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On the date

Monday, October 11, 1920

From the day

Perspective: The Street Photographer · Sound

The flashbulb sizzles over a sidewalk crowded with bobbed hair and silk chemises, while the static of a nearby shop’s speaker crackles with the first signals from KDKA. I can barely hear the soft melody of "Whispering" over the roar of the city, but I catch a newsboy shouting about moratoriums in Cuba as a woman adjusts her cloche hat, her finger wrapped in one of those new adhesive Band-Aids. She looks like the cat’s pajamas under the streetlamps, though she’s whispering to a man who looks suspicious enough to be a stool pigeon for the precinct. Between the hum of a portable electric hair dryer whirring in a salon window and the scent of eleven-cent bread, I click the shutter to freeze this golden, grimy autumn evening forever.

Memories from that day

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The Headlines

FIFTY-DAY MORATORIUM IS DECREED FOR CUBA; President Menocal Issues Proclamation After a Conferencewith Bankers.

Read in The New York Times →

Best-selling Sheet Music

Whispering

John Schonberger

The must-have

Raggedy Andy

Slang

Slang of the decade

General

applesaucebaloneycheaterscrush

Flapper

bee's kneescat's pajamasgiggle watershebahotsy-totsy

Gangster

big cheesebump offstool pigeongatfall guy

Catchphrases of 1920

  • Return to normalcy

Tech Check

Commercial Radio Stations (KDKA), Hair Dryer & Band-Aid.

Style of 1920

Silhouette: Straight and drop-waisted (Flapper)

Material: Beaded silk and rayon

  • Bobbed hair
  • Cloche hats
  • T-strap heels

Cost of Living (1920)

Loaf of Bread

$0.11

Gallon of Gas

$0.30

Average Home

$6,296

New Car

$575

Meanwhile

  • Post-WWI RecessionSevere deflation and collapse of agricultural prices.

Time Elapsed

38,588 days ago

(105 years, 263 days)