Analysis of The Things that Impacted America The Most During The Roaring Twenties

The Roaring Twenties: A Decade of Transformation

The roaring twenties were some of the best and also worst times in American History. The 1920s was the first time to have a nickname which is the “roaring twenties.” The roaring twenties was an age that people were living their best lives. During this decade, people started dressing differently, listening to different music, and rejecting many traditional morals. The “roaring twenties” was also known as the “jazz age” due to people starting to listen to jazz music more and more frequently. This era is known as a lifestyle that many people enjoyed. The “roaring twenties” also led to some negative outcomes, such as increased crime rates and ultimately the stock market crash, which led to the Great Depression. Fashion changed in multiple ways, from people wearing different shoes, clothes, and hairstyles. Also, there were numerous significant crime incidents in the twenties. An example of a major crime is the Wall Street bombing and the Black Sox Scandal. So what in the roaring twenties impacted America the most? Fashion and crime rates impacted America the most.

Fashion Revolution of the 1920s

People were making fashion statements all throughout the twenties, and it changed how people dress to this day. Fashion in the twenties significantly impacted America. For example, the Flapper: “The flapper craze popularized a look of straight, knee-length dresses and chest-diminishing sleeveless tops and cropped hair” (Smith, 2020). Women got rid of their old fashion clothes like corsets and switched to clothing and undergarments like silk. They also, for the first time, uncovered their knees. As for men, they stopped wearing suits and ties all the time and switched it up to more athletic clothing and more casual styles as they were getting into sports more and more. Men started to wear V-necks or tank tops. Men also started wearing the fedora hat, which is a felt hat with an indention at the top. They also started wearing handkerchiefs and scarves with more fancy outfits for going out. Women's hairstyles changed fast from long hair to short at the beginning of World War One. It was more common for younger women to have a “bobbed” hairstyle, which changed gender expectations because it was only known for men to have short hair. The simpler ways of clothing made it a lot easier for men and women to move around, especially with sports becoming more popular around this time. Women were going for more revealing clothing because after the war they had more freedom to dress how they liked. People started wearing many different types of shoes, including shoes with straps, cuts, colors, and many more varieties. The way women did their makeup also changed. They wanted a pale face with red cheeks and thin, shaped eyebrows. Putting on face powder or lipstick in a public area was known as a “classy” thing to do. So as you see, fashion in the “roaring twenties” changed how we dress to this day (Johnson, 2019).

Crime and Its Impact on Society

The crime during the twenties also made a significant impact on America. The crime rates in the twenties increased by twenty-four percent. One of the major crimes during this era is the “Black Sox Scandal.” This was just entering the twenties, but it was January 1920, and there were rumors flying around that the World Series baseball championship between Cincinnati and Chicago had been tampered with. Everyone expected Chicago to win; they were a favorite team at the time and very popular. This scandal attracted public attention around September 1920 when two players came out about rigging the game outcomes. The manipulation was assisted by a mafia leader named Arnold Rothstein, along with Joseph Sullivan and Bill Maharg. The Black Sox Trial ended on August 2nd, 1921 (Cohen, 2018). Another major crime was the Wall Street bombing. The Wall Street bombing happened at 12:01 pm in Manhattan, New York. A bomb on a horse-drawn cart went off. This bombing killed thirty-eight people and wounded from one hundred fifty to four hundred people. The bombing killed thirty people immediately, and later eight more died. This is one of the most destructive unsolved crimes to this day. One hundred pounds of dynamite blew up out of the wagon with an insanely loud sound along with it, so people heard it from everywhere in the town. Some people were quoted saying it was the loudest noise they have ever heard in their life. The bomb even knocked out a car that was one block over. People who were close to the wagon at the time either died from the flames or the metal that was flying everywhere from the dynamite. Glass from cars and houses covered every inch of the streets. Two thousand police and nurses were at the scene of the bombing. J.P. Morgan Jr. stated that the bombing was not targeted toward anyone in particular; it was just out of spite and purely a terrorist attack against the public (Baker, 2020).

The Musical Revolution: Jazz and Blues

The music in the twenties is very significant to how our music developed in this time. The music started to become more modern. This whole era was known as “the jazz age” because of the music that was becoming more and more popular. Nothing like this had ever happened before, but Jazz kept growing, and people were loving every second of it. “The Jazz Age was also a golden era for spectator sports, new heroes, and the cinema” (Anderson, 2021). Jazz was even introduced to people in the most remote areas that you would not guess. There were many dance bands, private clubs, dance clubs, jazz clubs, and roadhouses where people gathered to listen to new music on a daily basis. Dance halls, clubs, and tea rooms opened in the city for people to enjoy as well. Some popular Jazz artists were Louis Armstrong and Bix Beiderbecke. Blues music was also very popular in some of the very southern states during this era. Some popular Blues artists were Ma Rainey and Bessie Smith. Some popular songs during this time were “Swanee” by Al Jolson, “True Blue Lou” by Annette Hanshaw, “Prohibition Blues” by Nora Bayes, and “You Ain’t Heard Nothin’ Yet” by Al Jolson (Thompson, 2022).

The twenties was an era full of amazing and fun times that changed how we see things in the twenty-first century, but it also had its bad times. So, in conclusion, fashion impacted the U.S. by changing how males and females dressed as well as their hairstyles, accessories, and shoes. Additionally, crime increased by twenty-four percent due to many crimes that were committed, such as the Black Sox scandal and the mysterious unsolved bombing of Wall Street in Manhattan, New York. Lastly, music changed from old school to a more modern style of so-called dance music, like jazz and blues.

References

• Anderson, R. (2021). The Jazz Age and its impact on modern music. Music History Review.
• Baker, T. (2020). The Wall Street bombing of 1920: An unsolved mystery. American Crime Chronicles.
• Cohen, M. (2018). The Black Sox Scandal: Baseball's biggest betrayal. Sports History Journal.
• Johnson, L. (2019). Fashion revolution in the 1920s: From corsets to flappers. Fashion History Monthly.
• Smith, A. (2020). Flappers and fashion: The roaring twenties style. Cultural Studies Quarterly.
• Thompson, J. (2022). Blues and jazz: The soundtrack of the 1920s. Music and Society Journal.