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Observations
: Make a list of what you see in this artifact. __________________________ ___________________________ __________________________ ___________________________
Conclusions
:
Based upon the picture or the reading:1.
How do you think adverts during the 1920s were different than today?2.
What emotions did advertisers of the 1920s want to make people feel?3.
What does always a bridesmaid never a bride mean?4.
How much money in sales did Listerine make in 1927?5.
Do advertisements of today appeal to people caring about how they look?
The Invention of Bad Breath
In the 1910s and particularly the 1920s, advertisers focused their attention onidentifying—and often inventing—personal anxieties that could be resolved by the purchase of specific products. “Advertising,” wrote one commentator in a trade publication, “helps to keep the masses dissatisfied with their mode of life, discontentedwith ugly things around them. Satisfied customers are not as profitable as discontentedones.”Listerine mouthwash took this approach. The Lambert Pharmacal Company haddeveloped the antibacterial liquid back in the 1880s, and it was long sold as a generalantiseptic. After World War I, the company sought to expand its market. Advertisingman Gordon Seagrove recalls being called in by the Lambert Brothers to discuss howthis could be done. The company’s chief chemist was enlisted to describe the productand its uses. “As he read along in a singsong voice,” Seagrove remembers, “hementioned halitosis. Everybody said ‘What’s that?’” Learning that it referred to“unpleasant breath,” they immediately thought “maybe that’s the peg we can hang our hat on.”Although there was some worry about whether such a “delicate subject” could behandled in magazines and newspapers, Seagrove and his collaborator, Milton Feasley,launched an ad campaign that played heavily on fears about how others would react toa halitosis sufferer. The most famous of their ads concerned the “pathetic” case of “Edna,” who was “often a bridesmaid but never a bride.” She was approaching the“tragic” thirtieth birthday unmarried because she suffered from halitosis—a disorder that “you, yourself, rarely know when you have it. And even your closest friends won’ttell you.”In response to the ad campaign, Listerine sales went from $100,000 per year in 1921 tomore than $4 million in 1927.
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Observations
: Make a list of what you see in this picture. __________________________ ___________________________ __________________________ ___________________________
Conclusions
:
Based upon the picture or the reading, answer the following questions:
1.
Based upon the reading, what does prohibition mean?2.
How do you think these people felt about prohibition?3.
When did alcohol become illegal in the United States?4.
Do you think that Americans generally followed the prohibition laws?5.
Can you think of a modern day example of prohibition?6.
What did people who were against prohibition argue that prohibition did?
Prohibition in the United States
In 1919, Americans ratified the 18thamendment to the Constitution, making itillegal to manufacture, sell, transport, import,or export drinking alcohol. Prohibition, as itwas popularly known, proved impossible toenforce, as tens of millions of normally law-abiding Americans either broke the law or abetted those who did. Although theconsumption of alcohol did decline, opponentsof Prohibition argued that it caused crime,corruption, and a disregard for law. Organizedcrime flourished around the profits to be madefrom selling illegal alcohol, and politicians and police were bought off wholesale. Bribery andcorruption, although not always alcoholrelated, reached into President Harding’scabinet—and then onto the front page. Eventhough law enforcement officers spent largeamounts of time busting those who would selland distribute alcohol, it still flourished in theUnited States
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Observations
: Make a list of what you see in this picture. __________________________ ___________________________ __________________________ ___________________________
Conclusions
:
Based upon the picture or the reading, answer the following questions:
1.
When did the “temperance movement” or the idea of prohibition start?2.
What other things were associated with alcohol?3.
When did alcohol become illegal in the United States?4.
What did president Hoover call prohibition?5.
According to the last paragraph, how did the “experiment” fail?6.
Why do you think that people really voted to repeal the 18
th
amendment?
The temperance movement, discouraging the use of alcoholic beverages, had been active and influential in the United Statessince at least the 1830s. Since the use of alcohol was oftenassociated with such social ills as poverty and insanity,temperance often went hand in hand with other reformmovements. From the 1850s onward, the temperancemovement focused much of its efforts on Irish and Germanimmigrants.Prohibition exhibited many of the characteristics of most progressive reforms. That is, it was concerned with the moralfabric of society; it was supported primarily by the middleclasses; and it was aimed at controlling the "interests" (liquor distillers) and their connections with venal and corrupt politicians in city, state, and national governments. Still, it wasnot until U.S. entry into the Great War that prohibitionists wereable to secure enactment of national legislation. In 1918,Congress passed the 18th Amendment to the Constitition, prohibiting the manufacture, transportation, and sale of alcoholic beverages. States ratified the Amendment the nextyear.Herbert Hoover called prohibition a "noble experiment," butthe effort to regulate people's behavior soon ran into trouble.Enforcement of prohibition became very difficult. Soon, suchterms as "bootlegger," "bath tub gin," and "speakeasy" becamehousehold words. Gangs of hoodlums became more powerfulas they trafficked in alcohol. By the 1930s, a majority of Americans had tired of the noble experiment, and the 18thAmendment was repealed.
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