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the ideas and innovations of the 1920s were things that characterized the public and the things that they did. They also were some of the most important things that affected society and things that we still love and use today.

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The first electronic television was created in 1927 by a 21 year old, Philo Taylor Farnsworth, and completely changed the american public. The invention of the television granted the public access to see what was happening in other part of the world and the country. Soon after it was made it was being manufactured and produced all over the country and was then in everyones homes. This became a staple in American society, everyone had one.

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Televisions can be found in billions of homes around the world. But 100 years ago, nobody even knew…

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ideas and innovations 1.2 discovery of penicillin 

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ideas and innovations 1.2 discovery of penicillin 

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Dr. Fleming discovered penicillin when he returned from a holiday in 1923. He noticed that one of the bacteria in the petri dishes containing colonies of Staphylococcus, a bacteria that causes sore throats and abscesses was unusual. He later discovered that in that dish was a bacteria called penicillin which cured that. The discovery revolutionized the medicinal world and changed the amount of sick people in the US and worldwide. This discovery paved the way for many others like it.

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Alexander Fleming Discovery and Development of Penicillin - Landmark - American Chemical Society

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American Chemical Society: Chemistry for Life.

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ideas and innovations 1.3 World series on radio

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ideas and innovations 1.3 World series on radio

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The world series was among one of the first things that were ever broadcasted on the radio. Thousands of americans listened in on the game that couldn't attend themselves . The radio was new technology that entrianced the public. it was invented by Guglielmo Marconi Marconi and was the first practical radio that was widely used by the public, many people used this to listen to news and baseball broadcasts from yankee stadium.

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Philliedelphia: Philadelphia Phillies News and Rumors

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Today, fans take for granted their ability to easily obtain an update on a ball game. They can look for updates on their phone, computer, radio, or television. A diehard Phillies fan can cheer, jeer, and otherwise follow the team without ever having to step foot inside Citizens Bank Park. But prior to 1921, going to the ballpark was the only way a fan could follow their favorite team in real time, with the exception of the "watching" the World Series on a Playograph. All of that changed on August 5, 1921 when the Philadelphia Phillies played the Pittsburgh Pirates at Forbes Field in Pittsburgh.

On Saturday August 5, 1921, the bottom-feeding Phillies played the final game of a three game series against league-leading Pittsburgh Pirates. The Phils dropped the previous two games against the Pirates and sought to rebound before they headed to Cincinnati to take on the Reds.

Radio was still in its infancy in 1921. The previous November, Pittsburgh's KDKA station broadcasted presidential election results for the first time, unofficially kickstarting commercial radio. Nine months later, 25-year-old Westinghouse employee Harold Arlin sat behind home plate at Forbes Field and watched as the Pirates and Phillies concluded their series. Arlin had with him transmitter equipment and a telephone-turned-microphone. The items were rigged so he could broadcast his voice over radio waves, becoming the first play-by-play announcer in baseball history.

Ronald Smith quotes Arlin in his book Play-by-Play: Radio, Television, and Big-Time College Sport:

"We were looking for programming," Arlin recalled years later, "and baseball seemed a natural. I went to Forbes Field and set up shop." The operation, a hand-held telephone connected to a transmitter in a box behind home plate, had a few glitches, though. "Nobody told me I had to talk between pitches," he conceded, and when he did, his distinctive deep voice did not always come through. "Sometimes the transmitter didn't work. Often the crowd noise would drown us out. We didn't know whether we'd talk into a total vacuum or whether somebody would hear us."

The broadcast was an immediate success, and while the World Series would be broadcast on the radio yearly from 1921 onward, regular broadcasts were nearly a decade away. Club owners feared that fans wouldn't attend games if they could simply listen to them on the radio. Eventually, they found that broadcasting games regularly was a way to advertise their team in a way that newspapers and playograh's could not.

The Phillies lost to the Pirates that day 8-5 and finished the 1921 season with a dismal 51-103 record.

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August 5, 1921: The first MLB radio broadcast

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Today, fans take for granted their ability to easily obtain an update on a ball game. They can look for updates on their phone, computer, radio, or television. A diehard Phillies fan can cheer, jeer, and otherwise follow the team without ever having to step foot inside Citizens Bank Park.

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ideas and innovations 1.4 Ford Company established

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ideas and innovations 1.4 Ford Company established

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Ford company was established in june 6, 1903 but became a huge part of society in the 1920s. The most popular model that was sold was the Model T, made from 1908 to 1927, and the 1924 Chrysler Model B-70. Many Americans showed pride driving these cars around town a they were an american owned company and all of the money they made went right back into the american economy.

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1948

Ford introduces the F-Series line of trucks.

With its first postwar truck design, Ford ceased building trucks on car platforms and used a purpose-built truck platform instead. The truck was available in eight sizes and weight ratings, from the ½ ton capacity F-1 to the three-ton capacity F-8. In 1953, Ford replaced the F-1 with the ½ ton F-100, along with the F-250 ¾ ton trucks and the F-350 one-ton trucks. In 1984, the F-100 was replaced by the F-150 line of trucks. Since 1982, F-series has been the best-selling vehicle in the U.S.

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With its first postwar truck design, Ford ceased building trucks on car platforms and used a purpose-built truck platform instead. The truck was available in eight sizes and weight ratings, from the ½ ton capacity F-1 to the three-ton capacity F-8.

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Society in the 1920s was quite different than society today. They were making so many revolutions and new inventions that shaped the way that society perceived the United States as a whole. The 20s was a very prosperous time with lots of fun and parties in the public, as well as patriotism.

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The 19th amendment was one of the most influential amendments in the constitution. This amendment allowed women the right to vote. The public was extremely happy and Women soon began exercising their right to vote and gave them a actual voice in what happened in their country. Some men were not happy that they were not the only people in the household that actually had a right to vote now and that women were slowly coming out of oppression.

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The 19th Amendment to the U.S. Constitution granted American women the right to vote, a right known as women's suffrage, and was ratified on August 18, 1920, ending almost a century of protest. In 1848 the movement for women's rights launched on a national level with the Seneca Falls Convention organized by Elizabeth Cady Stanton and Lucretia Mott. Following the convention, the demand for the vote became a centerpiece of the women's rights movement. Stanton and Mott, along with Susan B. Anthony and other activists, raised public awareness and lobbied the government to grant voting rights to women. After a lengthy battle, these groups finally emerged victorious with the passage of the 19th Amendment.

Women's Suffrage

During America's early history, women were denied some of the basic rights enjoyed by male citizens.

For example, married women couldn't own property and had no legal claim to any money they might earn, and no female had the right to vote. Women were expected to focus on housework and motherhood, not politics.

The campaign for women's suffrage was a small but growing movement in the decades before the Civil War. Starting in the 1820s, various reform groups proliferated across the U.S.-temperance leagues, the abolitionist movement, religious groups-and in a number of these, women played a prominent role.

Meanwhile, many American women were resisting the notion that the ideal woman was a pious, submissive wife and mother concerned exclusively with home and family. Combined, these factors contributed to a new way of thinking about what it meant to be a woman and a citizen in the United States.

Seneca Falls Convention

It was not until 1848 that the movement for women's rights began to organize at the national level.

In July of that year, reformers Elizabeth Cady Stanton and Lucretia Mott organized the first women's rights convention at Seneca Falls, New York (where Stanton lived). More than 300 people-mostly women, but also some men-attended, including former African-American slave and activist Frederick Douglass.

In addition to their belief that women should be afforded better opportunities for education and employment, most of the delegates at the Seneca Falls Convention agreed that American women were autonomous individuals who deserved their own political identities.

Declaration of Sentiments

A group of delegates led by Stanton produced a "Declaration of Sentiments" document, modeled after the Declaration of Independence, which stated: "We hold these truths to be self-evident: that all men and women are created equal; that they are endowed by their Creator with certain inalienable rights; that among these are life, liberty, and the pursuit of happiness."

What this meant, among other things, was that the delegates believed women should have the right to vote.

Following the convention, the idea of voting rights for women was mocked in the press and some delegates withdrew their support for the Declaration of Sentiments. Nonetheless, Stanton and Mott persisted-they went on to spearhead additional women's rights conferences and they were eventually joined in their advocacy work by Susan B. Anthony and other activists.

National Suffrage Groups Established

With the onset of the Civil War, the suffrage movement lost some momentum, as many women turned their attention to assisting in efforts related to the conflict between the states.

After the war, women's suffrage endured another setback, when the women's rights movement found itself divided over the issue of voting rights for black men. Stanton and some other suffrage leaders objected to the proposed 15th Amendment to the U.S. Constitution, which would give black men the right to vote, but failed to extend the same privilege to American women of any skin color.

In 1869, Stanton and Anthony formed the National Woman Suffrage Association (NWSA) with their eyes on a federal constitutional amendment that would grant women the right to vote.

That same year, abolitionists Lucy Stone and Henry Blackwell founded the American Woman Suffrage Association (AWSA); the group's leaders supported the 15th Amendment and feared it would not pass if it included voting rights for women. (The 15th Amendment was ratified in 1870.)

The AWSA believed women's enfranchisement could best be gained through amendments to individual state constitutions. Despite the divisions between the two organizations, there was a victory for voting rights in 1869 when the Wyoming Territory granted all female residents age 21 and older the right to vote. (When Wyoming was admitted to the Union in 1890, women's suffrage remained part of the state constitution.)

By 1878, the NWSA and the collective suffrage movement had gathered enough influence to lobby the U.S. Congress for a constitutional amendment. Congress responded by forming committees in the House of Representatives and the Senate to study and debate the issue. However, when the proposal finally reached the Senate floor in 1886, it was defeated.

Carrie Chapman Catt

In 1890, the NWSA and the AWSA merged to form the National American Woman Suffrage Association (NAWSA). The new organization's strategy was to lobby for women's voting rights on a state-by-state basis. Within six years, Colorado, Utah and Idaho adopted amendments to their state constitutions granting women the right to vote. In 1900, with Stanton and Anthony advancing in age, Carrie Chapman Catt stepped up to lead the NASWA.

The turn of the 20th century brought renewed momentum to the women's suffrage cause. Although the deaths of Stanton in 1902 and Anthony in 1906 appeared to be setbacks, the NASWA under the leadership of Catt achieved rolling successes for women's enfranchisement at state levels.

Between 1910 and 1918, the Alaska Territory, Arizona, Arkansas, California, Illinois, Indiana, Kansas, Michigan, Montana, Nebraska, Nevada, New York, North Dakota, Oklahoma, Oregon, South Dakota and Washington extended voting rights to women.

Also during this time, through the Equality League of Self-Supporting Women (later, the Women's Political Union), Stanton's daughter Harriot Stanton Blatch introduced parades, pickets and marches as means of calling attention to the cause. These tactics succeeded in raising awareness and led to unrest in Washington, D.C.

Did you know? Wyoming, the first state to grant voting rights to women, was also the first state to elect a female governor. Nellie Tayloe Ross (1876-1977) was elected governor of the Equality State-Wyoming's official nickname-in 1924. And from 1933 to 1953, she served as the first woman director of the U.S. Mint.

Protest and Progress

On the eve of the inauguration of President Woodrow Wilson in 1913, protesters thronged a massive suffrage parade in the nation's capital, and hundreds of women were injured. That same year, Alice Paul founded the Congressional Union for Woman Suffrage, which later became the National Woman's Party.

The organization staged numerous demonstrations and regularly picketed the White House, among other militant tactics. As a result of these actions, some group members were arrested and served jail time.

In 1918, President Wilson switched his stand on women's voting rights from objection to support through the influence of Catt, who had a less-combative style than Paul. Wilson also tied the proposed suffrage amendment to America's involvement in World War I and the increased role women had played in the war efforts.

When the amendment came up for vote, Wilson addressed the Senate in favor of suffrage. As reported in The New York Times on October 1, 1918, Wilson said, "I regard the extension of suffrage to women as vitally essential to the successful prosecution of the great war of humanity in which we are engaged."

However, despite Wilson's newfound support, the amendment proposal failed in the Senate by two votes. Another year passed before Congress took up the measure again.

The Final Struggle

On May 21, 1919, U.S. Representative James R. Mann, a Republican from Illinois and chairman of the Suffrage Committee, proposed the House resolution to approve the Susan Anthony Amendment granting women the right to vote. The measure passed the House 304 to 89-a full 42 votes above the required two-thirds majority.

Two weeks later, on June 4, 1919, the U.S. Senate passed the 19th Amendment by two votes over its two-thirds required majority, 56-25. The amendment was then sent to the states for ratification.

Within six days of the ratification cycle, Illinois, Michigan and Wisconsin each ratified the amendment. Kansas, New York and Ohio followed on June 16, 1919. By March of the following year, a total of 35 states had approved the amendment, one state shy of the two-thirds required for ratification.

Southern states were adamantly opposed to the amendment, however, and seven of them- Alabama, Georgia, Louisiana, Maryland, Mississippi, South Carolina and Virginia-had already rejected it before Tennessee's vote on August 18, 1920. It was up to Tennessee to tip the scale for woman suffrage.

The outlook appeared bleak, given the outcomes in other Southern states and given the position of Tennessee's state legislators in their 48-48 tie. The state's decision came down to 23-year-old Representative Harry T. Burn, a Republican from McMinn County, to cast the deciding vote.

Although Burn opposed the amendment, his mother convinced him to approve it. Mrs. Burn reportedly wrote to her son: "Don't forget to be a good boy and help Mrs. Catt put the 'rat' in ratification."

With Burn's vote, the 19th Amendment was fully ratified.

When Did Women Get the Right to Vote?

On August 26, 1920, the 19th Amendment was certified by U.S. Secretary of State Bainbridge Colby, and women finally achieved the long-sought right to vote throughout the United States.

On November 2 of that same year, more than 8 million women across the U.S. voted in elections for the first time.

It took over 60 years for the remaining 12 states to ratify the 19th Amendment. Mississippi was the last to do so, on March 22, 1984.

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The 19th Amendment to the U.S. Constitution granted American women the right to vote, a right known as women's suffrage, and was ratified on August 18, 1920, ending almost a century of protest. In 1848 the movement for women's rights launched on a national level with the Seneca Falls Convention organized by Elizabeth Cady Stanton and Lucretia Mott.

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society and culture 1.2  yankee stadium built

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society and culture 1.2  yankee stadium built

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Yankee stadium was a huge staple in american society that affected the american public as it gave them a beautiful structure to watch their favorite game at, Baseball. The stadium was built in 1923 and was open to the public for use. This was before the Great Depression hit the public. The stadium provided many fun times and also provided much needed entertainment for the entertainment starved public.

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Ballparks of Baseball - Your Guide to Major League Baseball Stadiums

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Bronx, NY

Throughout the world there are many buildings or structures, that become famous, legendary or popular over time for a variety of reasons. Yankee Stadium was one of these historic archives to many baseball fans across the world. The 2008 baseball season marked the end to one of the most famous stadiums in the world, Yankee Stadium. Since the time of its opening more than eight decades ago, the stadium was the home to one of the greatest teams in sports, the New York Yankees, with legendary players such as Babe Ruth, Lou Gehrig, Joe Dimaggio, Mickey Mantle and today's stars, Alex Rodriquez and Derek Jeter. The Yankees have a long history that dates back to Baltimore at the turn of the 20th century. They moved to New York in 1903 and were then known as the New York Highlanders. They played at Hilltop Park until 1912, when their lease expired. They accepted an invitation to play at the New York Giants home, Polo Grounds and changed their name to the Yankees. They signed a ten year lease at the Polo Grounds in 1913 and began to outdraw the Giants at the end of the decade as a result of the acquisition of Babe Ruth. By 1920, the Yankees became the first team to attract more than one million fans. The Giants evicted the Yankees after the 1922 season, hoping that the Yankees would have to move to a borough far away so the Giants would attract more fans.

The Yankees looked at several locations across the city to construct a new stadium. Various sites were explored including Queens, upper Manhattan and along 5th Avenue and 32nd Street. Yankees co-owners, Colonel Jacobs Ruppert and Colonel T.L. Huston, paid $675,000 for land in the Bronx, less than one mile from Polo Grounds, to build the stadium. Designed by Osborn Engineering, original plans called for a triple-decked stadium with grandstands circling the entire field. However, because the stadium seemed too foreboding, the original plans were scaled back. Instead, the ballpark became the first to have three tiers of seating, consisting of 58,000 seats. It was also the first ballpark to be called a stadium due to its enormous size. Construction of the stadium began on May 5, 1922 and was completed in just 284 days. The stadium was built of mainly steel and concrete, as the triple decked grandstand extended behind homeplate and up the base lines. The lower deck continued until it met the wooden bleachers behind the outfield fence. A 15-foot copper facade was erected to adorn the stadium's third deck. This quickly became one of its most recognized and grandest features. The scoreboard was located beyond the bleachers in right field. Given the name Yankee Stadium, it was completed in only 284 days, opening on April 18, 1923. Original dimensions at Yankee Stadium were 295 ft. (right), 490 ft. (center), and 281 ft. (left). Centerfield became known as "Death Valley" because of its distance from homeplate.

Since the Yankees achieved great such tremendous success in attracting fans at Yankee Stadium, it was not long before the stadium was expanded. The triple decked grandstand was extended into left field in 1928 and the same extension was completed down the right field line in 1937. Concrete bleachers replaced the wooden bleachers beyond the outfield fence. With the addition of the grandstands, the capacity of Yankee Stadium grew to nearly 80,000, depending on the amount of people that stood while watching games. The first of many monuments and plaques was added in 1932. This area became known as "Monument Park" in fair territory in dead center field when a monument to former manager Miller Huggins was erected. Monuments of Babe Ruth, Lou Gehrig, and others were erected in years following 1932. Night baseball came to Yankee Stadium on May 28, 1946 and a new scoreboard was installed in 1959. Other sports, such as boxing and football, were played at Yankee Stadium until the early 1970s.

In the early 1970s, Yankee Stadium began showing its age. In 1971, Yankees owner Mike Burke began exploring the possibility of building a new stadium in New Jersey. However New York City Mayor, John Lindsay, announced that the city would buy and renovate Yankee Stadium, purchasing it for $24 million in 1972. The same year, George Steinbrenner bought the team. The Yankees played in Yankee Stadium one more year before drastic changes were made.

Renovations to Yankee Stadium began immediately after the 1973 season. While Yankee Stadium was being renovated the Yankees played at Shea Stadium, home of the New York Mets. Parts of Yankee Stadium were completely demolished. Changes were made to eliminate the posts and columns that supported the upper deck. The copper facade atop the upper deck was removed and replicated at the top of the scoreboard that runs from center field to right field. New 22 inch blue, plastic seats replaced the old 18 inch wooden green seats reducing the capacity to 54,000. New luxury suites and concessions were added along with the remodeling of the press box and restrooms. To eliminate climbs to the third level, escalators and elevators were added to parts of the exterior of the stadium. The facade of Yankee Stadium was repainted and a 138 foot tall replica of a Louisville Slugger baseball bat was placed near the entrance of the stadium.

After two years of renovations, Yankee Stadium reopened on April 15, 1976. There were several striking differences that fans noticed at the renovated stadium. They included the monuments in centerfield that were moved to Monument Park behind the left-centerfield wall and the original copper facade now replicated above the scoreboard in the outfield. However, the transition to the renovated Yankee Stadium was easy as the Yankees made it to the 1976 World Series. Since the late 1970s, very few changes occurred at Yankee Stadium. It remained the home to many great ballplayers and an excellent place to see a game. Since its opening in 1923, Yankee Stadium was home to 26 World Championship teams. In the late 1990s the Yankees began exploring the possibility of building a new stadium as Yankee Stadium lacked many of the modern amenities of newer ballparks built. In June 2005, the team announced plans to construct a new Yankee Stadium. Yankee Stadium will be demolished over a two year period, completed by Summer 2010, and converted into a public park area featuring a baseball and softball field. Nearly 12,000 trees will be planted in the shape of the stadium. For more than eight decades Yankee Stadium was the home to some of the greatest players in baseball. The Yankees played their last regular season game at Yankee Stadium on September 21, 2008. The new Yankee Stadium opened across East 161st Street in April 2009.

Yankee Stadium Pictures

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Yankee Stadium - history, photos and more of the New York Yankees ballpark from 1923-2008

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Throughout the world there are many buildings or structures, that become famous, legendary or popular over time for a variety of reasons. Yankee Stadium was one of these historic archives to many baseball fans across the world. The 2008 baseball season marked the end to one of the most famous stadiums in the world, Yankee Stadium.

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society and culture 1.3 The great gatsby published

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society and culture 1.3 The great gatsby published

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The great gatsby was written by author F. Scott Fitzgerald in the 1920s and was a great visual representation of that time period. He wrote about the prosperity and parties of that time and it sold millions due to the fact that the people were so interested in reading about Jay Gatsby and Daisy Buchanan.

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You have to look at the novel in total, particularly the last chapters. It's important to move beyond the flappers and parties, even the two murders. The backstory that Nick (quite impossibly, in the level of detail) discovers about Jimmy Gatz, aka Jay Gatsby, is critical to feeling both the glory and the tragedy of the story.

Gatsby, it turns out, is an unmade child of the Midwest, ashamed of what he is, and schooled in the most banal kind of mail-order self reinvention, who is then elevated and corrupted by Dan Cody and his lover. These two influences are fused in the pursuit of Daisy, and much else he does. (There is a later echo of this Midwest/East motif when Nick talks about taking the train East in college, as well. We can tell it's a pretty big deal in the book's artistic intention.)

Much of American Literature is a consideration of our ability to head to the frontier, reinvent ourselves, make a shining city on a hill, be the last best hope for mankind, free ourselves of the shackles of the past, the tragic fate of birth in a particular place ... you get the picture. It is shot through our attitudes to class, politics, the immigrant experience, and much else. That is why it is such an important theme in our national art -- you don't find it in the same way in the literature of England or Japan, say. This is rather uniquely explored in The Great Gatsby.

Fitzgerald, who was a very great artist and an admirer of John Keats (think the romance of impermanence, beauty that must die to have meaning, etc), added to our discourse on self-invention a deep expression of the romantic yearning inside this dream. In addition, he noticed the way in which we love the promise of the glittering and the shiny and the powerful, but how even to dream of it, let alone to seek it, also corrupts us and destroys us. And yet, we need it and live by it.

Art notices and points at previously little-noticed things in our experience, and helps us experience life more fully -- sometimes even more wisely. Fitzgerald added deeper meaning to understanding the problematic, often tragic, dimensions of pursuing the American dream, or experience.

He did this at a time when America was becoming even more powerful, and its promises of power, fame, and adoration even more extreme. That created a whole new dimension to our understanding of our culture and ourselves.

More questions on The Great Gatsby (1925 book):

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What Influence Did The Great Gatsby Have on American Literature?

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You have to look at the novel in total, particularly the last chapters. It's important to move beyond the flappers and parties, even the two murders. The backstory that Nick (quite impossibly, in the level of detail) discovers about Jimmy Gatz, aka Jay Gatsby, is critical to feeling both the glory and the tragedy of the story.

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society and culture 1.4 Mickey mouse is born 

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society and culture 1.4 Mickey mouse is born 

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Mickey Mouse was one of the first cartoon characters to ever premiere on television and create such a huge impact and empire as he has today. His creator was Mr. Walt Disney himself who later went on to create one of the biggest television empires known today, Disney Channel. Mickey Mouse if the fictional mouse character that started it all. He came to life on 1928 and starred in over 130 films. He then got his own cartoon strip in his paper with his friends Minnie and Pluto.

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"He popped out of my mind onto a drawing pad 20 years ago on a train ride from Manhattan to Hollywood at a time when the business fortunes of my brother Roy and myself were at lowest ebb, and disaster seemed right around the corner," Walt penned in a 1948 essay titled "What Mickey Means to Me." The disaster Walt mentioned was the brazen theft of both his successful cartoon character Oswald the Lucky Rabbit, as well as most of the Disney artists, at the hands of Universal distributor Charles Mintz. As for who popped out of Walt's mind? Why, that was Mickey Mouse!

Just before Walt left New York for the cross-country train ride back to Hollywood, he sent his brother Roy a telegram. Nowhere in it did he outline the possible career-ending blow he and his brother had just sustained. He simply indicated when he would arrive home, and took care to add, "Don't worry everything OK," to ease his brother's nerves. Everything was not okay. Walt knew he had to come up with a new character, and fast. Walt's daughter Diane Disney Miller recalled, "It was on that long train ride that dad conceived of a new cartoon subject, a mouse who was then refined and further developed by Ub Iwerks, and given his name by my mother."

The first Mickey Mouse cartoon actually completed was Plane Crazy. Inspired by Charles Lindbergh's heroic first solo flight across the Atlantic, its plot entailed Mickey and some animal friends attempting to assemble their own airplane. The cartoon premiered in Hollywood on May 15, 1928, in the form of a test screening. It failed to obtain distribution. The second Mickey Mouse cartoon, The Gallopin' Gaucho, met with the same fate. One unpleasant distributor even told Walt, "They don't know you and they don't know your mouse."

The third time was the charm for Mickey, however, when Steamboat Willie premiered on November 18, 1928, in New York's Colony Theatre. It was one of the very first cartoons to ever successfully utilize synchronized sound, and was so popular, it was talked about more than the feature film it was meant to just compliment. Walt received $1,000 for a two-week run-the highest sum ever paid for a cartoon on Broadway. Walt Disney Studios, with its small but loyal staff, was saved, and a cartoon star was born.

But, when was he born?

Oddly enough, Mickey's "official" birthday changed dates seemingly every year for decades following 1928. In 1933, Walt himself proclaimed, "Mickey Mouse will be five years old on Sunday. He was born on October 1, 1928. That was the date on which his first picture was started, so we have allowed him to claim this day as his birthday." That date wouldn't last. Ranging from late September to December, Mickey's birthday was often altered to conform to specific promotions. It wasn't until 1978 that Dave Smith, the founder of the Disney Archives, determined that the premiere of Steamboat Willie was truly Mickey Mouse's first public appearance, therefore his date of birth.

This of course makes November 18, 1928 Minnie Mouse's birthday too, as she was there hurrying along the banks of the river trying to catch Pegleg Pete's steamboat. Ever resourceful, Mickey found a way to get her aboard even after the boat had departed. The two realized an instant connection, and the rest, as they say, is history.
Happy birthday Minnie. And happy birthday, Mickey! Keith Gluck is a WDFM volunteer, writer/editor for thedisneyproject.com, and lifelong student of Disney. His Disney life started early, visiting Disneyland before turning one, and writing his very first book report on a Walt Disney biography for kids.

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"He popped out of my mind onto a drawing pad 20 years ago on a train ride from Manhattan to Hollywood at a time when the business fortunes of my brother Roy and myself were at lowest ebb, and disaster seemed right around the corner," Walt penned in 1948.

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Economics in the 1920s changed drastically from the begging to the end. it Began with many people being prosperous and having good money to the stock market crashing, making the economy go in a downward spiral and changing the way millions of americans lived.

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By the late 1800s, prohibitionist groups have rallied against the production, distribution, and usage of alcohol. They have claimed that alcohol leads to recklessness, drunkenness, and Americans being a threat to their very own nation.

Because of the immense amount of distress that the public had against intoxication drinks, congress decided to finally make the production, sale, and use of alcohol illegal in the United States. Congress had hopes that this would solve the problem of high crime in the United States and problems, when, to their surprise, did the opposite. This law proved to be extremely difficult to control as americans were finding every way possible to get their fix, including bootlegging and illegal bars and pubs.

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By the late 1800s, prohibition movements had sprung up across the United States, driven by religious groups who considered alcohol, specifically drunkenness, a threat to the nation. The movement reached its apex in 1920 when Congress ratified the 18th Amendment, prohibiting the manufacture, transportation and sale of intoxicating liquors. Prohibition proved difficult to enforce and failed to have the intended effect of eliminating crime and other social problems-to the contrary, it led to a rise in organized crime, as the bootlegging of alcohol became an ever-more lucrative operation. In 1933, widespread public disillusionment led Congress to ratify the 21st Amendment, which repealed Prohibition.

Origins of Temperance Movement

A wave of intense religious revivalism that swept the U.S. during the 1820s and 30s led to the formation of a number of prohibition movements driven by religious groups who considered alcohol, specifically drunkenness, a "national curse." (This revivalism also helped inspire the movement to end slavery.) The first temperance legislation appeared in 1838, in the form of a Massachusetts law prohibiting the sale of spirits in less than 15-gallon quantities. Though it was repealed two years later, Maine passed the first state prohibition law in 1846, and by the time the Civil War began, a number of other states had followed suit.

As early as 1873, the Women's Christian Temperance Union (WCTU) of Ohio called for the abolition of the sale of alcohol. They were soon joined in the fight by the even more powerful Anti-Saloon League (ASL), founded in 1893 in Ohio but later expanded into a national organization that endorsed political candidates and lobbied for legislation against saloons. Beginning around 1906, the ASL led a renewed call for prohibition legislation at the state level. Through speeches, advertisements and public demonstrations at saloons and bars, prohibition advocates attempted to convince people that that eliminating alcohol from society would eliminate poverty and social vices, such as immoral behavior and physical violence. One prominent temperance advocate, Kentucky-born Carrie Amelia Moore Nation (she called herself "Carry A. Nation"), became known for particularly violent tactics against what she called "evil spirits." In addition to making protest speeches, Nation was known for breaking saloon windows and mirrors and destroying kegs of beer or whiskey with a hatchet. She was arrested numerous times, and became a household name across the country for her "saloon-smashing" campaign.

From State to Federal Prohibition Legislation

By 1916, 23 of 48 states had passed anti-saloon legislation. Many went further, prohibiting the manufacture of alcoholic beverages as well. After the congressional elections that year, "dry" members (as those who favored a national prohibition of alcohol became known) won a two-thirds majority over "wet" in the U.S. Congress. On January 29, 1919, Congress ratified the 18th Amendment, which prohibited the manufacturing, transportation and sale of alcohol within the United States; it would go into effect the following January.

Later in 1919, the National Prohibition Act-popularly known as the Volstead Act, after its legislative sponsor, Representative Andrew J. Volstead of Minnesota-was enacted in order to provide the government with the means of enforcing Prohibition. Loopholes in this act-such as the fact that liquor used for medicinal, sacramental or industrial purposes remained legal, as did fruit or grape beverages prepared at home-as well as varying degrees of government support throughout the 1920s hampered the enforcement of Prohibition, and it would remain more of an ideal than a reality.

Unexpected Events

Under Prohibition, the illegal manufacture and sale of liquor-known as "bootlegging"-occurred on a large scale across the United States. In urban areas, where the majority of the population opposed Prohibition, enforcement was generally much weaker than in rural areas and smaller towns. Perhaps the most dramatic consequence of Prohibition was the effect it had on organized crime in the United States: as the production and sale of alcohol went further underground, it began to be controlled by the Mafia and other gangs, who transformed themselves into sophisticated criminal enterprises that reaped huge profits from the illicit liquor trade.

When it came to its booming bootleg business, the Mafia became skilled at bribing police and politicians to look the other way. Chicago's Al Capone emerged as the most notorious example of this phenomenon, earning an estimated $60 million annually from the bootlegging and speakeasy operations he controlled. In addition to bootlegging, gambling and prostitution reached new heights during the 1920s as well. A growing number of Americans came to blame Prohibition for this widespread moral decay and disorder-despite the fact that the legislation had intended to do the opposite-and to condemn it as a dangerous infringement on the freedom of the individual.

Calls for Prohibition's Repeal

If public sentiment had turned against Prohibition by the late 1920s, the advent of the Great Depression only hastened its demise, as some argued that the ban on alcohol denied jobs to the unemployed and much-needed revenue to the government. The efforts of the nonpartisan group Americans Against Prohibition Association (AAPA) added to public disillusionment. In 1932, the platform of Democratic presidential candidate Franklin D. Roosevelt included a plank for repealing the 18th Amendment, and his victory that November marked a certain end to Prohibition.

In February 1933, Congress adopted a resolution proposing the 21st Amendment to the Constitution, which repealed both the 18th Amendment and the Volstead Act. The resolution required state conventions, rather than the state legislatures, to approve the amendment, effectively reducing the process to a one-state, one-vote referendum rather than a popular vote contest. That December, Utah became the 36th state to ratify the amendment, achieving the necessary majority for repeal. A few states continued statewide prohibition after 1933, but by 1966 all of them had abandoned it. Since then, liquor control in the United States has largely been determined at the local level.

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By the late 1800s, prohibition movements had sprung up across the United States, driven by religious groups who considered alcohol, specifically drunkenness, a threat to the nation. The movement reached its apex in 1920 when Congress ratified the 18th Amendment, prohibiting the manufacture, transportation and sale of intoxicating liquors.

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Bootlegging was a huge part of the 1920s, due to the fact that prohibition was a huge part of the 1920s as well because of the fact that the eighteenth amendment caused it. It was intended to help benefit the populations for the greater good but it in turn created crime.

People were in need of their alcohol and would do anything possible to get it. Bootlegging then became a popular practice from 1920 to 1933. In fact, drinking became even more desired and popular in the american public as it was now outlawed. Organized crime, illegal production and distribution became a huge problem in the country.

Although the recreational usage of alcohol was prohibited, loopholes were still being found. Some americans got doctors prescriptions for Whiskey to help with medical issues.

Along with the organized crime of bootlegging, came gangs. Some parts of the country were controlled by specific gangs that sold their own, manufactured alcohol, to the public of that area, preventing others from cashing in on their profit of the addicted public. If another group tried to take a part of their profit, most of the times fights would break out and people would be thrown in jail, or worst case scenario, died due to this.

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Dumping wine, Chicago, Illinois, 1921

Intended to benefit the common good, Prohibition banned the sale and use of most alcohol from 1920 to 1933. But it did not stop Americans from drinking. Continuing and widespread public desire for alcohol had the unexpected consequence of expanding violent, organized crime. Illegal sources of production and distribution emerged quickly, and mob bosses controlled competition with guns. Crime became big business.

Prescription for medicinal alcohol, 1929

Cocktail shaker and cups, 1924

Criminal competition for control of the illegal alcohol market was intense and violent. One of the most notorious mobsters, Al Capone, ruled Chicago with an iron fist. His charitable donations made Capone popular with many people. After the brutal St. Valentine's Day Massacre of rivals in 1929, his popularity tumbled.

Thompson submachine gun, 1920s

The New York Times, February 24, 1929

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Dumping wine, Chicago, Illinois, 1921 Intended to benefit the common good, Prohibition banned the sale and use of most alcohol from 1920 to 1933. But it did not stop Americans from drinking. Continuing and widespread public desire for alcohol had the unexpected consequence of expanding violent, organized crime.

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On October 29, 1929, a devastating event happened on Wall Street, The Stock Market crash. Investors had traded around 16 million shares that day, and Billions of dollars were lost. As a result of this the Great Depression occured(1929-1939), this was the deepest and longest lasting economic struggle in the history of the world at that time.

After this, stock prices could only increase, due to this, there was a considerable amount of recovery in a few weeks, thought the country was far from being stable in the stock market again. The crash of the Stock Market was not the only reason for the Great Depression, but it did a lot to excel it.

President, Franklin D. Roosevelt enacted relief and reform measures which helped lessen the effects of the Great Depression on the American public. The economy did not fully recover from this event until after World War II in 1945.

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On October 29, 1929, Black Tuesday hit Wall Street as investors traded some 16 million shares on the New York Stock Exchange in a single day. Billions of dollars were lost, wiping out thousands of investors. In the aftermath of Black Tuesday, America and the rest of the industrialized world spiraled downward into the Great Depression (1929-39), the deepest and longest-lasting economic downturn in the history of the Western industrialized world up to that time.

1929 Stock Market Crash

During the 1920s, the U.S. stock market underwent rapid expansion, reaching its peak in August 1929, after a period of wild speculation. By then, production had already declined and unemployment had risen, leaving stocks in great excess of their real value. Among the other causes of the eventual market collapse were low wages, the proliferation of debt, a struggling agricultural sector and an excess of large bank loans that could not be liquidated.

Did you know? The New York Stock Exchange was founded in 1817, although its origins date back to 1792 when a group of stockbrokers and merchants signed an agreement under a buttonwood tree on Wall Street.

Stock prices began to decline in September and early October 1929, and on October 18 the fall began. Panic set in, and on October 24, Black Thursday, a record 12,894,650 shares were traded. Investment companies and leading bankers attempted to stabilize the market by buying up great blocks of stock, producing a moderate rally on Friday. On Monday, however, the storm broke anew, and the market went into free fall. Black Monday was followed by Black Tuesday (October 29), in which stock prices collapsed completely and 16,410,030 shares were traded on the New York Stock Exchange in a single day. Billions of dollars were lost, wiping out thousands of investors, and stock tickers ran hours behind because the machinery could not handle the tremendous volume of trading.

1929 Stock Market Crash and the Great Depression

After October 29, 1929, stock prices had nowhere to go but up, so there was considerable recovery during succeeding weeks. Overall, however, prices continued to drop as the United States slumped into the Great Depression, and by 1932 stocks were worth only about 20 percent of their value in the summer of 1929. The stock market crash of 1929 was not the sole cause of the Great Depression, but it did act to accelerate the global economic collapse of which it was also a symptom. By 1933, nearly half of America's banks had failed, and unemployment was approaching 15 million people, or 30 percent of the workforce.

Relief and reform measures enacted by the administration of President Franklin D. Roosevelt (1882-1945) helped lessen the worst effects of the Great Depression; however, the U.S. economy would not fully turn around until after 1939, when World War II (1939-45) revitalized American industry.
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On October 29, 1929, Black Tuesday hit Wall Street as investors traded some 16 million shares on the New York Stock Exchange in a single day. Billions of dollars were lost, wiping out thousands of investors.

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The League of Nations aimed to improve peoples lives and jobs, stop wars, and encourage the disarmament of nations and enforce the Treaty of Versailles.

They were quite successful in their work in the 1920s. They stopped border disputes from turning into wars and also improved peoples lives. They took around 400,000 Prisoners of War home to their countries and set up refugee camps after the war between Greece and Turkey. Their health committee worked against the spread of Malaria and Leprosy.

Though they had many successes, they also had failures. They sometimes did not do well in enforcing the Treaty of Versailles, which was one of their main goals when they established themselves. They also failed to stop wars when powerful nations were involved, rendering themselves useless to their mission.

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The League also improved people's lives.It took 400,000 Prisoners of War home.It set up refugee camps after the 1922 war between Turkey and Greece.The Health Committee worked against leprosy and malaria.The League closed down four Swiss companies which were selling drugs, and attacked slave owners in Burma and Sierra Leone, setting free 200,000 slaves.Finally, its economics experts helped Austria (1922) and Hungary (1923).

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The 1920s, also known as the roaring 20s, was a time of republicans in office, nationalistic and fundamentalist movements, and changing social conventions. While the American public enjoyed the prosperity of the times, they were ultimately scared of radicals and immigration. This causes americans to close off the country to immigration to an extent.

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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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The Palmer Raids happened in 1919 and 1920 and were a series of abusive law-enforcement raids and violent acts that were directed at radicals and anarchists. These raids light up a livid debate about our constitutional rights.

Since the raids continued for quite some time, the police began to pull people out of their home. The majority of the time the officers did not have arrest warrants.  around 1,000 people were detained and 75% of them were released in 1919.

in 1920, more raids began happening which resulted in the arresting of 3,000 people unlawfully. Many of the State attorney's believed that Palmer had paid off local targets and took them in a day early in hopes to achieve the desired arrests.

The abusive practices of law enforcements included starvation of men for close to a week in a small, windowless room at the top of a federal building. At Fort Wayne, they were tortured during questioning, Often having their family members assaulted in front of them in hopes of provoking information out the the detained people.

The American Civil Liberties Union, or ACLU, was created to directly stop the Palmer Raids from happening. This union challenged the Sedition Act. They also took on cases from immigrants who had been victims of the Palmer Raids.

Palmer tried to defend his actions in court but was soon defeated by a group of lawyers and judges who said that due process had been disregarded and that his actions had caused further damage.

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In the beginning of World War I, hoover devoted his time to humanitarian work, helping over 120,000 stranded tourists return to Europe from America. Because of his major help, president Woodrow Wilson appointed him as head of the Food Administration, during this time, he influenced many americans to stop eating meat in order to ensure the steady supply of food to the armed forces at the time.

His success in this type of work earned him a spot as secretary of commerce under President Harding and Coolidge. He took office in 1929 and served during the hardest time to date in america, the Great Depression. He had to deal with the previous presidents policies contributing ultimately to the cause of the Great Depression, which was when the stock market crashed. Hoover was widely seen by many americans as callous and insensitive towards the major suffering of many americans.

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Herbert Hoover (1874-1964), America's 31st president, took office in 1929, the year the U.S. economy plummeted into the Great Depression. Although his predecessors' policies undoubtedly contributed to the crisis, which lasted over a decade, Hoover bore much of the blame in the minds of the American people.

As the Depression deepened, Hoover failed to recognize the severity of the situation or leverage the power of the federal government to squarely address it. A successful mining engineer before entering politics, the Iowa-born president was widely viewed as callous and insensitive toward the suffering of millions of desperate Americans. As a result, Hoover was soundly defeated in the 1932 presidential election by Democrat Franklin D. Roosevelt (1882-1945).

Early Years

Herbert Clark Hoover was born on August 10, 1874, in West Branch, Iowa-the first U.S. president to be born west of the Mississippi River. He was the second of three children in a family of Quakers, who valued honesty, industriousness and simplicity. His father, Jesse Clark Hoover (1846-80), worked as a blacksmith, and his mother, Hulda Minthorn Hoover (1848-84), was a teacher. Orphaned at age nine, Hoover was raised primarily by an uncle in Oregon.

Did you know? On March 3, 1931, President Herbert Hoover signed a law that made "The Star-Spangled Banner," based on an 1814 poem by Francis Scott Key (1779-1843), America's national anthem.

After attending Quaker schools, Hoover became part of the first class to enter Stanford University when it opened in 1891. He graduated four years later with a degree in geology and launched a lucrative career as a mining engineer. Intelligent and hardworking, Hoover traveled all over the world to find valuable mineral deposits and establish business enterprises to extract the resources. His work made him a multimillionaire. On February 10, 1899, Hoover married his college sweetheart, Lou Henry (1874-1944), and the couple had two sons, Herbert (1903-69) and Allan Henry (1907-93).

Humanitarian Work

At the start of World War I (1914-18), Hoover dedicated his talents to humanitarian work. He helped 120,000 stranded American tourists return home from Europe when the hostilities broke out and coordinated the delivery of food and supplies to citizens of Belgium after that country was overrun by Germany.

When the U.S. entered the war in 1917, President Woodrow Wilson (1856-1924) appointed Hoover head of the Food Administration. Hoover encouraged Americans to reduce their consumption of meat and other commodities in order to ensure a steady supply of food and clothing for the Allied troops.

Once the war ended, Hoover, as head of the American Relief Administration, arranged shipments of food and aid to war-ravaged Europe. He earned worldwide acclaim for his humanitarian efforts, as well as thousands of appreciative letters from people across Europe who benefited from the free meals known as "Hoover lunches."

Hoover's success earned him an appointment as secretary of commerce under President Warren Harding (1865-1923), and he continued in this position under President Calvin Coolidge (1872-1933). During the fast-paced modernization of the 1920s, Hoover played an active role in organizing the fledgling radio broadcasting and civilian aviation industries, and also laid the groundwork for the construction of a huge dam on the Colorado River between Arizona and Nevada. (Named after Hoover, the dam opened in 1936.)

The Great Depression

In the U.S. presidential election of 1928, Hoover ran as the Republican Party's nominee. Promising to bring continued peace and prosperity to the nation, he carried 40 states and defeated Democratic candidate Alfred E. Smith (1873-1944), the governor of New York, by a record margin of 444-87 electoral votes. "I have no fears for the future of our country," Hoover declared in his inaugural address. "It is bright with hope."

On October 24, 1929-only seven months after Hoover took office-a precipitous drop in the value of the U.S. stock market sent the economy spiraling downward and signaled the start of the Great Depression. Banks and businesses failed across the country. Nationwide unemployment rates rose from 3 percent in 1929 to 23 percent in 1932. Millions of Americans lost their jobs, homes and savings. Many people were forced to wait in bread lines for food and to live in squalid shantytowns known derisively as Hoovervilles.

Hoover undertook various measures designed to stimulate the economy, and a few of the programs he introduced became key components of later relief efforts. However, Hoover's response to the crisis was constrained by his conservative political philosophy. He believed in a limited role for government and worried that excessive federal intervention posed a threat to capitalism and individualism. He felt that assistance should be handled on a local, voluntary basis. Accordingly, Hoover vetoed several bills that would have provided direct relief to struggling Americans. "Prosperity cannot be restored by raids upon the public Treasury," he explained in his 1930 State of the Union address.

Post-Presidential Years

The Depression worsened throughout Hoover's term in office, and critics increasingly portrayed him as indifferent to the suffering of the American people. By the time of the 1932 presidential election, Hoover had become a deeply unpopular-even reviled-figure across much of the country. Carrying only six states, he was soundly defeated by Democratic candidate Franklin D. Roosevelt, the governor of New York, who promised to enact a slate of progressive reforms and economic relief programs that he described as a New Deal for the American people.

After leaving office, Hoover emerged as a prominent critic of Roosevelt's New Deal programs. He wrote articles and books outlining his conservative political views and warning about the dangers of investing too much power in the federal government. Hoover returned to public service in the 1950s, serving on commissions aimed at increasing government efficiency for presidents Harry Truman (1884-1972) and Dwight Eisenhower (1890-1969).

By the time Hoover died at age 90 on October 20, 1964, in New York City, assessments of his legacy had grown more favorable. Noting that after Hoover left the White House the Great Depression continued for eight more years despite Roosevelt's active intervention, some historians have argued for a more sympathetic appraisal of Hoover's presidency.

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Herbert Hoover (1874-1964), America's 31st president, took office in 1929, the year the U.S. stock market crashed, plunging the country into the Great Depression. Although his predecessors' policies undoubtedly contributed to the crisis, which lasted over a decade, Hoover bore much of the blame in the minds of the American people.

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As the 29th president of the United states, Warren G. Harding served in office from 1921 to 1923. He was considered one of the most corrupt president of the United States. His presidency was shadowed by many political crimes involving his cabinet members and other government officials. Though, he was not directly involved in the crimes mentioned.

In 1920, Harding won the general election by a surprising landslide with the popular votes with his main idea of the "return to normalcy", which is the reason he won over the public, after World war I (1914-1918). He favored pro-business politics and agreed with limited immigration ideas as well.

After an abruptly shocking death in 1923, Harding was soon replaced by Vice president, Calvin Coolidge. Shortly after his death many of the corrupt things he had done came to the public's attention, such as the Teapot Dome scandal and other instances of corruption involving him , ruining his reputation as a great leader.

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Contents

1. Warren Harding's Early Years

2. Warren Harding's Rise in the Republican Party

3. Warren Harding in the White House

4. Warren Harding's Death

The 29th U.S. president, Warren Harding (1865-1923) served in office from 1921 to 1923 before dying of an apparent heart attack. Harding's presidency was overshadowed by the criminal activities of some of his cabinet members and other government officials, although he himself was not involved in any wrongdoing. An Ohio native and Republican, Harding was a successful newspaper publisher who served in the Ohio legislature and the U.S. Senate. In 1920, he won the general election in a landslide, promising a "return to normalcy" after the hardships of World War I (1914-1918). As president, he favored pro-business policies and limited immigration. Harding died suddenly in San Francisco in 1923, and was succeeded by Vice President Calvin Coolidge (1872-1933). After Harding's death, the Teapot Dome Scandal and other instances of corruption came to light, damaging his reputation.

Warren Harding's Early Years

Warren Gamaliel Harding was born on November 2, 1865, on a farm in the small Ohio community of Corsica (present-day Blooming Grove). He was the oldest of eight children of George Harding (1843-1928), a farmer who later became a doctor and part owner of a local newspaper, and Phoebe Dickerson Harding (1843-1910), a midwife.

Did you know? In 1923, as part of a cross-country tour, Harding became the first American president to visit Alaska, which had been a territory since 1912 and would achieve statehood in 1959.

Harding graduated from Ohio Central College (now defunct) in 1882 and moved to Marion, Ohio, where he eventually found work as a newspaper reporter. In 1884, he and several partners purchased a small, struggling newspaper, the Marion Star.

In 1891, Harding married Florence Kling De Wolfe (1860-1924), a Marion native with one son from a previous relationship. The Hardings had no children together, and Florence Harding helped manage the business operations for her husband's newspaper, which became a financial success. She later encouraged Warren Harding's political career and once remarked, "I have only one real hobby-my husband."

Warren Harding's Rise in the Republican Party

Warren Harding, a Republican, began his political career in 1898 by winning election to the Ohio senate, where he served until 1903. He was Ohio's lieutenant governor from 1904 to 1906 but lost his bid for the governorship in 1910. Two years later, he stepped into the national spotlight at the Republican National Convention when he gave a speech nominating President William Taft (1857-1930) for a second term. In 1914, Harding was elected to the U.S. Senate, where he remained until his 1921 presidential inauguration. The congenial Harding had an undistinguished career in the Senate. While he supported high protective tariffs and opposed President Woodrow Wilson's (1856-1924) plan for the League of Nations, Harding was generally a conciliator and took few strong stands on any issues.

At the 1920 Republican National Convention, delegates deadlocked over their choice for a presidential nominee and eventually chose Harding as a compromise candidate. Calvin Coolidge, the governor of Massachusetts, was selected as his vice presidential running mate. The Democrats named James Cox (1870-1957), the governor of Ohio, as their presidential candidate; Franklin Roosevelt (1882-1945), the former assistant secretary of the Navy (and future 32nd U.S. president), was picked as his running mate.

In the aftermath of World War I and the social changes of the Progressive Era, the pro-business Harding advocated a "return to normalcy." He conducted a front-porch campaign from his home in Marion, and thousands of people travelled there to hear him speak. (Due to the high volume of visitors, Harding's front lawn had to be replaced with gravel).

In the general election, the Harding-Coolidge ticket defeated the Democrats in the largest landslide up to that time, capturing some 60 percent of the popular vote and an electoral margin of 404-127. It was the first presidential election in which women across the United States could vote, having gained the right with the ratification of the 19th Amendment in August 1920.

Warren Harding in the White House

Once in office, Warren Harding followed a predominantly pro-business, conservative Republican agenda. Taxes were reduced, particularly for corporations and wealthy individuals; high protective tariffs were enacted; and immigration was limited. Harding signed the Budget and Accounting Act of 1921, which streamlined the federal budget system and established the General Accounting Office to audit government expenditures. Additionally, the United States hosted a successful naval disarmament conference for the world's leading countries. Harding also nominated ex-president Taft as the chief justice of the U.S. Supreme Court. To date, Taft is the only former chief executive to have held this position.

Harding appointed capable men to his cabinet, including Secretary of Commerce Herbert Hoover (1874-1964), Secretary of State Charles Evans Hughes (1862-1948) and Secretary of the Treasury Andrew Mellon (1855-1937). However, he also surrounded himself with individuals who were later accused of misconduct. Harding was popular while in office, but his reputation was tarnished following his death when Americans learned of corruption within his administration-even though he had not engaged in any of this criminal activity. In one infamous incident, known as the Teapot Dome Scandal, Secretary of the Interior Albert Fall (1861-1944) rented public lands to oil companies in exchange for gifts and personal loans. (Fall was later convicted of accepting bribes and spent less than a year in prison.) Other government officials took payoffs and embezzled funds. Harding himself allegedly had extramarital affairs and drank alcohol in the White House, a violation of the 18th Amendment.

Warren Harding's Death

In the summer of 1923, Warren Harding embarked on a cross-country tour of the United States to promote his policies. During the trip, the 57-year-old president became sick, and on August 2 he died of what was likely a heart attack (no autopsy was conducted) at a San Francisco hotel.

In the early hours of August 3, Vice President Coolidge was sworn in as America's 30th president at his boyhood home in Plymouth Notch, Vermont, where he was vacationing. Coolidge's father, a notary public, administered the oath of office.

Millions of people across the nation gathered along the railroad tracks to pay their respects to Harding as his body was returned from the West Coast to Washington, D.C. Harding's Marion home was later designated a National Historic Landmark and opened to the public. The president's tomb is also located in Marion.

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PHOTO GALLERIES

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Warren Harding (1865-1923) was the 29th U.S. president, who served from 1921 to 1923 before dying of an apparent heart attack. Harding's presidency was overshadowed by the criminal activities of some of his cabinet members and other government officials, although he himself was not directly involved in any wrongdoing.

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when Warren G. Harding died abruptly, as vice president, Calvin Coolidge took his spot as the president of the united states in 1923. Coolidge, who was a former republican governor, cleaned up Harding's mess and corruption. He was a pro-business conservative who wanted to make several tax cuts and also wanted to limit the government's spending. Sadly, some of his laissez-faire policies aided in the outbreak of the Great Depression.

In 1924, Coolidge ran for the presidency, and his reputation of integrity and honesty helped him secure his spot in the white house. His strong belief in private enterprise and small government influence many of the policies. He was also the reason that the US rejected being a part of the League of Nations. He kept his popular reputation throughout the years of the 1920s.

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Calvin Coolidge (1872-1933), the 30th U.S. president, led the nation through most of the Roaring Twenties, a decade of dynamic social and cultural change, materialism and excess. He took office on August 3, 1923, following the sudden death of President Warren G. Harding (1865-1923), whose administration was riddled with scandal.

Nicknamed "Silent Cal" for his quiet, steadfast and frugal nature, Coolidge, a former Republican governor of Massachusetts, cleaned up the rampant corruption of the Harding administration and provided a model of stability and respectability for the American people in an era of fast-paced modernization. He was a pro-business conservative who favored tax cuts and limited government spending. Yet some of his laissez-faire policies also contributed to the economic problems that erupted into the Great Depression.

A Quiet and Serious Young Man

John Calvin Coolidge was born on July 4, 1872, in the small village of Plymouth Notch, Vermont. His father, also named John Calvin Coolidge (1845-1926), was a hardworking and frugal businessman who ran a general store and post office. His mother, Victoria Josephine Moor Coolidge (1846-85), died when her son was just 12 years old. He was raised to be honest, industrious and conservative, with a deep respect for business.

Did you know? Calvin Coolidge was the only U.S. president to be sworn in by his own father. In 1923, while visiting his childhood home in Vermont, Coolidge learned of President Warren Harding's death. As it was the middle of the night, Coolidge's father-a notary public-administered the oath by lamplight.

Coolidge graduated from Black River Academy in Ludlow, Vermont, in 1890, and went on to attend Amherst College in Massachusetts, graduating with honors in 1895. He studied law and passed the Massachusetts bar exam in 1898. After opening a law office in Northampton, he spent the next 20 years handling real estate deals, wills and bankruptcies.

On October 4, 1905, Coolidge married Grace Anna Goodhue (1879-1957), a teacher at a local school for the deaf. They had two sons, John (1906-2000) and Calvin Jr. (1908-24), who died from blood poisoning as a teenager.

Political Career

Coolidge launched his career in politics in 1898, when he was elected to the Northampton, Massachusetts, city council. He then began a quiet but methodical climb up the political ladder, serving in the Massachusetts House of Representatives, as mayor of Northampton, as a state congressman, as a state senator and as lieutenant governor.

During this period, Coolidge studied public policy questions, made speeches and steadily gained influence with Republican Party leaders. He developed a reputation as a pro-business conservative who strove to make government lean and efficient.

In 1918, Coolidge was elected governor of Massachusetts. He was catapulted into the national spotlight the following year when the Boston police force went on strike and riots broke out across the city. Coolidge sent in the state guard to restore order and then took a strong stand against rehiring the striking police officers. In a telegram to labor leader Samuel Gompers (1850-1924), he famously declared that "there is no right to strike against the public safety by anybody, anywhere, anytime."

Coolidge's handling of the situation captured the imagination of the American public. As the 1920 U.S. presidential election approached, rank-and-file delegates to the Republican National Convention chose him as the vice-presidential candidate on a ticket headed by U.S. Senator Warren G. Harding of Ohio.

Coolidge in the White House

The Harding-Coolidge ticket won the 1920 election in a landslide and the men took office in March 1921. Coolidge quickly grew frustrated with his largely ceremonial duties as vice president, but just two years later, Harding's sudden death on August 2, 1923, unexpectedly vaulted him to the Oval Office.

Coolidge's no-nonsense approach and somber nature stood in stark contrast to his predecessor's genial personality and casual leadership style. The differences served Coolidge well as he worked to clean up the corruption that had plagued the Harding administration. He appointed a special counsel to investigate the Teapot Dome oil-lease scandal (in which the U.S. Secretary of the Interior was accused-and later convicted-of accepting bribes to lease federal oil reserves without competitive bidding), and he dismissed Harding's tarnished U.S. attorney general, Harry M. Daugherty (1860-1941). Coolidge's reputation for honesty and integrity helped him restore public faith in the government.

Coolidge ran for president in 1924 and won decisively over the Democratic candidate, U.S. Representative John W. Davis (1873-1955) of West Virginia, and the Progressive Party candidate, U.S. Senator Robert M. La Follette (1855-1925) of Wisconsin. Coolidge's policies in office continued to be guided by his strong belief in private enterprise and small government. He cut taxes, limited government spending and stacked regulatory commissions with people sympathetic to business. Coolidge once said, "The chief business of the American people is business." He also rejected U.S. membership in the League of Nations and set high tariffs on imported goods to protect American industry.

Coolidge remained popular throughout his presidency. The Roaring Twenties were a time of fast-paced social, cultural and technological changes, and many Americans lived boisterously and spent extravagantly. Some young women adopted the "flapper" lifestyle, and drank alcohol, smoked, danced and wore shorter skirts, makeup and bobbed hair. Women also voted, having won that right with the ratification of the 19th Amendment to the U.S. Constitution in 1920.

Jazz music and Art Deco architecture flourished. Charles Lindbergh (1902-74) made his pioneering solo airplane flight across the Atlantic Ocean in 1927. More people owned automobiles and purchased mass-produced goods such as canned foods. During this era of societal transformation, Coolidge served as a sort of father figure. The quiet, respectable and frugal president provided a comforting symbol of old-fashioned responsibility and virtue.

Post-Presidential Years

Although many people believed that Coolidge could have won re-election in 1928, he publicly announced his decision not to run on August 2, 1927, in a simple note delivered to reporters at a press conference. The physical strain of the job, as well as the death of his father and his youngest son, had depleted his energy and interest in another term. The Republican Party turned to Herbert Hoover (1874-1964), who had served as secretary of commerce under both Harding and Coolidge, as its candidate.

After departing the White House, Coolidge retired to Northampton, where he occupied himself by writing his memoirs and contributing political commentary to magazines. Less than a year after he left office, the U.S. stock market crashed and the economy plummeted into the Great Depression.

Although Coolidge had received a great deal of credit for the prosperity of the 1920s, he recognized that he bore some responsibility for the severe economic downturn. He admitted to friends that he had spent his presidency "avoiding the big problems," as William Allen White quoted him as saying in his biography, "A Puritan in Babylon." Coolidge died of a heart attack at the age of 60 at his Northampton home on January 5, 1933.

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Calvin Coolidge (1872-1933), the 30th U.S. president, led the nation through most of the Roaring Twenties, a decade of dynamic social and cultural change, materialism and excess. He took office on August 3, 1923, following the sudden death of President Warren G. Harding (1865-1923), whose administration was riddled with scandal.