AMERICA

Cards (85)

  • EVIDENCE OF OPPORTUNITIES - 1920s
    • new industries created - 500,000 workers were employed in the car industry alone by 1925
    • buying on margins allowed millions of working class Americans to buy consumer goods
    • thousands of african americans moved north in “great migration“
    • the wages of the average American worker increased by more than 20%
  • EVIDENCE OF INEQUALITIES
    • workers in old industries lost their jobs
    • farmers lost income and often their land
    • native americans were forced to live in reservations
    • most african americans remained sharecroppers in the south
    • there were huge inequalities in wealth
  • 1922
    Fordney McCumber Act increases tariffs on foreign goods
  • 1924
    600,000 farmers lose their land
  • 1929 March
    Herbert Hoover is elected
  • 1929 September
    Wall Street crash begins
  • in 1911 a car cost $800 to make. by 1928 mass production had lowered the cost to $300
  • by 1926 there are 20 million cars on Americas roads
  • by 1929 50% of consumer goods were made in the USA
  • 1920
    women are given the vote
  • 1927
    first talkies are introduced in Hollywood films
  • OPPORTUNITY FOR WOMEN 1920s
    • american women won the vote
    • divorce rate doubled
    • WW1 led to many women entering the workforce, a 25% increase from 1920-1929
    • flappers began to become more common
  • INEQUALITIES FOR WOMEN 1920s
    • by 1929 only 5 out of 435 were women
    • organisations like the Anti Flirt league were set up
    • woman tended to work in the least skilled jobs and earned less that men for the same work
    • most flappers came from middle-upper class background in northern cities (rural areas and poor women had less change)
  • by 1929 10.5 million women were in work
  • by 1930 100 million americans were going to the cinema each week
  • 1920
    prohibition law was passed
  • Feb 14th 1929
    7 rival gangsters are murder in chicago on Al Capones orders in the “St valentine’s day massacre”
  • 1933
    alcohol is legalised by President Roosevelt, who is elected having made popular promise to end Prohibition
  • CAUSES OF PROHIBITION
    • pressures groups - anti-saloon league to ban alcohol
    • religious groups - churches opposed alcohol because they blamed it for growing violence and addiction
    • rural areas - rural areas were more conservative than cities that strongly supported prohibition
  • EVENTS OF PROHIBITION
    • illegal bars - gangs set up and ran secret illegal known as speakeasies
    • smuggling - ”bootleggers” smuggling alcohol in from abroad, making money from selling ”moonshine”
    • prohibition - 3000 prohibition agents were hired to find and shutdown illegal alcohol makers and sellers
  • OUTCOMES OF PROHIBITION
    • violence - growing violence as rival gangs fought for control of the alcohol business
    • corruption - gangs made so much money they could bribe most police, prohibition agents, lawyers and judges to avoid arrest
    • ending prohibition - Roosevelt ended prohibition in 1933
  • after prohibition in 1920 deaths from alcohol poisoning actually increased 800% by 1926
  • there were over 300,000 speakeasies across America by 1930
  • Al Capone was making $10 million a year from racketeering alone
  • IMMIGRATION TO AMERICA PUSH FACTORS
    • poverty - majority of Europeans lived in poverty
    • persecution - different groups were persecuted for their religious or political beliefs in europe, especially jews in eastern europe
    • lack of opportunity - europe was still divided by a sticky class system
  • PULL FACTORS OF IMMIGRATION TO AMERICA
    • work and pay - american wages were double european ones and there were millions of new jobs because mass production
    • greater freedom - the US religious and political minorities had greater freedom of speech and protection from persecution
    • american dream
  • OPPORTUNITY FOR IMMIGRANTS
    • many immigrants were able to escape sever persecution that they faced in their homeland
    • jews faced mob attacks known as pogroms and had limited access to schools in Russia
    • american wages were double those available in Europe
    • mass prod and the post war boom created millions of job opportunities
  • INEQUALITIES FOR IMMIGRANTS IN AMERICA
    • red scare means many immigrants persecuted for their african political beliefs particularly those from E. Europe
    • immigration was massively reduced in the early 1920s
    • most immigrants faced work in poor conditions and severe hardship. many were uneducated and were exploited and overworked in sweatshops
  • 1917
    communist revolution in Russia
  • 1920
    ”palmer raids“ leads to arrest of over 6000 suspected communists
  • 1921
    immigration quota law allowing 350,000 immigrants to enter each year
  • 1924
    national origins act cut immigration to 150,000 a year
  • OPPORTUNITIES FOR AFRICAN AMERICANS
    • moving north - african americans moved North could get higher wages in new mass production industries. there was less racism in the north than the south
    • harlem renaissance - in the North, African Americans had opportunities to express themselves as writers, artists and musicians. this led to the invention of jazz
    • new organisations - the NAACP was set up and battled against racial inequality
  • INEQUALITIES FOR AFRICAN AMERICANS
    • discrimination in the north - those who move North still faced lower wages and had to live in worse neighbourhoodd than white people. there were anti-black riots in northern cities like chicago
    • lynching - hundreds of african americans were lycnhed over the course of the 1920s
    • rise of the KKK - membership reached of 5 million in the 1920s
  • 1910
    National Association for the Advancement of Coloured People (NAACP) founded
  • Jim Crow Laws
    the racist segregation laws in the south
  • OPPORTUNITIES FOR AFRICAN AMERICANS
    • moving north - new mass production industries. there was less racism in the north
    • harlem renaissance - north african americans had opportunities to express themselves
    • new organisations - founding of NAACP
  • INEQUALITIES FOR AFRICAN AMERICANS
    • discriminarion in the north - those who move north still faced lower wages and had to live in worse neighbourhoods than white people. there were anti-black riots in chicago
    • lynching - african americans were lynched
    • rise of the KKK - peak of 5 million, intimidating and terrorising african americans
  • How were different groups affected by the great depression?
    • Factory owners - cut production, wages and jobs to stay in business
    • Hobos - lived in slums known as Hoovervilles
    • Farmers - thousands went into debt and lost their farms to banks, 1 in 20 by 1932
    • Factory workers - lost jobs or wages were cut
    • The very rich - lost some wealth but had properties to fall back on
  • 24th October 1929
    Wall street crash begins - 13 million shares sold in single day in panic selling