usa revision guide america depth study
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Revision Guide version 2TRANSCRIPT
Boom Time? 10 Facts that say YES!
- America experienced an economic
boom during the 1920’s. We’ll look at
the reasons for this in a minute, but the
evidence is there for all to see:
1) In 1919 there were 9 million car. In
1929 there were 26 million (1 in 5
Americans owned a car, 1 in 43
British and 1 in 7,000 Russians!)
2) By 1925 one Ford car was built
every 10 seconds.
3) In 1920 there were 60,000 radios in
1929 there were 10,000,000
4) In 1915 there were 10 million
radios. In 1930 there were 20
million.
5) For every one fridge that was
around in 1921 there were 167 in
1929.
6) New York doubled in size during the
1920’s
7) Silk Stockings had been a luxury
item in 1900 with only 12,000 pairs
sold. In 1920’s a cheaper substitute
for silk was created (rayon). In 1930
300 million pairs of stocking were
sold.
8) There were no civilian airlines in
1918, but 1930 new companies
flew 162,000 flights each year.
9) Buy 1929 nearly all American
homes were on the electricity grid.
10) During the 1920’s the American
road network doubled.
Boom Time? 10 Facts that say NO!
1) FARMING
2) Total US farm income dropped from
$22 billion in 1919 to just $13 billion in
1928.
3) Less food was being imported by
Europe after the war.
4) Canadian wheat was being produced
cheaper.
5) The population of the US was actually
falling.
6) More efficiency increased the quantity
of food produced which meant that
there was too much available (driving
prices down)
7) In the 1920’s the average farmer would
produce enough to feed his family and
14 others.
8) 1921 saw farm prices fall by 50%
9) In the 1920’s there were 5 times as
many bankruptcies in farming than
there had been in the 1900’s and
1910’s.
10) 6 million rural Americas were forced off
their land. The African Americans were
particularly badly hit (750,000 made
unemployed)
BUT
- Fruit and vegetable farmers did well,
since rich Americans wanted their
produce. Lettuce shipments to the city
rose from 14,000 crates in 1920 to
52,000 crates in 1928.
Reasons for
the Boom
1. America’s wealth.
- America was rich in raw
materials eg. Oil, coal
and iron ore, this gave
it the ability to
manufacture lots of
different goods.
2. New Industries
Total production in American
industry increased by 50%
during the 1920’s. This was
driven by the demand for new
products including radios,
vacuum cleaners and the car.
3. Rising Wages and Stable
Prices
- Wages went up but prices
became the same. The
assembly line, made famous
by Ford was one reason that
prices stayed low.
5. Republican (Government) policies
- ‘Laissez-faire; the president left it to the businessmen to make
money.
- Tariffs; 1922 saw the Fordney-McCumber tariff which made
imported food expensive to buy. This helped American producers
(farmers in this case) sell their products more easily.
- Low Taxes; the Republicans kept taxes low which left people with
more money to spend.
- Trusts; Republicans allowed big trusts to be created where one
company dominated an industry eg. Rockefller (oil) and Carnegie
(steel)
4. Hire Purchase (credit)
- This allowed people to buy
new products (eg radio) with a
small deposit and then weekly
instalments. 8/10 cars and
6/10 radio were purchased on
hire credit.
- Mail order catalogues also
provided this.
August 1921 saw only 1 licenced radio station in
America, but by the end of 1922 there were 508 of
them. This goes to show why so many people bought
me – I was a new invention and frankly, I was the best!
It’s all about the jazz man. In
fact the 1920’s was named after
me – ‘the Jazz age’. New dances
like the Charleston and those
new flappers were all brought
about by my groovy rhythms.
Brrrrrm brrrrm brrrrrm, sorry, nearly didn’t see
you there, you see I’m the new car and I ROCK! I
allowed Americans to get wherever they
wanted (and the young ones wanted to get
away from their parents!) In fact by 1929 4.8
million cars had been built. Gotta
go…..Brrrrrrrrrrrrm
Phew, you’ve heard
of the New York
Yankies right? Well
baseball and boxing
became really
popular
Ah yes, the silver screen, that’s me. 100 million tickets were
being sold each week by 1930! The first talkie was released in
1927…wow, times move so fast. I was busy shocking people
with some provocative (for the time!) movies like A Shocking
Night starring Clara Bow (the first ‘It’ girl. I’ll still remember
the women fainting at the sight of a Rudolph Valentino
naked torso in The Sheik in 1921!
Wore restrictive
clothes and behaved
appropriately
Very few paid jobs
were open to women
1914; only 100,000
divorces (women
remained in unhappy
marriages) By 1929 200,000
women got divorced
each year.
Smoked and drank in
public, went about
without chaperones.
Although there were
some high profile
women (Eleanor
Roosevelt), few women
had been elected by
1929.
1920’s – the rise of the flapper….
The Johnson –Reid Act (1924)
Considering the problems being caused by immigration at the moment;
specifically the way in which different groups are looking down on each
other (Irish American, French Canadians and German Americans in pole
position, followed by the Eastern European and Italian immigrants with the
African Americans and Mexicans at the bottom of the pile., we are
proposing:
- A QUOTA of 150,000 immigrants each year, who are likely to be
entirely European.
- Asian immigration is to stop immediately.
Sacco and Vanzetti
These were two high profile victims of the Red Scare. They were Italian Americans who were self-confessed
anarchists. Their trial was one of racial slurs and very dodgy evidence. However the judge of the trial hated anarchists
and said:
Although this might seem a bit biased to you, it was carried through and both Sacco and Vanzetti were sentenced to
death. This was what the fear of the Red Scare did to some Americans. Despite massive protests Sacco and Vanzetti
were both eventually executed in 1927. The Red Scare also caused a clampdown on immigration (already noted). By
1929 the number of immigrants arriving each year had dropped from over a million in 1919 to 150,000 (see the
Johnson – Reid Act of 1924).
Although Vanzetti ‘may not have actually
committed the crime attributed to him, he is
nevertheless morally culpable (to blame)
because he is the enemy of our existing
institutions’
Those
anarchist
B******s
The Klu Klux Klan
- This organisation became very
popular again in the 1920’s after
the release of the film ‘Birth of a
Nation’
- At their height they had around 4.5
million members (1924).
- The governors of both Oregon and
Oklahoma were both members of
the Klan.
- Methods included parades,
beatings and lynching.
The Scopes Trial (aka the monkey trial)
- In Tennessee teaching the theory
of evolution had been banned.
- One teacher (Scopes ) taught it
anyway.
- He was put on trial, this was the
conservatives vs the modernists.
- He was found guilty and fined
$100.
- However, the war was won by the
modernists, who were able to
expose the stupidity of this
intolerance and the fact that it
contradicter the right to freedom
of speech. The law was never used
again.
- Supporters of Prohibition were also known as ‘dries’.
- The Anti-Saloon League and Women’s Christian Temperance Union were the two big anti
drinking groups that wanted to see prohibition introduced.
- By 1916 21 states had already banned saloons, this shows us that prohibition had support
from leaders and politicians.
- The ‘dries’ claimed that every year 3000 infants were smothered in their beds by drunken
parents.
- USA’s entry into WWI boosted the prohibition campaign since many big breweries were run
by German’s and anti-German feeling was encouraged by the war.
- The eighteenth amendment was proposed in 1917 and became law in January 1920. It was
known as the ‘Volstead Act’ and ‘prohibited the manufacture, sale or transportation of
intoxicating liquors’.
- It was repealed by the new Democratic President Franklin D Roosevelt who put it on his
campaign promises.
1921 1925 1929
Illegal distilleries seized
9,746 12,023 15,794
Gallons of spirit seized
414,000 11,030,000 11,860,000
Arrests 34,175 62,747 66,878
- The majority of
Americans weren’t
willing to obey the law.
- Maryland never even
introduced prohibition.
- Al Capone made $60
million each year from
his speakeasies.
- William McKoy made
$70 from his importing
of illegal whiskey ‘the
real Mckoy’
Hi, I’m Issy Einstein and with my deputy Moe Smith I tried to clamp
down on the illegal sale of alcohol in so called speakeasies. In fact, by
1925 there were more speakeasies in American cities than there had
been saloons in 1919. It was pretty easy to find people selling alcohol,
despite it being illegal. In fact it too me just 21 minutes in Chicago, 17
minutes in Atlanta, 11 minutes in Pittsburgh and my personal
favourite, 35 seconds in New Orleans (the taxi driver offered me a
bottle of whiskey)!
This showed that Prohibition wasn’t working, but also shows that we
were successfully catching the law breakers. You could use this
evidence to support either side of the argument!
- This caused corruption to become rife and
led to gang warfare over the lucrative
trade in illegal alcohol.
- Organised gangs made over $2 billion
from the sale of illegal alcohol.
- George Remus bribed officials to allow
him to carry out his illegal practise. He
was so rich that at one party he gave a car
to all of the female guests and a $25,000
pair of cufflinks to all of the men.
- The most famous of all of these gangsters
however, was Al Capone.
- Al Capone was based in Chicago where there were 130 gangland murders in 1926 and 1927 but not one
arrest – the criminals were in control!
- He was a well-known figure in the city since he was bribing nearly all of the officials, he even had the
mayor on his payroll!
- - He was well known for being generous eg.$100 to waiters and spent $30,000 on a soup kitchen for the
unemployed.
- Capone was in complete control of Chicago after 1929 when he carried out the St Valentine’s Day
Massacre murdering 7 members of his rivals (Bugsy Malone’s) gang using a false police car and two
gangsters in police uniforms.
- He committed (or his gang did at least!) over 300 murders during his time in control.
Don’t forget he positives,
levels of alcohol consumption
fell by about 30% during the
1920’s.
Ask Yourself:
1) Can you give two facts to support the idea that America was booming during the
1920’s?
2) Can you give two facts to support the argument that America was not booming in
the 1920’s
3) Which Republican policies helped the boom?
4) What were the new inventions created in the 1920’s?
5) How many Ford Model T cars were being produced during 1925?
6) What evidence is there for the importance of credit during the boom?
7) Give one film star of the 1920’s.
8) How many tickets were being sold each week by 1930?
9) Give two examples of how life had changed for women by the 1920’s.
10) Which immigrants were at the bottom of the pile?
11) What was the immigration quota act called?
12) When was it introduced?
13) What was the quota set to?
14) What was the Red Scare?
15) Where did these ideas come from?
16) Give one example that shows why people were so worried.
17) How many people were arrested during the Red Scare?
18) How many pof those cases actually had a basis in fact?
19) What was the important about the Sacco and Vanzetti case?
20) What was the Scopes Trial?
21) What happened to Scopes?
22) What was the long term result of the trial?
23) Who were the Ku Klux Klan?
24) Which film restarted their popularity? Why?
25) When did their membership peak? How many people had joined?
26) Give one governor who was also a clan member.
27) Which groups campaigned for prohibition.
28) What ‘evidence’ did they use to push their case?
29) When was Prohibition introduced? What was the act called?
30) What evidence was there that Prohibition worked? (give at least 2 examples
31) How many murders were there in Chicago in 1926/7?
32) Name one prohibition agent.
33) How quickly could he find alcohol?
34) How much did Al Capone make from illegal speakeasies?
35) What was ‘the real McKoy?’
- Occurred in October 1929.
- Caused by a crash in the Stock Markets.
- People had been investing in the Stock
Market because the value of shares kept
rising.
- This made them borrow money to buy even
more shares. Before selling these shares for
a profit (not keeping them for very long).
This was called speculation.
- When people started to sell shares their
value decreased.
- This meant that the people who had
borrowed money were left in massive debt.
- Unemployment started to rise as companies
fired people in order to save money.
Impacts of the Wall Street Crash:
1) The Wealthy: Rockefeller lost 80% of wealth – left with $40 million
2) The Banks: 1929 – 659 banks went bankrupt, 1930 – 1,352 went bankrupt, 1931 – 2,294 banks
went bankrupt, and overall $1 billion have been removed from these banks by investors.
3) Industry and Farming: Industrial and farm production fell by 40% and wages by 60% between
1928 and 1933. Farm income had dropped to $5 billion per year.
4) Unemployment: By 1933 14 million workers had been made unemployed. Unemployment in
the steel city of Cleveland hit 50% and Toledo 80%
5) The Human Cost: New slums were created and caused ‘Hoovervilles’ and in New York in 1932
238 people were admitted to hospital for malnutrition. 45 died?
6) WWI Veterans: WWI veterans marched on Washington to ask for their war bonus to be paid
early. Hoover asks General MacArthur to deal with them, but to treat them with respect.
MacArthur ignored these orders and burnt their camp down. Hoover refused to condemn
MacArthur, instead he stood by him.
Key Facts:
- In 1920 there had been only 4
million share owners in America.
- By 1929 there were 20 million.
- There were 600,000 speculators
The Campaign:
- Unlike Hoover (Republican), Roosevelt (Democrat) wanted to do something.
- He carried out a campaign of some 20,800km giving 16 major speeches and a further 60 from the back of
the train. He promised a ‘New Deal’.
- Roosevelt won by 7 million votes (a huge margin)
1) The Emergency Banking Act – Roosevelt shut down
the banks for two days and had them all checked
out. 5000 trustworthy banks were reopened; they
were to be backed by the government if necessary.
2) The Federal Emergency Relief Administration –
this acted on the needs of the poor. A sum of $500
million was spent on soup kitchens, blankets,
employment schemes and nursery schools.
3) The Civilian Conservation Corps – aimed at young
unemployed men in particular. They could sign up
for periods of six months which could be renewed.
Most of their work was done on environmental
projects in national parks. 2.5 million young men
were helped by this scheme.
4) The Agricultural Adjustment Administration – set
quotas to reduce farm production in order to
increase prices. Helped modernise farms, however
this put farm labourers out of work.
5) The National Industrial Recovery Act:
- Public Works Administration – used
government money to build schools, roads,
dams, bridges and airports. Great for the long
term and created millions of jobs.
- The National Recovery Administration –
improved working conditions in industry and
outlawed child labour. It also set fair wages
and sensible levels of production. It was
voluntary, but firms which joined used the blue
eagle as a symbol of presidential approval.
Over 2 million employers joined the scheme.
6) The Tennessee Valley Authority – this cut across
an area of seven states which were particularly
poor. The authority built dams which irrigated
dried out land, created electricity to those who had
none, and created thousands of jobs in the area.
Despite his achievements, by May 1935 Roosevelt was
facing severe criticism from all sides. People like Senator
Huey Long, for example, thought that he wasn’t doing
enough. Roosevelt met with his ‘brains trust’ and decided
to take even further action.
1) The Wagner Act – forced all employers to allow
trade unions to operate in their companies and
to let them negotiate with employers for better
pay and conditions. The act made it illegal to sack
workers for being in a union.
2) The Social Security Act – provided state pensions
for the elderly and for widows and allowed state
and federal governments to work together to
help the sick and disabled. It also set up
unemployment insurance for workers.
3) The Works Progress Administration – later
renamed the Works Project Administration
united all of the projects put together to create
jobs. Also extended to unemployed actors etc.
For example 80,000 photos of farming were
taken and displayed locally as part of the Federal
Arts Project.
4) The Resettlement Administration – helped
smallholders and tenant farmers who had not
been helped by the AAA. It moved over 500,000
families to better quality housing. The Farm
Security Administration replaced the RA in 1937.
It gave special loans to small farmers to help
them buy their land. It also built camps to help
migrant workers.
Women
- The New Deal saw many
women achieve prominent
positions including Elenor
Roosevelt.
- The National Youth
Administration was a
woman, Mary Macleod
Bethune. She was also
African American.
- Frances Perkins was the
Secretary of Labor and a
key New Deal figure.
- Most of the New Deal
programmes were aimed
at men, only 8,000 women
benefited from the CCC.
- Local governments sought
to avoid paying women
social security by
A New Society?
- The New Deal restored the faith of
the American people in their
government.
- It handled billions of dollars of public
money with no corruption. For
example, Harold Hopkins distributed
$10 billion but never drew more
than his salary of $15,000. The
Secretary of the Interior, Harold
Ickes, actually tapped the phones of
his employees to ensure there was
no corruption. There was none.
- However, others accused Ickes and
Hopkins of being Communist and
anti-business (because they
supported trade unions).
Industrial Workers
- The NRA and second new Deal
strengthened the position of the
labour unions.
- Some labour unions joined
forces in 1935 to form the
Committee for Industrial
Organisation (CIO).
- The Union of Automobile
Workers (UAW) was recognised
by two very anti-union
organisations: General Motors in
1936 and Ford in 1941.
- However, many strikes
continued to be broken up with
violence and companies such as
Ford and Chrysler employed
their own thugs or controlled the
local police.
Unemployment and the Economy:
- The New Deal created millions of jobs.
- It stabilised the banking system and reduced the number of business failures.
- Projects, eg. The TVA improved the standard of living for thousands of people.
- Valuable resources including schools, roads and power stations were built.
- The new Deal never solved the underlying economic problems.
- The US economy took longer to recover than most European countries.
- There were 6 million unemployed in 1941
- Only the entry of the USA into WWI brought an end to unemployment.
African Americans:
- Around 200,000 African Americans
gained benefits from the CCC and
other New Deal agencies.
- They benefited from the slums
clearances etc.
- However, many New Deal agencies
still discriminated against African
Americans.
Native Americans
- The Indian Reorganisation Act in
1934 provided money to help
Native Americans to buy and
improve land.
- The Indian Reservation Act
(1934) helped the Native
Americans to preserve and
practise their traditions laws
and cultures.
- Native Americans remained a
poor and excluded group of
society.
Ask Yourself:
1) When was the Wall Street Crash?
2) What was it?
3) Why did it happen?
4) What were speculators? How many of them were there?
5) How many people owned shares by 1929?
6) How many banks shut in 1929?
7) What was Hoover’s solution to the crisis?
8) What were Hoovervilles?
9) What happened to the WWI veterans? Why was this bad for Hoover?
10) How many KM did Roosevelt travel during his election campaign?
11) Wich party did Roosevelt represent?
12) What was the New Deal?
13) How many agencies can you remember?
14) Who did the CCC help?
15) What did the TVA do?
16) How much did farm profits increase by as a result of the AAA?
17) Which two agencies made up the NIRA?
18) Who didn’t like the New Deal? Explain why.
19) Who did? (think votes!)
20) Who did Roosevelt consult before creating the Second New Deal?
21) Do you know all these agencies?
22) Who benefited from the SSA?
23) What was good about the RA?
24) Who benefited from the New Deal?
25) Who didn’t?
26) What was unemployment in 1941?
27) Give two key New Deal supporters from Roosevelt’s government; what did they do
that made them important?
28) Give an example of an important woman?
29) Who were the CIO and UAW?
30) Make sure that you know all of the above, go through the questions again!
With Reference To:
Ben Walsh: Modern World History
OCR Modern World History
Google Images