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The 1920s Portal

Wall Street Crash of 1929

The 1920s (pronounced "nineteen-twenties" often shortened to the "'20s" or the "Twenties") was a decade that began on January 1, 1920, and ended on December 31, 1929. In America, it is frequently referred to as the "Roaring Twenties" or the "Jazz Age", while in Europe the period is sometimes referred to as the "Golden Twenties" because of the economic boom following World War I (1914–1918). French speakers refer to the period as the "Années folles" ("crazy years"), emphasizing the era's social, artistic, and cultural dynamism.

The 1920s saw foreign oil companies begin operations in Venezuela, which became the world's second-largest oil-producing nation. The devastating Wall Street Crash in October 1929 is generally viewed as a harbinger of the end of 1920s prosperity in North America and Europe. In the Soviet Union, the New Economic Policy was created by the Bolsheviks in 1921, to be replaced by the first five-year plan in 1928. The 1920s saw the rise of radical political movements, with the Red Army triumphing against White movement forces in the Russian Civil War, and the emergence of far-right political movements in Europe. In 1922, the fascist leader Benito Mussolini seized power in Italy. Other dictators that emerged included Józef Piłsudski in Poland, and Peter and Alexander Karađorđević in Yugoslavia. First-wave feminism made advances, with women gaining the right to vote in the United States (1920), Albania (1920), Ireland (1921), and with suffrage being expanded in Britain to all women over 21 years old (1928).

In Turkey, nationalist forces defeated Greece, France, Armenia and Britain in the Turkish War of Independence, leading to the Treaty of Lausanne (1923), a treaty more favorable to Turkey than the earlier proposed Treaty of Sèvres. The war also led to the abolition of the Ottoman Caliphate. Nationalist revolts also occurred in Ireland (1919–1921) and Syria (1925–1927). Under Mussolini, Italy pursued a more aggressive domestic and foreign policy, leading to the nigh-eradication of the Sicilian Mafia and the Second Italo-Senussi War in Libya respectively. In 1927, China erupted into a civil war between the Kuomintang (KMT)-led government of the Republic of China (ROC) and forces of the Chinese Communist Party (CCP). Civil wars also occurred in Paraguay (1922–1923), Ireland (1922–1923), Honduras (1924), Nicaragua (1926–1927), and Afghanistan (1928–1929). Saudi forces conquered Jabal Shammar and subsequently, Hejaz.

A severe famine occurred in Russia (1921–1922) due to the combined effects of economic disturbance because of the Russian Revolution and the Russian Civil War, exacerbated by rail systems that could not distribute food efficiently, leading to 5 million deaths. Another severe famine occurred in China (1928–1930), leading to 6 million deaths. The Spanish flu pandemic (1918–1920) and Russian typhus epidemic (1918–1922), which had begun in the previous decade, caused 25–50 million and 2–3 million deaths respectively. Major natural disasters of this decade include the 1920 Haiyuan earthquake (258,707~273,407 deaths), 1922 Shantou typhoon (50,000–100,000 deaths), 1923 Great Kantō earthquake (105,385–142,800 deaths), and 1927 Gulang earthquake (40,912 deaths).

Silent films were popular in this decade, with the highest-grossing film of this decade being either the American silent epic adventure-drama film Ben-Hur: A Tale of the Christ or the American silent war drama film The Big Parade, depending on the metrics used. Sinclair Lewis was a popular author in the United States in the 1920s, with his books Main Street and Elmer Gantry becoming best-sellers. Best-selling books outside the US included the Czech book The Good Soldier Švejk, which sold 20 million copies. Songs of this decade included "Mack the Knife" and "Tiptoe Through the Tulips".

During the 1920s, the world population increased from 1.87 to 2.05 billion, with approximately 700 million births and 525 million deaths in total. (Full article...)

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Three African-American women in Harlem during the Harlem Renaissance in 1925

The Harlem Renaissance was an intellectual and cultural revival of African-American music, dance, art, fashion, literature, theater, politics and scholarship centered in Harlem, Manhattan, New York City, spanning the 1920s and 1930s. At the time, it was known as the "New Negro Movement", named after The New Negro, a 1925 anthology edited by Alain Locke. The movement also included the new African-American cultural expressions across the urban areas in the Northeast and Midwest United States affected by a renewed militancy in the general struggle for civil rights, combined with the Great Migration of African-American workers fleeing the racist conditions of the Jim Crow Deep South, as Harlem was the final destination of the largest number of those who migrated north.

Though it was centered in the Harlem neighborhood, many francophone black writers from African and Caribbean colonies who lived in Paris were also influenced by the movement, which spanned from about 1918 until the mid-1930s. Many of its ideas lived on much longer. The zenith of this "flowering of Negro literature", as James Weldon Johnson preferred to call the Harlem Renaissance, took place between 1924—when Opportunity: A Journal of Negro Life hosted a party for black writers where many white publishers were in attendance—and 1929, the year of the stock-market crash and the beginning of the Great Depression. The Harlem Renaissance is considered to have been a rebirth of the African-American arts. (Full article...)

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Credit: American Colony, Jerusalem

Sultan al-Atrash was a prominent Arab Druze leader, Syrian nationalist and Commander General of the Syrian Revolution (1925–1927). He fought against the Ottomans, French, and even against the Syrian government in days of dictatorship. One of the most influential figures in Syrian and Druze history, he played a major role in deciding the destiny of Jabal ad-Duruz and of Syria in general.

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...that bead crochet (pictured) was a popular method of creating women's fashion accessories during the 1920s?
... that in the 1920s and '30s, various countries such as Mexico, Brazil and Chile issued Art Deco stamps?
... that in 1926, Albert Einstein solved the tea leaf paradox, which states that if the tea in a teacup is stirred, the tea leaves will collect in the middle rather than at the edges?

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Landis, c. 1922

Kenesaw Mountain Landis (/ˈkɛnɪsɔː ˈmaʊntɪn ˈlændɪs/; November 20, 1866 – November 25, 1944) was an American jurist who served as a United States federal judge from 1905 to 1922 and the first Commissioner of Baseball from 1920 until his death. He is remembered for his resolution of the Black Sox Scandal, in which he expelled eight members of the Chicago White Sox from organized baseball for conspiring to lose the 1919 World Series and repeatedly refused their reinstatement requests. His iron rule over baseball in the near quarter-century of his commissionership is generally credited with restoring public confidence in the game.

Landis was born in Millville, Ohio. Raised in Indiana, he became a lawyer, and then personal secretary to Walter Q. Gresham, the new United States Secretary of State, in 1893. He returned to private practice after Gresham died in office. (Full article...)

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... that in the 1920s, Hickson Inc. had the "most elegant and expensive specialty shop" on New York's Fifth Avenue?
... that Hans Robertson ran a studio in 1920s Berlin where he photographed celebrities such as artist Käthe Kollwitz, boxer Max Schmeling and dancer Gret Palucca?
... that in the 1920s, Austrian painter Richard Geiger produced numerous portraits of the character Pierrette?
... that the League for Human Rights, established in Germany in the early 1920s, was the first mass organization for homosexuals?
... that Ruth M. Anderson recorded a "timeless" Spain in her photographs of the 1920s?
... that the serial arsonist who started the fatal Nihon Shōgakkō fire confessed to starting at least 25 other California fires in the early 1920s?

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General images

The following are images from various 1920s-related articles on Wikipedia.

Image 1Charlie Chaplin during the 1920s (from 1920s)
Image 2Irving Berlin (left) and Al Jolson, c. 1927 (from 1920s)
Image 3Prohibition agents emptying barrels of alcohol. (from 1920s)
Image 4George Grosz in 1921 (from 1920s)
Image 5Map of the world from 1920, two years after World War I (from 1920s)
Image 6D. W. Griffith at a rolltop desk, c. 1925 (from 1920s)
Image 7Thompson submachine gun (1921 model) (from 1920s)
Image 8Albert Einstein, 1921 (from 1920s)
Image 9The British and French colonial empires in 1920 (from 1920s)
Image 10Frank Lloyd Wright, 1926 (from 1920s)
Image 11Buster Keaton in the 1922 short film The Frozen North (from 1920s)
Image 12Robert Goddard and his rocket, 1926 (from 1920s)
Image 13Dow Jones Industrial, 1928–1930 (from 1920s)
Image 14Benito Mussolini and Fascist Blackshirts during the March on Rome in 1922. (from 1920s)
Image 15Spanish troops in San Sebastián, prior to their departure to the Rif War. (from 1920s)
Image 161920s phone (from 1920s)
Image 17Paavo Nurmi in 1924 Summer Olympics (from 1920s)
Image 18The period from the end of the First World War until the start of the Depression in 1929 is known as the "Jazz Age" (from 1920s)
Image 19Adolf Hitler (standing) delivers a speech in February 1925 (from 1920s)
Image 202 out of 10 best-selling American books in the 1920s were written by Sinclair Lewis (1885–1951) (from 1920s)
Image 21Georgia O'Keeffe in 1920, photographed by Alfred Stieglitz (from 1920s)
Image 22Crowd gathering after the Wall Street Crash of 1929 (from 1920s)
Image 23From left, clockwise: Third Tipperary Brigade Flying Column No. 2 under Seán Hogan during the Irish War of Independence; Prohibition agents destroying barrels of alcohol in accordance to the 18th amendment, which made alcoholic beverages illegal in the United States throughout the entire decade; In 1927, Charles Lindbergh embarks on the first solo nonstop flight from New York to Paris on the Spirit of St. Louis; A crowd gathering on Wall Street after the 1929 stock market crash, which led to the Great Depression; Benito Mussolini and fascist Blackshirts during the March on Rome in 1922; the People's Liberation Army attacking government defensive positions in Shandong, during the Chinese Civil War; The women's suffrage campaign leads to numerous countries granting women the right to vote and be elected; Babe Ruth becomes the most famous baseball player of the time. (from 1920s)
Image 24Babe Ruth in 1920 (from 1920s)
Image 25The most memorable fashion trend of the Roaring Twenties was undoubtedly "the flapper" look. (from 1920s)
Image 26The Union of Soviet Socialist Republics (Soviet Union) is created in 1922. (from 1920s)
Image 27F. Scott Fitzgerald, 1929 (from 1920s)