Hist 112- 1920s Essays (504 words) - , Term Papers

Richard Heredia October 18, 2018 US History 112, section 4036 Stanley The Roaring 20s The roaring twenties is the era just after The Great War, it was a time of triumph, pride, and unity. A time when the American public felt they were invincible , pushing the limits of their bodies and the law. The era of flappers, m obsters, jazz, and prohibition , bootleggers, flagpole sitters, and marathon dances . Imagine dancing for days on end or making gin in a bathtub, those were common in that era. The 1920s were a defining time for the nation because of the music, industry, clothing , and empowerment. Jazz is America's most iconic music genre contribution to the world. Jazz culture began with slavery, when slaves would sing songs of sorrow and hardship. It embodies the experiences of Africans Americans in the US. Jazz was born in the New Orleans, and its roots trace back to African origin. In the 1920s however, Jazz evolved with into a sound of liberation. Jazz coincided with prohibition, a period where alcohol was prohibited from 1919-1933. Many older folks considered jazz as wild and for the young. The illegal production of alcohol and the wild new music was a recipe for fun. Prohibition led to the illegal production and distribution of alcohol in the US. This type of activity bred crime and with so much crime came organized crime. Prohibition made mob bosses like Al Copone very rich and very dangerous. With nothing to lose, Copone ran the crime in the streets of Chicago during the 1920s. Liquor smuggling was an estimated $40 million business a year. Where was this liquor being smuggled to? Into speakeasies, a secret barroom that required a password in order to gain entry. It was these kinds of establishments that played jazz music. With speakeasies and jazz music together, the two helped fuel each other. Jazz attracting African Americans to partake in drinking and speakeasies gave jazz a new audience. The audiences often consisted of flappers. Flappers were women with bobbed hair, skirts, pearls, and who drank and smoked. These women were part of a movement, a movement of liberation. These women challenged the status quo, they went against conservative minds and flaunted their bodies. The 1920s was an age of women's rights. With the Nineteenth Amendment passed in 1920 women were now able to vote. For the first time in US history women were recognized as actual humans. The 1920s holds a little bit of everything, from a new genre of music to notorious mob bosses. The 1920s went through more than any other decade, in just over ten years the US rose to an age of enlightenment of all kinds and fell to an unbelievable depression. This generation had it all and had it stripped from them as well. The 1920s was America's teenage years, a decade where people thought they were invincible and had zero consequences. Like a teenager drinking too much, the Great Depression was the hangover.