1920..........1930

1920

• Heeding demands from temperance leagues, Congress passed the 18th Amendment (also called the Volstead Act), prohibiting the "manufacture, sale, or transportation of intoxicating liquors." At midnight on January 16, 1920, the era of speakeasies and bootlegging began. State and federal agents never came close to stemming the tide of illegal alcohol.

• The League of Nations is established to end war, but the U.S. never ratifies American participation.

• Pittsburgh's KDKA transmits the
  first live radio broadcast, the results
  of the presidential race.

1922

• In October 1922, armed Blackshirts, fascist followers of Benito Mussolini, marched on Rome. The government fell, and King Victor Emmanuel III "invited" Mussolini to join his Cabinet. The melodramatic - and murderous - Mussolini, nicknamed "Il Duce," transformed himself into a dictator by gradual steps, but imperialist aspirations led to his downfall.

• The short skirts, bobbed hair, and kicking heels of flappers instantly bring to mind F. Scott Fitzgerald and the wild parties of the Jazz Age. Spirited young women of the 1920s adopted loose clothes - and some claimed loose morals - in defiance of their mothers' conventional lives.

1921

• Ireland is Partially Free
  The British parliament recognizes Ireland's 26 southern counties as the Irish Free State.

1923

• Hitler Jailed
  Adolf Hitler unsuccessfully stages his "Beer Hall Putsch" in Munich. In prison, he writes Mein Kampf.
  

1924

• Winter games first took place as a separate celebration in 1924 at the Alpine resort town of Chamonix, France. (Figure skating and ice hockey were seen at earlier summer games.) The winter competitions began modestly - only 16 countries and fewer than 300 athletes participated in 1924. Nearly all medals went to Scandinavian athletes.

• Vladimir Lenin Dies
  The father of Soviet Russia dies and warns his successors to keep an eye out for Joseph Stalin.
  

1926

• Dr. Robert H. Goddard (1882-1945) stands beside the world's first liquid-fueled rocket prior to launch from an Auburn, Massachusetts, field on March 16, 1926. The rocket flew for 2.5 seconds, achieving a height of 41 feet and a distance of 184 feet. Goddard, who in 1919 suggested the possibility of moon travel, was treated with skepticism during his lifetime, but his work set the stage for the space age. Along with the basics of rocket propulsion, he also developed the fundamentals of rocket navigation.

1927

• The 1927 debut of The Jazz Singer, starring Al Jolson (1886-1950), rang the death knell for silent movies. Audiences flocked to the first "talkie" - or more accurately, the first feature film to mix dialog, music, and an effective story line. As a cantor's son who aspires to Broadway, Jolson cries out, "Wait a minute, wait a minute, you ain't heard nothing yet," and launches into the song "Toot, Toot, Tootsie." Other memorable numbers were "Blue Skies" and the signature song "Mammy."
  
• When he landed in Paris on the evening of May 21, 1927, 25-year-old Charles A. Lindbergh (1902-1974) won more than the $25,000 prize money for completing the first nonstop transatlantic solo flight; he also earned instant international fame that lasted the rest of his life. The handsome Lindbergh looked the perfect hero, and photographs of him appeared around the globe.

1929

• The night spot that best evokes glittering images of Harlem in the 1920s and 1930s is the Cotton Club. While literary urbanites appreciated Harlem Renaissance writers like Langston Hughes, more fun-loving New Yorkers were attracted to the neighborhood's vibrant cabarets. If you were white and well-heeled, you could enjoy African American entertainers like Louis Armstrong and Bill "Bojangles" Robinson at the elegant Cotton Club.