Deck 24: The New Era 1920-1929

Question 1

The chapter introduction tells the story of Sister Aimee and the imaginary Smiths to make the point that

A) Catholics, like other marginal groups, were becoming more culturally influential in the urbanized mass culture of the 1920s.
B) transformations of the New Era mixed ambivalently with traditional beliefs and practices.
C) in the Jazz Age, truth was often stranger than fiction.
D) modern methods and values had taken over the minds of Americans by the 1920s.

Answer 1

transformations of the New Era mixed ambivalently with traditional beliefs and practices.

Question 2

One of the most important economic transformations in the years after World War I was

A) the shift from industry's reliance on railroads to reliance on the automobile.
B) the shift in production from heavy industry to consumer goods and services.
C) the move from the Northeast and Midwest to the West Coast as the country's industrial heartland.
D) a change from a more cooperative to a more adversarial relationship between government and business.

Answer 2

the shift in production from heavy industry to consumer goods and services.

Question 3

What might be called a "second or post-Industrial Revolution,"the "roaring economy"of the 1920s involved all of the following EXCEPT

A) a productivity revolution based on technology.
B) a consumer-goods revolution.
C) a revolution in thinking, in which advertising persuaded consumers to buy now rather than save.
D) a revolution in labor relations, marked by new growth in the size and influence of labor unions.

Answer 3

a revolution in labor relations, marked by new growth in the size and influence of labor unions.

Question 4

The automobile was to the 1920s what the railroad had been to the nineteenth century, in that

A) it was both a powerful catalyst to economic growth and a symbol for the age.
B) the government regulated it strictly.
C) Americans made heroes out of automakers like Ford and Sloan, as they had the railroad builders.
D) automobile production relied on earlier forms of corporate strategies.

Question 5

Which one of the following was NOT a feature of the modern corporation in the 1920s?

A) Ownership was spread among thousands of stockholders.
B) Bureaucratized organizations created a new elite of salaried managers.
C) Corporate power existed in the hands of stockholders rather than in company management.
D) A new wave of mergers further consolidated industry into a series of oligopolies.

Question 6

To encourage consumption, demand for goods was stimulated by all of the following EXCEPT

A) advertising.
B) the creation of consumer credit.
C) a new abundance and variety of goods available.
D) increased business competition.

Question 7

All of the following are traits attributed to a "New Woman"EXCEPT

A) spiritual.
B) independent.
C) assertive.
D) athletic.

Question 8

Aviator Charles "Lucky Lindy"Lindbergh thrilled the world with his solo, non-stop flight from Long Island, NY, to

A) Paris.
B) London.
C) Rome.
D) Madrid.

Question 9

What new style of music that fused soulfulness and syncopated rhythms was born in the roaring 20s?

A) ragtime
B) Dixieland
C) rhythm and blues
D) jazz

Question 10

Examples of the "defenders of the faith"of traditional America against modern urban culture in the 1920s include all EXCEPT

A) prohibition, which reduced both drinking and respect for the law.
B) hostility to radicalism, which gave the label "Red Scare Decade" to the 1920s.
C) the rejuvenation of the Ku Klux Klan, which crusaded against both blacks and foreigners.
D) Protestant fundamentalism, which persisted despite the humiliation of the Scopes trial.

Question 11

In the early part of the twentieth century, immigration from Mexico jumped for all of the following reasons EXCEPT

A) recruiting by the AFL in a campaign to increase its membership.
B) recruiting by American farmers in need of farm workers.
C) Mexicans fleeing poverty.
D) Mexicans fleeing the dislocations of revolution.

Question 12

The National Origins Act, which fixed immigration patterns for four decades,

A) greatly increased immigration from eastern Europe.
B) allowed for increased immigration from Asia, particularly well-educated Japanese.
C) put strict quotas on the number of immigrants to be allowed into the U.S. every year.
D) authorized discrimination against American citizens who had a particular national origin.

Question 13

Which statement about the National Origins Act of 1924 is NOT true?

A) It reflected a resurgent nativism.
B) It completely cut off foreign immigration.
C) Its system of quotas favored certain races.
D) It set immigration policy for the next 40 years, reversing the three-century-old practice of virtually open immigration.

Question 14

In the 1920s the Ku Klux Klan

A) did not really exist as an influential organization, despite media ballyhoo.
B) primarily attracted upper-class single males and females of declining social status.
C) was not entirely a small-town organization.
D) primarily focused its hatred on the "New Negro."

Question 15

As secretary of commerce, Herbert Hoover practiced "associationalism."That is, he gave government encouragement and assistance to private business in all of the following ways EXCEPT

A) by encouraging the creation of trade associations.
B) by combining the ideal of individualism with the pursuit of efficiency, organization, and cooperation.
C) by advocating laissez-faire policies to avoid government control.
D) by urging businesses to act in the public interest.

Question 16

In the 1920s, Secretary of Commerce Herbert Hoover believed in

A) the benefits of unrestrained competition.
B) the inefficiency of warm-spirited labor relations.
C) viewing business and government as partners rather than as adversaries.
D) viewing foreign trade as a cause of dependency rather than profitability.

Question 17

The weakest area of the American economy through the 1920s was

A) the stock market.
B) agriculture.
C) electric power.
D) the automobile industry.

Question 18

The Five-Power Agreement of 1921 involved

A) steps to outlaw war.
B) the creation of a collective security agreement throughout the Western Hemisphere.
C) steps toward naval disarmament.
D) the end of the Open Door.

Question 19

What event signaled the start of the Great Depression, the greatest depression in the history of the modern world?

A) the Great Crash
B) "Black Friday"
C) the Bull Market Bubble
D) Great Britain abandoning the gold standard

Question 20

What two industries began suffering in 1928 as demand sagged, which should have called attention to defects in the American economy prior to the Great Depression?

A) energy and construction
B) durable goods and steel
C) mining and heavy industry
D) construction and auto manufacturing

Question 21

Added to gasoline, tetraethyl lead could raise the energy level of "high-________"gasoline without causing premature ignition.

Question 22

Urban, Catholic, and "wet,"Al ________ was defeated for president, but the votes he won signaled an emerging political realignment.

Question 23

The actual amount of cash put down to purchase stock is known as the "_________ requirement."

Question 24

What were the "boom industries"of the 1920s, and how did they contribute to economic growth? Discuss two other factors that account for prosperity in the 1920s.

Question 25

In what ways did the automobile serve simultaneously as an economic catalyst, transportation revolution, and cultural symbol in the 1920s? What role did Henry Ford play in these developments?

Question 26

What was welfare capitalism? How did it work? Why did employers use it? What effect did it have on most wage earners during the 1920s? On unionization?

Question 27

What factors led to the rise of mass society and mass culture in the 1920s?

Question 28

Describe the "New Woman"and the "New Negro"of the 1920s. How "new"were they?

Question 29

Discuss three features of American society in the 1920s that alienated some artists and writers.

Question 30

What was "normalcy,"and how normal was it?

Question 31

How and why did American business practices change in the 1920s? What effect did those changes have on the economy?

Question 32

Describe the origins and effects of the consumer culture. Why was it critical to prosperity in the 1920s?

Question 33

How successful were women in achieving independence and equality in the 1920s? How successful were African Americans?

Question 34

How did motion pictures, radio, and mass-circulation newspapers and magazines shape American life in the 1920s? Which of these media was the most important?

Question 35

Consider the following statement: "The era of the 1920s witnessed a continual pull between the traditional and the modern."Explain how the following events reflected the pull of either the traditional or the modern-or both: Aimee Semple McPherson, the New Woman, Prohibition, the KKK, Fundamentalism, and advertising.

Question 36

Describe and evaluate the policies of the Harding and Coolidge administrations. Who was helped and who hurt or ignored? Why?

Question 37

Why was the election of 1928 important?

Question 38

What were the causes of the Great Depression? What role did the stock market crash play in the economic downturn?