1921 – Page 3 – Old Magazine Articles

An Alien Anti-Dumping Bill
(Literary Digest, 1921)

A 3 percent remedy’ for our immigration ills, real or fancied, will restrict the admission of aliens from May of this year to June, 1922, to 3 percent of the total of each nationality in this country when the Federal census was taken in 1910. As passed by the house, and expected to pass the Senate, the new measure, except for the time limit, is identical with the Johnson Bill passed in the last session of Congress and killed by pocket-veto of President Wilson.

But the Johnson Bill does not set up a permanent restrictive policy; it is intended merely to protect this country for the next fourteen months from a horde of Europe’s most objectionable classes.

The War-Poetry of the Soldier-Poets
(The English Review, 1921)

Soldier poets are the true historians of the war. Unlike the host of professional versifiers who sat up day and night on Parnassus, pouring out their patriotic zeal in allegorical rhymes of battles and batteries with more than Aesopian facility, the soldier poets have given to life and literature a genuine interpretation of warfare stripped bare of artificialty

Columbia University and NYU Charged with Antisemitism
(The Nation, 1921)

A short paragraph from 1921 in which the editors of The Nation leveled a charge at the admission departments for both New York University and Columbia for having taken steps that would reduce the number of Jewish students admitted each year.

The Future of War and Chemical Weapons
(Current Opinion, 1921)

Read this article and you will soon get a sense of what busy bees they must have been over at the United States Department of War within that year and a half following the close of World War One. General Amos A. Fries and the lads attached to the Chemical Warfare Service had been applying much cranium power to all matters involving mustard gas, tear gas, Lewisite and White Phosphorus. Much of the post-war dollar was devoted to making ships impervious to gas attacks, masks and uniforms suited to withstand nerve agents and offensive aircraft capable of deploying chemical bombs.

As to the effectiveness of phosphorous and thermit against machine-gun nests, there is no recorded instance where our gas troops failed to silence German machine-gun nests once they were located…In the next war, no matter how soon it may occur, a deadly composition called Lewisite will be used with far more devastating effect than that of mustard gas.

Two Million Dead Men and the Advance of Feminism
(Delineator Magazine, 1921)

What was keenly felt in the Great Britain of the 1920s was the distinct absence of two million men as a result of the First World War. This short article points out clearly that this was fertile ground for suffrage advancements, as well as any number of other social changes.

England is the great human laboratory of our generation – England with her surplus of two million women, her restless, well-equipped, unsatisfied women.

Modern Women for a Modern Age
(Vanity Fair, 1921)

Contained within the confines of the attached PDF is an excerpt from the review of the New York production of the 1921 play, A Bill of Divorcement by Clemence Dane (born Winifred Ashton 1888-1965) – with much enthusiasm, the reviewer wrote:

We know of no better expression of the creed of the new generation than that which Clemence Dane has drawn up….

What followed was a very short soliloquy which beautifully summed up not only the philosophy of the modern woman, but the philosophy of much the Twentieth Century.

Comprehending the Flapper Revolt
(Vanity Fair, 1921)

In the early Twenties there were a good many social changes which men had to struggle to understand; among them was the Modern Woman. The Italian novelist and lexicographer Alfredo Panzini (1863 – 1939) attempted to do just that for the editors of Vanity Fair.

‘Don’t expect us’, she says to you, disconsolate male, ‘don’t expect us to be like the old-fashioned girls who went to church, and did the laundry, and looked up to their husbands as to their God.’

The Downfall of a Dirigible
(The Independent, 1921)

A 1921 article from The Independent reported on the accident that doomed the dirigible Z-R2 in the skies over the British town of Hull. This British-built R-38 class airship was to be handed-over to the U.S. Navy and had a mixed crew composed of both Yanks and Brits; five of whom survived. Among the dead was Air-Commodore E.M. Maitland (b. 1880).

Christians 2: Buddhists 1′
(Literary Digest, 1921)

In 1921 a Kyoto Bible school was challenged by a neighboring Buddhist temple. The confrontation did not involve the finer points of theology (not openly, anyway) but which of the two tribes was superior at baseball. It was a Hell of a game.

The uncredited foreign correspondent made it known within the opening paragraphs that the Kyoto Buddhists were irked by the spread of Christianity in that region of Japan and chose to deploy any means at their disposal to gain some sort of advantage.

Twenty-one years later a Japanese team would play an American team. Read about that game here…

British Attempt to Prevent Jewish Growth in Palestine
(The Spectator, 1921)

Confronting the issue of growing unrest in British Palestine, Winston Churchill cautioned the British colonial administrators to soothe the tempers of the Arabs in Palestine by limiting the growth of the Jewish population.

‘Canonizing the Flapper”
(Vanity Fair, 1921)

The following is an excerpt from the review of the New York production of the 1921 play, A Bill of Divorcement by Clemence Dane (born Winifred Ashton 1888 – 1965). With much enthusiasm, the reviewer wrote:

We know of no better expression of the creed of the new generation than that which Clemence Dane has drawn up….

What followed was a very short soliloquy which beautifully summed up not only the philosophy of the modern woman, but the philosophy of much the Twentieth Century.

Farewell Woodrow Wilson
(Vanity Fair Magazine, 1921)

Celebrated columnist Walter Lippmann (1889 – 1974) wrote this piece to mark the end of the Wilson administration (1912 – 1920) and usher-in that of Warren G. Harding (1865 – 1923).

Unlike the ink-slingers in ages to come, Lippmann had pleasant remarks to make regarding his presidency:

And I firmly believe that the historian who examines the state papers of Wilson up to November, 1918, will say, not only that they are in an unbroken line from Washington’s Farewell Address, but that it required something very like genius under the pressure and in the fog of a world war, to keep that line intact.

Click here to read about a dream that President Lincoln had, a dream that anticipated his violent death.

Read a 1951 profile of a future First Lady: the young Nancy Reagan.

Quotas in 1921 Immigration
(The Independent, 1921)

One hundred years ago the U.S. Government processed immigrants through a quota system – entry would be granted if the applicants arrived before the quota amount arriving from their country had not been reached – and if they passed their physical examination. The immigration agents did not accept one nationality for citizenship officially while permitting hundreds of thousands from this same country to reside illegally, as is the practice today. The attached column pertains to how unfair the quota system was and how it tended to break-up families. President Harding’s response to this issue is quoted.

…many would-be immigrants arriving at the port of New York had been refused admission and been sent home again, because they had happened to arrive a few hours after their country’s legal quota for the month…

Britain and France Draw Closer
(Literary Digest, 1921)

When Capitol Hill rejected the Versailles Treaty in 1919, Paris and London found themselves having to rely upon each other in ways they weren’t expecting.

‘The Real Yellow Peril”
(The Independent, 1921)

Three cheers for the late Earl S. Parker, long-suffering secretary of the now-defunct American League of Justice (California) who recognized the tyranny inherit in the California Alien Land Bill of 1921! Seeing that the Japanese immigrants had been dealt enough cruelty by being denied citizenship, he was quick to point out that it was wrong to deny them real estate as well.

Click here to read about the Yellow Peril in Canada.

Alien Poll Tax Overruled
(The Independent,1921)

A report on the California Supreme Court of 1921 which saw fit to overturn a piece of legislation that mandated an alien poll tax.

The tax had been passed into law just one year earlier and was found to be in conflict with the Fourteenth Amendment of the United States Constitution.

Read another article about Asian immigration to California.

Ties, Waistcoats, Panama Hats & the Right Clothes for Summer Sports
(Vanity Fair Magazine, 1921)

This article is very broad in it’s appeal; the fashion journalist did not simply cover the summer suit options available to the Well-Dressed Man of 1921 but also the tennis apparel, equestrian attire and the apropriate togs for slacking off at your favorite homo-phobic, sexist, anti-semetic and racist club.

The Shirt Tuck
(Magazine Advertisement, 1921)

There is no doubt about the fact that in the 1920s, there lived a great number of men who left the world a far richer place for their having walked the earth when they did; fellows like Pablo Picasso and Bertrand Russel, to name only two. The shallow editors at OldMagazineArticles.com think that is all just ducky, but what we really want to know is how did these men keep their shirts tucked in? How could such fellows as these look so presentable when so many men before them have failed?

We did some digging around and this is what we discovered…