Module 6 Study Guide

U.S. History, Part 2

These notes will help you prepare for quizzes and exams.

Lesson 1: The Roaring Twenties

Innovations and Their Impact
1. How did the following things reflect cultural changes in America in the
1920s. (Explain in 2-3 sentences each.)
Radio/Mass media Radio brought news, music, and entertainment
directly into homes across the country for the first
time, creating a shared national culture where millions
of Americans could listen to the same broadcasts
simultaneously. This helped spread new ideas, music,
and consumer trends faster than ever before,
reflecting the era's growing embrace of modern
technology and mass communication.
Jazz music Jazz, which grew out of African American musical
traditions, became hugely popular during the 1920s,
giving the decade its nickname, the "Jazz Age." Its
improvisational, energetic style symbolized the era's
rebellion against traditional values and reflected a
growing openness to Black artistic culture, even as
segregation persisted elsewhere in society.
Movies The movie industry boomed in the 1920s, especially
after the introduction of "talkies," or films with
synchronized sound, drawing millions of Americans to
theaters every week. Movies helped spread new
fashions, slang, and ideas about romance and lifestyle
across the country, reflecting and shaping the more
modern, glamorous culture of the decade.
Sports heroes Sports stars like Babe Ruth and boxer Jack Dempsey
became national celebrities during the 1920s, thanks
in part to radio broadcasts and newspaper coverage
that made their achievements widely known. Their
fame reflected the era's growing celebrity culture and
Americans' desire for larger-than-life heroes and
entertainment during a time of prosperity.

2. How did economic growth and mass production during the 1920s
change how Americans lived and what they could buy? (Explain in 2-3
sentences.)
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U.S. History, Part 2

Mass production techniques, especially assembly lines pioneered by Henry

Ford, made consumer goods like automobiles, radios, and appliances
cheaper and more widely available than ever before. This let many middle-
class Americans afford products that had previously been luxuries, fueling a
culture of consumerism and installment buying that reshaped everyday life
and spending habits throughout the decade.

3. What were the major inventions or technologies of the 1920s, and

how did they affect everyday life? (Explain in 2-3 sentences.)
Major innovations of the 1920s included the widespread adoption of the
automobile, household appliances like refrigerators and washing machines,
and the radio, all of which dramatically changed daily routines and
expectations for convenience. These technologies gave Americans more
mobility, leisure time, and access to information and entertainment,
fundamentally reshaping how people lived, worked, and spent their free
time.

4. How did the growth of suburbs in the 1920s reflect changes in

American lifestyles? (Explain in 2-3 sentences.)
As automobile ownership became more common, many Americans moved
out of crowded cities into new suburban neighborhoods, seeking more
space, privacy, and a sense of upward mobility. This growth reflected the
era's rising middle-class prosperity and changing ideas about the ideal
American lifestyle, centered around homeownership, cars, and separation
between work and home life.
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U.S. History, Part 2

Lesson 2: Cultural Wars of the 1920s

Conflict Between Cultures

1. What is a “culture war,” and what caused the culture wars of the
1920s in the United States? (Explain in 2-3 sentences.)
A culture war is an intense conflict between groups holding very different
values, beliefs, and ways of life, often over issues like religion, morality, or
social change. In the 1920s, rapid modernization, urbanization, and shifting
social norms clashed with more traditional, rural, and religious values,
creating deep tension over issues like alcohol, evolution, immigration, and
women's changing roles in society.

2. How did values in urban and rural areas differ in the 1920s, and how
did this lead to conflict? (Explain in 2-3 sentences.)
Urban Americans in the 1920s tended to embrace modern values like
consumerism, changing gender roles, and greater social and religious
diversity, while many in rural areas held onto more traditional, religious, and
conservative values. This growing divide fueled conflict over issues like
Prohibition, immigration, and the teaching of evolution in schools, as rural,
traditionalist communities felt threatened by the rapid cultural changes
happening in American cities.

3. How did the Scopes Trial show the conflict between science and
religion in the 1920s? (Explain in 2-3 sentences.)
The Scopes Trial in 1925 put teacher John Scopes on trial for illegally
teaching evolution in a Tennessee public school, pitting famous lawyers
Clarence Darrow and William Jennings Bryan against each other in a
nationally publicized legal battle. The trial highlighted the deep conflict
between scientific ideas like evolution and traditional religious beliefs, and
though Scopes was technically convicted, the trial exposed and intensified
the broader cultural divide between modern science and religious
fundamentalism.

4. What was Prohibition, and what were the goals and effects of this law
in the 1920s? (Explain in 2-3 sentences.)
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U.S. History, Part 2

Prohibition, enacted through the 18th Amendment in 1920, banned the

manufacture, sale, and transportation of alcohol nationwide, driven largely
by temperance reformers who blamed alcohol for crime, poverty, and family
breakdown. In practice, it proved nearly impossible to enforce, leading to
widespread illegal alcohol production and smuggling, and fueling the rise of
organized crime and gangsters like Al Capone, until it was repealed in 1933.

5. How did fears about immigration lead to new laws and actions in the
1920s? (Explain in 2-3 sentences.)
Fears that immigrants, especially from Southern and Eastern Europe, were
taking jobs, bringing radical political ideas, or failing to assimilate into
American culture led to growing nativist pressure for immigration restriction.
This resulted in laws like the Emergency Quota Act of 1921 and the
Immigration Act of 1924, which set strict quotas dramatically limiting
immigration, especially from regions outside Northern and Western Europe.

6. Who did the Ku Klux Klan target in the 1920s, and what did their
actions show about cultural conflicts in the U.S.? (Explain in 2-3
sentences.)
The Ku Klux Klan in the 1920s expanded its targets beyond Black Americans
to also include Catholics, Jews, and immigrants, framing itself as a defender
of traditional white Protestant American values. Its resurgence and
significant membership, including political influence in some states, showed
just how widespread and mainstream nativist and racist attitudes still were
during the decade, despite the era's image of modern progress.

7. How did the image and behavior of women change in the 1920s, and
why did this create tension? (Explain in 2-3 sentences.)
The 1920s saw the rise of the "flapper," a young woman who cut her hair
short, wore shorter dresses, smoked, drank, and openly challenged
traditional expectations about modesty and women's proper behavior. This
shift created tension with more conservative Americans who saw these
changes as a troubling breakdown of traditional morals and gender roles,
even as many women embraced the greater freedom and independence the
decade offered.

8. What was the Red Scare, and how did it affect attitudes toward
immigrants and political ideas? (Explain in 2-3 sentences.)
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U.S. History, Part 2

The Red Scare was a period of intense fear that communists and radical
political movements were plotting to overthrow the American government,
fueled by the Russian Revolution and a wave of strikes and bombings in
1919 and 1920. This fear led to the Palmer Raids, where the government
arrested and deported thousands of suspected radicals and immigrants with
little regard for due process, deepening public suspicion toward immigrants
and left-wing political ideas throughout the decade.

9. How did the Great Migration lead to the Harlem Renaissance, and why
was it important for African American culture? (Explain in 2-3
sentences.)
The Great Migration saw millions of African Americans move from the rural
South to Northern cities seeking better jobs and escaping the violence and
discrimination of Jim Crow laws, with many settling in neighborhoods like
Harlem in New York City. This concentration of Black talent and culture
helped spark the Harlem Renaissance, a flourishing of African American
literature, art, and music that gave Black artists like Langston Hughes and
Duke Ellington a national platform and helped reshape American culture
more broadly.
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U.S. History, Part 2

Lesson 3: The Great Depression

Cause and Effects

1. What was “buying on margin,” and how did it contribute to the stock
market crash of 1929? (Explain in 2-3 sentences.)
Buying on margin meant purchasing stocks with borrowed money, paying
only a small percentage of the stock's price upfront and borrowing the rest
from a broker. This practice let investors buy far more stock than they could
actually afford, but it also meant that when stock prices began falling in
1929, many investors couldn't repay their loans, triggering panicked selling
that helped crash the market.

2. How did the collapse of the stock market affect banks, and what
happened to people’s savings as a result? (Explain in 2-3 sentences.)
When the stock market crashed, many banks that had invested depositors'
money in stocks or made risky loans found themselves unable to cover
withdrawals, leading to a wave of bank failures across the country. Because
there was no federal deposit insurance at the time, many Americans lost
their entire life savings when their banks collapsed, wiping out financial
security for millions of families almost overnight.

3. How did overproduction and low wages during the 1920s contribute to
the economic collapse? (Explain in 2-3 sentences.)
Throughout the 1920s, factories produced more goods than consumers,
especially lower-paid workers and farmers, could actually afford to buy,
creating a growing surplus of unsold products. This imbalance between
production and consumer purchasing power weakened the overall economy,
since businesses eventually had to cut production and lay off workers,
setting off a downward economic spiral even before the stock market crash
hit.

4. What were installment plans, and how did rising personal debt make
the economy unstable by the end of the 1920s? (Explain in 2-3
sentences.)
Installment plans let Americans buy expensive goods like cars and
appliances by paying in small monthly payments rather than the full price
upfront, which fueled a consumer spending boom throughout the decade.
But this also meant many households were carrying significant debt by the
end of the 1920s, leaving families financially vulnerable and unable to keep
spending once the economy started to falter.
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U.S. History, Part 2

5. What was the unemployment rate at the peak of the Great

Depression, and how did this affect people’s lives? (Explain in 2-3
sentences.)
At the height of the Great Depression, around 1933, the US unemployment
rate reached roughly 25 percent, meaning one in four American workers
was out of a job. This mass unemployment devastated families financially
and emotionally, forcing many to rely on charity, government aid, or
breadlines just to survive, while the psychological toll of long-term
joblessness affected millions of Americans.

6. How did people experience poverty and homelessness during the

Great Depression? What were Hoovervilles? (Explain in 2-3
sentences.)
During the Great Depression, widespread unemployment and poverty forced
many Americans out of their homes, and shantytowns made of scrap
materials, known as Hoovervilles, sprang up in cities across the country,
named mockingly after President Hoover, whom many blamed for failing to
address the crisis. These makeshift communities became a visible symbol of
the era's suffering and the government's inadequate initial response to the
economic collapse.

7. Why did so many people migrate during the Great Depression?

(Explain in 2-3 sentences.)
Many Americans migrated during the Great Depression in search of work,
particularly farmers and families from the Great Plains who lost their land
due to drought and economic hardship, often heading to California hoping
for agricultural jobs. This mass movement, especially of "Okies" fleeing the
Dust Bowl, reflected the desperate search for any opportunity during a time
when jobs and stable income were scarce almost everywhere.

8. What was the Dust Bowl, and how did it affect farming families during
the Great Depression? (Explain in 2-3 sentences.)
The Dust Bowl was a severe environmental disaster in the 1930s in which
years of drought combined with poor farming practices, like over-plowing,
stripped away topsoil across the Great Plains, creating massive dust storms
that destroyed crops and made farming impossible. This forced thousands
of farming families, especially in states like Oklahoma and Texas, to
abandon their land and migrate elsewhere, often to California, in search of
work and a new start.

9. How did the U.S. banking collapse contribute to a worldwide

depression? (Explain in 2-3 sentences.)
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U.S. History, Part 2

As American banks failed and the US economy collapsed, US demand for

foreign goods dropped sharply, and American banks called in loans that had
been made to European countries still recovering from World War I. This cut
off crucial capital and trade that many countries depended on, spreading
the economic crisis well beyond US borders and helping turn the American
depression into a global one.