This 1921 photo of Cassville, Wisconsin, shows an automobile repair shop and a shoe store.
The radio was everything Bettmann/Getty Images
In 1919, after World War I, the U.S. government lifted a ban on civilian radio ownership and transmission, and it wasn t long before commercial radio became a favorite source of entertainment.
The first baseball game to be broadcast on the radio was one between the Pittsburgh Pirates and Philadelphia Phillies on August 5, 1921. Gould the Light Man Getty Images
And with the increasing popularity of radio, the personal electronics industry boomed. This store in Stockton, California, was billed as the only real radio store in San Joaquin Valley.
United States
The postwar Republican administrations
After the end of World War I, many Americans were left with a feeling of distrust toward foreigners and radicals, whom they held responsible for the war. The Russian Revolution of 1917 and the founding of the communists’ Third International in 1919 further fanned American fears of radicalism. Race riots and labour unrest added to the tension. Thus, when a series of strikes and indiscriminate bombings began in 1919, the unrelated incidents were all assumed incorrectly in most cases to be communist-inspired. During the ensuing Red Scare, civil liberties were sometimes grossly violated and many innocent aliens were deported. The Red Scare was over within a year, but a general distrust of foreigners, liberal reform movements, and organized labour remained throughout the 1920s. In fact, many viewed Warren G. Harding’s landslide victory in 1920 (
Illustrated London News [London, England], 22 January 1921
A tank being used to break open the door of a shop in Dublin during a search for armsPhoto: I
Dublin, 18 January 1921
Two women abducted from outside their homes in Dublin have turned up safe and well in Mohill, Co. Leitrim.
Freeman s Journal, 13 January 1921
Julia Brady and Nora Redican, with Nora s mother Anne (centre).