WEBVTT 00:00:00.000 --> 00:00:03.140 You know, when you update the software on your 00:00:03.140 --> 00:00:06.440 phone today, you generally expect like a few 00:00:06.440 --> 00:00:09.099 minor changes. Right. Maybe a new battery icon 00:00:09.099 --> 00:00:12.160 or something. Exactly. Or your home screen is 00:00:12.160 --> 00:00:14.939 rearranged a bit. It's a mild convenience or 00:00:14.939 --> 00:00:17.760 maybe a mild annoyance. But it certainly doesn't 00:00:17.760 --> 00:00:20.239 change the fundamental nature of your physical 00:00:20.239 --> 00:00:22.219 reality. No, not at all. You're still driving 00:00:22.219 --> 00:00:24.260 to work the same way. Right. You still buy your 00:00:24.260 --> 00:00:26.859 groceries the same way. And the laws of physics 00:00:26.859 --> 00:00:30.989 remain. comfortably intact. Because we're completely 00:00:30.989 --> 00:00:34.670 accustomed to a world that just slowly, predictably 00:00:34.670 --> 00:00:37.490 iterates on itself. The updates are incremental. 00:00:37.750 --> 00:00:39.829 But imagine a software update for physical reality 00:00:39.829 --> 00:00:42.329 that is so massive, so incredibly disruptive, 00:00:42.890 --> 00:00:45.049 that the world you lived in on Monday is completely 00:00:45.049 --> 00:00:47.450 unrecognizable by Friday. Which is a terrifying 00:00:47.450 --> 00:00:49.530 thought, honestly. It really is, but that is 00:00:49.530 --> 00:00:51.909 exactly what we're looking at today. So welcome 00:00:51.909 --> 00:00:53.850 to our deep dive. We are so thrilled to have 00:00:53.850 --> 00:00:56.390 you with us as we explore a really comprehensive 00:00:56.390 --> 00:00:59.909 historical timeline of the United States, specifically 00:00:59.909 --> 00:01:03.409 focusing on the years 1900 to 1929, which is 00:01:03.409 --> 00:01:06.129 arguably the most compressed, intense period 00:01:06.129 --> 00:01:09.439 of radical transformation in human history. Our 00:01:09.439 --> 00:01:12.060 mission today is to figure out exactly how the 00:01:12.060 --> 00:01:15.840 U .S. went from this horse drawn, newly post 00:01:15.840 --> 00:01:18.219 frontier society. Where the ultimate speed limit 00:01:18.219 --> 00:01:20.739 was basically how fast a large animal could run. 00:01:20.980 --> 00:01:23.819 Yes, exactly. How they went from that into the 00:01:23.819 --> 00:01:27.180 incredibly fast paced, recognizable modern world 00:01:27.180 --> 00:01:30.799 of cars, mass media and global superpowers. And 00:01:30.799 --> 00:01:33.760 they did it all in just three decades. OK, let's 00:01:33.760 --> 00:01:35.939 unpack this because the sheer density of this 00:01:35.939 --> 00:01:38.620 era is just staggering. It really is. Our timeline 00:01:38.620 --> 00:01:41.200 starts with a literal bang, the assassination 00:01:41.200 --> 00:01:43.799 of President William McKinley in 1901, and it 00:01:43.799 --> 00:01:46.000 ends with the catastrophic economic collapse 00:01:46.000 --> 00:01:49.319 of the Wall Street crash in 1929. But the technological 00:01:49.319 --> 00:01:51.659 and cultural whiplash sandwiched between those 00:01:51.659 --> 00:01:53.780 two events, that is the crucible that forged 00:01:53.780 --> 00:01:55.760 the world you live in right now. Yeah. And the 00:01:55.760 --> 00:01:58.180 McKinley assassination really acts as this violent, 00:01:58.180 --> 00:02:00.599 abrupt changing of the guard, because when McKinley 00:02:00.599 --> 00:02:03.319 dies in September 1901 from an assassin's bullet, 00:02:03.700 --> 00:02:05.719 his vice president, Theodore Roosevelt, takes 00:02:05.719 --> 00:02:08.979 over as the 26th president. And Roosevelt wasn't 00:02:08.979 --> 00:02:12.000 just a new politician stepping into the Oval 00:02:12.000 --> 00:02:14.780 Office. He fundamentally understood that the 00:02:14.780 --> 00:02:17.240 presidency itself needed to be modernized to 00:02:17.240 --> 00:02:20.259 manage the sheer aggressive energy that was about 00:02:20.259 --> 00:02:22.500 to define the 20th century. It really was like 00:02:22.500 --> 00:02:26.020 a human locomotive. And suddenly, you see this 00:02:26.020 --> 00:02:29.520 massive explosion of industry and corporate power 00:02:29.520 --> 00:02:32.520 that perfectly mirrors his energy. I mean, the 00:02:32.520 --> 00:02:35.659 very same year Roosevelt takes office. 1901, 00:02:36.020 --> 00:02:38.199 John Pierpont Morgan founds U .S. Steel. Which 00:02:38.199 --> 00:02:40.599 is huge. Yeah, we aren't just talking about a 00:02:40.599 --> 00:02:42.759 successful wealthy business here. We're talking 00:02:42.759 --> 00:02:45.419 about the birth of the mega corporation. Right. 00:02:45.539 --> 00:02:47.419 And to understand the scale of U .S. Steel, you 00:02:47.419 --> 00:02:49.639 have to look at the numbers. It was the first 00:02:49.639 --> 00:02:52.379 billion dollar corporation in the world. A billion 00:02:52.379 --> 00:02:55.460 dollars in 1901. That's just wild. Unimaginable 00:02:55.460 --> 00:02:58.180 wealth. Morgan achieved this by buying out Andrew 00:02:58.180 --> 00:03:00.259 Carnegie and consolidating dozens of smaller 00:03:00.259 --> 00:03:03.419 steel companies into one massive vertically integrated 00:03:03.419 --> 00:03:06.110 behemoth. Meaning they owned everything. Exactly. 00:03:06.169 --> 00:03:08.610 They own the mines, they own the ships that transported 00:03:08.610 --> 00:03:10.870 the ore, and they own the mills. It signaled 00:03:10.870 --> 00:03:13.909 this permanent shift from local small -scale 00:03:13.909 --> 00:03:17.909 production to monumental, continent -spanning 00:03:17.909 --> 00:03:21.189 industrial might. And of course, producing that 00:03:21.189 --> 00:03:22.949 much steel meant you needed to build something 00:03:22.949 --> 00:03:26.310 with it. Which brings us to 1903. And this is 00:03:26.310 --> 00:03:28.629 a year that honestly breaks my brain a little 00:03:28.629 --> 00:03:30.469 bit when I look at the timeline. It's a big one. 00:03:30.669 --> 00:03:34.310 It is. In 1903, Henry Ford forms the Ford Motor 00:03:34.310 --> 00:03:37.159 Company. That exact same year down in Kitty Hawk, 00:03:37.340 --> 00:03:39.560 North Carolina, the Wright brothers make their 00:03:39.560 --> 00:03:42.219 first powered flight in the Wright Flyer. And 00:03:42.219 --> 00:03:44.960 then just five years later in 1908, the Ford 00:03:44.960 --> 00:03:47.740 Model T hits the market. The pacing is just relentless. 00:03:48.080 --> 00:03:50.259 It is. Imagine living in a world where the speed 00:03:50.259 --> 00:03:52.800 limit is a galloping horse, and within one single 00:03:52.800 --> 00:03:55.180 decade, humans are flying in the sky and mass 00:03:55.180 --> 00:03:57.860 producing automobiles. It's exactly like downloading 00:03:57.860 --> 00:03:59.939 that massive reality -altering software update 00:03:59.939 --> 00:04:01.939 we talked about, but for physical infrastructure. 00:04:02.169 --> 00:04:04.330 What's fascinating here is how the mechanics 00:04:04.330 --> 00:04:07.169 of that mass production actually functioned. 00:04:07.389 --> 00:04:09.490 Because Ford didn't invent the automobile, but 00:04:09.490 --> 00:04:11.930 he fundamentally changed how humans interact 00:04:11.930 --> 00:04:14.949 with work. Right. Before the Model T, a team 00:04:14.949 --> 00:04:16.949 of mechanics would build a car from the ground 00:04:16.949 --> 00:04:20.430 up, moving around a stationary vehicle. Ford 00:04:20.430 --> 00:04:22.629 flipped the script with the moving assembly line. 00:04:23.110 --> 00:04:25.649 He broke the assembly of the car down into 84 00:04:25.649 --> 00:04:28.790 discrete, highly repetitive steps. He brought 00:04:28.790 --> 00:04:32.220 the work to the worker. So instead of being a 00:04:32.220 --> 00:04:34.759 like a craftsman building a machine, the worker 00:04:34.759 --> 00:04:37.720 essentially becomes a stationary cog in a larger 00:04:37.720 --> 00:04:40.079 factory sized machine. That is the psychological 00:04:40.079 --> 00:04:42.720 shift right there. It reduced the time to build 00:04:42.720 --> 00:04:45.480 a car from over 12 hours to about 90 minutes. 00:04:45.600 --> 00:04:48.259 Wow. Yeah. That combustion engine didn't just 00:04:48.259 --> 00:04:50.199 change how people got to work. The production 00:04:50.199 --> 00:04:52.579 of it changed how society conceived of time, 00:04:52.819 --> 00:04:55.819 labor and efficiency. And you really can't separate 00:04:55.819 --> 00:04:58.500 this internal domestic explosion of industry 00:04:58.500 --> 00:05:01.990 from America. as external actions. Because as 00:05:01.990 --> 00:05:04.050 the economic engine of the country was revving 00:05:04.050 --> 00:05:06.829 up, the US started aggressively projecting its 00:05:06.829 --> 00:05:09.550 power geopolitically. The big stick ideology. 00:05:09.790 --> 00:05:13.149 Speak softly and carry a big stick. That was 00:05:13.149 --> 00:05:15.689 taking shape around 1903 as well, right? It was. 00:05:16.290 --> 00:05:18.250 Roosevelt's Roosevelt corollary to the Monroe 00:05:18.250 --> 00:05:20.970 Doctrine in 1904 essentially declared the US 00:05:20.970 --> 00:05:23.550 the primary police power of the entire Western 00:05:23.550 --> 00:05:26.709 hemisphere. And the most glaring physical manifestation 00:05:26.709 --> 00:05:29.620 of that power is how the US acquires the Panama 00:05:29.620 --> 00:05:32.199 Canal Zone that same year. Right. The timeline 00:05:32.199 --> 00:05:34.180 mentions the acquisition of the Canal Zone, but 00:05:34.180 --> 00:05:36.060 how did that actually happen? Did we just, you 00:05:36.060 --> 00:05:38.660 know, buy it from whoever owned it? Not exactly. 00:05:38.899 --> 00:05:41.160 Colombia originally owned the territory of Panama 00:05:41.160 --> 00:05:43.519 and they refused to agree to U .S. terms for 00:05:43.519 --> 00:05:46.860 the canal. So the Roosevelt administration essentially 00:05:46.860 --> 00:05:49.420 threw its weight behind a Panamanian independence 00:05:49.420 --> 00:05:52.259 movement. Oh, wow. Yeah. They parked U .S. warships 00:05:52.259 --> 00:05:54.399 off the coast to block Colombia from putting 00:05:54.399 --> 00:05:56.899 down the rebellion. Once Panama was declared 00:05:56.899 --> 00:05:59.120 an independent nation, they immediately granted 00:05:59.120 --> 00:06:01.379 the US the rights to build and control the canal. 00:06:01.860 --> 00:06:03.980 They were literally carving a path between two 00:06:03.980 --> 00:06:07.240 oceans by any political means necessary to accommodate 00:06:07.240 --> 00:06:09.839 their new industrial output and naval ambitions. 00:06:10.120 --> 00:06:12.120 The United States was actively reshaping the 00:06:12.120 --> 00:06:14.560 map of the world. Literally reshaping it, yeah. 00:06:14.740 --> 00:06:17.620 But moving at that breakneck speed obviously 00:06:17.620 --> 00:06:20.079 comes with the terrible cost. You can't just 00:06:20.079 --> 00:06:22.379 strap a rocket engine to a horse -drawn carriage 00:06:22.379 --> 00:06:26.160 and expect a smooth ride. The timeline highlights 00:06:26.160 --> 00:06:29.399 some incredibly grim milestones that resulted 00:06:29.399 --> 00:06:32.139 from this completely unchecked industrialization. 00:06:32.600 --> 00:06:34.720 And before we dive into the intense social reforms 00:06:34.720 --> 00:06:36.939 and labor struggles of the 1910s, we should probably 00:06:36.939 --> 00:06:39.899 set some parameters. Yes, absolutely. We are 00:06:39.899 --> 00:06:42.399 looking at highly charged political shifts here, 00:06:42.680 --> 00:06:45.560 from intense labor disputes to massive wealth 00:06:45.560 --> 00:06:48.000 inequality and civil rights battles. And just 00:06:48.000 --> 00:06:50.000 as a reminder for you listening, we are simply 00:06:50.000 --> 00:06:52.420 reporting what is in the historical source material 00:06:52.420 --> 00:06:55.000 today. Right. We are not endorsing any specific 00:06:55.000 --> 00:06:56.920 political viewpoints left wing or right wing. 00:06:57.319 --> 00:06:59.459 Our goal is strictly impartial to understand 00:06:59.279 --> 00:07:01.980 the actual mechanics of the era and how these 00:07:01.980 --> 00:07:04.439 events unfolded. And looking impartially at the 00:07:04.439 --> 00:07:07.660 early 1900s, the machinery of progress was entirely 00:07:07.660 --> 00:07:10.259 unregulated and the human toll was devastating. 00:07:10.720 --> 00:07:13.740 In 1907, we see the worst industrial accident 00:07:13.740 --> 00:07:16.459 in American history, a coal mine explosion in 00:07:16.459 --> 00:07:19.480 Monongo, West Virginia that killed at least 361 00:07:19.480 --> 00:07:22.120 people. Terrific. And then just a few years later 00:07:22.120 --> 00:07:25.360 in 1911, the Triangle Shirtwaist factory fire 00:07:25.360 --> 00:07:28.920 in New York. You have these massive engines of 00:07:28.920 --> 00:07:31.660 wealth being fueled by workers who had virtually 00:07:31.660 --> 00:07:34.649 zero protections. The Triangle Shirtwaist Fire 00:07:34.649 --> 00:07:37.490 really galvanized the public because of how preventable 00:07:37.490 --> 00:07:40.449 it was. The managers had literally locked the 00:07:40.449 --> 00:07:42.949 doors to the stairwells to prevent unauthorized 00:07:42.949 --> 00:07:45.410 breaks and theft. Oh my god. So when the fire 00:07:45.410 --> 00:07:47.250 broke out, the garment workers, who were mostly 00:07:47.250 --> 00:07:49.389 young immigrant women, were trapped. It was a 00:07:49.389 --> 00:07:52.350 very public tragedy that made it undeniable that 00:07:52.350 --> 00:07:55.009 an industrialized workforce required entirely 00:07:55.009 --> 00:07:57.649 new rules of engagement. And it wasn't just workplace 00:07:57.649 --> 00:08:00.699 safety either. Society was realizing that the 00:08:00.699 --> 00:08:03.379 speed of mass production was outpacing basic 00:08:03.379 --> 00:08:07.240 public health. That pushback comes in 1906 with 00:08:07.240 --> 00:08:09.399 the Pure Food and Drug Act and the Federal Meat 00:08:09.399 --> 00:08:11.899 Inspection Act. Right, up in Sinclair's era. 00:08:12.199 --> 00:08:14.540 Exactly. Because if corporations were going to 00:08:14.540 --> 00:08:16.620 slaughter and package meat for the entire nation, 00:08:17.000 --> 00:08:18.660 the federal government had to step in to ensure 00:08:18.660 --> 00:08:20.920 they weren't selling toxic, contaminated food 00:08:20.920 --> 00:08:23.759 to the public. Which represents a massive expansion 00:08:23.759 --> 00:08:25.959 of what the federal government was actually expected 00:08:25.959 --> 00:08:29.060 to do. And at the same time, you have this intense 00:08:29.060 --> 00:08:32.539 struggle for basic civil rights. The old social 00:08:32.539 --> 00:08:35.700 order was deeply entrenched, even as the technological 00:08:35.700 --> 00:08:39.039 order was being rewritten. In 1909, W .E .B. 00:08:39.159 --> 00:08:42.440 Dubois and others found the NAACP to fight for 00:08:42.440 --> 00:08:45.820 racial justice. In 1913, Alice Paul organized 00:08:45.820 --> 00:08:48.500 a massive women's suffrage procession in Washington, 00:08:48.500 --> 00:08:51.799 D .C. on the eve of Woodrow Wilson's inauguration. 00:08:52.059 --> 00:08:55.740 And from 1917 to 1919, you have the silent sentinels, 00:08:55.940 --> 00:08:58.519 women holding a literal multi -year vigil outside 00:08:58.519 --> 00:09:00.980 the White House gates. They stood there in the 00:09:00.980 --> 00:09:03.059 freezing rain and the blistering heat, being 00:09:03.059 --> 00:09:05.600 harassed and arrested, which finally leads to 00:09:05.600 --> 00:09:08.240 the 19th Amendment in 1920, granting women the 00:09:08.240 --> 00:09:10.899 right to vote. A monumental shift. It is, but 00:09:10.899 --> 00:09:13.000 I have to push back on the traditional historical 00:09:13.000 --> 00:09:15.860 narrative of pure progress here. We've got cars 00:09:15.860 --> 00:09:18.159 rolling off assembly lines and airplanes in the 00:09:18.159 --> 00:09:20.399 sky, but women literally have to stand outside. 00:09:20.169 --> 00:09:21.929 the White House gates for two and a half years 00:09:21.929 --> 00:09:24.230 just to get a ballot. Yeah, it's a stark contrast. 00:09:24.389 --> 00:09:26.470 The whiplash between technological advancement 00:09:26.470 --> 00:09:29.529 and basic human rights is just severe. It is 00:09:29.529 --> 00:09:32.029 severe and it underscores the friction of the 00:09:32.029 --> 00:09:34.870 era. If we connect this to the bigger picture, 00:09:35.129 --> 00:09:36.929 the United States was essentially trying to rein 00:09:36.929 --> 00:09:39.330 in the chaos of sudden growth. You see this in 00:09:39.330 --> 00:09:41.330 the massive corporate breakups like the Supreme 00:09:41.330 --> 00:09:44.070 Court dismantling Standard Oil in 1911 because 00:09:44.070 --> 00:09:46.250 it had become an illegal monopoly. They were 00:09:46.250 --> 00:09:48.929 just getting too big. Way too big. And to manage 00:09:48.929 --> 00:09:51.889 this newly complex, overheating national economy, 00:09:52.429 --> 00:09:54.789 the government had to build systems that you, 00:09:54.929 --> 00:09:58.159 the listener, still deal with today. The 16th 00:09:58.159 --> 00:10:00.940 amendment establishing a federal income tax and 00:10:00.940 --> 00:10:03.000 the creation of the Federal Reserve Act both 00:10:03.000 --> 00:10:05.960 happened in 1913 Okay, I have to stop you there 00:10:05.960 --> 00:10:09.159 and admit some serious confusion Acting as a 00:10:09.159 --> 00:10:11.320 proxy for anyone listening. I use money every 00:10:11.320 --> 00:10:14.279 single day. I pay taxes But I actually have no 00:10:14.279 --> 00:10:17.159 idea how creating the Federal Reserve in 1913 00:10:17.159 --> 00:10:19.600 supposedly managed the economy a lot of people 00:10:19.600 --> 00:10:21.679 don't honestly How did that actually work? Why 00:10:21.679 --> 00:10:24.460 did they need it? It's a great question and it's 00:10:24.460 --> 00:10:27.979 central to how the modern world functions Before 00:10:27.979 --> 00:10:31.100 1913, the U .S. didn't have a central bank. If 00:10:31.100 --> 00:10:33.639 there was a financial panic, which happened frequently, 00:10:34.320 --> 00:10:36.679 people would rush to their local banks to withdraw 00:10:36.679 --> 00:10:39.860 their cash. Right, a bank run. Exactly. But banks 00:10:39.860 --> 00:10:41.720 don't keep everyone's money in the vault, they 00:10:41.720 --> 00:10:43.940 lend it out. So the banks would run out of cash 00:10:43.940 --> 00:10:47.299 and fail, wiping out life savings. The Federal 00:10:47.299 --> 00:10:50.419 Reserve was created to be a lender of last resort. 00:10:50.649 --> 00:10:53.110 It basically acts as a massive shock absorber 00:10:53.110 --> 00:10:55.110 for the economy. So if a local bank is running 00:10:55.110 --> 00:10:57.490 out of cash during a panic, they can borrow from 00:10:57.490 --> 00:10:59.909 the Federal Reserve to stay afloat. Exactly that. 00:11:00.070 --> 00:11:03.070 It created an elastic currency, meaning the central 00:11:03.070 --> 00:11:05.429 bank could expand or shrink the money supply 00:11:05.429 --> 00:11:07.730 based on what the economy needed to stabilize. 00:11:07.909 --> 00:11:10.210 Oh, interesting. Yeah, it was a highly controversial 00:11:10.210 --> 00:11:12.330 move at the time, centralizing that much financial 00:11:12.330 --> 00:11:14.990 control, but it was deemed absolutely necessary 00:11:14.990 --> 00:11:17.149 to prevent the whole industrial machine from 00:11:17.149 --> 00:11:19.610 collapsing in on itself. So the U .S. is building 00:11:19.610 --> 00:11:22.879 this massive, heavily regulated, highly productive 00:11:22.879 --> 00:11:26.679 economic engine. But a nation producing millions 00:11:26.679 --> 00:11:29.500 of cars and flexing that kind of naval power 00:11:29.500 --> 00:11:32.120 couldn't stay isolated from global affairs forever. 00:11:32.500 --> 00:11:34.860 That industrial might was on a collision course 00:11:34.860 --> 00:11:37.340 with global conflict. It was inevitable. World 00:11:37.340 --> 00:11:40.019 War I broke out in Europe in 1914, and initially 00:11:40.019 --> 00:11:42.000 the U .S. tried very hard to stay out of it. 00:11:42.039 --> 00:11:44.779 They wanted no part of it. None. But the modern 00:11:44.779 --> 00:11:47.539 world was simply too interconnected. The turning 00:11:47.539 --> 00:11:51.070 points were visceral. First, the sinking of the 00:11:51.070 --> 00:11:54.909 British ocean liner RMS Lusitania in 1915 by 00:11:54.909 --> 00:11:57.889 a German U -boat, which killed 128 Americans. 00:11:58.450 --> 00:12:01.169 And then the interception of the Zimmermann telegram 00:12:01.169 --> 00:12:04.029 in 1917. OK, the Zimmermann telegram is wild. 00:12:04.210 --> 00:12:06.250 That was Germany secretly reaching out to Mexico, 00:12:06.450 --> 00:12:08.460 right? Yes. The British intercepted a secret 00:12:08.460 --> 00:12:10.500 communication where Germany essentially proposed 00:12:10.500 --> 00:12:13.059 an alliance with Mexico. Germany promised that 00:12:13.059 --> 00:12:15.179 if Mexico declared war on the U .S., Germany 00:12:15.179 --> 00:12:17.159 would help Mexico recover the territories of 00:12:17.159 --> 00:12:20.159 Texas, New Mexico and Arizona. That is just I 00:12:20.159 --> 00:12:22.440 mean, you can imagine how people reacted. Oh, 00:12:22.500 --> 00:12:24.460 when that telegram was published in the American 00:12:24.460 --> 00:12:27.919 press, public opinion violently flipped. It ultimately 00:12:27.919 --> 00:12:30.259 pulled the United States into the conflict. President 00:12:30.259 --> 00:12:32.379 Woodrow Wilson brings the U .S. into the Great 00:12:32.379 --> 00:12:36.139 War in 1917 and the industrial capacity we just 00:12:36.139 --> 00:12:37.940 talked about. about the steel, the assembly lines, 00:12:38.059 --> 00:12:40.740 the mass production, is suddenly redirected toward 00:12:40.740 --> 00:12:43.419 a global mechanized slaughter. On a scale never 00:12:43.419 --> 00:12:46.600 seen before. Yeah. The war ends with an armistice 00:12:46.600 --> 00:12:49.720 in 1918, but the tragedy doesn't stop there, 00:12:50.059 --> 00:12:52.720 because returning troops bring home the 1918 00:12:52.720 --> 00:12:55.440 Spanish flu pandemic, which is just a staggering 00:12:55.440 --> 00:12:57.480 global health crisis right on the heels of the 00:12:57.480 --> 00:13:00.000 war. The physical and psychological exhaustion 00:13:00.000 --> 00:13:02.139 of the country at this point is almost impossible 00:13:02.139 --> 00:13:04.659 to overstate. Millions are dead globally from 00:13:04.659 --> 00:13:07.840 war and disease. President Wilson tries to secure 00:13:07.840 --> 00:13:11.840 a lasting peace with his 14 points in 1918, advocating 00:13:11.840 --> 00:13:14.279 for moral diplomacy and a League of Nations to 00:13:14.279 --> 00:13:16.899 prevent future wars. Right. He travels to Europe, 00:13:17.240 --> 00:13:19.679 champions the Treaty of Versailles in 1919, but 00:13:19.679 --> 00:13:22.100 the political effort physically destroys him. 00:13:22.399 --> 00:13:24.019 OK, here's where it gets really interesting. 00:13:24.940 --> 00:13:29.070 In 1919, President Wilson suffers a massive stroke. 00:13:29.830 --> 00:13:32.450 And according to the historical timeline, First 00:13:32.450 --> 00:13:35.970 Lady Edith Wilson essentially takes over in what 00:13:35.970 --> 00:13:38.649 is described as a silent coup. It's one of the 00:13:38.649 --> 00:13:40.850 craziest moments in presidential history. I mean, 00:13:41.090 --> 00:13:43.750 how does a country function with an incapacitated 00:13:43.750 --> 00:13:46.070 president while trying to navigate the fallout 00:13:46.070 --> 00:13:48.850 of a world war? How did she actually pull this 00:13:48.850 --> 00:13:51.720 off without the government collapsing? It was 00:13:51.720 --> 00:13:54.879 an unprecedented constitutional crisis handled 00:13:54.879 --> 00:13:57.059 entirely behind the closed doors of the White 00:13:57.059 --> 00:14:00.379 House. She didn't forge his signature or explicitly 00:14:00.379 --> 00:14:03.279 claim to be the acting president. Instead, she 00:14:03.279 --> 00:14:06.440 controlled the paper flow. She acted as the absolute 00:14:06.440 --> 00:14:09.460 sole gatekeeper to the sick room. So if the secretary 00:14:09.460 --> 00:14:11.279 of state had an urgent memo, he had to give it 00:14:11.279 --> 00:14:14.149 to her first. Yes. She would read the memos, 00:14:14.429 --> 00:14:15.809 decide if they were important enough to stress 00:14:15.809 --> 00:14:17.830 her husband, and if he decided they weren't, 00:14:17.909 --> 00:14:19.850 they simply never reached the president's desk. 00:14:20.230 --> 00:14:23.309 She essentially ran the executive branch by omission. 00:14:23.750 --> 00:14:26.350 This raises an important question about America's 00:14:26.350 --> 00:14:29.700 political stability in 1919. The U .S. had just 00:14:29.700 --> 00:14:31.879 demonstrated the industrial and military strength 00:14:31.879 --> 00:14:34.840 to help end a world war, yet the political leadership 00:14:34.840 --> 00:14:38.080 was completely paralyzed by secrecy. And the 00:14:38.080 --> 00:14:40.799 timing couldn't be worse. Exactly. Consequently, 00:14:41.200 --> 00:14:43.399 without Wilson there to fight for it, the U .S. 00:14:43.580 --> 00:14:45.960 Senate outright rejected the Treaty of Versailles 00:14:45.960 --> 00:14:48.240 and refused to join the League of Nations. They 00:14:48.240 --> 00:14:50.399 just packed up and went home. They built the 00:14:50.399 --> 00:14:52.120 modern world and then slammed the door shut on 00:14:52.120 --> 00:14:55.500 it. The country retreated violently inward. And 00:14:55.500 --> 00:14:58.500 that fear and isolationism manifested domestically 00:14:58.500 --> 00:15:02.779 as the first red scare from 1917 to 1920. It 00:15:02.779 --> 00:15:05.700 was marked by a widespread, intense paranoia 00:15:05.700 --> 00:15:08.159 about Bolshevism and anarchism infiltrating the 00:15:08.159 --> 00:15:10.539 U .S. after the Russian Revolution. The timeline 00:15:10.539 --> 00:15:13.379 mentions the Palmer Raids of 1919. What were 00:15:13.379 --> 00:15:15.440 those, practically speaking? Attorney General 00:15:15.440 --> 00:15:18.259 A. Mitchell Palmer, using the espionage and sedition 00:15:18.259 --> 00:15:21.399 acts, orchestrated a series of massive, often 00:15:21.399 --> 00:15:24.120 warrantless raids against suspected radical leftists 00:15:24.120 --> 00:15:26.179 and immigrants. They're going door to door. The 00:15:26.179 --> 00:15:28.419 Department of Justice literally kicked down the 00:15:28.419 --> 00:15:31.440 doors of labor halls and private homes, arresting 00:15:31.440 --> 00:15:33.720 thousands of people and deporting hundreds without 00:15:33.720 --> 00:15:36.679 trial. The mechanics of the fear were weaponized 00:15:36.679 --> 00:15:39.519 by the state. The nation was pulling up the drawbridge. 00:15:39.840 --> 00:15:42.500 Which perfectly sets the stage for the 1920s. 00:15:42.580 --> 00:15:44.919 Yeah. You have a society that has just survived 00:15:44.919 --> 00:15:47.200 the meat grinder of the first industrialized 00:15:47.200 --> 00:15:50.519 world war, survived a devastating global pandemic 00:15:50.519 --> 00:15:54.279 and is now gripped by intense political paranoia. 00:15:54.379 --> 00:15:56.879 And if we connect to the broader arc of human 00:15:56.879 --> 00:16:00.120 behavior, that trauma and isolationism led directly 00:16:00.120 --> 00:16:02.399 to the cultural explosion of the 1920s. It's 00:16:02.399 --> 00:16:04.700 like a pressure valve releasing. Yes. Society 00:16:04.700 --> 00:16:07.639 was exhausted by war, disease, and heavy moral 00:16:07.639 --> 00:16:10.440 crusades. The collective response was to throw 00:16:10.440 --> 00:16:13.240 itself into a frantic, almost desperate pursuit 00:16:13.240 --> 00:16:15.399 of entertainment, consumption, and distraction. 00:16:15.539 --> 00:16:18.179 The roaring 20s. And the contradictions of this 00:16:18.179 --> 00:16:20.659 decade are just wild to me. On one hand, you 00:16:20.659 --> 00:16:22.700 have the 18th Amendment establishing prohibition 00:16:22.700 --> 00:16:26.480 in 1919 and 1920. literally outlawing the manufacture 00:16:26.480 --> 00:16:29.120 and sale of alcohol nationwide. Right. But at 00:16:29.120 --> 00:16:31.860 the exact same time, you have the birth of the 00:16:31.860 --> 00:16:35.259 Jazz Age. You have the Harlem Renaissance flourishing 00:16:35.259 --> 00:16:38.460 with places like the Cotton Club opening in 1923, 00:16:38.940 --> 00:16:41.159 Langston Hughes publishing the Weary Blues in 00:16:41.159 --> 00:16:44.279 1926, and F. Scott Fitzgerald dropping the Great 00:16:44.279 --> 00:16:47.659 Gatsby in 1925. The creativity was unmatched. 00:16:47.759 --> 00:16:50.720 It was. The government says no drinking and the 00:16:50.720 --> 00:16:53.259 culture responds by throwing the biggest, loudest, 00:16:53.399 --> 00:16:55.879 most creatively vibrant underground party in 00:16:55.879 --> 00:16:58.840 human history. It was a profound cultural rebellion 00:16:58.840 --> 00:17:01.419 and it was fueled by the very technology that 00:17:01.419 --> 00:17:03.340 had industrialized the nation earlier in the 00:17:03.340 --> 00:17:06.099 century. This is the moment where culture itself 00:17:06.099 --> 00:17:08.460 becomes mass produced. Oh, that's an interesting 00:17:08.460 --> 00:17:11.640 way to look at it. Yeah. In 1920, the first commercial 00:17:11.640 --> 00:17:15.339 radio broadcasts occur, KDKA in Pittsburgh and 00:17:15.339 --> 00:17:18.900 WWJ in Detroit. By 1926, NBC is founded as the 00:17:18.900 --> 00:17:21.319 first major broadcast network, followed immediately 00:17:21.319 --> 00:17:24.200 by CBS in 1927. So what does this all mean? To 00:17:24.200 --> 00:17:26.380 me, it feels like the birth of the American monoculture. 00:17:26.440 --> 00:17:29.299 I'd agree with that. Because before 1920, if 00:17:29.299 --> 00:17:31.799 you lived in a Manhattan apartment, your cultural 00:17:31.799 --> 00:17:33.579 experience was completely different from someone 00:17:33.579 --> 00:17:37.700 living in, say, Wyoming, which, by the way, elected 00:17:37.700 --> 00:17:40.700 the first female governor in U .S. history, Nellie 00:17:40.700 --> 00:17:43.920 Taylor Ross, in 1925. A great milestone. Yeah. 00:17:44.140 --> 00:17:46.220 But suddenly. Because of these national radio 00:17:46.220 --> 00:17:49.200 networks, a listener in New York and a farmer 00:17:49.200 --> 00:17:52.500 in Wyoming can listen to the exact same audio 00:17:52.500 --> 00:17:55.680 broadcast at the exact same time. That is the 00:17:55.680 --> 00:17:57.599 crucial insight. They could listen to the same 00:17:57.599 --> 00:17:59.599 broadcast and they could cheer for the exact 00:17:59.599 --> 00:18:02.559 same national icons. The timeline is packed with 00:18:02.559 --> 00:18:04.460 people who became more than just famous. They 00:18:04.460 --> 00:18:08.200 became legends overnight. Right. In 1927, Babe 00:18:08.200 --> 00:18:11.119 Ruth hits a record 60 home runs in a single season. 00:18:11.759 --> 00:18:14.319 That same year, Charles Lindbergh makes the first 00:18:14.319 --> 00:18:16.339 solo transatlantic flight. And the following 00:18:16.339 --> 00:18:19.339 year, Amelia Earhart becomes the first woman 00:18:19.339 --> 00:18:21.279 to fly across the Atlantic. And it wasn't just 00:18:21.279 --> 00:18:24.299 radio and sports. Hollywood becomes the absolute 00:18:24.299 --> 00:18:27.019 center of the movie industry in the early 1920s. 00:18:27.450 --> 00:18:31.269 In 1927, the jazz singer becomes the first feature 00:18:31.269 --> 00:18:33.769 length motion picture with synchronized sound. 00:18:34.589 --> 00:18:37.730 Exactly. And then in 1928, George Eastman demonstrates 00:18:37.730 --> 00:18:40.410 the first color motion pictures, while Mickey 00:18:40.410 --> 00:18:43.369 Mouse debuts in Disney's Steamboat Willie. All 00:18:43.369 --> 00:18:45.450 of this confirms your point about monoculture. 00:18:45.710 --> 00:18:47.509 Mass production wasn't just for cars anymore, 00:18:47.589 --> 00:18:50.950 though Ford's 15 millionth Model T did roll off 00:18:50.950 --> 00:18:53.349 the assembly line in 1927. Right, they're still 00:18:53.349 --> 00:18:55.869 making cars. Tons of them. But mass production 00:18:55.869 --> 00:18:58.690 was now applied to entertainment, news, and shared 00:18:58.690 --> 00:19:01.910 national identity. But, and we must be incredibly 00:19:01.910 --> 00:19:04.529 sober about this, this frantic pace was largely 00:19:04.529 --> 00:19:07.029 a debt -fueled illusion. It couldn't last. It 00:19:07.029 --> 00:19:10.130 couldn't. The unchecked consumption, the installment 00:19:10.130 --> 00:19:12.960 buying, and the wild stock market spec - that 00:19:12.960 --> 00:19:15.380 defined the Roaring Twenties were fundamentally 00:19:15.380 --> 00:19:17.559 unsustainable. There's a high -speed train running 00:19:17.559 --> 00:19:19.880 completely out of track. And the crash, when 00:19:19.880 --> 00:19:22.880 it came, was violent. The decade that began with 00:19:22.880 --> 00:19:25.000 the hope of returning to normalcy ended with 00:19:25.000 --> 00:19:28.339 two brutal shocks. Culturally, the St. Valentine's 00:19:28.339 --> 00:19:31.319 Day Massacre in 1929 highlighted the violent, 00:19:31.640 --> 00:19:33.859 organized crime empires that Prohibition had 00:19:33.859 --> 00:19:35.839 accidentally built. Right, the dark side of the 00:19:35.839 --> 00:19:38.930 Underground Party. Exactly. And economically, 00:19:39.210 --> 00:19:41.930 the Wall Street crash of 1929 wasn't just a bad 00:19:41.930 --> 00:19:44.009 day at the market. It was the collapse of an 00:19:44.009 --> 00:19:47.450 entire margin debt illusion. It erased massive 00:19:47.450 --> 00:19:50.250 fortunes overnight, wiping out millions of ordinary 00:19:50.250 --> 00:19:52.589 investors and plunging the nation into the Great 00:19:52.589 --> 00:19:55.829 Depression. The music stopped abruptly. It's 00:19:55.829 --> 00:19:57.809 simply breathtaking when you step back and look 00:19:57.809 --> 00:20:00.230 at the whole picture. For you, the listener, 00:20:00.829 --> 00:20:03.700 thinking about your everyday life. Well, the 00:20:03.700 --> 00:20:05.619 federal agencies regulating the food in your 00:20:05.619 --> 00:20:08.079 fridge, the income taxes pulled from your paycheck, 00:20:08.519 --> 00:20:10.599 the very concept of sitting in a traffic jam 00:20:10.599 --> 00:20:12.500 or turning on an audio stream to hear a shared 00:20:12.500 --> 00:20:15.339 national broadcast. All of those fundamental 00:20:15.339 --> 00:20:18.460 pillars of your reality were born in this chaotic 00:20:18.460 --> 00:20:21.799 30 -year window. It was the painful, rapid, and 00:20:21.799 --> 00:20:23.880 extraordinary adolescence of the modern world. 00:20:24.089 --> 00:20:26.150 They figured out the mechanics of how to mass 00:20:26.150 --> 00:20:28.369 produce everything from steel to culture that 00:20:28.369 --> 00:20:30.109 they hadn't yet figured out how to stabilize 00:20:30.109 --> 00:20:32.269 the consequences of that speed. Which leaves 00:20:32.269 --> 00:20:34.450 us with a lingering thought for you to carry 00:20:34.450 --> 00:20:38.170 into your day. In the short span from 1900 to 00:20:38.170 --> 00:20:41.869 1929, human beings went from a wobbly 12 -second 00:20:41.869 --> 00:20:44.569 airplane flight over a muddy field in Kitty Hawk 00:20:44.569 --> 00:20:47.210 to confidently flying solo across the Atlantic 00:20:47.210 --> 00:20:50.230 Ocean. We went from silent black and white film 00:20:50.230 --> 00:20:53.289 to sound and color. An incredible leap. It is. 00:20:53.509 --> 00:20:55.930 We updated the software of reality faster than 00:20:55.930 --> 00:20:58.289 anyone thought possible. So look around at your 00:20:58.289 --> 00:21:01.730 life right now. What quiet seemingly small invention 00:21:01.730 --> 00:21:04.150 or cultural shift is happening today right under 00:21:04.150 --> 00:21:06.630 your nose that in 30 years will have completely 00:21:06.630 --> 00:21:08.809 rewritten the rules of our reality? It's a powerful 00:21:08.809 --> 00:21:11.109 question. It's always the things we underestimate 00:21:11.109 --> 00:21:13.109 in the moment that end up changing the world 00:21:13.109 --> 00:21:15.450 the most. Thank you so much for joining us on 00:21:15.450 --> 00:21:17.750 this deep dive. Until next time, keep looking 00:21:17.750 --> 00:21:18.569 at the bigger picture.