Video: The Century - America's Time From Boom to Burst

Throughout the nineteen twenties the _____________ here blizzard: bands played, liquor
flowed and everyone who was drinking it was breaking the law.
In the first month of the new decade the 18th amendment became the law of the land: the
sale and consumption of alcohol was now _____________.
"There was prohibition but oddly enough nobody paid any attention to it."
"You entered people's homes and served dreadful things called orange glasses, which was
gin and orange juice"
Liqor was now sold behind closed doors, in places called speakeasies. Proprietors took the risks and reaped the profits.
"It was good _____________, I was 15 years old I was riding around in a Nash convertible, we had four _____________:
one by the Daily News, one by the Daily Mirror."
"People wanted to drink, it was a great game."
It became a _____________ game for the high-stakes players. Battles between
rival _____________ for control of illegal liquor territories riddled American cities with
mushrooming _____________ rates.
Prohibition's aim was to sweep liqor off the city streets, now they were flooded with
_____________ and guns.
"I used to carry two persuaders myself. You had to have them, or else!"
_____________ and the general disregard which followed it, was the perfect _____________ for the twenties, a decade
which was about crossing the line, smashing tradition, breaking _____________.
As modern America came of age in the nineteen twenties boundaries of all sorts - technological geographical and social were shattered.
The _____________ in the roaring twenties was the birth scream of the modern. America was now about to leave
behind the formative experience of its _____________ past and embrace the promise of an _____________ Future. But
_____________ would have its price. A sudden wrenching departure from the certainties of the _____________ and the
_____________, spread by an emerging mass media: the movies and the radio, things that seem old and familiar now
were just beginning to take shape in the nineteen twenties.
At the dawn of the 1920s America was clearly entering a new era, an era defined
by a vast and complicated urban culture that would dominate the rest of the 20th century.
The very names of New York streets would become synonymous with _____________
and innovation. Broadway would represent the best and latest in American
_____________, Madison Avenue would come to stand for the bustling new business of
_____________ which was uniting the nation in a set of shared fantasies and desires. And
Wall Street came to represent the decade's expanding economic _____________.
Wall Street was where the _____________ was. People came from everywhere.
"The reason I come to New York was there was nobody there after they closed the mines
in 1926.
In Pennsylvania there was no money coming there. This fellow Jerry got me the first job
and he said 'Come on down to Wall Street, the streets are paved with gold!'"
It seemed that way too on Park and Fifth Avenues where the tycoon's lived.
The number of _____________ in the 1920s jumped _____________ percent over the
previous decade. The twenties' feeling of limitless horizons was fueled by their
_____________ lifestyle.
The capital of _____________ in the nineteen twenties was just a subway ride
uptown in Harlem.
It was in Harlem clubs that one could see the artists at the forefront of this freshened
uniquely American _____________.
Performers such as Louis Armstrong, Bessie Smith and a young man named Edward
Kennedy Ellington his friends simply called him Duke.
While Harlem seem to promise land for _____________ Americans, New York's Lower East Side was for
European _____________ their gateway to the American dream
Throughout the nineteen twenties new technologies would transform daily life.
At the beginning of the decade most Americans lived without _____________; when night fell only candles and
lamps held off the darkness. America was electrified in the twentie. Electric lights extended today opened up new
_____________ for work and play
The _____________ seemed to me more revolutionary anyway than anything that's happened since, it totally
changed the kind of space we live in really.
The car would give Americans a sense of autonomy and freedom, the freedom to _____________ their city or town, to go
away on a vacation or simply on a day's out. By mid-decade the government was spending more than one billion dollars

on the construction of _____________, bridges and tunnels the beginnings of a national infrastructure which knit the
country together.
Roadways were soon dotted with a new phenomenon: roadside _____________.
Advertising helped transform not just the physical landscape but the cultural one. Along with advertising came the
expansion of a brand new consumer concept: _____________.
The old inhibition against debt came tumbling down as everything from cars to clothes could be bought on time. "Buy
now, pay _____________." became the order of the day. By 1927 seventy-five percent of all household goods were
bought on credit.
And in the last years of the decade the item desired most was the _____________.
From its scratchy beginnings in 1920 as a mere hobby radio would become a
nationwide phenomenon as important as the car.
Suddenly all Americans were _____________ to the same things, _____________ at the
same jokes, there was a kind of communal exercise here and of very much a
strengthening of the notion of what it was to be an _____________.
Along with and sometimes propelled by the great technological leap in the
nineteen twenties, social patterns in place for decades also began to shift. Nowhere was
this more obvious than with the changes for American
_____________. An expanding job market had given more
and more women _____________ and the disposable income to do with what they wished.
Throughout the nineteen twenties women would assert a new-found freedom and
independence and nothing symbolized it more the 19th amendment. In 1920 after eighty-one
years of agitation women won the right to vote.
A woman's lot had changed in almost every way. She thought that she had the right to live for
_____________ rather than for her family, for others as women were always supposed to. She
went to _____________, she went to after hours clubs, she went to wild _____________, she
had much shorter hair, she wore much more makeup. You go from having young women
whose dresses reached to their ankles to flesh flesh everywhere. And a lot of twenties culture is
about the fun of smashing prohibitions. The more daring women of the day were known as
_____________ and vamps.
The puplic's _____________ with flying in the 1920s seemed fitting for a time when even gravity couldn't hold
on progress and when every boundary seemed just waiting to be broken.
In 1927 one pilot would put aviation and himself on every front page in the world.
On a misty may morning outside New York City a plane called the spirit of Saint Lewis was ready to take off for Paris.
No one had ever flown solo across the _____________ before .
Ready to take the chance this time was Charles Lindbergh, the 6-foot-2 son of a
former Congressman from Minnesota. Thousands of people came to watch him take
off.
His flight had represented the best of an era, a mastery of modern _____________
joined with old-fashioned _____________ of courage, individualism and hard-won
achievement.
The _____________ promised blue skies in the country's future. At his
inauguration in 1929 Herbert Hoover repeated the common wisdom of the day that
Americans were on their way to riches.
If proof was needed all one had to do was look at the bubbling pool of wealth: the _____________ market.
"There were no regulations as we have now, people got away with murder all the time, the government didn't bother them
so they were all making money, you know, doing very well.
A boom in buying had driven up stock prices. Suddenly in _____________ of 1929
investors started cashing in their overpriced stock. A _____________ of selling started.
On October 29 in 1929, it was obvious from the opening bell that things were wildly
amiss.
The stock market went into a free _____________, crowds gathered in the street outside at
the Exchange.
At three o'clock the bell rang and that was it!
More than $30 billion dollars in paper value simply _____________ that day as the stock
market crashed.
"The famous word: The Crash!
Overnight! It was like bombs fell."
The twenties bubble had burst and with it the decade's optimism.
People lost every _____________ that they had. Nobody had any pensions and there were no... there was no Medicare,
Medicaid, Social Security.
If people lost their money that was it, they were down and out.

New York City's Great White Way: Broadway!

Throughout the nineteen twenties the nightlife here blizzard: bands played, liquor flowed and everyone who
was drinking it was breaking the law.
In the first month of the new decade the 18th amendment became the law of the land: the sale and consumption
of alcohol was now illegal.
"There was prohibition but oddly enough nobody paid any attention to it."
"You entered people's homes and served dreadful things called orange glasses, which was gin and orange juice"
Liqor was now sold behind closed doors, in places called speakeasies. Proprietors took the risks and reaped the
profits.
"It was good money, I was 15 years old I was riding around in a Nash convertible, we had four
speakeasies: one by the Daily News, one by the Daily Mirror.
You had the people and you let them in, okay a guy would explain who he was and he showed you ID or
something and you let him in. You get to know him, he was like family after a while."
"Every corner had a saloon on it. Of course we were never made in, the cops picked up that business plan.
People wanted to drink, it was a great game."
It became a dangerous game for the high-stakes players. Battles between rival gangs for control of illegal liquor
territories riddled American cities with mushrooming murder rates.
Prohibition's aim was to sweep liqor off the city streets, now they were flooded with gangsters and guns.
"I used to carry two persuaders myself. You had to have them, or else!"
Prohibition and the general disregard which followed it, was the perfect symbol for the twenties, a decade
which was about crossing the line, smashing tradition, breaking boundaries.
As modern America came of age in the nineteen twenties boundaries of all sorts - technological geographical
and social - were shattered.
The roar in the roaring twenties was the birth scream of the modern. America was now about to leave behind
the formative experience of its rural past and embrace the promise of an Urban Future. But progress would have
its price. A sudden wrenching departure from the certainties of the traditional and the familiar, spread by an
emerging mass media: the movies and the radio, things that seem old and familiar now were just beginning to
take shape in the nineteen twenties.
At the dawn of the 1920s America was clearly entering a new era, an era defined by a vast and complicated
urban culture that would dominate the rest of the 20th century.
After World War One there was an eagerness to embrace the new and it was in America cities, most
dramatically in its biggest: New York, where the modern page was born.
The very architecture of the city spoke of America's new ascendency and her aspirations.
"The skyscraper was an example of the new form achieving a kind of thrilling scale nobility. People worked
there then lived in the average small town in America."
A movement to the cities that had started during World War One accelerated, in 1920 for the first time more
Americans live in urban centres then in country towns and villages.
"The pace is being set in the cities. The city is irresistibly attractive, is really at a kind of high tide in this
decade, it's a force, a magnet."
The very names of New York streets would become synonymous with progress and innovation.
Broadway would represent the best and latest in American entertainment, Madison Avenue would come to stand
for the bustling new business of advertising which was uniting the nation in a set of shared fantasies and
desires. And Wall Street came to represent the decade's expanding economic opportunities.
Wall Street was where the action was. People came from everywhere.
"The reason I come to New York was there was nobody there after they closed the mines in 1926.
In Pennsylvania there was no money coming there. This fellow Jerry got me the first job and he said 'Come on
down to Wall Street, the streets are paved with gold!'"
It seemed that way too on Park and Fifth Avenues where the tycoon's lived.
The number of millionaires in the 1920s jumped 400 percent over the previous decade.
The twenties' feeling of limitless horizons was fueled by their lavish lifestyle.
"Our family had a house at 9-34 Fifth Avenue when I was growing up, we had a place in Tuxedo Park, and a
house in New York and then we used to come to South Hampton in the summer. Everybody seemed to be
having a good time!"

"In in those days you had lots of help. You had a cook, you had a kitchen maid, you had a laundress and then
you had a parlour maid, a chamber maid and mothers maid. How many does that make? Six, but I think they
were eight actually. Terribly nice people!"
"Almost everybody had a boat. I recall in the twenties you would see a harbor filled with yahts, I mean really
filled. Almost gunnel to gunnel and we didn't refer to yahts as such unless they were a hundred feet or over.
There was a great deal of entertaining, it was all done in people's houses, seated in the parlours were 50-60
people. Always after dinner there would be entertainment by guests. George Gershwin was there with his
orchestrated Bill Bailey, they got up and played on two pianos, mother always said two grand pianos in the big
room downstairs.
Gershwin, who wrote Rhapsody in Blue and other anthems of the decades was profoundly influenced by the
new music he had heard in pub called Jess.
The capital of Jazz in the nineteen twenties was just a subway ride uptown in Harlem.
It was in Harlem clubs that one could see the artists at the forefront of this freshened uniquely American Music.
Performers such as Louis Armstrong, Bessie Smith and a young man named Edward Kennedy Ellington his
friends simply called him Duke.
"Duke was the essence of what black music was all about. Everybody else was heading in that direction but
Duke was there."
8'58
"The first time that I was seized by the music was the first time I heard the Duke in a broadcast from the Cotton
Club on Broadway, in Hollywood and parish Rub Elbows.
People came from all over noon and teach to experience what was going on

Part 2
While harlem seem to promise land for black Americans, New York's Lower East Side was for European
immigrants their gateway to the American dream
Throughout the nineteen twenties new technologies would transform daily life.
At the beginning of the decade most Americans lived without electricity; when night fell only candles and
lamps held off the darkness.
America was electrified in the twentie. Electric lights extended today opened up new possibilities for work and
play
The car seemed to me more revolutionary anyway than anything that's happened since, it totally changed the
kind of space we live in really.
The car would give Americans a sense of autonomy and freedom, the freedom to escape their city or town, to
go away on a vacation or simply on a day's out. By mid-decade the government was spending more than one
billion dollars on the construction of highways, bridges and tunnels the beginnings of a national infrastructure
which knit the country together.
Roadways were soon dotted with a new phenomenon: roadside advertising.
Advertising help transform not just the physical landscape but the cultural one. Along with advertising came the
expansion of a brand new consumer concept: credit.
The old inhibition against debt came tumbling down as everything from cars to clothes could be bought on
time. "Buy now, pay later." became the order of the day. By 1927 seventy-five percent of all household goods
were bought on credit.
And in the last years of the decade the item desired most was the radio.
From its scratchy beginnings in 1920 is a mere hobby radio would become a nationwide phenomenon as
important as the car.
Suddenly all Americans were listening to the same things, laughing at the same jokes, there was a kind of
communal exercise here and of very much a strengthening of the notion of what it was to be an American.
Along with and sometimes propelled by the great technological leap in the nineteen twenties, social patterns in
place for decades also began to shift. Nowhere was this more obvious than with the changes for American
women. An expanding job market had given more and more women careers and the disposable income to do

with what they wished.

Throughout the nineteen twenties women would assert a new-found freedom and independence and nothing
symbolized it more the 19th amendment. In 1920 after eighty-one years %uh vegetation women won the right
to vote.
A woman's lot had changed in almost every way. She thought that she had the right to live for herself rather
than for her famil, for others as women were always supposed to. She went to bars, she went to after hours club,
she went to wild parties, she had much shorter hair, she wore much more makeup. You go from having young
women whose dresses reached to their ankles to flesh flesh everywhere. And a lot of twenties culture is about
the fun of smashing prohibitions. The more daring women of the day were known as flappers and vamps.
The puplic's fascination with flying in the 1920s seemed fitting for a time when even gravity couldn't hold on
progress and when every boundary seemed just waiting to be broken.
In 1927 one pilot would put aviation and himself on every front page in the world.
On a misty may morning outside New York City a plane called the spirit of Saint Lewis was ready to take off
for Paris. No one had ever flown solo across the Atlantic before .
Ready to take the chance this time was Charles Lindbergh, the 6-foot-2 son of a former Congressman from
Minnesota. Thousands of people came to watch him take off.
His flight had represented the best of an era, a mastery of modern technology joined with old-fashioned values
of courage, individualism and hard-won achievement.
The president promised blue skies in the country's future. At his inauguration in 1929 Herbert Hoover repeated
the common wisdom of the day that Americans were on their way to riches. If proof was needed all one had to
do was look at the bubbling pool of wealth: the stock market.
"There were no regulations as we have now, people got away with murder all the time, the government didn't
bother them so they were all making money, you know, doing very well.
A boom in buying had driven up stock prices. Suddenly in October of 1929 investors started cashing in their
overpriced stock. A panic of selling started.
On October 29 in 1929, it was obvious from the opening bell that things were wildly amiss.
The stock market went into a free fall, crowds gathered in the street outside at the Exchange.
At three o'clock the bell rang and that was it!
More than $30 billion dollars in paper value simply vanished that day as the stock market crashed.
"The famous word: The Crash!
Overnight! It was like bombs fell."
The twenties bubble had burst and with it the decade's optimism.
People lost every penny that they had. Nobody had any pensions and there were no... there was no Medicare,
Medicaid, Social Security.
If people lost their money that was it, they were down and out.

10:23
him home and 20
10:28
am hearing that over me when after hola midnight
10:31
diets and everything well saved up for
10:35
months to get money to go after them
10:38
tonight person meeting 1
10:46
and
10:48
a harlem was contributing more than music to America's new urban culture
10:54

the world above new york's a hundred and twenty-fifth street

10:57
was in the nineteen twenties a hotbed of political social and cultural activity
11:02
was later called the Harlem Renaissance
11:05
the Harlem Renaissance is one of those fancy terms that white folks and then
11:10
and they want to take a particular look at some aspect for
11:13
black folks I don't think black folks run around saying
11:17
we don't have a renaissance assuming that the
11:20
it was a holiday at the spirit in harlem was born this idea
11:26
the new me about someone who startup company
11:29
well who advertised his and her contributions to American culture
11:34
who was proud to be black
11:38
problem was the and allowed
11:41
the promised land place where our fantasies
11:45
came true if I had to choose between
11:51
Evan other poor or all column of course would win
11:56
every day
11:59
that
12:03
While harlem seem to promise land for black Americans, New York's Lower East Side was for European
immigrants their gateway to the American dream
12:17
we were blessed because we were in america my father came
12:23
from ukraine he went to work in New York City and worked
12:29
enough factory with a blocked pat's
12:32
men's hats and he was making
12:36
you know like nine or ten dollars a week working a six-day week
12:40
and he would tell me how he was able to buy lunch
12:44
everyday for 12 cents and the lunch consisted
12:48
are hard arm herring
12:51
a big small tearing out of the barrel on my mouth what is now to think a bit
12:56
and a big rolled poppy seeds

13:00
and on on it and
13:03
life was beautiful
13:08
this wise perhaps the most mixed
13:11
City racially ethnically on in the country
13:15
it but cities all
13:18
country have become more important because
13:21
changed this century in the city's business
13:26
industry culture
13:30
you
13:32
nothing in this life then no just the Meiji commit
13:36
thing
13:39
the world former then should be explored
13:45
that 10 this one invention
13:49
you like this happen in shape to it summer but 3 like american the spillway
13:56
my anything my uncle
14:00
the decades startling changes would soon spread from american cities
14:04
to envelop the entire nation
14:15
far from the speakeasies and the dance poles and the night time was there was
14:18
another American in the 1920s
14:20
here people still lived as their parents and grandparents
14:24
they like
14:32
in the early 1920s this with a quad
14:36
easy lie
14:40
the
14:41
neighborhood
14:43
who hola from porn
14:45
the and minute when they would be
14:49
explosion may be imminent

14:53
Throughout the nineteen twenties new technologies would transform daily life.
At the beginning of the decade most Americans lived without electricity; when night fell only candles and
lamps held off the darkness.
America was electrified in the twentie. Electric lights extended today opened up new possibilities for work and
play

0:23
1
0:25
then search new power came first to the cities
0:30
by the decades am the majority American homes
0:34
had electricity
0:37
p
0:41
you can't understand this century without understanding
0:44
the effect the impact have science
0:47
and technology
0:52
of my father's generation is the one that really so amazing changes
0:57
he was born in 1902 world where the horse was still the main
1:02
means of getting about half
1:09

The car seemed to me more revolutionary anyway than anything that's happened since, it totally changed the
kind of space we live in really.
The car would give Americans a sense of autonomy and freedom, the freedom to escape their city or town, to
go away on a vacation or simply on a day's out. By mid-decade the government was spending more than one
billion dollars on the construction of highways, bridges and tunnels the beginnings of a national infrastructure
which knit the country together.
1:53
my father took my mother and me in the car
1:55
for the highest bride
1:59
through the Holland Tunnel
2:02
this was opening night water costs going up
2:05
to go to just come up
2:08
are high bespoke I cringed
2:12
supposed to work election how did people don't
2:16

como under the water which is the water and I imagine as move on for tonight but
2:21
I heard the way himself
2:27
a PAB on the sock more highways are closed a
2:33
is outsider log we sold the billboards
2:40
Roadways were soon dotted with a new phenomenon: roadside advertising.
Advertising help transform not just the physical landscape but the cultural one. Along with advertising came the
expansion of a brand new consumer concept: credit.
The old inhibition against debt came tumbling down as everything from cars to clothes could be bought on
time. "Buy now, pay later." became the order of the day. By 1927 seventy-five percent of all household goods
were bought on credit.
And in the last years of the decade the item desired most was the radio.
From its scratchy beginnings in 1920 is a mere hobby radio would become a nationwide phenomenon as
important as the car.
Young radio enthusiast albert's in linger was there
3:45
at the birth of modern radio in 1920 the night station KDKA
3:50
broadcasting from a factory rooftop in Pittsburgh transmitted the results of
3:55
the presidential election
3:56
public apart going to crawl up on my
4:00
gallon was reading the election returns
4:03
he got track show for about 45 35 or 45 minutes I
4:09
red Lexion return shipping nobody and any comprehension
4:14
are the significant overall going on of
4:17
don't forget there are only a couple hundred listen
4:22
within six months every story in America even grocery stores
4:25
resulting radios the
4:28
for
Suddenly all Americans were listening to the same things, laughing at the same jokes, there was a kind of
communal exercise here and of very much a strengthening of the notion of what it was to be an American.
Along with and sometimes propelled by the great technological leap in the nineteen twenties, social patterns in
place for decades also began to shift. Nowhere was this more obvious than with the changes for American
women. An expanding job market had given more and more women careers and the disposable income to do
with what they wished.
Throughout the nineteen twenties women would assert a new-found freedom and independence and nothing
symbolized it more the 19th amendment. In 1920 after eighty-one years %uh vegetation women won the right
to vote.
A woman's lot had changed in almost every way. She thought that she had the right to live for herself rather
than for her famil, for others as women were always supposed to. She went to bars, she went to after hours club,
she went to wild parties, she had much shorter hair, she wore much more makeup. You go from having young
women whose dresses reached to their ankles to flesh flesh everywhere. And a lot of twenties culture is about

the fun of smashing prohibitions. The more daring women of the day were known as flappers and vamps.
6:19
sure remember flap is all over the place
6:23
know they were older than me butter
6:27
you know you look at work when you look at the flap is fully I should the
6:30
governor and i
6:31
I'll well I think a flapper with the typeof
6:38
have young woman who just wanted to see how far she could go and then
6:43
would stop because should be afraid to go to for an advanced didn't hear no
6:48
force you
6:50
people yeah
6:57
the shattering ways in nineteen twenties
7:01
city life were spread by the media to
7:04
rural America places where the changes were not always so easy
7:09
to get used
7:14
smokin year %uh
7:16
drinking no being loose with told using profanity
7:20
this shifted down from the cities from New York in Chicago
7:25
and then this for me he
7:29
own warning police mean by Wu
7:32
moody here was a good
7:35
come home she'd been working Chicago
7:39
he'd come home we show addresses I'll lay one on Wed children
7:44
you going to church with had shown and why don't know
7:48
the world
7:50
this time in Lincolnshire London Broil with pp
7:53
generation
8:02
this country was founded on a respectable in a sense of righteousness
8:07
keeping the Sabbath day and people brought their children up
8:11

on the disciplines read the Scripture and all those things were
8:16
other things about the studio
8:20
the people were shot a week church
8:24
norm their little crime control
8:37
as the city's grew in size and influence many people in small town america found
8:42
them threatening
8:43
a breeding ground for new and often helium ideas
8:50
for
8:52
in one small American town the force is a traditional religion
8:56
and modern science would clash in the battle heard round the world
9:01
here in dayton tennessee in the summer of 1925
9:05
12 the century's most famous courtroom battles would take place
9:09
John T scopes stood accused to teaching darwin's theory of evolution
9:16
that man and he shared a common ancestor
9:19
that was against the law %uh in Tennessee
9:24
the scopes trial attracted the best legal brains at the time
9:28
William Jennings Bryan three times presidential candidate and the christian
9:33
fundamentalist himself
9:35
came to prosecute
9:39
clarence darrow the celebrated Chicago trial lawyer
9:42
came to defend schools
9:49
outside as the trial progressed in the scorching summer heat
9:53
Dayton had itself accountable home
9:56
old people would bring in
9:59
trained chimpanzees branch in
10:02
solution packaging and they'd leedom up and down the street
10:10
bring your Bible was ever wear and tear post about Street Cross Street banners
10:14
you ok baby a hundred yards just weighed
10:18

you have a street preacher I did you wouldn't

10:21
preaching to bed he'd ever sence a paper tries
10:26
you go the same place next next day to be sober people
10:29
some other partner Stacey
10:32
but it was hit with a lot of people joke
10:37
Scopes trial became emblematic everybody had to make up their mind people never
10:43
been to Tennessee
10:44
to be in fine Tennessee had to think about this question
10:49
do I believe in modern science
10:56
earn
10:56
at times it seemed that the whole world and converged on Dayton
11:00
the housework Leola malval and
11:05
with newspaper people from England
11:08
much pain from cramps we had for many newspaper people wear them
11:14
that you could experiment
11:17
there
11:20
when all the hoopla ended John T scopes was found guilty
11:23
and find a hundred dollars a ruling later overturned on a technicality
11:28
what scopes represented in what the world came to witness was a colossal
11:33
clash of ideals the cool reason
11:36
of Science seem to threaten the deep and abiding roots a religion
11:40
it was one thing to replace the family mule with the Model T but quite another
11:44
to trade Matthew Mark and Ron
11:46
for Einstein Freud and garment for many people
11:50
these were confusing times and what may have been the most
11:54
unsettling about the pace of change in the 1920s was that people really wanted
11:58
both the benefits
12:00
up the future and the familiar comforts
12:03

%uh the past theme

12:10
they want fruit to the dentist they want awesome
12:14
electricians radio and the same time
12:18
they wanted to remain 1850 may know they cannot have box
12:22
and this creates psychological tension within American society
12:27
that is an looking for somewhere to go and it goes into hatred towards
12:32
immigrants hatred towards people who wasn't be different it goes into into
12:38
homes
12:38
and into the Ku Klux Klan
12:44
Ku Klux Klan membership soared to four million
12:48
in the 1920 almost everybody
12:54
it was a good citizen the South was a member the Klein
12:58
I think they were encouraging morality
13:01
my turn the light on
13:04
on him are held in the seat and on things
13:07
me created grady loom
13:11
or I'd take on the information in the baby
13:14
getting 21
13:17
they win against bill opposed to the Board but they will oppose to the came
13:22
from judicial in the morning thinking
13:28
going to people's houses coalinga ma'am
13:32
so p
13:33
with him thing make time
13:37
do not need cucumber shout but Alabama it was nationwide
13:43
I'm
13:46
the clan was actively recruiting in many northern states
13:50
my father was asked if you would like to join
13:54
the Ku Klux Klan he grabbed the guy by the collar and threw him down the stairs
14:01

has three nights later almost directly across the street

14:06
there was a large cross-burning the I still can see it in my mind it was a
14:13
dreadful horrifying experience
14:18
my mother said it's just too so they're guarding the gates of hell
14:22
those by people who
14:25
who cater to our store and save the weather's they caught him 30
14:30
James Cameron was living in Indiana when he and two childhood friends were seized
14:35
by a clan inspired mom
14:37
in rage by reports of the rape and murder other white couple
14:45
many I'm on Nuketown a crowd had had the road in and
14:48
good on 20
14:51
and then leaves at a guardian it on hang on
14:54
his two friends were lynched
14:57
James Cameron barely escaped

by put a rope around my neck it's true though they know the tree
0:05
not Kim crime harlem I haven't done anything
0:10
before they could hang me out
0:12
arrested pictures boy back here not to do with any
0:15
killing parade
0:17
I looked up to heaven national i'd have mercy
0:24
I
0:26
throughout the decade an estimated 200 people real interest by the clan
0:30
this organization claiming to uphold the values and virtues in the past
0:35
became so powerful in the nineteen twenties that it sees political control
0:41

in seven states and in 1927 klansman marched

0:45
fifty thousand strong down the streets
0:48
the nation's path clearly the forces
0:52
have twenties modernity have stirred bitter resistance
0:55
and the Manassa mauler lashed out on his own party done
1:03
Dublin
1:07
in a decade frontally so many changes people in the 1920s seem hungry for all
1:12
Fashion heroes
1:14
and an explosion in spectator sports
1:17
provided them
1:19
sports Giants became household names their
1:22
every move followed by radio and eager tabloid press
1:26
one name was known him more households
1:30
than any other in of family would have been every baseball
1:34
oriented but I would have had to be death not to have heard about babe
1:39
the George
1:43
common Ruth the baby reshaped America's pastime
1:47
in an era a big events he excelled at the game's biggest excitement
1:51
the home run he hit sixty of them in a single season in 1927
1:56
a record that would stand for four decades
1:59
fans drove from miles around to see
2:06
used to getting the truck seven members but pay in the truck yes said I'm not
2:10
in in three and a half hours with from smack to the
2:14
Yankee Stadium
2:17
was 35 cents to see the baby lou gehrig
2:20
the ID please
2:25
babe ruth was a hero
2:29
lou gehrig's knowledge but people seems like everybody backed him as a hero
2:38

we try to keep our best

2:40
they graciously sent his pictures tree should purchase tickets bitch babe
2:46
really missed him
2:49
feel good to be in a bit
3:00

The puplic's fascination with flying in the 1920s seemed fitting for a time when even gravity couldn't hold on
progress and when every boundary seemed just waiting to be broken.
once I got up about a thousand me
it was like I was home
3:18
and I'm not an American describe it to you I was home
3:23
I i've never wanted to be anyplace else
3:30
In 1927 one pilot would put aviation and himself on every front page in the world.
On a misty may morning outside New York City a plane called the spirit of Saint Lewis was ready to take off
for Paris. No one had ever flown solo across the Atlantic before
six others have tried the failed and I'm the
Ready to take the chance this time was Charles Lindbergh, the 6-foot-2 son of a former Congressman from
Minnesota. Thousands of people came to watch him take off.
in once he was out of sight it seemed as if all-america the held its breath
The in nike stadium they had three minutes of silence praying for everybody in the country the hand Klein the
fuel heavy single-engine plane was the battle against
4:38
whether hunger and two teams
4:42
for the entire thirty three and a half hour flight the Western world wondered
4:46
about the fader that tiny plane
4:48
somewhere over the past two left
4:54
on
4:56
it was a Saturday night
4:58
they were they hadn't heard from for a long time
5:01
and I was walking up to 120 to straighten someone shouted they prey on
5:06
them
5:06
it he was crying over Highland and with me.
5:10
an hour or so he landed in and Paris
5:19
hundred thousand reasons were there to welcome wish I am
5:23

lucky lindy emerge from his plane carrying only a razor

5:26
and a passport
5:32

His flight had represented the best of an era, a mastery of modern technology joined with old-fashioned values
of courage, individualism and hard-won achievement.
5:48
Highland Park in back it was no he walked on the water
5:51
public couldn't get enough of a he was the starter
5:57
a there was no one in america Porn
6:00
prize your problem
6:02
1
6:06
he was a hero he was amazed guy
6:10
was mucho used rodeos front bookkeeper
6:13
that was what they wanted
6:17
the parade remember down Broadway was the biggest national celebration sentry
6:21
and
6:21
with no and
6:25
yeah
6:28
everybody UK newburgh they be treated
6:32
the person that he wasn't represented it was great
6:35
made a big impression
6:40
great signing for lawless commonly
6:43
realize that from a young man could do great day
6:47
my a
6:55
old
6:57
after lindbergh's triumph there remain only one continent
7:02
for the airplane to Concord antarctica
7:05
the frozen and forbidding landscape at the bottom of the world was the boundary
7:10
wonder the century's great explorers Admiral Richard Byrd
7:14

set out to break his goal was to fly over the south pole
7:18
his expedition was flooded with young and eager volunteers
7:22
all love them wanting to be here the at newburgh on select
7:27
the figure how many Boy Scouts to go to
7:30
poll
7:31
I was about 12
7:34
and I was nominated for the guys to go now this was a big three was in all the
7:39
papers
7:39
my composure my what do you think
7:44
I'm gonna go to the north pole with admiral Burgess you can't go I said why
7:48
did you catch it does the cold on
7:52
I never want my cousin winston
7:55
human
7:59
Nora 120 man
8:02
connected with the good expedition 20-year-old Harvard student norman
8:08
vaughan dropped out of school
8:10
train for a year and was finally selected on the adventure of a lifetime
8:17
we stepped on land that had never been seen
8:21
are touch before
8:23
and that just excited baby
8:25
on words absolutely a new frontier
8:31
the expedition home base was called little America
8:34
its two-year mission was to conduct geological research
8:37
and prepare for birds record-breaking attempt
8:41
we were responsible for getting out onto the
8:44
interior and talk to her as far as we could
8:48
to be there for admiral boorda's the
8:52
rescue expedition should he have at a forced landing
8:59

it
9:03
the
9:08
on
9:16
just after midnight on november the 29th 1929
9:20
admiral byrd's aircraft flew 500 feet above the geographic South Pole
9:25
on
9:27
going to star wrapped in an American flag on
9:30
on
9:31
Americans and their airplane can reach the Thames
9:35
above the earth
9:48
by the end of the 1920s anything seemed possible
9:52
the most
10:01
extraordinary thing about the decade
10:04
Trinian's was pandemic
10:07
air love optimism
10:10
a feeling that the future of the country was
10:13
unlimited out and one of the great
10:17
jazz songs have the day it was
10:21
blue skies only but blue skies do I C
10:31

The president promised blue skies in the country's future. At his inauguration in 1929 Herbert Hoover repeated
the common wisdom of the day that Americans were on their way to riches. If proof was needed all one had to
do was look at the bubbling pool of wealth: the stock market.
the butcher the baker the candlestick maker everybody oddly enough was in the stock market
wanna more chauffeur's was a mild
11:01
if he can be in the market anybody
"There were no regulations as we have now, people got away with murder all the time, the government didn't
bother them so they were all making money, you know, doing very well.
A boom in buying had driven up stock prices. Suddenly in October of 1929 investors started cashing in their
overpriced stock. A panic of selling started.

On October 29 1929, it was obvious from the opening bell that things were wildly amiss.

9:30
11:48
there was a who rumble in the ninth floor
11:52
when the page with the mines
11:56
bpm to sell orders coming out on home phone the wheels
12:02
really started to come off

The stock market went into a free fall, crowds gathered in the street outside at the Exchange.
At three o'clock the bell rang and that was it!
More than $30 billion dollars in paper value simply vanished that day as the stock market crashed.
The famous word: The Crash!
Overnight! It was like bombs fell.
The twenties bubble had burst and with it the decades optimism.
People lost every penny that they had. Nobody had any pensions and there were no... there was no Medicare,
Medicaid, Social Security.
If people lost their money that was it, they were down and out.

13:14
people jumped of the George Washington Bridge
13:17
which had only just then not too long ago been billed
13:21
people being killed my father was
13:24
wiped out he
13:28
never psychologically he never recovered
13:33
29 I lost million dollar
13:36
what do you do same story
13:40
wash your face in hand call me a head start all over again but as people would
13:46
find out in the decade to come
13:48
decade is different from the 22's has nine years from day
13:51
starting over was not going to be so easy
13:55
America
13:58
along with much of the world faced the Great Depression
14:02
that on the next episode of the century america's time
14:06
i'm peter jennings thank you for joining us it

14:24
the
14:31
the
14:32
you
14:45
in

Uploaded on Sep 27, 2010

2
ha motion pictures
0:07
one of the more popular forms a preacher entertainment had become an american
0:11
obsession movie-goers bought $100 million tickets each week
0:16
equalling nearly $1 for every US citizen silent stars continue to shine
0:27
Charlie Chaplin Buster Keaton and Harold Lloyd
0:30
made silent comedies one of those popular genres with audiences
0:34
in
0:37
Mary Pickford was america's sweetheart and her husband the dashing
0:41
Douglas Fairbanks burned up the screen and a swashbuckling adventures
0:45
the 1921 film the sheik
0:49
introduced a new kind of overtly sexual screen star
0:52
rudolph valentino yet the most remarkable film event at the early
0:58
twenties played not on the screen
0:59
but in a courtroom in 1921 famed comedian fatty arbuckle
1:04
was implicated in the assault and murder young actors
1:07
in Virginia rap arbuckle was acquitted but the well-publicized escapade
1:12
ruined his career the scandal concerns studio bosses enough
1:18
beheading of further trouble by hiring an independent watchdog
1:21
named will hayes in the early thirties Hayes
1:24
instituted the Hays Code forbid among other things
1:28

any screen kiss longer than a few seconds demanding movies hold true to
1:32
one point
1:33
a good guy wins want the best directors at manipulating the new code
1:38
was Cecil B DeMille the most successful and flamboyant represented
1:43
Roaring Twenties Hollywood demille embodied the new morality
1:46
the day his religious epic spur trade sex and murder
1:51
doing it in such a way that a moral was drawn appear the nineteen twenties were
2:00
considered golden years
2:02
sports in the early part of the decade Jack Dempsey continued his rise to
2:06
national attention
2:07
damn she successfully defended his title against French boxers georgie Carpentier
2:12
in 1921 in boxing's first million dollar gay
2:16
Bobby Jones dominated the links
2:20
winning 13 national championships in the early part of the decade
2:24
contributing to golf's ever-increasing popularity
2:32
on the baseball George Herman be ru
2:36
swung his way to fame and fortune originally entering the major leagues
2:40
ace pitcher for the Boston Red Sox the bambinos most recognized as a Yankee
2:45
slugger
2:45
he joined the Yankees in 1920 in his first season with New York
2:50
he pounded 54 home runs the next year
2:53
59 Ruth help restore baseball's luster
2:56
that have been tarnished by the scandal involving the Chicago players
3:00
accused of throwing the 1919 World Series
3:03
various scandals that marked the twenties contributed to the rise have
3:10
tabloid style newspapers
3:12
these papers found a willing audience hungry for anything trivial
3:16
and sensational the carefree attitude contributed to numerous
3:24

bad came in during the day whatever the idea

3:35
it was new unique or exotic it was sure to become the latest craze
3:40
the Miss America pageant
3:43
debuted in atlantic city in 1921 marathon dances became the most popular
3:48
fat
3:49
and promised quick riches to any couple would be a difference to last
3:53
but nothing scandalized and flown to the social mores have the time
4:06
flappers
4:11
India she was the representative of the nation's
4:13
first met subculture wild dances
4:17
frivolous bad and Bob here that was boyish
4:20
in Carefree signaled the combination youthful exuberance
4:24
and rebellion the Flambeau
4:27
who chronicled their hedonistic band in this side of paradise
4:31
and the great gatsby the flapper generation found through as they sought
4:36
in dance halls
4:37
and speakeasies that's where most were introduced to the sounds
4:41
jazz this uniquely american music was born in New Orleans
4:48
and fanned out like a wildfire it was energetic
4:51
syncopated and filled with improvisational rest
4:55
jazz pioneers like jelly roll morton chetori
4:59
and Joe King Oliver flourished on the club scene
5:02
from New Orleans to Chicago in New York I kinda remember a little bit about the
5:07
two is
5:08
was already in kiddin 21 is and
5:11
used to hear this music all the time good records a
5:15
jelly roll morton the records king I love
5:19
and the all the bands from you all as many of them from Arkansas and Tennessee
5:24

there were other bands heard them

5:26
but basically all the black group played for black people
5:30
played in the dance halls and in the honky tonk
5:33
and the music became very popular during that period also because
5:39
be wide play in the music and the
5:42
the music now was not only be in her
5:46
black it was now being heard by them
5:49
masses why the most during ambassador for jazz had to be the great
5:54
Louis virtual Armstrong
5:57
with this stylish cornet raspy voice in ever-present smile
6:01
Armstrong define the American jazz musician
6:04
for decades to come who is one of these people that come along we have been they
6:10
come along at different intervals
6:12
time say he
6:15
he was a genius Heather
6:18
way to play had no one ever he could play
6:21
probably like no one else is articulation
6:24
he spots who world because up until that time
6:29
even as had a a a love
6:33
rigidity to they played marches bands these guys played maggi
6:38
they were region has to be
6:41
lose in
6:45
Josephine Baker the living embodiment of the Jazz Age
6:49
up the vaudeville stage with the way to escape the poverty of her childhood in
6:54
wage 18 would see was born singer and dancer
6:57
was appearing with music field polly's in New York City a year later
7:00
in 1925 she went to paris to become international sensation
7:05
while appearing in a scandalous production called the meagre review
7:08

probably just dance moves and exotic costumes

7:11
excited crowds all over the world as a black woman
7:15
openly displaying her sexuality on stage baker would have been shunned in her
7:19
home country
7:20
still even overseas she was sometimes
7:23
too much while some critics called her performances lewd
7:27
decade most considered her really a her supporters embraced and celebrated her
7:32
the living embodiment of the Jazz Age making her toes to Paris throughout the
7:36
nineteen twenties
7:37
no longer
7:42
battered by Victorian standards the twenties witnessed an explosion artistic
7:46
expression
7:47
and social commentary in america and abroad Sinclair Lewis created works have
7:53
stark reality
7:53
his novels Main Street babbitt earned him best selling status in international
7:58
acclaim
7:59
former war correspondent ernest hemingway became the world's most
8:03
celebrated author
8:04
with his top pros and works like the Sun Also Rises
8:07
and a farewell to arms social critics and commentators were abundant
8:11
but none as popular as the folksy humorist and political satirist
8:15
Will Rogers to silent films
8:18
radio and newspaper columns rogers ronny observations and gentle pokes at
8:23
virtually every American institution me my favorite with all classes
8:27
well flappers NJ
8:30
in the world of sports
8:35
the most recognized figure in the country Notre Dame's dynamic
8:38
head coach Rock Me he revolutionized the sport
8:42

frosting football the Fighting Irish into the national spotlight

8:46
from 1918 to 1931 rock news teams
8:50
1 105 games lost on
8:53
12 the most celebrated college player
8:56
was Illinois running back red grange the Galloping Ghost
9:00
Saturday afternoon exploits made for amazing head the Harlem Globetrotters
9:08
traverse the country
9:10
formed in 1926 by Abe Saperstein
9:13
the all-black touring squad dazzled the crowds with their antics and superb
9:17
skills
9:17
giving the little-known game a basketball a much-needed lift
9:30
at the movies silent comedies continue to entertain audiences
9:34
while european films influenced
9:37
the early part of the decade produced two classics in German Expressionism
9:41
FW Murnau does nose for one of the most common alternative direction cinematic
9:47
style
9:47
as an expressive were films ever made and Fritz Lang's
9:51
destiny in 1926 playing followed with another expressionist classic
9:56
metropolis a stylish in terrifying glimpse the 21st century
10:00
director Ernst Lubitsch established himself as a major talent
10:05
with his own distinct style that became known as the which touch
10:09
in Russian directors Sergio eisenstein one of the pioneering geniuses
10:15
martinson emerged is theoretical writings on
10:18
for a minute and beloved rank among the greatest
10:22
kitchen history the influenza
10:26
Eisenstein's series and German Expressionism
10:29
was accelerated filmmakers technicians and actors
10:32
migrated to the United States new talent developed
10:36

Clara Bow was introduced to movie goers in 1925

10:40
two years later with your movie it she became known as the
10:44
it girl I'm
10:49
in the fall 26 tragedy struck when the world's greatest entertainers
10:53
Harry Houdini after enduring thousands of death defying acts
10:57
the master illusionist died from a ruptured appendix after encouraging a
11:01
fan to punch him in the stomach to demonstrate his
11:04
reagan 1927 was crowned by another innovation win for the first time
11:16
synchronous and appeared in the movies al jolson
11:20
appearing in the jazz singer I should in a revolution change the face
11:24
cinema in
11:27
although silent films continue to be produced they dwindle
11:31
as the new technology advanced silent stars
11:34
fell from the firmament like me two years unable to make the transition
11:38
Clara bow's heavy accent was not pleasing to the public senior
11:41
John Gilbert like boys didn't appeal to audiences
11:45
and he disappeared along with Norma Talmadge Vilma Banky
11:49
and a host of other well-known stars
11:59
for others
12:00
the transition was not so difficult Greta Garbo
12:04
flourished as did Laurel and Hardy team together in 1927
12:08
hell Roach the two had produced numerous silent shorts
12:12
with the introduction of sound they went on to become one of the most important
12:16
comic teams in film history
12:18
in 1928
12:21
what are the biggest icons and entertainment history made his screen
12:24
debut
12:25
when Mickey Mouse start in the cartoon classics steamboat willie
12:29

the famous character sprang from the mind in pain

12:32
talented animator walt Disney a mouse was originally called
12:37
modem walt's wife suggested mickey and the name stuck
12:41
voiced by Walt Disney himself it was Mickey Mouse
12:44
made audiences laugh in Steamboat Willie steamboat willie came along in 1928 it
12:50
was released in
12:51
November I think year and was the first
12:55
cartoon ever made was he was very complicated nobody's ever done that
13:00
before
13:00
knew how to do it in the exhorted did it all by Braille you know
13:04
well well I guess this is what you doing mickey mouse with an immediate favorite
13:08
with audiences
13:09
beginning a legacy animated characters the entire world has grown into law
13:14
animation is an interesting media me in the sense that it's about half-hearted
13:19
have technology
13:20
and world had their very very good
13:23
sensitivity towards both sides in that equation
13:26
he wanted the technology to make the art better
13:30
Americans were on them
13:35
and they went by car a middle class family could
13:39
ownership /url a for seven hundred dollars a Ford Model T
13:44
rolled off the assembly line every 10 seconds and was priced under 300 dollars
13:48
anyone could have one for as little as five dollars a week on the installment
13:52
plan Sunday driving became a national pastime
13:56
gas was 22 cents a gallon and car ownership
14:00
rocketed to over 23 million before the decade closed
14:03
during the nineteen twenties stock market expanded in this public
14:08
expectation and
14:09

as optimism grew a lot more expensive cars were being produced

14:15
in america you had fabulous cars for fabulous people wealthy people
14:19
powerful people you have these fabulous 16 sonar cadillacs and Mormons another
14:25
splendid cars like the stray debuts in Berkeley double overhead cams and four
14:29
valves per cylinder and a supercharger
14:31
he wanted one probably the only thing rivaling the automobile
14:35
was radio by the mid twenties
14:39
Americans were buying 1.5 million radios
14:42
year broadcast stations with premier 30 in 1922
14:47
to 550 in 1923 radio personality spraying
14:52
as the mediums popularity grew
15:00
bandleader Rudy Vallee cream to the delight of millions of fans during live
15:04
broadcasts
15:05
its commercial appeal quickly gave rise to advertisers
15:09
and networks by the close at the twenties the columbia broadcasting
15:12
system had seventy affiliates
15:14
and rival NBC had 75 with the proliferation of national magazines and
15:20
radio stations
15:21
advertising became one of the decade's growth industries
15:24
and took on Angeles to for encouraging the public to buy
15:29
and by they did everything from the everyday necessities
15:33
to fashionable and household appliances buying on credit became commonplace
15:38
for the first time one could live beyond their means

Capone
he was born and raised in these brooklyn streets a man who more than any other
0:05
came to symbolize a new American breed the gangsters
0:08
he believed to the promised land he pursue the American dream
0:13
and he was to set up an organization that became the template for the modern
0:18
he was Al Capone
0:22
Capone was not an immigrant but his family had come from Naples
0:26
and like other children from immigrant homes capone soon found himself
0:30
running with street gangs ollie's
0:33
gangs junior divisions cook home
0:37
and aged 18 14 use it number of two games simultaneously
0:42
five-point juniors in Manhattan and also
0:47
the shop brought one rippers in his own area of whatever you gotta feel pleased
1:00
in his youth capone works here in Coney Island
1:03
then is now our favorite weekend destination
1:06
for New Yorkers with money in their pockets and time in their minds
1:12
capone's job bouncer in a bar called the Hawthorne
1:15
him
1:17
capone's boss was a local hood with mafia connections
1:20
Frank you acting in the role of mentor and Godfather
1:24
Gayle took the young Capone under his wing Al Capone was Friday yields the
1:30
student starch to yet Capone was to make his name not in New York
1:36
but in a city 800 miles to the west Chicago
1:42
Chicago was a wild town a boomtown a man could get rich quick here if he had
1:47
energy and enthusiasm and if he was handy with his fist Oregon
1:51
Capone was through a local connection
1:54
the future big fellow got his big break in nineteen
1:58

T
2:02
local racketeering nightclub owner Big Jim Coliseum 0
2:06
he did a bodyguard for himself in his young life
2:11
janitorial was big Jim's number two he knew capone from New York and gave him
2:15
the job
2:16
it was the start of a partnership that would change the shape up america
2:20
organized crime
2:24
by the time he was 24 years old
2:26
Al Capone was the biggest name in gangland by then his face had been
2:31
marked in a vicious brawl
2:32
and he had acquired the nickname by which he has gone down in history
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scarface capone became the first true gang lands are
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he was a larger-than-life figure
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and he made an indelible impression on all who met him
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and Hollywood came to love capone he had all the ingredients to make him an
2:55
underworld star actor rod steiger played capone
3:00
in the first full blown film biography of the mobster
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in 1924 toria fell victim to a drive-by shooting badly wounded in badly shaken
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with two rackets cup o now had a shot at the big time
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controller Chicago like other gangsters
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he endured years have squalor years have petty crime
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years of mindless muscle but unlike other gangsters
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Capone had learned that honeyed words and grease palms
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could be just as effective as the blackjack and the gun
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it's what made him special I like to think
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the Capone was different because he was also a multi-dimensional
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gangster he was not someone who simply understood
3:44
profits and mayhem he had a
3:47

some depth to him he had a public relations

3:50
ability he was able to attract even editors and
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reporters that his causes report it delivering
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whiskey to a populace that desperately wanted
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whiskey and entertainment so he in many ways he was a very astute business
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person
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his instinct for public relations was the key to capone success
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unlike the Mafia a sicilians on the operation
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capone employed anyone with talent in ethnically divided gang land
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it was a smart move compounded things the American Way
4:27
he was a byproduct immigration and the quest for the promised land