Describe each picture. What might eachrepresent about the 1920’s?
Unit 4—Chapter 7
The Roaring Twenties
CSS 11.5
Part One
Normalcy and the Booming Economy
11.5.7 Discuss the rise of mass production techniques, the growth of cities, theimpact of new technologies (e.g., the automobile, electricity), and the resultingprosperity and effect on the American landscape.
EQ: How did the booming economy of the 1920’s lead to changes in Americanlife?
The Automobile Drives Prosperity
•Henry Ford (1863 – 1947)
•combined mass production withhigh wages
•tried to pay his workers enoughthat they could buy his cars
•$5 a day in 1914
•set very high standards on the workand lives of his workers
“I will build a car for the great multitude. It will be large enough for thefamily, but small enough for the individual to run and care for. It will beconstructed of the best materials, by the best men to be hired, after thesimplest designs that modern engineering can devise. But it will be low inprice that no man making a good salary will be unable to own one-andenjoy with his family the blessing of hours of pleasure in God's great openspaces.”
The Automobile Drives Prosperity
•The Model T, 1908
•marketed to the middle class
•cost $850 in 1908 but pricedropped to $295 by 1927
•car ownership went from 10%of American families in 1919 to56% in 1927
•over 15 million were produced
•"Any customer can have a carpainted any color that he wantsso long as it is black."
The Automobile Drives Prosperity
•the automobile changed the entire nation
1.stimulated economic growth
•resources, roads, service stations, diners, motels,insurance
2.freedom of movement
•unlike the train, you could go wherever you wantedwhenever you wanted
3.helped create “urban sprawl”
•spread cities out to the suburbs
Mass Production
Assembly Line
•techniques to produce goods inlarge numbers were popularizedby Henry Ford
•standardized parts
•the assembly line
•lowered cost of production
•provided lots of jobs that requiredlittle expertise
•made things affordable that hadbeen too expensive for averagepeople
•a Model T rolled off the assembly lineevery three minutes
•a Model T could be made in 93minutes
A Bustling Economy
•Consumerism
•money saved during WWI, was nowspent on new, affordable goods
•vacuum cleaner, electric iron, electricwashing machines, radios,refrigerators
•Advertising
•used scientific techniques to play onpeoples desires and fears
•Installment Buying
•consumers could make a small downpayment and then pay monthlypayments
•people could own products that theyotherwise could not afford
Listerine's new adsfeatured forlornyoung women andmen, eager formarriage but turnedoff by their mate'srotten breath. "CanI be happy with himin spite of that?"one maiden askedherself. In justseven years, thecompany'srevenues rose from$115,000 to morethan $8 million.
The Stock Market
Bull Market
•a period of rising stockprices
•4 million Americansowned stock by 1929
•economists claimed thatthe value of stocks wouldalways rise
The Stock Market
Buying on Margin
•the buyer paid 10% down andhad months to pay the rest
•the stock was the collateral forthe loan
•people figured that by the timethe money was due they couldsell the stock for a profit
•this is allowed more peopleto buy stock
•This is a REALLY, REALLY,REALLY bad idea!!
People paid 10% of stockprice, and could “makepayments” on the rest,causing them to buy morethan they could afford.
“We in America are nearer to the finaltriumph over poverty than ever before inthe history of any land. We have not yetreached the goal—but . . . we shall soon,with the help of God, be in sight of theday when poverty will be banished fromthis nation.”
—Herbert Hoover, 1928
EQ:
•How did the booming economy of the 1920’s lead tochanges in American life?