The History of the Twentieth Century

Dissenting generals kidnap Chiang Kai-shek and force him to negotiate with the Chinese, while in Japan, right-wing radicals in the military consolidate their power.

The generals tried to end the war in a matter of months by moving on the capital. Madrid held, but the Republic couldn't hold its crucial northern enclave.

English language literature of the Jazz Age disdained the old conventions and went off in a new direction, emphasizing the subjectivity of experience and rejecting established authority.

Franklin Roosevelt was very popular in 1936, but he and his campaign had concerns, not only about the Republicans, but about potential challenges from the left.

The Spanish government was aware that a coup was coming and had taken steps against it, though these precautions would prove inadequate. Still, the coup would likely have failed without intervention from Germany and Italy.

King Alfonso XIII fled Spain in 1931 following the declaration of the Second Spanish Republic. But monarchists, the Catholic Church, and other right-wing forces in Spain were not ready to submit.

King George V died in January 1936, leaving the crown to his eldest son, who became Edward VIII. But Edward just didn't seem to take his responsibilities seriously.

By all appearances, Adolf Hitler was enormously popular in the early years of his rule over Germany. The Germans named streets, squares, even their own children, after him. They sold beer steins with his face on them. The Nazis created the "Strength through Joy" program to create leisure activities for working people. The 1936 Olympics was staged to celebrate Nazi accomplishments.

Whatever its domestic policies, in international relations, Fascist Italy remained reasonable in its international relations. Then it invaded Ethiopia.

Under Nazi rule, German officials had to create a legal system that would define who was and wasn't "Aryan," because you can't oppress the "non-Aryans" until you know who they are.

After the vindication of the 1934 mid-terms, Franklin Roosevelt further enlarges his agenda.

In the early twentieth century, sovereignty over the Chaco Boreal in central South America was still unsettled. Bolivia and Peru went to war over their conflicting claims.

Animated short films were already popular during the 1920s, but the rise of sound and color in motion pictures, pioneered by Walt Disney, revolutionized the form.

Animated drawings, in the form of flip books and zoetropes, already existed at the beginning of the twentieth century, but the rise of motion pictures also made possible the beginning of animated motion pictures.

After the Night of the Long Knives, and with his domestic position secure, Hitler turned to foreign policy. German violations of the Treaty of Versailles were publicly acknowledged by 1935, and in spring of 1936, German soldiers entered the Rhineland.

Adolf Hitler was already effectively dictator of Germany, but in the first 18 months, he moved to tighten his grip, even going so far as to murder his own supporters in the SA and elsewhere.

Even before Hitler and the Nazis took power, it was an open secret that Germany was enlarging its military beyond what the Treaty of Versailles allowed, leading to jittery nerves in France and Britain.

In this episode, we finish up a couple of New Deal programs we didn't get to talk about last time, and examine the Roosevelt Administration's efforts to restore confidence in Wall Street and in a dollar no longer backed by gold.

Franklin Roosevelt's administration began with a bang.

In the four-month period between Roosevelt's election and his inauguration, the American economy went from bad to worse.

New York Governor Franklin Roosevelt was the wide favorite for the 1932 Democratic Presidential nomination, while Herbert Hoover's popularity, like the US economy, was declining every month.

Franklin Delano Roosevelt, scion of two old and wealthy New York families, former Assistant Secretary of the Navy and candidate for Vice President of the United States, had a bright future ahead of him. Then he came down with polio.

Rutherford's hypothetical neutron was proved to exist in 1932. Atomic physics in the 1930s was regularly producing dramatic--and disturbing--new results.

The British economy hadn't fully bounced back from the war when the Depression hit, eventually forcing Britain off the gold standard once again.

The Indian National Congress had declared independence, but waited for Gandhi to propose a strategy for resisting British rule. Gandhi came up with a characteristically unusual suggestion.