s after it had sold thousands of the jugs, according to Oak Ridge Associated Universities, which has a collection of radium quack products.

The company faded away amid bad publicity, as did makers of other radium products during the 1930s and 1940s. At last, radiation had lost its healthy glow.

Should people worry about century-old radioactive devices that may be lurking in their attics and closets? What about museum employees and collectors who work near such objects?

In 2015, Oregon Health Sciences University tested the Revigator in its medical museum and reported that while it emitted a low level of radiation, someone would have to sit next to it for a year to face a potential risk of harm.

For his part, while he's very cautious about storing radioactive artifacts himself, Willis believes that "there's probably no detectable risk as long as people are not using the items as originally intended."

In other words: Don't radiate as directed.

A visit to Trinity, where the first A-Bomb was tested in 1945, still turns up radiation

Should you worry about radiation exposure from X-rays, mammograms and other scans?

'Strange Glow': The eerie history of radiation and humans

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The lethal legacy of early 20th-century radiation quackery

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Not long ago, curator Natalie Luvera began to worry about the strangest item in the National Atomic Testing Museum's collection of artifacts - a tiny 1920s device designed to restore lost manhood by irradiating the manliest of human body parts. Was the gold-plated "scrotal radiendocrinator" still dangerous after nearly a century?

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Errin

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How do you know Arthur? Please share your stories and photos, and help spread the word about this page!

ABOUT THIS MEMORIAL

Arthur was the president of the United States Radium Corporation during the 1920's. He is the most famous when his girls working under him got suddenly ill from the radium used to make clocks that glow.

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Visit Arthur Roeder's memorial page on We Remember

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How do you know Arthur? Please share your stories and photos, and help spread the word about this page! ABOUT THIS MEMORIAL Arthur was the president of the United States Radium Corporation during the 1920's. He is the most famous when his girls working under him got suddenly ill from the radium used to make clocks that glow.

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Katherine Schaub (1902-1933), a watch dial painter at the U.S. Radium Corporation plant in Orange was an early victim of radium poisoning. Her death alerted authorities to the dangers of radio-activity.
During World War I, young women employed at the U. S. Radium Corporation in Orange painted luminous numbers on watch faces. These women were directed to point up the brushes with their tongues which led to the consequent ingestion of radioactive paint. After the war, doctors discovered that these women were dying of anemia and a disease called radium necrosis (radium poisoning)which ate away their jawbones.

In the fall of 1923, Schaub began to have trouble with her teeth. Although she had two teeth removed to ease the pain, Schaub was plagued by "gloomy" thoughts and bouts of nervousness. An investigation made by the Consumers League of New Jersey looked into Schaub's illness. Findings demonstrated that the radium Schaub had ingested at work was plated in her bones, causing necroses, joint deterioration, anemia, and cancers from which she and other painters suffered.

The League campaigned successfully to have radium necrosis recognized as an occupational disease by the State Workmen's Compensation Board in 1926. This measure occurred too late, according to a two-year statute of limitations, to actually benefit the women who had suffered from radium poisoning. The universal horror caused by this case contributed to a 1941 bill that made all industrial diseases compensable and extended the time during which workers could discover the illness. Schaub succumbed to radium poisoning in 1933 at the age of 31.

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Katherine Schaub (1902-1933), a watch dial painter at the U.S. Radium Corporation plant in Orange was an early victim of radium poisoning. Her death alerted authorities to the dangers of radio-activity. During World War I, young women employed at the U. S. Radium Corporation in Orange painted luminous numbers on watch faces.

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Antonia Mille

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New Jersey Legislative Documents (1848-1921) - New Jersey State Library

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New Jersey Legislative Documents was a series of compiled reports to the Governor and Legislature by State departments, agencies, commissions, boards, and institutions, as well as some county and interstate entities. Later reports in the series often included illustrations, photographs, maps, and data tables.

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Mackenzie Danzig

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Prohibition was not one of Newark's grandest eras. One reporter described a Newark that 'glittered like the mouth of hell' during the Prohibition era. Not even Manhattan Island had more speakeasies to the square mile.

Historian John T. Cunningham viewed it as 'not a shining era in Newark or anywhere else in the nation,' for it was an open secret that gangsters and politicians worked hand-in-hand. What's more, policemen often were unable to find illegal speakeasies despite the fact that almost anyone who wished could be admitted to these haunts by securing a membership card. As a result of this general retreat from Puritan ethics and Victorian convictions, crime of all sorts was on the increase. Respect for elected officials dwindled and police credibility was called into question. It was an era that saw the entrenchment of crime in communities large and small nationwide, tempered eventually by the Great Depression and the outbreak of World War II.

The age of speakeasies and roadhouses, rum running and vice spawned the emergence of nationally known gangsters including Capone, Saperstein, Lansky, Anastasia and Luciano. In Newark, Dutch Schultz and 'Longie' Zwillman were the bigwigs. It was a dangerous time, an exciting time and a lawless time, a colorful epoch that began in the Roaring Twenties. Prohibition was the source of many of the problems that followed. Between 1920 and 1933 it curtailed the manufacture, transportation and sale of alcoholic beverages in the United States. Its origins date to the last century and the Anti-Saloon League. With the passage of the 18th Amendment to the U.S. Constitution, it became a national mandate, yet its enforcement proved impossible and brought about a series of events that changed the country.

Passed on January 16, 1920, the amendment was designed to curb the evils of alcohol. Instead, it promoted speakeasies, bootlegging, hijacking, gang warfare, murder, political graft, and general lawlessness. As federal agents began confiscating wine and liquor, the general public seemed to develop an insatiable appetite for any forbidden elixir. No sooner had federal agents begun seizing alcohol stockpiles gangsters began moving into all types of illegal operations, from the building of stills in the remote western hills of New Jersey to rum running along the New Jersey shore. The New Jersey coast became the very hub of bootlegging activities outside the 12-mile limit. In 1920, a case of liquor bought in Scotland for $18 could be resold in New Jersey for $45 to $90. To counter the predicament, the Federal Prohibition Administration was established in Newark at 1060 Broad St. under the direction of the Rev. Marna S. Poulson. The agency, however, proved ineffective for a variety of reasons. To begin with, Poulson was opposed to the philosophy of New Jersey Gov. Edward I. Edwards, who had vowed to make 'New Jersey as wet as the Atlantic Ocean.' On a typical night, 30 or more liquor-laden ships with more than $1 million of illegal booze were just outside the 12-mile limit, waiting for their contents to be moved inland. The FPA reported some successes in its efforts to confiscate illegal liquor. In 1932, in New Jersey alone, 62,536 gallons of beer were seized, 26,732 gallons of spirits were destroyed, and 5,547 gallons of wine were poured on the ground. Fifty-five stills were closed down and 38 liquor-transporting vehicles were impounded. Yet the lawlessness continued until Prohibition's repeal in 1933. Poulson, meanwhile, overzealously criticized three local judges of 'being corrupt,' bringing sharp criticism, according to one report, from a federal judge who 'looking Poulson in the eyes, then unlimbered one of the worst tongue-lashings these ears have ever listened to.' No sentence was imposed on Poulson for slander, but a $500 fine was levied with this admonition from the judge: 'I am not sending you to prison . . . because you will suffer more by going to your grave knowing you have committed one of the worst sins-bearing false witness against your neighbor.' Being a federal agent was difficult. Much of the public was unsympathetic. Some agents were injured or killed, and there were insufficient funds to enforce the law. The unsettling possibility that regulating a moral code was beyond the jurisdiction of government also existed. On December 5, 1933, Utah became the 36th state to ratify the 21st Amendment, thus ending the 'Noble Experiment.'

On the roof of the old Kresge's Department Store the large P.O.N. (Pride of Newark) brewery sign now had new reason for burning. For the first time in more than a decade, the freshly polished copper vats at the Krueger Brewery were filled with beer. The statue of King Gambrinus, the mythical German god of beer, again became the symbol of beer production in a beer-consuming city. Prohibition's legacy to New Jersey's largest city was several fold. Newark was a plum, and a rich and prosperous one at that, whether manifested in big-time criminal activity or an ordinary stop by a local gin mill. With Prohibition came the emergence of the speakeasy, which was different from the colonial tavern, the old-fashioned saloon, or more modern cocktail lounges. Essentially, it symbolized a more sinister side of the era, one fraught with rival gangs ready to kill to protect their mini-kingdoms. More often than not, big-time gangsters were known and feared, locally and nationally.

The speakeasy

In old Newark, Arch Gifford's Tavern at Broad and Market streets not only was a place to eat and sleep, it was also a stagecoach stop for trips to New York, Jersey City or Philadelphia. Later, 19th century saloons were scattered along Broad and Market streets, establishments such as Iffland's, which served hard-boiled eggs, pigs knuckles cooked in wine, frankfurters and knockwurst, along with a nickel beer. Similar establishments included Ludwig Achtel-Stetter's bar near the Central Railroad Station and Charlie Charles' saloon at the Four Corners, a favorite rendezvous for politicians and attorneys. Speakeasies were designed to provide a safe haven while getting an illegal drink without being hassled by either the law or potentially dangerous customers. Writer Bill Gordon's 1960s interview of a former speakeasy owner described such a place in the Ironbound as 'just a little room in the back.' This particular speakeasy had a huge mirror from the old Clark Thread Mill Club in Ogden Street, a large bar without stools and lots of small tables and chairs for the customers. A buzzer announced the arrival of potential guests. 'Then we'd look you over through a window in the second floor to okay the customer,' the owner said. 'If we didn't know you, well, then you wouldn't get in.' Liquor or booze often was made in the cellar, then blended with the 'imported stuff.' No precautions were necessary when Prohibition was repealed in 1933. The need for secrecy died with the law.

Louis Saperstein

While the speakeasy was the lighter side of the activities of the time, the gangs were certainly the dark side of the era. The bullet-riddled body of Louis B. Saperstein, victim of a gangland shooting, was indeed no joke. A man in his 40s who had been an insurance broker with political connections, he held a $5,000 a year position with the Newark City Fund Insurance Commission until 1945. His association with a failed Newark bank and friendship with Joseph 'Doc' Rosen, one-time Newark bootlegger, was questionable. When he was pulled before a New York grand jury to testify, this proved too much. Somebody did him in. Because of the overlapping gangland jurisdictions and the possibility of open gangland warfare, Al Capone 'thought it would better to end the projected Newark war' with a two-day conference held here.

Dutch Schultz

Infamous Dutch Schultz, whose real name was Arthur Flegenheimer, was born in the Bronx, where he spent most of his early criminal career before moving to New Jersey and was eventually bumped off. His career began as a bartender. Soon, he controlled many bars in the Bronx and Manhattan. But his big opportunity came when he set up and ran the first numbers racket in Harlem some years later with the help of his friend and financial wizard Otto 'Abbadabba' Herman, whose mathematical calculations eventually made him rich. Schultz was known for unbridled ruthlessness and overpowering cheapness. Almost everyone who knew him feared him, and with reason. During his career he employed and later murdered Jack 'Legs' Diamond and Vincent 'Mad Dog' Coll. When he discovered he was being defrauded by George Winbert, it was rumored he was so angry that he killed Winbert with his bare hands. Other say he plugged a bullet into Winbert's brain or 'fitted him out with a cement overcoat and dropped him into the Hudson River while he was still alive.' The federal government tried to charge Schultz with murder, but failed. Then it attempted to convict him of tax evasion. To counter the move, Schultz relocated to upstate New York, where the trial was held. The charges against him were dismissed. Upon his return to the metropolitan area, Schultz tried to revive his old criminal empire. But a newly appointed special prosecutor, Thomas Dewey, was determined to thwart the effort. To stop Dewey, Schultz suggested his assassination. 'Lucky' Luciano replied: 'It'll bring down the heat on all of us.' Schultz, therefore, decided to go it alone. At this point, the New York crime syndicate allegedly issued a contract on Schultz. During dinner at his favorite Newark restaurant, the Palace Chop House on Park Street, he was shot to death, along with his three companions. This classic gangland slaying was considered a fitting end to a man who lived by the gun.

Abner 'Longie' Zwillman

One of America's most important crime figures, Abner `Longie' Zwillman rose from humble beginnings on Newark's Broome Street to become the warlord in a vast regional crime empire. Zwillman was feared as well as respected, rich, and generally opposed to open violence. As one of the nation's top crime figures, he often was referred to as the Al Capone of New Jersey. He knew every American gangster, and they knew him. Zwillman's rise to fame was gradual, taking him from his roots in a poor Russian immigrant family in the old Jewish Third Ward to a 20-room mansion on Beverly Road in West Orange. This would-be gangster kingpin left school at 13 to help support a widowed mother and four siblings. During Prohibition he ran 'a vast bootlegging enterprise that brought him a fortune as well as a past he could not escape in later life. Zwillman was associated with, and is reputed to have been part owner, in gambling enterprises at the Riviera Hotel in Havana and similar operations in Bergen County. A New York mayor once described him among the six most important crime figures in the area and also linked him to Murder Incorporated, a ring of hired thugs and gangland executioners. He also was accused of jury tampering, a charge which continued to plague him throughout his life. Following the death of Dutch Schultz, he was thought to be the most important gangland figure in New Jersey. Later, when asked during the McClellan Senate hearings if he was the Al Capone of New Jersey, he responded: 'I don't intend to be. I never strive to, and I am trying to make a living for my family and myself. But rumors go around. They accuse me of owning the place. I walk into a restaurant and I own the restaurant. I walk into a hotel and I own the hotel. I take a shine twice and I own the bootblack, too.' With the arrival of the 1950s, Zwillman was reported to have 'gone straight' by becoming involved in several legitimate businesses. For a short time he owned stock in the Hudson and Manhattan Railroad and was involved in the trucking business. He also is said to have acquired a General Motors franchise, had a financial interest in a washing machine and dryer company, owned several coin-operated laundromats, and was associated with cigarette vending machine companies in and around Newark. During this time, he donated $250,000 to a housing project in Newark near his boyhood home. On February 27, 1959, everything ended with the report of his suicide. Increased pressure from the Senate investigation committee, dissatisfaction within the criminal syndicate, and health problems may have contributed to his end. Was it a suicide or a murder? The questions persist to this day. Some think Zwillman was murdered. Yet the autopsy performed by Dr. Edwin Albano, the Essex County medical examiner, ruled his demise as 'suicide by hanging, death due to asphyxia and temporary insanity.' Thus the suave, polite, well-spoken, but powerful, complex and fateful life of Abner Zwillman ended.

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An Age of Speakeasies, Rum-Running, Dutch and 'Longie'

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Prohibition was not one of Newark's grandest eras. One reporter described a Newark that 'glittered like the mouth of hell' during the Prohibition era. Not even Manhattan Island had more speakeasies to the square mile. Historian John T. Cunningham viewed it as 'not a shining era in Newark or anywhere else in the nation,' for [...]

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digitized newspaper page from 20's New Jersey Leader _ BH

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digitized newspaper page from 20's New Jersey Leader _ BH

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Search America's historic newspaper pages from 1777-1963 or use the U.S. Newspaper Directory to find information about American newspapers published between 1690-present. Chronicling America is sponsored jointly by the National Endowment for the Humanities external link and the Library of Congress. Learn more

id
'his is one of the great names of the century. No one-not even a political enemy-has ever said
'Eugen#Af.
that Debs is not sincere to the core of his heart. It is an eve,nt to meet this courageous friend of man."--Edwin Markham.
LEADER
A NEWSPAPER DEVOTED TO THE INTERESTS OF THE WORKING CLASS
AOL 1. NO*. II, PRICK 2 CENTS.
OFFICE: 07 SPRINGFIELD AVENUE.
NEWARK, NEW JERSEY, 'MY 29, 1920.
ISSUED EVERY SATURDAY.
ONE DOLLAR ($1.00) PER YEAR
NEW JERSEY OPENS
CAMPAIGN FOR DESS
W"
Every Member of Socialist Party In State
Urged to Activity in Drive for
Campaign Fund.
State Convention Meets Sunday to Plan for
Educational Work of Coming Weeks.
Will Wage Greatest Campaign in
Party's History For Debs and
Socialism.
w&lk
*The State Convention of the So
cialist Party of New Jersey will be
held at 256 Central Avenue, Jersey
City next Sunday morning at 9:io
A. M. standard (railroad) time. The
convention will be called to order
iby the State Secretary, Milo €.
Jones, and after the preliminary or
ganization of the body, reports of
officers, etc., the convention' will pro
ceed to plan for the campaign in
New Jersey this year.
Already campaign lists have been
sent to over a thousand members of
the partysgand the membership urg
ed to respond in securing the neces
sary fundjjOor an aggressive cum
paign
"Capitalism.'ltaitethe appeal, "is
iwentrt** <iown'"Mte""d indus
trially. Contusion wa3 never so
genetal In politics; industry never
so unsettled and chaotic. The class
lines were never so distinctly and
sharply drawn.
"The struggle of the workers be
comes vjnore and more intense thru
increased pric.es, rents and the de
nial of t^c right to protest and
strike for better conditions.
"Thousands of workmen are suf
fering in prison for political and
conscientious beliefs.
"Your contribution on thisi list
will help the working class in their
fight for industrial and political
freedom.
"The workers must build a new
world. They must be organized to
manage and operate the industries
of America for the benefit of all.
"The Socialist Party has alwaysi
been the political party of the work
ing class. Help finance the cam
paign of our standard bearer, Eu
gene V. Debs. Give to the extent
of your ability.'*
Funds collected through this ap
peal $re to he divided as follows:
One-lialf goes to the County organ
ization, one-quarter to the State
and one-quarter to the National
Campaign Committee. All lists
(Continued on. Second Page.)
HEARQUA^TjERS OP SOCIALIST
PARTY AXtH LEADER OFFICE
"'deluged.; with WATER FROM
SERIOUS flRE NEXT DOOR.
Last Saturday, aJbout noon,- a
$25,000 door to Socialist
HeadquarteMfc-esulted in consider
able damag^to Party and Leader
furniture a"i!j'office supplies.
Water pcm'td into the State Of
fice from adjourning building
arid beforiTtre biate Secretary couid
rescue leaflets, Leader cards, etc.,
he was'wading ankle deep in the
water and the ceiling began falling
aibout his eajjg.
(Continue'on Second Page.)
OBITUARY
CARL SCHULER
Following a decline in health
for the past nine months, Carl
Schuler, aged 46 of Rahway, died
May 19 th.
Comrade Schuler was a native
of Germany and had been a resi
dent of this country for twenty
seven years, six of which were
spent in Rahway. * *
Comrade Schuler was an expert
cabinet maker. He was general
ly active in public affairs. He
was a staunch Socialist, a mem
ber of Carpenters Local No.-723
of Newark,. of the Workmen's
Sick and Death Benefit Society,
and of the Rahway Citizen's Club.
He was a highly respected citizen
in the community in which he
lived and always an active work
er in the Socialist cause.
t
Three Million Votes
For Debs
How much will you give to gain three million Votes for Debs
this Fall?
Be has given a year of his life for you!
What are you willing to give for him?
Thomas Watson of Georgia made his campaign for the demo
cratic presidential nomination in that state on the issue that Debs
should be in the White House and Woodrow Wilson in jail! ,
■ What will you do to help Debs speak to the American people
this year?
Will you give one dollar to send the Leader to some New Jer
sey woraer who can he convinced to cast his vote for Debs and
* Socialism this fall.
Send it along this week!
Time is short!
Don't, waste a day!
Fill out the following 'blank and mail with one dollar TODAY!
NEW JERSEY .LEADER,
97 Springfield Ave.,
Newark, New Jersey.
Enclosed find one dollar for one yearly subscription to the
Leader. \ ,
Name . ... .....
- .. :_
Addrees ...
NEW JERSEY LEADER-ONE YEAR-ONE DOLLAR.
SIX MONTHS-FIFTY CENTS. *
- -*****-.-- - -1- ' i ■ '
Socialist Platform in Brief
1--Ail business vitally essential to the existence anti welfare of the
people to be taken over-by the nation.
3- Pifbliely owned interests to be administered by the government
and representatives of the workers for service and not for profit.
-Hanks to be acquired, by the nation and unified.
4- AH insurance to be taken o\er by the nation.
5- Pjtll-civil, political, industrial and educational rights to l>e seemed
to \egroes.
8--Abolition of child labor.
7- A national minimum wage law.
8- Protection, of migratory and unemployed workers from oppres
sion.
0-Abolition of detective and strikebreaking agencies.
10- A Shorter workday hi keeping with increased production.
11- Freedom of speech, press and assembly.
13-Repeal of the Espionage law.
13-JHscontimi a nee of Espionage law proseentions.
1-j-Repeal of arbitrary power of deportation of aliens.
15-Abrogation of injunctions in strikes.
'10-Universal suffrage in fact as well as in law.
,17-Power of recaft of Federal executives and judges.
(Special to The N. J. Leader.)
The strike of Carpenters and
Joiners in the Philadelphia district
which includes Chester, Bristol and
Camden has ibeen brought to a suc
cessful conclusion so far as con
cerns building construction and ail
work outside the shipyards. They
are at present hiding behind the
skirts ot the Emergency Fleet Cor
poration and the Macy Wage Board
the latter Of which ' has not func
tioned for nearly, if not quite, a
year past. ^ .
The original demands were $1.2*5
per hour, a 40 hour week, no Satur
day work, double time for overtime,
the abolishment of all piece work,
and 10 cents extra per hour for
night shift. , , )
'The hours were changed to 44 on
the advise of the national officers of
the United Brotherhood of Parpen'
ters and Joiners because of a short
age of carpenters, and, later the
wage demand was reduced Jo $1>
112 Vs by a small majority on a refer
ij endum vote, which was at once ac
(Continued on Second Page.)
WORLD WAR VETERANS
ORGANIZE IN WEST N. Y.
ON RECORD FOR, TAXATION OF
INCOMES IN EXCESS OF $25,
OOO TO FAY BONUS TO SER
VICE MEN.
Last Friday evening at 449 Fif
teenth St., West New York, a'branch
organization of the World War Vet
erans was formed. The following
officers were elected: Commander,
Dr. Walter S. 'Kipnis; Viee-Com
mander, I. George Koven; Corre
spending Secretary Harold Fackart;
Recording Secretary, Anthony M.
Marro; Treasurer, David Hyman;
Sergeant-at-arms, Anthony J. No
vak.
The next meeting of the post will
be held at an early date. The or
ganization is on record as favoring
a bonus of $1.00 for each day in
service with* a minimum of $300;
all bonuses to he paid from funds
derived from taxation of incomes in
excess of $25,000 per year ,or from
war excess profits on corporations
for the privilege of declaring such
dividends.
Enlisted men of the American or
Allied iannies are eligible to: asem
RA1WAY NEWS ITEMS
By Mayor Trenfbley's prompt ac
tion "we were saved from drinking
raw river water;" so he says in re
porting his purchase of a new chlor
inator recently to replace one worn
out. The Mayor didn't.explain how
Engineer Gage happened , to allow
the. machinery to deteriorate to that
condition nor how; we, liyed on "raw
water" ibef ore any chlorlnator was
ever vised. The,filter plant always)
gave Rahway first class.water when
it was 'kept, in good, condition, but'
Colonel Johnson, who discovered the
advantages of. ch.Iorination and who
is thoroughly acquainted with the
Rahway water plant from personal
inspection, said' under oath during
chancery proceedings that the plant
was not properly handled. How
ever, Commissioner Farrell praises
the Mayor and the Mayor compli
ments Commissioner Farrell, and ev
erything flows along like a song.
Commissioners patting each other on
the back and then being endorsed
by the "Rahway B.latter" doesn't
get the city anywhere.
" -' * "
The local. paper, which formerly
had plenty, of space editorially to
condemn every project which the
Socialist Commissioner put forward
to benefit the people, has practical
ly abandoned its editorial columns
which are now used for want ads
and most recently for display ad
vertising. .Well, it's not to be won
dered at that they find it difficult to.
procure editorials when they have
no principles or policies worth while
to endorse. Like the Saturday Eve
ning Post, it can find no difference
between the Republicans and Iterad
erafs and therefore has decided to
keep mum. . ■
Miller and Sons, clothiers have
publicly endorsed municipal fire in
surance. They have evidently felt
the high rates imposed By the in
surance companies. While a few
feel the insurance rates everyone fs
affected by the price of clothing and
the. enormous waste in methods of
distribution. When will Miller &
Sons advocate Co-operative hand
ling of clothing and foods which
ate actual necessities?
* * *
When Socialists argue in a gentle
manly way with the Commissioners
at the City Hall, they are expelled
'by the Chief of Police on the May
or's orders. When good old line
Republicans or Democrats like Char
lie Dudling or Arthur Schaffer take
exception to the actions of city of
ficials they can express themselves
to their hearts' content without risk
As reasons are so few it might be
well to note this as one good rea
son why one should be a membei
of one of the old parties.
3. B. F.
BUSINESS MEN ARE BIGOTS.
New York.-"Self-revealed bl
pots" is the term applied to mem
bers of the . Chamber of Commereo
of the United States by the New
York Evening World in' discussing
a refusal of the recent convention
of these business men to listen to
Matthew Wolf, vice president of the
A. P. of L., give reasons for labor's
strike" law,
"Governor Allen missed the op
portunity of a life time," "aid the
Evening World, "when he failed to
administer a stinging rebuke to
these business men.
"The discourtesy and intolerance
was all the nibre glaring h 'cause
Governor Allen , was present and
scheduled as the next speaker.
"Had Governor Alien risen to the
occasion he would have accepted the
discourtesy of the chamber as a> for
tunate opportunity to read a lesson
in tolsrance. 'He wou'l have re
fused to discuss the plan-itself be
fore a group of self-revealed bigots.
He would have strong'./ defended
Mr. Woll's right to be heard."
Subscribe Today.
bership. Applications may he se
cured from Counselor I. Gr Koven,
143 Summit Are., West Hoboken;
Dr. W. S. Kipnis, B94 Bergen line
Ave., West New York and- from An
thony M. Marro, 149* Sflfinyside
Ave., North Bergdii. tit- ■
The dcM we owe to Dtbs
The following excerpts from the speeches and writings of
Engene \. Debs teH the story of the indebtedness of the Ameri
can people to this great leader of the working class. He gave
himself unreservedly for us. We must not fail in our devotion
to the cause he still speaks for eloquently in the silence of At
lanta Penitentiary,
THE PASSING Ob' CAPITALISM. ,
Capitalism has fulfilled its mission, for the capitalist class can no
longer control the productive forces, nor manage industry, nor give em
ployment to the workers. And so the historic mission of this movement
is to abolish capitalism, based upon private ownership, and organize so
ciety upon a basis of collective ownership of the means of production and
distribution. This change is coming just as certain as I stand in your
presence. It will come as soon as you are ready for it, and you will ibe
ready fo.r it just as scon as you understand whati Socialism means.
* * * * * 0
THE END OF WARS.
With the end of industrial and commercial competition comes the end
of war, and with the beginning of world-wide co-operation cornea the in
auguration of the reign of peace on earth and good will toward all men.
So that when this movement sweeps into power, and establishes an indus
trial democracy, every man will'have the inalienable right to work, will
receive what ftp produces, may stand fortli a free man, enjoy the fruit of
his labor, have a comfortable home, a happy wife, his children at play or
at school; and in that hour the badge of labor will be the only badge of
nobility.
THE RUSSIAN REVOLUTION.
A11 the forces of the world's reaction, all its dynasties and despotisms,
all its kingdoms and principalities, all its monarchies and imperialism, all
its ruling and exploiting classes, and their politicians, priests, professorsi
and parasites of every breed-all these are pitted openly or covertly
against the Russian Revolution and conspiring together for the overthrow
of the victorious Russian proletariat and the destruction of the new-born
democracy. But, whatever may be the fate of the revolution, its flaming
soul is immortal and will flood the world with light and liberty and love.
*****
Do not imagine for one moment that all the plutocrats and Junkers
are all in Germany; we have them here in our own country, and these
want to keep our eyes focused upon the Junkers in Germany so we won't
see those within our own border. I have no earthly use for the Junkers
of Ce. u."ad or Vfhj *xwti-'l" "(act.Writ ill ciie Unlit.!
states.
**'*.* * *
Anybody tan be nobody, but it taks a man to be somebody. Turn
your back upon that corrupt Republican Party and that still more corrupt
Democratic Tarty, the gold-dust twins of the ruling class. Get into a min
ority party that fights for a cause. Make that change. It will be the
most important change you ever made in your life. You will thanik me
for having made the suggestion. It was a day of days for me. I passed
from darkness to light.
* * * * *
THE PRESS.
How thoroughly alive the capitalists are to the power ot the press!
And how assiduously they develop and support it that it may in turn but
tress their class interests!
The press is one of their most valuable assets, and, as an investment,
pays the highest dividends.
When^there is trouble between capita! and labor the press volleys and
thunders against labor and Its unions and leaders and all other things
that dare to breathe against the sacred rights of capital. In such a con
test labor is dumb, speechless: it has no press that reaches the public,
and must submit to the vilest calumny, the most outrageous misrepre
sentation.
The lesson has been taught in all the languages of labor and written
in the blood of Us countless martyred victims.
Labor must have a press as formidable as the great movement of the
working class requires, to worthily represent its dignity and fearlessly and
uncompromisingly advocate its principles.
* * * * *
* LABOR OMNIA VINC1T.
Why is it that labor does not conquer anything? Why does it not
assert its mighty powei ? Why does it not rule in congress, in legislatures
and in courts' 1 answer because it is factionized, because it will not
unify, because, for some inscrutable reason, it prefers division, weakness
and slavery, rather than unity, strength and victory.
Will it always he thus unmindful of its power and prerogativesl
do not think so. Will it always tamely submit to degradation? I protest
that it will not. Labor has the ballot. It has redeeming power. I write
trom behind prison bars, the victim of a petty tyrant. My crime was that *
I sought to rescue Pullman slaves from the grasp of a monster of greed
and rapacity.
I think a day is doming when "Labor Omnia Vincit" will change con
ditions. I hear the slogan of the clans or organized labor. It cheers me,
7. believe with the poet that
A Labor Day is coining when our starry flag shall wave,
Above land where a famine no longer digs a grave,
Where money is not master, nor the workingman a slave-*
For the right is marching on.
-EUGENE V DEBS.
> t 'McHenry County Jail, Woodstock, 111., August 5, 1895.
* * * * *
LIBERTY SPEECH AT BATTERY D, CHICAGO, ON HIS RELEASE
FROM WOODSTOCK JAIL, 189.1
Leaving all other nations, kindred and tongues out of the question,
what is the duty of Americans? Above all, what is the duty of American
workingmen whose liberties have been placed in peril? They are not
.hereditary bondsmen. Their fathers were free-born-their sovereignty none
denied and their children yet have the ballot. It has been called "a
weapon that executes a free man's will as lightning does the will of God."
It is a metaphor pregnant with life and truth. TJiere is nothing in our
government it can not remove or amend. It can make and unmake presi
dents and congresses and courts. It can abolish unjust laws and consign
to eternal odium and oblivion unjust judges, strip from them their robes
and gowns and send them forth unclean as lepers to bear the butrden of
merited obloquy as Cain with the mark of a murderer. It can sweep away
truests. syndicates, corporations, monopolies, and every other abnormal
development of the money power designed to abridge the liberties of
workingmen and enslave them by the degradation incident to poverty and
enforced idleness, as cyclones, scatter the leaves of the forest. The ballot
can do this and more. It can give our civilization its crowning glory-
the co-operative commonwealth.
(Continued on Third Page.) * *,

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Search America's historic newspaper pages from 1777-1963 or use the U.S. Newspaper Directory to find information about American newspapers published between 1690-present. Chronicling America is sponsored jointly by the National Endowment for the Humanities external link and the Library of Congress. Learn more id'his is one of the great names of the century.

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Errin

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Gene Smiley, Marquette University

Introduction

The interwar period in the United States, and in the rest of the world, is a most interesting era. The decade of the 1930s marks the most severe depression in our history and ushered in sweeping changes in the role of government. Economists and historians have rightly given much attention to that decade. However, with all of this concern about the growing and developing role of government in economic activity in the 1930s, the decade of the 1920s often tends to get overlooked. This is unfortunate because the 1920s are a period of vigorous, vital economic growth. It marks the first truly modern decade and dramatic economic developments are found in those years. There is a rapid adoption of the automobile to the detriment of passenger rail travel. Though suburbs had been growing since the late nineteenth century their growth had been tied to rail or trolley access and this was limited to the largest cities. The flexibility of car access changed this and the growth of suburbs began to accelerate. The demands of trucks and cars led to a rapid growth in the construction of all-weather surfaced roads to facilitate their movement. The rapidly expanding electric utility networks led to new consumer appliances and new types of lighting and heating for homes and businesses. The introduction of the radio, radio stations, and commercial radio networks began to break up rural isolation, as did the expansion of local and long-distance telephone communications. Recreational activities such as traveling, going to movies, and professional sports became major businesses. The period saw major innovations in business organization and manufacturing technology. The Federal Reserve System first tested its powers and the United States moved to a dominant position in international trade and global business. These things make the 1920s a period of considerable importance independent of what happened in the 1930s.

National Product and Income and Prices

We begin the survey of the 1920s with an examination of the overall production in the economy, GNP, the most comprehensive measure of aggregate economic activity. Real GNP growth during the 1920s was relatively rapid, 4.2 percent a year from 1920 to 1929 according to the most widely used estimates. (Historical Statistics of the United States, or HSUS, 1976) Real GNP per capita grew 2.7 percent per year between 1920 and 1929. By both nineteenth and twentieth century standards these were relatively rapid rates of real economic growth and they would be considered rapid even today.

There were several interruptions to this growth. In mid-1920 the American economy began to contract and the 1920-1921 depression lasted about a year, but a rapid recovery reestablished full-employment by 1923. As will be discussed below, the Federal Reserve System's monetary policy was a major factor in initiating the 1920-1921 depression. From 1923 through 1929 growth was much smoother. There was a very mild recession in 1924 and another mild recession in 1927 both of which may be related to oil price shocks (McMillin and Parker, 1994). The 1927 recession was also associated with Henry Ford's shut-down of all his factories for six months in order to changeover from the Model T to the new Model A automobile. Though the Model T's market share was declining after 1924, in 1926 Ford's Model T still made up nearly 40 percent of all the new cars produced and sold in the United States. The Great Depression began in the summer of 1929, possibly as early as June. The initial downturn was relatively mild but the contraction accelerated after the crash of the stock market at the end of October. Real total GNP fell 10.2 percent from 1929 to 1930 while real GNP per capita fell 11.5 percent from 1929 to 1930.

Price changes during the 1920s are shown in Figure 2. The Consumer Price Index, CPI, is a better measure of changes in the prices of commodities and services that a typical consumer would purchase, while the Wholesale Price Index, WPI, is a better measure in the changes in the cost of inputs for businesses. As the figure shows the 1920-1921 depression was marked by extraordinarily large price decreases. Consumer prices fell 11.3 percent from 1920 to 1921 and fell another 6.6 percent from 1921 to 1922. After that consumer prices were relatively constant and actually fell slightly from 1926 to 1927 and from 1927 to 1928. Wholesale prices show greater variation. The 1920-1921 depression hit farmers very hard. Prices had been bid up with the increasing foreign demand during the First World War. As European production began to recover after the war prices began to fall. Though the prices of agricultural products fell from 1919 to 1920, the depression brought on dramatic declines in the prices of raw agricultural produce as well as many other inputs that firms employ. In the scramble to beat price increases during 1919 firms had built up large inventories of raw materials and purchased inputs and this temporary increase in demand led to even larger price increases. With the depression firms began to draw down those inventories. The result was that the prices of raw materials and manufactured inputs fell rapidly along with the prices of agricultural produce-the WPI dropped 45.9 percent between 1920 and 1921. The price changes probably tend to overstate the severity of the 1920-1921 depression. Romer's recent work (1988) suggests that prices changed much more easily in that depression reducing the drop in production and employment. Wholesale prices in the rest of the 1920s were relatively stable though they were more likely to fall than to rise.

Economic Growth in the 1920s

Despite the 1920-1921 depression and the minor interruptions in 1924 and 1927, the American economy exhibited impressive economic growth during the 1920s. Though some commentators in later years thought that the existence of some slow growing or declining sectors in the twenties suggested weaknesses that might have helped bring on the Great Depression, few now argue this. Economic growth never occurs in all sectors at the same time and at the same rate. Growth reallocates resources from declining or slower growing sectors to the more rapidly expanding sectors in accordance with new technologies, new products and services, and changing consumer tastes.

Economic growth in the 1920s was impressive. Ownership of cars, new household appliances, and housing was spread widely through the population. New products and processes of producing those products drove this growth. The combination of the widening use of electricity in production and the growing adoption of the moving assembly line in manufacturing combined to bring on a continuing rise in the productivity of labor and capital. Though the average workweek in most manufacturing remained essentially constant throughout the 1920s, in a few industries, such as railroads and coal production, it declined. (Whaples 2001) New products and services created new markets such as the markets for radios, electric iceboxes, electric irons, fans, electric lighting, vacuum cleaners, and other laborsaving household appliances. This electricity was distributed by the growing electric utilities. The stocks of those companies helped create the stock market boom of the late twenties. RCA, one of the glamour stocks of the era, paid no dividends but its value appreciated because of expectations for the new company. Like the Internet boom of the late 1990s, the electricity boom of the 1920s fed a rapid expansion in the stock market.

Fed by continuing productivity advances and new products and services and facilitated by an environment of stable prices that encouraged production and risk taking, the American economy embarked on a sustained expansion in the 1920s.

Population and Labor in the 1920s

At the same time that overall production was growing, population growth was declining. As can be seen in Figure 3, from an annual rate of increase of 1.85 and 1.93 percent in 1920 and 1921, respectively, population growth rates fell to 1.23 percent in 1928 and 1.04 percent in 1929.

These changes in the overall growth rate were linked to the birth and death rates of the resident population and a decrease in foreign immigration. Though the crude death rate changed little during the period, the crude birth rate fell sharply into the early 1930s. (Figure 4) There are several explanations for the decline in the birth rate during this period. First, there was an accelerated rural-to-urban migration. Urban families have tended to have fewer children than rural families because urban children do not augment family incomes through their work as unpaid workers as rural children do. Second, the period also saw continued improvement in women's job opportunities and a rise in their labor force participation rates.

Immigration also fell sharply. In 1917 the federal government began to limit immigration and in 1921 an immigration act limited the number of prospective citizens of any nationality entering the United States each year to no more than 3 percent of that nationality's resident population as of the 1910 census. A new act in 1924 lowered this to 2 percent of the resident population at the 1890 census and more firmly blocked entry for people from central, southern, and eastern European nations. The limits were relaxed slightly in 1929.

The American population also continued to move during the interwar period. Two regions experienced the largest losses in population shares, New England and the Plains. For New England this was a continuation of a long-term trend. The population share for the Plains region had been rising through the nineteenth century. In the interwar period its agricultural base, combined with the continuing shift from agriculture to industry, led to a sharp decline in its share. The regions gaining population were the Southwest and, particularly, the far West.- California began its rapid growth at this time.

During the 1920s the labor force grew at a more rapid rate than population. This somewhat more rapid growth came from the declining share of the population less than 14 years old and therefore not in the labor force. In contrast, the labor force participation rates, or fraction of the population aged 14 and over that was in the labor force, declined during the twenties from 57.7 percent to 56.3 percent. This was entirely due to a fall in the male labor force participation rate from 89.6 percent to 86.8 percent as the female labor force participation rate rose from 24.3 percent to 25.1 percent. The primary source of the fall in male labor force participation rates was a rising retirement rate. Employment rates for males who were 65 or older fell from 60.1 percent in 1920 to 58.0 percent in 1930.

With the depression of 1920-1921 the unemployment rate rose rapidly from 5.2 to 8.7 percent. The recovery reduced unemployment to an average rate of 4.8 percent in 1923. The unemployment rate rose to 5.8 percent in the recession of 1924 and to 5.0 percent with the slowdown in 1927. Otherwise unemployment remained relatively low. The onset of the Great Depression from the summer of 1929 on brought the unemployment rate from 4.6 percent in 1929 to 8.9 percent in 1930. (Figure 5)

Earnings for laborers varied during the twenties. Table 1 presents average weekly earnings for 25 manufacturing industries. For these industries male skilled and semi-skilled laborers generally commanded a premium of 35 percent over the earnings of unskilled male laborers in the twenties. Unskilled males received on average 35 percent more than females during the twenties. Real average weekly earnings for these 25 manufacturing industries rose somewhat during the 1920s. For skilled and semi-skilled male workers real average weekly earnings rose 5.3 percent between 1923 and 1929, while real average weekly earnings for unskilled males rose 8.7 percent between 1923 and 1929. Real average weekly earnings for females rose on 1.7 percent between 1923 and 1929. Real weekly earnings for bituminous and lignite coal miners fell as the coal industry encountered difficult times in the late twenties and the real daily wage rate for farmworkers in the twenties, reflecting the ongoing difficulties in agriculture, fell after the recovery from the 1920-1921 depression.

The 1920s were not kind to labor unions even though the First World War had solidified the dominance of the American Federation of Labor among labor unions in the United States. The rapid growth in union membership fostered by federal government policies during the war ended in 1919. A committee of AFL craft unions undertook a successful membership drive in the steel industry in that year. When U.S. Steel refused to bargain, the committee called a strike, the failure of which was a sharp blow to the unionization drive. (Brody, 1965) In the same year, the United Mine Workers undertook a large strike and also lost. These two lost strikes and the 1920-21 depression took the impetus out of the union movement and led to severe membership losses that continued through the twenties. (Figure 6)

Under Samuel Gompers's leadership, the AFL's "business unionism" had attempted to promote the union and collective bargaining as the primary answer to the workers' concerns with wages, hours, and working conditions. The AFL officially opposed any government actions that would have diminished worker attachment to unions by providing competing benefits, such as government sponsored unemployment insurance, minimum wage proposals, maximum hours proposals and social security programs. As Lloyd Ulman (1961) points out, the AFL, under Gompers' direction, differentiated on the basis of whether the statute would or would not aid collective bargaining. After Gompers' death, William Green led the AFL in a policy change as the AFL promoted the idea of union-management cooperation to improve output and promote greater employer acceptance of unions. But Irving Bernstein (1965) concludes that, on the whole, union-management cooperation in the twenties was a failure.

To combat the appeal of unions in the twenties, firms used the "yellow-dog" contract requiring employees to swear they were not union members and would not join one; the "American Plan" promoting the open shop and contending that the closed shop was un-American; and welfare capitalism. The most common aspects of welfare capitalism included personnel management to handle employment issues and problems, the doctrine of "high wages," company group life insurance, old-age pension plans, stock-purchase plans, and more. Some firms formed company unions to thwart independent unionization and the number of company-controlled unions grew from 145 to 432 between 1919 and 1926.

Until the late thirties the AFL was a voluntary association of independent national craft unions. Craft unions relied upon the particular skills the workers had acquired (their craft) to distinguish the workers and provide barriers to the entry of other workers. Most craft unions required a period of apprenticeship before a worker was fully accepted as a journeyman worker. The skills, and often lengthy apprenticeship, constituted the entry barrier that gave the union its bargaining power. There were only a few unions that were closer to today's industrial unions where the required skills were much less (or nonexistent) making the entry of new workers much easier. The most important of these industrial unions was the United Mine Workers, UMW.

The AFL had been created on two principles: the autonomy of the national unions and the exclusive jurisdiction of the national union.-Individual union members were not, in fact, members of the AFL; rather, they were members of the local and national union, and the national was a member of the AFL. Representation in the AFL gave dominance to the national unions, and, as a result, the AFL had little effective power over them. The craft lines, however, had never been distinct and increasingly became blurred. The AFL was constantly mediating jurisdictional disputes between member national unions. Because the AFL and its individual unions were not set up to appeal to and work for the relatively less skilled industrial workers, union organizing and growth lagged in the twenties.

Agriculture

The onset of the First World War in Europe brought unprecedented prosperity to American farmers. As agricultural production in Europe declined, the demand for American agricultural exports rose, leading to rising farm product prices and incomes. In response to this, American farmers expanded production by moving onto marginal farmland, such as Wisconsin cutover property on the edge of the woods and hilly terrain in the Ozark and Appalachian regions. They also increased output by purchasing more machinery, such as tractors, plows, mowers, and threshers. The price of farmland, particularly marginal farmland, rose in response to the increased demand, and the debt of American farmers increased substantially.

This expansion of American agriculture continued past the end of the First World War as farm exports to Europe and farm prices initially remained high. However, agricultural production in Europe recovered much faster than most observers had anticipated. Even before the onset of the short depression in 1920, farm exports and farm product prices had begun to fall. During the depression, farm prices virtually collapsed. From 1920 to 1921, the consumer price index fell 11.3 percent, the wholesale price index fell 45.9 percent, and the farm products price index fell 53.3 percent. (HSUS, Series E40, E42, and E135)

Real average net income per farm fell over 72.6 percent between 1920 and 1921 and, though rising in the twenties, never recovered the relative levels of 1918 and 1919. (Figure 7) Farm mortgage foreclosures rose and stayed at historically high levels for the entire decade of the 1920s. (Figure 8) The value of farmland and buildings fell throughout the twenties and, for the first time in American history, the number of cultivated acres actually declined as farmers pulled back from the marginal farmland brought into production during the war. Rather than indicators of a general depression in agriculture in the twenties, these were the results of the financial commitments made by overoptimistic American farmers during and directly after the war. The foreclosures were generally on second mortgages rather than on first mortgages as they were in the early 1930s. (Johnson, 1973; Alston, 1983)

A Declining Sector

A major difficulty in analyzing the interwar agricultural sector lies in separating the effects of the 1920-21 and 1929-33 depressions from those that arose because agriculture was declining relative to the other sectors. A relatively very slow growing demand for basic agricultural products and significant increases in the productivity of labor, land, and machinery in agricultural production combined with a much more rapid extensive economic growth in the nonagricultural sectors of the economy required a shift of resources, particularly labor, out of agriculture. (Figure 9) The market induces labor to voluntarily move from one sector to another through income differentials, suggesting that even in the absence of the effects of the depressions, farm incomes would have been lower than nonfarm incomes so as to bring about this migration.

The continuous substitution of tractor power for horse and mule power released hay and oats acreage to grow crops for human consumption. Though cotton and tobacco continued as the primary crops in the south, the relative production of cotton continued to shift to the west as production in Arkansas, Missouri, Oklahoma, Texas, New Mexico, Arizona, and California increased. As quotas reduced immigration and incomes rose, the demand for cereal grains grew slowly-more slowly than the supply-and the demand for fruits, vegetables, and dairy products grew. Refrigeration and faster freight shipments expanded the milk sheds further from metropolitan areas. Wisconsin and other North Central states began to ship cream and cheeses to the Atlantic Coast. Due to transportation improvements, specialized truck farms and the citrus industry became more important in California and Florida. (Parker, 1972; Soule, 1947)

The relative decline of the agricultural sector in this period was closely related to the highly inelastic income elasticity of demand for many farm products, particularly cereal grains, pork, and cotton. As incomes grew, the demand for these staples grew much more slowly. At the same time, rising land and labor productivity were increasing the supplies of staples, causing real prices to fall.

Table 3 presents selected agricultural productivity statistics for these years. Those data indicate that there were greater gains in labor productivity than in land productivity (or per acre yields). Per acre yields in wheat and hay actually decreased between 1915-19 and 1935-39. These productivity increases, which released resources from the agricultural sector, were the result of technological improvements in agriculture.

Technological Improvements In Agricultural Production

In many ways the adoption of the tractor in the interwar period symbolizes the technological changes that occurred in the agricultural sector. This changeover in the power source that farmers used had far-reaching consequences and altered the organization of the farm and the farmers' lifestyle. The adoption of the tractor was land saving (by releasing acreage previously used to produce crops for workstock) and labor saving. At the same time it increased the risks of farming because farmers were now much more exposed to the marketplace. They could not produce their own fuel for tractors as they had for the workstock. Rather, this had to be purchased from other suppliers. Repair and replacement parts also had to be purchased, and sometimes the repairs had to be undertaken by specialized mechanics. The purchase of a tractor also commonly required the purchase of new complementary machines; therefore, the decision to purchase a tractor was not an isolated one. (White, 2001; Ankli, 1980; Ankli and Olmstead, 1981; Musoke, 1981; Whatley, 1987). These changes resulted in more and more farmers purchasing and using tractors, but the rate of adoption varied sharply across the United States.

Technological innovations in plants and animals also raised productivity. Hybrid seed corn increased yields from an average of 40 bushels per acre to 100 to 120 bushels per acre. New varieties of wheat were developed from the hardy Russian and Turkish wheat varieties which had been imported. The U.S. Department of Agriculture's Experiment Stations took the lead in developing wheat varieties for different regions. For example, in the Columbia River Basin new varieties raised yields from an average of 19.1 bushels per acre in 1913-22 to 23.1 bushels per acre in 1933-42. (Shepherd, 1980) New hog breeds produced more meat and new methods of swine sanitation sharply increased the survival rate of piglets. An effective serum for hog cholera was developed, and the federal government led the way in the testing and eradication of bovine tuberculosis and brucellosis. Prior to the Second World War, a number of pesticides to control animal disease were developed, including cattle dips and disinfectants. By the mid-1920s a vaccine for "blackleg," an infectious, usually fatal disease that particularly struck young cattle, was completed. The cattle tick, which carried Texas Fever, was largely controlled through inspections. (Schlebecker, 1975; Bogue, 1983; Wood, 1980)

Federal Agricultural Programs in the 1920s

Though there was substantial agricultural discontent in the period from the Civil War to late 1890s, the period from then to the onset of the First World War was relatively free from overt farmers' complaints. In later years farmers dubbed the 1910-14 period as agriculture's "golden years" and used the prices of farm crops and farm inputs in that period as a standard by which to judge crop and input prices in later years. The problems that arose in the agricultural sector during the twenties once again led to insistent demands by farmers for government to alleviate their distress.

Though there were increasing calls for direct federal government intervention to limit production and raise farm prices, this was not used until Roosevelt took office. Rather, there was a reliance upon the traditional method to aid injured groups-tariffs, and upon the "sanctioning and promotion of cooperative marketing associations." In 1921 Congress attempted to control the grain exchanges and compel merchants and stockyards to charge "reasonable rates," with the Packers and Stockyards Act and the Grain Futures Act. In 1922 Congress passed the Capper-Volstead Act to promote agricultural cooperatives and the Fordney-McCumber Tariff to impose high duties on most agricultural imports.-The Cooperative Marketing Act of 1924 did not bolster failing cooperatives as it was supposed to do. (Hoffman and Liebcap, 1991)

Twice between 1924 and 1928 Congress passed "McNary-Haugan" bills, but President Calvin Coolidge vetoed both. The McNary-Haugan bills proposed to establish "fair" exchange values (based on the 1910-14 period) for each product and to maintain them through tariffs and a private corporation that would be chartered by the government and could buy enough of each commodity to keep its price up to the computed fair level. The revenues were to come from taxes imposed on farmers. The Hoover administration passed the Hawley-Smoot tariff in 1930 and an Agricultural Marketing Act in 1929. This act committed the federal government to a policy of stabilizing farm prices through several nongovernment institutions but these failed during the depression. Federal intervention in the agricultural sector really came of age during the New Deal era of the 1930s.

Manufacturing

Agriculture was not the only sector experiencing difficulties in the twenties. Other industries, such as textiles, boots and shoes, and coal mining, also experienced trying times. However, at the same time that these industries were declining, other industries, such as electrical appliances, automobiles, and construction, were growing rapidly. The simultaneous existence of growing and declining industries has been common to all eras because economic growth and technological progress never affect all sectors in the same way. In general, in manufacturing there was a rapid rate of growth of productivity during the twenties. The rise of real wages due to immigration restrictions and the slower growth of the resident population spurred this. Transportation improvements and communications advances were also responsible. These developments brought about differential growth in the various manufacturing sectors in the United States in the 1920s.

Because of the historic pattern of economic development in the United States, the northeast was the first area to really develop a manufacturing base. By the mid-nineteenth century the East North Central region was creating a manufacturing base and the other regions began to create manufacturing bases in the last half of the nineteenth century resulting in a relative westward and southern shift of manufacturing activity. This trend continued in the 1920s as the New England and Middle Atlantic regions' shares of manufacturing employment fell while all of the other regions-excluding the West North Central region-gained. There was considerable variation in the growth of the industries and shifts in their ranking during the decade. The largest broadly defined industries were, not surprisingly, food and kindred products; textile mill products; those producing and fabricating primary metals; machinery production; and chemicals. When industries are more narrowly defined, the automobile industry, which ranked third in manufacturing value added in 1919, ranked first by the mid-1920s.

Productivity Developments

Gavin Wright (1990) has argued that one of the underappreciated characteristics of American industrial history has been its reliance on mineral resources. Wright argues that the growing American strength in industrial exports and industrialization in general relied on an increasing intensity in nonreproducible natural resources. The large American market was knit together as one large market without internal barriers through the development of widespread low-cost transportation. Many distinctively American developments, such as continuous-process, mass-production methods were associated with the "high throughput" of fuel and raw materials relative to labor and capital inputs. As a result the United States became the dominant industrial force in the world 1920s and 1930s. According to Wright, after World War II "the process by which the United States became a unified 'economy' in the nineteenth century has been extended to the world as a whole. To a degree, natural resources have become commodities rather than part of the 'factor endowment' of individual countries." (Wright, 1990)

In addition to this growing intensity in the use of nonreproducible natural resources as a source of productivity gains in American manufacturing, other technological changes during the twenties and thirties tended to raise the productivity of the existing capital through the replacement of critical types of capital equipment with superior equipment and through changes in management methods. (Soule, 1947; Lorant, 1967; Devine, 1983; Oshima, 1984) Some changes, such as the standardization of parts and processes and the reduction of the number of styles and designs, raised the productivity of both capital and labor. Modern management techniques, first introduced by Frederick W. Taylor, were introduced on a wider scale.

One of the important forces contributing to mass production and increased productivity was the transfer to electric power. (Devine, 1983) By 1929 about 70 percent of manufacturing activity relied on electricity, compared to roughly 30 percent in 1914. Steam provided 80 percent of the mechanical drive capacity in manufacturing in 1900, but electricity provided over 50 percent by 1920 and 78 percent by 1929. An increasing number of factories were buying their power from electric utilities. In 1909, 64 percent of the electric motor capacity in manufacturing establishments used electricity generated on the factory site; by 1919, 57 percent of the electricity used in manufacturing was purchased from independent electric utilities.

The shift from coal to oil and natural gas and from raw unprocessed energy in the forms of coal and waterpower to processed energy in the form of internal combustion fuel and electricity increased thermal efficiency. After the First World War energy consumption relative to GNP fell, there was a sharp increase in the growth rate of output per labor-hour, and the output per unit of capital input once again began rising. These trends can be seen in the data in Table 3. Labor productivity grew much more rapidly during the 1920s than in the previous or following decade. Capital productivity had declined in the decade previous to the 1920s while it also increased sharply during the twenties and continued to rise in the following decade. Alexander Field (2003) has argued that the 1930s were the most technologically progressive decade of the twentieth century basing his argument on the growth of multi-factor productivity as well as the impressive array of technological developments during the thirties. However, the twenties also saw impressive increases in labor and capital productivity as, particularly, developments in energy and transportation accelerated.

Warren Devine, Jr. (1983) reports that in the twenties the most important result of the adoption of electricity was that it would be an indirect "lever to increase production." There were a number of ways in which this occurred. Electricity brought about an increased flow of production by allowing new flexibility in the design of buildings and the arrangement of machines. In this way it maximized throughput. Electric cranes were an "inestimable boon" to production because with adequate headroom they could operate anywhere in a plant, something that mechanical power transmission to overhead cranes did not allow. Electricity made possible the use of portable power tools that could be taken anywhere in the factory. Electricity brought about improved illumination, ventilation, and cleanliness in the plants, dramatically improving working conditions. It improved the control of machines since there was no longer belt slippage with overhead line shafts and belt transmission, and there were less limitations on the operating speeds of machines. Finally, it made plant expansion much easier than when overhead shafts and belts had been relied upon for operating power.

The mechanization of American manufacturing accelerated in the 1920s, and this led to a much more rapid growth of productivity in manufacturing compared to earlier decades and to other sectors at that time. There were several forces that promoted mechanization. One was the rapidly expanding aggregate demand during the prosperous twenties. Another was the technological developments in new machines and processes, of which electrification played an important part. Finally, Harry Jerome (1934) and, later, Harry Oshima (1984) both suggest that the price of unskilled labor began to rise as immigration sharply declined with new immigration laws and falling population growth. This accelerated the mechanization of the nation's factories.

Technological changes during this period can be documented for a number of individual industries. In bituminous coal mining, labor productivity rose when mechanical loading devices reduced the labor required from 24 to 50 percent. The burst of paved road construction in the twenties led to the development of a finishing machine to smooth the surface of cement highways, and this reduced the labor requirement from 40 to 60 percent. Mechanical pavers that spread centrally mixed materials further increased productivity in road construction. These replaced the roadside dump and wheelbarrow methods of spreading the cement. Jerome (1934) reports that the glass in electric light bulbs was made by new machines that cut the number of labor-hours required for their manufacture by nearly half. New machines to produce cigarettes and cigars, for warp-tying in textile production, and for pressing clothes in clothing shops also cut labor-hours. The Banbury mixer reduced the labor input in the production of automobile tires by half, and output per worker of inner tubes increased about four times with a new production method. However, as Daniel Nelson (1987) points out, the continuing advances were the "cumulative process resulting from a vast number of successive small changes." Because of these continuing advances in the quality of the tires and in the manufacturing of tires, between 1910 and 1930 "tire costs per thousand miles of driving fell from $9.39 to $0.65."

John Lorant (1967) has documented other technological advances that occurred in American manufacturing during the twenties. For example, the organic chemical industry developed rapidly due to the introduction of the Weizman fermentation process. In a similar fashion, nearly half of the productivity advances in the paper industry were due to the "increasingly sophisticated applications of electric power and paper manufacturing processes," especially the fourdrinier paper-making machines. As Avi Cohen (1984) has shown, the continuing advances in these machines were the result of evolutionary changes to the basic machine. Mechanization in many types of mass-production industries raised the productivity of labor and capital. In the glass industry, automatic feeding and other types of fully automatic production raised the efficiency of the production of glass containers, window glass, and pressed glass. Giedion (1948) reported that the production of bread was "automatized" in all stages during the 1920s.

Though not directly bringing about productivity increases in manufacturing processes, developments in the management of manufacturing firms, particularly the largest ones, also significantly affected their structure and operation. Alfred D. Chandler, Jr. (1962) has argued that the structure of a firm must follow its strategy. Until the First World War most industrial firms were centralized, single-division firms even when becoming vertically integrated. When this began to change the management of the large industrial firms had to change accordingly.

Because of these changes in the size and structure of the firm during the First World War, E. I. du Pont de Nemours and Company was led to adopt a strategy of diversifying into the production of largely unrelated product lines. The firm found that the centralized, divisional structure that had served it so well was not suited to this strategy, and its poor business performance led its executives to develop between 1919 and 1921 a decentralized, multidivisional structure that boosted it to the first rank among American industrial firms.

General Motors had a somewhat different problem. By 1920 it was already decentralized into separate divisions. In fact, there was so much decentralization that those divisions essentially remained separate companies and there was little coordination between the operating divisions. A financial crisis at the end of 1920 ousted W. C. Durant and brought in the du Ponts and Alfred Sloan. Sloan, who had seen the problems at GM but had been unable to convince Durant to make changes, began reorganizing the management of the company. Over the next several years Sloan and other GM executives developed the general office for a decentralized, multidivisional firm.

Though facing related problems at nearly the same time, GM and du Pont developed their decentralized, multidivisional organizations separately. As other manufacturing firms began to diversify, GM and du Pont became the models for reorganizing the management of the firms. In many industrial firms these reorganizations were not completed until well after the Second World War.

Competition, Monopoly, and the Government

The rise of big businesses, which accelerated in the postbellum period and particularly during the first great turn-of-the-century merger wave, continued in the interwar period. Between 1925 and 1939 the share of manufacturing assets held by the 100 largest corporations rose from 34.5 to 41.9 percent. (Niemi, 1980) As a public policy, the concern with monopolies diminished in the 1920s even though firms were growing larger. But the growing size of businesses was one of the convenient scapegoats upon which to blame the Great Depression.

However, the rise of large manufacturing firms in the interwar period is not so easily interpreted as an attempt to monopolize their industries. Some of the growth came about through vertical integration by the more successful manufacturing firms. Backward integration was generally an attempt to ensure a smooth supply of raw materials where that supply was not plentiful and was dispersed and firms "feared that raw materials might become controlled by competitors or independent suppliers." (Livesay and Porter, 1969) Forward integration was an offensive tactic employed when manufacturers found that the existing distribution network proved inadequate. Livesay and Porter suggested a number of reasons why firms chose to integrate forward. In some cases they had to provide the mass distribution facilities to handle their much larger outputs; especially when the product was a new one. The complexity of some new products required technical expertise that the existing distribution system could not provide. In other cases "the high unit costs of products required consumer credit which exceeded financial capabilities of independent distributors." Forward integration into wholesaling was more common than forward integration into retailing. The producers of automobiles, petroleum, typewriters, sewing machines, and harvesters were typical of those manufacturers that integrated all the way into retailing.

In some cases, increases in industry concentration arose as a natural process of industrial maturation. In the automobile industry, Henry Ford's invention in 1913 of the moving assembly line-a technological innovation that changed most manufacturing-lent itself to larger factories and firms. Of the several thousand companies that had produced cars prior to 1920, 120 were still doing so then, but Ford and General Motors were the clear leaders, together producing nearly 70 percent of the cars. During the twenties, several other companies, such as Durant, Willys, and Studebaker, missed their opportunity to become more important producers, and Chrysler, formed in early 1925, became the third most important producer by 1930. Many went out of business and by 1929 only 44 companies were still producing cars. The Great Depression decimated the industry. Dozens of minor firms went out of business. Ford struggled through by relying on its huge stockpile of cash accumulated prior to the mid-1920s, while Chrysler actually grew. By 1940, only eight companies still produced cars-GM, Ford, and Chrysler had about 85 percent of the market, while Willys, Studebaker, Nash, Hudson, and Packard shared the remainder. The rising concentration in this industry was not due to attempts to monopolize. As the industry matured, growing economies of scale in factory production and vertical integration, as well as the advantages of a widespread dealer network, led to a dramatic decrease in the number of viable firms. (Chandler, 1962 and 1964; Rae, 1984; Bernstein, 1987)

It was a similar story in the tire industry. The increasing concentration and growth of firms was driven by scale economies in production and retailing and by the devastating effects of the depression in the thirties. Although there were 190 firms in 1919, 5 firms dominated the industry-Goodyear, B. F. Goodrich, Firestone, U.S. Rubber, and Fisk, followed by Miller Rubber, General Tire and Rubber, and Kelly-Springfield. During the twenties, 166 firms left the industry while 66 entered. The share of the 5 largest firms rose from 50 percent in 1921 to 75 percent in 1937. During the depressed thirties, there was fierce price competition, and many firms exited the industry. By 1937 there were 30 firms, but the average employment per factory was 4.41 times as large as in 1921, and the average factory produced 6.87 times as many tires as in 1921. (French, 1986 and 1991; Nelson, 1987; Fricke, 1982)

The steel industry was already highly concentrated by 1920 as U.S. Steel had around 50 percent of the market. But U. S. Steel's market share declined through the twenties and thirties as several smaller firms competed and grew to become known as Little Steel, the next six largest integrated producers after U. S. Steel. Jonathan Baker (1989) has argued that the evidence is consistent with "the assumption that competition was a dominant strategy for steel manufacturers" until the depression. However, the initiation of the National Recovery Administration (NRA) codes in 1933 required the firms to cooperate rather than compete, and Baker argues that this constituted a training period leading firms to cooperate in price and output policies after 1935. (McCraw and Reinhardt, 1989; Weiss, 1980; Adams, 1977)

Mergers

A number of the larger firms grew by merger during this period, and the second great merger wave in American industry occurred during the last half of the 1920s. Figure 10 shows two series on mergers during the interwar period. The FTC series included many of the smaller mergers. The series constructed by Carl Eis (1969) only includes the larger mergers and ends in 1930.

This second great merger wave coincided with the stock market boom of the twenties and has been called "merger for oligopoly" rather than merger for monopoly. (Stigler, 1950) This merger wave created many larger firms that ranked below the industry leaders. Much of the activity in occurred in the banking and public utilities industries. (Markham, 1955) In manufacturing and mining, the effects on industrial structure were less striking. Eis (1969) found that while mergers took place in almost all industries, they were concentrated in a smaller number of them, particularly petroleum, primary metals, and food products.

The federal government's antitrust policies toward business varied sharply during the interwar period. In the 1920s there was relatively little activity by the Justice Department, but after the Great Depression the New Dealers tried to take advantage of big business to make business exempt from the antitrust laws and cartelize industries under government supervision.

With the passage of the FTC and Clayton Acts in 1914 to supplement the 1890 Sherman Act, the cornerstones of American antitrust law were complete. Though minor amendments were later enacted, the primary changes after that came in the enforcement of the laws and in swings in judicial decisions. Their two primary areas of application were in the areas of overt behavior, such as horizontal and vertical price-fixing, and in market structure, such as mergers and dominant firms. Horizontal price-fixing involves firms that would normally be competitors getting together to agree on stable and higher prices for their products. As long as most of the important competitors agree on the new, higher prices, substitution between products is eliminated and the demand becomes much less elastic. Thus, increasing the price increases the revenues and the profits of the firms who are fixing prices. Vertical price-fixing involves firms setting the prices of intermediate products purchased at different stages of production. It also tends to eliminate substitutes and makes the demand less elastic.

Price-fixing continued to be considered illegal throughout the period, but there was no major judicial activity regarding it in the 1920s other than the Trenton Potteries decision in 1927. In that decision 20 individuals and 23 corporations were found guilty of conspiring to fix the prices of bathroom bowls. The evidence in the case suggested that the firms were not very successful at doing so, but the court found that they were guilty nevertheless; their success, or lack thereof, was not held to be a factor in the decision. (Scherer and Ross, 1990) Though criticized by some, the decision was precedent setting in that it prohibited explicit pricing conspiracies per se.

The Justice Department had achieved success in dismantling Standard Oil and American Tobacco in 1911 through decisions that the firms had unreasonably restrained trade. These were essentially the same points used in court decisions against the Powder Trust in 1911, the thread trust in 1913, Eastman Kodak in 1915, the glucose and cornstarch trust in 1916, and the anthracite railroads in 1920. The criterion of an unreasonable restraint of trade was used in the 1916 and 1918 decisions that found the American Can Company and the United Shoe Machinery Company innocent of violating the Sherman Act; it was also clearly enunciated in the 1920 U. S. Steel decision. This became known as the rule of reason standard in antitrust policy.

Merger policy had been defined in the 1914 Clayton Act to prohibit only the acquisition of one corporation's stock by another corporation. Firms then shifted to the outright purchase of a competitor's assets. A series of court decisions in the twenties and thirties further reduced the possibilities of Justice Department actions against mergers. "Only fifteen mergers were ordered dissolved through antitrust actions between 1914 and 1950, and ten of the orders were accomplished under the Sherman Act rather than Clayton Act proceedings."
Energy
The search for energy and new ways to translate it into heat, light, and motion has been one of the unending themes in history. From whale oil to coal oil to kerosene to electricity, the search for better and less costly ways to light our lives, heat our homes, and move our machines has consumed much time and effort. The energy industries responded to those demands and the consumption of energy materials (coal, oil, gas, and fuel wood) as a percent of GNP rose from about 2 percent in the latter part of the nineteenth century to about 3 percent in the twentieth.

Changes in the energy markets that had begun in the nineteenth century continued. Processed energy in the forms of petroleum derivatives and electricity continued to become more important than "raw" energy, such as that available from coal and water. The evolution of energy sources for lighting continued; at the end of the nineteenth century, natural gas and electricity, rather than liquid fuels began to provide more lighting for streets, businesses, and homes.

In the twentieth century the continuing shift to electricity and internal combustion fuels increased the efficiency with which the American economy used energy. These processed forms of energy resulted in a more rapid increase in the productivity of labor and capital in American manufacturing. From 1899 to 1919, output per labor-hour increased at an average annual rate of 1.2 percent, whereas from 1919 to 1937 the increase was 3.5 percent per year. The productivity of capital had fallen at an average annual rate of 1.8 percent per year in the 20 years prior to 1919, but it rose 3.1 percent a year in the 18 years after 1919. As discussed above, the adoption of electricity in American manufacturing initiated a rapid evolution in the organization of plants and rapid increases in productivity in all types of manufacturing.

The change in transportation was even more remarkable. Internal combustion engines running on gasoline or diesel fuel revolutionized transportation. Cars quickly grabbed the lion's share of local and regional travel and began to eat into long distance passenger travel, just as the railroads had done to passenger traffic by water in the 1830s. Even before the First World War cities had begun passing laws to regulate and limit "jitney" services and to protect the investments in urban rail mass transit. Trucking began eating into the freight carried by the railroads.

These developments brought about changes in the energy industries. Coal mining became a declining industry. As Figure 11 shows, in 1925 the share of petroleum in the value of coal, gas, and petroleum output exceeded bituminous coal, and it continued to rise. Anthracite coal's share was much smaller and it declined while natural gas and LP (or liquefied petroleum) gas were relatively unimportant. These changes, especially the declining coal industry, were the source of considerable worry in the twenties.

Coal

One of the industries considered to be "sick" in the twenties was coal, particularly bituminous, or soft, coal. Income in the industry declined, and bankruptcies were frequent. Strikes frequently interrupted production. The majority of the miners "lived in squalid and unsanitary houses, and the incidence of accidents and diseases was high." (Soule, 1947) The number of operating bituminous coal mines declined sharply from 1923 through 1932. Anthracite (or hard) coal output was much smaller during the twenties. Real coal prices rose from 1919 to 1922, and bituminous coal prices fell sharply from then to 1925. (Figure 12) Coal mining employment plummeted during the twenties. Annual earnings, especially in bituminous coal mining, also fell because of dwindling hourly earnings and, from 1929 on, a shrinking workweek. (Figure 13)

The sources of these changes are to be found in the increasing supply due to productivity advances in coal production and in the decreasing demand for coal. The demand fell as industries began turning from coal to electricity and because of productivity advances in the use of coal to create energy in steel, railroads, and electric utilities. (Keller, 1973) In the generation of electricity, larger steam plants employing higher temperatures and steam pressures continued to reduce coal consumption per kilowatt hour. Similar reductions were found in the production of coke from coal for iron and steel production and in the use of coal by the steam railroad engines. (Rezneck, 1951) All of these factors reduced the demand for coal.

Productivity advances in coal mining tended to be labor saving. Mechanical cutting accounted for 60.7 percent of the coal mined in 1920 and 78.4 percent in 1929. By the middle of the twenties, the mechanical loading of coal began to be introduced. Between 1929 and 1939, output per labor-hour rose nearly one third in bituminous coal mining and nearly four fifths in anthracite as more mines adopted machine mining and mechanical loading and strip mining expanded.

The increasing supply and falling demand for coal led to the closure of mines that were too costly to operate. A mine could simply cease operations, let the equipment stand idle, and lay off employees. When bankruptcies occurred, the mines generally just turned up under new ownership with lower capital charges. When demand increased or strikes reduced the supply of coal, idle mines simply resumed production. As a result, the easily expanded supply largely eliminated economic profits.

The average daily employment in coal mining dropped by over 208,000 from its peak in 1923, but the sharply falling real wages suggests that the supply of labor did not fall as rapidly as the demand for labor. Soule (1947) notes that when employment fell in coal mining, it meant fewer days of work for the same number of men. Social and cultural characteristics tended to tie many to their home region. The local alternatives were few, and ignorance of alternatives outside the Appalachian rural areas, where most bituminous coal was mined, made it very costly to transfer out.

Petroleum

In contrast to the coal industry, the petroleum industry was growing throughout the interwar period. By the thirties, crude petroleum dominated the real value of the production of energy materials. As Figure 14 shows, the production of crude petroleum increased sharply between 1920 and 1930, while real petroleum prices, though highly variable, tended to decline.

The growing demand for petroleum was driven by the growth in demand for gasoline as America became a motorized society. The production of gasoline surpassed kerosene production in 1915. Kerosene's market continued to contract as electric lighting replaced kerosene lighting. The development of oil burners in the twenties began a switch from coal toward fuel oil for home heating, and this further increased the growing demand for petroleum. The growth in the demand for fuel oil and diesel fuel for ship engines also increased petroleum demand. But it was the growth in the demand for gasoline that drove the petroleum market.

The decline in real prices in the latter part of the twenties shows that supply was growing even faster than demand. The discovery of new fields in the early twenties increased the supply of petroleum and led to falling prices as production capacity grew. The Santa Fe Springs, California strike in 1919 initiated a supply shock as did the discovery of the Long Beach, California field in 1921. New discoveries in Powell, Texas and Smackover Arkansas further increased the supply of petroleum in 1921. New supply increases occurred in 1926 to 1928 with petroleum strikes in Seminole, Oklahoma and Hendricks, Texas. The supply of oil increased sharply in 1930 to 1931 with new discoveries in Oklahoma City and East Texas. Each new discovery pushed down real oil prices, and the prices of petroleum derivatives, and the growing production capacity led to a general declining trend in petroleum prices. McMillin and Parker (1994) argue that supply shocks generated by these new discoveries were a factor in the business cycles during the 1920s.

The supply of gasoline increased more than the supply of crude petroleum. In 1913 a chemist at Standard Oil of Indiana introduced the cracking process to refine crude petroleum; until that time it had been refined by distillation or unpressurized heating. In the heating process, various refined products such as kerosene, gasoline, naphtha, and lubricating oils were produced at different temperatures. It was difficult to vary the amount of the different refined products produced from a barrel of crude. The cracking process used pressurized heating to break heavier components down into lighter crude derivatives; with cracking, it was possible to increase the amount of gasoline obtained from a barrel of crude from 15 to 45 percent. In the early twenties, chemists at Standard Oil of New Jersey improved the cracking process, and by 1927 it was possible to obtain twice as much gasoline from a barrel of crude petroleum as in 1917.

The petroleum companies also developed new ways to distribute gasoline to motorists that made it more convenient to purchase gasoline. Prior to the First World War, gasoline was commonly purchased in one- or five-gallon cans and the purchaser used a funnel to pour the gasoline from the can into the car. Then "filling stations" appeared, which specialized in filling cars' tanks with gasoline. These spread rapidly, and by 1919 gasoline companies were beginning to introduce their own filling stations or contract with independent stations to exclusively distribute their gasoline. Increasing competition and falling profits led filling station operators to expand into other activities such as oil changes and other mechanical repairs. The general name attached to such stations gradually changed to "service stations" to reflect these new functions.

Though the petroleum firms tended to be large, they were highly competitive, trying to pump as much petroleum as possible to increase their share of the fields. This, combined with the development of new fields, led to an industry with highly volatile prices and output. Firms desperately wanted to stabilize and reduce the production of crude petroleum so as to stabilize and raise the prices of crude petroleum and refined products. Unable to obtain voluntary agreement on output limitations by the firms and producers, governments began stepping in. Led by Texas, which created the Texas Railroad Commission in 1891, oil-producing states began to intervene to regulate production. Such laws were usually termed prorationing laws and were quotas designed to limit each well's output to some fraction of its potential. The purpose was as much to stabilize and reduce production and raise prices as anything else, although generally such laws were passed under the guise of conservation. Although the federal government supported such attempts, not until the New Deal were federal laws passed to assist this.

Electricity

By the mid 1890s the debate over the method by which electricity was to be transmitted had been won by those who advocated alternating current. The reduced power losses and greater distance over which electricity could be transmitted more than offset the necessity for transforming the current back to direct current for general use. Widespread adoption of machines and appliances by industry and consumers then rested on an increase in the array of products using electricity as the source of power, heat, or light and the development of an efficient, lower cost method of generating electricity.

General Electric, Westinghouse, and other firms began producing the electrical appliances for homes and an increasing number of machines based on electricity began to appear in industry. The problem of lower cost production was solved by the introduction of centralized generating facilities that distributed the electric power through lines to many consumers and business firms.

Though initially several firms competed in generating and selling electricity to consumers and firms in a city or area, by the First World War many states and communities were awarding exclusive franchises to one firm to generate and distribute electricity to the customers in the franchise area. (Bright, 1947; Passer, 1953) The electric utility industry became an important growth industry and, as Figure 15 shows, electricity production and use grew rapidly.

The electric utilities increasingly were regulated by state commissions that were charged with setting rates so that the utilities could receive a "fair return" on their investments. Disagreements over what constituted a "fair return" and the calculation of the rate base led to a steady stream of cases before the commissions and a continuing series of court appeals. Generally these court decisions favored the reproduction cost basis. Because of the difficulty and cost in making these calculations, rates tended to be in the hands of the electric utilities that, it has been suggested, did not lower rates adequately to reflect the rising productivity and lowered costs of production. The utilities argued that a more rapid lowering of rates would have jeopardized their profits. Whether or not this increased their monopoly power is still an open question, but it should be noted, that electric utilities were hardly price-taking industries prior to regulation. (Mercer, 1973) In fact, as Figure 16 shows, the electric utilities began to systematically practice market segmentation charging users with less elastic demands, higher prices per kilowatt-hour.

Energy in the American Economy of the 1920s

The changes in the energy industries had far-reaching consequences. The coal industry faced a continuing decline in demand. Even in the growing petroleum industry, the periodic surges in the supply of petroleum caused great instability. In manufacturing, as described above, electrification contributed to a remarkable rise in productivity. The transportation revolution brought about by the rise of gasoline-powered trucks and cars changed the way businesses received their supplies and distributed their production as well as where they were located. The suburbanization of America and the beginnings of urban sprawl were largely brought about by the introduction of low-priced gasoline for cars.
Transportation
The American economy was forever altered by the dramatic changes in transportation after 1900. Following Henry Ford's introduction of the moving assembly production line in 1914, automobile prices plummeted, and by the end of the 1920s about 60 percent of American families owned an automobile. The advent of low-cost personal transportation led to an accelerating movement of population out of the crowded cities to more spacious homes in the suburbs and the automobile set off a decline in intracity public passenger transportation that has yet to end. Massive road-building programs facilitated the intercity movement of people and goods. Trucks increasingly took over the movement of freight in competition with the railroads. New industries, such as gasoline service stations, motor hotels, and the rubber tire industry, arose to service the automobile and truck traffic. These developments were complicated by the turmoil caused by changes in the federal government's policies toward transportation in the United States.

With the end of the First World War, a debate began as to whether the railroads, which had been taken over by the government, should be returned to private ownership or nationalized. The voices calling for a return to private ownership were much stronger, but doing so fomented great controversy. Many in Congress believed that careful planning and consolidation could restore the railroads and make them more efficient. There was continued concern about the near monopoly that the railroads had on the nation's intercity freight and passenger transportation. The result of these deliberations was the Transportation Act of 1920, which was premised on the continued domination of the nation's transportation by the railroads-an erroneous presumption.

The Transportation Act of 1920 presented a marked change in the Interstate Commerce Commission's ability to control railroads. The ICC was allowed to prescribe exact rates that were to be set so as to allow the railroads to earn a fair return, defined as 5.5 percent, on the fair value of their property. The ICC was authorized to make an accounting of the fair value of each regulated railroad's property; however, this was not completed until well into the 1930s, by which time the accounting and rate rules were out of date. To maintain fair competition between railroads in a region, all roads were to have the same rates for the same goods over the same distance. With the same rates, low-cost roads should have been able to earn higher rates of return than high-cost roads. To handle this, a recapture clause was inserted: any railroad earning a return of more than 6 percent on the fair value of its property was to turn the excess over to the ICC, which would place half of the money in a contingency fund for the railroad when it encountered financial problems and the other half in a contingency fund to provide loans to other railroads in need of assistance.

In order to address the problem of weak and strong railroads and to bring better coordination to the movement of rail traffic in the United States, the act was directed to encourage railroad consolidation, but little came of this in the 1920s. In order to facilitate its control of the railroads, the ICC was given two additional powers. The first was the control over the issuance or purchase of securities by railroads, and the second was the power to control changes in railroad service through the control of car supply and the extension and abandonment of track. The control of the supply of rail cars was turned over to the Association of American Railroads. Few extensions of track were proposed, but as time passed, abandonment requests grew. The ICC, however, trying to mediate between the conflicting demands of shippers, communities and railroads, generally refused to grant abandonments, and this became an extremely sensitive issue in the 1930s.

As indicated above, the premises of the Transportation Act of 1920 were wrong. Railroads experienced increasing competition during the 1920s, and both freight and passenger traffic were drawn off to competing transport forms. Passenger traffic exited from the railroads much more quickly. As the network of all weather surfaced roads increased, people quickly turned from the train to the car. Harmed even more by the move to automobile traffic were the electric interurban railways that had grown rapidly just prior to the First World War. (Hilton-Due, 1960) Not surprisingly, during the 1920s few railroads earned profits in excess of the fair rate of return.

The use of trucks to deliver freight began shortly after the turn of the century. Before the outbreak of war in Europe, White and Mack were producing trucks with as much as 7.5 tons of carrying capacity. Most of the truck freight was carried on a local basis, and it largely supplemented the longer distance freight transportation provided by the railroads. However, truck size was growing. In 1915 Trailmobile introduced the first four-wheel trailer designed to be pulled by a truck tractor unit. During the First World War, thousands of trucks were constructed for military purposes, and truck convoys showed that long distance truck travel was feasible and economical. The use of trucks to haul freight had been growing by over 18 percent per year since 1925, so that by 1929 intercity trucking accounted for more than one percent of the ton-miles of freight hauled.

The railroads argued that the trucks and buses provided "unfair" competition and believed that if they were also regulated, then the regulation could equalize the conditions under which they competed. As early as 1925, the National Association of Railroad and Utilities Commissioners issued a call for the regulation of motor carriers in general. In 1928 the ICC called for federal regulation of buses and in 1932 extended this call to federal regulation of trucks.

Most states had began regulating buses at the beginning of the 1920s in an attempt to reduce the diversion of urban passenger traffic from the electric trolley and railway systems. However, most of the regulation did not aim to control intercity passenger traffic by buses. As the network of surfaced roads expanded during the twenties, so did the routes of the intercity buses. In 1929 a number of smaller bus companies were incorporated in the Greyhound Buslines, the carrier that has since dominated intercity bus transportation. (Walsh, 2000)

A complaint of the railroads was that interstate trucking competition was unfair because it was subsidized while railroads were not. All railroad property was privately owned and subject to property taxes, whereas truckers used the existing road system and therefore neither had to bear the costs of creating the road system nor pay taxes upon it. Beginning with the Federal Road-Aid Act of 1916, small amounts of money were provided as an incentive for states to construct rural post roads. (Dearing-Owen, 1949) However, through the First World War most of the funds for highway construction came from a combination of levies on the adjacent property owners and county and state taxes. The monies raised by the counties were commonly 60 percent of the total funds allocated, and these primarily came from property taxes. In 1919 Oregon pioneered the state gasoline tax, which then began to be adopted by more and more states. A highway system financed by property taxes and other levies can be construed as a subsidization of motor vehicles, and one study for the period up to 1920 found evidence of substantial subsidization of trucking. (Herbst-Wu, 1973) However, the use of gasoline taxes moved closer to the goal of users paying the costs of the highways. Neither did the trucks have to pay for all of the highway construction because automobiles jointly used the highways. Highways had to be constructed in more costly ways in order to accommodate the larger and heavier trucks. Ideally the gasoline taxes collected from trucks should have covered the extra (or marginal) costs of highway construction incurred because of the truck traffic. Gasoline taxes tended to do this.

The American economy occupies a vast geographic region. Because economic activity occurs over most of the country, falling transportation costs have been crucial to knitting American firms and consumers into a unified market. Throughout the nineteenth century the railroads played this crucial role. Because of the size of the railroad companies and their importance in the economic life of Americans, the federal government began to regulate them. But, by 1917 it appeared that the railroad system had achieved some stability, and it was generally assumed that the post-First World War era would be an extension of the era from 1900 to 1917. Nothing could have been further from the truth. Spurred by public investments in highways, cars and trucks voraciously ate into the railroad's market, and, though the regulators failed to understand this at the time, the railroad's monopoly on transportation quickly disappeared.

Communications

Communications had joined with transportation developments in the nineteenth century to tie the American economy together more completely. The telegraph had benefited by using the railroads' right-of-ways, and the railroads used the telegraph to coordinate and organize their far-flung activities. As the cost of communications fell and information transfers sped, the development of firms with multiple plants at distant locations was facilitated. The interwar era saw a continuation of these developments as the telephone continued to supplant the telegraph and the new medium of radio arose to transmit news and provide a new entertainment source.

Telegraph domination of business and personal communications had given way to the telephone as long distance telephone calls between the east and west coasts with the new electronic amplifiers became possible in 1915. The number of telegraph messages handled grew 60.4 percent in the twenties. The number of local telephone conversations grew 46.8 percent between 1920 and 1930, while the number of long distance conversations grew 71.8 percent over the same period. There were 5 times as many long distance telephone calls as telegraph messages handled in 1920, and 5.7 times as many in 1930.

The twenties were a prosperous period for AT&T and its 18 major operating companies. (Brooks, 1975; Temin, 1987; Garnet, 1985; Lipartito, 1989) Telephone usage rose and, as Figure 19 shows, the share of all households with a telephone rose from 35 percent to nearly 42 percent. In cities across the nation, AT&T consolidated its system, gained control of many operating companies, and virtually eliminated its competitors. It was able to do this because in 1921 Congress passed the Graham Act exempting AT&T from the Sherman Act in consolidating competing telephone companies. By 1940, the non-Bell operating companies were all small relative to the Bell operating companies.

Surprisingly there was a decline in telephone use on the farms during the twenties. (Hadwiger-Cochran, 1984; Fischer 1987) Rising telephone rates explain part of the decline in rural use. The imposition of connection fees during the First World War made it more costly for new farmers to hook up. As AT&T gained control of more and more operating systems, telephone rates were increased. AT&T also began requiring, as a condition of interconnection, that independent companies upgrade their systems to meet AT&T standards. Most of the small mutual companies that had provided service to farmers had operated on a shoestring-wires were often strung along fenceposts, and phones were inexpensive "whoop and holler" magneto units. Upgrading to AT&T's standards raised costs, forcing these companies to raise rates.

However, it also seems likely that during the 1920s there was a general decline in the rural demand for telephone services. One important factor in this was the dramatic decline in farm incomes in the early twenties. The second reason was a change in the farmers' environment. Prior to the First World War, the telephone eased farm isolation and provided news and weather information that was otherwise hard to obtain. After 1920 automobiles, surfaced roads, movies, and the radio loosened the isolation and the telephone was no longer as crucial.

Othmar Merganthaler's development of the linotype machine in the late nineteenth century had irrevocably altered printing and publishing. This machine, which quickly created a line of soft, lead-based metal type that could be printed, melted down and then recast as a new line of type, dramatically lowered the costs of printing. Previously, all type had to be painstakingly set by hand, with individual cast letter matrices picked out from compartments in drawers to construct words, lines, and paragraphs. After printing, each line of type on the page had to be broken down and each individual letter matrix placed back into its compartment in its drawer for use in the next printing job. Newspapers often were not published every day and did not contain many pages, resulting in many newspapers in most cities. In contrast to this laborious process, the linotype used a keyboard upon which the operator typed the words in one of the lines in a news column. Matrices for each letter dropped down from a magazine of matrices as the operator typed each letter and were assembled into a line of type with automatic spacers to justify the line (fill out the column width). When the line was completed the machine mechanically cast the line of matrices into a line of lead type. The line of lead type was ejected into a tray and the letter matrices mechanically returned to the magazine while the operator continued typing the next line in the news story. The first Merganthaler linotype machine was installed in the New York Tribune in 1886. The linotype machine dramatically lowered the costs of printing newspapers (as well as books and magazines). Prior to the linotype a typical newspaper averaged no more than 11 pages and many were published only a few times a week. The linotype machine allowed newspapers to grow in size and they began to be published more regularly. A process of consolidation of daily and Sunday newspapers began that continues to this day. Many have termed the Merganthaler linotype machine the most significant printing invention since the introduction of movable type 400 years earlier.

For city families as well as farm families, radio became the new source of news and entertainment. (Barnouw, 1966; Rosen, 1980 and 1987; Chester-Garrison, 1950) It soon took over as the prime advertising medium and in the process revolutionized advertising. By 1930 more homes had radio sets than had telephones. The radio networks sent news and entertainment broadcasts all over the country. The isolation of rural life, particularly in many areas of the plains, was forever broken by the intrusion of the "black box," as radio receivers were often called. The radio began a process of breaking down regionalism and creating a common culture in the United States.

The potential demand for radio became clear with the first regular broadcast of Westinghouse's KDKA in Pittsburgh in the fall of 1920. Because the Department of Commerce could not deny a license application there was an explosion of stations all broadcasting at the same frequency and signal jamming and interference became a serious problem. By 1923 the Department of Commerce had gained control of radio from the Post Office and the Navy and began to arbitrarily disperse stations on the radio dial and deny licenses creating the first market in commercial broadcast licenses. In 1926 a U.S. District Court decided that under the Radio Law of 1912 Herbert Hoover, the secretary of commerce, did not have this power. New stations appeared and the logjam and interference of signals worsened. A Radio Act was passed in January of 1927 creating the Federal Radio Commission (FRC) as a temporary licensing authority. Licenses were to be issued in the public interest, convenience, and necessity. A number of broadcasting licenses were revoked; stations were assigned frequencies, dial locations, and power levels. The FRC created 24 clear-channel stations with as much as 50,000 watts of broadcasting power, of which 21 ended up being affiliated with the new national radio networks. The Communications Act of 1934 essentially repeated the 1927 act except that it created a permanent, seven-person Federal Communications Commission (FCC).

Local stations initially created and broadcast the radio programs. The expenses were modest, and stores and companies operating radio stations wrote this off as indirect, goodwill advertising. Several forces changed all this. In 1922, AT&T opened up a radio station in New York City, WEAF (later to become WNBC). AT&T envisioned this station as the center of a radio toll system where individuals could purchase time to broadcast a message transmitted to other stations in the toll network using AT&T's long distance lines and an August 1922 broadcast by a Long Island realty company became the first conscious use of direct advertising.

Though advertising continued to be condemned, the fiscal pressures on radio stations to accept advertising began rising. In 1923 the American Society of Composers and Publishers (ASCAP), began demanding a performance fee anytime ASCAP-copyrighted music was performed on the radio, either live or on record. By 1924 the issue was settled, and most stations began paying performance fees to ASCAP. AT&T decided that all stations broadcasting with non AT&T transmitters were violating their patent rights and began asking for annual fees from such stations based on the station's power. By the end of 1924, most stations were paying the fees. All of this drained the coffers of the radio stations, and more and more of them began discreetly accepting advertising.

RCA became upset at AT&T's creation of a chain of radio stations and set up its own toll network using the inferior lines of Western Union and Postal Telegraph, because AT&T, not surprisingly, did not allow any toll (or network) broadcasting on its lines except by its own stations. AT&T began to worry that its actions might threaten its federal monopoly in long distance telephone communications. In 1926 a new firm was created, the National Broadcasting Company (NBC), which took over all broadcasting activities from AT&T and RCA as AT&T left broadcasting. When NBC debuted in November of 1926, it had two networks: the Red, which was the old AT&T network, and the Blue, which was the old RCA network. Radio networks allowed advertisers to direct advertising at a national audience at a lower cost. Network programs allowed local stations to broadcast superior programs that captured a larger listening audience and in return received a share of the fees the national advertiser paid to the network. In 1927 a new network, the Columbia Broadcasting System (CBS) financed by the Paley family began operation and other new networks entered or tried to enter the industry in the 1930s.

Communications developments in the interwar era present something of a mixed picture. By 1920 long distance telephone service was in place, but rising rates slowed the rate of adoption in the period, and telephone use in rural areas declined sharply. Though direct dialing was first tried in the twenties, its general implementation would not come until the postwar era, when other changes, such as microwave transmission of signals and touch-tone dialing, would also appear. Though the number of newspapers declined, newspaper circulation generally held up. The number of competing newspapers in larger cities began declining, a trend that also would accelerate in the postwar American economy.
Banking and Securities Markets
In the twenties commercial banks became "department stores of finance."- Banks opened up installment (or personal) loan departments, expanded their mortgage lending, opened up trust departments, undertook securities underwriting activities, and offered safe deposit boxes. These changes were a response to growing competition from other financial intermediaries. Businesses, stung by bankers' control and reduced lending during the 1920-21 depression, began relying more on retained earnings and stock and bond issues to raise investment and, sometimes, working capital. This reduced loan demand. The thrift institutions also experienced good growth in the twenties as they helped fuel the housing construction boom of the decade. The securities markets boomed in the twenties only to see a dramatic crash of the stock market in late 1929.

There were two broad classes of commercial banks; those that were nationally chartered and those that were chartered by the states. Only the national banks were required to be members of the Federal Reserve System. (Figure 21) Most banks were unit banks because national regulators and most state regulators prohibited branching. However, in the twenties a few states began to permit limited branching; California even allowed statewide branching.-The Federal Reserve member banks held the bulk of the assets of all commercial banks, even though most banks were not members. A high bank failure rate in the 1920s has usually been explained by "overbanking" or too many banks located in an area, but H. Thomas Johnson (1973-74) makes a strong argument against this. (Figure 22)- If there were overbanking, on average each bank would have been underutilized resulting in intense competition for deposits and higher costs and lower earnings. One common reason would have been the free entry of banks as long as they achieved the minimum requirements then in force. However, the twenties saw changes that led to the demise of many smaller rural banks that would likely have been profitable if these - changes had not occurred. Improved transportation led to a movement of business activities, including banking, into the larger towns and cities. Rural banks that relied on loans to farmers suffered just as farmers did during the twenties, especially in the first half of the twenties. The number of bank suspensions and the suspension rate fell after 1926. The sharp rise in bank suspensions in 1930 occurred because of the first banking crisis during the Great Depression.

Prior to the twenties, the main assets of commercial banks were short-term business loans, made by creating a demand deposit or increasing an existing one for a borrowing firm. As business lending declined in the 1920s commercial banks vigorously moved into new types of financial activities. As banks purchased more securities for their earning asset portfolios and gained expertise in the securities markets, larger ones established investment departments and by the late twenties were an important force in the underwriting of new securities issued by nonfinancial corporations.

The securities market exhibited perhaps the most dramatic growth of the noncommercial bank financial intermediaries during the twenties, but others also grew rapidly. (Figure 23) The assets of life insurance companies increased by 10 percent a year from 1921 to 1929; by the late twenties they were a very important source of funds for construction investment. Mutual savings banks and savings and loan associations (thrifts) operated in essentially the same types of markets. The Mutual savings banks were concentrated in the northeastern United States. As incomes rose, personal savings increased, and housing construction expanded in the twenties, there was an increasing demand for the thrifts' interest earning time deposits and mortgage lending.

But the dramatic expansion in the financial sector came in new corporate securities issues in the twenties-especially common and preferred stock-and in the trading of existing shares of those securities. (Figure 24) The late twenties boom in the American economy was rapid, highly visible, and dramatic. Skyscrapers were being erected in most major cities, the automobile manufacturers produced over four and a half million new cars in 1929; and the stock market, like a barometer of this prosperity, was on a dizzying ride to higher and higher prices. "Playing the market" seemed to become a national pastime.

The Dow-Jones index hit its peak of 381 on September 3 and then slid to 320 on October 21. In the following week the stock market "crashed," with a record number of shares being traded on several days. At the end of Tuesday, October, 29th, the index stood at 230, 96 points less than one week before. On November 13, 1929, the Dow-Jones index reached its lowest point for the year at 198-183 points less than the September 3 peak.

The path of the stock market boom of the twenties can be seen in Figure 25. Sharp price breaks occurred several times during the boom, and each of these gave rise to dark predictions of the end of the bull market and speculation. Until late October of 1929, these predictions turned out to be wrong. Between those price breaks and prior to the October crash, stock prices continued to surge upward. In March of 1928, 3,875,910 shares were traded in one day, establishing a record. By late 1928, five million shares being traded in a day was a common occurrence.

New securities, from rising merger activity and the formation of holding companies, were issued to take advantage of the rising stock prices.-Stock pools, which were not illegal until the 1934 Securities and Exchange Act, took advantage of the boom to temporarily drive up the price of selected stocks and reap large gains for the members of the pool. In stock pools a group of speculators would pool large amounts of their funds and then begin purchasing large amounts of shares of a stock. This increased demand led to rising prices for that stock. Frequently pool insiders would "churn" the stock by repeatedly buying and selling the same shares among themselves, but at rising prices. Outsiders, seeing the price rising, would decide to purchase the stock whose price was rising. At a predetermined higher price the pool members would, within a short period, sell their shares and pull out of the market for that stock. Without the additional demand from the pool, the stock's price usually fell quickly bringing large losses for the unsuspecting outside investors while reaping large gains for the pool insiders.

Another factor commonly used to explain both the speculative boom and the October crash was the purchase of stocks on small margins. However, contrary to popular perception, margin requirements through most of the twenties were essentially the same as in previous decades. Brokers, recognizing the problems with margin lending in the rapidly changing market, began raising margin requirements in late 1928, and by the fall of 1929, margin requirements were the highest in the history of the New York Stock Exchange. In the 1920s, as was the case for decades prior to that, the usual margin requirements were 10 to 15 percent of the purchase price, and, apparently, more often around 10 percent. There were increases in this percentage by 1928 and by the fall of 1928, well before the crash and at the urging of a special New York Clearinghouse committee, margin requirements had been raised to some of the highest levels in New York Stock Exchange history. One brokerage house required the following of its clients. Securities with a selling price below $10 could only be purchased for cash. Securities with a selling price of $10 to $20 had to have a 50 percent margin; for securities of $20 to $30 a margin requirement of 40 percent; and, for securities with a price above $30 the margin was 30 percent of the purchase price. In the first half of 1929 margin requirements on customers' accounts averaged a 40 percent margin, and some houses raised their margins to 50 percent a few months before the crash. These were, historically, very high margin requirements. (Smiley and Keehn, 1988)-Even so, during the crash when additional margin calls were issued, those investors who could not provide additional margin saw the brokers' sell their stock at whatever the market price was at the time and these forced sales helped drive prices even lower.

The crash began on Monday, October 21, as the index of stock prices fell 3 points on the third-largest volume in the history of the New York Stock Exchange. After a slight rally on Tuesday, prices began declining on Wednesday and fell 21 points by the end of the day bringing on the third call for more margin in that week. On Black Thursday, October 24, prices initially fell sharply, but rallied somewhat in the afternoon so that the net loss was only 7 points, but the volume of thirteen million shares set a NYSE record. Friday brought a small gain that was wiped out on Saturday. On Monday, October 28, the Dow Jones index fell 38 points on a volume of nine million shares-three million in the final hour of trading. Black Tuesday, October 29, brought declines in virtually every stock price. Manufacturing firms, which had been lending large sums to brokers for margin loans, had been calling in these loans and this accelerated on Monday and Tuesday. The big Wall Street banks increased their lending on call loans to offset some of this loss of loanable funds. The Dow Jones Index fell 30 points on a record volume of nearly sixteen and a half million shares exchanged. Black Thursday and Black Tuesday wiped out entire fortunes.

Though the worst was over, prices continued to decline until November 13, 1929, as brokers cleaned up their accounts and sold off the stocks of clients who could not supply additional margin. After that, prices began to slowly rise and by April of 1930 had increased 96 points from the low of November 13,- "only" 87 points less than the peak of September 3, 1929. From that point, stock prices resumed their depressing decline until the low point was reached in the summer of 1932.

-There is a long tradition that insists that the Great Bull Market of the late twenties was an orgy of speculation that bid the prices of stocks far above any sustainable or economically justifiable level creating a bubble in the stock market. John Kenneth Galbraith (1954) observed, "The collapse in the stock market in the autumn of 1929 was implicit in the speculation that went before."-But not everyone has agreed with this.

In 1930 Irving Fisher argued that the stock prices of 1928 and 1929 were based on fundamental expectations that future corporate earnings would be high.- More recently, Murray Rothbard (1963), Gerald Gunderson (1976), and Jude Wanniski (1978) have argued that stock prices were not too high prior to the crash.-Gunderson suggested that prior to 1929, stock prices were where they should have been and that when corporate profits in the summer and fall of 1929 failed to meet expectations, stock prices were written down.- Wanniski argued that political events brought on the crash. The market broke each time news arrived of advances in congressional consideration of the Hawley-Smoot tariff. However, the virtually perfect foresight that Wanniski's explanation requires is unrealistic.- Charles Kindleberger (1973) and Peter Temin (1976) examined common stock yields and price-earnings ratios and found that the relative constancy did not suggest that stock prices were bid up unrealistically high in the late twenties.-Gary Santoni and Gerald Dwyer (1990) also failed to find evidence of a bubble in stock prices in 1928 and 1929.-Gerald Sirkin (1975) found that the implied growth rates of dividends required to justify stock prices in 1928 and 1929 were quite conservative and lower than post-Second World War dividend growth rates.

However, examination of after-the-fact common stock yields and price-earning ratios can do no more than provide some ex post justification for suggesting that there was not excessive speculation during the Great Bull Market.- Each individual investor was motivated by that person's subjective expectations of each firm's future earnings and dividends and the future prices of shares of each firm's stock. Because of this element of subjectivity, not only can we never accurately know those values, but also we can never know how they varied among individuals. The market price we observe will be the end result of all of the actions of the market participants, and the observed price may be different from the price almost all of the participants expected.

In fact, there are some indications that there were differences in 1928 and 1929. Yields on common stocks were somewhat lower in 1928 and 1929. In October of 1928, brokers generally began raising margin requirements, and by the beginning of the fall of 1929, margin requirements were, on average, the highest in the history of the New York Stock Exchange. Though the discount and commercial paper rates had moved closely with the call and time rates on brokers' loans through 1927, the rates on brokers' loans increased much more sharply in 1928 and 1929.- This pulled in funds from corporations, private investors, and foreign banks as New York City banks sharply reduced their lending. These facts suggest that brokers and New York City bankers may have come to believe that stock prices had been bid above a sustainable level by late 1928 and early 1929. White (1990) created a quarterly index of dividends for firms in the Dow-Jones index and related this to the DJI. Through 1927 the two track closely, but in 1928 and 1929 the index of stock prices grows much more rapidly than the index of dividends.

The qualitative evidence for a bubble in the stock market in 1928 and 1929 that White assembled was strengthened by the findings of J. Bradford De Long and Andre Shleifer (1991). They examined closed-end mutual funds, a type of fund where investors wishing to liquidate must sell their shares to other individual investors allowing its fundamental value to be exactly measurable.- Using evidence from these funds, De Long and Shleifer estimated that in the summer of 1929, the Standard and Poor's composite stock price index was overvalued about 30 percent due to excessive investor optimism. Rappoport and White (1993 and 1994) found other evidence that supported a bubble in the stock market in 1928 and 1929. There was a sharp divergence between the growth of stock prices and dividends; there were increasing premiums on call and time brokers' loans in 1928 and 1929; margin requirements rose; and stock market volatility rose in the wake of the 1929 stock market crash.

There are several reasons for the creation of such a bubble. First, the fundamental values of earnings and dividends become difficult to assess when there are major industrial changes, such as the rapid changes in the automobile industry, the new electric utilities, and the new radio industry.- Eugene White (1990) suggests that "While investors had every reason to expect earnings to grow, they lacked the means to evaluate easily the future path of dividends." As a result investors bid up prices as they were swept up in the ongoing stock market boom. Second, participation in the stock market widened noticeably in the twenties. The new investors were relatively unsophisticated, and they were more likely to be caught up in the euphoria of the boom and bid prices upward.- New, inexperienced commission sales personnel were hired to sell stocks and they promised glowing returns on stocks they knew little about.

These observations were strengthened by the experimental work of economist Vernon Smith. (Bishop, 1987) In a number of experiments over a three-year period using students and Tucson businessmen and businesswomen, bubbles developed as inexperienced investors valued stocks differently and engaged in price speculation. As these investors in the experiments began to realize that speculative profits were unsustainable and uncertain, their dividend expectations changed, the market crashed, and ultimately stocks began trading at their fundamental dividend values. These bubbles and crashes occurred repeatedly, leading Smith to conjecture that there are few regulatory steps that can be taken to prevent a crash.

Though the bubble of 1928 and 1929 made some downward adjustment in stock prices inevitable, as Barsky and De Long have shown, changes in fundamentals govern the overall movements. And the end of the long bull market was almost certainly governed by this. In late 1928 and early 1929 there was a striking rise in economic activity, but a decline began somewhere between May and July of that year and was clearly evident by August of 1929. By the middle of August, the rise in stock prices had slowed down as better information on the contraction was received. There were repeated statements by leading figures that stocks were "overpriced" and the Federal Reserve System sharply increased the discount rate in August 1929 was well as continuing its call for banks to reduce their margin lending. As this information was assessed, the number of speculators selling stocks increased, and the number buying decreased. With the decreased demand, stock prices began to fall, and as more accurate information on the nature and extent of the decline was received, stock prices fell more. The late October crash made the decline occur much more rapidly, and the margin purchases and consequent forced selling of many of those stocks contributed to a more severe price fall. The recovery of stock prices from November 13 into April of 1930 suggests that stock prices may have been driven somewhat too low during the crash.

There is now widespread agreement that the 1929 stock market crash did not cause the Great Depression. Instead, the initial downturn in economic activity was a primary determinant of the ending of the 1928-29 stock market bubble. The stock market crash did make the downturn become more severe beginning in November 1929. It reduced discretionary consumption spending (Romer, 1990) and created greater income uncertainty helping to bring on the contraction (Flacco and Parker, 1992). Though stock market prices reached a bottom and began to recover following November 13, 1929, the continuing decline in economic activity took its toll and by May 1930 stock prices resumed their decline and continued to fall through the summer of 1932.
Domestic Trade
In the nineteenth century, a complex array of wholesalers, jobbers, and retailers had developed, but changes in the postbellum period reduced the role of the wholesalers and jobbers and strengthened the importance of the retailers in domestic trade. (Cochran, 1977; Chandler, 1977; Marburg, 1951; Clewett, 1951) The appearance of the department store in the major cities and the rise of mail order firms in the postbellum period changed the retailing market.

Department Stores

A department store is a combination of specialty stores organized as departments within one general store. A. T. Stewart's huge 1846 dry goods store in New York City is often referred to as the first department store. (Resseguie, 1965; Sobel-Sicilia, 1986) R. H. Macy started his dry goods store in 1858 and Wanamaker's in Philadelphia opened in 1876. By the end of the nineteenth century, every city of any size had at least one major department store. (Appel, 1930; Benson, 1986; Hendrickson, 1979; Hower, 1946; Sobel, 1974) Until the late twenties, the department store field was dominated by independent stores, though some department stores in the largest cities had opened a few suburban branches and stores in other cities. In the interwar period department stores accounted for about 8 percent of retail sales.

The department stores relied on a "one-price" policy, which Stewart is credited with beginning. In the antebellum period and into the postbellum period, it was common not to post a specific price on an item; rather, each purchaser haggled with a sales clerk over what the price would be. Stewart posted fixed prices on the various dry goods sold, and the customer could either decide to buy or not buy at the fixed price. The policy dramatically lowered transactions costs for both the retailer and the purchaser. Prices were reduced with a smaller markup over the wholesale price, and a large sales volume and a quicker turnover of the store's inventory generated profits.

Mail Order Firms

What changed the department store field in the twenties was the entrance of Sears Roebuck and Montgomery Ward, the two dominant mail order firms in the United States. (Emmet-Jeuck, 1950; Chandler, 1962, 1977) Both firms had begun in the late nineteenth century and by 1914 the younger Sears Roebuck had surpassed Montgomery Ward. Both located in Chicago due to its central location in the nation's rail network and both had benefited from the advent of Rural Free Delivery in 1896 and low cost Parcel Post Service in 1912.

In 1924 Sears hired Robert C. Wood, who was able to convince Sears Roebuck to open retail stores. Wood believed that the declining rural population and the growing urban population forecast the gradual demise of the mail order business; survival of the mail order firms required a move into retail sales. By 1925 Sears Roebuck had opened 8 retail stores, and by 1929 it had 324 stores. Montgomery Ward quickly followed suit. Rather than locating these in the central business district (CBD), Wood located many on major streets closer to the residential areas. These moves of Sears Roebuck and Montgomery Ward expanded department store retailing and provided a new type of chain store.

Chain Stores

Though chain stores grew rapidly in the first two decades of the twentieth century, they date back to the 1860s when George F. Gilman and George Huntington Hartford opened a string of New York City A&P (Atlantic and Pacific) stores exclusively to sell tea. (Beckman-Nolen, 1938; Lebhar, 1963; Bullock, 1933) Stores were opened in other regions and in 1912 their first "cash-and-carry" full-range grocery was opened. Soon they were opening 50 of these stores each week and by the 1920s A&P had 14,000 stores. They then phased out the small stores to reduce the chain to 4,000 full-range, supermarket-type stores. A&P's success led to new grocery store chains such as Kroger, Jewel Tea, and Safeway.

Prior to A&P's cash-and-carry policy, it was common for grocery stores, produce (or green) grocers, and meat markets to provide home delivery and credit, both of which were costly. As a result, retail prices were generally marked up well above the wholesale prices. In cash-and-carry stores, items were sold only for cash; no credit was extended, and no expensive home deliveries were provided. Markups on prices could be much lower because other costs were much lower. Consumers liked the lower prices and were willing to pay cash and carry their groceries, and the policy became common by the twenties.

Chains also developed in other retail product lines. In 1879 Frank W. Woolworth developed a "5 and 10 Cent Store," or dime store, and there were over 1,000 F. W. Woolworth stores by the mid-1920s. (Winkler, 1940) Other firms such as Kresge, Kress, and McCrory successfully imitated Woolworth's dime store chain. J.C. Penney's dry goods chain store began in 1901 (Beasley, 1948), Walgreen's drug store chain began in 1909, and shoes, jewelry, cigars, and other lines of merchandise also began to be sold through chain stores.

Self-Service Policies

In 1916 Clarence Saunders, a grocer in Memphis, Tennessee, built upon the one-price policy and began offering self-service at his Piggly Wiggly store. Previously, customers handed a clerk a list or asked for the items desired, which the clerk then collected and the customer paid for. With self-service, items for sale were placed on open shelves among which the customers could walk, carrying a shopping bag or pushing a shopping cart. Each customer could then browse as he or she pleased, picking out whatever was desired. Saunders and other retailers who adopted the self-service method of retail selling found that customers often purchased more because of exposure to the array of products on the shelves; as well, self-service lowered the labor required for retail sales and therefore lowered costs.

Shopping Centers

Shopping Centers, another innovation in retailing that began in the twenties, was not destined to become a major force in retail development until after the Second World War. The ultimate cause of this innovation was the widening ownership and use of the automobile. By the 1920s, as the ownership and use of the car began expanding, population began to move out of the crowded central cities toward the more open suburbs. When General Robert Wood set Sears off on its development of urban stores, he located these not in the central business district, CBD, but as free-standing stores on major arteries away from the CBD with sufficient space for parking.

At about the same time, a few entrepreneurs began to develop shopping centers. Yehoshua Cohen (1972) says, "The owner of such a center was responsible for maintenance of the center, its parking lot, as well as other services to consumers and retailers in the center." Perhaps the earliest such shopping center was the Country Club Plaza built in 1922 by the J. C. Nichols Company in Kansas City, Missouri. Other early shopping centers appeared in Baltimore and Dallas. By the mid-1930s the concept of a planned shopping center was well known and was expected to be the means to capture the trade of the growing number of suburban consumers.

International Trade and Finance

In the twenties a gold exchange standard was developed to replace the gold standard of the prewar world. Under a gold standard, each country's currency carried a fixed exchange rate with gold, and the currency had to be backed up by gold. As a result, all countries on the gold standard had fixed exchange rates with all other countries. Adjustments to balance international trade flows were made by gold flows. If a country had a deficit in its trade balance, gold would leave the country, forcing the money stock to decline and prices to fall. Falling prices made the deficit countries' exports more attractive and imports more costly, reducing the deficit. Countries with a surplus imported gold, which increased the money stock and caused prices to rise. This made the surplus countries' exports less attractive and imports more attractive, decreasing the surplus. Most economists who have studied the prewar gold standard contend that it did not work as the conventional textbook model says, because capital flows frequently reduced or eliminated the need for gold flows for long periods of time. However, there is no consensus on whether fortuitous circumstances, rather than the gold standard, saved the international economy from periodic convulsions or whether the gold standard as it did work was sufficient to promote stability and growth in international transactions.

After the First World War it was argued that there was a "shortage" of fluid monetary gold to use for the gold standard, so some method of "economizing" on gold had to be found. To do this, two basic changes were made. First, most nations, other than the United States, stopped domestic circulation of gold. Second, the "gold exchange" system was created. Most countries held their international reserves in the form of U.S. dollars or British pounds and international transactions used dollars or pounds, as long as the United States and Great Britain stood ready to exchange their currencies for gold at fixed exchange rates. However, the overvaluation of the pound and the undervaluation of the franc threatened these arrangements. The British trade deficit led to a capital outflow, higher interest rates, and a weak economy. In the late twenties, the French trade surplus led to the importation of gold that they did not allow to expand the money supply.

Economizing on gold by no longer allowing its domestic circulation and by using key currencies as international monetary reserves was really an attempt to place the domestic economies under the control of the nations' politicians and make them independent of international events. Unfortunately, in doing this politicians eliminated the equilibrating mechanism of the gold standard but had nothing with which to replace it. The new international monetary arrangements of the twenties were potentially destabilizing because they were not allowed to operate as a price mechanism promoting equilibrating adjustments.

There were other problems with international economic activity in the twenties. Because of the war, the United States was abruptly transformed from a debtor to a creditor on international accounts. Though the United States did not want reparations payments from Germany, it did insist that Allied governments repay American loans. The Allied governments then insisted on war reparations from Germany. These initial reparations assessments were quite large. The Allied Reparations Commission collected the charges by supervising Germany's foreign trade and by internal controls on the German economy, and it was authorized to increase the reparations if it was felt that Germany could pay more. The treaty allowed France to occupy the Ruhr after Germany defaulted in 1923.

Ultimately, this tangled web of debts and reparations, which was a major factor in the course of international trade, depended upon two principal actions. First, the United States had to run an import surplus or, on net, export capital out of the United States to provide a pool of dollars overseas. Germany then had either to have an export surplus or else import American capital so as to build up dollar reserves-that is, the dollars the United States was exporting. In effect, these dollars were paid by Germany to Great Britain, France, and other countries that then shipped them back to the United States as payment on their U.S. debts. If these conditions did not occur, (and note that the "new" gold standard of the twenties had lost its flexibility because the price adjustment mechanism had been eliminated) disruption in international activity could easily occur and be transmitted to the domestic economies.

In the wake of the 1920-21 depression Congress passed the Emergency Tariff Act, which raised tariffs, particularly on manufactured goods. (Figures 26 and 27) The Fordney-McCumber Tariff of 1922 continued the Emergency Tariff of 1921, and its protection on many items was extremely high, ranging from 60 to 100 percent ad valorem (or as a percent of the price of the item). The increases in the Fordney-McCumber tariff were as large and sometimes larger than the more famous (or "infamous") Smoot-Hawley tariff of 1930. As farm product prices fell at the end of the decade presidential candidate Herbert Hoover proposed, as part of his platform, tariff increases and other changes to aid the farmers. In January 1929, after Hoover's election, but before he took office, a tariff bill was introduced into Congress. Special interests succeeded in gaining additional (or new) protection for most domestically produced commodities and the goal of greater protection for the farmers tended to get lost in the increased protection for multitudes of American manufactured products. In spite of widespread condemnation by economists, President Hoover signed the Smoot-Hawley Tariff in June 1930 and rates rose sharply.

Following the First World War, the U.S. government actively promoted American exports, and in each of the postwar years through 1929, the United States recorded a surplus in its balance of trade. (Figure 28) However, the surplus declined in the 1930s as both exports and imports fell sharply after 1929. From the mid-1920s on finished manufactures were the most important exports, while agricultural products dominated American imports.

The majority of the funds that allowed Germany to make its reparations payments to France and Great Britain and hence allowed those countries to pay their debts to the United States came from the net flow of capital out of the United States in the form of direct investment in real assets and investments in long- and short-term foreign financial assets. After the devastating German hyperinflation of 1922 and 1923, the Dawes Plan reformed the German economy and currency and accelerated the U.S. capital outflow. American investors began to actively and aggressively pursue foreign investments, particularly loans (Lewis, 1938) and in the late twenties there was a marked deterioration in the quality of foreign bonds sold in the United States. (Mintz, 1951)

The system, then, worked well as long as there was a net outflow of American capital, but this did not continue. In the middle of 1928, the flow of short-term capital began to decline. In 1928 the flow of "other long-term" capital out of the United States was 752 million dollars, but in 1929 it was only 34 million dollars. Though arguments now exist as to whether the booming stock market in the United States was to blame for this, it had far-reaching effects on the international economic system and the various domestic economies.

The Start of the Depression

The United States had the majority of the world's monetary gold, about 40 percent, by 1920. In the latter part of the twenties, France also began accumulating gold as its share of the world's monetary gold rose from 9 percent in 1927 to 17 percent in 1929 and 22 percent by 1931. In 1927 the Federal Reserve System had reduced discount rates (the interest rate at which they lent reserves to member commercial banks) and engaged in open market purchases (purchasing U.S. government securities on the open market to increase the reserves of the banking system) to push down interest rates and assist Great Britain in staying on the gold standard. By early 1928 the Federal Reserve System was worried about its loss of gold due to this policy as well as the ongoing boom in the stock market. It began to raise the discount rate to stop these outflows. Gold was also entering the United States so that foreigners could obtain dollars to invest in stocks and bonds. As the United States and France accumulated more and more of the world's monetary gold, other countries' central banks took contractionary steps to stem the loss of gold. In country after country these deflationary strategies began contracting economic activity and by 1928 some countries in Europe, Asia, and South America had entered into a depression. More countries' economies began to decline in 1929, including the United States, and by 1930 a depression was in force for almost all of the world's market economies. (Temin, 1989; Eichengreen, 1992)
Monetary and Fiscal Policies in the 1920s Fiscal Policies
As a tool to promote stability in aggregate economic activity, fiscal policy is largely a post-Second World War phenomenon. Prior to 1930 the federal government's spending and taxing decisions were largely, but not completely, based on the perceived "need" for government-provided public goods and services.

Though the fiscal policy concept had not been developed, this does not mean that during the twenties no concept of the government's role in stimulating economic activity existed. Herbert Stein (1990) points out that in the twenties Herbert Hoover and some of his contemporaries shared two ideas about the proper role of the federal government. The first was that federal spending on public works could be an important force in reducin investment. Both concepts fit the ideas held by Hoover and others of his persuasion that the U.S. economy of the twenties was not the result of laissez-faire workings but of "deliberate social engineering."

The federal personal income tax was enacted in 1913. Though mildly progressive, its rates were low and topped out at 7 percent on taxable income in excess of $750,000. (Table 4) As the United States prepared for war in 1916, rates were increased and reached a maximum marginal rate of 12 percent. With the onset of the First World War, the rates were dramatically increased. To obtain additional revenue in 1918, marginal rates were again increased. The share of federal revenue generated by income taxes rose from 11 percent in 1914 to 69 percent in 1920. The tax rates had been extended downward so that more than 30 percent of the nation's income recipients were subject to income taxes by 1918. However, through the purchase of tax exempt state and local securities and through steps taken by corporations to avoid the cash distribution of profits, the number of high income taxpayers and their share of total taxes paid declined as Congress kept increasing the tax rates. The normal (or base) tax rate was reduced slightly for 1919 but the surtax rates, which made the income tax highly progressive, were retained. (Smiley-Keehn, 1995)

President Harding's new Secretary of the Treasury, Andrew Mellon, proposed cutting the tax rates, arguing that the rates in the higher brackets had "passed the point of productivity" and rates in excess of 70 percent simply could not be collected. Though most agreed that the rates were too high, there was sharp disagreement on how the rates should be cut. Democrats and Progressive Republicans argued for rate cuts targeted for the lower income taxpayers while maintaining most of the steep progressivity of the tax rates. They believed that remedies could be found to change the tax laws to stop the legal avoidance of federal income taxes. Republicans argued for sharper cuts that reduced the progressivity of the rates. Mellon proposed a maximum rate of 25 percent.

Though the federal income tax rates were reduced and made less progressive, it took three tax rate cuts in 1921, 1924, and 1925 before Mellon's goal was finally achieved. The highest marginal tax rate was reduced from 73 percent to 58 percent to 46 percent and finally to 25 percent for the 1925 tax year. All of the other rates were also reduced and exemptions increased. By 1926, only about the top 10 percent of income recipients were subject to federal income taxes. As tax rates were reduced, the number of high income tax returns increased and the share of total federal personal income taxes paid rose. (Tables 5 and 6) Even with the dramatic income tax rate cuts and reductions in the number of low income taxpayers, federal personal income tax revenue continued to rise during the 1920s. Though early estimates of the distribution of personal income showed sharp increases in income inequality during the 1920s (Kuznets, 1953; Holt, 1977), more recent estimates have found that the increases in inequality were considerably less and these appear largely to be related to the sharp rise in capital gains due to the booming stock market in the late twenties. (Smiley, 1998 and 2000)

Each year in the twenties the federal government generated a surplus, in some years as much as 1 percent of GNP. The surpluses were used to reduce the federal deficit and it declined by 25 percent between 1920 and 1930. Contrary to simple macroeconomic models that argue a federal government budget surplus must be contractionary and tend to stop an economy from reaching full employment, the American economy operated at full-employment or close to it throughout the twenties and saw significant economic growth. In this case, the surpluses were not contractionary because the dollars were circulated back into the economy through the purchase of outstanding federal debt rather than pulled out as currency and held in a vault somewhere.
Monetary Policies
In 1913 fear of the "money trust" and their monopoly power led Congress to create 12 central banks when they created the Federal Reserve System. The new central banks were to control money and credit and act as lenders of last resort to end banking panics. The role of the Federal Reserve Board, located in Washington, D.C., was to coordinate the policies of the 12 district banks; it was composed of five presidential appointees and the current secretary of the treasury and comptroller of the currency. All national banks had to become members of the Federal Reserve System, the Fed, and any state bank meeting the qualifications could elect to do so.

The act specified fixed reserve requirements on demand and time deposits, all of which had to be on deposit in the district bank. Commercial banks were allowed to rediscount commercial paper and given Federal Reserve currency. Initially, each district bank set its own rediscount rate. To provide additional income when there was little rediscounting, the district banks were allowed to engage in open market operations that involved the purchasing and selling of federal government securities, short-term securities of state and local governments issued in anticipation of taxes, foreign exchange, and domestic bills of exchange. The district banks were also designated to act as fiscal agents for the federal government. Finally, the Federal Reserve System provided a central check clearinghouse for the entire banking system.

When the Federal Reserve System was originally set up, it was believed that its primary role was to be a lender of last resort to prevent banking panics and become a check-clearing mechanism for the nation's banks. Both the Federal Reserve Board and the Governors of the District Banks were bodies established to jointly exercise these activities. The division of functions was not clear, and a struggle for power ensued, mainly between the New York Federal Reserve Bank, which was led by J. P. Morgan's protege, Benjamin Strong, through 1928, and the Federal Reserve Board. By the thirties the Federal Reserve Board had achieved dominance.

There were really two conflicting criteria upon which monetary actions were ostensibly based: the Gold Standard and the Real Bills Doctrine. The Gold Standard was supposed to be quasi-automatic, with an effective limit to the quantity of money. However, the Real Bills Doctrine (which required that all loans be made on short-term, self-liquidating commercial paper) had no effective limit on the quantity of money. The rediscounting of eligible commercial paper was supposed to lead to the required "elasticity" of the stock of money to "accommodate" the needs of industry and business. Actually the rediscounting of commercial paper, open market purchases, and gold inflows all had the same effects on the money stock.

The 1920-21 Depression

During the First World War, the Fed kept discount rates low and granted discounts on banks' customer loans used to purchase V-bonds in order to help finance the war. The final Victory Loan had not been floated when the Armistice was signed in November of 1918: in fact, it took until October of 1919 for the government to fully sell this last loan issue. The Treasury, with the secretary of the treasury sitting on the Federal Reserve Board, persuaded the Federal Reserve System to maintain low interest rates and discount the Victory bonds necessary to keep bond prices high until this last issue had been floated. As a result, during this period the money supply grew rapidly and prices rose sharply.

A shift from a federal deficit to a surplus and supply disruptions due to steel and coal strikes in 1919 and a railroad strike in early 1920 contributed to the end of the boom. But the most-common view is that the Fed's monetary policy was the main determinant of the end of the expansion and inflation and the beginning of the subsequent contraction and severe deflation. When the Fed was released from its informal agreement with the Treasury in November of 1919, it raised the discount rate from 4 to 4.75 percent. Benjamin Strong (the governor of the New York bank) was beginning to believe that the time for strong action was past and that the Federal Reserve System's actions should be moderate. However, with Strong out of the country, the Federal Reserve Board increased the discount rate from 4.75 to 6 percent in late January of 1920 and to 7 percent on June 1, 1920. By the middle of 1920, economic activity and employment were rapidly falling, and prices had begun their downward spiral in one of the sharpest price declines in American history. The Federal Reserve System kept the discount rate at 7 percent until May 5, 1921, when it was lowered to 6.5 percent. By June of 1922, the rate had been lowered yet again to 4 percent. (Friedman and Schwartz, 1963)

The Federal Reserve System authorities received considerable criticism then and later for their actions. Milton Friedman and Anna Schwartz (1963) contend that the discount rate was raised too much too late and then kept too high for too long, causing the decline to be more severe and the price deflation to be greater. In their opinion the Fed acted in this manner due to the necessity of meeting the legal reserve requirement with a safe margin of gold reserves. Elmus Wicker (1966), however, argues that the gold reserve ratio was not the main factor determining the Federal Reserve policy in the episode. Rather, the Fed knowingly pursued a deflationary policy because it felt that the money supply was simply too large and prices too high. To return to the prewar parity for gold required lowering the price level, and there was an excessive stock of money because the additional money had been used to finance the war, not to produce consumer goods. Finally, the outstanding indebtedness was too large due to the creation of Fed credit.

Whether statutory gold reserve requirements to maintain the gold standard or domestic credit conditions were the most important determinant of Fed policy is still an open question, though both certainly had some influence. Regardless of the answer to that question, the Federal Reserve System's first major undertaking in the years immediately following the First World War demonstrated poor policy formulation.

Federal Reserve Policies from 1922 to 1930

By 1921 the district banks began to recognize that their open market purchases had effects on interest rates, the money stock, and economic activity. For the next several years, economists in the Federal Reserve System discussed how this worked and how it could be related to discounting by member banks. A committee was created to coordinate the open market purchases of the district banks.

The recovery from the 1920-1921 depression had proceeded smoothly with moderate price increases. In early 1923 the Fed sold some securities and increased the discount rate from 4 percent as they believed the recovery was too rapid. However, by the fall of 1923 there were some signs of a business slump. McMillin and Parker (1994) argue that this contraction, as well as the 1927 contraction, were related to oil price shocks. By October of 1923 Benjamin Strong was advocating securities purchases to counter this. Between then and September 1924 the Federal Reserve System increased its securities holdings by over $500 million. Between April and August of 1924 the Fed reduced the discount rate to 3 percent in a series of three separate steps. In addition to moderating the mild business slump, the expansionary policy was also intended to reduce American interest rates relative to British interest rates. This reversed the gold flow back toward Great Britain allowing Britain to return to the gold standard in 1925. At the time it appeared that the Fed's monetary policy had successfully accomplished its goals.

By the summer of 1924 the business slump was over and the economy again began to grow rapidly. By the mid-1920s real estate speculation had arisen in many urban areas in the United States and especially in Southeastern Florida. Land prices were rising sharply. Stock market prices had also begun rising more rapidly. The Fed expressed some worry about these developments and in 1926 sold some securities to gently slow the real estate and stock market boom. Amid hurricanes and supply bottlenecks the Florida real estate boom collapsed but the stock market boom continued.

The American economy entered into another mild business recession in the fall of 1926 that lasted until the fall of 1927. One of the factors in this was Henry's Ford's shut down of all of his factories to changeover from the Model T to the Model A. His employees were left without a job and without income for over six months. International concerns also reappeared. France, which was preparing to return to the gold standard, had begun accumulating gold and gold continued to flow into the United States. Some of this gold came from Great Britain making it difficult for the British to remain on the gold standard. This occasioned a new experiment in central bank cooperation. In July 1927 Benjamin Strong arranged a conference with Governor Montagu Norman of the Bank of England, Governor Hjalmar Schacht of the Reichsbank, and Deputy Governor Charles Ritt of the Bank of France in an attempt to promote cooperation among the world's central bankers. By the time the conference began the Fed had already taken steps to counteract the business slump and reduce the gold inflow. In early 1927 the Fed reduced discount rates and made large securities purchases. One result of this was that the gold stock fell from $4.3 billion in mid-1927 to $3.8 billion in mid-1928. Some of the gold exports went to France and France returned to the gold standard with its undervalued currency. The loss of gold from Britain eased allowing it to maintain the gold standard.

By early 1928 the Fed was again becoming worried. Stock market prices were rising even faster and the apparent speculative bubble in the stock market was of some concern to Fed authorities. The Fed was also concerned about the loss of gold and wanted to bring that to an end. To do this they sold securities and, in three steps, raised the discount rate to 5 percent by July 1928. To this point the Federal Reserve Board had largely agreed with district Bank policy changes. However, problems began to develop.

During the stock market boom of the late 1920s the Federal Reserve Board preferred to use "moral suasion" rather than increases in discount rates to lessen member bank borrowing. The New York City bank insisted that moral suasion would not work unless backed up by literal credit rationing on a bank by bank basis which they, and the other district banks, were unwilling to do. They insisted that discount rates had to be increased. The Federal Reserve Board countered that this general policy change would slow down economic activity in general rather than be specifically targeted to stock market speculation. The result was that little was done for a year. Rates were not raised but no open market purchases were undertaken. Rates were finally raised to 6 percent in August of 1929. By that time the contraction had already begun. In late October the stock market crashed, and America slid into the Great Depression.

In November, following the stock market crash the Fed reduced discount rates to 4.5 percent. In January they again decreased discount rates and began a series of discount rate decreases until the rate reached 2.5 percent at the end of 1930. No further open market operations were undertaken for the next six months. As banks reduced their discounting in 1930, the stock of money declined. There was a banking crisis in the southeast in November and December of 1930, and in its wake the public's holding of currency relative to deposits and banks' reserve ratios began to rise and continued to do so through the end of the Great Depression.

Conclusion

Though some disagree, there is growing evidence that the behavior of the American economy in the 1920s did not cause the Great Depression. The depressed 1930s were not "retribution" for the exuberant growth of the 1920s. The weakness of a few economic sectors in the 1920s did not forecast the contraction from 1929 to 1933. Rather it was the depression of the 1930s and the Second World War that interrupted the economic growth begun in the 1920s and resumed after the Second World War. Just as the construction of skyscrapers that began in the 1920s resumed in the 1950s, so did real economic growth and progress resume. In retrospect we can see that the introduction and expansion of new technologies and industries in the 1920s, such as autos, household electric appliances, radio, and electric utilities, are echoed in the 1990s in the effects of the expanding use and development of the personal computer and the rise of the internet. The 1920s have much to teach us about the growth and development of the American economy.

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The interwar period in the United States, and in the rest of the world, is a most interesting era. The decade of the 1930s marks the most severe depression in our history and ushered in sweeping changes in the role of government. Economists and historians have rightly given much attention to that decade.

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Leisure and Entertainment at the Turn of the Twentieth Century

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Leisure and Entertainment at the Turn of the Twentieth Century

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Antonia Mille

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Activity 1. Leisure and Entertainment

Ask students to define the term "leisure." You might direct them to consult a print or online dictionary for a definition. Dictionary.com, available through the EDSITEment-reviewed resource The Internet Public Library, defines leisure as "freedom from time-consuming duties, responsibilities, or activities." Next, ask them to define the term "entertainment," which Dictionary.com defines as "something that amuses, pleases, or diverts, especially a performance or show." Ask students-what is the relationship between leisure and entertainment; how are they inter-related?

Explain that by the turn of the century reduced work hours gave many Americans leisure time, and higher wages gave them the means with which to explore new forms of entertainment. To provide historical context, explain that by 1900 there were more than 29 million people in the American workforce. This included men, women, and children. Americans worked an average of 59 hours per week and usually received Saturday afternoons and Sundays off. Many companies provided unpaid leave to their employees.

Ask students to describe what they like to do in their leisure time. Encourage them to discuss their favorite forms of entertainment. Use the following questions as a guide:

How do you spend your free time?

Where do you like to go?

What do you like to do?

Do you stay at home, or do you go out?

Do you try out local activities, or do you travel to other places?

When do you travel?

How often do you travel?

Write their answers on the left side of the blackboard in front of the class.

After viewing the footage of a baseball game recorded by Thomas Edison in 1898, ask students to think about how Americans might have spent their leisure time a century ago. To help students brainstorm, show some of the following photographs, or have them explore them in groups using the EDSITEment-reviewed National Archives Document Analysis Worksheets:

Connie Mack, Catcher, 1887

Carriages on Boulevard in Park, c. 1890-1910

Football Team, c. 1895-1910

Bathers, Atlantic City, c. 1900-1915

Loop the Loop, Coney Island, c. 1903-1910

A Morning's Catch in the Adirondacks, c. 1903

May Pole Dance, Central Park, New York, c. 1905

These and many other photographs useful for this exercise are available via the following EDSITEment-reviewed resources:

Use these photographs as a springboard for discussion about leisure and entertainment at the turn of the century. Have students identify the activity depicted in each photograph. Ask the following questions:

Who is in the photograph?

What can you tell about the person or people in the photograph?

What is going on in the photograph?

Where might the photograph have been taken?

Hand out copies of the Inventions timeline, which lists leisure-related inventions. If you prefer, you may refer students directly to the Technology Timeline, available through the EDSITEment-reviewed resource The Internet Public Library, and the Interactive Timeline at the EDSITEment-reviewed resource Learner.org. Discuss some of the leisure-related inventions listed in the timeline, such as the phonograph (1877), the Kodak camera (1888), the motion picture camera (1891), and radio (1906). Explain that these inventions came before the age of television (1927) and well before the age of the Internet. These new technologies connected Americans as never before. For the first time, Americans could listen to music in their own homes, take their own photographs, watch a motion picture at a local theater, and listen to radio broadcasts.

Encourage students to brainstorm other leisure-related inventions that may have been introduced at the turn of the century. Write their answers on the right side of the blackboard in front of the class. Now compare the two sets of answers. Ask students if they see any similarities or differences between the activities they enjoy today and activities Americans enjoyed a century ago. Make some comparisons-e.g., Americans watched motion picture shows then; today, we have television and the Internet. Ask students which turn-of-the-century entertainments are still popular today, and which ones they enjoy.

Activity 2. Getting There

Refer again to the Inventions timeline introduced above. Discuss some of the transportation inventions listed in the timeline, such as the steamboat (1807), the transcontinental railroad (1869), the electric trolley (1885), the automobile (1892), and the airplane (1903). Use the timeline as a springboard to discuss turn-of-the-century technologies that influenced the growth of the leisure industry.

To provide historical context, explain that transportation improvements opened inland and coastal areas and led to the establishment of national parks and resorts. By the turn of the century, a growing network of railroad, trolley, and steamship lines and inexpensive fares made it possible for Americans to travel to new destinations. Transportation companies often financed the construction of amusement parks and other attractions to encourage people to use their transportation services to reach resort areas.

Have students explore the interactive map, On the Old Fall River Line, to see how steamship lines carried passengers to and from a turn-of-the-century seaside resort. As part of this exercise, students will explore The Fall River Line and Other Steamers website, available at the EDSITEment-reviewed American Studies at UVA.

Activity 3. The Economics of Leisure

Have students estimate how much money they spend on leisure activities each month. Ask:

Are your favorite activities free?

If not, how much do they cost?

How might the amount of money you have influence how you spend your free time?

In this activity, students will learn about the various people-their social and economic status, activities, jobs, and so forth-that vacationed in Newport. Students will then work together to study the various entertainment venues that were popular at the turn of the century and the economics of leisure. Teachers might have students role-play their characters and follow up with a discussion of how the various individuals might-or might not-encounter one another. Part of this activity's research requirements might be suitable for homework.

Define the term "class" for your students. Dictionary.com, available through the EDSITEment-reviewed resource The Internet Public Library, defines class as "a social stratum whose members share certain economic, social, or cultural characteristics." Explain that indicators of class include income level, level of education, and choice of employment. A century ago, members of upper-class society included intellectuals and wealthy businessmen. Middle-class workers included salaried employees such as business managers, physicians, lawyers, and teachers. Working-class families included skilled or semi-skilled laborers.

Now hand out copies of the Class in Newport student worksheet. Ask students to read the background information about different classes in Newport on Class and Leisure at America's First Resort, a link on the EDSITEment-reviewed resource, American Studies at the University of Virginia. Ask them to read about how Americans of different classes spent their leisure time in Newport.

Ask each student to select a name from the list on the People in Newport worksheet (or, teachers might cut up the list and hand out names or have students pick them from a hat). Ask each student to read a brief biography of this person. Ask students to answer the following questions (which are on their worksheet) using the information they have researched online:

What was the class of the person you researched?

Was this person a summer visitor, a summer worker, or a year-round resident?

Why did this person come to Newport?

What did members of his or her class do in Newport? Where did they go? Where did they stay? What leisure activities did they enjoy?

Would the person you researched have socialized with members of other classes? Why or why not?

How might this person have interacted with members of other classes?

Now ask students to consider how Americans at different levels of society spent their leisure time a century ago. Explain that the economic levels of many Americans determined how they spent their leisure time. Upper-class Americans took vacations to resorts throughout the country and often stayed in their own vacation homes. Middle-class Americans took short trips away from home, renting small cottages or staying in hotels and boarding houses. Working-class Americans took Saturday afternoon or Sunday trips to local parks and beaches.

Place students-or have them self-select-into groups. Have each group select a topic from the following list:

National parks

Seaside resorts

Spectator sports

Variety shows

World's fairs

Have students conduct Internet research and create a brief report on their topic's history and significance, its associated costs, and who might have enjoyed going there.

It may be helpful if students first review the essays and timelines on the following EDSITEment-reviewed websites:

Point students to The Economics of Leisure Study Activity, which provides a list of web resources they can use to research their topic. The Study Activity includes a list of questions students should ask as they conduct their research, such as:

Where did this leisure activity take place?

What is its significance?

What is the history of this activity? Be brief.

What types of visitors engaged in this leisure activity?

What types of transportation enabled visitors to get to and from this location?

What forms of entertainment did people enjoy there?

What new technologies, if any, were used?

What did it cost to travel there and enjoy the entertainment?

What other observations can you make about your topic?

Hand out copies of The Economics of Leisure student worksheet for note taking. Remind students that Americans at all economic levels may have participated in any given activity. When the groups have completed their research, ask each to present its conclusions and supporting evidence to the class.

Note: If a group has discovered an interesting game from the turn of the century, encourage them to share it with the class in their presentation. You may ask students to learn to play the game in class.

Activity 4. Advertising Fun for Everyone

Ask students to consider how companies might have advertised leisure and entertainment in a time when there was no television or the Internet. What methods might companies have used to reach their intended audiences?

Explain to students that the mass media encouraged the growth of a leisure industry by promoting leisure and entertainment options to all Americans. Turn-of-the-century ads appealed to consumers' desires by convincing them that the products in the ads would satisfy their emotional and physical needs.

Travel ads used words, images, and selected details to interest Americans of all classes in exploring new destinations. Society columns in major newspapers described the comings and goings of American industrialists and their families at resorts around the country. Photographs and illustrations of their vacation homes appeared in popular magazines. This type of media coverage encouraged upper-class Americans to frequent the same locations as their peers. Guidebooks, travel guides, and newspaper ads introduced middle-class Americans to travel. Newspaper ads and word of mouth interested working-class Americans in leisure activities.

Have students examine an actual turn-of-the-century travel ad. Project on a screen or hand out copies of the Easton's Beach ad, which is also available on Class and Leisure at America's First Resort, a link on the EDSITEment-reviewed resource, American Studies at the University of Virginia. Also, hand out copies of the Easton's Beach: The Coolest Place to Spend the Day student worksheet.

Ask students to study the ad and answer the following questions on the worksheet:

What forms of entertainment are listed in the ad? Who enjoyed these forms of entertainment at the turn of the century?

What do the photographs tell you about Easton's Beach visitors? What are they doing? What are they wearing?

How long are visitors expected to stay at Easton's Beach? How do you know this?

Who do you think this ad hopes to attract to Easton's Beach? Give some examples to support your answer.

Ask students to read the brief history of Easton's Beach available at the EDSITEment-reviewed Class and Leisure at America's First Resort. What other forms of entertainment were at the beach? Were these forms of entertainment listed in the ad? Why or why not?

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Having Fun: Leisure and Entertainment at the Turn of the Twentieth Century

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How did Americans "have fun" a century ago? In this lesson, students will learn how Americans spent their leisure time and explore new forms of entertainment that appeared at the turn of the century. In addition, they will learn how transportation and communication improvements made it possible for Americans to travel to new destinations.

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ZIO >:D

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Technology has greatly improved over the last century, and the form of many products has changed massively from what they used to be. Household items, vehicles, as well as everyday objects, are not even close to what they used to be like in the 1900s. Check out 35 everyday items from the early 20th century and see just how different they look today!

Kids always love to have a good time romping around outdoors, which is why playgrounds have been popular for a very long time. In these two pictures, we can see the difference between a playground in the 1900s and a modern playground. The toys at the old playground are made almost entirely of metal, as well as being dangerously high.

The modern ones are however safer, made with metal, plastic, and other materials that are relatively safer. They also come in bright colors that are perfect for attracting kids.

Drills in ancient Rome? No, this is not another Ancient Aliens episode. Manual drills were, in fact, used in ancient Rome, as archaeologists can attest. Their shape was very different from the drills of today, and their use, no doubt by slaves, involved a lot of physical effort.

Modern-day drills are a huge work-saving tool and are being created by their manufacturers in ergonomic shapes and with many added functionalities - torches, percussion, etc.

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35 Everyday Items From the Early 1900s vs How They Look Today

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Technology has greatly improved over the last century, and the form of many products has changed massively from what they used to be. Household items, vehicles, as well as everyday objects, are not even close to what they used to be like in the 1900s.

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Errin

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As the 1920s came roaring in, the United States was experiencing a time of economic prosperity. With that prosperity came a desire for convenience and more leisure time. For this reason, many inventions in the 1920s are related to entertainment and making domestic life easier. These inventions not only drastically shaped the 1920s but shaped the world as we know it today.

Check out these seven 1920s inventions that are still used today.

1. The Electric Automatic Traffic Signal

Garret Morgan is credited with inventing the first electric automatic traffic signal in 1923. Although other types of traffic signals were in use since 1868, Morgan's design used a T-shaped pole and had three positions. The patented design was sold to General Electric for $40,000.

According to the United States Access Board, the United States had roughly 300,000 traffic lights in 2018. Just imagine how many are in use across the whole world!

2. Quick-Frozen Food

Can you imagine not having a pack of frozen peas in the freezer just when you need it? Or how about a frozen pizza for when a craving hits? Well, frozen veggies and food as we know them today haven't always been a staple in every home! Clarence Birdseye invented and offered Americans the first quick-frozen foods in the 1920s after noticing how good a fish kept if it was frozen quickly rather than slowly.

3. The Band-Aid®

Earle Dickson, a Johnson and Johnson employee, created the first adhesive bandage for small wounds in 1920. Dickson invented the special bandage for his wife, Josephine, who seemed to cut and burn herself regularly while cooking. Now, she could easily dress a wound herself.

Johnson and Johnson mass produced machine-made Band-Aids® in 1924. Over time, these bandages have evolved to be made in a variety of shapes and sizes and in various materials. Some have added medication, and they can be a favorite decorative "sticker" to many children around the world!

Over 100 billion Band-Aids® have been made.

4. Water Skis

In 1922, Ralph Samuelson created a new sport-water skiing! It quickly became a favorite summer pastime. Samuelson first used a pair of boards as skis and a clothesline as a towrope. He tried his idea on Lake Pepin in Lake City, Minnesota, where his brother pulled him in a boat that reached 20 mph. It took him a bit of time to perfect the best position for skimming the water, but once he did, he never looked back!

Samuelson spent the next 15 years performing water skiing shows and teaching other people the skill.

5. Electric Blender

Are you a fan of milk shakes? The first electric blender made its appearance in 1922.

Stephen J. Poplawski is credited for the electric blender that was first used for making milk shakes and malts. In 1932, Poplawski received patents for a blender that worked well for fruits and vegetables.

The electric blender made cool creamy treats and pureed fruits and veggies easily. It quickly became a popular kitchen appliance in most homes.

6. Television

Oh, what would we do without the greatest pastime in this day and age-and yes, I'm talking about binge-watching the television. Inventors Philo Taylor Farnsworth, John Logie Baird, and Charles Francis Jenkins are credited with the idea and creation of televisions as we know them today.

Before electronic television, there was mechanical television. The world's first electronic television is credited to Philo Taylor Farnsworth in 1927. Though other mechanical television inventors such as John Logie Baird and Charles Francis Jenkins had successes in television technology, Farnsworth's invention is considered the direct ancestor of our modern electronic television.

Some estimates say there are as many as 120.6 million TVs in homes across America today!

7. Vacuum Cleaner

Though the first vacuum cleaner can be traced back to about 1860, it was in the mid-1920s that the vacuum became much more efficient and easier to use. In fact, in 1920 Air-Way Sanitizer of Toledo, Ohio, introduced a vacuum cleaner with a disposable bag. In 1926, the popular vacuum company Hoover developed a positive agitation system that greatly increased dirt removal efficiency. Cleaning household carpets became a lot easier and much faster.

Today, vacuum cleaners come in all sorts of varieties such as cordless, upright, central, wet and dry, and even robotic! What do you think was your grandmother's favorite 1920s invention? You can learn more about your ancestors in the 1920s by finding them in the 1930 United States census records. Find them now!

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Seven Inventions from the 1920s That We Still Use Today * FamilySearch

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As the 1920s came roaring in, the United States was experiencing a time of economic prosperity. With that prosperity came a desire for convenience and more leisure time. For this reason, many inventions in the 1920s are related to entertainment and making domestic life easier.

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S.L.

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NEws PAper from Orange New jersey reports on the world war -BH

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NEws PAper from Orange New jersey reports on the world war -BH

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The Central New Jersey Home News 11 Nov 1918, page 1

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View the digital scanned newspaper from The Central New Jersey Home News dated 11 Nov 1918, page 1.

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Updated October 28, 2002
Steve Garber, NASA History Web Curator
For further information, e-mail histinfo@hq.nasa.gov

Designed by Douglas Ortiz and
edited by Lisa Jirousek
NASA Printing and Design

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Updated October 28, 2002 Steve Garber, NASA History Web Curator For further information, e-mail histinfo@hq.nasa.gov Designed by Douglas Ortiz and edited by Lisa Jirousek NASA Printing and Design

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Mackenzie Danzig

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On a Friday night in February 1926, a crowd of some 1,500 packed the Renaissance Casino in New York City's Harlem neighborhood for the 58th masquerade and civil ball of Hamilton Lodge.

Nearly half of those attending the event, reported the New York Age, appeared to be "men of the class generally known as 'fairies,' and many Bohemians from the Greenwich Village section who...in their gorgeous evening gowns, wigs and powdered faces were hard to distinguish from many of the women."

The tradition of masquerade and civil balls, more commonly known as drag balls, had begun back in 1869 within Hamilton Lodge, a black fraternal organization in Harlem. By the mid-1920s, at the height of the Prohibition era, they were attracting as many as 7,000 people of various races and social classes-gay, lesbian, bisexual, transgender and straight alike.

Stonewall (1969) is often considered the beginning of forward progress in the gay rights movement. But more than 50 years earlier, Harlem's famous drag balls were part of a flourishing, highly visible LGBTQ nightlife and culture that would be integrated into mainstream American life in a way that became unthinkable in later decades.

Paul Hartnett/PYMCA/Universal Images Group/Getty Images

The Beginnings of a New Gay World

"In the late 19th century, there was an increasingly visible presence of gender-non-conforming men who were engaged in sexual relationships with other men in major American cities," says Chad Heap, a professor of American Studies at George Washington University and the author of Slumming: Sexual and Racial Encounters in American Nightlife, 1885-1940.

In addition to these groups, whom social reformers in the early 1900s would call "male sex perverts," a number of nightclubs and theaters were featuring stage performances by female impersonators; these spots were mainly located in the Levee District on Chicago's South Side, the Bowery in New York City and other largely working-class neighborhoods in American cities.

By the 1920s, gay men had established a presence in Harlem and the bohemian mecca of Greenwich Village (as well as the seedier environs of Times Square), and the city's first lesbian enclaves had appeared in Harlem and the Village. Each gay enclave, wrote George Chauncey in his book Gay New York: Gender, Urban Culture, and the Making of the Gay Male World, 1890-1940, had a different class and ethnic character, cultural style and public reputation.

Historica Graphica Collection/Heritage Images/Getty Images

Gay Life in the Jazz Age

As the United States entered an era of unprecedented economic growth and prosperity in the years after World War I, cultural mores loosened and a new spirit of sexual freedom reigned. The flapper, with her short hair, figure-skimming dresses and ever-present cigarette and cocktail, would become the most recognizable symbol of the Roaring Twenties, her fame spreading via the new mass media born during that decade. But the '20s also saw the flourishing of LGBTQ nightlife and culture that reached beyond the cities, across the country, and into ordinary American homes.

Though New York City may have been the epicenter of the so-called "Pansy Craze," gay, lesbian and transgender performers graced the stages of nightspots in cities all over the country. Their audiences included many straight men and women eager to experience the culture themselves (and enjoy a good party) as well as ordinary LGBTQ Americans seeking to expand their social networks or find romantic or sexual partners.
READ MORE: 8 Ways 'The Great Gatsby' Captured the Roaring Twenties
"It gave them many more possible places they could go to meet other people like themselves," Heap says of the Pansy Craze and accompanying lesbian or Sapphic craze, of the '20s and early to mid-'30s. "At its height, when many ordinary heterosexual men and women were going to venues that featured queer entertainment, it probably also provided useful cover for queer men and women to go to the same venues."

At the same time, lesbian and gay characters were being featured in a slew of popular "pulp" novels, in songs and on Broadway stages (including the controversial 1926 play The Captive) and in Hollywood-at least prior to 1934, when the motion picture industry began enforcing censorship guidelines, known as the Hays Code. Heap cites Clara Bow's 1932 film Call Her Savage, in which a short scene features a pair of "campy male entertainers" in a Greenwich Village-like nightspot. On the radio, songs including " Masculine Women, Feminine Men" and " Let's All Be Fairies" were popular.

The fame of LGBTQ nightlife and culture during this period was certainly not limited to urban populations. Stories about drag balls or other performances were sometimes picked up by wire services, or even broadcast over local radio. "You can find them in certain newspaper coverage in unexpected places," Heap says.

Weegee/International Center of Photography/Getty Images

"Pansy Craze" Comes to an End

With the end of Prohibition, the onset of the Depression and the coming of World War II, LGBTQ culture and community began to fall out of favor. As Chauncey writes, a backlash began in the 1930s, as "part of a wider Depression-era condemnation of the cultural experimentation of the 20's, which many blamed for the economic collapse."

The sale of liquor was legal again, but newly enforced laws and regulations prohibited restaurants and bars from hiring gay employees or even serving gay patrons. In the mid- to late '30s, Heap points out, a wave of sensationalized sex crimes "provoked hysteria about sex criminals, who were often-in the mind of the public and in the mind of authorities-equated with gay men."

This not only discouraged gay men from participating in public life, but also "made homosexuality seem more dangerous to the average American."

READ MORE: How the Great Depression Helped End Prohibition

By the post-World War II era, a larger cultural shift toward earlier marriage and suburban living, the advent of TV and the anti-homosexuality crusades championed by Joseph McCarthy would help push the flowering of gay culture represented by the Pansy Craze firmly into the nation's rear-view mirror.

Drag balls, and the spirit of freedom and exuberance they represented, never went away entirely-but it would be decades before LGBTQ life would flourish so publicly again.

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How Gay Culture Blossomed During the Roaring Twenties

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On a Friday night in February 1926, a crowd of some 1,500 packed the Renaissance Casino in New York City's Harlem neighborhood for the 58th masquerade and civil ball of Hamilton Lodge.

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Website containing new clippings during the first world war -BH

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Website containing new clippings during the first world war -BH

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This vast online collection of World War I era newspaper clippings is from a single unique source: the 400-volume, 80,000-page set, World War History: Daily Records and Comments as Appeared in American and Foreign Newspapers, 1914-1926. Beginning with the assassination of Austrian Archduke Franz Ferdinand on June 28, 1914 and extending to the November 11, 1918 armistice and years after, the clippings yield significant information about the political, social, cultural, and economic impact of the war as it is taking place and its aftermath. The clippings cover far beyond the valuable contemporary news reports and contain war-related editorials, features, cartoons, photos, maps, and more. Front pages and full-page features of New York City newspapers are frequently presented, while many newspapers from around the country and some foreign ones are represented through clipped individual articles and cartoons.

The 400 volumes of World War History were created after the war through the dedicated direction of Otto Spengler, owner of the Argus Press Clipping Bureau. Spengler was particularly qualified to embark on this task, having spent his entire career working in news clipping services. As a teen, he worked at the Argus and Information Bureau of Berlin and, following his immigration to America in 1892, at a clippings bureau in New York for more than 10 years. By the early 20th century, he had established his own company and understood the importance of his clipping service and how to market it. Ads in 1907 for the company in the magazine, Advocate of Peace, touted press clippings as "an important factor in peace negotiations" ending the Russo-Japanese War. The ads stated that both Russian and Japanese negotiators "were kept posted through newspaper clippings furnished by Argus." The ads then asked "What Interests You" with a cost of $5.00 per hundred clippings and $35.00 per 1,000.

The outbreak of the World War in 1914 presented Spengler with the massive task of documenting the conflict as fully as possible. Throughout the war years and for several years after, Spengler's Argus Bureau acquired and clipped newspapers from around the country, including several foreign language U.S. newspapers, and some from other nations. At a time when German language American newspapers faced newsstand boycotts, declining advertising and subscriptions, and even government raids, inclusion of these newspapers provides a particularly important perspective.

After World War I, Spengler and his staff began organizing the hundreds of thousands of clippings, mounting them chronologically in hardcover volumes of 200 pages each. The pages were oversized so that a full newspaper page or several smaller articles could be accommodated. For this undertaking, the New-York Historical Society secured funding from John D. Rockefeller, Jr. This donation provided for the blank volumes of high quality paper and the cost of preserving and mounting the clippings, utilizing glue that has not deteriorated the clippings to this day. The clippings were donated by Spengler and several other collectors who gave them after they learned about the project. The clippings were so voluminous that for August 1914 to December 1918, a single volume generally covers just three days. Only one copy of the collection was created, and it was the largest known to exist at that time.

The volumes were kept at the New-York Historical Society until the late 1980s when staff decided there was no longer room for them. The collection was then offered to the U.S. Army Military History Institute in Carlisle, Pennsylvania, where it was kept until 2003. At that time, two librarians from the Library of Congress Humanities and Social Sciences Division visited the Army Institute and compiled a list of materials for possible acquisition out of those being weeded from the Institute's library. Near the end of their visit, the Institute's representative led the two librarians to a room where hundreds of oversized volumes were shelved and stacked. It was explained that unless an institution could be found to take the volumes, they might be destroyed. As the librarians discovered the depth and scope of the information the volumes contained, they realized the importance of saving them. After a period of negotiation and a flurry of paperwork, the 400 volumes were trucked to Washington, D.C. and became part of the Library of Congress collections.

Once at the Library, conservators performed considerable work to preserve the volumes. Some original containers carried mold so all containers were removed and treatment for mold removal was completed before every volume was individually boxed in an archival acid-free container and stored offsite in a controlled environment. More recently, prior to digitization, each page was examined and received additional conservation as needed, particularly when articles came loose after more frequent opening of the volumes.

The preface to World War History encourages "the student and scholar" to utilize this resource "in studying the history of the great war as reflected in the minds of the people and expressed day by day in the press." Now that these pages are available online and searchable that study is finally widely feasible.

Notes

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About this Collection | World War History: Newspaper Clippings, 1914-1926 | Digital Collections | Library of Congress

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This vast online collection of World War I era newspaper clippings is from a single unique source: the 400-volume, 80,000-page set, World War History: Daily Records and Comments as Appeared in American and Foreign Newspapers, 1914-1926.

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khaliah. w

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1920s consumption (article) | 1920s America | Khan Academy

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In the 1920s, assembly line production and easy credit made it possible for ordinary Americans to purchase many new consumer goods.

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Mackenzie Danzig

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When Passing debuts on Netflix on Nov. 10, the film-starring Oscar nominee Ruth Negga ( Loving) and Tessa Thompson-will draw new attention to Nella Larsen's 1929 novel on which it is based. The story and its title most obviously raise questions about race in American society, with the tale of two light-skinned Black women, childhood friends Irene and Clare, navigating the phenomenon of passing as white. But Passing also shines a light on the often overlooked role of sexuality in the Harlem Renaissance.

"Clare makes Irene uncomfortable in lots of ways...Might she be attracted to Clare herself?" TIME's film critic Stephanie Zacharek wrote after the movie's premiere at Sundance this year. "The dance these two perform with one another is entrancing and heady and a little mysterious-its steps not easily parsed but always captivating."

Questions about attraction between the protagonists in this novel have made it not only one of the milestone works to come out of the Harlem Renaissance of the 1920s and '30s, but also a milestone work in LGBTQ+ history. Scholars of this period point out that acknowledging the queer culture and nightlife of the Harlem Renaissance is essential in order to paint a full picture of the time-and also to show that there was a thriving LGBTQ+ scene in New York City that long predated the 1969 Stonewall uprising, even though that moment is often credited with ushering in the modern LGBTQ+ movement. For LGBTQ+ History Month and Monday's National Coming Out Day, the above video looks back at the overlooked queer artists and writers of the Harlem Renaissance.
Read more: Co-Founding the ACLU, Fighting for Labor Rights and Other Helen Keller Accomplishments Students Don't Learn in School
Literary scholars consider Nella Larsen, the first Black female Guggenheim fellowship recipient, one of the "queer figures" of the Harlem Renaissance, says Octavio R. González, an Associate Professor of English and Creative Writing at Wellesley College and an expert on the Harlem Renaissance. González describes Passing as a novel that exhibits "same-sex desire between the two female protagonists."
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The rising influence of LGBTQ+ social life in the 1920s came about just as Harlem became the nation's largest Black urban neighborhood. The Great Migration of the early 20th century-the movement of Black people from the Jim Crow South to Northern cities for job opportunities-enabled Harlem to become a center for Black cultural life and fostered "a sense of new possibilities," as González puts it. "Sexuality became a form of freedom...expressing sexuality became a form of emancipation."

In Harlem and beyond, the 1920s saw a period of relaxed social mores as people rebelled against Prohibition-era restrictions. The speakeasy culture paved the way for LGBTQ+ nightlife and drag balls-or what Langston Hughes called "Spectacles in Color," according to James Wilson, author of Bulldaggers, Pansies, and Chocolate Babies: Performance, Race and Sexuality in the Harlem Renaissance and a professor of English at LaGuardia Community College. As he described the queer nightlife scene back then to TIME, "The Harlem balls, or the 'fairy balls,' as they were oftentimes called, attracted people from all over the country to converge on the Renaissance Casino, and they would cross-dress... There were contests. There were awards given for the most lavish gowns and costumes. They became celebrity events. These were in the gossip columns."

The social scene stretched far beyond those parties, to spaces from cabarets to private rent parties, at which a person who needed help covering rent would ask guests to kick in whatever money they could spare to help the cause. Lesbian blues singer Gladys Bentley got her start at rent parties. She appeared at the Apollo Theater and the Cotton Club, but she was also often seen decked out in a white tuxedo singing raunchy songs at gay speakeasies like H arry Hansberry's Clam House, backed up by drag performers. Langston Hughes described Bentley in his 1945 autobiography as "an amazing exhibition of musical energy."

It also stretched into the writing that would give the Harlem Renaissance its fame: Wallace Thurman co-founded a magazine called Fire!! that boasted contributors such as Langston Hughes (whose sexuality has generated a lot of speculation over the years). One of the few openly gay Black writers of the period, Richard Bruce Nugent, published the short story "Smoke, Lilies and Jade," considered a seminal work of gay Harlem for depicting bisexuality and a 19-year-old male artist sexually involved with another man. Many other figures of the Harlem literati have since seen their work adopted as part of a queer canon. Alain Locke edited The New Negro, a 1925 anthology of poetry, fiction and essays credited with ushering in the Harlem Renaissance. Claude McKay wrote Home to Harlem, which has been hailed as "the first commercially successful novel by a Black Writer." And poet Countee Cullen wrote several volumes of poetry and once taught James Baldwin in high school. (The New York Public Library branch named after him in Harlem is the first library in the system to be named after a Black person.)

The Black political leaders of the 1920s and 1930s hoped that the flourishing cultural scene during the Harlem Renaissance could work to counter stereotypes about Black people and "facilitate the Negro's demand for civil rights and for social and economic equality," as Henry Louis Gates, Jr. wrote in TIME in 1994.
Read more: You've Probably Heard of the Red Scare, but the Lesser-Known, Anti-Gay 'Lavender Scare' Is Rarely Taught in Schools
But the Harlem Renaissance ended when the Great Depression dried up the usual channels for patronage. The Roaring Twenties were followed by a conservative political culture characterized by Joseph McCarthy and the Red Scare and the Lavender Scare, during which there was a fear within the Black intelligentsia that talking openly about queerness could jeopardize their civil rights agendas. Writing that depicted Gay Harlem went out of print as well.

The richness of that culture still remained, waiting to be rediscovered-a process that began after the 1960s and '70s gay rights movement was followed by the loss of life during the AIDS crisis of the 1980s and '90s, which raised awareness of the need to preserve gay history. Since LGBTQ+ studies became a discipline at the college level in the 1990s, there have been more scholars looking back to the Harlem Renaissance for roots of drag ball culture and to fill in the gaps of LGBTQ+ history and culture.

"Only now are we looking back to find inspiration in those pages and in those moments in history," says González. "Teaching this history will help us diversify the true rainbow of queerness."

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The Overlooked LGBTQ+ History of the Harlem Renaissance

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Acknowledging the queer culture of the Harlem Renaissance is essential in order to paint a full picture of the period

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Buck v Bell and the American Eugenics Movement

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Buck v Bell and the American Eugenics Movement

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An article describing the Buck v Bell case, the Virginia Sterilization Act, and the eugenics movement surrounding it based on the premise of sterilizing "feeble-minded" individuals - Jace Furman

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Buck v. Bell (1927) | The Embryo Project Encyclopedia

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comparison article of 1920's real estate to current day (article published 2020) - BH

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comparison article of 1920's real estate to current day (article published 2020) - BH

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Real Estate Follow this topic

It's officially the '20s again, and we're throwing it back to the Roaring 1920s all week. Whether you love Jazz Age decor, historic homes, or just learning how people lived 100 years ago, we've got you covered. Cheers, old chap!

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Our house was built in 1920, and it's funny to think that the people who bought it a century ago probably took some of the same steps we did-even if they were buying a brand-new house rather than a battered old fixer-upper. They likely used a real estate agent, were probably just as enamored by the fireplace and convenient location in Quincy, Mass., and maybe even took out a loan to afford such a major purchase.

But the home-buying process wasn't a carbon copy of today's by a long shot.

There was no such thing as a 30-year mortgage, for example, until after the Federal Housing Administration came about in 1934. There were no laws requiring the disclosure of structural issues or other known problems in a house, and buyers generally didn't have anyone representing them.

"Sellers were represented by a broker, but there were no buyer's agents the way there are now," Heller said. "In fact, at the beginning of the 1920s, it would have been possible for your real estate broker, insurance agent, appraiser, mortgage lender, even the person who built your house, to all be the same person."

All of this-the stuff that hasn't changed at all, and the stuff that most definitely has-becomes pretty evident after taking a look at vintage real estate ads.

Real estate ads in the 1920s vs. 2020

One big difference between then and now is that there just aren't a whole lot of real estate ads anymore-at least not in newspapers. With websites like Zillow and Redfin opening up access to the Multiple Listing Service (MLS), most people just head straight to the listings. Half of recent buyers found their home online, according to an NAR report, compared to 1 percent who found it in print.

"In the 1920s, the main venue for property listings was the classified section of the local newspaper-usually just two or three lines of text highlighting the key features, no photos," Heller says. Bigger developments, like new subdivisions and apartment buildings, more closely resembled the remaining print ads we see today in newspapers or magazines, with photos and illustrations, he added.

While the content and character of 1920s real estate listings seem remarkably familiar in some ways, and they're very, very different in others. Ahead, find some of the similarities and differences between ads in the Boston Globe and New York Times archives from the 1920s.

Difference: Electricity and hot water were pretty big selling points

In 1920, only 1 percent of American homes had both electricity and indoor plumbing, though both were on their way to becoming mainstream. It wasn't until 1925 that half of American homes were wired for electricity, and even in 1940, a third of U.S. homes still lacked a flush toilet. Such modern innovations, found mostly in cities at first, were worth pointing out to buyers.

A March 1920 ad in the Boston Globe advertised "an ideal house" at 17 Eustis Street in my neighborhood in Quincy-complete with "bath, toilets, steam heater," and more. Other new features of the day have since either fallen out of fashion or faded into everyday life.

"In the 1920s, there are tons of ads for items such as 'fireproof' asbestos shingles, enameled plumbing fixtures, garbage incinerators-for both apartments and single-family homes-laminated flooring ('withstands steam!'), 'automatic' gas water heaters, heated garages, refrigerators, and ironing boards that fold into the wall, among other features," Heller says. "'Door beds,' or Murphy beds, seem to have been enormously popular, based on ads throughout the decade in the National Real Estate Journal," he adds.

Similarity: Location, fireplaces, porches, and oak floors were all desirable features

In the 1920s many real estate listings bragged about how near a house was from the city or train station. Sound familiar? One 1925 ad boasts of a house "handy to cars, trains, and stores," and a new development in Revere, Mass., (on "high, dry, healthful lots") trumpets its location only "two minutes to street cars, twenty-two minutes to Boston." A brick two-family with a yard in Astoria, Queens, was only "15 minutes to Grand Central, 5c subway fare."

Difference: Some real estate ads were overtly discriminatory

"Discrimination in listings is a huge difference between then and now," Heller says. Sometimes it was blatantly obvious, but often it was more subtle, he says, using vague descriptions of location "'on the north side of town,' or 'west of Maple Avenue," for example, to indicate that the property was located in an area with few minorities or immigrants.

Of course, there is still discrimination in housing today, even after the Fair Housing Act was passed in 1968 to protect renters, buyers, and mortgage-seekers from unfair treatment. More regulations have been put in place since the days of red-lining-real estate agents, for example, are not permitted to use the racially-loaded phrase " good schools " when marketing a property.

Difference: Build-your-own houses were advertised and sold through the Sears catalog

After selecting a style from the "Modern Homes" catalog (where one could browse floor plans, exterior drawings, and custom add-ons like plumbing) and ordering it by mail, your house would arrive via train: An assortment of some 30,000 parts, including about 750 pounds of nails, dozens of windows, thousands of shingles, and a 75-page, leather-bound instruction manual.

Sears offered refreshingly fair financing terms: If you owned a plot of land and you had a job, you could generally qualify for a mortgage, no matter your race, ethnicity, or gender. The do-it-yourself aspect helped thousands of ambitious homebuyers create instant equity and claim their slice of what was increasingly considered the American Dream.

"The view of home ownership was really changing in the popular mindset in the 1920s," Heller said. "1920 was the first year that more people lived in urban areas than rural areas, the middle class was growing, and more people had the means to buy a home."

Sears didn't shut down its kit home business until 1940, but the 1920s were surely its heyday. "People who don't know better say Sears stopped selling kit homes because of the Depression. That didn't help things, but really housing just became increasingly complex" as electricity grew more commonplace, Thornton says. "If you were wired in 1925, you might have a single bulb hanging from a braided cord. If you needed to plug in a brand-new invention like a waffle iron, you'd unscrew the lightbulb and screw in an adapter to plug in your waffle maker," she adds. By the end of the decade, electric service was far more sophisticated, and it was getting harder for amateurs to build a modern, wired home. Or as Thornton puts it, "Housing became very complicated very fast."

Difference: 1920s houses were pretty darn small

The 1920s certainly saw the building of stately mansions and Gatsby-esque estates, but the average new home built that decade ranged from just 742 to 1,223 square feet. The average new home built in the third quarter of 2019, meanwhile, was more than double that size, at 2,464 square feet.

"The one style that was popular almost everywhere in the 1920s was the bungalow," Heller says, which had spread across the country after debuting in the Los Angeles area in the early 1900s. "They were small, quick to build, affordable, and could be easily outfitted with the modern amenities that buyers were looking for, and they could be built relatively close together without creating a sense of overcrowding."

Difference: Forget avocado toast. Cutting back on a few summer dresses could have gotten the Lost Generation a down payment

Looking through ads in 1920s newspapers, I couldn't help but notice that apparel and furniture were surprisingly expensive. One could buy a house outside of Boston for about $6,500 in 1925 with a down payment as low as $500. Meanwhile, a four-piece bedroom set was advertised at $235, and summer dresses were on sale for $45 to $95 apiece. (Woolen knit bathing suits, on the other hand-yes, you read that correctly-were only $4.50 a pop that season.)

Similarity: Realtors were selling the affordable, attainable American Dream

What's most striking to me is how our house's inaugural buyers probably experienced the same sense of hope and excitement we did when buying their home almost a hundred years later. They were probably just trying to gain a foothold in this modern life, a place to make their own at a price they could handle.

"More than anything else, affordability was probably the 'feature' that was stressed the most in 1920s advertising," Heller says. "The view of homeownership was shifting to become something anyone could or should strive for, so home builders and real estate brokers emphasized that in their ads: A convenient, modern home to call your own, with all of these features, and it only costs a few thousand dollars."

Add a "hundred" in there and it's not too far off.

Editor's note: This story has been updated to clearly acknowledge the continuation of housing discrimination through the present day. We regret the oversight.

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100 Years of Home Buying: Comparing 1920s Real Estate Listings to Today's

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It's officially the '20s again, and we're throwing it back to the Roaring 1920s all week. Whether you love Jazz Age decor, historic homes, or just learning how people lived 100 years ago, we've got you covered.

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Maddie

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During the Roaring '20s, more and more Americans were plugging into electricity.

Even before there were power companies to generate electricity -- the first was in 1890 -- inventors began looking for ways to harness the newfangled power source for household chores.

For several years, Thomas Edison and industry leaders were mired in the battle between AC (alternating current) and DC (direct current). After it was standardized, power companies emphasized the advantages of electrical lighting over gas lights but weren't particularly interested in other uses.

But America's obsessions with cleanliness, toasted bread and neatly pressed clothing drove the pioneer inventors to create electrically powered solutions.

Most of the earliest inventions were vacuum sweepers, toasters and laundry irons. The vacuum cleaners looked like bags attached to carpet sweepers, the toasters were open construction without a cover, and irons looked like heavy sadirons embedded with an electrical element.

Great strides were made in both technical and decorative designs in the 1920s. Toasters, for instance, were encased in sculptural deco shells. In many cases, the appliances copied historical designs. Electric percolators were shaped like 18th-century silver coffee servers. Waffle irons resembled those that had been heated on the top of the stove.

Creative inventors vied with one another in making multipurpose appliances, such as:

A combination hot plate, grill and toaster.

"Perc-o-Toaster," which made coffee, toast and waffles.

A clothes iron with a hair-curling iron that plugged into the iron to heat.

Waffle irons with a reversible plate to make toasted sandwiches.

Attachments such as juicers on electric mixers.

The new appliances, which changed the way housekeeping and cooking were done, often took on personalities of their own. Some appliance brand names evolved into verbs or nouns -- Hoovering the rug, putting milk in the Frigidaire, offering a rental apartment with a Hotpoint (stove).

The prospects of selling these inventions all hinged on the availability of electrical power. Late in the 1930s, an estimated 40 percent of Americans still did not have electricity. Inventors often sold their own creations by following the electric power lines into neighborhoods and selling them door to door.

In this electronic era, it is hard to fathom that most of the new electrical appliances were luxury items. In 1928 when a swell new house in Alameda or Laurelhurst cost less than $6,000 and experienced carpenters sought work for $6 a day, the Eureka's No. 11 model vacuum cleaner sold for $56.50. Salesmen peddled them door to door to customers, who paid for them on the installment plan.

Then came the stock market crash in 1929. The market for household appliances plummeted during the Depression. During World War II, most industries concentrated on the war effort. The end of the war, however, ignited an electric revolution of household appliances that even the most creative of the pioneer inventors could not have imagined.
Electric highlights of the 1920s:

1920s: Juicer attachment added to Magic Maid mixer.

1920: KitchenAid makes the first mixer mounted on its own stand.

1920: Hankscraft Co. begins selling an electric egg cooker.

1923: Whip-All is introduced, the first combination base-mounted and/or portable mixer.

1924: Electrolux No. 5 debuts, the first tank- or cylinder-type vacuum cleaner.

1924: Joseph W. Myers perfects the Liberty iron, the first with an adjustable, automatic temperature control, and sells them for $5 at a county fair in Michigan.

1924: Everhot electric cooker (roaster) is developed.

1925: Sun Chief's ornate sandwich toaster is introduced in nickel or chrome.

1926: The Toastmaster debuts, the first automatic timed toaster for home use.

If you're interested in early vacuum cleaners -- not just from the 1920s, but dating back to the 1880s -- visit the

in Southeast Portland.
Next Sunday: 20th-century collectibles, 1930-39: Depression glass
-- HGNW staff
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During the Roaring '20s, more and more Americans were plugging into electricity. Even before there were power companies to generate electricity -- the first was in 1890 -- inventors began looking for ways to harness the newfangled power source for household chores.

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article exploring the history  of 1920's slang -BH

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article exploring the history  of 1920's slang -BH

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as well as the cause of much of the slang and language we may be unfamiliar with. also many phrases we are common with. very interesting read.

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No doubt: the 1920s were the bee's knees. But the ads banking on the latest film adaptation of The Great Gatsby would have you believe the Jazz Age was all about flappers, fashion, and parties. It was more than that.

After World War I, Americans had more money to spend. That combined with "low prices. . . and generous credit made cars affordable luxuries" in the early 1920s; by the end of the decade, "they were practically necessities."

With " a car in every backyard," automobile-related language entered the everyday lexicon. There was , as in "step on the gas" or hurry up, in 1923; in 1924; and in 1927, back-seat driver, "a passenger who constantly advises, corrects, or nags the driver of a motor vehicle," and by extension, "a person who persists in giving unsolicited advice." (This 1929 article lauded Mrs. Charles Lindbergh for keeping her mouth shut as her husband flew and being "no 'back seat' driver.")

Americans were also going to the movies more. By the end of the decade, "three-quarters of the American population visited a movie theater every week," says History.com. Hollywood, a district of Los Angeles, came to refer to the U.S. film industry in general around 1926, three years after the Hollywood sign was erected.

Synonyms for the movies arose, including ( 1926) and the silver screen ( 1924). In 1921, Chaplinesque entered the vernacular, and in 1927, named after movie heartthrob Rudolph Valentino, came to mean a "good-looking romantic man."

Also in 1927, meaning "sex appeal," while originally coined by Rudyard Kipling, was popularized by Elinor Glyn in her novel, It, and the film of the same name. Clara Bow, the star of the movie, became known as the It Girl, which now refers to any fashionable young female celebrity with a certain something.

The post- Victorian age also saw a change in " manners and mores," with raised hemlines ("all of nine inches above the ground"), petting parties (more on that later), and wider acceptance of contraception. Along with that came new words about sex and relationships.

, a date with someone one hasn't seen before, originated as college slang around 1921, says the Online Etymology Dictionary. The earliest attested use referred to the person one was going on the date with.

While we're sure the French kiss existed before the 1920s, the earliest citation in English is from around 1923, with the idea of equating French culture with "sexual sophistication."

, a sex therapist or expert in sex, is attested to 1924. Sugar daddy, a rich older man who lavishes gifts on a younger woman, came about in 1926; a male prostitute, is from 1922; and to pursue multiple women, is from 1927, says the OED. To or cheat on a lover, is from 1924. The earlier non-romantic notion of to deceive or double-cross is from 1922.

Now how about those petting parties? The earliest citation goes to F. Scott Fitzgerald in his debut novel, This Side of Paradise, published in 1920: "That great current American phenomenon, the 'petting party.'" ( in case you were unclear, refers to the "practice of amorously embracing, kissing, and caressing one's partner.") However, not everyone was such a fan of this 1920s version of PDA, such as one Fay King in a 1923 article:

But when this love stuff becomes a dull, deadly determined battle of the eyes, and a kiss is a long drawn out disgusting episode, it's time somebody blew a whistle or rang a bell to remind these love birds that public petting parties are not permitted.

The term sleep around originated around 1928, says the OED, with the earliest recorded mention by Aldous Huxley: "'Sleeping around'-that was how he had heard a young American girl describe the amorous side of the ideal life, as lived in Hollywood."

Who were these young girls? We know them as flappers. The term flapper originated around 1921, but where it came from is uncertain. A possibility is flapper meaning "a young bird when first trying its wings," or the 17th century meaning "young woman of loose character."

While we might think of the flapper as a sexually free "young woman with bobbed hair and short skirts who drank, smoked and said what might be termed 'unladylike' things," the term flapper became "the popular press catch-word for an adult woman worker, aged twenty-one to thirty."

In 1926, a train which conveyed "only female workers to London each morning" was dubbed "the flapper special." From a 1927 article about giving women over 21 in the United Kingdom the right to vote: "The expression 'flapper vote' has been used by those who strongly denounced the plan to extend the vote to women between the ages of twenty and thirty." Lady Astor, "American born pioneer woman member of the House of Commons," responded:

They are not flappers; most of those 5,000,000 women who are going to vote are hard workers. They went into factories during the World War. They are still at work and now they are going to have their rightful vote.

The first election in the United Kingdom to allow women over 21 to vote was often called the Flapper Election.

Despite the passing of the Volstead Act of 1919, at least a few new drink words sneaked into English. slang for champagne, is from 1920. It comes from the earlier bubbly water, which now refers to water that's carbonated. The "a cocktail combining brandy, an orange-flavored liqueur, and lemon juice," came about in 1928, says the OED.

, a cocktail of "rum, lime or lemon juice, and sugar," is first attested to Fitzgerald in This Side of Paradise: "Here's the old jitney waiter. If you ask me, I want a double Daiquiri." Daiquiri is also the name of a beach in Cuba, and was supposedly invented by an American mining engineer who was there during the Spanish-American War.

To discourage illegal drinking, in 1924 a national contest was held "to coin a word to characterize a person who drinks illegally." Two contestants simultaneously entered , a combination of scoff and law. Now scofflaw also refers to "one who habitually violates the law or fails to answer court summonses."

Continued demand for alcohol and lack of legal supply led to supply by criminal means. Although the term had been around since the late 19th century, it gained wide usage during the Prohibition. (For more on speakeasy language, check out this post from the OxfordWords blog.) referring to organized crime, originated in 1927. The , slang for the police, is from 1929, while is from 1925.

In terms of harder stuff, became slang for marijuana in the 1920s, perhaps as a shortening of From a 1924 article:

"Marihuana," or "Marijuana" as some spell it, the everyday "loco weed" that formerly grew wild on the deserts of northern Mexico, now is being cultivated on thousands of acres in that country for sale to addicts of the plant in this country.

Other 1920s terms for marijuana are ( 1928) and muggle ( 1926). The term is from 1923, and now known as a lively party or celebration, originated in 1927, says the OED, as "a fit or spasm, esp. as simulated by a drug addict."

meaning "to join or enter. . .without invitation" originated around 1922. The financial meaning of a "sudden severe downturn" is older, from 1817, but gained resurgence with the Wall Street crash of 1929, which marked the end of a prosperous and seemingly carefree time.
[Photo, "Zez Confrey Car," CC BY 2.0 by Infrogmation]
[Photo: "Clara Bow,"CC BY 2.0 by Classic Film Scans]
[Photo: "Saturday Evening Post,"Public Domain]
[Photo: "El Daiquiri @ El Floridita,"CC BY 2.0 by kudumomo]

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The Language of the 1920s: More Than the Bee's Knees - Wordnik

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No doubt: the 1920s were the bee's knees. But the ads banking on the latest film adaptation of The Great Gatsby would have you believe the Jazz Age was all about flappers, fashion, and parties. It was more than that. After World War I, Americans had more money to spend.

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Maddie

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Mackenzie Danzig

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dictionary of slang terms from the 20's -BH

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dictionary of slang terms from the 20's -BH

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This article is from the archive of our partner .
Prohibition be damned, words were just better in the 1920s. There's a fascinating piece today in the New York Times from Edward Rothstein about the new prohibition exhibition at Philadelphia's National Constitution Center that's well worth a read if you're interested in things booze and 1920s, and of course about that truly weird little legal time in our country's history. But of extra-special interest to me in this article was the following note about the exhibition:

On small tables like those at which "zozzled" (drunk) flappers and "jelly beans" (their boyfriends) once illegally imbibed "foot juice" (cheap wine) or "jag juice" (hard liquor), you can read explanations of speakeasy slang.

Speakeasy slang! Language was truly so much more evocative then, wasn't it? If you don't request extra foot juice tonight at that dive bar where you order the subpar pinot grigio, you are doing something wrong. In honor of this exhibition, I've scoured the Internet for a list of twenties-era words and phrases that we need to add to our contemporary conversations. Did you know that in the '20s, bimbo was used to mean "a tough guy"; butt me was "to take a cigarette"; and handcuff and manacle meant engagement and wedding ring? A person who was divorced was out on parole, a gimlet was "a chronic bore," and the exclamation "Nerts!" meant "I am amazed." Herewith, a dictionary of awesome twenties slang.

Applesauce. Remember how we were going on and on about malarkey, thanks to Joe Biden's use of it in the vice presidential debate, the other week? Applesauce is a synonym. Use it to demonstrate your lack of appreciation for the words of another. Or, alternatively, shout horsefeathers.

Bee's knees. No dictionary of twenties slang would be complete without this one, which means, in simple terms, the best. (Synonym: That's the berries.) In related bee-talk, say something is "none of your beeswax" when someone who is not the bee's knees is butting into your beeswax. Where did "bee's knees" come from? From World Wide Words, "It's sometimes explained as being from an Italian-American way of saying business or that it's properly Bs and Es, an abbreviation for be-alls and end-alls. Both are without doubt wrong. Bee's knees is actually one of a set of nonsense catchphrases from 1920s America, the period of the flappers, speakeasies, feather boas and the Charleston." (Other such phrases: " elephant's adenoids, cat's miaow, ant's pants, tiger's spots, bullfrog's beard, elephant's instep, caterpillar's kimono, turtle's neck, duck's quack, duck's nuts, monkey's eyebrows, gnat's elbows, oyster's earrings, snake's hips, kipper's knickers, elephant's manicure, clam's garter, eel's ankle, leopard's stripes, tadpole's teddies, sardine's whiskers, canary's tusks, pig's wings, cuckoo's chin, and butterfly's book.")

Recommended Reading

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How to Sound Like the Bee's Knees: A Dictionary of 1920s Slang

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This article is from the archive of our partner . Prohibition be damned, words were just better in the 1920s. There's a fascinating piece today in the New York Times from Edward Rothstein about the new prohibition exhibition at Philadelphia's National Constitution Center that's well worth a read if you're interested in things booze and 1920s, and of course about that truly weird little legal time in our country's history.

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Maddie

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If someone walked up to you today and suggested you drink radioactive water to reinvigorate your body, or offered you a cigarette to ease your asthma symptoms, you'd probably walk away quickly, in the hope that such craziness isn't contagious. Yet not that long ago, these and other questionable "health" products were openly marketed to the public as great ideas.

Take a walk with us down memory lane for a look at products that more than a few people once thought were sound ways to improve your health, but which now may make you wonder how humankind made it through the Twentieth Century.

1. Lysol as Contraception & Vaginal Hygiene Product

The first thing you think of when you think of Lysol is probably germs, as we use the product today as a disinfectant. But killing germs meant something entirely different at one point in Lysol's history, when the product was widely advertised as a douching product for women to maintain "daintiness" down there. It also had another scary purpose, however: Mother Jones cites Andrea Tone who writes in her book Devices and Desires: A History of Contraceptives in America that it was also the most common form of birth control from 1940 until 1960, when "The Pill" first hit the market.

2. Radium Water

Feeling sluggish? How about a swig of water with a splash of radium in it? It might seem ridiculous to casually ingest radioactive fluids, but radium water had its time in the spotlight around 100 years ago.

You could use the "Revigator," which was a water dispenser made of ceramic lined with uranium ore. Just fill it with water and let the radium-lined jug do its work overnight!

There was also William A. Bailey, a man who called himself a doctor but held no medical degree, who founded Radium Company and peddled Radithor, a medicine that was essential radium dissolved in water that he claimed would "invigorate" his patients.

Eben Byers was one of Bailey's wealthiest clients, Popular Science noted in 2004. He drank more than 1,000 bottles of Radithor, before his jaw fell off and he died. His autopsy revealed large holes in his brain and skull.

3. Ozone Paper & Cigarettes For Asthmatics

The idea of someone with asthma lighting up anything in an effort to breathe better is laughable by today's standards, but things were different in the 19th century.

"Preparations such as Potter's Asthma Cigarettes, Himrod's Cure for Asthma, Asthmador Cigarettes, Dr. J.D. Kellog's Asthma Remedy, Espic, Legras, and Escouflaire powders, and ozone paper were aggressively marketed and sold over the counter in most Western countries," Mark Jackson writes in Asthma: A Biography.

4. Listerine To Treat Dandruff, Gonorrhea

Long before it was sold as mouthwash to ward off halitosis, and some time after it was sold for its original use as a surgical antiseptic in the 1880s, Listerine served as a sort of catch-all for whatever might ail you - including treating dandruff, as seen above.

"Originally invented as a surgical antiseptic (and named after the founding father of antiseptics, Dr. Joseph Lister), its uses were varied-they including foot cleaning, floor scrubbing and gonorrhea treating," Smithsonian Magazine noted.

By the 1920s, the company had come up with a better idea, and invented the word "halitosis" - using a Latin root, to mean "unpleasant breath" - pushing Listerine as the way to cure it.

5. Vitamin Donuts

Just try offering young Henryson or wee Everly a healthy doughnut today, and see what their parents say. Not gonna happen. Sure, these sugary treats might've brought "pep and vigor" to the kids way back when, but today we call that a sugar high, that will only lead to a sugar crash.

6. 7-Up... For Babies

While we're on the topic of nutrition for the younger set, how about calming that squalling baby down by filling his bottle with sugary soda, like this ad from 1953 suggests? With today's concerns over childhood obesity, it's doubtful you'd see an ad for soda featuring anyone this young.

7. "Violet Rays," The Revitalizing Cure-All

In 1922, "Violet Rays" were another cure-all, with products like this Vi-Rex device, which promised to make you "vital, compelling, and magnetic," Collectors Weekly noted in a roundup of dangerous ads.

Though the device plugged into a light socket to work, another ad says Vi-Rex is "not a vibrator, and will not contract the muscles or shock nerves."

"Its magic rays pass through every cell and tissue, creating 'cellular massage' - the most beneficial electrical treatment known," the ad claims.

Whatever it did or didn't do, a spate of recalls and lawsuits over the product led to the Food and Drug Administration banning these devices. The last manufacturer of violet ray devices in the U.S. appears to have been Master Electric, but in 1951 the company was hit with a lawsuit in Marion, Indiana, and the devices were seized by the FDA.

Want more consumer news? Visit our parent organization, Consumer Reports, for the latest on scams, recalls, and other consumer issues.

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7 "Health" Products From The Past That Would Never Make It Onto Shelves Today

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If someone walked up to you today and suggested you drink radioactive water to reinvigorate your body, or offered you a cigarette to ease your asthma symptoms, you'd probably walk away quickly, in the hope that such craziness isn't contagious. Yet not that long ago, these and other questionable "health" products were openly marketed to the public as great ideas.

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Jurrion Dickey

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1920s Tennis Clothes | Womens and Men’s Outfits

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How to dress in a 1920s tennis outfit. 20s tennis dresses for women and white 20s tennis sweaters and trousers for men. History, pictures, DIY tips.

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Mackenzie Danzig

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Art Deco architecture derives from a style of visual arts of the same name that emerged in Europe in the 1920s, which also influenced the movie industry, fashion, interior design, graphic design, sculpture, painting, and other forms of art, in addition to architecture. The milestone of this style was the International Exhibition of Modern Decorative and Industrial Arts held in Paris in 1925, from which it took its name.

Just like in the many fields influenced by this style, Art Deco architecture combines modern design with traditional elements such as exquisite craftsmanship and luxurious materials including jade, lacquer, and ivory. As a successor to the Arts and Crafts and Art Nouveau movements, Art Deco was also influenced by the abstract and geometric forms of Cubism, the bright colors of Fauvism, and the exoticized crafts and styles of countries such as China, Japan, and Egypt. The decorative aspect and the compositional arrangements also derive from Beaux-Arts architecture, through symmetry, straight lines, hierarchy in the floor plan distribution, and facades divided into base, shaft, and capital (Classical tripartite division) - although this time with more rational volumes and the occasional use of ornaments. It was a lavish mixture of styles that was embraced by the wealthy post-war bourgeoisie.

From the 1930s, however, the style began to establish a closer dialogue with industrial manufacturing and the possibility of mass production. During this period, Art Deco becomes more moderate and sober, incorporating materials such as concrete and stainless steel. The most iconic works of the style emerged at this time, including the Chrysler Building, the Rockefeller Center, and the Empire State Building, all in New York, introducing a new language to the skyscrapers that changed the city's skyline, reflecting a new modern and technological society. These buildings reveal some of the most striking characteristics of the style, which contributed to its consolidation in the history of architecture. Among them is the use of reinforced concrete, straight lines, clean rectangular shapes, terraced buildings, sharp angles, chevrons, and zigzags. The latter is a striking feature of the Chrysler Building's elevators and shows that the patterns spread beyond the façade into the interior spaces.

Besides the New York skyscrapers of the early 20th century, the city of Rio de Janeiro also featured several notable examples of this style, such as the Carlos Gomes Theater and the Central do Brasil Station, with its staircases, stained glass windows, signs, among other elements. The sculpture of Christ the Redeemer, one of Rio's most famous landmarks, is an Art Deco piece and is considered to be the largest sculpture of this style to date.

The fine line between the search for simplicity, especially when compared to previous movements, and the extravagance of its forms, was considered by many experts as a paradox. However, Art Deco architecture assumed an important role in history by representing the process of modernization of the urban landscape, balancing the elements of the past with new geometric configurations and ornamental references.

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Art Deco architecture derives from a style of visual arts of the same name that emerged in Europe in the 1920s, which also influenced the movie industry, fashion, interior design, graphic design, sculpture, painting, and other forms of art, in addition to architecture.

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Errin

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To bob or not to bob in 1924

The 1920s bob haircut craze of 1924 takes Hollywood by storm. The 12 Classic bobs.To bob or not to bob. Which actresses bobbed their hair.An exclusive interview with Colleen Moore, whose famous Dutch bob caused a worldwide rage. We also get the opinions of many other top Hollywood actresses on the pros and cons of the 1920's bob haircut and of getting the big "chop!"

1920's hairstyle correspondent Carolyn Van Wyck reports for Glamourdaze.com .

The 12 Top 1920's Bob Hairstyles

1920's bob hairstyles - The Top 12 - Click to enlarge

Shingle, or Ina Claire Bob

Boyish Bob

Marcel, or Water Waved Shingle

Horizontal Tapered Bob

French Side Part Bob

Horizontal Clubbed Bob

Flapper Bob

Permanently Waved Bob

Girlish Bob

French Center Part Bob

Dutch Boy haircut

Center Part Bob

As the Lady of Long hair majestically entered the hotel lobby, a member of the Bobbed Hair Sisterhood jauntily jeered: "Here comes the horse and buggy!"
"Bandit!" retorted the Lady of Long Hair, with all the venom of outraged womanhood.
To bob or not to bob - that is the question that is causing more argument, more acrimonious discussion in this country today than any other, with the possible exception of prohibition. It interests all classes and sexes.
The emancipated - those who have had their hair bobbed - have coined a term for those who have not - "horse and buggy". This has taken its place beside that other term of opprobrium and scorn - "Old Ironsides" - applied to those of the younger generation who still wear corsets.

- Hollywood bobs cause newspaper storm -

"It is an incentive to crime!" declares one newspaper. "It's a result of the war and falling morals" declares another
Some of these anti bob headlines are hilarious to me but obviously not those who wrote them.
"Bobbed hair leads to divorce."
"Bobbing of hair costs twelve nurse jobs!"
"Shocked husband shoots himself when wife bobs hair!"
"Bobbing your hair leads to insanity!"
"Bobbing your hair will make you go bald!"
"Bob-hair bandit collects $350 for spring suit!"
"What if Lady Godica had bobbed her hair - I rest my case!!" and so on and on ....
There is no getting around the fact though that the bob is immensely popular, a large part being due to the coiffures of Hollywood's current stars such as Colleen Moore, whose 'Dutch bob' has swept the nation.
One famous hair salon in New York bobs three thousand eager heads a week!

1920's bob hairstyle - the cost of up keeping

The Cost of the Bob Cut

If it costs a man $25 a year to maintain a $5 derby, how much does it cost a woman to support a $5 bob?
The answer is anywhere between $2 a week up, mostly "up". Bobbed hair has introduced the item of "overhead" into the feminine budget.

1920's bob hairstyles- salon-advert

Seven million American women have opted for the short bob hairstyles, as of this April of 1924. It appears also that women are shunning their local barber and travelling great distances to the salons of New York to be sure they get the particular kind of bob, Dutch, boyish or clubbed which will set off their individuality to best advantage.

1920s Hairstyles-The-Bob hair cost - Norma Talmadge

For the great majority of the bobbed hair sisterhood it's a choice between learning how to to use the iron and the tight curlers every night, or spending money for the daily, semi-weekly or weekly Marcel and accompanying trim. Even the permanent Marcel wave doesn't take care of itself, but needs regular water-waving to preserve the natural appearance.

So the true cost of having a bob haircut is at least $5 for the initial bob hairstyle and $2 a week thereafter. This totals - and I'm being conservative girls, a minimum of $107 a year. Many women spend much more weekly so the cost is often much much higher. Not that the hairdressers are complaining!

So girls - if you are considering committing the act of "bobbery" you might find some helpful suggestions as to what to do after the fatal "snip!" has made your decision irrevocable.

Colleen Moore talks about her 1920's bob hairstyle

1920's bob hairstyle - Colleen Moore leads the way

Colleen Moore - "I used to wear a faux bob hairstyle, with my hair rolled up in back with a short fringe to the front. My Mom basically didn't approve so I had to improvise. Then I did something drastic one day and chopped my own hair to resemble a little China doll I had. For me it began with the filming last year of Flaming Youth. My character was wild and reckless but also innocent. So I wanted a basic girlish hairstyle that embodied innocence. Since Patricia was a modern woman, her hair had to be short. I decided to cut it properly short for this part and - well - I've been cutting it shorter ever since. I guess that this is what has caused all the fuss!"

As for cost of upkeep - it appears, with her straight or at least semi-straight bob, Colleen gets off comparatively easy. "I have to have it cut often!" she tells me, "but at a cost of about $5 a week, I'm fairly average with most Americian girls. Like most other film actresses I also believe that the hair should be trimmed whenever it is marcelled, to keep the line just perfect!" As it happens - Miss Moore's is currently one of the few successful straight bobs in Hollywood, but it is clearly having an impact as I see it now everywhere when I travel.

What other top 1920's Actresses think of the bobbed hairstyle

1920's hairstyles for long hair - Bebe Daniel's bob haircut

Bebe Daniels - "My hair is long but I do prefer it bobbed. The only reason I don't chop my hair is that I'm required for so many parts calling for long hair and I hate wearing wigs. As for becoming "bald" because of bobbing, I think that's what they call "bunk."

1920's bob hairstyle - Gloria Swanson 1924

Gloria Swanson - "I might as well confess my secret: I'm a cliptomaniac! Cutting hair amounts to an obsession with me. I'm always trimming my won; i love to cut my baby's; and I cut Alice Brady's beautifully. i find short hair very convenient for every type of coiffure. I do always wear a bob though!"

1920's bob hairstyle - Anna May Wong in 1924

Anna May Wong - "I had to bob my hair because of my job. I do like it but it took a lot of thought before I made the decision. A Chinese woman's hair is her chief ornament in life. Chinese women never wear hats, but they put all their ideas of decoration in their hair. As a race, we use hair for head covering instead of hats, so we could not possibly approve of bobbed hair. Some Chinese women think bobbed hair is dangerous to the femininity and beauty of woman!"

1920's bob haircut - Betty Blythe 1924

Betty Blythe - " I felt five years younger when I bobbed mine. In Paris I shopped for hats, but found none for sale for women with long hair. So to be in the swim of the present vogue is one reason i bobbed my hair. It makes me feel youthful"

Mary Astor - "Bobbed hair, never! I see no reason for it. Beautiful hair is one of woman's greatest charms. When men decide to wear their hair long, then that is when I will bob mine!

That's all !
©Glamouraze.com

Originally published in Photoplay - April 1924. Many thanks to the Media History Project for finding and preserving these wonderful time capsules.

Bobbed Hair 1926 - AI Enhanced Film

Bobbed Hair - 1926 in Sweden

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1920's Bob - The Hairstyle Phenomenon of 1924

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The 1920s bob haircut craze of 1924 takes Hollywood by storm. The 12 Classic bobs.To bob or not to bob. Which actresses bobbed their hair.An exclusive interview with Colleen Moore, whose famous Dutch bob caused a worldwide rage.

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Maddie

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Byers was a rich man with an eye for the ladies and past success as an amateur golfer. But in 1927 he badly hurt his arm and was prescribed Radithor - a triple distilled radium water by a doctor.

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Byers was a rich man with an eye for the ladies and past success as an amateur golfer. But in 1927 he badly hurt his arm and was prescribed Radithor - a triple distilled radium water by a doctor. https://t.co/ZwSfd6iWF6

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After a quick break the A-Z of radium is back with E is for Eben Byers #WeirdHistory #histmed #histsci #medhist #medicalhistorian https://t.co/UlItKyEuKi

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An article detailing the history of the disease syphilis in the US, including the stigma its sufferers received - Jace Furman

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It killed Al Capone and would have killed the husband of Mary Queen of Scots (who wore a mask to hide facial disfigurements caused by the disease) had he not died at 21 in a mysterious explosion. It's been here a while and unfortunately, it's still sticking around, and it's had quite the journey.

Here's a brief history of syphilis, the notorious "disease of love."

A medical overview

Syphilis is a sexually transmitted disease (STD) caused by the bacterium Treponema pallidum. Over time, it progresses through increasingly unpleasant stages.

A primary (first stage) infection causes painless ulcers on the genitals or mouth, which often go unnoticed. Secondary syphilis can produce a blotchy, red rash on the palms of the hands and soles of the feet and may be accompanied by hair and weight loss, fever, headaches and fatigue. These symptoms clear out on their own and are followed by a latent period, which can last as long as 20 years, during which sufferers exhibit no symptoms whatsoever that they have the disease.

One-third of untreated cases progress to tertiary syphilis, which causes neurological and cardiac problems including numbness, altered behavior, blindness and other sensory deficits, dementia, facial disfigurements (permanent damage to the nose was historically common) and paralysis.

Ultimately, it can be fatal.

The discovery of syphilis

For a disease shrouded in stigma, it's perhaps fitting that even its origins are highly contested.

Radiocarbon dating has detected syphilis-attributed lesions on skeletons from several thousand years ago. Some researchers (but not all) suggest Columbus and his crew introduced it to the indigenous peoples of North America in the 15th century. It is clear syphilis was widespread in Europe by 1495, when a mass outbreak swept across the continent, possibly originating among the French armies of Charles VIII when he invaded Naples at the start of the Italian Wars.

By the early 1900s, syphilis was among the leading morbidities in the United States, with no connected cause or effective treatment. The social stigma was rife-it was termed the disease of "bad blood," assumed to afflict only adulterers and prostitutes-and many who had it were ostracized or disgraced.

Finding a treatment

For centuries, syphilis sufferers were forced to endure horrific (and unsuccessful) treatments.

Mercury was the primary method utilized to burn away lesions, available first as an elixir, and later as an ointment, steam, bath or pill. However, not only was mercury ineffective as a cure, it caused horrific side effects, including tooth loss, severe ulceration, neurological damage and mercury poisoning, which in itself was often deadly. Other unscientific remedies ranged from guaiacum-also known as the Holy Wood from the New World-to sweat baths.

It wasn't until 1905 that Fritz Schaudinn and Erich Hoffman identified the bacteria behind the disease. Five years later, the first effective therapy, Salvarsan, was developed by Nobel Prize winner Paul Ehrlich (his famous 'magic bullet'). Unfortunately, Salvarsan, too, came with horrible side effects although this was unsurprising, perhaps, considering it was derived from arsenic.

While penicillin had been discovered by Alexander Fleming in 1928, it didn't become widely available around the globe for decades. In 1932, the unethical Tuskegee syphilis study began in the United States: To summarize briefly, it evaluated the long-term effects of untreated syphilis by withholding treatment from African-American men with the disease.

In 1943, penicillin was introduced as a cure for syphilis and by 1947, it became the first line of treatment. While the vast majority of bacteria today are no longer treatable with this traditional, widely-used drug, T. pallidum remains susceptible.

Currently, treating syphilis is as simple as a shot of our oldest antibiotic.

Syphilis resurgence

With the discovery and implementation of a genuine cure, syphilis rates began to decline in the U.S. after a peak in the late 1940s. Prevalence of the infection continued to slowly decline during the next half-century, except for an uptick in cases in the late 1980s and early '90s, associated with a rise in crack cocaine use among gay men. Syphilis rates dropped promisingly afterward, supported by significant public health efforts, hitting all-time lows at the end of the millennium: In 2000, national syphilis rates were 2.1 cases per 100,000 Americans, the lowest rate since 1941.

However, the disease was not eradicated, and rates began climbing again swiftly after 2013, and by 2019 rates had risen to those not seen since the 1940s. New research suggests a link to co-occurrence with another dangerous STD-a shocking 41.6 percent of HIV-positive gay men have primary or secondary syphilis. Increased rates of illicit drug use, unprotected sex and sex with multiple partners are additional factors perpetuating this spread.

The continuous rise in sexually transmitted diseases in the U.S. population remains concerning for public health officials, resulting in a new wave of awareness campaigns to encourage surveillance, testing and treatment.

Nonetheless, a diagnosis of syphilis is no longer (or certainly, should not be) the stigma that it was for centuries, and thanks to Fleming, the cure is just a jab away.

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The History of Syphilis in the United States

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It killed Al Capone and would have killed the husband of Mary Queen of Scots (who wore a mask to hide facial disfigurements caused by the disease) had he not died at 21 in a mysterious explosion. It's been here a while and unfortunately, it's still sticking around, and it's had quite the journey.

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Errin

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The United States Radium Corporation was a company operated between the years 1917 to 1926 in Orange, New Jersey, in the United States. After initial success in developing a Glow-in-the-dark radioactive paint, the company closed in the late 1920s in the wake of severe illnesses and deaths of workers who had ingested radioactive material when they licked their brushes to paint the thin lines needed on watch dials. Workers had been told that the paint was harmless.[1] During World War I, the company sold many of its watches to the United States Army for use by soldiers.[2]

U.S Radium was the subject of major radioactive contamination of its workers, primarily women who painted the dials of watches and other instruments with luminous paint.[1]

Additional recommended knowledge

History

The company was founded in 1914 in Newark, New Jersey by Dr. Sabin Arnold von Sochocky and Dr. George S. Willis, and was originally called the Radium Luminous Material Corporation. The company produced uranium from carnotite ore and eventually moved into the business of producing radioluminescent paint. The company then moved to Orange in 1917 and four years later opened its doors as United States Radium Corporation in 1921. By 1926 carnotite ore processing ceased and the company called itself the Safety Light Corporation, a reference to glow-in-the-dark safety signs, dials and other luminous paint products the company produced until 1927.

The luminescent paint used by the women, a product called Undark, had radium as its main ingredient. Workers had been instructed to "point" the brushes by licking them with their mouths.[3] Unbeknownst to the women, the product was highly radioactive and therefore, carcinogenic. The ingestion of the paint by the women, brought about while licking the brushes, resulted in a condition called radium jaw, a painful swelling and porosity of the upper and lower jaws, and ultimately led to the deaths of many of these women.

Radium jaw (Radium necrosis), was allegedly known and initially denied by US Radium's management and scientists working for the company. This was the reason for litigation against US Radium by the so-called Radium girls. The unfavourable publicity generated by reports of illness and death amongst previous dial painters resulted in a drop in potential employees. This was the reason cited by the company for its closure.

Around 1920, a similar dial painting business, a division of the Standard Chemical Company based in Chicago, known as the Radium Dial Company opened in Chicago, but soon moved its dial painting operation to Peru, Illinois to be closer to its major customer, the Westclox Clock Company. Even though several previous workers died and health risks associated with radium were allegedly known, this company continued dial painting operations until 1940, when the operation was moved to New York City.

Immediate aftermath

The chief medical examiner of Essex County, New Jersey published a report in 1925 that identified the radioactive material the women had ingested as the cause of their bone disease and aplastic anemia, and ultimate death.[2]

Illness and death resulting from ingestion of radium paint and the subsequent legal action taken by the women, forced closure of the company in 1927. The case was settled out of court in 1928, but not before a substantial number of the litigants were seriously ill or had died from bone cancer and other radiation related illnesses.[4] The company, it was alleged, were taking too much time to settle the litigation on purpose, leading to further deaths.

In November 1928, Dr. von Sochocky, the inventor of the radium-based paint, died of aplastic anemia resulting from his exposure to the radioactive material, "a victim of his own invention."[5]

To this day, the levels of radiation ingested by the victims is sufficient to be detected at their graves using a Geiger counter.[3]

Superfund site

The company processed about 1,000 pounds of ore daily while in operation, which was dumped on the site. The radon and radiation resulting from the 1,600 tons of material on the abandoned factory resulted in the site's designation as a Superfund site by the United States Environmental Protection Agency in 1983.[6] From 1997 through 2005, the EPA remediated the site in a process that involved the excavation and off-site disposal of radium-contaminated material at the former plant site, and at 250 residential and commercial properties that had been contaminated in the intervening decades.[7]

References

1. ^ Frame, Paul. Radioluminescent Paint, Oak Ridge Associated Universities. Accessed September 17, 2007.

2. ^ University Libraries Special Collections: U.S. Radium Corporation, University of Medicine and Dentistry of New Jersey. Accessed September 20, 2007.

3. ^ http://query.nytimes.com/gst/fullpage.html?res=9B0DE7DB1338F937A35753C1A961948260 "Radium: From Wonder Drug to Hazard"], The New York Times, October 4, 1987. Accessed September 20, 2007. "It was not until the early 1920's, after the first cancer deaths of watch-dial painters at the United States Radium Corporation in East Orange, N.J., that medical authorities began to realize that radium, in even the most minute amounts, was extremely dangerous and long-lasting. Workers had been instructed to twirl their paint brushes in their mouths to get a fine point. As a result, some victims ingested so much radium that their graves still cause Geiger-counter needles to jump."

4. ^ Radium dial painters, 1920-1926, Johnston's Archive. Accessed September 17, 2007.

5. ^ "RADIUM PAINT TAKES ITS INVENTOR'S LIFE; Dr. Sabin A. von Sochocky Ill a Long Time, Poisoned by Watch Dial Luminant. 13 BLOOD TRANSFUSIONS Death Due to Aplastic Anemia-- Women Workers Who Were Stricken Sued Company.", The New York Times, November 15, 1928.

6. ^ NPL Site Narrative for U.S. Radium Corp., United States Environmental Protection Agency notice dated September 8, 1983. Accessed September 20, 2007.

7. ^ U.S. Radium Corp., United States Environmental Protection Agency notice dated September 8, 1983. Accessed September 20, 2007.

See also

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The United States Radium Corporation was a company operated between the years 1917 to 1926 in Orange, New Jersey, in the United States. After initial success in developing a Glow-in-the-dark radioactive paint, the company closed in the late 1920s in the wake of severe illnesses and deaths of workers who had ingested radioactive material when they licked their brushes to paint the thin lines needed on watch dials.

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Mackenzie Danzig

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Radithor was a patent medicine that is a well-known example of radioactive quackery and specifically of excessively broad and pseudoscientific application of the principle of radiation hormesis. It consisted of triple distilled water containing at a minimum 1 microcurie (37 kBq) each of the radium 226 and 228 isotopes.

The time of Radithor and radioactive elixirs ended in 1932, with the premature death of one of its most fervent users, Eben Byers, an American industrialist. This history has led to the strengthening of regulatory control of pharmaceutical and radioactive products.

Radithor was manufactured from 1918 to 1928 by the Bailey Radium Laboratories, Inc., of East Orange, New Jersey. The owner of the company and head of the laboratories was listed as William J. A. Bailey, a dropout from Harvard College, who was not a medical doctor. It was advertised as "A Cure for the Living Dead" as well as "Perpetual Sunshine". The expensive product was claimed to cure impotence, among other ills.

Eben Byers, a wealthy American socialite, athlete, industrialist and Yale College graduate, died from Radithor radium poisoning in 1932. Byers was buried in a lead-lined coffin; when exhumed in 1965 for study, his remains were still highly radioactive and measured at 225,000 becquerels. As a comparison, the roughly 0.0169 g of potassium-40 present in a typical human body produces approximately 4,400 becquerels.

Byers's death led to the strengthening of the Food and Drug Administration's powers and the demise of most radiation-based patent medicines. A Wall Street Journal article (1 Aug. 1990) describing the Byers incident was titled "The Radium Water Worked Fine Until His Jaw Came Off".

Radithor (ca. 1918). 15 Sep. 2004. Oak Ridge Associated Universities. 12 Apr. 2005 [1].

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Radithor was a patent medicine that is a well-known example of radioactive quackery and specifically of excessively broad and pseudoscientific application of the principle of radiation hormesis. It consisted of triple distilled water containing at a minimum 1 microcurie (37 kBq) each of the radium 226 and 228 isotopes.

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Errin

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How did these fabulous fashions find their way into women's wardrobes? The evolution of dressmaking and sewing skills over the decades reflected women's changing roles as did the fashions they wore. In the 1890s, affluent women selected their desired toilettes (attire) from the many French fashion magazines with the latest Paris styles. Here in the United States, The Delineator, first published in 1873 by Ebenezer Butterick, featured color fashion plates (illustrations) as well as printed patterns. Armed with these elaborate illustrations and patterns, fashion-conscious women met with their dressmakers to select just the right fabric, laces, ribbons, braids, buttons and trims to customize the garment to their style and taste. Even though women, then as now, followed fashion, no one wanted their gown to look exactly like another.

The lavish design and embellishment of 1890s gowns was echoed in the intricate fitting and tailoring needed to customize the garment for the client. Working from a pattern without printed style details or instructions, seamstresses needed excellent craftsmanship and meticulous attention to detail to execute the many steps required to cut, fit, assemble, tailor and decorate the gown. Sewing machines, introduced by Isaac Singer in 1851, made quick work of assembling the garment, but much of the fitting and detail work was still done by hand.

The picture of the elegant green wool bodice from the 1890s shows the detailed inner construction that creates a perfect fit for the wearer:

1) The stand-up collar is finished on the inside with brown satin to prevent chafing.

2) A small watch pocket is hand stitched onto the inner flap of the bodice.

3) The velvet trimmed hemline ends in a shaped point at center front and center back and is hand finished on the inside with brown satin ribbon.

4) The bodice is interlined to shape the garment's silhouette, and to extend the useful life of the garment. Each piece of lining material has been cut to match the corresponding outer fabric. The pieces are pinned together smoothly, then seamed together.

5) The seams are notched at strategic points to fit the garment to the wearer's shape, then bound and hand finished. Casings for whalebone inserts that shape and fit the garment are hand stitched on top of the seams. (Whalebone stays are made from baleen, a keratin-like substance found in the mouth of the whale used to filter food from sea water. By the 1890s metal stays had replaced whalebone.)

6) A Petersham band (waist tape) attached at the center back, is fastened around the waist at the center front by a hook and hand-sewn eye. It anchors the garment in place and helps to define the waistline.

7) Hook and eye closures are sewn alternately to keep the bodice securely closed.

8) A large hook attached to the lower edge of the waist tape and a ribbon loop stitched vertically below the waist tape serve to hold up the heavy skirt.

In the 1920s elaborately beaded, embroidered and fringed flapper dresses were the rage in night clubs and on the dance floor. Art Deco inspired beading embellished the iconic Jazz-era dresses that fell straight from the shoulders with little shaping. The heavy beading helped maintain the straight lines of the dress. Sadly, many of these gorgeous dresses have fallen victim to their own beauty as the weight of the beads caused the delicate chiffons, crepes, silks and laces to tear and shred.

These intricately beaded gowns were costly as the bead work was all done by hand as it still is today in the couture fashion industry. A beading pattern is printed or drawn onto the fabric first, then beads are attached prior to assembling the garment. The sheer fabric is stretched onto a tambour frame then beads and sequins are attached one-by-one by hand with a tambour hook. (See photograph below). Decorative embroidery can also be added in this way.

These beautiful flapper dresses were intended to sparkle and glitter on the dance floor as daring young women shimmied their way through the latest dance steps with sleekly-groomed gentlemen who were equally skilled at dancing the night away. Flashing legs were adorned with dainty garters which held stockings in place...and often a small flask of whiskey as well!

So how did these fabulous fashions find their way into the collections of Pasadena Museum of History? Our collections are the repository of many examples of elegant 1890s and 1920s garments. These expensive gowns are typically the types of garments that would be saved by a family and, fortunately, end up in museum collections; whereas everyday and work clothing usually wore out or was cut up and repurposed into another garment.

By Susan Stevens

Ms. Stevens is a co-curator of the exhibition Fabulous Fashion, Decades of Change - 1890s, 1920s, & 1950s.

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Sewing and Construction Skills of the 1890s and 1920s * Pasadena Museum of History

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How did these fabulous fashions find their way into women's wardrobes? The evolution of dressmaking and sewing skills over the decades reflected women's changing roles as did the fashions they wore. In the 1890s, affluent women selected their desired toilettes (attire) from the many French fashion magazines with the latest Paris styles.

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Errin

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The 1920s was a key decade in poetry: modernism really came to the fore, with a number of major poets adopting an increasingly experimental approach to form, rhyme, imagery, and subject matter. Below, we introduce and discuss some of the best and most notable poems from the 1920s.
1. Ezra Pound, Hugh Selwyn Mauberley.
We begin our pick of the best 1920s poems with a poem from 1920, which is very much a watershed poem: the US-born Pound described it as his 'farewell to London', before he moved to Europe and worked on his more ambitious long work, The Cantos.

Mauberley sees Pound responding to the last few decades of English verse, his attempts to 'make it new', and various failed poetic projects such as the 1890s 'Rhymers' Club'. A difficult and allusive work, it's well worth diving into and reading - though perhaps our introduction to the poem will help (follow the link above to read the first part; part II is also online).
2. T. S. Eliot, The Waste Land.
In 1922, the American-born T. S. Eliot - who had settled in London in 1914 - produced this masterpiece of some 433 lines, incorporating numerous verse forms and taking in the post-war world from squalid encounters in bedsits to chatter in East End pubs.

Eliot presents us with the modern world of 1920s London: civilisation has been reduced to a 'waste land' and the land has lost its fertility and ability to bring forth life. Even the living seem to be suffering from some kind of spiritual wound. But how can we fix this society? By regaining spiritual and psychological enlightenment and making peace with our demons. But that's easier said than done.

The allusions to nymphs, Tiresias, and Elizabethan England suggest at once a continuum with the past and a break with it: everything is simultaneously worse than it used to be, and yet the same as it ever was. In some ways, Eliot's poem represents the end of civilisation as Shakespeare, Greek myth, and various holy texts go through the literary waste-disposal, regurgitated only as fragments. One of the high points of the modernist movement and one of the most important and influential poems of the twentieth century.
3. Marianne Moore, 'Marriage'.
Published in 1923, a year after Eliot's The Waste Land, 'Marriage' is a long(ish) poem by one of American modernism's greatest poets. And like The Waste Land, Moore's poem is allusive, taking in Shakespeare and the Bible as the poet explores the obligations and meaning of marriage (Moore herself never married). The poem is radical in both its form (modernist, free verse) and politics (we can label Moore's treatment of marriage 'feminist').
4. William Carlos Williams, 'The Red Wheelbarrow'.
This 1923 poem should more properly be referred to as 'XXII', since it's the 22 nd poem to appear in Williams's 1923 collection Spring and All, and the title 'The Red Wheelbarrow' is one retrospectively applied to the poem (not by the poet himself). One of the most famous examples of American imagism, the poem invites us to reflect upon the importance of something as simple as red wheelbarrow and some white chickens.

Perhaps Williams literally means that much depends upon a red wheelbarrow and the white chickens: that these symbols of farming and agriculture are central to the maintaining of life as we know it. Of course, one may ask here why it's important the wheelbarrow is red; would a green wheelbarrow be viewed as less important in the agrarian history of the world? But this interpretation is tenable, nevertheless.

We have analysed this poem here.
5. Wallace Stevens, 'Sunday Morning'.
1923 was the year Wallace Stevens' landmark collection Harmonium was published. Stevens, like Williams, was an American modernist - and an American who stayed in America, rather than moving to England (as Eliot did). 'Sunday Morning' is about a woman who stays home on a Sunday morning in America, instead of going to church. Does this make her any less spiritual or religious than her neighbours?

In many ways, Stevens's poem can be viewed as part of a Romantic tradition in poetry, stretching back a century earlier to John Keats (who wrote, memorably, in ' Ode to a Nightingale ' that the bird 'dwells with beauty - beauty that must die'), William Wordsworth, and others.

Romanticism was often about poets finding a sort of divinity and awe in the natural world, rather than looking to the heavens and to God to provide this sense of mystical wonder. 'Sunday Morning', when analysed from this perspective, is a belated Romantic poem.

We have analysed this poem here.
6. Robert Frost, 'Stopping by Woods on a Snowy Evening'.
Robert Frost (1874-1963) is regarded as one of the greatest American poets of the twentieth century. And yet he didn't belong to any particular movement: unlike his contemporaries William Carlos Williams or Wallace Stevens he was not a modernist, preferring more traditional modes and utilising a more direct and less obscure poetic language. He famously observed of free verse, which was favoured by many modernist poets, that it was 'like playing tennis with the net down'.

Many of his poems are about the natural world, with woods and trees featuring prominently in some of his most famous and widely anthologised poems ('The Road Not Taken', 'Stopping by Woods on a Snowy Evening', 'Birches', 'Tree at My Window'). Elsewhere, he was fond of very short and pithy poetic statements: see 'Fire and Ice' and 'But Outer Space', for example.

Was 1923 the annus mirabilis for American poetry? 1922 may have been the high point of European modernism, with Eliot's The Waste Land (written in London and Lausanne, although Eliot himself was American), James Joyce's Ulysses, and Virginia Woolf's Jacob's Room among some of the important works published in that year; but 1923 saw Frost, Stevens, and Williams all publish some of their most famous works. Here, Frost (pictured right) observes the 'lovely, dark and deep' woods as he travels home one night, in an altogether more Romantic scene than many of the other poems on this list.
7. T. S. Eliot, 'The Hollow Men'.
After he wrote The Waste Land, Eliot spent the next years working on a sort of follow-up poem whose form and language allude to that earlier poem in suggestive ways. Published in 1925, 'The Hollow Men' reflects the general malaise and sense of limbo that characterised the mid-1920s in Britain for many people: in the US many of the wealthiest may have been enjoying the Jazz Age, but post-war Britain was marked, for Eliot, by a loss of spiritual meaning and direction. 'The Hollow Men' brilliantly captures this.
8. Nancy Cunard, Parallax.
Although not as famous as Moore, Cunard was another female modernist poet who wrote a long poem in the wake of Eliot's The Waste Land - and, in Cunard's case, she seems to have deliberately alluded to Eliot's work in order to challenge his despairing and pessimistic view of modernity.

Parallax was, like The Waste Land, published in Britain by Virginia Woolf's Hogarth Press (in 1925). Cunard's own poetry has often been overlooked, read by a few, and written off even by many of those who have read it. Although she was an influential part of the little magazines which modernist poets used to publish their work to a like-minded readership - she was a frequent contributor to Wheels, the Sitwells' magazine, whose title was inspired by one of Cunard's own poems - Nancy Cunard's own poetry has not received much serious attention. Yet her long 1925 poem Parallax, published by the Hogarth Press run by Virginia and Leonard Woolf, is certainly worth paying serious attention to, not least because of its relationship to, and dialogue with, the work of T. S. Eliot.

Not all of Parallax is available online, but you can read an excerpt by following the link above and discover more about it here.
9. Langston Hughes, 'I, Too'.
The finest poet of the Harlem Renaissance, Hughes (1901-67) often writes about the lives of African Americans living in America, especially in New York, in the early twentieth century.

In this poem from 1926, and with an allusive nod to Walt Whitman's poem 'I Hear America Singing', Hughes - describing himself as the 'darker brother' - highlights the plight of black Americans at the time, having to eat separately from everyone else in the kitchen when guests arrive, but determined to strive and succeed in the 'Land of the Free'.
10. W. B. Yeats, 'Sailing to Byzantium'.
That is no country for old men. The young
In one another's arms, birds in the trees,
-Those dying generations-at their song,
The salmon-falls, the mackerel-crowded seas,
Fish, flesh, or fowl, commend all summer long
Whatever is begotten, born, and dies.
Caught in that sensual music all neglect
Monuments of unageing intellect ...

Written in September 1926 and published the following year, this poem is about growing older and feeling out of touch with the new generation superseding you, feeling surplus to requirements, waiting for death. Perhaps this is something to do with the age gap between Yeats - who concludes this list of significant 1920s poems but was the oldest of the poets listed here - and modernists like Eliot, Pound, and Moore, all of whom were born at least twenty years later.

So Yeats's thoughts of death and ageing in this poem are, perhaps, inevitable for a poet in his sixties when he wrote this powerful piece about one's twilight years. Young love, birds singing, and other signs of joy and youth are not the province of the old. 'Sailing to Byzantium', as this opening stanza establishes, is about something that is still very much hotly debated and highlighted: how the elderly are neglected by the rest of society.

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The 1920s was a key decade in poetry: modernism really came to the fore, with a number of major poets adopting an increasingly experimental approach to form, rhyme, imagery, and subject matter. Below, we introduce and discuss some of the best and most notable poems from the 1920s. 1.

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The Radium Emanator (portable radiator maker)

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The Radium Emanator (portable radiator maker)

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Maddie

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The National Radium Emanator, an extremely sophisticated device, was produced ca. 1924-1929 by National Radium Products Company of New York City.

The photo above shows the emanator alongside its carrying case. The photograph below is a close-up of the instructions that are clipped to the inside of the door of the unit.

Quoting the company literature:
The National Radium Emanator
"The Storage Battery of Radium Energy"

ACCEPTED by the American Medical Association, meeting their standard requirements as to dosage.

The National Radium Emanator will last a lifetime... it will maintain constantly its efficiency and radioactivity; none of the radium content being lost."

The American Medical Association described it thusly:

"A portable appliance for activating water with emanation; the emanation is emitted from a solution of radium chloride, barium chloride and sodium chloride. The emanations pass through a purifying chamber into a compartment containing the water to be drunk."

The glass bottle (lower left corner of the unit in the top photo) was filled with tap water and then mounted in the holder as shown in Figure 1 of the instructions. The holder was then rotated to an upside down position so that radon gas bubbled through the water thereby charging it. Next, the holder was returned to its original position so that the bottle, now filled with radioactive water, could be removed. Finally, the water was transferred to a drinking glass and consumed or used for some other purpose such as watering plants.

Based on the measured exposure rates around the emanator, we estimated that it contained a substantial fraction of a millicurie of Ra-226 (0.1-0.5 mCi ?).

In order to reduce the exposure rate to a level that would allow the unit to be put on display, we had to remove the source. The latter consisted of a dried deposit on the inside of a series of glass tubes and vessels in the back of the case.

Versions of the device were available with the following source strengths: 50,000, 100,000, 150,000, and 200,000 Mache Units. By way of explanation, the 50,000 MU device would impart about 18 microcuries of radon to one liter of water per day (New and Nonofficial Remedies. AMA. 1924)

Size: ca. 14" x 12" x 8"

Case: Wood (mahogany?)

Exposure rate: ca. 5-8 mR/hr above background at one foot prior to the removal of the source

Its Unique Capability

In the patent, Herbert Savoye explained what was unique about the device:

"I am aware that it has heretofore been the practice to prepare radioactive water by first passing a stream of `purified air through a solution of radium salt to take up radium emanations, and then to bubble the air... through the water to be treated where by the... emanations are absorbed by the water from said air, consequently my present invention is confined to providing a novel construction of apparatus for practicing such general method in such a manner that the air serving as the transferring vehicle or agent may be repeatedly circulated through both the radium salt solution and the water... so that a desired maximum degree of saturation of the given volume of water with soluble radium principles may be easily and quickly attained."

American Radium Products Company

Before there was the National Radium Products Company, there was the American Radium Products Company. The latter, located in Morristown, NJ, was incorporated in 1922 with a listed capital of $100,000. Its purpose was to "manufacture medical supplies." The notice of incorporation identified the following individuals: Francis H. Glazebrook, Ernest R. Rubsamen and Samuel C. Cutler (Drug and Chemical Markets Vol. 10, Jan. 18, 1922).

American Radium Appliance Company

Like the American Radium Products Company, the American Radium Appliance Company was incorporated in 1922, capitalized at $100,000 and located in Morristown, NJ. The same three folks were identified as being associated with the company (albeit in a different order): Ernest R. Rubsamen, Samuel C. Cutler, and Francis H. Glazebrook. Rather than manufacture medical supplies, the notice of incorporation indicated that the company would "manufacture radium specialties" (Chemical & Metallurgical Engineering. Vol. 26, No. 4, 1922).

If there was an intended difference between the American Radium Products Company and the American Radium Appliance Company, I don't know what it was. Perhaps one was to focus on manufacturing and the other on sales. They didn't seem to have lasted very long-the only references I have found to them date from 1922. My guess is that they ceased operations when the National Radium Products Company was incorporated (1923/1924).

Savoye's patent for the radium emanator was assigned to the American Radium Appliance Company, but it would be the National Radium Products Company that would manufacture and sell the device.

National Radium Products Company

The earliest references I have found to the National Radium Products Company are from 1924. One was a notice that appeared in the Journal of Medical-physical Research (Vol. 2, 1924). It reported that the National Radium Products Company "will exhibit their new radium emanator models for office, home and hospital" at an upcoming medical conference. I suspect that the company was organized in 1923 in order to take over the operations of the American Radium Products Company and the American Radium Appliance Company.

There is evidence that the National Radium Products Company might have existed as late as 1933 (1933 New York City Directory). nevertheless, I suspect that its existence was in name only after 1929.

I have found several addresses for the company: 345 Madison Avenue, 18 West 45th Street (1927-1928) and 445 West 41st Street (1931-1933) in New York. Of course, there might have been others.

National Radium Products Company's product line seems to have been limited to one item: the National Radium Emanator featured above.

Reflecting the fact that the company's first president, Francis Glazebrook, was a physician, the company's literature was aimed squarely at medical professionals, e.g.,

"An outline of radium and its emanations, a complete handbook for the medical profession" (A.E. Fein. 33 pages, 1924)"

"The effect of radium therapy upon physiology & metabolism" (M.J. Rosenau. 1924)

"Radium Therapy in Gout, Arthritis and Rheumatism" (16 pages. 1925)

"Radium Therapy in High Blood Pressure and Circulatory Diseases" (1925)

Herbert F. Savoye

The National Radium Emanator was invented by Herbert Savoye of Hackensack, New Jersey-he filed the patent for it on February 8, 1922(Apparatus for Preparing Artificial Radioactive Water, 1,452,709). The patent, which he assigned to the American Radium Appliance Company, was granted April 24, 1923. A nice birthday present, he turned 30 years old that month.

A little earlier, in 1919, Savoye filed a notice of organization for the Radio-Active Compounds Company "to manufacture chemicals, etc." (Drug & Chemical Markets Vol. 5, Mar. 19, 1919). Whether or not the company manufactured anything is unknown, but I doubt that it did. The 1920 census indicated that Savoye was living with his parents and working as a salesman for a brokerage house. Ten years later he had the same job, but had moved out of his parent's home and started a family. There is no indication that he was involved in the manufacture or marketing of the emanator.

Francis Henry Glazebrook

Francis H. Glazebrook was born in Maryland in 1877, but he spent most of his adult life living and working in Morristown, N.J. and New York City. He graduated from Cornell in 1900 with a medical degree. In 1902 he married Grace Squire, and together they had two children.

At various times, he managed a private medical practice, served as a coroner for Morris County, NJ. (ca. 1911), served as the secretary and treasurer of the Board of Health for the City of Morristown, was president of the Morris County Milk Commission (ca. 1915, 1916), was on the Executive Committee of the Medical Society of New Jersey (1922), and had a staff position at the Presbyterian Hospital in New York City (1921). He was also the Medical Director for the New York Stock Exchange (ca. 1929-1935). If he had known CPR, the Black Friday stock market crash of 1929 would have kept him busy dealing with heart attacks on the trading floor.

The bottom line is that he was a civic-minded physician rather than a businessman. This is attested to by the subject matter of his book, "Abundant Life: a Doctor Speaks of Health" (Christopher Publishing House, Boston. 1952).

By one means or another, Glazebrook became aware of Savoye's emanator and took steps to get it into production. This involved the creation of two companies, the American Radium Products Company and the American Radium Appliance Company. Savoye's patent was assigned to the latter. By 1924, both of these appear to have been dissolved and the production of the emanator taken over by the National Radium Products Company in New York City.

Glazebrook served as president of National Radium Products Company at the beginning, but very soon that position was taken over by A. Edwin Fein. At the end, as indicated by the 1933 New York City Directory, Fein still served as the president while Glazebrook functioned as the company's vice-president-treasurer. The company products were described in the Directory as "phys supplies mfrs." In other words, National Radium Products manufactured and distributed physician's supplies. It is not known if any of these employed radium.

National Radium Products Company was not a scam operation whose primary objective was to make money - at least from Glazebrook's perspective. He actually seemed to have believed that medical benefits could be derived from drinking radioactive water, and that he had a responsibility to make these benefits available to the public. The following quotes are from a paper he published in 1922, (The Treatment of High Blood Pressure with Radioactive Water. American Medicine Vol 28. June, 1922).

"Mankind, thru disregard of the laws of nature and the abuse of his body functions, has been cut down before his accorded time on earth... the "fountain of youth" is in the reach of every living being... Radium is the one hope of the future... I believe that the future of radium will prove to be in its internal administration... no one questions the curative value of the waters of the world's famous [health] springs, nor is there any question that this curative factor is due largely to radio-activity... The general profession has neglected therapy with radio-active water. On account of the impossibility to procure it, until very recently the only portable appliances for this purpose were cumbersome and crude"

"A simple, easily regulated and thoroly [sic] scientific appliance has been devised where-by soluble radium chloride dissolved in salt solution may be used.

"This appliance is portable and makes it possible for a patient to have an adequate supply of radio-active water constantly available. Since a considerable amount of radium is needed, it is the custom to rent these appliances under the direction of the medical attendant"

I suppose we might give Glazebrook a pass for the sales pitch at the end, but the spelling is a little harder to forgive.

For what it's worth, this paper would frequently be quoted by other manufacturers of radioactive curative devices (e.g., the Zimmer Radon Generator).

A. Edwin Fein

At first, A. Edwin Fein served as the vice-president and secretary of the National Radium Products Company, but he soon assumed Glazebrook's position as company president. One reference incorrectly indicates that he only held that position from 1924-1925 (Who's Who in American Jewry. 1980), while another suggests that it was 1925-1935 (American Jews: their lives and achievements. American Jewish Library Foundation. 1947).

Fein was variously described as a "business executive," "management executive," "marketing-management-research-consultant" (Who's Who in American Jewry. 1980). Without doubt, he was an impressive guy. Born in 1898, he became president of the National Radium Products Company while he was still a student at Columbia University and/or New York University. Prior to that, from 1919 to 1922, he had been a manager at William H, Knox & Co. While his career is too extensive to consider here, it is worth noting that he seems to have been the President and General Manager of Sparklets Corporation for a period of time. Some of these "sparklets" were used to produce radon-containing sparkling water. Learn about this product.
The National Radium Products Company of Grand Junction, Colorado
The National Radium Products Company of Grand Junction Colorado had no relation to the New York company of the same name. Among other things, they did not operate at the same time. The Colorado company was incorporated in 1916 "to mine and treat radium ore" (Fairplay Flume. Feb. 4, 1916) and by 1922 they were out of business (Mines Register. Vol. 15. 1922).

Although they were primarily a mining operation, they seem to have marketed at least one commercial product: Radium Fertilizer. The latter was said to have the effect of "Eternal Sunshine" (Brodsky, A. A handbook of Radiation Measurement and Protection. 1978).

The man behind the National Radium Products Company, and also its president, was George W. Kunkle. It was a turbulent presidency, Kunkle was sued by company stockholders who claimed that he had defrauded them in a transfer of company stock and property. In 1922, the case made it all the way to the Colorado Supreme Court. The latter ruled in Kunkle's favor, but the lawsuit proved to be the end of the company (Telluride Daily Journal, March 11, 1922).

No need to feel sorry for him. Within a year Kunkle was occupying the president's office of his latest creation, the Vanadium Corporation of Colorado - undoubtedly with the majority of the company's shares in his pocket.

It should also be noted that Kunkle was granted a patent in 1918 for a radium applicator (1,288,048) and another in 1921 for a radium emanator (1,395,120). Unfortunately, I don't know if there was any attempt made to manufacture and market either of these.

He was certainly an interesting guy. For example, he was "an authority on Saurology" according to the November 2, 1925 issue of the Lincoln Star. Kunkle was being interviewed by the paper about the discovery of a portion of a fossilized dinosaur egg. He claimed it was the "first of its kind to be found in America."

He was a politician in addition to being a dinosaur expert, and in 1912 he was elected to the Colorado state legislature. He ran for office as a socialist, but this was early in his career. The attractions of capitalism would soon prove irresistible. The following quotes from a newspaper account (Plateau Voice, October 4, 1912) give a feel for what he was like on the stump "Mr. Kunkle is an odd character. The way he disfigures the king's English is something fierce... and his oratory is of the most unconventional sort... Mr. Kunkle is a verbal cyclone."

Kunkle might also have done time, but maybe not as much as he was supposed to. The following is taken from the March 30, 1899 issue of the Eagle County Blade: "The sheriff's office received the news of a jail break at Glenwood Springs on Monday. The telegraphic description of the escaped prisoners is as follows: "George Kunkle, six feet one inch in height, weight about 180 pounds, black hair and eyes."

Perhaps it was a different George Kunkle.

The National Radium Products Company of St. Louis, Missouri

Apparently there was another unrelated "National Radium Products Company" in St. Louis. A newspaper advertisement taken out by one of their distributors, William H. Wild, indicated that they sold "Radium Medical Preparations, Compresses and Healing Radium Waters" (Troy Call. Feb. 24, 1922). Unfortunately, that is all I know about them.
References

American Medical Association. New and Nonofficial Remedies. 1924.

Herbert Savoye. Apparatus for Preparing Artificial Radioactive Water. U.S. Patent 1,452,709. April 24, 1923.

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The National Radium Emanator (ca. 1923-1930)

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The National Radium Emanator, an extremely sophisticated device, was produced ca. 1924-1929 by National Radium Products Company of New York City. The photo above shows the emanator alongside its carrying case. The photograph below is a close-up of the instructions that are clipped to the inside of the door of the unit.

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Conceptualize On this slide gather 4-5 pictures that show your concept.