What does one think of when they hear the phrase "The Roaring Twenties", "The Jazz Age", or even what our grandparents refer to as the "Golden Years"? It was the best of times. Women's liberation was just beginning. The stock market was at its highest most glorious days. Alas, "The Roaring Twenties". It was the foundation of the largest Cultural Revolution in America's history. People were really questioning the meaning of life and finding out who they really were with the answers they received. On the contrary, many people only view this time period skin deep. It wasn't the glorious, carefree days that past generations remember. They too had the problems of violence, scandals, drugs, sex, and alcohol. However, it was all underground. Let me take you back to a time where the girls were dancing, the music was blasting, and underground crime was at its peak. The date you ask? February 14, 1929. A date that would go down in American history as "The Valentines Day Massacre.".
Prohibition was the eighteenth amendment, the Volstead Act, which was passed on October 10th, 1919 against alcohol. This Act outlined that it was illegal to import, export, transport, sell, manufacture, barter, and own any beverages which contained more than 0.5% alcohol excluding the alcohol used for medicinal and sacramental purposes. The law was passed mainly to reduce the crime and death rates in the United States. Prohibition did solve some of the problems in the United States for the first few years, but did not last for long.
One of the worst effects of Prohibition was alcohol export being controlled by huge gangsters like Al Capone, who had his headquarters based in Chicago. More than 100,000 speak-easies were in New-York City alone. It almost seemed impossible to control the huge amounts of alcohol being transported throughout the United States. .
Al "Scar face" Capone was one of the most notorious gang leaders of his time.
