The Roaring Twenties is a term that characterizes the distinct cultural tone of the 1920s, principally in American cities, but also in Berlin and Paris, as a period of social, artistic, cultural, and economic dynamism. It was not until the Wall Street Crash of 1929 that this remarkable era ended and the Great Depression spread worldwide.
Politics and Economics
In the period following World War I, the United States experienced three consecutive Republican presidential administrations: Warren Harding, Calvin Coolidge and Herbert Hoover. All three took the conservative position of forging a close relationship between government and big business. When Harding took office in 1921, the national economy was in the depths of a depression, with an unemployment rate of 20% and runaway inflation. He subsequently signed the Emergency Tariff of 1921 and the Fordney-McCumber Tariff of 1922 to ease the economic suffering of domestic producers such as farmers. One of the main initiatives of both the Harding and Coolidge administrations was rolling back income taxes on the wealthy, which had been raised during World War I. It was believed a heavy tax burden on the rich would slow the economy and reduce tax revenues.
The improvements resulting from an improved economy included the large-scale diffusion and use of automobiles, telephones, motion pictures, and electricity, unprecedented industrial growth, accelerated consumer demand and aspirations, and significant changes in lifestyle and culture. The media moved away from the hardships of war and focused on celebrities, especially sports heroes and movie stars, as cities rooted for their home teams and filled the new palatial movie theaters and gigantic stadiums. In most major countries, women had the opportunity to vote for the first time. Urbanization also reached a climax in the 1920s, with more Americans living in cities of 2,500 or more people than in small towns or rural areas than at any previous time in the country’s history.
Arts and Literature
The Roaring Twenties was a fruitful period for the arts, music and writing. The Art Deco movement was popular among designers and architects, fashion for women went in bold new directions, and Jazz music became all the rage. In literature, two popular movements or groups of writers arose: The Lost Generation and the Harlem Renaissance.
The Lost Generation were young people who came out of World War I disillusioned and cynical about the world. The term usually refers to American literary notables who lived in Paris at the time, including Ernest Hemingway, F. Scott Fitzgerald and Gertrude Stein. These expatriate authors wrote novels and short stories expressing their resentment towards the materialism and individualism that was rampant during the era.
F. Scott Fitzgerald, 1921
American expatriate author F. Scott Fitzgerald, a member of the Lost Generation literary movement, wrote The Great Gatsby, which epitomized Roaring Twenties culture.
African-American literary and artistic culture developed rapidly during the 1920s under the banner of "The Harlem Renaissance," named for the historically black Harlem section of New York City. At the time this cultural awakening was known as the “New Negro Movement” and was represented by notable writers including Langston Hughes, Zora Neale Hurston, Arna Bontemps, and Virginia Houston. Harlem also played a key role in the development of dance styles and the popularity of dance clubs. With several famous entertainment venues such as the Apollo Theater and the Cotton Club, people from all walks of life, races and classes came together in Harlem.
Art Deco was the style of design and architecture that marked the era. Originating in Europe, it spread to North America in the mid-1920s and developed in a different direction than that of Europe. Expressionism, and later surrealism, were the preferred styles in Europe during the 1920s. Art Deco, already globally popular, found favor among designers in America as the 1920s progressed, culminating with the opening of Radio City Music Hall in 1932.
Young women's fashion of the 1920s was both a trend and a social statement, immortalized in movies and magazine covers, that broke off from the rigid Victorian way of life. Rebellious, middle-class women, labeled "flappers" by older generations, did away with the corset and donned slinky knee-length dresses, which exposed their legs and arms. With this exposure women in the 1920s began staking claim to their own bodies and took part in a sexual liberation of their generation, which also extended to their minds in the form of progressive thinkers such as Sigmund Freud and the expansion of co-educational programs in which women took places at state colleges and universities alongside men.
If freedom was the mindset of the Roaring Twenties, then Jazz was the soundtrack. Following the war there was a mass migration of Jazz musicians from New Orleans to major northern cities like Chicago and New York, leading to a wider dispersal of Jazz as different styles developed in different cities. Because of its popularity in speakeasies and its advancement due to the emergence of more advanced recording devices, Jazz became very popular in a short amount of time, with stars including Duke Ellington, Cab Calloway, Ella Fitzgerald, and Chick Webb. Jazz and other energetic art forms also helped with the expansion of mass market entertainment such as radio and film.
Duke Ellington
Duke Ellington led a renowned Jazz orchestra that frequently played the Cotton Club during the Harlem Renaissance of the 1920s.
Entertainment for the Masses
Radio became the first mass broadcasting medium during the 1920s. Radio sets were initially expensive but the medium of entertainment and information transmission proved revolutionary. Radio advertising became the grandstand for mass marketing and its economic importance led to the mass culture that has since dominated society.
The "Golden Age of Radio" began after World War I with the first radio news program in Detroit on August 31, 1920, followed by the appearance of the first commercial station in Pittsburgh that same year. The first national radio networks came into being during this period, with the launch of the National Broadcasting Company in 1926 and the Columbia Broadcasting System in 1927. Unsurprisingly, 1927 was also the year that introduced a new era of regulation with the establishment of the Federal Radio Commission, ensuring the government played a role in the growth and oversight of the industry. Radio programming comprised a variety of formats and genres with shows similar to today’s television, including soap operas, quiz and talent shows, comedies, and children’s programs, as well as news bulletins and sports broadcasts.
Hollywood also boomed during this period, producing a new form of entertainment that shut down the old Vaudeville theatres – the silent film. Watching a movie was cheap and accessible, creating a profitable market that saw crowds surging into new downtown movie palaces and neighborhood theaters. Even greater entertainment marvels emerged as the decade progressed, the most important being sound synchronized motion pictures, or "talkies," which quickly replaced silent films between 1927 and 1929. Actors and actresses including Rudolph Valentino, Douglas Fairbanks, John Barrymore, Greta Garbo, and Clara Bow became household names during the Roaring Twenties.
Rudolph Valentino
Silent movie star Rudolph Valentino was one of Hollywood's first sex symbols, starring in films such as The Sheik before his untimely death at age 31 in 1926.
Prohibition and Crime
Prohibition was a national ban on the sale, manufacture and transportation of alcohol that lasted from 1920–1933. The Eighteenth Amendment to the U.S. Constitution banning alcohol was implemented through the Volstead Act, which went into effect on January 17, 1920.
Speakeasies, illegal nightclubs where alcohol was sold, became popular and plentiful as the legally dry years progressed. The ban led to a groundswell of criminal activity, with powerful gangs controlling the sale and distribution of alcohol and a number of related activities including gambling and prostitution. Gangsters such as Lucky Luciano, Al Capone, Moe Dalitz, Joseph Ardizzone, and Sam Maceo were involved in bribery, extortion, loan sharking, and money laundering. The illicit alcohol industry earned an average of $3 billion per year in illegal income, none of which was taxed, and effectively transformed cities into battlegrounds fought over by various crime syndicates, most notably the American Mafia. Prohibition continued until its repeal in the Twenty-first Amendment to the Constitution in 1933.