USA KQ2

When was the first 'talkie'

1927 - the jazz singer

How may times a week did young Americans go to the cinema?

2-3

How much did of their leisure budget did working class people in Chicago spend on films?

50%

What percentage of households had a radio?

1930 - 40%

Who's party did a young girl die at?

Fatty Arbuckle (calls for censorship but Hollywood acted first, led to no nudity and restricting the length of kisses)

How many states threatened to introduce censorship legislation?

36

How many cars were on the road?

1929 - 26 million

How often did a ford model T come off the line?

1927 - every 10 seconds

When did the civil war + slavery end?

1865

When were the Jim Crow laws introduced?

1870s/1880s

When was the KKK reborn? With what film?

1915 - Birth of a Nation

How much did the black population of NY and Chicago increase by?

doubled (NY: 150,000 - 330,000)

When was the Red Scare?

1919-1921

Palmer raids

1920
Mitchell Palmer - Attorney General
informed 10,000 they would be deported
556 deported

When did the Bolsheviks seize power?

1917

Decline in Native American population

1.5 million → 250,000 in 1920

When did Native Americans get the vote and citizenship?

1924, synder act gave citizenship

When were Sacco and Vanzetti arrested? What for?

1920
for armed robbery of a shoe factory in massachusetts and the murder of two people.

• similar robberies in 1919/1920

• 61 witnesses at scene, 107 said elsewhere

• many witnesses were Italian and couldn’t speak english = unfair

• radical anti-government pamphlets in car - anarchists

When were Sacco and Vanzetti executed?

1927

Anti immigration policy

1917 - literacy test
1921 - Emergency Quota act (357,000 a year, 3% of nationality from 1910
1924 - National Origins act (150,000 a year, 27% of nationality from 1890, mainly british/irish)
1929 - 150000. no asians. 85% of places went to western europeans

what happened at monkey trial

1925 - John Scopes - Tennessee

• fundamentalists (william jennings brian) came across as ignorant )

• scopes lost and was fined $100

When did women get the vote?

1920 in all states

How many women were in jobs in 1929?

10 million, up 24% from 1920

Muncie, Indiana housewives

no middle class housewives awake before 6am
90% of working class housewives up by 6am

number of divorces

1914 - 100,000
1929 - twice as many

When was prohibition introduced? What did it ban?

January 1920 - 18th amendment (Volstead act)
banned the transportation, production and sale of intoxicating liquors

Who petitioned for Prohibition?

• Women's Temperance Union (1874)

• Anti Saloon league

• backed by leading industries - thought workers would become more reliable

• ww1 (large breweries German)

• 'dries' claimed 3000 infants are smothered yearly in bed by drunken parents

How many stills were seized? where did most alcohol come from?

280,000
2/3 came from Canada

How many speakeasies where there? (in relation to saloons)

By 1925 there were more speakeasies than there were saloons in 1919

one in ? prohibition officers dismissed for corruption.

12

How far did alcohol consumption fall?

30% in early 1920s

How much did gangs make from the illegal sale of alcohol?

$2 billion

Chicago gangland murders

1926 - 1927: 130 murders, no arrests

Al Capone

Made roughly $60 million a year from bootlegging + speakeasies.
destroyed power of other gangs by 1929 - committing at least 300 murders.
Gave $300,000 to soup kitchen for unemployed.

St Valentines day Massacre

1929

Capone's men murdered 7 of Bugsy Moran's gang using fake police car + uniform.

When did America join the war?

1917

Why did prohibition fail?

St Valentines day Massacre
Wall Street crash
Made the country lawless
FDR elected in 1932
Prohibition repealed in December 1933

how many radio stations?, how much was nbc making?

1921 - 1

1922 - 508

nbc - $150mill a year by 1929

what music became popular? what did older generation think it was doing

jazz, corrupting younger generations

who was legendary baseball player

babe ruth

how many cinema tickets were sold in 1920, how much did they cost?

100mill

10-20 cents

changing morals + cinema - who were the sex symbols?

clara bow - it girl

rudolph valentino - women fainting during the sheik

changing attitudes towards sex/marriage + the car

• contraception widely available

• sex outside marriage more common

• car allowed couples to travel places without chaperones

limitations to improvement in women’s lives

• increase in women employment as cheaper labour ($18 week men, $9 women in mines)

• given vote but ‘unelectable’, only handful of women elected by 1929

• traditional ideas meant many still raised families + kept good home for husband

characteristics of flappers

short skirts, bobbed hair, bright clothes, lots of makeup

melting pot

melting away identity to form american citizens

strikes in 1919, who did they think was to blame

400,000 workers, some boston police

race riots in 25 towns

communist interference

how many kkk members

4.5 million in 1924

church bombing

april 1919, milwaukee, killed 10

postal bombs

may 1919, 36 prominent americans were posted bombs

why was palmer mocked

predicted red revolution in may 1920, nothing happened

consumer goods that benefitted women

vacuums =1920, 9% | 30%1930

1 fridge 1921 | 167 in 1929

it took who how many seconds to get alcohol

izzy einstein

• new orleans 35 seconds

why were prohibition agents ineffective

• poorly paid,

• responsible for large area (200,000 square miles)

• only 1,500 - 2,300, only 62,000 arrests made (how many weren’t)

how many arrests did izzy einstein make?

4392

attitudes towards native americans

• improved as 12,000 served in ww1

• poverty

• worse health/life expectancy

• worse education (boarding schools)

• poorly paid jobs

• lost land to mining companies (forced to reservations)

how many gallons alcohol seized

11.7 mill

which state didn’t introduce prohibition laws

maryland

5 things black americans did to respond

• black capitalist movement encouraged business

• harlem renaissance = culture + pride

• black performers (josephine baker) attracted big audiences

• NAACP in 1919 had 300 branches and 90,000 members, campaigned against segregation

• UNIA (marcus garvey) urged racial pride ‘back to africa scheme’, 1 mill members in 1921

how many native american children at boarding schools? what happened

10,000+

speak english, christian, boys cut hair, western clothes

where was kkk most prominent? why?

midwest/rural south.

working class whites competed with african americans for jobs

which states had klan members as govenors?

oregon + oklahoma

why did klan decline

1925, grand wizard (david stephenson) convicted of a vicious sexually motivated murder.

became informer and exposed corruption of kkk

who did kkk target, how

parades, beatings and lynchings to intimidate african americans, jews, catholics, foreign immigrants

how were african americans prevented from voting

intimidation, violence, literacy tests

when were saloons banned, when was prohib proposed

• 1916 - 21 states banned Saloons

• 1917 had enough states to propose Prohibition

Al Capone’s influence in chicago…

had half of chicago police on payroll

spent $250,000 on Big Bill Thompson as mayor

how many alcohol poisoning deaths were there

1920 → 98

1929 → 760