Prohibition was a 13 year period of time in the United States, spanning from 1920 to 1933, in which the manufacture, transportation and sale of alcohol was illegal. It was the 18th Amendment to the Constitution, designed in an effort to reduce drinking. It didn’t work. Instead of people drinking less, they began to drink more and in more unhealthy ways. They had to make their own alcohol, which usually tasted disgusting and was of an extremely high proof and could be dangerous to consume too much of. People were making alcohol in their bathtubs and selling it in speakeasies, which were illegal secret bars located in places like basements and attics, or even disguised as other businesses. A majority of these speakeasies were controlled by organized crime. This is where people like Al Capone or Lucky Luciano profited, and organized crime was at a peak in the 20’s because of the high involvement in the illegal sale of liquor done by people in the business of …show more content…
There was staggering amounts of racial inequality and although women could then vote, there was still the expectation that they should be housewives and they barely gained the right to have control over their right to use contraceptives. F. Scott Fitzgerald died before The Great Gatsby ever became a success, and that was likely because the portrayal of the 1920’s was a little too accurate for those living then to accept. An in depth read of the book reveals people caught up in newfound money and social class, partying and drinking and pretending to be happy despite troubles too deep to truly ignore. In the end, nobody is really happy at all. This is the very foundation of the Jazz Age. It was a decade of class and culture to be sure, and economically it started off with a boom, but underneath that was trouble and an unhappy society that would only continue to worsen along with the economy as the 20’s drew to a