Asa Yoelson, or Al Jolson was born in Russia in 1886. The thing that made Al popular was he applied burnt cork to his face, which gave him a black face, which at the time more actors began to take the blackface of as a part of their act. Al was easily then able to connect more with his audience with his blackface. The song that became Al Jolson’s signature song was Swanee.
4. The Volstead act, which banned the rights to sell or transport illegal beverages had little to no effect on the city of New York or on Broadway. Prohibition allowed the city of New York nightlife to grow. Nightclubs and speakeasies were in abundance, even the mayor of New York didn’t pay attention to the new law, and he just asked that nightclubs must close by 3 am.
Walter Winchell was born in 1897, he grew up from a poor Jewish family. Winchell first started out as a child entertainer but later moved up the ranks and worked in Vaudeville. Winchell was a mediocre review but he excelled as a chronicler. Winchell had the ability to create neologisms that no one had ever thought of especially in Broadway. Winchell came up with the term the Big Apple, which is still popularly used even today. Winchell was able to spread his influence far beyond New York, by showing everyone that it is alright to have a unique sense of
Showboat started out after Jerome Kern read Edna Ferber’s novel about a showboat named the cotton blossom, which travelled across the Mississippi. Fern got the approval from Ferber to turn the serious novel she wrote into a musical comedy and then Kern asked Oscar Hammerstein to collaborate with him. Showboat was a major risk for Ziegfeld because he feared that the audience members wouldn’t appreciate the show, because it wasn’t the kind of Follies that people would expect. There were many risk that came along with showboat, one was no previous musical had adapted a serious novel. Another problem was no other show in the past incorporated a three generation time span or show a story from the past to current or even show the intermingling of black and white characters sharing the stage with one another. There was a lot of work that went into creating showboat and thankfully it paid off, from Hammerstein incredible abilities to kern insane ability in manipulating musical idioms and using audience member’s knowledge on genres and trends that were happening. When the cast was practicing in Washington, Ziegfeld treated the show just like he had any other year, but this time there was something different because the show was America’s story. Ziegfeld was rewarded for his gamble, because the show made Broadway history by running 572 performances as well as it has been revived more than a 6 times and it is considered one of Americas most revolutionary
Upton Sinclair was born in Baltimore, Maryland on September 20th 1978. Sinclair grew up in a broken household; his father was an alcohol salesman and killed himself drinking. While his mother would not even think about drinking alcohol. So these personalities naturally clashed. So Sinclair found some solace in books, Sinclair was a natural writer and he began publishing at the young age of fifteen years old. Sinclair started off going to school at a small college by the name of New York City College. This was just temporary as Sinclair would need time and money to move higher up to a form of better education. So as a result Sinclair took the initiative and he started writing columns on ethnic jokes and hack fiction for small magazines in New York. The money he earned writing these columns allowed him to completely pay for New York City College, and eventually enroll to attend Columbia University. Sinclair worked as hard as he possibly could to get into Columbia University and he was going to do the absolute best he could while he was attending the University. Since Sinclair needed ex...
Johnny Cash was born in Kingsland, Arkansas on February 26, 1932 (Enslow 19). He began to take an interest to music when his father bought a radio. His mother loved listening to music and his mother and Johnny would sing songs all throughout the house. Taught by his mother and childhood friend, he learned to play guitar (Enslow 19). Working hard and practicing, he became very good at guitar and singing. However, he grew up through the Great Depression and this was very difficult for him and his family. In Edward Enslow’s “The Man in Black” Johnny Cash states, “We were very poor, and I almost died of starvation as a child.” This quote shows how life was a struggle for Cash in his early life. Facing all the many challenges was difficult for him but he found a way through it. Through his older brother Jack, he was able to cope with his life growing up. Jack was a huge role model to Johnny growing up, he would teach...
Supposedly there were over 100,000 saloons in New York at one time. Business leaders thought that if alcohol was withheld from the workers they’d be more productive. John D. Rockefeller alone donated over $350,000 to the Anti-Saloon League. Henry Ford stated “The country couldn't run without Prohibition.
Hank Williams Jr as we know him was born Hank Randall Williams, born in small town Shreveport, Louisiana, on May 26, 1949. Hank Jr was only three when his father Hank died, but that did not stop his music dream. At just the age of 8 Hank Jr began singing his dad songs on stage. “Williams made his stage debut at the age of 8 and his first appearance at Nashville's famed Grand Ole Opry at age 11. At age 15, Williams had his first Top 5 hit on the country charts. " (http://www.biography.com/) Even though his father was gone, Hank Jr helped carry on his legacy through music. His mother being his biggest supporter, helped him along the way.
The Prohibition or the Eighteenth Amendment was a huge failure for a law in 1920. There were many factors that led to its downfall that included illegal means, rise of gangsters, and the Twenty- First Amendment. Despite the Prohibition, it did not stop the people from drinking it and accessing it through thousands of speakeasies. It became a most lucrative business for criminals that led to dangerous competition. In 1933, the failed amendment was repealed and most people rejoiced that alcohol was legal again. The Eighteenth Amendment was an experiment that went horribly wrong and did absolutely nothing to bring any positive change. This was proof “that you don’t have to be drunk to come up with a really, really, bad idea.” (Carlson. 141)
Widely considered country music’s first superstar, Hiram/Hank Williams was born September 17, 1923, in mount olive, Alabama. Williams, the third child of Lon and Lillie Williams, grew up in a household that never had much money. His father worked as a logger before entering the Veterans’ Administration hospital when young hank was just six. Father and son rarely saw each other over the next decade, with William’s mother, who ran rooming houses, moving the family to Greenville, and later, Montgomery, Alabama. (Hank Williams) Everyone knew Hank was a good guy, but like any man had his ups and his downs throughout the short life he lived. Hank grew up rough and he knew it; however nothing was going to stop this young man from doing what he set out to pursue. What he did was astonishing changing art or “so called” music. Hank redefined country music with his personal opinion on what music really was.
The Act passed by those concerned with the above-mentioned problems, prohibited the vending, transportation of, and consumption of alcohol. The law was intended to be enforced nation-wide. Police raided and trashed many vendors to stop their trade. Sometimes however, the police took their share of the whiskey they were supposed to break, and paid reporters to look the other way. On the whole, prohibition was effective in smaller town/cities, but worked a bit less in the larger cities.
Motion pictures from Hollywood had taken Broadway’s place as the king of entertainment. The main reason behind this was that because it was culturally relevant and coming out with new flashy techniques such as Todd-AO and Cinerama.
Johnny Cash was born and raised in Arkansas. He was the son of a poor Southern Baptist sharecropper who moved his family to new farms when Johnny was only three (“Johnny
low, illegal activity increased. The prohibition amendment went on from 1920 to 1933. It was meant to be a nationwide ban on the sale, production, importation, and transportation of alcohol beverages. Gangsters and other opportunists saw this as a chance to make rackets in the illegal production of alcohol called ‘bootlegging’. People had their...
The 1920s were greatly influenced by prohibition. The prohibition law restricted the manufacturing, consumption, transportation, and sale of alcohol. The law was put into effect to lower the crime and corruption rates in the United States in the 1920s. It was also said to reduce social problems and lower taxes. In The Great Gatsby, F. Scott Fitzgerald examines the negative repercussions of prohibition on the economy, characters in the Great Gatsby, and on the different social classes of the 1920s.
Prohibition is possibly one of the most memorable events in the history of the United States. The 18th Amendment and eventually the Volstead Act created the law that made it illegal to produce, sell and the transport of alcohol over .5%. Although to most it seemed like a good idea, prohibition promoted the likes of criminal entrepreneurs. Numerous government officials were apprehended in night-clubs and speakeasies but never punished. At the time prohibition was also separating the social classes and making issues for those less prominent in the community. Holes in the government’s plans were beginning to show through leading up to the 21st Amendment and the ratification of the 13th. Prohibition failed to limit consumption and was actually costing the US more than originally expected. However according to Dr. Jack Blocker’s article, “Alcohol Prohibition as a Public Health Innovation” the claim that prohibition failed is actually false and failed only because voters became blinded by priorities over the Great Depression. With the amount of money being made on the illegal sale of alcohol was consumption really limited, or did Americans see a chance to overcome poverty and ratify the Amendment.
In the beginning of the twenties America was in the midst of an economic boom, people were happy- World War I was over and Americans were rich. But by the end, because of prohibition, and in large part because of the stock market crash, the American economy quickly declined into the Great Depression. During this time the 18th Amendment- prohibition- was passed. Prohibition's supporters were initially surprised by what did not come to pass during the dry era. When the law went into effect, real estate developers and landlords expected rents to rise as saloons closed and neighborhoods improved. Theater producers were expecting an increase in customers as Americans searched for new ways to entertain themselves, ways that did not involve alcohol. But this did not happen. Instead, there was a decline in amusement and entertainment industries all over the United States. Some restaurants even failed, as they could no longer make a profit without legal liquor sales. On the whole, the initial economic effects of Prohibition were largely negative. The closing of breweries, distilleries and saloons led to the elimination of thousands of jobs, and in turn thousands more jobs were eliminated for barrel makers, truckers, waiters, and other related trades. One of the most profound effects of Prohibition was on government tax revenues. Before Prohibition, many states relied heavily on excise taxes in liquor sales to fund their budgets. Almost 75% of New York’s revenue came from liquor taxes, but with prohibition in effect, all that reven...
According to wikipedia Johnny Cash was born in kingsland arkansas, though he was never given a real name, he was called J.r while a child, then when he got older people called him Johnny.When he turned five Johnny helped out on his fathers farm with his mom, dad, and older brother.Johnny had a rough childhood, not only the untimely death of his brother, but his abusive father made things worse.Johnnyjoined the air force as a radio operator in Landsberg am Lech, Germany.where he joined a band called the Landsberg Barbarians.afterhis term he married Vivian Liberto and moved to Memphis where he was a radio salesman, and studied to be a radio announser. Cash where for a record deal at sun records, where he sung mostly gospil, and Sam Phillips the owner of sun records said " go home and sin, then come back with a song I can sell.", cash won over sun records and relese...
“Prohibition did not achieve its goals. Instead, it added to the problems it was intended to solve.” On 16th January 1920, one of the most common personal habits and customs of American society came to a halt. The eighteenth amendment was implemented, making all importing, exporting, transporting, selling and manufacturing of intoxicating liquors absolutely prohibited. This law was created in the hope of achieving the reduction of alcohol consumption, which in turn would reduce: crime, poverty, death rates, and improve both the economy, and the quality of life for all Americans. These goals were far from achieved. The prohibition amendment of the 1920's was ineffective because it was unenforceable. Instead, it caused various social problems such as: the explosive growth of organized crime, increased liquor consumption, massive murder rates and corruption among city officials. Prohibition also hurt the economy because the government wasn’t collecting taxes on the multi-billion dollar a year industry.