1920 History, Trivia and Fun Facts

Quick Facts from 1920:

• World Changing Event: US Senate rejected the Versailles Treaty, effectively nullifying the League of Nations.
• World Changing Event: Treaty of Sèvres officially dissolved the Ottoman Empire.
• Pancho Villa surrendered and the Mexican Revolution ended.
• The Summer Olympics were held in Antwerp, Belgium.
• The Birth of Mass Media: On November 2, 1920, the first commercially-licensed radio station began broadcasting live results of the presidential election.
• The Eighteenth Amendment to the Constitution was enabled in 1920, outlawing the production and consumption of alcohol (more commonly known as Prohibition).
• The Nineteenth Amendment To The Constitution was ratified, giving women the right to vote.
• The American Civil Liberties Union (ACLU) was established.
• On September 16, 1920, a bomb exploded on Wall Street outside the NYSE building, killing 33 people and injuring more than 400. The perpetrators were never found.
• Influential Songs include: I’ll Be With You In Apple Blossom Time by Charles Harrison and others. Also: Swanee, written by George Gershwin and recorded by Al Jolson
• The Movies to Watch include The Mark of Zorro, The Cabinet of Dr. Caligari and Dr. Jekyll and Mr. Hyde
• The Most Famous Person in America was probably Al Jolson
• Price of Wrigley’s Doublemint gum in 1920: 5 cents/pack
• Price of Silver: $1.37 an ounce
• The Funny Fat Guy was: Roscoe ‘Fatty’ Arbuckle
• The Other Funny Guy was: Harold Lloyd
• The Magazine Cover: National Geographic magazine was the first US publisher to establish a color photo lab in 1920, the first to publish underwater color photographs in 1927, the first to print an all-color issue in 1962 and the first to print a hologram in 1984.

Firsts, Inventions, and Wonders:
Magnus Hirschfeld coined the term transsexualism.

The Holland Tunnel was started, allowing motor vehicle traffic to travel between New Jersey and New York City.

Raggedy Andy was introduced. His sister, Raggedy Ann was created in 1915 (US Patent #D47789).

On August 20, 1920,  The first US commercial radio station, 8MK (WWJ), Detroit began daily broadcasting.

On September 29 The first domestic radio sets come to stores in the United States; a Westinghouse radio costs $10.

The American Professional Football Association was formed in 1920 with Jim Thorpe as its president and fourteen teams. It later changed its name to the National Football League in 1922.

Jesse Langsdorf patented the all-weather and wrinkle-free necktie.

Carrie Chapman Catt founded the League of Women Voters during the National American Woman Suffrage Association (NAWSA) convention in Chicago, Illinois.

Both “googol” and “googolplex” were coined by the 9-year-old nephew of mathematician Edward Kasner in 1920. He defined a googol as 10^100 and a googolplex as “one, followed by writing zeroes until you get tired”. Kasner decided to standardize it and set a googolplex equal to 10^googol instead.

The Ford Motor Company produced so much factory wood waste that they manufactured it into charcoal and sold it under the name Ford Charcoal. The company was later renamed to Kingsford Charcoal.

Snap-on Tools, with interchangeable sockets, began being sold in Chicago.

The Royal Canadian Mounted Police Force was established.

On May 2, the first game of Negro National League baseball was played, in Indianapolis, Indiana.

Nikolai Tesla patented a one-way-valve with no moving parts in 1920 (#1,329,559).

On January 16, 1920, the League of Nations held its first Executive Council meeting, consisting of the major member-powers.

Pop Culture News:
May 1, 1920: The longest MLB game (by innings) Brooklyn Robins 1, Boston Braves 1 at 26 innings. The game was called due to darkness.

Hollywood’s first ‘super couple’ was Douglas Fairbanks and Mary ‘America’s Sweetheart’ Pickford, married 1920 and divorced in 1936. Both were huge stars in the silent film industry, but they were also significant players behind the scene. In 1919, along with Charlie Chaplin and D.W. Griffith, founded United Artists, one of the first movie distribution companies. They appeared in one film together – 1929’s Taming of the Shrew. The couple was also the first to officially handprint by Grauman’s Chinese Theater (1927), the first in Hollywood’s ‘Walk of Fame’.

George Polley (The’ Human Fly’) was arrested on the 30th Floor while trying to climb up the outside of the Woolworth Building in New York

Shipping children through parcel post service was initially legal in the United States. The US Post Office banned the practice in 1920.

The New York Times ridiculed American rocket scientist Robert H. Goddard, stating rockets could never fly. They rescinded the comment after the launch of Apollo 11 in 1969.

The first US postage stamps printed without the words “United States” or US.

Johnson & Johnson employee Earle Dickson used tape and cotton gauze to make a bandage for his wife. He told his bosses about it, they made him a VP, and they named it the ‘Band-Aid.’ It worked out well for all concerned.

Joan of Arc was canonized by Pope Benedict XV.

There are more trees in America today than 1920, mainly due to the reversion of farmland back to natural land cover.

By early 1920, every state west of the Mississippi River allowed women to vote. On August 18, 1920, the Tennessee House of Representatives voted in favor of, therefore ratifying, the 19th amendment by a vote of 50-49.

During the campaign of 1920, President Warren G. Harding was accused of making up a word: normalcy. When asked if he instead meant “normality,” Harding responded “I have looked for ‘normality’ in my dictionary and I do not find it there. ‘Normalcy’, however, I did find, and it is a good word.” #normalcy was used in the 1850s, however.

Tuition at Stanford University was free up until 1920.

American socialist candidate, Eugene V. Debs, ran his campaign from the inside of a jail cell with the slogan “Vote for President Convict #9653” and he garnered almost a million write-in votes in 1920

Drano became available to start unclogging household drains and toilets.

When the spitball was banned from baseball in 1920, 17 pitchers were grandfathered in and the last legal spitball was thrown in 1933.

February 14th – The League of Women Voters was founded in Chicago. Also that year, the Republican convention in Chicago endorsed women’s suffrage.

The word ‘robot’ was introduced to the public by Czech writer Karel Capek in his play R.U.R. (Rossum’s Universal Robots), He credited his brother, Josef Capek, with the word later.

The first early models of the TV were invented.

A pro wrestling match between Joe Stecher and Earl Caddock was filmed for later viewing by cinema audiences. The film of Stecher’s win over Caddock is the oldest existing movie of professional wrestling.

A Secret Court, headed by University President Abbott Lawrence Lowell and the acting Dean, was convened at Harvard University to rid the school of homosexuals, resulting in nine expulsions

Eddie Eagan is the only athlete to have won gold for different events at both the Summer and Winter Olympics, winning his first while boxing in 1920, and his second while on the 4-man bobsled in 1932.

America’s oldest Thanksgiving Day Parade, 6abc Dunkin’ Donuts Thanksgiving Day Parade (AKA 6abc IKEA Thanksgiving Day Parade, 6abc Boscov’s Thanksgiving Day Parade, Channel 6 Mellon PSFS Thanksgiving Day Parade, Channel 6 MasterCard Thanksgiving Day Parade) and originally the Gimbels Thanksgiving Day Parade was first held.

The Number One Hits of 1920
December 5, 1919 – January 16, 1920
Henry Burr – Oh! What A Pal Was Mary

January 17, 1920 – January 30, 1920
Al Jolson – I’ve Got My Captain Working For Me Now

January 31 – April 30, 1920
Ben Selvin’s Novelty Orchestra – Dardanella

May 1, 1920 – May 7, 1920
Edith Day – Alice Blue Gown

May 8, 1920 -July 2, 1920
Al Jolson – Swanee

July 3, 1920 – August 6, 1920
Ted Lewis and His Band – When My Baby Smiles At Me

August 7, 1920 – September 17, 1920
Art Hickman – Hold Me

September 18, 1920 – September 24, 1920
John Steel – The Love Nest

September 25, 1920 – October 15, 1920
Marion Harris – St. Louis Blues

October 16, 1920 – October 29, 1920
Art Hickman – The Love Nest

October 30, 1920 – December 10, 1920
Paul Whiteman – Whispering

December 11, 1920 – January 28, 1921
Paul Whiteman – The Japanese Sandman

Medical News:
HIV probably originated in Léopoldville, modern-day Kinshasa, the capital of the Belgian Congo.

During prohibition, an exemption was made for whiskey prescribed by a doctor and sold through a pharmacy. The Walgreens pharmacy chain grew from 20 retail stores to almost 400 during this period, from 1920 to 1933.

The Tragedies:
French passenger ship Afrique sank near La Rochelle, killing 533 people.

On December 16, 1920, an 8.5 earthquake rocked the Gansu province in China, killing an estimated 200,000 people.

November 21, 1920, Bloody Sunday: The Irish Republican Army, on the instructions of Michael Collins, kill fourteen British undercover agents in Dublin, most in their homes

The Palm Sunday tornado outbreak of 1920 included at least 37 tornadoes across the Midwest and Deep South states on March 28, 1920. The tornadoes left more than 380 people dead and at least 1,215 injured.