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Sacco and Vanzetti arrested for armed robbery and murder
Sacco and Vanzetti were anarchists, believing that social justice would come only through the destruction of governments. In the early 1920s, mainstream America developed a fear of communism and radical politics that resulted in an anti-communist, anti-immigrant hysteria. -
KDKA goes on the air from Pittsburgh
On November 2, 1920, station KDKA made the nation's first commercial broadcast. They chose that date because it was election day, and the power of radio was proven when people could hear the results of the Harding-Cox presidential race before they read about it in the newspaper. -
1st Miss American Pageant
Sixteen year-old Margaret Gorman from Washington, DC won the first competition. The 1921 Atlantic City Pageant was designed to encourage visitors to stay in the resort past Labor Day, the traditional end of the season. -
Teapot Dome Scandal
Secretary of the Interior Albert Bacon Fall had leased Navy petroleum reserves at Teapot Dome in Wyoming, as well as two locations in California, to private oil companies at low rates without competitive bidding. The leases were the subject of a seminal investigation by Senator Thomas J. Walsh. -
1st Winter Olympics Held
In 1921, the International Olympic Committee gave its patronage to a Winter Sports Week to take place in 1924 in Chamonix, France. This event was a great success, attracting 10,004 paying spectators, and was retrospectively named the First Olympic Winter Games. -
The Great Gatsby published by F. Scott Fitzgerald
The Great Gatsby, is a 1925 novel written by F. Scott Fitzgerald. This novel is ruled as one of the elevated pieces of American Fiction of its time for the simple fact that F. Scott Fitzgerald held a mirror up to the impersonal society in which he once played a part on in his own life. -
Scopes Monkey Trial
The Scopes “monkey trial” was the moniker journalist H. L. Mencken applied to the 1925 prosecution of a criminal action brought by the state of Tennessee against high school teacher John T. Scopes for violating the state's Butler Act, which prohibited the teaching of evolution in public schools. -
Charles Lindberg completes solo flight across the Atlantic
Charles A. Lindbergh completed the first solo, nonstop transatlantic flight in history, flying his Spirit of St. Louis from Long Island, New York, to Paris, France. This is important because it was the first across the ocean flight but it also started the celebrities thing. -
The Jazz Singer, American musical film, released in 1927, that was the first feature-length movie with synchronized dialogue. It marked the ascendancy of “talkies” and the end of the silent-film era.
The Jazz Singer, American musical film, released in 1927, that was the first feature-length movie with synchronized dialogue. It marked the ascendancy of “talkies” and the end of the silent-film era. -
St. Valentine's Day Massacre
St. Valentine's Day Massacre, mass murder of a group of unarmed bootlegging gang members in Chicago on February 14, 1929. The bloody incident dramatized the intense rivalry for control of the illegal liquor traffic during the Prohibition era in the United States. -
Black Tuesday (Stock Market Crash)
The market crash ended the period of economic growth and prosperity and led to the Great Depression. Black Tuesday triggered a chain of catastrophic macroeconomic events in the US and Europe, which included mass bankruptcies and unemployment, and dramatic declines in production and money supply.