TEACHING AMERICAN HISTORY PROJECT
Lesson Title – A Comparative Study of 1920s and 1930s Culture
From Kimberly Weber
Grade – 11
Length of class period – 60 minutes
Inquiry – How and why did popular culture, the arts, and literature change in the 1920s and the 1930s?
Objectives:
-Students will be able to work cooperatively individually and in groups to analyze primary
sources.
-Students will be able to compare and contrast American culture in the 1920s and 1930s.
Materials – Attached
Note guide
Primary source chart:
1. Literature
2. Art
20s
Fitzgerald: Great Gatsby
T.S. Eliot: Poem
“How to do the Charleston”
3. Sports
“KY vs Univ. of Tennessee
at Knoxville”
4. Music
“Puttin’ on the Ritz”
5. Movies
The Jazz Singer
“Steamboat Willie”
30s
Steinbeck: Grapes of Wrath
American Gothic
Migrant Mother
“Franklin Roosevelt ready
to throw baseball from
stands”
“Brother Can you Spare a
Dime”
Mr. Smith Goes to
Washington
“Mickey Mouse and
Friends”
Activities
• Students, with a partner, work at five learning stations. They work for approximately
eleven minutes and then switch, eventually getting to all five stations.
• Students complete a note guide to scaffold their learning. The teacher collects the note
guide for a classwork grade.
• The five learning stations include: literature, art, music, sports, and movies.
Assessment
Students complete a note guide that the teacher collects and assesses the students’ learning,
counting the assessment as a classwork grade.
1
Connecticut Framework Performance Standards –
1.1 Significant events and themes in United States history.
1. Apply chronological thinking to examine relationships among events and explain
causes and effects of events.
12. Analyze how the arts, architecture, music and literature of the United States reflect its
history and cultural heterogeneity (e.g. New Orleans, Jazz, Harlem Renaissance, Frank
Lloyd Wright, Maya Angelou, rock ‘n’ roll).
1.13 – The characteristics of and interactions among culture, social systems and institutions.
59. Demonstrate the importance of viewing a culture through a variety of perspectives.
2.2 – Interpret information from a variety of primary and secondary sources, including electronic
media (maps, charts, graphs, images, artifacts, recordings and text)
6. Determine the central ideas of and be able to summarize information from primary and
secondary sources.
2
Materials
Table of Contents
Note Guide……………………………………………………………4-6
Literature……………………………………………………………...7-9
Art …………………………………………………………………10-11
Sports ………………………………………………………………12-13
Music ………………………………………………………………14-16
Movies…………………………………………………………………17
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A Comparative Study of 20s and 30s Culture
~ Note Guide ~
Literature, art, music, sports, movies and radio, newspapers
1920s Literature
1930s Literature
1920s Art
1930s Art
4
1920s Music
1930s Music
1920s Sports
1930s Sports
5
1920s Music
1930s Music
6
Excerpt from
“The Hollow Men” (1925)
By T.S. Eliot
We are the hollow men
We are the stuffed men
Leaning together
Headpiece filled with straw. Alas!
Our dried voices, when
We whisper together
Are quiet and meaningless
As wind in dry grass
Or rats' feet over broken glass
In our dry cellar
Shape without form, shade without
colour,
Paralysed force, gesture without
motion;
Those who have crossed
With direct eyes, to death's other
Kingdom
Remember us - if at all - not as lost
Violent souls, but only
As the hollow men
The stuffed men.
7
Excerpt from The Great Gatsby (1925)
By F. Scott Fitzgerald
“They were careless people, Tom and Daisy–they smashed up
things and creatures and then retreated back into their money or
their vast carelessness or whatever it was that kept them together,
and let other people clean up the mess they had made…I shook
hands with him; it seemed silly not to, for I felt suddenly as
though I were talking to a child. Then he went into the jewelry
store to buy a pearl necklace–or perhaps only a pair of cuff
buttons–rid of my provincial squeamishness forever.”
8
Quotes from Grapes of Wrath (1939) by John Steinbeck
They breathe profits; they eat the interest on money. If they don't get it, they die
the way you die without air, without side-meat. [referring to the banks]
The Grapes of Wrath
Chapter 5
The bank is something more than men, I tell you. It's the monster. Men made it,
but they can't control it.
The Grapes of Wrath
Chapter 5
It ain't that big. The whole United States ain't that big. It ain't that big. It ain't big
enough. There ain't room enough for you an' me, for your kind an' my kind, for
rich and poor together all in one country, for thieves and honest men. For hunger
and fat.
The Grapes of Wrath
Chapter 12
Man, unlike any other thing organic or inorganic in the universe, grows beyond
his work, walks up the stairs of his concepts, emerges ahead of his
accomplishments.
The Grapes of Wrath
Chapter 14
9
“How to do the Charleston”
(Available on the Library of Congress site loc.gov)
10
American Gothic, by
Grant Wood,1930
(Available on
http://www.artic.edu/
aic/collections/artwo
rk/6565)
Photographer:
Dorothea Lange
Migrant Mother,
1936
(Available on
loc.gov)
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“KY vs Univ. of Tennessee at Knoxville” by Abe Thompson, 1921
12
“Franklin Roosevelt ready to throw baseball from stands, for first game of the year at Griffith
Stadium, Washington, DC” 1935 (Available on the Library of Congress site loc.gov)
13
Music
1. “Puttin’ on the Ritz” by Irving Berlin
a. Link options
i. http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=BAZhHXsknd8
ii. http://www.archive.org/details/PuttinOnTheRitz1930
2. “Brother Can you Spare a Dime?” by E. Y. “Yip” Harburg
a. Link options
i. http://www.authentichistory.com/1930-1939/3-music/19321027Brother_Can_You_Spare_a_Dime-Rudy_Vallee.html
ii. http://www.archive.org/details/AlJolson-BrotherCanYouSpareADime
iii. http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=eih67rlGNhU
Songs also featured on iTunes.
Print out lyrics featured below.
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1920s
“Puttin’ on the Ritz” Lyrics by Irving Berlin
Have you seen the well-to-do
Up and down park avenue
On that famous thoroughfare
With their noses in the air
High hats and Arrow collars
White spats and lots of dollars
Spending every dime
For a wonderful time
Now, if youre blue
And you dont know where to go to
Why dont you go where fashion sits
Puttin on the ritz
Different types who wear a daycoat
Pants with stripes and cutaway coat
Perfect fits
Puttin on the ritz
Dressed up like a million dollar trooper
Trying hard to look like gary cooper
Super-duper
Come, lets mix where rockefellers
Walk with sticks or umberellas
In their mitts
Puttin on the ritz
------ short instrumental break -----Tips his hat just like an english chappie
To a lady with a wealthy pappy
Very snappy
Youll declare its simply topping
To be there and hear them swapping
Smart tidbits
Puttin on the ritz
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1930s
“Brother Can you Spare a Dime?” Lyrics by Yip Harburg (1931)
They used to tell me I was building a dream
And so I followed the mob
When there was earth to plow or guns to bear
I was always there right on the job
They used to tell me I was building a dream
With peace and glory ahead
Why should I be standing in line
Just waiting for bread?
Once I built a railroad, I made it run
Made it race against time
Once I built a railroad, now it's done
Brother, can you spare a dime?
Once I built a tower up to the sun
Brick and rivet and lime
Once I built a tower, now it's done
Brother, can you spare a dime?
Once in khaki suits, gee we looked swell
Full of that Yankee-Doodly-dum
Half a million boots went sloggin' through Hell
And I was the kid with the drum
Say, don't you remember, they called me "Al"
It was "Al" all the time
Why don't you remember, I'm your pal
Say buddy, can you spare a dime?
Once in khaki suits, ah gee we looked swell
Full of that Yankee-Doodly-dum
Half a million boots went sloggin' through Hell
And I was the kid with the drum
Oh, say, don't you remember, they called me "Al"
It was "Al" all the time
Say, don't you remember, I'm your pal
Buddy, can you spare a dime?
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Movies (clips)
1. The Jazz Singer (1927), director Alan Crosland
Available at http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=bkyvstNrkHo&feature=related
2. “Steamboat Willie” (1928), director Ub Iwerks
Available at
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=BBgghnQF6E4
3. “Mickey Mouse & Friends” (1935), director Walt Disney
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=IErXg5kBXXg&feature=related
4. Mr. Smith Goes to Washington (1939), director Frank Capra
Available at
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=zWyEc7FAMTg
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