A New Popular Culture Is Born Chapter 20 Section 3 The Roaring Twenties Riddlebarger
Mass Entertainment in the1920 s
Radio New forms of media will allow people all across the country to share the same information and enjoy the same pastimes In the 1920 s, the radio becomes standard in American homes Hundreds of radio stations spring up by 1922 (570) with various types of programs Music, news, religious services, sporting events Soon, breakthroughs in sound quality and portability of the device will increase the popularity of radio It helps create more of a shared culture (eg., urban/rural)
Movies Movies also explode in popularity in 1920 s Prior to this, films were short, simple pieces Controversial The Birth of a Nation (1915) will help break new ground in filmmaking techniques Makes filmmaking more of an art & widens the audience for movies Later in the decade, the introduction of sound, or talkies Animated films will follow By end of 1920 s, an estimated 100 million ticket a week are being sold to movies (USA population of 123 million at the time)
How did radio and movies help create a common culture in the US? People throughout the country saw or heard the same images or news, ads and music.
An Era of Heroes
Film Stars Charlie Chaplin was a beloved silent film star Rudolph Valentino was also a favorite silent film star (who died unexpectedly in 1926) Clara Bow, known as the It Girl for her looks
Lucky Lindy Charles Lindbergh will fly nonstop across the Atlantic Ocean and land in Paris on May 21, 1927 33 ½ hour flight 1st successful transatlantic flight Called the greatest feat of a solitary man in the history of the human race, at the time Young, tall, handsome and humble, he became an American hero
Amelia Earhart Almost a year after Lindbergh, Amelia Earhart became the first woman to fly across the Atlantic. Also becomes an American hero Will go on to set a number of speed and distance records In 1937, while attempt another record-breaking flight (around the world), she disappears over the Pacific Ocean
Sports heroes Radio helps inflame public passions for sports in 1920 s Millions will tune in for ballgames or prize fights Millions turn out to watch live Red Grange, The Galloping Ghost, football Helen Wills, tennis Babe Ruth, baseball Bobby Jones, golf
By seven o clock the orchestra has arrived, no thin five-piece affair, but a whole pitful of oboes and trombones and saxophones and viols This and novel cornets details and piccolos, the selfish, and reckless, low and high and drums. The last swimmers ultimately have meaningless come from lives the beach of the now very and rich- are an dressing up-stairs; image the cars very from much New associated York are parked with The five deep Jazz in the drive, and Age. already the halls and salons and verandas are gaudy with primary colors, and hair shorn in strange new ways, and shawls beyond the dreams of Castile. The bar is in full swing, and floating rounds of cocktails permeate the garden outside, until the air is alive with chatter and laughter, and casual innuendo and introductions forgotten on the spot, and enthusiastic meetings between women who never knew each other s names. The Great Gatsby - F. Scott Fitzgerald
He was forty-six years old now, in April, 1920, and he made nothing in particular, neither butter nor shoes nor poetry...he who had been a boy very credulous of life was no longer greatly interested in the possible and improbable adventures of each new day. Babbitt Sinclair Lewis How does he portray middle-class life of the 1920 s? Full of emptiness
Art of the 1920 s 1920 s is a decade of great economic and social change Many themes for novelists to work with Beyond writers of Harlem Renaissance, many others will make their mark F. Scott Fitzgerald (most closely linked with 1920 s) Sinclair Lewis Edna St. Vincent Millay (poet) George Gershwin (music) Ernest Hemingway (impacted by World War I- A Farewell to Arms) Some become part of Lost Generation who chose to live in Europe after WW1