Roaring Twenties

            People called the time during the 1920s the “roaring twenties” because it was a time of social, artistic, and cultural dynamism, but also overseas to London, Berlin, and Pairs was a time of economic prosperity. Jazz music and art really bloomed while the flappers basically changed the way women carried themselves. When Wall Street crashed in 1929, that era ended and the Great Depression rolled right in.

            After World War I, Germany had to repay Great Britain, France, and the other Allied nations for the damages of the war. When Germany could no longer afford the reparations, the Americans created the Dawes Plan which would take care of the money problem. The Dawes Plan provided the Allies the ability to collect reparations debt from Germany. Soon prosperity was widespread because Wall Street invested into the Dawes Plan for Germany and the Europeans countries had a hard time getting funds because of World War I.

            During the “roaring twenties” a lot of the new technologies were made available to the middle class because of the mass production of the automobiles, movies, and the radio. With the great increase of automobiles also created an increase of industries such as highway building, motels, service stations, and used car dealerships. Radios became a great way to market a product to people country wide all at once, like the television today.

            The Nineteenth Amendment, granting women the right to vote, was ratified in August of 1920. A great way to see how people were feeling during the “roaring twenties” would be to look at the art work of the Europeans. The European style was expressionism, then later surrealism type of art work. At the beginning of the decade there were only black and white silent films, but in 1922 the first color film was created. In the later 1920s the creation of Walt Disney’s character Mickey Mouse made its debut.

            The fashion statement that the women made during the 1920s was a drastic change of how they wanted to be viewed by others. The younger generation of females done away with the long dresses the covered their whole bodies, their hairstyle was a bob cut that came down to the chin, and the use of make-up became popular. With all these changes the older generation considered them flappers.

            With the 20s coming to an end, problems start to arise. Wall Street crashes which would cause financial problems for a lot of people and businesses. The Great Depression, a worldwide economic depression, had people struggling for survival during the time.