The second decade of the twentieth century was to be an era many Americans would refer to fondly as "the good old days." It held the glowing promise that each and every man — farmer, clerk’s son, or new immigrant — could write his own rags-to-riches story providing he was prepared to sacrifice, work hard, and save. Most Americans bought that dream and worked hard to achieve it, so that the majority of people were starting to make financial gains. By 1910, America had developed into a country with a distinct and powerful middle class – one that seemed to radiate a kind of wholesome happiness even as it strove for upward mobility or an opportunity to compete with the wealthy elite who formed America’s upper crust.
The Simple Life of the Good Old Days
Popular Saturday Evening Post illustrator Norman Rockwell captured America’s middle class perfectly — the contented family in a small town, Victorian home headed by a mother and father. Grandfather or grandmother probably lived nearby; certainly they lived close enough to visit on holidays. Young couples courted on porch swings and made wedding plans, secure in the knowledge that their lives offered promise and possible wealth. This was a time of idealism, if the art and literature of 1910 were to be taken at face value. But life wasn’t so grand for everyone, and Americans weren’t quite as simple or near-sighted as the country’s wordsmiths and painters portrayed them.
By 1910, most Americans, even middle-class Americans, looked beyond the front stoop and saw that industrialization and urbanization had created a new set of problems, such as crowded cities, inadequate sanitation, new pockets of poverty, and health problems among urban dwellers. Plus, they worried about the country’s leadership. So, in 1910, when these townspeople gathered at their picnics and socials, they may have speculated about who would be running against President Taft in the next election, or debated over the value of allowing unions to organize at the local textile mill or factory. They might well have been concerned about the growing problem of the urban poor.
For, with the building of factories, textile mills, and small businesses, towns had grown into cities, and cities had doubled and tripled in size. One aspiring writer of the era, Sherwood Anderson, depicted this mass migration from farms to cities as destroying important traditional values: closeness to the land, pride in craftsmanship, and community ties. He described the new attitudes that had ousted love and respect for the land and the once small communities, saying, "The thing now is to get rich, be in the swim. That’s the ticket." He recalled, " ‘Hurry’ was the battle cry of the day."
Americans in these good old days measured their wealth with indoor plumbing, owning a home with a formal parlor filled with fine cherry-wood furniture, and wearing the latest fashions. They knew they had it made if they could go to the movies once a week and be one of the first to hook up to electricity once it was installed in the city. But the true mark of wealth was the automobile, and many middle-class American families made a point of owning one.
