HP7 SAQ #1 – 1920’s

Source A

For the revolt of the younger generation was only the beginning of a revolution in manners and morals that was already
beginning to affect men and women of every age in every part of the country. A number of forces were working
together and interacting upon one another to make this revolution inevitable. First of all was the state of mind brought
about by the war and its conclusion … The revolution was accelerated also by the growing independence of the
American woman … The principal remaining forces which accelerated the revolution in manners and moral were all 100
percent American. They were prohibition, the automobile, the confession and sex magazines, and the movies … Each of
these diverse influences … was played upon by all the others; none of them could alone have changed to any great
degree the folkways of America; together their force was irresistible.

--Frederick Lewis Allen, Only Yesterday, 1931

Source B

In its basic patterns, the new ferment of 1920-24 was far from new. The nativisms that came to the force in 1920
essentially continued prewar trends. They consisted largely of hatreds – towards Catholics, Jews, and southeastern
Europeans – that had gathered strength in the late Progressive era, reaching a minor crescendo in 1914 … two factors
which time and again in American history encouraged anti-foreign outbreaks vividly reappeared. One was economic
depression, the other a fresh wave of immigration … Prohibition, however, created a much more highly charged
situation, for it precipitated a head-on collision between mounting lawlessness and a new drive for social conformity …
In many respects the level of hysteria in the early twenties was a heritage of mind and spirit from the World War. Pre-
1914 traditions supplied the massive roots of that hysteria; post-1919 conditions proved fertile soil for a new season of
growth; but 100 percent Americanism was the vital force that gave it abundant life.

--John Higham, Strangers in a Strange Land: Patterns of American Nativism, 1860-1925, 1955
Name: _________________________ HP7 SAQ

1a. Explain the differences between the interpretations of the Roaring ‘20’s found in Source A and B.

1b. Provide specific historical evidence not mentioned in the document to support Source A.

1c. Provide specific historical evidence not mentioned in the document to support Source B.
Key:

1a)

1b)

1c)