1920 News Show

News:Cordel Bever
"KSUM News this is Cordel Bever reporting from the steps of the Capital Building where the 19th amendment of the constitution was just passed. The state of Tennessee has ratified the amendment, bringing the total to 36 states.                    Women of the United States of America, women who are our sisters, our mothers, our neighbors, and the backbone of American society,                     Now have the right to vote. Crowds have gathered around the Capital Building. They are singing the Star-Spangled Banner. And women are hugging each other and weeping with joy. A group of women are holding a sign with a quote from Susan B. Anthony that reads 'No self respecting women should wish or work for the success of a party that ignores her sex' and now the Republicans and Democrats will be fighting for new voters and the support of women. Later today I will be speaking with Alice Paul the leader of the National Woman's Party who is one of the most well known suffragists in America. We will get her reaction on the passage of the 19th amendment. Ladies and gentlemen today will go down in history as the day women have earned the right to take control of their own destinies.

Cordel Bever, KSUM News."

Flappers in the 1920s

      Before the First World War America's women were known as Gibson Girls, they wouldn't date but instead wait for the perfect man to satisfy their needs. When WWI started most of the young men went off to war, and a lot did not come back. The women during the war took the man's place as the U.S. work force. These huge changes effected U.S. society in a huge way that would lead to a more modern America. When the men came back from the war there were not nearly enough to satisfy the Gibson Girl women's needs, so they decided to just live their lives and enjoy themselves. Thus the flapper was created.

   
       Flappers were first known as women who were still a bit awkward when they danced or moved around, but later changed to a young more foolish girl who would go to dances and parties. The women's image also changed in the 1920's. Instead of wearing long hair and dresses they wore short colorful skirts and cut their hair back in a style called a Shingle or Eton cut. The women also started to use makeup, and lipstick which both became very popular in the 1020s. their attitude became extremely different from the older women of the early 20th century. They were more reckless and took more risks, fast living was the new thing as well as being more sexual towards men.
   
       The age of the flappers had a good run, but ended as quickly as it started in the late 1920s when the stock market crashed and sent the world into the great depression; however, the flapper's changes during that time period continued to change women throughout the next couple of decades.   

 By Cordel Bever
Sources: 
1.http://history1900s.about.com/od/1920s/a/flappers.htm
2.https://blsciblogs.baruch.cuny.edu/his1005/2010/06/28/flappers/

US Soldier Letter, 1918

      Dear Family,
I love you guys so much, it feels like I have not seen you for years! Me and the rest of the 1st division are going to accompany the French on their assault of Cantigny tomorrow. We are going to run the Germans out! It's still cold here in Europe, but the troops are warm and ready to go. If you could send me some wool socks that would be great.  Mine have holes in them.  The French well, they don't look the best. They are pretty tired and worn out.  How are you doing back home? I hear money is good right now, you should see if anyone will hire you. Because if I don't make it back, not saying I wont, you'll be all the kids got. We are at a French base getting ready for the attack. The land all around is spotted with craters and burnt trees, and though the sun is out everything is a dark color there is no green for miles! Not exactly what we pictured France looking like back home!
      Well, I hope everything is going well back home, make sure the kids stay in school. I miss you so much and the States in general. I will try to get this letter out as soon as possible, but for the time being hold on we wont be gone long. 5/27/18

      Sincerely, Soldier

Causes Of WWI And U.S. Involvement

Four main causes of WWI:
I. Imperialism-(When a nation takes political control over another country). Conflicts started to rise over land disputes in Africa, Asia and in some places in Europe.

II. Nationalism-(The feeling of intense pride of one's homeland). This made it so people were not as open to people from other countries and created huge tensions between European nations.

III. Militarism-(when a nation devotes a lot of resources to make armies and things for war). This started a huge race between nations to try and create the largest military.

IV. Alliances-Triple Entente: France, Russia, and Great Britain. Triple Alliance: Germany, Austria-Hungry, and Italy. These alliances formed huge threats to one another and when one country got into a conflict the rest went to back them up. This created large amounts of tension between European nations.

The Spark of WWI: In June 1914, Franz Ferdinand, heir to the Austro-Hungarian throne was assassinated wile on vacation in Bosnian, Sarajevo. The assassin was a member of the Black Hand a Serbian nationalist group that were trying to start a war to bring down Austria-Hungary. Austria-Hungary blamed Serbia for the assassination and used it as an excuse to invade. Russia, Serbia's ally, then declared war on Austria-Hungary with Russia's other ally France. Germany then went to war with both France and Russia and thus starting WWI.     

• Lusitania: May 7, 1915, a British passenger liner was sunk by the German's U-boats when it entered the war zone, or the area around England. They killed 1,200 passengers 128 of which were American. 
• Sussex Pledge: March 1916, US president Wilson threatened Germany to take a pledge to give warning before sinking merchant ships.
• Zimmerman Telegram: January 1917, a German telegram intercepted by the British asking Mexico for assistance in the war and in return they would give Mexico a hand full of Southern US states.  
• Unrestricted Sub Warfare: February 1, 1917, the German started up their unrestricted sub warfare and started to sink merchant ships again. They sank US ships before the United States on April 6, 1917, declared war on Germany.

Francisco Pancho Villa

 

      Francisco Pancho Villa, better known as "Pancho Villa", but born  Doroteo Arango, and was a famous Mexican revolutionary leader from 1910 to 1911. Before he was a leader of the Mexican Revolution he was a very skilled bandit that lived in the mountains as the leader of a bandit group. Many Mexicans looked up to him as the modern day Robin Hood because he would steal from the wealthy and give most of the profits to the poor. He was very skilled at attacking swiftly and not getting caught which was one of his great attributes.
      His actions caught the attention of a group of men who were planing a revolution to overthrow the current Mexican president Porfirio Diaz. After some convincing he finally decided to become a leader of the new revolution. The idea was to get Francisco Madero to take Diaz's place as president, Madero said that he was going to improve the living for the lower classes in Mexico. After the first two years of fighting, Pancho Villa and Pascual Orozco (another commander) got into a fight and that caused Pancho Villa to resign from the cause. After he resigned in 1911 Madero became president, but he did not change a thing for the people of Mexico. 
      A year had passed and Orozco, being left out of the government plans, started a new revolution to get himself a place in office. Madero called for Villa and another commander Victoriano Huerta to assist him in bringing down the revolutionaries. In June 1912 Huerta accused Villa of stealing a horse and sent him to be executed, Madero made it so he did not have to die but could not prevent him from going to prison. By the time Villa escaped from prison it was late December and Huerta had become a Madero adversary, killing Madero and taking presidency for himself. 
      When Villa escaped he allied  with Venustiano Carranza to try and bring down Huerta. After fighting with him by his side, Pancho Villa left Venustiano Carranza and declared him, his enemy. These now two huge military forces started to fight over Mexico. The United States seeing this would not stop decided to assist Carranza's cause to bring down Villa. Pancho Villa led an army to attack the US town of Columbus, New Mexico on March 9, 1916; this being the only attack on the US since 1812, the US sent  a couple thousand soldiers in the search for him. They searched over a year for him with no sucsess and during that time period Carranza was assassinated by Adolfo De la Huerta who became president. In 1920 Pancho Villa, now out of hiding, retired by an order from Huerta and also for some other promises. Villa was later gunned down wile in his car on July 20, 1923. 

By Cordel Bever

Source: http://history1900s.about.com/cs/panchovilla/p/panchovilla.htm

      
 

Progressive Era - The Jungle

 Questions:
1) What qualities did Sinclair believe a person must have to succeed in Packingtown?
2) According to the passage, what is the plant owner's main goal.
3) What does Sinclair mean when he says, "...there was no place in it where a man counted for      anything against a dollar....?"



Answers:
1) He believed that people who had good character and worked hard would rise and become more successful in Packingtown. 
2) The plant owner's main goal was to get as much work as possible out of the workers.
3) He is saying that the owners of the meat packaging plants did not care for anything other than the money, and that they did not have any loyalty or decency towards their workers as long as they brought in the cash they could care less.

Current US Government Regulations:
      The government now has a very large hold on the environment and tries to regulate what people do towards the environment. Through information from the Environmental Protection Agency we know that the government is trying to help the environment. The EPA focuses on trying to clean up water, air, waste, and chemical influences on the US. One way the EPA enforces these is by creating laws and acts that have a huge penalty if they are not followed, and EPA agents are allowed to investigate any business, corporation or industry that they think might be violating any of their laws.

Eyewitness to Imperialism

      Imperialism has changed countless lives throughout the course of history and destroyed the governments of many countries. Imperialism is the total economic and political takeover of an entire country or a portion of one. Many European countries had already joined the race for Imperialism around the world by 1900, but the United States had not yet decided whether or not to join the Imperialism race. At the time the US had control over the Philippines and was having conflicts with the Spanish over Cuba, but many of the politicians had very different views about what to do with Imperialism. 
      The Democrat William Jennings Bryan a US presidential candidate running for office in 1900, did not like the idea of the the US partaking in anything to do with the Philippines; moreover, he thought they should let the Philippines govern themselves and leave them to their own devices "We are told that the Filipinos are not capable of self-government; that has a familiar ring... The Filipinos are not far enough advanced to share in the government of the people of the United States, but they are competent to govern themselves" (William Bryan). He was one of many who opposed Imperialism in the United States, but others thought they where insane for not seeing the advantages of Imperialism. The Republican Theodore Roosevelt responded to the speech given by William Bryan opposing Imperialism with his own speech supporting the matter "Many of their people are utterly unfit for self-government and show no signs of becoming fit"(Theodore Roosevelt). In this short sentence from Roosevelt's speech he clearly states that the Filipinos are unfit for self-government. This was his way of saying that the US should hold on to the Philippines for their sake.
      After the Spanish-American War the US granted Cuba their independence, but Senator Orville H. Platt put together a set of requirements, known as the Platt Amendment, that Cuba had to meet "That the government of Cuba shall never enter into any treaty or other compact with any foreign power or powers which will impair or tend to impair the independence of Cuba"(Orville H. Platt). This rule that Platt came up with implied that the US did not want Cuba to become a victim of Imperialism again. It also seemed that the US liked to have control over other countries as a higher power, but they also wanted to protect the people of other countries.
      I think that the US should protect the rights of some countries that might still be targets of Imperialist nations, but should not become a Imperialist nation. I agree with the speech spoken by William Bryan about letting the Philippines govern themselves. I am going to say that the United States should not become a imperialist nation and should let all the countries under US control practice self-government.
-Cordel Bever