File:1920s decade montage.png, From left, clockwise: Third Tipperary Brigade Flying Column No. 2 under Seán Hogan
Seán Hogan (13 May 1901 – 24 December 1968) was one of the leaders of the 3rd Tipperary Brigade of the Irish Republican Army during the War of Independence.
Early life
Hogan was born on 13 May 1901, the elder child of Matthew Hogan of Green ...
during the Irish War of Independence
The Irish War of Independence () or Anglo-Irish War was a guerrilla war fought in Ireland from 1919 to 1921 between the Irish Republican Army (1919–1922), Irish Republican Army (IRA, the army of the Irish Republic) and United Kingdom of Gre ...
; Prohibition agents destroying barrels of alcohol in accordance to the 18th amendment, which made alcoholic beverages illegal in the United States throughout the entire decade; In 1927, Charles Lindbergh embarks on the first solo nonstop flight from New York to Paris on the Spirit of St. Louis
The ''Spirit of St. Louis'' (formally the Ryan NYP, registration: N-X-211) is the custom-built, single-engine, single-seat, high-wing monoplane that was flown by Charles Lindbergh on May 20–21, 1927, on the first solo nonstop transatlant ...
; A crowd gathering on Wall Street
Wall Street is an eight-block-long street in the Financial District of Lower Manhattan in New York City. It runs between Broadway in the west to South Street and the East River in the east. The term "Wall Street" has become a metonym for ...
after the 1929 stock market crash
The Wall Street Crash of 1929, also known as the Great Crash, was a major American stock market crash that occurred in the autumn of 1929. It started in September and ended late in October, when share prices on the New York Stock Exchange colla ...
, which led to the Great Depression; Benito Mussolini
Benito Amilcare Andrea Mussolini (; 29 July 188328 April 1945) was an Italian politician and journalist who founded and led the National Fascist Party. He was Prime Minister of Italy from the March on Rome in 1922 until his deposition in ...
and Fascist
Fascism is a far-right, authoritarian, ultra-nationalist political ideology and movement,: "extreme militaristic nationalism, contempt for electoral democracy and political and cultural liberalism, a belief in natural social hierarchy and the ...
Blackshirts
The Voluntary Militia for National Security ( it, Milizia Volontaria per la Sicurezza Nazionale, MVSN), commonly called the Blackshirts ( it, Camicie Nere, CCNN, singular: ) or (singular: ), was originally the paramilitary wing of the Natio ...
during the March on Rome
The March on Rome ( it, Marcia su Roma) was an organized mass demonstration and a coup d'état in October 1922 which resulted in Benito Mussolini's National Fascist Party (PNF) ascending to power in the Kingdom of Italy. In late October 1922, F ...
in 1922; the People's Liberation Army
The People's Liberation Army (PLA) is the principal military force of the People's Republic of China and the armed wing of the Chinese Communist Party (CCP). The PLA consists of five service branches: the Ground Force, Navy, Air Force, ...
attacking government defensive positions in Shandong, during the Chinese Civil War
The Chinese Civil War was fought between the Kuomintang-led government of the Republic of China and forces of the Chinese Communist Party, continuing intermittently since 1 August 1927 until 7 December 1949 with a Communist victory on main ...
; The Women's suffrage
Women's suffrage is the women's rights, right of women to Suffrage, vote in elections. Beginning in the start of the 18th century, some people sought to change voting laws to allow women to vote. Liberal political parties would go on to gran ...
campaign leads to numerous countries granting women the right to vote
Suffrage, political franchise, or simply franchise, is the right to vote in public, political elections and referendums (although the term is sometimes used for any right to vote). In some languages, and occasionally in English, the right to v ...
and be elected; Babe Ruth
George Herman "Babe" Ruth Jr. (February 6, 1895 – August 16, 1948) was an American professional baseball player whose career in Major League Baseball (MLB) spanned 22 seasons, from 1914 through 1935. Nicknamed "the Bambino" and "the Su ...
becomes the most famous baseball player of the time., 420px, thumb
rect 1 1 298 178 Irish War of Independence
The Irish War of Independence () or Anglo-Irish War was a guerrilla war fought in Ireland from 1919 to 1921 between the Irish Republican Army (1919–1922), Irish Republican Army (IRA, the army of the Irish Republic) and United Kingdom of Gre ...
rect 302 1 572 178 Prohibition in the United States
rect 1 181 194 400 Women's suffrage
Women's suffrage is the women's rights, right of women to Suffrage, vote in elections. Beginning in the start of the 18th century, some people sought to change voting laws to allow women to vote. Liberal political parties would go on to gran ...
rect 198 181 395 399 Babe Ruth
George Herman "Babe" Ruth Jr. (February 6, 1895 – August 16, 1948) was an American professional baseball player whose career in Major League Baseball (MLB) spanned 22 seasons, from 1914 through 1935. Nicknamed "the Bambino" and "the Su ...
rect 399 182 572 401 Spirit of St. Louis
The ''Spirit of St. Louis'' (formally the Ryan NYP, registration: N-X-211) is the custom-built, single-engine, single-seat, high-wing monoplane that was flown by Charles Lindbergh on May 20–21, 1927, on the first solo nonstop transatlant ...
rect 1 405 250 599 Chinese Civil War
The Chinese Civil War was fought between the Kuomintang-led government of the Republic of China and forces of the Chinese Communist Party, continuing intermittently since 1 August 1927 until 7 December 1949 with a Communist victory on main ...
rect 255 404 416 599 March on Rome
The March on Rome ( it, Marcia su Roma) was an organized mass demonstration and a coup d'état in October 1922 which resulted in Benito Mussolini's National Fascist Party (PNF) ascending to power in the Kingdom of Italy. In late October 1922, F ...
rect 419 405 572 598 1929 stock market crash
The Wall Street Crash of 1929, also known as the Great Crash, was a major American stock market crash that occurred in the autumn of 1929. It started in September and ended late in October, when share prices on the New York Stock Exchange colla ...
The 1920s (pronounced "nineteen-twenties" often shortened to the "20s" or the "Twenties") was a
decade
A decade () is a period of ten years. Decades may describe any ten-year period, such as those of a person's life, or refer to specific groupings of calendar years.
Usage
Any period of ten years is a "decade". For example, the statement that "d ...
that began on January 1, 1920, and ended on December 31, 1929. In America, it is frequently referred to as the "
Roaring Twenties
The Roaring Twenties, sometimes stylized as Roaring '20s, refers to the 1920s decade in music and fashion, as it happened in Western society and Western culture. It was a period of economic prosperity with a distinctive cultural edge in the ...
" or the "
Jazz Age", while in Europe the period is sometimes referred to as the "
Golden Twenties
The Golden Twenties ( also known as the Happy Twenties (german: Glückliche Zwanziger Jahre), was a five-year time period within the decade of the 1920s in Germany. The era began in 1924 after the end of the hyperinflation following on World War ...
" because of the economic boom following World War I (1914-1918). French speakers refer to the period as the ''"
Années folles
The ''Années folles'' (, "crazy years" in French) was the decade of the 1920s in France. It was coined to describe the rich social, artistic, and cultural collaborations of the period. The same period is also referred to as the Roaring Twen ...
"'' ("Crazy Years"), emphasizing the era's social, artistic, and cultural dynamism.
The 1920s saw foreign oil companies begin operations in Venezuela, which became the world's second-largest oil-producing nation. The devastating
Wall Street Crash
The Wall Street Crash of 1929, also known as the Great Crash, was a major American stock market crash that occurred in the autumn of 1929. It started in September and ended late in October, when share prices on the New York Stock Exchange colla ...
in October 1929 is generally viewed as a harbinger of the end of 1920s prosperity in North America and Europe. In the Soviet Union, the
New Economic Policy
The New Economic Policy (NEP) () was an economic policy of the Soviet Union proposed by Vladimir Lenin in 1921 as a temporary expedient. Lenin characterized the NEP in 1922 as an economic system that would include "a free market and capitalism ...
was created by the
Bolsheviks
The Bolsheviks (russian: Большевики́, from большинство́ ''bol'shinstvó'', 'majority'),; derived from ''bol'shinstvó'' (большинство́), "majority", literally meaning "one of the majority". also known in English ...
in 1921, to be replaced by the
first five-year plan
The first five-year plan (russian: I пятилетний план, ) of the Union of Soviet Socialist Republics (USSR) was a list of economic goals, created by Communist Party General Secretary Joseph Stalin, based on his policy of socialism in ...
in 1928. The 1920s saw the rise of radical political movements, with the
Red Army
The Workers' and Peasants' Red Army (Russian language, Russian: Рабо́че-крестья́нская Кра́сная армия),) often shortened to the Red Army, was the army and air force of the Russian Soviet Federative Socialist R ...
triumphing against
White movement forces in the
Russian Civil War
{{Infobox military conflict
, conflict = Russian Civil War
, partof = the Russian Revolution and the aftermath of World War I
, image =
, caption = Clockwise from top left:
{{flatlist,
*Soldiers ...
, and the emergence of
far right
Far-right politics, also referred to as the extreme right or right-wing extremism, are political beliefs and actions further to the right of the left–right political spectrum than the standard political right, particularly in terms of being ...
political movements in Europe. In 1922, the fascist leader
Benito Mussolini
Benito Amilcare Andrea Mussolini (; 29 July 188328 April 1945) was an Italian politician and journalist who founded and led the National Fascist Party. He was Prime Minister of Italy from the March on Rome in 1922 until his deposition in ...
seized power in Italy. Other dictators that emerged included
Józef Piłsudski
Józef Klemens Piłsudski (; 5 December 1867 – 12 May 1935) was a Polish statesman who served as the Naczelnik państwa, Chief of State (1918–1922) and Marshal of Poland, First Marshal of Second Polish Republic, Poland (from 1920). He was ...
in
Poland
Poland, officially the Republic of Poland, , is a country in Central Europe. Poland is divided into Voivodeships of Poland, sixteen voivodeships and is the fifth most populous member state of the European Union (EU), with over 38 mill ...
, and
Peter
Peter may refer to:
People
* List of people named Peter, a list of people and fictional characters with the given name
* Peter (given name)
** Saint Peter (died 60s), apostle of Jesus, leader of the early Christian Church
* Peter (surname), a su ...
and
Alexander Karađorđević in
Yugoslavia
Yugoslavia (; sh-Latn-Cyrl, separator=" / ", Jugoslavija, Југославија ; sl, Jugoslavija ; mk, Југославија ;; rup, Iugoslavia; hu, Jugoszlávia; rue, label= Pannonian Rusyn, Югославия, translit=Juhoslavij ...
.
First-wave feminism
First-wave feminism was a period of feminist activity and thought that occurred during the 19th and early 20th century throughout the Western world. It focused on legal issues, primarily on securing women's right to vote. The term is often used ...
made advances, with women
gaining the right to vote in the
United States (1920),
Albania (1920),
Ireland (1921), and with
suffrage being expanded in Britain to all women over 21 years old (1928).
In Turkey, nationalist forces defeated Greece, France, Armenia and Britain in the
Turkish War of Independence
The Turkish War of Independence "War of Liberation", also known figuratively as ''İstiklâl Harbi'' "Independence War" or ''Millî Mücadele'' "National Struggle" (19 May 1919 – 24 July 1923) was a series of military campaigns waged by th ...
, leading to the
Treaty of Lausanne
The Treaty of Lausanne (french: Traité de Lausanne) was a peace treaty negotiated during the Lausanne Conference of 1922–23 and signed in the Palais de Rumine, Lausanne, Switzerland, on 24 July 1923. The treaty officially settled the conf ...
(July 1923), a treaty more favorable to Turkey than the earlier proposed
Treaty of Sèvres
The Treaty of Sèvres (french: Traité de Sèvres) was a 1920 treaty signed between the Allies of World War I and the Ottoman Empire. The treaty ceded large parts of Ottoman territory to France, the United Kingdom, Greece and Italy, as well ...
. The war also led to the
abolition of the Ottoman Caliphate. Nationalist revolts also occurred in
Ireland (1919–1921) and
Syria (1925–1927). Under Mussolini, Italy pursued a more aggressive domestic and foreign policy, leading to the
nigh-eradication of the Sicilian Mafia and the
Second Italo-Senussi War
The Second Italo-Senussi War, also referred to as the Pacification of Libya, was a conflict that occurred during the Italian colonization of Libya between Italian military forces (composed mainly of colonial troops from Libya, Eritrea, and Soma ...
in Libya respectively. In 1927, China
erupted into a civil war between the
Kuomintang
The Kuomintang (KMT), also referred to as the Guomindang (GMD), the Nationalist Party of China (NPC) or the Chinese Nationalist Party (CNP), is a major political party in the Republic of China, initially on the Chinese mainland and in Tai ...
(KMT)-led
government
A government is the system or group of people governing an organized community, generally a state.
In the case of its broad associative definition, government normally consists of legislature, executive, and judiciary. Government ...
of the
Republic of China
Taiwan, officially the Republic of China (ROC), is a country in East Asia, at the junction of the East and South China Seas in the northwestern Pacific Ocean, with the People's Republic of China (PRC) to the northwest, Japan to the northea ...
(ROC) and forces of the
Chinese Communist Party
The Chinese Communist Party (CCP), officially the Communist Party of China (CPC), is the founding and sole ruling party of the People's Republic of China (PRC). Under the leadership of Mao Zedong, the CCP emerged victorious in the Chinese Ci ...
(CCP). Civil wars also occurred in
Paraguay (1922–1923),
Ireland (1922–1923),
Honduras (1924),
Nicaragua (1926–1927), and
Afghanistan (1928–1929). Saudi forces
conquered Jabal Shammar and
subsequently, Hejaz.
A severe famine occurred in Russia in 1921–1922 due to the combined effects of economic disturbance because of the
Russian Revolution
The Russian Revolution was a period of political and social revolution that took place in the former Russian Empire which began during the First World War. This period saw Russia abolish its monarchy and adopt a socialist form of government ...
and the
Russian Civil War
{{Infobox military conflict
, conflict = Russian Civil War
, partof = the Russian Revolution and the aftermath of World War I
, image =
, caption = Clockwise from top left:
{{flatlist,
*Soldiers ...
, exacerbated by rail systems that could not distribute food efficiently, leading to 5 million deaths.
Another severe famine occurred in China in 1928–1930, leading to 6 million deaths. The
Spanish flu (1918–1920) and the
1918–1922 Russia typhus epidemic, which had begun in the previous decade, caused 25–50 million and 2–3 million deaths respectively. Major natural disasters of this decade include the
1920 Haiyuan earthquake
1920 Haiyuan earthquake () occurred on December 16 in Haiyuan County, Ningxia Province, Republic of China at 19:05:53. It was also called the 1920 Gansu earthquake because Ningxia was a part of Gansu Province when the earthquake occurred. It caus ...
(258,707~273,407 deaths), the
1922 Swatow typhoon
The 1922 Shantou Typhoon was a devastating tropical cyclone that caused thousands of deaths in the Chinese city of Shantou in August 1922. This total makes it one of the deadliest known typhoons in history.
Meteorological history
A tropical dep ...
(50,000–100,000 deaths), the
1923 Great Kantō earthquake
The struck the Kantō Plain on the main Japanese island of Honshū at 11:58:44 JST (02:58:44 UTC) on Saturday, September 1, 1923. Varied accounts indicate the duration of the earthquake was between four and ten minutes. Extensive firestorms an ...
(105,385–142,800 deaths), and the
1927 Gulang earthquake (40,912 deaths).
Silent film
A silent film is a film with no synchronized Sound recording and reproduction, recorded sound (or more generally, no audible dialogue). Though silent films convey narrative and emotion visually, various plot elements (such as a setting or era) ...
s were popular in this decade, with the 1925 American
silent epic adventure
An adventure is an exciting experience or undertaking that is typically bold, sometimes risky. Adventures may be activities with danger such as traveling, exploring, skydiving, mountain climbing, scuba diving, river rafting, or other extr ...
-
drama film
In film and television, drama is a category or genre of narrative fiction (or semi-fiction) intended to be more serious than humorous in tone. Drama of this kind is usually qualified with additional terms that specify its particular super ...
''
Ben-Hur: A Tale of the Christ'' being the highest-grossing film of this decade, grossing $9,386,000 worldwide. Other high-grossing films included ''
The Big Parade
''The Big Parade'' is a 1925 American silent war drama film directed by King Vidor, starring John Gilbert, Renée Adorée, Hobart Bosworth, Tom O'Brien, and Karl Dane. Written by World War I veteran, Laurence Stallings, the film is abou ...
'' and ''
The Singing Fool
''The Singing Fool'' is a 1928 American musical drama part-talkie motion picture directed by Lloyd Bacon which was released by Warner Bros. The film stars Al Jolson and is a follow-up to his previous film, ''The Jazz Singer''. It is credited ...
''.
Sinclair Lewis
Harry Sinclair Lewis (February 7, 1885 – January 10, 1951) was an American writer and playwright. In 1930, he became the first writer from the United States (and the first from the Americas) to receive the Nobel Prize in Literature, which wa ...
was a popular author in the United States in the 1920s, with his books ''
Main Street'' and ''
Elmer Gantry
''Elmer Gantry'' is a satirical novel written by Sinclair Lewis in 1926 that presents aspects of the religious activity of America in fundamentalist and evangelistic circles and the attitudes of the 1920s public toward it. The novel's protagonis ...
'' becoming best-sellers. Best-selling books outside the US included the Czech book ''
The Good Soldier Švejk
''The Good Soldier Švejk'' () is an unfinished satirical dark comedy novel by Czech writer Jaroslav Hašek, published in 1921–1923, about a good-humored, simple-minded, middle-aged man who pretends to be enthusiastic to serve Austria-Hungary ...
'', which sold 20 million copies. Songs of this decade included "
Are You Lonesome Tonight?
"Are You Lonesome Tonight?" (sometimes stylized as Are You Lonesome To-night?) is a song written by Roy Turk and Lou Handman in 1926. It was recorded several times in 1927—first by Charles Hart, with successful versions by Vaughn De Leath, ...
" and "
Stardust
Stardust may refer to:
* A type of cosmic dust, composed of particles in space
Entertainment Songs
* “Stardust” (1927 song), by Hoagy Carmichael
* “Stardust” (David Essex song), 1974
* “Stardust” (Lena Meyer-Landrut song), 2012
* ...
".
During the 1920s, the world population increased from 1.87 to 2.05 billion, with approximately 700 million births and 525 million deaths in total.
Social history
The Roaring Twenties brought about several novel and highly visible social and cultural trends. These trends, made possible by sustained economic prosperity, were most visible in major cities like New York, Chicago, Paris, Berlin and London.
"Normalcy" returned to politics in the wake of hyper-emotional patriotism during World War I,
jazz
Jazz is a music genre that originated in the African-American communities of New Orleans, Louisiana in the late 19th and early 20th centuries, with its roots in blues and ragtime. Since the 1920s Jazz Age, it has been recognized as a majo ...
blossomed, and
Art Deco
Art Deco, short for the French ''Arts Décoratifs'', and sometimes just called Deco, is a style of visual arts, architecture, and product design, that first appeared in France in the 1910s (just before World War I), and flourished in the Unit ...
peaked. For women, knee-length skirts and dresses became socially acceptable, as did bobbed hair with a
finger wave
A finger wave is a method of setting hair into waves (curls) that was popular in the 1920s and early 1930s and again in the late 1990s in North America and Europe. Silver screen actresses such as Josephine Baker and Esther Philips are credited wit ...
or
marcel wave
Marcelling is a hair styling technique in which hot curling tongs are used to induce a curl into the hair. Its appearance was similar to that of a finger wave but it is created using a different method.
Marcelled hair was a popular style for w ...
. The women who pioneered these trends were frequently referred to as
flappers
Flappers were a subculture of young Western women in the 1920s who wore short skirts (knee height was considered short during that period), bobbed their hair, listened to jazz, and flaunted their disdain for what was then considered accep ...
.
The era saw the large-scale adoption of automobiles, telephones, motion pictures, radio and household electricity, as well as unprecedented industrial growth, accelerated consumer demand and aspirations, and significant changes in lifestyle and culture. The media began to focus on celebrities, especially sports heroes and movie stars. Large
baseball stadiums were built in major U.S. cities, in addition to palatial
cinemas
A movie theater (American English), cinema (British English), or cinema hall (Indian English), also known as a movie house, picture house, the movies, the pictures, picture theater, the silver screen, the big screen, or simply theater is a ...
.
Most independent countries passed
women's suffrage
Women's suffrage is the women's rights, right of women to Suffrage, vote in elections. Beginning in the start of the 18th century, some people sought to change voting laws to allow women to vote. Liberal political parties would go on to gran ...
after 1918, especially as a reward for women's support of the war effort and endurance of its deaths and hardships.
Politics and wars
Wars

*
Turkish War of Independence
The Turkish War of Independence "War of Liberation", also known figuratively as ''İstiklâl Harbi'' "Independence War" or ''Millî Mücadele'' "National Struggle" (19 May 1919 – 24 July 1923) was a series of military campaigns waged by th ...
**
Greco-Turkish War (May 1919 – October 1922)
**
Turkish–Armenian War
The Turkish–Armenian war ( hy, Հայ-թուրքական պատերազմ), known in Turkey as the Eastern Front ( tr, Doğu Cephesi) of the Turkish War of Independence, was a conflict between the First Republic of Armenia and the Turkish Na ...
(September–December 1920)
**
Franco-Turkish War
The Franco–Turkish War, known as the Cilicia Campaign (french: La campagne de Cilicie) in France and as the Southern Front ( tr, Güney Cephesi) of the Turkish War of Independence in Turkey, was a series of conflicts fought between France (the ...
(December 1918 – October 1921)
**
Royalist and separatist revolts (1919–1923)
*
Unification of Saudi Arabia
The Unification of Saudi Arabia was a military and political campaign in which the various tribes, sheikhdoms, city-states, emirates, and kingdoms of most of the Arabian Peninsula were conquered by the House of Saud, or ''Al Saud''. Unifica ...
**
Rashidi–Saudi War (1903–1921)
**
Kuwait–Saudi War (1919–1920)
**
Hejaz–Saudi War (1919–1925)
**
Transjordan-Saudi War (1922–1924)
*
Polish–Soviet War
The Polish–Soviet War (Polish–Bolshevik War, Polish–Soviet War, Polish–Russian War 1919–1921)
* russian: Советско-польская война (''Sovetsko-polskaya voyna'', Soviet-Polish War), Польский фронт (' ...
(February 1919 – March 1922)
*
Irish War of Independence
The Irish War of Independence () or Anglo-Irish War was a guerrilla war fought in Ireland from 1919 to 1921 between the Irish Republican Army (1919–1922), Irish Republican Army (IRA, the army of the Irish Republic) and United Kingdom of Gre ...
(January 1919 – July 1921)
*
Iraqi Revolt (1920)

*
Rif War
The Rif War () was an armed conflict fought from 1921 to 1926 between Spain (joined by France in 1924) and the Berber tribes of the mountainous Rif region of northern Morocco.
Led by Abd el-Krim, the Riffians at first inflicted several d ...
(1920–1927)
*
Second Italo-Senussi War
The Second Italo-Senussi War, also referred to as the Pacification of Libya, was a conflict that occurred during the Italian colonization of Libya between Italian military forces (composed mainly of colonial troops from Libya, Eritrea, and Soma ...
(1923–1932)
*
Great Syrian Revolt
The Great Syrian Revolt ( ar, الثورة السورية الكبرى) or Revolt of 1925 was a general uprising across the State of Syria and Greater Lebanon during the period of 1925 to 1927. The leading rebel forces comprised fighters of th ...
(1925–1927)
*
United States occupation of Nicaragua
The United States occupation of Nicaragua from 1912 to 1933 was part of the Banana Wars, when the US military invaded various Latin American countries from 1898 to 1934. The formal occupation began in 1912, even though there were various othe ...
(1912–1933)
*
United States occupation of Haiti
The United States occupation of Haiti began on July 28, 1915, when 330 U.S. Marines landed at Port-au-Prince, Haiti, after the National City Bank of New York convinced the President of the United States, Woodrow Wilson, to take control of ...
(1915–1934)
*
United States occupation of the Dominican Republic (1916–1924)
Internal conflicts
*
Russian Civil War
{{Infobox military conflict
, conflict = Russian Civil War
, partof = the Russian Revolution and the aftermath of World War I
, image =
, caption = Clockwise from top left:
{{flatlist,
*Soldiers ...
(November 1917 – October 1922)
**
Tambov Rebellion
The Tambov Rebellion of 1920–1921 was one of the largest and best-organized peasant rebellions challenging the Bolshevik government during the Russian Civil War. The uprising took place in the territories of the modern Tambov Oblast and part ...
(August 1920 – June 1921)
**
Allied intervention in the Russian Civil War
Allied intervention in the Russian Civil War or Allied Powers intervention in the Russian Civil War consisted of a series of multi-national military expeditions which began in 1918. The Allies first had the goal of helping the Czechoslovak Le ...
(1918 – 1925)
*
Patagonia Rebelde (1920–1922)
*
Mahmud Barzanji revolts
Mahmud Barzanji revolts were a series of armed uprisings by Kurdish Sheykh Mahmud Barzanji against the Iraqi authority in newly conquered British Mesopotamia and later the British Mandate in Iraq. Following his first insurrection in May 1919, S ...
(1920–1922)
*
Irish Civil War
The Irish Civil War ( ga, Cogadh Cathartha na hÉireann; 28 June 1922 – 24 May 1923) was a conflict that followed the Irish War of Independence and accompanied the establishment of the Irish Free State, an entity independent from the United ...
(June 28, 1922 – May 24, 1923)
*
Chinese Civil War
The Chinese Civil War was fought between the Kuomintang-led government of the Republic of China and forces of the Chinese Communist Party, continuing intermittently since 1 August 1927 until 7 December 1949 with a Communist victory on main ...
(first phase 1927–1936)
*
Ararat rebellion (1927–1930)
*
Kongo-Wara rebellion
The Kongo-Wara rebellion, also known as the War of the Hoe Handle and the Baya War, was a rural, anticolonial rebellion in the former colonies of French Equatorial Africa and French Cameroon which began as a result of recruitment of the native popu ...
(1928–1931)
*
Afghan Civil War (November 14, 1928 – October 13, 1929)
Major political changes

* Rise of radical political movements such as
communism
Communism (from Latin la, communis, lit=common, universal, label=none) is a far-left sociopolitical, philosophical, and economic ideology and current within the socialist movement whose goal is the establishment of a communist society ...
led by the Soviet Union and
fascism
Fascism is a far-right, authoritarian, ultra-nationalist political ideology and movement,: "extreme militaristic nationalism, contempt for electoral democracy and political and cultural liberalism, a belief in natural social hierarchy and th ...
led by Italy.
* League of Nations and associated bodies as experiment in international cooperation and prevention of wars
Decolonization and independence
*
Irish Free State
The Irish Free State ( ga, Saorstát Éireann, , ; 6 December 192229 December 1937) was a State (polity), state established in December 1922 under the Anglo-Irish Treaty of December 1921. The treaty ended the three-year Irish War of Independ ...
gains independence from the United Kingdom in 1922.
*
Egypt
Egypt ( ar, مصر , ), officially the Arab Republic of Egypt, is a transcontinental country spanning the northeast corner of Africa and southwest corner of Asia via a land bridge formed by the Sinai Peninsula. It is bordered by the Med ...
officially becomes an independent country through the
Declaration of 1922, though it still remains under the military and political influence of the
British Empire
The British Empire was composed of the dominions, colonies, protectorates, mandates, and other territories ruled or administered by the United Kingdom and its predecessor states. It began with the overseas possessions and trading post ...
.
Prominent political events
Peace and disarmament
*
Washington Naval Conference
The Washington Naval Conference was a disarmament conference called by the United States and held in Washington, DC from November 12, 1921 to February 6, 1922. It was conducted outside the auspices of the League of Nations. It was attended by nine ...
of 1922
**
followup treaties for the Limitation of Naval Armament
*
Geneva Protocol
The Protocol for the Prohibition of the Use in War of Asphyxiating, Poisonous or other Gases, and of Bacteriological Methods of Warfare, usually called the Geneva Protocol, is a treaty prohibiting the use of chemical and biological weapons in ...
1925, outlaws poison gas
*
Geneva Naval Conference
The Geneva Naval Conference was a conference held to discuss naval arms limitation, held in Geneva, Switzerland, in 1927. The aim of the conference was to extend the existing limits on naval construction which had been agreed in the Washington N ...
1927
*
Kellogg–Briand Pact
The Kellogg–Briand Pact or Pact of Paris – officially the General Treaty for Renunciation of War as an Instrument of National Policy – is a 1928 international agreement on peace in which signatory states promised not to use war to ...
(1928) signed by most nations promising not to declare war.
*
London Naval Treaty, 1930
*
Conference for the Reduction and Limitation of Armaments
The Conference for the Reduction and Limitation of Armaments, generally known as the Geneva Conference or World Disarmament Conference, was an international conference of states held in Geneva, Switzerland, between February 1932 and November 193 ...
1932-1934
Women's suffrage
* Women's suffrage movement continues to make gains as women obtain full voting rights in the United Kingdom in 1918 (women over 30) and in 1928 (full enfranchisement), in the United States in 1920. Also : full or partial gains in Uruguay 1917; Canada, 1917–1925 except Quebec (1940); Czechoslovakia 1920; Irish Free State, 1922; Burma, 1922; Italy, 1925 (partial); Ecuador 1929.
United States

* Prohibition of alcohol occurs in the United States.
Prohibition in the United States began January 16, 1919, with the ratification of the
Eighteenth Amendment to the
U.S.Constitution, effective as of January 17, 1920, and it continued throughout the 1920s. Prohibition was finally repealed in 1933.
Organized crime
Organized crime (or organised crime) is a category of transnational, national, or local groupings of highly centralized enterprises run by criminals to engage in illegal activity, most commonly for profit. While organized crime is generally tho ...
turns to
smuggling and
bootlegging of
liquor
Liquor (or a spirit) is an alcoholic drink produced by distillation of grains, fruits, vegetables, or sugar, that have already gone through alcoholic fermentation. Other terms for liquor include: spirit drink, distilled beverage or ha ...
, led by figures such as
Al Capone
Alphonse Gabriel Capone (; January 17, 1899 – January 25, 1947), sometimes known by the nickname "Scarface", was an American gangster and businessman who attained notoriety during the Prohibition era as the co-founder and boss of the ...
, boss of the
Chicago Outfit
The Chicago Outfit (also known as the Outfit, the Chicago Mafia, the Chicago Mob, the Chicago crime family, the South Side Gang or The Organization) is an Italian-American organized crime syndicate or crime family based in Chicago, Illinois, ...
.
* The
Immigration Act of 1924
The Immigration Act of 1924, or Johnson–Reed Act, including the Asian Exclusion Act and National Origins Act (), was a United States federal law that prevented immigration from Asia and set quotas on the number of immigrants from the Eastern ...
places restrictions on immigration. National quotas curbed most Eastern and Southern European nationalities, further enforced the ban on immigration of East Asians,
Indians
Indian or Indians may refer to:
Peoples South Asia
* Indian people, people of Indian nationality, or people who have an Indian ancestor
** Non-resident Indian, a citizen of India who has temporarily emigrated to another country
* South Asia ...
and Africans, and put mild regulations on nationalities from the Western Hemisphere (Latin Americans).
* The major sport was
baseball
Baseball is a bat-and-ball sport played between two teams of nine players each, taking turns batting and fielding. The game occurs over the course of several plays, with each play generally beginning when a player on the fielding ...
and the most famous player was
Babe Ruth
George Herman "Babe" Ruth Jr. (February 6, 1895 – August 16, 1948) was an American professional baseball player whose career in Major League Baseball (MLB) spanned 22 seasons, from 1914 through 1935. Nicknamed "the Bambino" and "the Su ...
.
* The ''
Lost Generation
The Lost Generation was the social generational cohort in the Western world that was in early adulthood during World War I. "Lost" in this context refers to the "disoriented, wandering, directionless" spirit of many of the war's survivors in the ...
'' (which characterized disillusionment), was the name
Gertrude Stein
Gertrude Stein (February 3, 1874 – July 27, 1946) was an American novelist, poet, playwright, and art collector. Born in Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania, in the Allegheny West (Pittsburgh), Allegheny West neighborhood and raised in Oakland, Calif ...
gave to American writers, poets, and artists living in Europe during the 1920s. Famous members of the ''
Lost Generation
The Lost Generation was the social generational cohort in the Western world that was in early adulthood during World War I. "Lost" in this context refers to the "disoriented, wandering, directionless" spirit of many of the war's survivors in the ...
'' include
Cole Porter
Cole Albert Porter (June 9, 1891 – October 15, 1964) was an American composer and songwriter. Many of his songs became standards noted for their witty, urbane lyrics, and many of his scores found success on Broadway and in film.
Born to ...
,
Gerald Murphy
Gerald Clery Murphy and Sara Sherman Wiborg were wealthy, expatriate Americans who moved to the French Riviera in the early 20th century and who, with their generous hospitality and flair for parties, created a vibrant social circle, particularly ...
,
Patrick Henry Bruce
Artist Patrick Henry Bruce (3rd from left) & friends/associates in front of the entrance to a 300px
Patrick Henry Bruce (March 25, 1881 – November 12, 1936) was an American cubist painter.
Biography
A descendant of Patrick Henry, Bruce wa ...
,
Waldo Peirce
Waldo Peirce (December 17, 1884 – March 8, 1970) was an American painter, who for many years reveled in living the life of a bohemian expatriate.
Peirce was both a prominent painter and a well-known colorful figure in the world of the arts ...
,
Ernest Hemingway
Ernest Miller Hemingway (July 21, 1899 – July 2, 1961) was an American novelist, short-story writer, and journalist. His economical and understated style—which he termed the iceberg theory—had a strong influence on 20th-century fic ...
,
F. Scott Fitzgerald
Francis Scott Key Fitzgerald (September 24, 1896 – December 21, 1940) was an American novelist, essayist, and short story writer. He is best known for his novels depicting the flamboyance and excess of the Jazz Age—a term he popularize ...
,
Zelda Fitzgerald
Zelda Fitzgerald (; July 24, 1900 – March 10, 1948) was an American novelist, painter, dancer, and socialite.
Born in Montgomery, Alabama, she was noted for her beauty and high spirits, and was dubbed by her husband F. Scott Fitzgerald a ...
,
Ezra Pound
Ezra Weston Loomis Pound (30 October 1885 – 1 November 1972) was an expatriate American poet and critic, a major figure in the early modernist poetry movement, and a fascist collaborator in Italy during World War II. His works includ ...
,
John Dos Passos
John Roderigo Dos Passos (; January 14, 1896 – September 28, 1970) was an American novelist, most notable for his ''U.S.A.'' trilogy.
Born in Chicago, Dos Passos graduated from Harvard College in 1916. He traveled widely as a young man, visit ...
, and
Sherwood Anderson
Sherwood Anderson (September 13, 1876 – March 8, 1941) was an American novelist and short story writer, known for subjective and self-revealing works. Self-educated, he rose to become a successful copywriter and business owner in Cleveland and ...
.
* A peak in the early 1920s in the membership of the
Ku Klux Klan
The Ku Klux Klan (), commonly shortened to the KKK or the Klan, is an American white supremacist, right-wing terrorist, and hate group whose primary targets are African Americans, Jews, Latinos, Asian Americans, Native Americans, and Ca ...
of four to five million members (after its reemergence in 1915), followed by a rapid decline down to an estimated 30,000 members by 1930.
* The
Scopes Trial (1925), which declared that
John T. Scopes
John Thomas Scopes (August 3, 1900 – October 21, 1970) was a teacher in Dayton, Tennessee, who was charged on May 5, 1925, with violating Tennessee's Butler Act, which prohibited the teaching of human evolution in Tennessee schools. He was trie ...
had violated the law by teaching
evolution
Evolution is change in the heritable characteristics of biological populations over successive generations. These characteristics are the expressions of genes, which are passed on from parent to offspring during reproduction. Variation ...
in schools, creating tension between the competing theories of
creationism
Creationism is the religious belief that nature, and aspects such as the universe, Earth, life, and humans, originated with supernatural acts of divine creation. Gunn 2004, p. 9, "The ''Concise Oxford Dictionary'' says that creationism ...
and evolutionism.
Europe
*
Polish–Soviet War
The Polish–Soviet War (Polish–Bolshevik War, Polish–Soviet War, Polish–Russian War 1919–1921)
* russian: Советско-польская война (''Sovetsko-polskaya voyna'', Soviet-Polish War), Польский фронт (' ...
(1920–21); Poland defeats Soviet expansion; Ukraine and Belarus were divided.
* Major armed conflict in Ireland including
Irish War of Independence
The Irish War of Independence () or Anglo-Irish War was a guerrilla war fought in Ireland from 1919 to 1921 between the Irish Republican Army (1919–1922), Irish Republican Army (IRA, the army of the Irish Republic) and United Kingdom of Gre ...
(1919–1921) resulting in Ireland becoming an independent country in 1922 followed by the
Irish Civil War
The Irish Civil War ( ga, Cogadh Cathartha na hÉireann; 28 June 1922 – 24 May 1923) was a conflict that followed the Irish War of Independence and accompanied the establishment of the Irish Free State, an entity independent from the United ...
(1922–23).
*
Russian famine of 1921–22
Russian(s) refers to anything related to Russia, including:
*Russians (, ''russkiye''), an ethnic group of the East Slavic peoples, primarily living in Russia and neighboring countries
* Rossiyane (), Russian language term for all citizens and pe ...
claimed up to five million victims.
* The
Union of Soviet Socialist Republics
The Soviet Union,. officially the Union of Soviet Socialist Republics. (USSR),. was a transcontinental country that spanned much of Eurasia from 1922 to 1991. A flagship communist state, it was nominally a federal union of fifteen nation ...
(Soviet Union) is created in 1922.
*
Benito Mussolini
Benito Amilcare Andrea Mussolini (; 29 July 188328 April 1945) was an Italian politician and journalist who founded and led the National Fascist Party. He was Prime Minister of Italy from the March on Rome in 1922 until his deposition in ...
leader of the
National Fascist Party
The National Fascist Party ( it, Partito Nazionale Fascista, PNF) was a political party in Italy, created by Benito Mussolini as the political expression of Italian Fascism and as a reorganization of the previous Italian Fasces of Combat. The p ...
became
Prime Minister of Italy
The Prime Minister of Italy, officially the President of the Council of Ministers ( it, link=no, Presidente del Consiglio dei Ministri), is the head of government of the Italian Republic. The office of president of the Council of Ministers is ...
, shortly thereafter creating the world's first
fascist
Fascism is a far-right, authoritarian, ultra-nationalist political ideology and movement,: "extreme militaristic nationalism, contempt for electoral democracy and political and cultural liberalism, a belief in natural social hierarchy and the ...
government. The Fascist regime establishes a
totalitarian
Totalitarianism is a form of government and a political system that prohibits all opposition parties, outlaws individual and group opposition to the state and its claims, and exercises an extremely high if not complete degree of control and regul ...
state led by Mussolini as a dictator. The Fascist regime restores good relations between the
Roman Catholic Church
The Catholic Church, also known as the Roman Catholic Church, is the largest Christian church, with 1.3 billion baptized Catholics worldwide . It is among the world's oldest and largest international institutions, and has played a ...
and Italy with the
Lateran Treaty
The Lateran Treaty ( it, Patti Lateranensi; la, Pacta Lateranensia) was one component of the Lateran Pacts of 1929, agreements between the Kingdom of Italy under King Victor Emmanuel III of Italy and the Holy See under Pope Pius XI to settle ...
, which creates
Vatican City
Vatican City (), officially the Vatican City State ( it, Stato della Città del Vaticano; la, Status Civitatis Vaticanae),—'
* german: Vatikanstadt, cf. '—' (in Austria: ')
* pl, Miasto Watykańskie, cf. '—'
* pt, Cidade do Vati ...
. The Fascist regime pursues an aggressive expansionist agenda in Europe such as by raiding the
Greek island
Greece has many islands, with estimates ranging from somewhere around 1,200 to 6,000, depending on the minimum size to take into account. The number of inhabited islands is variously cited as between 166 and 227.
The largest Greek island by a ...
of
Corfu in 1923, pressuring
Albania
Albania ( ; sq, Shqipëri or ), or , also or . officially the Republic of Albania ( sq, Republika e Shqipërisë), is a country in Southeastern Europe. It is located on the Adriatic
The Adriatic Sea () is a body of water separating the ...
to submit to becoming a ''
de facto
''De facto'' ( ; , "in fact") describes practices that exist in reality, whether or not they are officially recognized by laws or other formal norms. It is commonly used to refer to what happens in practice, in contrast with '' de jure'' ("by l ...
'' Italian
protectorate
A protectorate, in the context of international relations, is a state that is under protection by another state for defence against aggression and other violations of law. It is a dependent territory that enjoys autonomy over most of its inte ...
in the mid-1920s, and holding territorial aims on the region of
Dalmatia
Dalmatia (; hr, Dalmacija ; it, Dalmazia; see names in other languages) is one of the four historical regions of Croatia, alongside Croatia proper, Slavonia, and Istria. Dalmatia is a narrow belt of the east shore of the Adriatic Sea, stre ...
in
Yugoslavia
Yugoslavia (; sh-Latn-Cyrl, separator=" / ", Jugoslavija, Југославија ; sl, Jugoslavija ; mk, Југославија ;; rup, Iugoslavia; hu, Jugoszlávia; rue, label= Pannonian Rusyn, Югославия, translit=Juhoslavij ...
.
* In Germany, the
Weimar Republic
The German Reich, commonly referred to as the Weimar Republic,, was a historical period of Germany from 9 November 1918 to 23 March 1933, during which it was a constitutional federal republic for the first time in history; hence it is also r ...
suffers from economic crisis in the early 1920s and
hyperinflation
In economics, hyperinflation is a very high and typically accelerating inflation. It quickly erodes the real value of the local currency, as the prices of all goods increase. This causes people to minimize their holdings in that currency as t ...
of currency in 1923. From 1923 to 1925 the
Occupation of the Ruhr
The Occupation of the Ruhr (german: link=no, Ruhrbesetzung) was a period of military occupation of the Ruhr region of Germany by France and Belgium between 11 January 1923 and 25 August 1925.
France and Belgium occupied the heavily indus ...
takes place. The
Ruhr was an industrial region of Germany taken over by the military forces of the
French Third Republic
The French Third Republic (french: Troisième République, sometimes written as ) was the system of government adopted in France from 4 September 1870, when the Second French Empire collapsed during the Franco-Prussian War, until 10 July 194 ...
and Belgium, in response to the failure of the Weimar Republic under Chancellor
Wilhelm Cuno
Wilhelm Carl Josef Cuno (2 July 1876 – 3 January 1933) was a German businessman and politician who was the chancellor of Germany from 1922 to 1923, for a total of 264 days. His tenure included the episode known as the Occupation of the Ruhr ...
to keep paying the
World War I reparations
Following the ratification of article 231 of the Treaty of Versailles at the conclusion of World War I, the Central Powers were made to give war reparations to the Allied Powers. Each of the defeated powers was required to make payments in eit ...
. The recently formed fringe
National Socialist German Workers' Party
The Nazi Party, officially the National Socialist German Workers' Party (german: Nationalsozialistische Deutsche Arbeiterpartei or NSDAP), was a far-right politics, far-right political party in Germany active between 1920 and 1945 that crea ...
(a.k.a. Nazi Party) led by
Adolf Hitler
Adolf Hitler (; 20 April 188930 April 1945) was an Austrian-born German politician who was dictator of Nazi Germany, Germany from 1933 until Death of Adolf Hitler, his death in 1945. Adolf Hitler's rise to power, He rose to power as the le ...
attempts a coup against the Bavarian and German governments in the 1923
Beer Hall Putsch
The Beer Hall Putsch, also known as the Munich Putsch,Dan Moorhouse, ed schoolshistory.org.uk, accessed 2008-05-31.Known in German as the or was a failed coup d'état by Nazi Party ( or NSDAP) leader Adolf Hitler, Erich Ludendorff and oth ...
, which fails, resulting in Hitler being briefly imprisoned for one year in prison where he writes ''
Mein Kampf
(; ''My Struggle'' or ''My Battle'') is a 1925 autobiographical manifesto by Nazi Party leader Adolf Hitler. The work describes the process by which Hitler became antisemitic and outlines his political ideology and future plans for G ...
''.
*
Turkish War of Independence
The Turkish War of Independence "War of Liberation", also known figuratively as ''İstiklâl Harbi'' "Independence War" or ''Millî Mücadele'' "National Struggle" (19 May 1919 – 24 July 1923) was a series of military campaigns waged by th ...
(1919–23).
*
United Kingdom general strike (1926).
Asia
* The
Qajar dynasty
The Qajar dynasty (; fa, دودمان قاجار ', az, Qacarlar ) was an IranianAbbas Amanat, ''The Pivot of the Universe: Nasir Al-Din Shah Qajar and the Iranian Monarchy, 1831–1896'', I. B. Tauris, pp 2–3 royal dynasty of Turkic origin, ...
ended under
Ahmad Shah Qajar
Ahmad Shah Qajar ( fa, احمد شاه قاجار; 21 January 1898 – 21 February 1930) was Shah of Persia ( Iran) from 16 July 1909 to 15 December 1925, and the last ruling member of the Qajar dynasty.
Ahmad Shah was born in Tabriz on 21 Janu ...
as
Reza Shah Pahlavi
,
, spouse = Maryam Savadkoohi Tadj ol-Molouk Ayromlu (queen consort) Turan Amirsoleimani Esmat Dowlatshahi
, issue = Princess Hamdamsaltaneh Princess ShamsMohammad Reza ShahPrincess Ashraf Prince Ali Reza Prince Gholam Reza Pri ...
founds the
Pahlavi Dynasty
The Pahlavi dynasty ( fa, دودمان پهلوی) was the last Iranian royal dynasty, ruling for almost 54 years between 1925 and 1979. The dynasty was founded by Reza Shah Pahlavi, a non-aristocratic Mazanderani soldier in modern times, who ...
, which later became the last monarchy of
Iran
Iran, officially the Islamic Republic of Iran, and also called Persia, is a country located in Western Asia. It is bordered by Iraq and Turkey to the west, by Azerbaijan and Armenia to the northwest, by the Caspian Sea and Turkm ...
.
* The
Northern Expedition
The Northern Expedition was a military campaign launched by the National Revolutionary Army (NRA) of the Kuomintang (KMT), also known as the "Chinese Nationalist Party", against the Beiyang government and other regional warlords in 1926. Th ...
(1926-1928)
* The
Chinese Civil War
The Chinese Civil War was fought between the Kuomintang-led government of the Republic of China and forces of the Chinese Communist Party, continuing intermittently since 1 August 1927 until 7 December 1949 with a Communist victory on main ...
begins (1927–1937).
* In the
Kingdom of Afghanistan
The Kingdom of Afghanistan ( ps, , Dǝ Afġānistān wākmanān; prs, پادشاهی افغانستان, Pādešāhī-ye Afġānistān) was a constitutional monarchy in Central Asia established in 1926 as a successor state to the Emirate of ...
,
Amanullah Khan
Ghazi Amanullah Khan (Pashto and Dari: ; 1 June 1892 – 25 April 1960) was the sovereign of Afghanistan from 1919, first as Emir and after 1926 as King, until his abdication in 1929. After the end of the Third Anglo-Afghan War in August 1919, ...
's reforms cause conflict with conservative factions, resulting in the
Afghan Civil War.
Africa
*
Pan-Africanist
Pan-Africanism is a worldwide movement that aims to encourage and strengthen bonds of solidarity between all Indigenous and diaspora peoples of African ancestry. Based on a common goal dating back to the Atlantic slave trade, the movement exte ...
supporters of
Marcus Garvey
Marcus Mosiah Garvey Sr. (17 August 188710 June 1940) was a Jamaican political activist, publisher, journalist, entrepreneur, and orator. He was the founder and first President-General of the Universal Negro Improvement Association and African ...
's
(UNIA-ACL) are repressed by colonial powers in Africa. Garvey's UNIA-ACL supported the creation of a state led by black people in Africa including
African American
African Americans (also referred to as Black Americans and Afro-Americans) are an Race and ethnicity in the United States, ethnic group consisting of Americans with partial or total ancestry from sub-Saharan Africa. The term "African American ...
s.
Economics

* Economic boom ended by "
Black Tuesday
The Wall Street Crash of 1929, also known as the Great Crash, was a major American stock market crash that occurred in the autumn of 1929. It started in September and ended late in October, when share prices on the New York Stock Exchange colla ...
" (October 29, 1929); the
stock market crash
A stock market crash is a sudden dramatic decline of stock prices across a major cross-section of a stock market, resulting in a significant loss of paper wealth. Crashes are driven by panic selling and underlying economic factors. They often f ...
es, leading to the
Great Depression. The market actually began to drop on Thursday October 24, 1929, and the fall continued until the huge crash on Tuesday October 29, 1929.
* The
New Economic Policy
The New Economic Policy (NEP) () was an economic policy of the Soviet Union proposed by Vladimir Lenin in 1921 as a temporary expedient. Lenin characterized the NEP in 1922 as an economic system that would include "a free market and capitalism ...
is created by the Bolsheviks in the
Russian Soviet Federative Socialist Republic
The Russian Soviet Federative Socialist Republic, Russian SFSR or RSFSR ( rus, Российская Советская Федеративная Социалистическая Республика, Rossíyskaya Sovétskaya Federatívnaya Soci ...
, to be replaced by the
first five-year plan
The first five-year plan (russian: I пятилетний план, ) of the Union of Soviet Socialist Republics (USSR) was a list of economic goals, created by Communist Party General Secretary Joseph Stalin, based on his policy of socialism in ...
in 1928.
* The
Dawes Plan
The Dawes Plan (as proposed by the Dawes Committee, chaired by Charles G. Dawes) was a plan in 1924 that successfully resolved the issue of World War I reparations that Germany had to pay. It ended a crisis in European diplomacy following W ...
, by which U.S. funded German reparations from 1924 to 1928.
* Average annual inflation for the decade was virtually zero but individual years ranged from a high of 3.47% in 1925 to a deflationary −11% in 1921.
Natural disasters
* The
Great Kantō earthquake
Great may refer to: Descriptions or measurements
* Great, a relative measurement in physical space, see Size
* Greatness
Greatness is a concept of a state of superior (hierarchy), superiority affecting a person or wikt:entity, object in a par ...
struck the main Japanese island of
Honshū
, historically called , is the largest and most populous island of Japan. It is located south of Hokkaidō across the Tsugaru Strait, north of Shikoku across the Inland Sea, and northeast of Kyūshū across the Kanmon Straits. The island ...
on 1 September, 1923. The earthquake had a magnitude of 7.9 on the
moment magnitude scale
The moment magnitude scale (MMS; denoted explicitly with or Mw, and generally implied with use of a single M for magnitude) is a measure of an earthquake's magnitude ("size" or strength) based on its seismic moment. It was defined in a 1979 pap ...
.
Assassinations and attempts
Prominent assassinations, targeted killings, and assassination attempts include:
*
Walther Rathenau
Walther Rathenau (29 September 1867 – 24 June 1922) was a German industrialist, writer and liberal politician.
During the First World War of 1914–1918 he was involved in the organization of the German war economy. After the war, Rathenau ...
,
Foreign Minister of Germany
, insignia = Bundesadler Bundesorgane.svg
, insigniasize = 80px
, insigniacaption =
, department = Federal Foreign Office
, image = Annalena Baerbock (cropped, 2).jpg
, alt =
, incumbent = Annalena Baerbock
, incumbentsince = 8 December ...
is assassinated by
Ernst Werner Techow, Erwin Kern, and
Hermann Willibald Fischer, all members of
Organisation Consul
Organisation Consul (O.C.) was an ultra-nationalist and anti-Semitic terrorist organization that operated in the Weimar Republic from 1920 to 1922. It was formed by members of the disbanded Freikorps group Marine Brigade Ehrhardt and was respons ...
on June 24, 1922.
*
Francisco "Pancho" Villa
Francisco "Pancho" Villa (, Orozco rebelled in March 1912, both for Madero's continuing failure to enact land reform and because he felt insufficiently rewarded for his role in bringing the new president to power. At the request of Madero's c ...
, a
Mexican Revolutionary general is assassinated by a group of seven assassins on July 20, 1923.
Science and technology
Technology
*
John Logie Baird
John Logie Baird Fellow of the Royal Society of Edinburgh, FRSE (; 13 August 188814 June 1946) was a Scottish inventor, electrical engineer, and innovator who demonstrated the world's first live working Mechanical television, television system ...
invents the first working
mechanical television
Mechanical television or mechanical scan television is a television system that relies on a mechanical scanning device, such as a rotating disk with holes in it or a rotating mirror drum, to scan the scene and generate the video signal, and a s ...
system (1925). In 1928, he invents and demonstrates the first
color television
Color television or Colour television is a television transmission technology that includes color information for the picture, so the video image can be displayed in color on the television set. It improves on the monochrome or black-and-white ...
.
*
Warner Brothers
Warner Bros. Entertainment Inc. (commonly known as Warner Bros. or abbreviated as WB) is an American Film studio, film and entertainment studio headquartered at the Warner Bros. Studios, Burbank, Warner Bros. Studios complex in Burbank, Califo ...
produces the first movie with a soundtrack ''
Don Juan
Don Juan (), also known as Don Giovanni ( Italian), is a legendary, fictional Spanish libertine who devotes his life to seducing women. Famous versions of the story include a 17th-century play, ''El burlador de Sevilla y convidado de piedra'' ...
'' in 1926, followed by the first Part-Talkie ''
The Jazz Singer
''The Jazz Singer'' is a 1927 American musical drama film directed by Alan Crosland. It is the first feature-length motion picture with both synchronized recorded music score as well as lip-synchronous singing and speech (in several isolate ...
'' in 1927, the first All-Talking movie ''
Lights of New York'' in 1928 and the first All-Color All-Talking movie ''
On with the Show'', 1929.
Silent film
A silent film is a film with no synchronized Sound recording and reproduction, recorded sound (or more generally, no audible dialogue). Though silent films convey narrative and emotion visually, various plot elements (such as a setting or era) ...
s start giving way to
sound film
A sound film is a motion picture with synchronized sound, or sound technologically coupled to image, as opposed to a silent film. The first known public exhibition of projected sound films took place in Paris in 1900, but decades passed befo ...
s. By 1936, the transition phase arguably ends, with ''
Modern Times'' being the last notable silent film.
*
Karl Ferdinand Braun
Karl Ferdinand Braun (; 6 June 1850 – 20 April 1918) was a German electrical engineer, inventor, physicist and Nobel laureate in physics. Braun contributed significantly to the development of radio and television technology: he shared the ...
invents the modern electronic
cathode ray tube in 1897. The CRT became a commercial product in 1922.
*
Record companies
A record label, or record company, is a brand or trademark of music recordings and music videos, or the company that owns it. Sometimes, a record label is also a publishing company that manages such brands and trademarks, coordinates the produ ...
(such as
Victor,
Brunswick and
Columbia
Columbia may refer to:
* Columbia (personification), the historical female national personification of the United States, and a poetic name for America
Places North America Natural features
* Columbia Plateau, a geologic and geographic region in ...
) introduce an electrical recording process on their phonograph records in 1925 (that had been developed by
Western Electric
The Western Electric Company was an American electrical engineering and manufacturing company officially founded in 1869. A wholly owned subsidiary of American Telephone & Telegraph for most of its lifespan, it served as the primary equipment ma ...
), resulting in a more lifelike sound.
* The first
electric razor
An electric shaver (also known as the dry razor, electric razor, or simply shaver) is a razor with an electrically powered rotating or oscillating blade. The electric shaver usually does not require the use of shaving cream, soap, or water. The ...
is patented in 1928 by the American manufacturer Col.
Jacob Schick.
* The first selective
Jukebox
A jukebox is a partially automated music-playing device, usually a coin-operated machine, that will play a patron's selection from self-contained media. The classic jukebox has buttons, with letters and numbers on them, which are used to selec ...
es being introduced in 1927 by the Automated Musical Instrument Company.
*
Harold Stephen Black
Harold Stephen Black (April 14, 1898 – December 11, 1983) was an American electrical engineer, who revolutionized the field of applied electronics by discovering the negative feedback amplifier in 1927. To some, his discovery is considered the ...
revolutionizes the field of applied electronics by inventing the
negative feedback amplifier
A negative-feedback amplifier (or feedback amplifier) is an electronic amplifier that subtracts a fraction of its output from its input, so that negative feedback opposes the original signal.
The applied negative feedback can improve its perform ...
in 1927.
*
Clarence Birdseye
Clarence Birdseye (December 9, 1886 – October 7, 1956) was an American inventor, entrepreneur, and naturalist, considered the founder of the modern frozen food industry. He founded the frozen food company Birds Eye. Among his inventions during h ...
invents a process for
frozen food
Freezing food preserves it from the time it is prepared to the time it is eaten. Since early times, farmers, fishermen, and trappers have preserved grains and produce in unheated buildings during the winter season. Freezing food slows decompositi ...
in 1925.
*
Robert Goddard
Robert Hutchings Goddard (October 5, 1882 – August 10, 1945) was an American engineer, professor, physicist, and inventor who is credited with creating and building the world's first liquid-fueled rocket. Goddard successfully laun ...
makes the first flight of a
liquid-fueled rocket
A liquid-propellant rocket or liquid rocket utilizes a rocket engine that uses liquid propellants. Liquids are desirable because they have a reasonably high density and high specific impulse (''I''sp). This allows the volume of the propellant ta ...
in 1926.
File:Goddard and Rocket.jpg, Robert Goddard
Robert Hutchings Goddard (October 5, 1882 – August 10, 1945) was an American engineer, professor, physicist, and inventor who is credited with creating and building the world's first liquid-fueled rocket. Goddard successfully laun ...
and his rocket, 1926
File:Telefon, Nordisk familjebok.png, 1920s phone
File:Campbell_Thompson.jpg, Thompson submachine gun
The Thompson submachine gun (also known as the "Tommy Gun", "Chicago Typewriter", "Chicago Piano", “Trench Sweeper” or "Trench Broom") is a blowback-operated, air-cooled, magazine-fed selective-fire submachine gun, invented by United S ...
(1921 model)
Science
*
Charles Lindbergh
Charles Augustus Lindbergh (February 4, 1902 – August 26, 1974) was an American aviator, military officer, author, inventor, and activist. On May 20–21, 1927, Lindbergh made the first nonstop flight from New York City to Paris, a distance o ...
becomes the first person to fly solo across the Atlantic Ocean (May 20–21, 1927), nonstop from
New York
New York most commonly refers to:
* New York City, the most populous city in the United States, located in the state of New York
* New York (state), a state in the northeastern United States
New York may also refer to:
Film and television
* '' ...
to
Paris
Paris () is the capital and most populous city of France, with an estimated population of 2,165,423 residents in 2019 in an area of more than 105 km² (41 sq mi), making it the 30th most densely populated city in the world in 2020. ...
.
* Howard Carter opens the innermost shrine of King
Tutankhamun
Tutankhamun (, egy, twt-ꜥnḫ-jmn), Egyptological pronunciation Tutankhamen () (), sometimes referred to as King Tut, was an Egyptian pharaoh who was the last of his royal family to rule during the end of the Eighteenth Dynasty (ruled ...
's tomb near Luxor, Egypt, 1922
* In 1928, Alexander Fleming discovers
penicillin
Penicillins (P, PCN or PEN) are a group of β-lactam antibiotics originally obtained from ''Penicillium'' moulds, principally '' P. chrysogenum'' and '' P. rubens''. Most penicillins in clinical use are synthesised by P. chrysogenum using ...
File:Synthetic_Production_of_Penicillin_TR1468.jpg, In 1928, Alexander Fleming discovers penicillin
File:Tuts Tomb Opened.JPG, Howard Carter opens the innermost shrine of King Tutankhamun's tomb near Luxor, Egypt, 1922
Popular culture
Film
* Oscar winners: ''
Wings
A wing is a type of fin that produces lift while moving through air or some other fluid. Accordingly, wings have streamlined cross-sections that are subject to aerodynamic forces and act as airfoils. A wing's aerodynamic efficiency is exp ...
'' (1927–1928), ''
The Broadway Melody
''The Broadway Melody'', also known as ''The Broadway Melody of 1929'', is a 1929 American pre-Code musical film and the first sound film to win an Academy Award for Best Picture. It was one of the first musicals to feature a Technicolor sequen ...
'' (1928–1929), ''
All Quiet on the Western Front
''All Quiet on the Western Front'' (german: Im Westen nichts Neues, lit=Nothing New in the West) is a novel by Erich Maria Remarque, a German veteran of World War I. The book describes the German soldiers' extreme physical and mental trauma d ...
'' (1929–1930)
* First feature-length
motion picture
A film also called a movie, motion picture, moving picture, picture, photoplay or (slang) flick is a work of visual art that simulates experiences and otherwise communicates ideas, stories, perceptions, feelings, beauty, or atmospher ...
with a
soundtrack
A soundtrack is recorded music accompanying and synchronised to the images of a motion picture, drama, book, television program, radio program, or video game; a commercially released soundtrack album of music as featured in the soundtrack o ...
(''
Don Juan
Don Juan (), also known as Don Giovanni ( Italian), is a legendary, fictional Spanish libertine who devotes his life to seducing women. Famous versions of the story include a 17th-century play, ''El burlador de Sevilla y convidado de piedra'' ...
'') is released in 1926. First part-talkie (''
The Jazz Singer
''The Jazz Singer'' is a 1927 American musical drama film directed by Alan Crosland. It is the first feature-length motion picture with both synchronized recorded music score as well as lip-synchronous singing and speech (in several isolate ...
'') released in 1927, first all-talking feature (''
Lights of New York'') released in 1928 and first all-color all-talking feature (''
On with the Show'') released in 1929.
* The first animated short film by
Walt Disney
Walter Elias Disney (; December 5, 1901December 15, 1966) was an American animator, film producer and entrepreneur. A pioneer of the American animation industry, he introduced several developments in the production of cartoons. As a film p ...
is released in 1928, featuring
Mickey Mouse. Steamboat Willie was the first sound cartoon to attract widespread notice and popularity.
Fashion
The 1920s is the decade in which fashion entered the modern era. It was the decade in which
women first abandoned the more restricting fashions of past years and began to wear more comfortable clothes (such as short skirts or trousers). Men also abandoned highly formal daily attire and even began to wear athletic clothing for the first time. The suits men wear today are still based, for the most part, on those worn in the late 1920s. The 1920s are characterized by two distinct periods of fashion. In the early part of the decade, change was slow, as many were reluctant to adopt new styles. From 1925, the public passionately embraced the styles associated with the Roaring Twenties. These styles continued to characterize fashion until the worldwide depression worsened in 1931.
Music

* "
The Jazz Age"—
jazz
Jazz is a music genre that originated in the African-American communities of New Orleans, Louisiana in the late 19th and early 20th centuries, with its roots in blues and ragtime. Since the 1920s Jazz Age, it has been recognized as a majo ...
and jazz-influenced dance music became widely popular throughout the decade.
*
George Gershwin
George Gershwin (; born Jacob Gershwine; September 26, 1898 – July 11, 1937) was an American composer and pianist whose compositions spanned popular, jazz and classical genres. Among his best-known works are the orchestral compositions ' ...
wrote ''
Rhapsody in Blue
''Rhapsody in Blue'' is a 1924 musical composition written by George Gershwin for solo piano and jazz band, which combines elements of classical music with jazz-influenced effects. Commissioned by bandleader Paul Whiteman, the work premiered ...
'' and
An American in Paris
''An American in Paris'' is a jazz-influenced orchestral piece by American composer George Gershwin first performed in 1928. It was inspired by the time that Gershwin had spent in Paris and evokes the sights and energy of the French capital d ...
.
*
Eddie Lang
Eddie Lang (born Salvatore Massaro, October 25, 1902 – March 26, 1933) was an American musician who is credited as the father of jazz guitar. During the 1920s, he gave the guitar a prominence it previously lacked as a solo instrument, as p ...
and
Joe Venuti
Giuseppe "Joe" Venuti (September 16, 1903 – August 14, 1978) was an American jazz musician and pioneer jazz violinist.
Considered the father of jazz violin, he pioneered the use of string instruments in jazz along with the guitarist Eddie ...
were the first musicians to incorporate the
guitar
The guitar is a fretted musical instrument that typically has six strings. It is usually held flat against the player's body and played by strumming or plucking the strings with the dominant hand, while simultaneously pressing selected string ...
and
violin
The violin, sometimes known as a ''fiddle'', is a wooden chordophone (string instrument) in the violin family. Most violins have a hollow wooden body. It is the smallest and thus highest-pitched instrument (soprano) in the family in regular ...
into jazz.
Radio
* First commercial radio stations in the U.S., 8MK (WWJ) in
Detroit
Detroit ( , ; , ) is the largest city in the U.S. state of Michigan. It is also the largest U.S. city on the United States–Canada border, and the seat of government of Wayne County. The City of Detroit had a population of 639,111 at ...
and (
KDKA 1020 AM) in
Pittsburgh
Pittsburgh ( ) is a city in the Commonwealth (U.S. state), Commonwealth of Pennsylvania, United States, and the county seat of Allegheny County, Pennsylvania, Allegheny County. It is the most populous city in both Allegheny County and Wester ...
,
Pennsylvania
Pennsylvania (; (Pennsylvania Dutch: )), officially the Commonwealth of Pennsylvania, is a state spanning the Mid-Atlantic, Northeastern, Appalachian, and Great Lakes regions of the United States. It borders Delaware to its southeast, Ma ...
, go on the air on August 27, 1920.
* Both stations broadcast the election results between Harding and Cox in early November. The first station to receive a commercial license is
WBZ, then in Springfield MA, in mid-September 1921. While there are only a few radio stations in 1920–21, by 1922 the radio craze is sweeping the country.
* 1922: The
BBC #REDIRECT BBC
Here i going to introduce about the best teacher of my life b BALAJI sir. He is the precious gift that I got befor 2yrs . How has helped and thought all the concept and made my success in the 10th board exam. ...
begins radio broadcasting in the
United Kingdom
The United Kingdom of Great Britain and Northern Ireland, commonly known as the United Kingdom (UK) or Britain, is a country in Europe, off the north-western coast of the European mainland, continental mainland. It comprises England, Scotlan ...
as the ''British Broadcasting Company'', a consortium between radio manufacturers and newspapers. It became a public broadcaster in 1926.
* On August 27, 1920, regular wireless broadcasts for entertainment began in
Argentina
Argentina (), officially the Argentine Republic ( es, link=no, República Argentina), is a country in the southern half of South America. Argentina covers an area of , making it the second-largest country in South America after Brazil, t ...
for the first time, by a Buenos Aires group including
Enrique Telémaco Susini. The station is soon called
Radio Argentina
Radio is the technology of signaling and communicating using radio waves. Radio waves are electromagnetic waves of frequency between 30 hertz (Hz) and 300 gigahertz (GHz). They are generated by an electronic device called a transmi ...
. (See
Radio in Argentina
Radio in Argentina is an important facet of the nation's media and culture. Radio, which was first broadcast in Argentina in 1920, has been widely enjoyed in Argentina since the 1930s. Radio broadcast stations totaled around 150 active AM stations ...
.)
Arts
* Beginning of
surrealist
Surrealism is a cultural movement that developed in Europe in the aftermath of World War I in which artists depicted unnerving, illogical scenes and developed techniques to allow the unconscious mind to express itself. Its aim was, according to ...
movement.
*
Art Deco
Art Deco, short for the French ''Arts Décoratifs'', and sometimes just called Deco, is a style of visual arts, architecture, and product design, that first appeared in France in the 1910s (just before World War I), and flourished in the Unit ...
becomes fashionable.
* The
Group of Seven (artists)
The Group of Seven, once known as the Algonquin School, was a group of Canadian landscape painters from 1920 to 1933, originally consisting of Franklin Carmichael (1890–1945), Lawren Harris (1885–1970), A. Y. Jackson (1882–1974), ...
.
*
Pablo Picasso
Pablo Ruiz Picasso (25 October 1881 – 8 April 1973) was a Spanish painter, sculptor, printmaker, ceramicist and theatre designer who spent most of his adult life in France. One of the most influential artists of the 20th century, he is ...
paints ''
Three Musicians
''Three Musicians'' is the title of two similar collage and oil paintings by Spanish artist Pablo Picasso. They were both completed in 1921 in Fontainebleau near Paris, France, and exemplify the Synthetic Cubist style; the flat planes of colo ...
'' in 1921.
*
René Magritte
René François Ghislain Magritte (; 21 November 1898 – 15 August 1967) was a Belgian surrealist artist known for his depictions of familiar objects in unfamiliar, unexpected contexts, which often provoked questions about the nature and bounda ...
paints ''
The Treachery of Images
''The Treachery of Images'' (french: La Trahison des Images, link=no) is a 1929 painting by Belgian surrealist painter René Magritte. It is also known as ''This Is Not a Pipe'' and ''The Wind and the Song''. Magritte painted it when he was 30 ye ...
''.
*
Albert Gleizes
Albert Gleizes (; 8 December 1881 – 23 June 1953) was a French artist, theoretician, philosopher, a self-proclaimed founder of Cubism and an influence on the School of Paris. Albert Gleizes and Jean Metzinger wrote the first major treatise o ...
paints ''
Woman with Black Glove'', 1920
*
Marcel Duchamp
Henri-Robert-Marcel Duchamp (, , ; 28 July 1887 – 2 October 1968) was a French painter, sculptor, chess player, and writer whose work is associated with Cubism, Dada, and conceptual art. Duchamp is commonly regarded, along with Pablo Picasso ...
completes ''
The Bride Stripped Bare By Her Bachelors, Even (The Large Glass)''.
* The
Museum of Modern Art
The Museum of Modern Art (MoMA) is an art museum located in Midtown Manhattan, New York City, on 53rd Street (Manhattan), 53rd Street between Fifth Avenue, Fifth and Sixth Avenues.
It plays a major role in developing and collecting modern art, ...
opens in Manhattan, November 7, 1929, nine days after the
Wall Street Crash
The Wall Street Crash of 1929, also known as the Great Crash, was a major American stock market crash that occurred in the autumn of 1929. It started in September and ended late in October, when share prices on the New York Stock Exchange colla ...
.
* The first
science fiction
Science fiction (sometimes shortened to Sci-Fi or SF) is a genre of speculative fiction which typically deals with imagination, imaginative and futuristic concepts such as advanced science and technology, space exploration, time travel, Paral ...
comic strip,
Buck Rogers
Buck Rogers is a science fiction adventure hero and feature comic strip created by Philip Francis Nowlan first appearing in daily US newspapers on January 7, 1929, and subsequently appearing in Sunday newspapers, international newspapers, books ...
, begins January 7, 1929. The first
Tarzan
Tarzan (John Clayton II, Viscount Greystoke) is a fictional character, an archetypal feral child raised in the African jungle by the Mangani great apes; he later experiences civilization, only to reject it and return to the wild as a heroic adv ...
comic strip begins on the same date.
Literature
The best-selling books of every year in the United States were as follows:
* 1920: ''The Man of the Forest'' by
Zane Grey
Pearl Zane Grey (January 31, 1872 – October 23, 1939) was an American author and dentist. He is known for his popular adventure novels and stories associated with the Western genre in literature and the arts; he idealized the American fronti ...
* 1921: ''
Main Street'' by
Sinclair Lewis
Harry Sinclair Lewis (February 7, 1885 – January 10, 1951) was an American writer and playwright. In 1930, he became the first writer from the United States (and the first from the Americas) to receive the Nobel Prize in Literature, which wa ...
* 1922: ''
If Winter Comes
''If Winter Comes'' is a 1947 drama film released by MGM. The movie was directed by Victor Saville and based on the 1921 novel by A.S.M. Hutchinson. The film tells the story of an English textbook writer who takes in a pregnant girl. The novel ...
'' by
A. S. M. Hutchinson
* 1923: ''
Black Oxen'' by
Gertrude Atherton
Gertrude Franklin Horn Atherton (October 30, 1857 – June 14, 1948) was an American author. Paterson, Isabel, "Gertrude Atherton: A Personality"
The Bookman'', New York, February 1924, (pgs. 632-636) Many of her novels are set in her home sta ...
* 1924'':
So Big'' by
Edna Ferber
Edna Ferber (August 15, 1885 – April 16, 1968) was an American novelist, short story writer and playwright. Her novels include the Pulitzer Prize-winning '' So Big'' (1924), '' Show Boat'' (1926; made into the celebrated 1927 musical), '' C ...
* 1925: ''Soundings'' by
A. Hamilton Gibbs
* 1926: ''
The Private Life of Helen of Troy
''The Private Life of Helen of Troy'' is a 1927 American silent film about Helen of Troy based on the 1925 novel of the same name by John Erskine, and adapted to screen by Gerald Duffy. The film was directed by Alexander Korda and starred Mar ...
'' by
John Erskine
* 1927: ''
Elmer Gantry
''Elmer Gantry'' is a satirical novel written by Sinclair Lewis in 1926 that presents aspects of the religious activity of America in fundamentalist and evangelistic circles and the attitudes of the 1920s public toward it. The novel's protagonis ...
'' by
Sinclair Lewis
Harry Sinclair Lewis (February 7, 1885 – January 10, 1951) was an American writer and playwright. In 1930, he became the first writer from the United States (and the first from the Americas) to receive the Nobel Prize in Literature, which wa ...
* 1928: ''
The Bridge of San Luis Rey
''The Bridge of San Luis Rey'' is American author Thornton Wilder's second novel. It was first published in 1927 to worldwide acclaim. The novel won the Pulitzer Prize in 1928, and was the best-selling work of fiction that year.
Premise
''The B ...
'' by
Thornton Wilder
Thornton Niven Wilder (April 17, 1897 – December 7, 1975) was an American playwright and novelist. He won three Pulitzer Prizes — for the novel ''The Bridge of San Luis Rey'' and for the plays '' Our Town'' and '' The Skin of Our Teeth'' — ...
* 1929: ''
All Quiet on the Western Front
''All Quiet on the Western Front'' (german: Im Westen nichts Neues, lit=Nothing New in the West) is a novel by Erich Maria Remarque, a German veteran of World War I. The book describes the German soldiers' extreme physical and mental trauma d ...
'' by
Erich Maria Remarque
Erich Maria Remarque (, ; born Erich Paul Remark; 22 June 1898 – 25 September 1970) was a German-born novelist. His landmark novel '' All Quiet on the Western Front'' (1928), based on his experience in the Imperial German Army during Wor ...
Architecture
*
Walter Gropius
Walter Adolph Georg Gropius (18 May 1883 – 5 July 1969) was a German-American architect and founder of the Bauhaus School, who, along with Alvar Aalto, Ludwig Mies van der Rohe, Le Corbusier and Frank Lloyd Wright, is widely regarded as one ...
builds the
Bauhaus
The Staatliches Bauhaus (), commonly known as the Bauhaus (), was a German art school operational from 1919 to 1933 that combined crafts and the fine arts.Oxford Dictionary of Art and Artists (Oxford: Oxford University Press, 4th edn., 2 ...
in
Dessau
Dessau is a town and former municipality in Germany at the confluence of the rivers Mulde and Elbe, in the '' Bundesland'' (Federal State) of Saxony-Anhalt. Since 1 July 2007, it has been part of the newly created municipality of Dessau-Ro� ...
*
Le Corbusier
Charles-Édouard Jeanneret (6 October 188727 August 1965), known as Le Corbusier ( , , ), was a Swiss-French architect, designer, painter, urban planner, writer, and one of the pioneers of what is now regarded as modern architecture. He was ...
published the book
Toward an Architecture
''Vers une architecture'', recently translated into English as ''Toward an Architecture'' but commonly known as ''Towards a New Architecture'' after the 1927 translation by Frederick Etchells, is a collection of essays written by Le Corbusier (Ch ...
serving as the
manifesto
A manifesto is a published declaration of the intentions, motives, or views of the issuer, be it an individual, group, political party or government. A manifesto usually accepts a previously published opinion or public consensus or promotes a ...
for a generation of architects.
Sports highlights
1920
* January 24:
Grand Prix de Paris
The Grand Prix de Paris is a Group 1 flat horse race in France open to three-year-old thoroughbred colts and fillies. It is run at Longchamp over a distance of 2,400 metres (about 1½ miles), and ...
switches its name to
Prix de l'Arc de Triomphe
The Prix de l'Arc de Triomphe is a Group races, Group 1 Flat racing, flat Horse racing, horse race in France open to thoroughbreds aged three years or older. It is run at Longchamp Racec ...
(
horse race
Horse racing is an equestrian performance sport, typically involving two or more horses ridden by jockeys (or sometimes driven without riders) over a set distance for competition. It is one of the most ancient of all sports, as its basic p ...
)
* February 13:
Negro National League created (baseball)
* April:
Babe Ruth
George Herman "Babe" Ruth Jr. (February 6, 1895 – August 16, 1948) was an American professional baseball player whose career in Major League Baseball (MLB) spanned 22 seasons, from 1914 through 1935. Nicknamed "the Bambino" and "the Su ...
began playing for the
New York Yankees
The New York Yankees are an American professional baseball team based in the New York City borough of the Bronx. The Yankees compete in Major League Baseball (MLB) as a member club of the American League (AL) East division. They are one o ...
* April–September:
Summer Olympics
The Summer Olympic Games (french: link=no, Jeux olympiques d'été), also known as the Games of the Olympiad, and often referred to as the Summer Olympics, is a major international multi-sport event normally held once every four years. The ina ...
held in
Antwerp.
* August 17:
Ray Chapman
Raymond Johnson Chapman (January 15, 1891 – August 17, 1920) was an American baseball player. He spent his entire career as a shortstop for the Cleveland Indians.
Chapman was hit in the head by a pitch thrown by pitcher Carl Mays and died 1 ...
from the
Cleveland Indians
The Cleveland Guardians are an American professional baseball team based in Cleveland. The Guardians compete in Major League Baseball (MLB) as a member club of the American League (AL) Central division. Since , they have played at Progressive ...
is killed by
Carl Mays
Carl William Mays (November 12, 1891 – April 4, 1971) was an American baseball pitcher who played 15 seasons in Major League Baseball from 1915 to 1929. During his career, he won over 200 games, 27 in 1921 alone, and was a member of four Wor ...
' pitch (baseball)
* August 20:
National Football League
The National Football League (NFL) is a professional American football league that consists of 32 teams, divided equally between the American Football Conference (AFC) and the National Football Conference (NFC). The NFL is one of the ma ...
founded
*
Kenesaw Mountain Landis
Kenesaw Mountain Landis (; November 20, 1866 – November 25, 1944) was an American jurist who served as a United States federal judge from 1905 to 1922 and the first Commissioner of Baseball from 1920 until his death. He is remembered for his h ...
is named the first
Commissioner of Baseball
The Commissioner of Baseball is the chief executive officer of Major League Baseball (MLB) and the associated Minor League Baseball (MiLB) – a constellation of leagues and clubs known as "organized baseball". Under the direction of the Commiss ...
.
1921
* March 26: Schooner
Bluenose
''Bluenose'' was a fishing and racing gaff rig schooner built in 1921 in Lunenburg, Nova Scotia, Canada. A celebrated racing ship and fishing vessel, ''Bluenose'' under the command of Angus Walters, became a provincial icon for Nova Scotia an ...
launched
1923
* May 26: the
24 hours of Le Mans
The 24 Hours of Le Mans (french: link=no, 24 Heures du Mans) is an endurance-focused sports car race held annually near the town of Le Mans, France. It is the world's oldest active endurance racing event. Unlike fixed-distance races whose w ...
conducts their first sports car race
* October: The New York Yankees win the
1923 World Series
The 1923 World Series was the championship series in Major League Baseball for the 1923 season. The 20th edition of the World Series, it matched the American League champion New York Yankees against the National League champion New York Giants. ...
, the first title for the team.
1924
* January–February:
First Winter Olympic Games takes place in
Chamonix
Chamonix-Mont-Blanc ( frp, Chamôni), more commonly known as Chamonix, is a commune in the Haute-Savoie department in the Auvergne-Rhône-Alpes region of southeastern France. It was the site of the first Winter Olympics in 1924. In 2019, it ha ...
France.
* May–July:
Summer Olympics
The Summer Olympic Games (french: link=no, Jeux olympiques d'été), also known as the Games of the Olympiad, and often referred to as the Summer Olympics, is a major international multi-sport event normally held once every four years. The ina ...
held in Paris, France.
* July 10–13:
Paavo Nurmi
Paavo Johannes Nurmi (; 13 June 1897 – 2 October 1973) was a Finnish middle-distance and long-distance runner. He was called the " Flying Finn" or the "Phantom Finn", as he dominated distance running in the 1920s. Nurmi set 22 official worl ...
wins five gold medals in Summer Olympics (
track and field
Track and field is a sport that includes athletic contests based on running, jumping, and throwing skills. The name is derived from where the sport takes place, a running track and a grass field for the throwing and some of the jumping eve ...
)
1925
* May 28:
French Open
The French Open (french: Internationaux de France de tennis), also known as Roland-Garros (), is a major tennis tournament held over two weeks at the Stade Roland Garros in Paris, France, beginning in late May each year. The tournament and v ...
invites non-French
tennis
Tennis is a racket sport that is played either individually against a single opponent ( singles) or between two teams of two players each ( doubles). Each player uses a tennis racket that is strung with cord to strike a hollow rubber ball c ...
athletes for the first time
* Germany and Belgium in first
handball international tournament.
1926
* August 6:
Gertrude Ederle
Gertrude Caroline Ederle (October 23, 1906 – November 30, 2003) was an American competition swimmer, Olympic champion, and world record-holder in five events. On August 6, 1926, she became the first woman to swim across the English Channel. ...
swims
English Channel
The English Channel, "The Sleeve"; nrf, la Maunche, "The Sleeve" ( Cotentinais) or (Jèrriais), ( Guernésiais), "The Channel"; br, Mor Breizh, "Sea of Brittany"; cy, Môr Udd, "Lord's Sea"; kw, Mor Bretannek, "British Sea"; nl, Het Kan ...
and is first woman to do so.
* September 23:
Gene Tunney
James Joseph Tunney (May 25, 1897 – November 7, 1978) was an American professional boxer who competed from 1915 to 1928. He held the world heavyweight title from 1926 to 1928, and the American light heavyweight title twice between 1922 and 192 ...
wins
Jack Dempsey
William Harrison "Jack" Dempsey (June 24, 1895 – May 31, 1983), nicknamed Kid Blackie and The Manassa Mauler, was an American professional boxer who competed from 1914 to 1927, and reigned as the world heavyweight champion from 1919 to 1926 ...
's world heavyweight
boxing
Boxing (also known as "Western boxing" or "pugilism") is a combat sport in which two people, usually wearing protective gloves and other protective equipment such as hand wraps and mouthguards, throw punches at each other for a predetermine ...
title.
1927
* May 23:
Warwickshire
Warwickshire (; abbreviated Warks) is a county in the West Midlands region of England. The county town is Warwick, and the largest town is Nuneaton. The county is famous for being the birthplace of William Shakespeare at Stratford-upon-Avon an ...
end
Yorkshire
Yorkshire ( ; abbreviated Yorks), formally known as the County of York, is a historic county in northern England and by far the largest in the United Kingdom. Because of its large area in comparison with other English counties, functions have ...
's 71-match unbeaten sequence in the
County Championship
The County Championship (referred to as the LV= Insurance County Championship for sponsorship reasons) is the domestic first-class cricket competition in England and Wales and is organised by the England and Wales Cricket Board (ECB). It b ...
– the longest unbeaten sequence in that competition.
* June 3: First
Ryder Cup
The Ryder Cup is a biennial men's golf competition between teams from Europe and the United States. The competition is contested every two years with the venue alternating between courses in the United States and Europe. The Ryder Cup is named af ...
golf tournaments are held in
1928
* February:
Winter Olympics
The Winter Olympic Games (french: link=no, Jeux olympiques d'hiver) is a major international multi-sport event held once every four years for sports practiced on snow and ice. The first Winter Olympic Games, the 1924 Winter Olympics, were h ...
held in St. Moritz Switzerland.
* May–August: Women's Olympics takes place for first time, in
1928 Summer Olympics
The 1928 Summer Olympics ( nl, Olympische Zomerspelen 1928), officially known as the Games of the IX Olympiad ( nl, Spelen van de IXe Olympiade) and commonly known as Amsterdam 1928, was an international multi-sport event that was celebrated from ...
held in Amsterdam.
*
William Ralph "Dixie" Dean wins the Football League, scores 60 goals in 39 matches for
Everton F.C.
Everton Football Club () is an English professional association football club based in Liverpool that competes in the Premier League, the top tier of English football. The club was a founder member of the Football League in 1888 and has comp ...
(
English Football
Association football is the most popular sport in England, where the first modern set of rules for the code were established in 1863, which were a major influence on the development of the modern Laws of the Game (association football), Laws of ...
)
1929
* The English team led by
Wally Hammond
Walter Reginald Hammond (19 June 1903 – 1 July 1965) was an English first-class cricketer who played for Gloucestershire in a career that lasted from 1920 to 1951. Beginning as a professional, he later became an amateur and was appointed ca ...
defeats Australia in
The Ashes
The Ashes is a Test cricket series played between England and Australia. The term originated in a satirical obituary published in a British newspaper, '' The Sporting Times'', immediately after Australia's 1882 victory at The Oval, its first ...
series (
Test Cricket
Test cricket is a form of first-class cricket played at international level between teams representing full member countries of the International Cricket Council (ICC). A match consists of four innings (two per team) and is scheduled to last f ...
)
Miscellaneous trends
* Youth culture of
The Lost Generation;
flapper
Flappers were a subculture of young Western women in the 1920s who wore short skirts (knee height was considered short during that period), bobbed their hair, listened to jazz, and flaunted their disdain for what was then considered accep ...
s, the
Charleston
Charleston most commonly refers to:
* Charleston, South Carolina
* Charleston, West Virginia, the state capital
* Charleston (dance)
Charleston may also refer to:
Places Australia
* Charleston, South Australia
Canada
* Charleston, Newfoun ...
, and the
bob cut
A bob cut, also known as a bob, is a short to medium length haircut, in which the hair is typically cut straight around the head at approximately jaw level, but no longer than shoulder-length, often with fringe or bangs at the front. The standa ...
haircut
A hairstyle, hairdo, haircut or coiffure refers to the styling of hair, usually on the human scalp. Sometimes, this could also mean an editing of facial or body hair. The fashioning of hair can be considered an aspect of personal groomi ...
.
* Fads such as
marathon dancing,
mah-jong
Mahjong or mah-jongg (English pronunciation: ) is a tile-based game that was developed in the 19th century in China and has spread throughout the world since the early 20th century. It is commonly played by four players (with some three-pla ...
,
crossword puzzle
A crossword is a word puzzle that usually takes the form of a square or a rectangular grid of white- and black-shaded squares. The goal is to fill the white squares with letters, forming words or phrases, by solving clues which lead to the a ...
s and
pole-sitting
Pole sitting is the practice of sitting on top of a pole (such as a flagpole) for extended lengths of time, generally used as a test of endurance. A small platform is typically placed at the top of the pole for the sitter. Led by the stunt actor ...
are popular.
* The height of the
clip joint
A clip joint or fleshpot is an establishment, usually a strip club or night club (often claiming to offer adult entertainment or bottle service) in which customers are tricked into paying far above market prices for low-grade goods or services—or ...
.
* The
Harlem Renaissance centered in a thriving
African American
African Americans (also referred to as Black Americans and Afro-Americans) are an Race and ethnicity in the United States, ethnic group consisting of Americans with partial or total ancestry from sub-Saharan Africa. The term "African American ...
community of
Harlem
Harlem is a neighborhood in Upper Manhattan, New York City. It is bounded roughly by the Hudson River on the west; the Harlem River and 155th Street on the north; Fifth Avenue on the east; and Central Park North on the south. The greater Harl ...
, New York City.
* Since the 1920s scholars have methodically dug into the layers of history that lie buried at thousands of sites across China.
* The tomb of
Tutankhamun
Tutankhamun (, egy, twt-ꜥnḫ-jmn), Egyptological pronunciation Tutankhamen () (), sometimes referred to as King Tut, was an Egyptian pharaoh who was the last of his royal family to rule during the end of the Eighteenth Dynasty (ruled ...
is discovered intact by
Howard Carter
Howard Carter (9 May 18742 March 1939) was a British archaeologist and Egyptologist who discovered the intact tomb of the 18th Dynasty Pharaoh Tutankhamun in November 1922, the best-preserved pharaonic tomb ever found in the Valley of the ...
(1922). This begins a second revival of
Egyptomania
Egyptomania refers to a period of renewed interest in the culture of ancient Egypt sparked by Napoleon's Egyptian Campaign in the 19th century. Napoleon was accompanied by many scientists and scholars during this Campaign, which led to a larg ...
.
*
Twiglets
Twiglets are a wheat-based snack marketed in the United Kingdom that have a "distinctive knobbly shape" similar to that of twigs and a speckled-brown-over-pale-colour appearance. The taste of Twiglets, which has been compared to that of Marmite, ...
are invented in December 1929 by Frenchman
Rondalin Zwadoodie, and sold by
Peek Freans
Peek Freans is the name of a former biscuit making company based in Bermondsey, London, which is now a global brand of biscuits and related confectionery owned by various food businesses. Owned but not marketed in the UK, Europe and USA by De Be ...
.
* Smoking in America was deemed socially acceptable, with the first magazine advertising women smoking for the first time in 1927.
* Newly improved latex condoms resulted in soaring condom sales in the United States.
People
Science

*
Albert Einstein
Albert Einstein ( ; ; 14 March 1879 – 18 April 1955) was a German-born theoretical physicist, widely acknowledged to be one of the greatest and most influential physicists of all time. Einstein is best known for developing the theor ...
*
Sigmund Freud
Sigmund Freud ( , ; born Sigismund Schlomo Freud; 6 May 1856 – 23 September 1939) was an Austrian neurologist and the founder of psychoanalysis, a clinical method for evaluating and treating psychopathology, pathologies explained as originatin ...
*
Alexander Fleming
*
Frederick Banting
Sir Frederick Grant Banting (November 14, 1891 – February 21, 1941) was a Canadian medical scientist, physician, painter, and Nobel laureate noted as the co-discoverer of insulin and its therapeutic potential.
In 1923, Banting and J ...
*
Niels Bohr
Niels Henrik David Bohr (; 7 October 1885 – 18 November 1962) was a Danish physicist who made foundational contributions to understanding atomic structure and quantum theory, for which he received the Nobel Prize in Physics in 1922 ...
*
Werner Heisenberg
Werner Karl Heisenberg () (5 December 1901 – 1 February 1976) was a German theoretical physicist and one of the main pioneers of the theory of quantum mechanics. He published his work in 1925 in a breakthrough paper. In the subsequent series ...
*
Howard Carter
Howard Carter (9 May 18742 March 1939) was a British archaeologist and Egyptologist who discovered the intact tomb of the 18th Dynasty Pharaoh Tutankhamun in November 1922, the best-preserved pharaonic tomb ever found in the Valley of the ...
*
Georges Lemaître
Georges Henri Joseph Édouard Lemaître ( ; ; 17 July 1894 – 20 June 1966) was a Belgian Catholic priest, theoretical physicist, mathematician, astronomer, and professor of physics at the Catholic University of Louvain. He was the first to th ...
*
Edwin Powell Hubble
Edwin Powell Hubble (November 20, 1889 – September 28, 1953) was an American astronomer. He played a crucial role in establishing the fields of extragalactic astronomy and observational cosmology.
Hubble proved that many objects previous ...
*
Garrett Morgan
Garrett Augustus Morgan, Sr. (March 4, 1877 – July 27, 1963) was an American inventor, businessman, and community leader. His most notable inventions were a three-position traffic signal and a smoke hood (a predecessor to the gas mask) notably ...
Literature
*
Alexander Belyaev
Alexander Romanovich Belyaev (russian: Алекса́ндр Рома́нович Беля́ев, ; – 6 January 1942) was a Soviet Russian writer of science fiction. His works from the 1920s and 1930s made him a highly regarded figure in Russi ...
*
Bertolt Brecht
Eugen Berthold Friedrich Brecht (10 February 1898 – 14 August 1956), known professionally as Bertolt Brecht, was a German theatre practitioner, playwright, and poet. Coming of age during the Weimar Republic, he had his first successes as a ...
*
Countee Cullen
Countee Cullen (born Countee LeRoy Porter; May 30, 1903 – January 9, 1946) was an American poet, novelist, children's writer, and playwright, particularly well known during the Harlem Renaissance.
Early life
Childhood
Countee LeRoy Porter ...
*
Nancy Cunard
Nancy Clara Cunard (10 March 1896 – 17 March 1965) was a British writer, heiress and political activist. She was born into the British upper class, and devoted much of her life to fighting racism and fascism. She became a muse to some of the ...
*
T. S. Eliot
Thomas Stearns Eliot (26 September 18884 January 1965) was a poet, essayist, publisher, playwright, literary critic and editor.Bush, Ronald. "T. S. Eliot's Life and Career", in John A Garraty and Mark C. Carnes (eds), ''American National Biogr ...
*
William Faulkner
William Cuthbert Faulkner (; September 25, 1897 – July 6, 1962) was an American writer known for his novels and short stories set in the fictional Yoknapatawpha County, based on Lafayette County, Mississippi, where Faulkner spent most ...
*
F. Scott Fitzgerald
Francis Scott Key Fitzgerald (September 24, 1896 – December 21, 1940) was an American novelist, essayist, and short story writer. He is best known for his novels depicting the flamboyance and excess of the Jazz Age—a term he popularize ...
*
Zelda Fitzgerald
Zelda Fitzgerald (; July 24, 1900 – March 10, 1948) was an American novelist, painter, dancer, and socialite.
Born in Montgomery, Alabama, she was noted for her beauty and high spirits, and was dubbed by her husband F. Scott Fitzgerald a ...
*
Ernest Hemingway
Ernest Miller Hemingway (July 21, 1899 – July 2, 1961) was an American novelist, short-story writer, and journalist. His economical and understated style—which he termed the iceberg theory—had a strong influence on 20th-century fic ...
*
Langston Hughes
James Mercer Langston Hughes (February 1, 1901 – May 22, 1967) was an American poet, social activist, novelist, playwright, and columnist from Joplin, Missouri. One of the earliest innovators of the literary art form called jazz poetry, H ...
*
Zora Neale Hurston
Zora Neale Hurston (January 7, 1891 – January 28, 1960) was an American author, anthropologist, and filmmaker. She portrayed racial struggles in the early-1900s American South and published research on hoodoo. The most popular of her four ...
*
James Weldon Johnson
James Weldon Johnson (June 17, 1871June 26, 1938) was an American writer and civil rights activist. He was married to civil rights activist Grace Nail Johnson. Johnson was a leader of the National Association for the Advancement of Colored Peopl ...
*
Erich Kastner
*
Sinclair Lewis
Harry Sinclair Lewis (February 7, 1885 – January 10, 1951) was an American writer and playwright. In 1930, he became the first writer from the United States (and the first from the Americas) to receive the Nobel Prize in Literature, which wa ...
*
Alain Locke
Alain LeRoy Locke (September 13, 1885 – June 9, 1954) was an American writer, philosopher, educator, and patron of the arts. Distinguished in 1907 as the first African-American Rhodes Scholar, Locke became known as the philosophical architect ...
* Thomas Mann
* Claude McKay
* Carl Sandburg
* William Butler Yeats
Entertainers

* Charlie Chaplin
* Buster Keaton
* Roscoe Arbuckle, Roscoe "Fatty" Arbuckle
* Mary Astor
* Josephine Baker
* Tallulah Bankhead
* Ethel Barrymore
* John Barrymore
* Lionel Barrymore
* Clara Bow
* Louise Brooks
* Lon Chaney, Sr., Lon Chaney
* Katharine Cornell
* Joan Crawford
* Bebe Daniels
* Betty Bronson
* Mary Brian
* Marion Davies
* Douglas Fairbanks
* Eva Le Gallienne
* Greta Garbo
* Janet Gaynor
* John Gilbert (actor), John Gilbert
* Dorothy Gish
* Lillian Gish
* William Haines
* William S. Hart
* Harry Houdini
* Emil Jannings
* Al Jolson
* Harold Lloyd
* Tom Mix
* Colleen Moore
* Mae Murray
* Pola Negri
* Ramón Novarro
* Will Rogers
* Mary Pickford
* Norma Shearer
* Gloria Swanson
* Chief Tahachee
* Norma Talmadge
* Rudolph Valentino
* Anna May Wong
Musicians

*
George Gershwin
George Gershwin (; born Jacob Gershwine; September 26, 1898 – July 11, 1937) was an American composer and pianist whose compositions spanned popular, jazz and classical genres. Among his best-known works are the orchestral compositions ' ...
* Al Jolson
* Louis Armstrong
* Richard Tauber
* Irving Berlin
* Eddie Cantor
* Duke Ellington
* Kelly Harrell
* Jimmie Rodgers (country singer), Jimmy Rodgers
* Jelly Roll Morton
*
Cole Porter
Cole Albert Porter (June 9, 1891 – October 15, 1964) was an American composer and songwriter. Many of his songs became standards noted for their witty, urbane lyrics, and many of his scores found success on Broadway and in film.
Born to ...
* Rudy Vallée
* Paul Whiteman
* Fats Waller
* Fletcher Henderson
*
Eddie Lang
Eddie Lang (born Salvatore Massaro, October 25, 1902 – March 26, 1933) was an American musician who is credited as the father of jazz guitar. During the 1920s, he gave the guitar a prominence it previously lacked as a solo instrument, as p ...
*
Joe Venuti
Giuseppe "Joe" Venuti (September 16, 1903 – August 14, 1978) was an American jazz musician and pioneer jazz violinist.
Considered the father of jazz violin, he pioneered the use of string instruments in jazz along with the guitarist Eddie ...
* Bix Beiderbecke
* Art Tatum
* Béla Bartók
* Lonnie Johnson (musician), Lonnie Johnson
* Bessie Smith
* Count Basie
* King Oliver
* Sidney Bechet
* Blind Willie Johnson
Film makers

* Harry Beaumont
* Busby Berkeley
* Frank Borzage
* Charles Chaplin
* Alan Crosland
* Cecil B. DeMille
* William C. DeMille
* Sergei Eisenstein
* Victor Fleming
* John Ford
* D. W. Griffith
* Alfred Hitchcock
* Rex Ingram (director), Rex Ingram
* Buster Keaton
* Fritz Lang
* Ernst Lubitsch
* Lewis Milestone
* Erich von Stroheim
* King Vidor
* Robert Wiene
Artists
* Hans Arp
* Max Beckmann
* Georges Braque
* André Breton
*
Patrick Henry Bruce
Artist Patrick Henry Bruce (3rd from left) & friends/associates in front of the entrance to a 300px
Patrick Henry Bruce (March 25, 1881 – November 12, 1936) was an American cubist painter.
Biography
A descendant of Patrick Henry, Bruce wa ...
* Alexander Calder
* Carlo Carrà
* Marc Chagall
* Giorgio de Chirico
* Salvador Dalí
* Stuart Davis (painter), Stuart Davis
* Charles Demuth
* Otto Dix
* Theo van Doesburg
* Arthur Dove
*
Marcel Duchamp
Henri-Robert-Marcel Duchamp (, , ; 28 July 1887 – 2 October 1968) was a French painter, sculptor, chess player, and writer whose work is associated with Cubism, Dada, and conceptual art. Duchamp is commonly regarded, along with Pablo Picasso ...
* Max Ernst
* Alberto Giacometti
* Julio González (sculptor), Julio Gonzalez
* Juan Gris
* George Grosz
* Marsden Hartley
* Wassily Kandinsky
* Paul Klee
* Gaston Lachaise
* Fernand Léger
* Tamara de Lempicka
*
René Magritte
René François Ghislain Magritte (; 21 November 1898 – 15 August 1967) was a Belgian surrealist artist known for his depictions of familiar objects in unfamiliar, unexpected contexts, which often provoked questions about the nature and bounda ...
* Georges Malkine
* John Marin
* André Masson
* Henri Matisse
* Joan Miró
* Piet Mondrian
* Henry Moore
* Max Morise
* Georgia O'Keeffe
* Francis Picabia
*
Pablo Picasso
Pablo Ruiz Picasso (25 October 1881 – 8 April 1973) was a Spanish painter, sculptor, printmaker, ceramicist and theatre designer who spent most of his adult life in France. One of the most influential artists of the 20th century, he is ...
* Man Ray
* Morgan Russell
* Kurt Schwitters
* Charles Sheeler
* Chaïm Soutine
* Yves Tanguy
* Stanton Macdonald-Wright
Architects

* Marcel Breuer
*
Le Corbusier
Charles-Édouard Jeanneret (6 October 188727 August 1965), known as Le Corbusier ( , , ), was a Swiss-French architect, designer, painter, urban planner, writer, and one of the pioneers of what is now regarded as modern architecture. He was ...
*
Walter Gropius
Walter Adolph Georg Gropius (18 May 1883 – 5 July 1969) was a German-American architect and founder of the Bauhaus School, who, along with Alvar Aalto, Ludwig Mies van der Rohe, Le Corbusier and Frank Lloyd Wright, is widely regarded as one ...
* Ludwig Mies van der Rohe
* Frank Lloyd Wright
Sports figures

* Grover Cleveland Alexander (American
baseball
Baseball is a bat-and-ball sport played between two teams of nine players each, taking turns batting and fielding. The game occurs over the course of several plays, with each play generally beginning when a player on the fielding ...
player)
* Ty Cobb, (American
baseball
Baseball is a bat-and-ball sport played between two teams of nine players each, taking turns batting and fielding. The game occurs over the course of several plays, with each play generally beginning when a player on the fielding ...
player)
* Eddie Collins, (American
baseball
Baseball is a bat-and-ball sport played between two teams of nine players each, taking turns batting and fielding. The game occurs over the course of several plays, with each play generally beginning when a player on the fielding ...
player)
* Walter Johnson (American
baseball
Baseball is a bat-and-ball sport played between two teams of nine players each, taking turns batting and fielding. The game occurs over the course of several plays, with each play generally beginning when a player on the fielding ...
player)
* Rogers Hornsby (American
baseball
Baseball is a bat-and-ball sport played between two teams of nine players each, taking turns batting and fielding. The game occurs over the course of several plays, with each play generally beginning when a player on the fielding ...
player)
*
Babe Ruth
George Herman "Babe" Ruth Jr. (February 6, 1895 – August 16, 1948) was an American professional baseball player whose career in Major League Baseball (MLB) spanned 22 seasons, from 1914 through 1935. Nicknamed "the Bambino" and "the Su ...
(American
baseball
Baseball is a bat-and-ball sport played between two teams of nine players each, taking turns batting and fielding. The game occurs over the course of several plays, with each play generally beginning when a player on the fielding ...
player)
* Tris Speaker, (American
baseball
Baseball is a bat-and-ball sport played between two teams of nine players each, taking turns batting and fielding. The game occurs over the course of several plays, with each play generally beginning when a player on the fielding ...
player)
* Lou Gehrig (American
baseball
Baseball is a bat-and-ball sport played between two teams of nine players each, taking turns batting and fielding. The game occurs over the course of several plays, with each play generally beginning when a player on the fielding ...
player)
*
Kenesaw Mountain Landis
Kenesaw Mountain Landis (; November 20, 1866 – November 25, 1944) was an American jurist who served as a United States federal judge from 1905 to 1922 and the first Commissioner of Baseball from 1920 until his death. He is remembered for his h ...
(American Baseball Commissioner)
*
Gene Tunney
James Joseph Tunney (May 25, 1897 – November 7, 1978) was an American professional boxer who competed from 1915 to 1928. He held the world heavyweight title from 1926 to 1928, and the American light heavyweight title twice between 1922 and 192 ...
(American boxer)
*
Jack Dempsey
William Harrison "Jack" Dempsey (June 24, 1895 – May 31, 1983), nicknamed Kid Blackie and The Manassa Mauler, was an American professional boxer who competed from 1914 to 1927, and reigned as the world heavyweight champion from 1919 to 1926 ...
(American boxer)
* Francisco Guilledo (Filipino boxer)
* Warwick Armstrong (Australian cricket captain)
* Wilfred Rhodes (Yorkshire and England cricketer)
* Jack Hobbs (Surrey and England cricketer)
* Herbert Sutcliffe (Yorkshire and England cricketer)
* Maurice Tate (Sussex and England cricketer)
* Jack Gregory (cricketer), Jack Gregory, Australian cricketer
* Bert Oldfield, Australian cricketer
* Herbie Taylor, South African cricketer
* Alex Grove (American bowler)
* Red Grange (American football player)
* Knute Rockne (American football player and coach)
* Alex James (footballer), Alex James (Arsenal and Scotland soccer player)
* Gordon Coventry (Australian rules football player)
* Walter Hagen (American golfer)
* Bobby Jones (golfer), Bobby Jones (American golfer)
*
Paavo Nurmi
Paavo Johannes Nurmi (; 13 June 1897 – 2 October 1973) was a Finnish middle-distance and long-distance runner. He was called the " Flying Finn" or the "Phantom Finn", as he dominated distance running in the 1920s. Nurmi set 22 official worl ...
(Finnish runner)
* Bobbie Rosenfeld, Fanny "Bobbie" Rosenfeld (Canadian athlete)
* Earl Sande (jockey)
*
Gertrude Ederle
Gertrude Caroline Ederle (October 23, 1906 – November 30, 2003) was an American competition swimmer, Olympic champion, and world record-holder in five events. On August 6, 1926, she became the first woman to swim across the English Channel. ...
(swimming)
* Johnny Weissmuller (swimming)
* Suzanne Lenglen (French
tennis
Tennis is a racket sport that is played either individually against a single opponent ( singles) or between two teams of two players each ( doubles). Each player uses a tennis racket that is strung with cord to strike a hollow rubber ball c ...
player)
* Helen Wills Moody (American tennis player)
* Bill Tilden (American tennis player)
See also
* Interwar Britain
* 1920s in television
* Table of years in radio
* List of years in literature#1920s, 1920s in literature
*
Roaring Twenties
The Roaring Twenties, sometimes stylized as Roaring '20s, refers to the 1920s decade in music and fashion, as it happened in Western society and Western culture. It was a period of economic prosperity with a distinctive cultural edge in the ...
Timeline
The following articles contain brief timelines listing the most prominent events of the decade:
1920 • 1921 • 1922 • 1923 • 1924 • 1925 • 1926 • 1927 • 1928 • 1929
Notes
References
Sources
*
*
*
Further reading
* Allen, Frederick Lewis. ''Only Yesterday: An Informal History of the 1920s'' (1931), classic popular history of United States
online free* Cornelissen, Christoph, and Arndt Weinrich, eds. ''Writing the Great War - The Historiography of World War I from 1918 to the Present'' (2020
free download full coverage for major countries.
* Currell, Susan. ''American Culture in the 1920s'' (Edinburgh University Press, 2009), a British perspective.
* Dumenil, Lynn. ''The modern temper: American culture and society in the 1920s'' (Macmillan, 1995).
* Grossman, Mark. ''Encyclopedia of the Interwar Years: From 1919 to 1939'' (2000). 400pp.
* Jacobson, Jon. "Is there a New International History of the 1920s?." ''American Historical Review'' 88.3 (1983): 617–645
online* Johnson, GAynor, and Michael Dockrill eds. ''Locarno Revisited: European Diplomacy 1920-1929'' (2004)
* McAuliffe, Mary. ''When Paris Sizzled: The 1920s Paris of Hemingway, Chanel, Cocteau, Cole Porter, Josephine Baker, and Their Friends'' (2016
excerpt* Maier, Charles S. ''Recasting bourgeois Europe: stabilization in France, Germany, and Italy in the decade after World War I'' (Princeton University Press, 2015).
* Mowat, Charles Loch. ''Britain Between the Wars, 1918–1940'' (1955), 690pp; thorough scholarly coverage; emphasis on politic
also online free to read scholarly survey of the era.
* Robert Sobel, Sobel, Robert ''The Great Bull Market: Wall Street in the 1920s.'' (1968)
* Uldricks, Teddy J. "Russia and Europe: Diplomacy, Revolution, and Economic Development in the 1920s." ''International History Review'' 1.1 (1979): 55–83.
* Walters, Ryan S. ''The Jazz Age President: Defending Warren G. Harding'' (2022
excerptals
online review
{{Commons category
1920s,
Roaring Twenties
1920s decade overviews