Interactive Historical Introduction

Coolidge-Consumerism Collection

This program introduces the Coolidge-Consumerism collection, sketching out principal themes and offering a broad sampling of available titles relevant to these themes. The INTRO NOTES listed below have a sequential logic and can be read in the order listed. There is enough overlapping information, however, to permit each note to stand alone.

Throughout the introduction, links are provided to selected items from the collection as well as to other INTRO NOTES, DETAIL NOTES (supplemental information), and DIRECTORY NOTES (information about individual collections).

Overview (start here)

INTRO NOTES:

1. Taylorism and Economic Efficiency in the 1920s
2. The Coolidge Presidency
3. Herbert Hoover, Economic Mastermind
4. Data as Product and the Growth of the Social Sciences
5. The Thrift Movement and Mass Consumption
6. Laboring to Prosper
7. The Automobile: Consumerism on Wheels
8. Consumerism and The Home
9. Consumerism on the Farm
10. African Americans and the Consumer Economy
11. Retailing: Five and Dime to High Fashion
12. Chain Stores and Mail Order
13. Buying on the Installment Plan: The Debate over Consumer Credit
14. Advertising and Public Relations: The Mass Distribution of Ideas
15. Radio: A Consumer Product and a Producer of Consumption
16. Newsstand 1926
17. The Anxiety of Leisure and the Search for "Wholesome" Recreation
18. Spiritual Well Being: the Ultimate Economic Good
19. Critiques of the Mass Consumer Society: Protecting the Consumer from Consumerism