Unit 8: The Early 1900s: Fast Forward
  Frameworks for America's Past



Click on the links below -
 

Teacher Key - for Unit 8



Review - famous people
Historical photo sets

1.  The automobile, the assembly line, and mechanization  

2.  The birth of the airline industry

3.  Radio in the early 1900s  

4.  Prohibition - the banning of alcohol

5.  The Great Migration  

6.  The Harlem Renaissance

7.  1920s and 1930s Culture - art, music, literature
History food feature A Taste of the Twenties  (Check out these all-American foods that first appeared on grocery store shelves in the 1920s.)
Exploring further
 Find history in family scrapbooks:
A Girl of the 1920s Grows Up: A Family Photo Album
Videos and
Internet sites
Students: Check with your parents for permission before visiting Internet links.

 		Industry and inventors - early 1900s - segment from The Century: America's Time - Seeds of Change (1 of 3).  Watch from 8:00 to 14:05.

Changing life in the 1920s - segment from The Century: America's Time - Boom to Bust (2 of 3).  Watch from beginning to 8:50.

New York City in the 1920s - segment from The Century: America's Time - Boom to Bust (1 of 3).  Watch from 5:15 to 14:08.

The Model T automobile  (a short video that shows the Model T in production and on the road - continue on to Life after WW I)

The Wright brothers' airplane  (a short video of one of the Wright brothers' airplanes, a few years after the first flight of 1903)

Electrification in the 1920s  (a short video shows how the spread of electricity improved American life in the home)

Mickey Mouse in "Steamboat Willie"  (an early Disney short animated film from 1922)

Creating a radio show  (this film clip shows voice actors in an old-time radio studio with all their sound effects techniques)

Prohibition - History of Speakeasies  (a short video)
Music: See the links in photo sets 6 and 7 (above).
Consider also:
 America: The Story of Us TV mini-series, Episode 8, "Boom," has several good video segments for topics in this unit, including the oil boom, Henry Ford's automobiles, and the Great Migration.  This widely praised production originally ran on the History Channel.  Less than $20 on Amazon for the 3 DVD set.

A Tree Grows in Brooklyn - This semi-autobiographical novel by Betty Smith tells the story of an adolescent girl growing up in a poor neighborhood of Brooklyn in the early 1900s.  It ranks among the most loved and most widely praised stories in American literature.  Read it online here, or get a copy at any library or bookstore.





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