Definition: Many lost their life savings as they had taken out significant loans and made hefty investments into the stock market which crashed in 1929, plunging them into poverty and shattering the U.S. economy. Bank loans could not be repaid, paper money was worthless, and millions of workers were laid off not only in the U.S., but also in Japan, Chile, Great Britain, etc.

Significance: By the 1930s before the Depression even fully took hold, around 60% of American families were considered below the poverty line. To this day the Great Depression is considered one of the most desperate economic moments in American history. Banks and businesses closed, and the economy was devastated.

Definition: Franklin D Roosevelt (Democrat) was inaugurated in 1933 during the Great Depression promising a “New Deal for the American people (New Deal - legislation aimed at ending the Great Depression).” Through a series of “fireside chats” where FDR connected with his people, bringing hope to Americans through their charisma. His New Deal permanently led to extraordinary change for Americans, providing jobs, helping Natives with their legal rights, and more.

Significance: FDR permanently changed the reach and bureaucracy of the federal government, transforming it from a smaller, less activist government to one which regularly interacted with its citizens, regularly added legislation, and more. 

Definition: The Zimmermann Telegram was an intercepted secret German telegram cable to Mexico which promised the return of Texas to Mexico if Mexico attacked the United States. 

Significance: This interception turned more of the previously reluctant American public opinion against Germany. This combined with submarine attacks led to the United States entering WWI. 

Definition: Beginning in the 1920s the “Brown Shirts” transformed into the Nazi Party which quickly grew from street thugs to the political group which successfully elected Adolf Hitler. This group enforced Hitler’s idea of the Germans being a “master race,” ended many German freedoms (ex. Freedom of speech), ruthlessly enforced Nazi authority, and murdered millions of Jewish citizens, the disabled, and more. 

Significance: As the Nazi Party grew in power so did Adolf Hitler who quickly used this newfound power to end free speech and assembly, discriminate against the Jews (ex. Kristallnacht), and eventually send Jews all over Europe to death camps. Nazi authority in Germany led to the brutal genocide known as the Holocaust, which ended in the deaths of around 6 million Jews (⅔ of the European Jew population).

Definition: After Communists seized control of Russia, some Americans feared a connection between American radicals and Russian communists. U.S. labor unions, Socialists, and Anarchists were connected to the Bolshevik Communist regime in Russia as communism spread to Hungary, Vienna, and Berlin. Many speculated it would similarly spread in the U.S. 

Significance: Significant tension existed in the United States and the Senate responded by issuing an all-out effort to find radicals and the Palmer Raids which oftentimes wrongly arrested and deported anyone suspected of being a Communist. 

Definition: Woodrow Wilson is a progressive democrat inaugurated in 1913 who laid four different initiatives for his administration: conversation, access to raw materials, banking and finance, and the tariff and taxes. He also reformed the nation’s banking system, regulated trade policies, and created the Federal Trade Commission. Some, especially African Americans, criticized him for letting certain bills die and for his lack of support regarding African Americans. 

Significance: He created the Federal Reserve System which remains the core of the nation’s banking system today. He eventually also had the United States (where he previously focused on domestic policies) join WWI.