When thinking of toys that have tested the fate of time, none are as prevalent as the yo-yo. It’s a simple toy that is two disks tied together with a string that people can perform increasingly difficult tricks with. The average person in the 21st century is aware of Duncan Toys Company and the various yo-yos they sell, but they don’t know who brought the modern concept to the United States.

What many people don’t realize is that the story of the first commercialized yo-yos is one of immigrant success during a time of hatred and nationalism. Despite the surplus of anti-Filipino riots throughout the United States and the eventual stock market crash, Pedro Flores created a product that lasted long after his death, and his name and story deserve to be acknowledged by the public sphere.

The Creator

Pedro Flores was born in 1896 in Vintar, a municipality in the Philippines. It’s very likely he did not have the best childhood growing up, as his home country was transitioning through a period of war and turmoil. They had been part of the Spanish–American War, with a naval battle happening in Manila bay, and many Filipinos fighting alongside the Americans.

When they were free from the chains of Spanish rule, the United States annexed them, and they soon found themselves in the Philippines-American War after revolting against their new colonial power, until the Philippines surrendered in 1901.

What he did gain from everything, despite his rough childhood, was the precursor to the modern yo-yo.

In 1915, at around 19 years old, Flores moved from the Philippines to the United States, landing himself in California in order to pursue an education at San Francisco’s High School of Commerce.¹ Afterwards, he studied law at the University of California’s law school, but dropped out and moved to Santa Barbra, working odd jobs in order to survive.²

While working as a bellboy, he decided to “[demonstrate] a toy that he had carved out of wood during his lunch break.”³ After reading of a man who made money off of a rubber ball attached to a string, he thought back to the yo-yo and figured it had market potential, stating “I do not expect to make a million dollars, I just want to be working for myself. I have been working for other people for practically all my life and I don’t like it.”⁴

From there, he set his pursuits on starting up a yo-yo company. He had no luck asking for assistance from wealthy Filipino countrymen, so Flores focused on receiving a certificate to conduct business, which he received on June 9th 1928. From there, he started the Yo-Yo Manufacturing Company in Santa Barbara, California.⁵

The Production

Although its modern iteration comes from Pedro Flores, the idea of the yo-yo has been around for centuries in Ancient Greece and China, showing up in pots and paintings respectively.⁶ In the 18th century, it was a popular toy among aristocrats and, in English, was referred to as a “bandalore” or “quiz.”⁷⁸ A popular theory states the yo-yo was used as a weapon in the Philippines, but there is no evidence to back up this claim.

Additionally, many people incorrectly claim that “yo-yo” is a word from Tagalog that translates to “come-come” or “to return” in English. In Tagalog, the word does not exist. “Halika dito” (come here) and “bumalik” (with a person, to return) are actual words in Tagalog, but not “yo-yo.”

Another theory is that the word comes from Ilocano, but I am not familiar enough with the language, nor do I know anyone who can speak it. This makes the question of where the word “yo-yo” comes from unanswered, but the simplest answer could be that Flores came up with something catchy that would help the toy sell. Unfortunately, no one can know for sure.

After the creation of the Yo-Yo Manufacturing Company, Flores created a dozen yo-yos that he sold to the neighboring children on June 23, 1928.⁹ Some quick math reveals that each yo-yo likely took a day to create. By November of that same year, 2,000 yo-yos were produced. This attracted financiers James Lewis and Daniel Stone, who helped him create a new company in Los Angeles that had machines.[] He finally didn’t have to carve yo-yos by hand. By November 1929, he also had Flores Yo-Yo Corporation in Hollywood, and was producing 300,000 yo-yos daily.

What helped propel the yo-yo’s popularity was the yo-yo contests held. The first contests happened in 1928, and were hosted by Pedro Flores himself in Santa Barbara. These original contests were a test to see “who could make the yo-yo go up and down the most times without stopping.”¹⁰

There were also contests to see “who could throw their yo-yo the farthest with a complete return to the hand, and who could perform the most perfect spins in five minutes.”¹¹ These fun tricks one could do with a yo-yo attracted the attention of various people, going as far out as interesting Donald F. Duncan, the man behind Duncan Toys Company.

After the success of the yo-yo, Flores sold the product to Duncan in 1930 for around $25,000 to $250,000—though many agree the price to be on the lower end of the spectrum.¹² He is quoted with saying “I am more interested in teaching children to use the yo-yos than I am in manufacturing of yo-yos,” and did promote the toy for Duncan after the fact.¹³ Flores continued to attach himself to the yo-yo, helping people such as Joe Radovan sell the Chico Yo-yo, and even started Flores Corp. of America in 1954, where he temporarily produced more of the toy.¹⁴ Unfortunately, many of these companies are gone, and Flores eventually passed in 1964, but Duncan still sells yo-yos of varying skill levels to this day.

Significance

Immigration and Racism

Pedro Flores was an immigrant from the Philippines. He isn’t unlike other immigrants who came to the United States; he likely traveled across the Pacific Ocean to seek a better life outside the Philippines. However, as a Filipino immigrant, his experience is more unique from other immigrants.

After the Spanish-American War and the Philippine-American War, the United States controlled the Philippines behind the scenes. This included Filipino education, where they taught the new generation English, and that all men are created equal. As a result, Filipinos did not see themselves as aliens when they immigrated to the United States and “existed, rather, in a midway zone between Filipino and American identity.”¹⁵

Filipino immigrants were also unaffected by the Immigration Act of 1917, which imposed literacy tests on Asian immigrants. This is likely due to the Philippines being controlled by the United States.

Numbers rose as more Filipinos immigrated to the United States, with a large population of them settling in California—it is the closest state to the Philippines, after all. However, as immigration rose throughout the United States, the Ku Klux Klan rose to fight for nativism. They were one of many groups to lobby for restrictions on immigration.¹⁶ Additionally, despite their focus being against black Americans and Catholics, they also targeted immigrants, such as Filipinos. The KKK stirred much anti-Asian sentiment within America, causing anti-Filipino riots to occur in America.

For example, in 1927, one of the biggest anti-Filipino riots happened in Yakima Valley, Washington. A mob of white people was demanding that Filipino farmworkers be driven out from the valley, believing that “since the Filipinos were brown-skinned and Asian, they should not be permitted to approach white women or compete with white men for jobs.”¹⁷ This is, obviously, not true and only serves to objectify Filipinos, but people believed it at the time, and these mobs eventually chased them out after threatening their deaths. The perpetrators were arrested, but only received ten days of jail time.

Something similar happened in Wenatchee Valley, Washington in 1928 and 1929, where Filipinos were chased out of the valley.¹⁸ What happened at these riots, and many other anti-Filipino riots throughout the decade, is disgusting. This isn’t even the worst of what I found, as more violent acts have been committed in different riots, but the fact that white people were willing to chase these Filipinos down because they looked different is a testament to the hatred of the decade, even with the pluralism of the time.

Despite this anti-Filipino sentiment along the West Coast, Pedro Flores still made a name for himself. This is an amazing accomplishment that should be celebrated alongside other famous figures of the decade. He made a noteworthy contribution to culture then and now, and his name deserves recognition as well.

Reflection of Culture

When reflecting upon consumer culture, the creation of the modern yo-yo for American audiences is an interesting case. Especially when compared to objects like the Form Model T.

Pedro Flores created a product based on the culture he knew, and managed to sell it through demonstration. According to Lynn Dumenil, blue-collar workers helped shape consumer culture, while white-collar workers were more susceptible to consumer culture through things such as advertising.¹⁹²⁰

As stated before with Filipino immigrants being the midway point of their Filipino and American identities, Flores’s yo-yos exist as him contributing his culture, that being a toy from the Philippines, while also successfully advertising it to the public.

The Modern Temper specifically discusses how advertisements in the 1920s utilized “the personal approach, the tendency to include “you” in the text.”²¹ He managed to encapsulate this perfectly with his yo-yo competitions. If a person wished to participate, they needed a yo-yo, and Flores Yo-yos were the only yo-yos available for a while. These competitions eventually spread outside Santa Barbara and outside California, furthering his product’s reach, and getting more people to buy his yo-yo.

On top of that, yo-yos were relatively cheap to make, meaning they could easily be produced and sold to the public. Even when the Great Depression hit, “[inexpensive] toys with high play value, such as the yo-yo and the Radio Flyer Wagon, were very lucrative investments. Whereas other American entrepreneurs lost fortunes, toy inventors such as Pedro Flores and Antonio Pasin acquired millions.”²² The yo-yo surviving the Great Depression is an incredible feat, but it’s thanks to the fact that it’s simply two wooden disks, a wooden axel, and a piece of string. Anyone could hypothetically create a yo-yo if they had the skill and patience.

What this meant for the 20s (and beyond?)

Ever since, the yo-yo has been a popular toy among children. In the late 90s, Yomega partnered with Bandai, causing a bunch of advertising of the yo-yo to spread like wildfire and reignite the craze for the toy.²³

The toy became so popular that National Yo-yo Day is celebrated on June 6th to commemorate Donald F. Duncan. While this is an amazing achievement for a toy to have, what about the man who brought the toy to the United States?

I’m not suggesting we change National Yo-yo Day to be on Pedro Flores’ birthday, but it is a shame that Duncan is celebrated before Flores.

The story behind the modern yo-yo is a story of Filipino success that should be celebrated. Considering the toy’s 100th year anniversary is coming up as of writing this blog post, Duncan Toys Company should commemorate the toy’s origin by retelling Pedro Flores’ story. That way, his name isn’t just a footnote in the toy’s history, as he had a huge role in bringing the toy over from the Philippines.

They also used to have a history page back in the early 2000s that mentioned Pedro Flores, but have since removed it as the years have gone by and website standards change. I personally believe they should bring their history page back, so that people curious about the origin of the yo-yo have a starting point and understand that Duncan shouldn’t be taking all the credit from Flores.

After all, to quote Lucky’s Collectors Guide to 20th Century Yo-yos: History and Values, “Although Duncan is now the name most frequently associated with the popularity of the yo-yo, Pedro Flores fueled the original yo-yo fire.”²⁴

Citations

Footnotes

1. Naomi Hirahara, Distinguished Asian American Business Leaders (Bloomsbury Academic, 2003), 57. ︎
2. Hirahara, 57. ︎
3. Hirahara, 57. ︎
4. Lucky J. Meisenheimer, Lucky’s Collectors Guide to 20th Century Yo-Yos (Lucky J’s Swim & Surf, 1998), 99. ︎
5. Meisenheimer, 99. ︎
6. Mark Fischetti, “String Theory,” Scientific American 291, no. 3 (2004): 110. http://www.jstor.org/stable/26060692. ︎
7. Fischetti, 110. ︎
8. Meisenheimer, 34. ︎
9. Meisenheimer, 99. ︎
10. Meisenheimer, 36. ︎
11. Meisenheimer, 100. ︎
12. Meisenheimer, 61. ︎
13. Meisenheimer, 100 ︎
14. Meisenheimer, 100. ︎
15. Kevin Starr, Golden Dreams (Oxford University Press, 2011), 450. ︎
16. Lynn Dumenil, The Modern Temper : American Culture and Society in the 1920s (New York, Ny: Hill and Wang, 2007), 207. ︎
17. Steve Ross, “Ninety Years Ago in Washington, a Wave of Anti-Immigrant Sentiment Resulted in Horror for Filipinos,” Slate Magazine (Slate, August 4, 2017). https://slate.com/news-and-politics/2017/08/ninety-years-ago-in-washington-a-wave-of-anti-immigrant-sentiment-resulted-in-horror-for-filipinos.html?pay=1778139475174. ︎
18. Ross. ︎
19. Dumenil, 82. ︎
20. Dumenil, 86. ︎
21. Dumenil, 90. ︎
22. Sharon M. Scott, Toys and American Culture: An Encyclopedia (ABC-CLIO, 2009), xxiv. ︎
23. Dr. Yo-Yo’s Emporium of Wonderful Things, “AYYA: 10 Years and Throwing – the Unreleased Documentary,” YouTube, November 4, 2012, 30:36. https://youtu.be/EeYhGP92ESI?si=ufsyMmG1iAuFIyvR. ︎
24. Meisenheimer, 100. ︎

Bibliography

Dr. Yo-Yo’s Emporium of Wonderful Things. “AYYA: 10 Years and Throwing – the Unreleased Documentary.” YouTube, November 4, 2012. https://youtu.be/EeYhGP92ESI?si=ufsyMmG1iAuFIyvR.

Dumenil, Lynn. The Modern Temper : American Culture and Society in the 1920s. New York, Ny: Hill and Wang, 2007.

Fischetti, Mark. “String Theory.” Scientific American 291, no. 3 (2004): 110–11. http://www.jstor.org/stable/26060692.

Hirahara, Naomi. Distinguished Asian American Business Leaders. Bloomsbury Academic, 2003.

Meisenheimer, Lucky J. Lucky’s Collectors Guide to 20th Century Yo-Yos. Lucky J’s Swim & Surf, 1998.

Ross, Steve. “Ninety Years Ago in Washington, a Wave of Anti-Immigrant Sentiment Resulted in Horror for Filipinos.” Slate Magazine. Slate, August 4, 2017. https://slate.com/news-and-politics/2017/08/ninety-years-ago-in-washington-a-wave-of-anti-immigrant-sentiment-resulted-in-horror-for-filipinos.html?pay=1778139475174.

Scott, Sharon M. Toys and American Culture: An Encyclopedia. ABC-CLIO, 2009.

Starr, Kevin. Golden Dreams. Oxford University Press, 2011.

Eryn Argonza

Eryn is a Ramapo College sophomore majoring in History and minoring in Museum Studies.

On December 5th, 1928, Colombian laborers and their families gathered at Ciénaga’s train station to negotiate the terms of their strike against the United Fruit Company with the Governor of Magdelena. Just before midnight, the Colombian military opened fire on the crowd as the government declared a state of siege in the banana zone.​ This atrocity, ending the morning of December 6th, is known as the Banana Massacre.¹ 

The Popularity of Bananas

The 1920s was an era known for excessive consumer culture fueled by increased advertising and affordable goods. The banana offers a case in point – it grew in popularity in the 1920s due to the United Fruit Company’s vigorous advertising campaign.  The company began advertising bananas in 1917 when they already had established plantations in Central and South American countries. They used the “logic” form of advertising to sell the exotic fruit, having scientists promote the nutritional value of bananas, and saw banana sales increase. Advertising in America would change forever when Edward Bernays began targeting people’s emotions instead of logic. With this new mode of advertising proving to be highly successful, the U.F.C. launched the “Great White Fleet” cruiser that brought Americans to tour United Fruit’s plantations in Latin America while also transporting bananas. This endeavor would prove to be very successful in increasing the banana market.² 

Visitors saw a theatrically created plantation that appeared to be a humane and peaceful place. In reality, U.F.C. plantations were corrupt, and the laborers were subjected to terrible work conditions.³ The United Fruit Company did not value their workers; laborers were only regarded as replaceable cogs in their machines. For this reason, there are few photos of the actual workers who labored at the UFC’s plantations. Indeed, most photos from the UFC during this era are of cars, the bananas themselves, and infrastructure.⁴ This makes the photo of the strike organizers particularly rare. The image was not meant to be available to the general public, as its primary purpose was to inform the operations of the management and security forces. ⁵

The Strike

Colombia was home to several United Fruit plantations, where banana workers were subjected to long hours and low pay. Raul Eduardo Mahecha, a Partido Socialista Revolucionário (PSR) representative, led the strike that preceded the massacre.⁶ With the support of fellow PSR members Ignacio Torres Giraldo and Maria Cano, Mahecha led a lecture tour of the Banana Zone discussing labor rights. This inspired significant support for reform, with the plantation workers’ concerns regarding the contract system, their work hours, and the abuses they and their families were subjected to by their supervisors. For example, a worker named Aristides Lopez Rokano stated: “We worked from six in the morning until eleven and then from one in the afternoon until six…The contractor paid the salary and reserved up to thirty percent for himself.” At the same time, the wives and daughters of the workers suffered sexual violence at the hands of the UFC employees. Inspired by the words of Mahecha, workers gathered on October 6, 1928, to discuss these frustrations, and unionist Erasmo Coronel proposed the idea of a strike. The workers created nine demands for better working conditions, citing parts of the Colombian Constitution to support these demands.⁷ In this way, these efforts were less an act of communism and more an attempt to modernize labor relations in Colombia. Their demands included receiving real money payments and transitioning to a six-day work week. ⁸

The Massacre

American corporate interference in international relations would not have been possible before World War I when there was more suspicion of corporate power. However, by the 1920s, the American public idealized corporations and businessmen, as Americans largely viewed them as instrumental parts of the war effort.⁹ The American government in the 1920s supported corporations like the United Fruit Company to expand their markets and acquire raw materials by applying economic, diplomatic, and military pressure. This was particularly common in Latin America. The pressure could be subtle or indirect. However, in Nicaragua, Guatemala, Haiti, Honduras, and Santo Domingo, the U.S. government took bold action to protect corporations’ interests by sending troops.¹⁰

The United Fruit Company thus leveraged its power in the United States government to ensure that the strike in Colombia was brought to what would be a bloody end. Considering that the strikers’ demands would have resulted in higher operation costs for the company, the U.F.C. utilized its ties with the United States government to have the Marine Corps threaten to invade Colombia if the Colombian government did not protect the company’s interests and end the strike.¹¹ In this way, the Banana Massacre was the direct result of American military threats and pressure against the Colombian government. 

The strike gained national attention in the United States, although it conveniently ignored the terrible conditions that led to the strike. Prominent newspapers like the New York Times focused on how the strike threatened Americans in Colombia, as opposed to what this strike and the actions of the U.F.C. had meant for Colombians. For example, the Times published a map entitled “Region Affected by Colombia Strike” on December 6, 1928, after the massacre had been committed. Instead of using this visualization of the Banana Zone as an opportunity to highlight the crimes committed by the Colombian military on the strikers, the map’s caption highlights how the strike was endangering the “lives and property of Americans.”¹² This demonstrates how the strike was viewed as a harmful hindrance to the small number of Americans located in and exploiting the Banana Zone. This is a testament to the successful efforts to cover up the massacre in American media. 

The strike lasted two months, and on December 5th, the Governor of Magdalena summoned the strikers to Ciénaga to settle the strike. Strikers gathered in the thousands, and at the same time, the government issued Decree Number 1 that ordered the military, led by Carlos Cortes Vargas, to open fire on the unarmed strikers and their families.¹³ It is estimated that anywhere from 50 to 2,000 people were killed in Ciénaga’s train station that night.¹⁴ Despite this, by daybreak, only nine bodies were left behind. Some strikers theorized that the nine bodies were symbolic of the nine demands of the strikers. The Colombian military did not end there, with officers killing over 1,000 strikers. Laborers responded by destroying several of United Fruit’s buildings.¹⁵

Liberal politician Jorge Eliecer Gaitan brought significant attention to the disastrous conduct of the military during the massacre in Colombia. Union leader Ignacio Tores Giraldo quipped that Gaitan “concluded the investigation” on the massacre less than a day after it had been committed. One primary issue Gaitan raised regarding the massacre was that it was pre-planned, indicating that there would be little chance for the strikers to protect themselves. Furthermore, those who were only injured after the military opened fire were killed by officers with bayonets, and the dead bodies were thrown into the sea so they could not be found and identified afterward. While committing this atrocity, the drunken military officers, including Cortes Vargas, sexually violated the women in Cienaga. The overarching qualm Gaitan held was that the army acted not in the interest of Colombia but of the United States. The press widely spread Gaitan’s allegations and only increased the disapproval of this massacre.¹⁷ 

The Legacy of the Banana Massacre

In January 1929, 600 strikers were detained and charged with criminal offenses in military courts. Of these 600, 31 were sentenced to prison, ranging from 2-25 years. All of the sentenced were freed in 9 months, after the advocacy of Jorge Eliecer Gaitan during a parliamentary debate. The former strikers only continued their activism, with one of the freed individuals, Alberto Castrillon, announcing his run for the presidency as the PSR party candidate on the symbolic date of December 6, 1929. At the same time, Cortes Vargas and the Minister of War Ignacio Rengifo were demoted from their positions, indicating the decline of the Conservative elite in Colombian politics.¹⁸ Therefore, although the massage successfully crushed the strike, it had the reverse effect in the long term. It offered Colombian workers and unionists a story and martyrs to further their movement and contributed to the end of the conservative hegemony. However, the polarization between Liberals and Conservatives that resulted from this massacre is considered to be the cause of La Violencia, a bloody civil war in Colombia that lasted from 1948-1958.¹⁹

The Banana Massacre was further ingrained into Colombian culture as it was featured in Gabriel Garcia Marquez’s 1967 Nobel Prize-winning novel 100 Years of Solitude. In this pillar of magical realism, Marquez describes the presence of an American banana company in the fictional Colombian town of Macondo, which exploited and destroyed the town’s resources and people. The people responded with a general strike, culminating in the military executing an apocalyptic massacre against the strikers who had gathered in a train station. Garcia Marquez has explained that this scene was directly inspired by the Banana Massacre, which was prominent in his memory of Colombian history.²⁰

This atrocity continues to be a point of contention in Colombia, as, in 2017, right-wing Representative Maria Fernanda Cabal claimed that the massacre was a communist myth that was blown out of proportion in order to support communist operations.²¹ In this way, the rhetoric of a communist threat persists in modern-day discussions of the Banana Massacre.

Significance to the 1920s

Justifying such violence and anti-union activity required fear-mongering, with the most effective tool being the apparent threat of the spread of communism. The strike in Colombia did occur in alliance with the Colombian Communist Party, which helped mobilize the poor and small business owners to support the strikers and their demands.²² Prior to the massacre, from 1919 to 1920, the United States was the site of a Red Scare, the successful result of the Bolshevik Revolution in what became the Soviet Union. During the Red Scare, the American public feared that communism would create a revolution in the United States. Due to this, significant hysteria spread throughout the United States, with people like organized laborers under intense scrutiny.²³ For this reason, corporations that suppressed strikes were viewed as safeguards against communism.²⁴ This was not coincidental, as corporations, with the help of the press, made it seem as though all strikes were part of a larger communist plot.²⁵ Furthermore, companies like the United Fruit Company hired public relations firms to ensure that bloody stories like the Banana Massacre did not reach the American public.²⁶

The language of a communist threat also pervaded government correspondence regarding the massacre. According to a telegram sent from the American Vice Consul in Santa Marta Lawrence Cotie to the Secretary of State at the time, Frank Billings Kellogg, on December 9, 1928, the Colombian military was “actively engaged in clearing the district of the Communists.”²⁸ What is meant by “clearing” is not precisely clear, but one could conjecture that it is about detaining or even killing those suspected to be communist. In this way, it is clear that the apparent threat of communism was key to military operations in the Banana Zone.

The role of the Red Scare and censorship looked rather different on the Colombian side of this atrocity. The Colombian government also feared a communist revolution, resulting in the passage of Decree 707, which gave the police significant powers to repress those suspected to be communist in 1927. Similarly, in 1928, the government introduced and passed projects aimed at attacking suspected communists. However, this did very little to prevent the growth of the opposition to the conservative government. Thus the campaign against the “Red Menace” was largely unsuccessful and criticized by many domestically and internationally.²⁹ 

Despite the predominantly conservative regime that seemed to dominate Colombia’s politics in the 1920s, propaganda against them proliferated before and during the strike. For example, the Diario de Córdoba was best known for ridiculing army officers. Mahecha utilized his printing machine to have La Nacion and La Prensa publish pieces supporting the strike. This rhetoric spread to the opposition press in Bogota. The propaganda leaflets were read aloud to the largely illiterate crowds. The government was slightly more successful in censoring the press in the Banana Zone from the date of the massacre until the end of the state of siege on March 14, 1929. Outside of the Banana Zone, however, newspapers continued to criticize the actions of the government.³⁰

Citations 

Footnotes

1. “Colombia: A Photograph We Were Not Supposed To See,” Visualizing the Americas, accessed March 31, 2025, https://visualizingtheamericas.utm.utoronto.ca/1928-massacre-1. ︎
2. Lindsey Morey, “Blood For Bananas: United Fruit’s Central American Empire,” Roots of Contemporary Issues, 2014, https://history.wsu.edu/rci/sample-research-project/. ︎
3. Morey, “Blood For Bananas.” ︎
4. Kevin Coleman, “The Photos That We Don’t Get to See: Sovereignties, Archives, and the 1928 Massacre of Banana Workers in Colombia,” essay, in Making the Empire Work: Labor and United States Imperialism (New York, NY: New York University Press, 2015), 104–34, https://kevincoleman.org/wp-content/uploads/2021/05/Coleman_The-Photos-We-Dont-Get-to-See_Sovereignties-Archives-and-the-1928-Massacre-of-Banana-Workers-in-Colombia.pdf, 106. ︎
5. Coleman, “The Photos That We Don’t Get to See,” 108. ︎
6. “Colombia: A Photograph We Were Not Supposed To See.” ︎
7.  Coleman, “The Photos That We Don’t Get to See,” 110-111. ︎
8. Mariana Ramirez Cabal, “The Dark Side of Bananas: Imperialism, Non-State Actors, and Power,” Harvard International Review, June 9, 2023, https://hir.harvard.edu/the-dark-side-of-bananas-imperialism-non-state-actors-and-power/. ︎
9.  Dumenil, The Modern Temper, 31-32. ︎
10.  Dumenil, The Modern Temper, 36. ︎
11. Ramirez Cabal, “The Dark Side of Bananas: Imperialism, Non-State Actors, and Power.” ︎
12.  Coleman, “The Photos That We Don’t Get to See,” 109. ︎
13.  “Colombia: A Photograph We Were Not Supposed To See.” ︎
14. Aviva Chomsky, “Globalization, Labor, and Violence in Colombia’s Banana Zone,” International Labor and Working-Class History, no. 72 (2007): 901–115, https://www.jstor.org/stable/27673094, 95. ︎
15.  “Colombia: A Photograph We Were Not Supposed To See.” ︎
16.  After the Military Opened Fire on the Striking Workers in Ciénaga, the Workers Destroyed Several of the UFC’s Buildings, Including the Engineers’ Quarters in Sevilla., Kevin Coleman (The United Fruit Company Photograph Collection, Harvard University, 1928), https://kevincoleman.org/wp-content/uploads/2021/05/Coleman_The-Photos-We-Dont-Get-to-See_Sovereignties-Archives-and-the-1928-Massacre-of-Banana-Workers-in-Colombia.pdf. ︎
17. Eduardo Posada-Carbó, “Fiction as History: The Bananeras and Gabriel García Márquez’s One Hundred Years of Solitude,” Journal of Latin American Studies 30, no. 2 (May 1998): 395–414, https://www.jstor.org/stable/158531, 404-405. ︎
18. Posada-Carbó, “Fiction as History,” 403 ︎
19. Adriaan Alsema, “One of Colombia’s Worst Massacres in History a Communist Myth: Opposition Senator,” Colombia News, November 30, 2017, https://colombiareports.com/amp/one-colombias-worst-massacres-history-communist-myth-opposition-senator/. ︎
20. Posada-Carbó, “Fiction as History,” 395-396. ︎
21. Alsema, “One of Colombia’s Worst Massacres in History a Communist Myth.” ︎
22.  Chomsky, “Globalization, Labor, and Violence in Colombia’s Banana Zone,” 95. ︎
23. Dumenil, The Modern Temper, 218. ︎
24. Dumenil, The Modern Temper, 32. ︎
25. Dumenil, The Modern Temper, 220. ︎
26. Dumenil, The Modern Temper, 31. ︎
27. Coleman, “The Photos We Don’t Get to See.” ︎
28.  Kevin Coleman, “The Photos We Don’t Get to See,” Kevin Coleman, June 23, 2021, https://kevincoleman.org/the-1928-massacre-of-banana-workers/. ︎
29. Posada-Carbó, “Fiction as History,” 403-404. ︎
30. Posada-Carbó, “Fiction as History,” 402-403. ︎

Bibliography

1916 Advertisement for the United Fruit Company Steamship Line, Wikimedia Commons (Scribner’s Magazine, February 1, 1916), https://commons.wikimedia.org/wiki/File:United_Fruit_Ad_1916.jpg.

After the military opened fire on the striking workers in Ciénaga, the workers destroyed several of the UFC’s buildings, including the engineers’ quarters in Sevilla. Kevin Coleman. The United Fruit Company Photograph Collection, Harvard University, 1928. https://kevincoleman.org/wp-content/uploads/2021/05/Coleman_The-Photos-We-Dont-Get-to-See_Sovereignties-Archives-and-the-1928-Massacre-of-Banana-Workers-in-Colombia.pdf. 

Alsema, Adriaan. “One of Colombia’s Worst Massacres in History a Communist Myth: Opposition Senator.” Colombia News, November 30, 2017. https://colombiareports.com/amp/one-colombias-worst-massacres-history-communist-myth-opposition-senator/. 

Chomsky, Aviva. “Globalization, Labor, and Violence in Colombia’s Banana Zone.” International Labor and Working-Class History, no. 72 (2007): 901–115. https://doi.org/www.jstor.org/stable/27673094. 

Coleman, Kevin. “The Photos That We Don’t Get to See: Sovereignties, Archives, and the 1928 Massacre of Banana Workers in Colombia.” Essay. In Making the Empire Work: Labor and United States Imperialism, 104–34. New York, NY: New York University Press, 2015. https://kevincoleman.org/wp-content/uploads/2021/05/Coleman_The-Photos-We-Dont-Get-to-See_Sovereignties-Archives-and-the-1928-Massacre-of-Banana-Workers-in-Colombia.pdf. 

Coleman, Kevin. “The Photos We Don’t Get to See.” Kevin Coleman, June 23, 2021. https://kevincoleman.org/the-1928-massacre-of-banana-workers/. 

“Colombia: A Photograph We Were Not Supposed To See.” Visualizing the Americas. Accessed March 31, 2025. https://visualizingtheamericas.utm.utoronto.ca/1928-massacre-1. 

Comisaría de la United Fruit Company en Ciénaga, 1928. 1928. Wikimedia Commons. https://commons.wikimedia.org/wiki/File:Comisariato_cienaga.jpg. 

Handling bananas, backing the bunch, Colombia, 1924. ReVista. Baker Library Historical Collections, Harvard Business School, 1924. https://revista.drclas.harvard.edu/making-a-difference-repatriating-photographs-revista/. 

Morey, Lindsey. “Blood For Bananas: United Fruit’s Central American Empire.” Roots of Contemporary Issues, 2014. https://history.wsu.edu/rci/sample-research-project/. 

Posada-Carbó, Eduardo. “Fiction as History: The Bananeras and Gabriel García Márquez’s One Hundred Years of Solitude.” Journal of Latin American Studies 30, no. 2 (May 1998): 395–414. https://www.jstor.org/stable/158531. 

Ramirez Cabal, Mariana. “The Dark Side of Bananas: Imperialism, Non-State Actors, and Power.” Harvard International Review, June 9, 2023. https://hir.harvard.edu/the-dark-side-of-bananas-imperialism-non-state-actors-and-power/. 

Unknown. Banana Massacre Photo. 1928. Wikimedia Commons. https://commons.wikimedia.org/wiki/File:Banana_massacre_photo.png.

stefanieviera

Stefanie Viera is a 3rd year History and Humanities & Global Studies double major who is taking the Discovering Digital History course in the spring of 2025. She currently work at the Jane Addams Papers Project as an Editorial Assistant.

Across the entire world, the 1920s served as a period of extensive change. Americans experienced the roaring prosperous twenties while Europeans reconstructed from World War I yet Mexico lived through unceasing revolutions. During 1926-1929, both soldiers and civilians lost their lives in the Cristero War to the extent of 90,000 fatalities. The paper analyzes the Cristero War within the historical framework of Mexican society and politics in the 1920s. The United States lived in economic prosperity with cultural freedom at the same time that Mexico faced difficulties applying revolutionary standards which led to widespread population alienation (Meyer, 2008). During the Cristero conflict the worldwide modernization patterns of the 1920s took distinct forms in different societies that produced violent religious upheaval when they confronted traditional cultural identities and beliefs.

Historical Background

After Mexican independence in 1821, the complex dynamics between the state of Mexico and its Catholic Church initiated the Cristero War. Maintaining their belief that progressive reform and democratic progress required diminished Church power, secular reformers pursued measures to reduce the institution’s enormous economic and political capabilities during the 19th century. Anticlerical measures of the 1857 Constitution and Reform Laws by President Benito Juárez finished in nationalized Church properties and separation of state and religion.

In 1910, the Mexican Revolution launched as an opposition against dictator Porfirio Díaz but transformed into several opposing movements that contested Mexico’s prospective direction. Several parts of the 1917 Revolutionary Constitution enforced strict limitations upon religious practices across Mexico (Bailey, 2019). The Mexican Revolution adopted Article 3 to forbid religious education alongside Article 5, which banned monastic orders, and Article 24 limi, ted worship to church buildings as well as Article 27, which legalized all church properties, then denied legal recognition to churches through Article 130 while imposing public dress code limitations on clergy members and demanded civil official approval for clergy during Article 130.

The first post-revolutionary president, Venustiano Carranza, along with Álvaro Obregón, chose not to strictly implement religious opposition laws in order to establish political harmony. Plutarco Elías Calles took over the presidency in 1924 and began systematically enforcing strict measures against the Catholic Church because he believed revolutionary nationalism rejected its religious presence.

The Calles Law and Religious Persecution

The Calles administration established significant changes between the state and church during this period. Calles established the “Law for Reforming the Penal Code” in June 1926 as “Calles Law,” through which he established harsh consequences for breaking anticlerical provisions in the Constitution (Reich, 2018). All priests needed state registration according to the law, while the government maintained limits on religious numbers per state and bans on teaching religion and public worship.

These measures were launched rapidly through forceful execution. Government officials closed monasteries together with convents and religious education institutions. The authorities performed foreign religious staff deportations and created laws against priestly apparel in public while stopping religious parades. Local area officials exceeded federal commands through church closures and religious image destruction. When the government enforced restrictions on Catholic practices, it targeted longstanding Mexican traditions that maintained their essence through rural Catholic communities.

This marked the first time in Mexican history when the Catholic leadership stopped all church-based public worship on July 31, 1926, denying millions of their vital sacraments and religious events. Unpaid religious clerks conducted the “clerical strike” as a peaceful stand that would pressure the government to modify its legislative measures (Rice, 2017). These actions heightened conflicts to a point that sparked military revolt across Mexico.

The Cristero Uprising

In late 1926, several states across Mexico entered into armed conflict with the government because of its religious policies, most notably in the highly Catholic western-central region known as the Bajío. The rebels started using the battle cry “Viva Cristo Rey!” as their war chant. The rebels started using “Long live Christ the King!” as their battle cry and received the nickname “Cristeros.” An initial wave of spontaneous local insurgencies formed into widespread opposition against government religious policies.

Peaceful rural peasants, alongside indigenous people and landowning families, participated in the Cristero rebellion based on their strong connection between Catholicism and their cultural beliefs and social integration. Various Catholic demographics from urban areas united with them by bringing monetary backing, tactical help, and material resources. The “Feminine Brigades of St. Joan of Arc” served as women combatants who managed supply chains and medical aid while distributing ammunition to the resistance forces.

Despite their lack of organization, the Cristero fighters learned to fight through irregular warfare against federal troops. As the conflict grew more intense Generals Enrique Gorostieta regardless of his former stature as a federal general and his skeptic religious views and José Reyes Vega and Jesús Degollado Guízar led the development of the Cristero fighters into a larger fighting force. During 1928, the Cristero fighters successfully ruled across the Mexican states of Jalisco, Michoacán, Guanajuato, Zacatecas, and Colima.

During this time, the government intensified its violent tactics against rebellion supporters. Federal troops conducted executions on captured Cristeros while troops destroyed suspected rebel-supporting villages and forced population relocations to separate the rebels from each other. The Church punished priests through immediate executions when they displayed support for the revolt (Bailey, 2019). Both sides launched a vicious cycle of violence throughout the conflict, which included Cristeros violently targeting government officials and teachers but also federal forces carrying out executions and church desecration of priests.

International Context and U.S. Involvement

During this period, Mexican-American diplomatic relations stood in a state of diplomatic strain. American petroleum industries clashed with the Mexican government through diplomatic conflicts because they objected to provisions in the 1917 Constitution commanding control of natural resource assets. The religious tensions between Mexico and American Catholics became international because of the U.S (Butler, 2007). Catholics defended Mexico’s religious freedom, yet Protestants, along with secular groups, sided with the Mexican government’s church-state separation efforts.

Officially, the U.S. government declared neutrality but concurrently sold weapons to the Mexican government, and at the same time, it instituted an arms embargo against the Cristeros. Under President Calvin Coolidge, America adopted a different approach when he appointed Dwight Morrow as the new ambassador to Mexico in 1927. Morrow devoted his efforts to building better diplomatic ties, which led him to play a decisive role in ending the conflict.

The Cristero War took place alongside the rise of religious conflict, which spread throughout different parts of the world. The 1925 Scopes “Monkey Trial in the United States” displayed the battle between tradition and modernity (Rice, 2017). Through the 1929 Lateran Treaty, Italy resolved previous disputes between its state authorities and the Vatican. The modernizing world witnessed worldwide societal responses to religious questions during these simultaneous historical events.

The Mexican Church and State in the Modern Era

The peace treaty that settled the Cristero War developed in June 1929 as the “Arreglos” through diplomatic efforts by U.S. Ambassador Morrow. The agreement enabled religious worship services inside church buildings while allowing religious education activities within church properties, though educational institutions remained prohibited. The Church acquired the right to demand alterations of the existing laws (Meyer, 2008). The Church accepted to silence its criticisms against the government as part of this deal.

The resulting agreement contained solutions that failed to please the groups involved fully. Several Cristeros felt despair after religious leaders failed to bring about formal legal change through their concessions to the government (Young, 2019). The government decided to maintain the Constitutional anticlerical provisions while agreeing to enforce them with reduced strictness. Hardline officials in the government believed the giveaway of concessions was a major mistake.

The agreement ended the primary combat state, although both parties felt unsatisfied. The June 27, 1929 reopening of churches led most Cristero guerrillas to surrender their arms by August of that year (Tuck, 2021). The government reneged on its promise to provide amnesty, so it executed over 500 leaders of the Cristero movement. The federal government’s betrayal of its promises ignited another Cristero rebellion called “La Segunda,” which fought through the 1930s.

Cultural Impact and Legacy

The Cristero War deeply marked Mexican culture and historical memory. The Cristero War motivated Graham Greene to write “The Power and the Glory” in 1940 and filmmakers to produce the divisive “For Greater Glory” in 2012. John Paul II carried out Church canonizations and beatifications of 25 martyrs during the conflict with 25 priests and other laypeople attaining sainthood status in 2000.

During the Cristero War, rural populations showed that revolutionary elites in Mexico City had lost touch with the traditional Catholic beliefs and cultural elements their rural supporters wished to preserve (Butler, 2007). The conflict made the post-revolutionary state soften its approach to secularization as it recognized that Catholicism remained fundamental to Mexican cultural traditions.

During the 20th century, religious tradition, as an element of Mexican politics, battled continuously against the revolutionary anti-religious initiatives. The government altered its opposition to religion through World War II because it needed national unity for survival (Meyer, 2008). Under President Carlos Salinas de Gortari, Mexico changed its constitution in 1992 to establish legal religious organization recognition, which enabled public worship outside churches and permitted clergy voting rights along with faith-based education in private schools.

Conclusion

Studies of the Cristero War constitute an essential piece of the North American historical narrative that receives minimal attention. During the 1920s, Americans lived in prosperity and cultural liberation. However, Mexicans faced violent conflicts about how religion should shape their national identity. During the 1920s, modernizing trends of the era created diverse reactions across nations, which prompted opposition toward any threats toward prevailing cultural characteristics.

References

Bailey, D. C. (2019). Viva Cristo Rey!: The Cristero Rebellion and the church-state conflict in Mexico. University of Texas Press.

Butler, M. (2007). Popular piety and political identity in Mexico’s Cristero Rebellion: Michoacán, 1927-29. Oxford University Press.

Meyer, J. (2008). The Cristero Rebellion: The Mexican people between church and state 1926-1929. Cambridge University Press.

Reich, P. L. (2018). Mexico’s hidden revolution: The Catholic Church in law and politics since 1929. University of Notre Dame Press.

Rice, E. A. (2017). The diplomatic relations between the United States and Mexico, as affected by the struggle for religious liberty in Mexico, 1925-1929. Georgetown University Press.

Tuck, J. (2021). The holy war in Los Altos: A regional analysis of Mexico’s Cristero rebellion. University of Arizona Press.

Young, J. (2019). Mexican exodus: Emigrants, exiles, and refugees of the Cristero War. Oxford University Press.

The 1920s was an era known for its trends of excessive consumer culture. Although this is often exaggerated, there is still some truth to this assessment, as material goods gained increasing popularity during the decade. Such atypical purchases were also more affordable to the general public, and many were eager to purchase them.³ One such item that gained popularity amongst the 1920s consumer culture crowd was the banana, which was not part of the typical American diet until after the United Fruit Company (U.F.C.) vigorously advertised it. The company began advertising bananas in 1917, at which time they already had established plantations in Central and South American countries, and they used the typical “logic” form of advertising to sell the exotic fruit. For this reason, they had scientists promote the nutritional value of bananas, and banana sales began to increase. However, it would only truly reach its peak in the 1920s, when Edward Bernays changed American advertising forever as he targeted people’s emotions as opposed to using logic. One of the largest projects the U.F.C undertook with Bernays as advertising director was the launch of the “Great White Fleet” cruiser that brought Americans to tour United Fruit’s plantations in Latin America. This endeavor would prove to be very successful in increasing the banana market. However, the visitors only saw a theatrically created plantation that aimed to portray it as a humane and peaceful place. In reality, U.F.C. plantations were corrupt and the laborers were subjected to terrible work conditions.⁴

Colombia was home to a number of United Fruit plantations, where the banana workers were subjected to long hours and low pay. Laborers from the U.F.C.’s Magdalena plantation organized a strike on October 6, 1928, in which they issued nine demands to the company.⁵ Their demands included receiving real money payments and transitioning to a six-day work week.⁶ The strike lasted two months, and on December 5th, the Governor of Magdalena summoned the strikers to Ciénaga in order to settle the strike. Strikers gathered in the thousands and, at the same time, the government issued Decree Number 1 that ordered the military to open fire on the unarmed strikers and their families.⁷ It is estimated that anywhere from 50 to 2,000 people were killed in Ciénaga’s train station that night.⁸ Despite this, once daybreak came around, only nine bodies were left behind. Some strikers theorized that the nine bodies were symbolic of the nine demands of the strikers. The Colombian military did not end there, with them killing over 1,000 strikers. Laborers responded by destroying a number of United Fruit’s buildings.⁹

This massacre was not the effort of just the Colombian government. In fact, the United Fruit Company leveraged their power in the United States government to ensure that the strike was brought to an end. Considering that the strikers’ demands would have resulted in higher operation costs for the company, U.F.C. utilized their ties with the United States government to have the Marine Corps threaten to invade Colombia if the Colombian government did not protect the company’s interests and bring an end to the strike.¹¹ Such corporate interference in international relations would not have been possible prior to World War I, when there was a greater amount of suspicion of corporate power. However, by the 1920s, corporations and businessmen were idealized, as the American public viewed them as instrumental parts of the war effort.¹² The American government in the 1920s therefore supported corporations like the United Fruit Company to expand their markets and acquire raw materials through applying economic, diplomatic and military pressure. This was particularly common in Latin America. The pressure could be subtle or indirect. However, in Nicaragua, Guatemala, Haiti, Honduras and Santo Domingo, the U.S. government took more direct and bold action to protect corporations’ interests by sending troops.¹³ The Banana Massacre was the direct result of American military threats and pressure against the Colombian government. 

Justifying such violence and anti-union activity required the use of fear-mongering, with the most effective tool being the apparent threat of the spread of communism. The strike in Colombia did in fact occur in alliance with the Colombian Communist Party, which helped mobilize the poor and small business owners to provide support for the strikers and their demands.¹⁴ Prior to the massacre, from 1919 to 1920 the United States was the site of a Red Scare, which was the successful result of the Bolshevik Revolution in what became the Soviet Union. During the Red Scare, the American public feared that communism would create a revolution in the United States. Due to this, significant hysteria spread throughout the United States, with people such as organized laborers falling under intense scrutiny.¹⁵ For this reason, corporations that suppressed strikes were viewed as safeguards against communism.¹⁶ This was not coincidental, as corporations, with the help of the press, made it seem as though all strikes were part of a larger communist plot.¹⁷ Furthermore, companies like the United fruit Company hired public relations firms to ensure that such bloody stories like that of the Banana Massacre did not reach the American public.¹⁸ Despite these efforts, the memory of the massacre has remained deeply ingrained in Colombian culture, with it even inspiring a scene of Gabriel Garcia Marquez’ Nobel Peace Prize winning book One Hundred Years of Solitude.¹⁹

Citations

Footnotes

1.  “Colombia: A Photograph We Were Not Supposed To See,” Visualizing the Americas, accessed March 31, 2025, https://visualizingtheamericas.utm.utoronto.ca/1928-massacre-1. ︎
2.  Handling Bananas, Backing the Bunch, Colombia, 1924., ReVista (Baker Library Historical Collections, Harvard Business School, 1924), https://revista.drclas.harvard.edu/making-a-difference-repatriating-photographs-revista/. ︎
3.  Lynn Dumenil, The Modern Temper: American Culture and Society in the 1920s, ed. Eric Foner (New York, NY: Hill and Wang, 1995), 77. ︎
4.  Lindsey Morey, “Blood For Bananas: United Fruit’s Central American Empire,” Roots of Contemporary Issues, 2014, https://history.wsu.edu/rci/sample-research-project/. ︎
5.  “Colombia: A Photograph We Were Not Supposed To See.” ︎
6.  Mariana Ramirez Cabal, “The Dark Side of Bananas: Imperialism, Non-State Actors, and Power,” Harvard International Review, June 9, 2023, https://hir.harvard.edu/the-dark-side-of-bananas-imperialism-non-state-actors-and-power/. ︎
7.  “Colombia: A Photograph We Were Not Supposed To See.” ︎
8.  Aviva Chomsky, “Globalization, Labor, and Violence in Colombia’s Banana Zone,” International Labor and Working-Class History, no. 72 (2007): 901–115, https://www.jstor.org/stable/27673094, 95. ︎
9.  “Colombia: A Photograph We Were Not Supposed To See.” ︎
10.  Comisaría de La United Fruit Company En Ciénaga, 1928., 1928, Wikimedia Commons, 1928, https://commons.wikimedia.org/wiki/File:Comisariato_cienaga.jpg. ︎
11.  Ramirez Cabal, “The Dark Side of Bananas: Imperialism, Non-State Actors, and Power.” ︎
12.  Dumenil, The Modern Temper, 31-32. ︎
13.  Dumenil, The Modern Temper, 36. ︎
14.  Chomsky, “Globalization, Labor, and Violence in Colombia’s Banana Zone,” 95. ︎
15.  Dumenil, The Modern Temper, 218. ︎
16.  Dumenil, The Modern Temper, 32. ︎
17.  Dumenil, The Modern Temper, 220. ︎
18.  Dumenil, The Modern Temper, 31. ︎
19.  “Colombia: A Photograph We Were Not Supposed To See.” ︎

Bibliography

Chomsky, Aviva. “Globalization, Labor, and Violence in Colombia’s Banana Zone.” International Labor and Working-Class History, no. 72 (2007): 901–115. https://www.jstor.org/stable/27673094. 

“Colombia: A Photograph We Were Not Supposed To See.” Visualizing the Americas. Accessed March 31, 2025. https://visualizingtheamericas.utm.utoronto.ca/1928-massacre-1. 

Dumenil, Lynn. The Modern Temper: American Culture and Society in the 1920s. Edited by Eric Foner. New York, NY: Hill and Wang, 1995. 

Handling bananas, backing the bunch, Colombia, 1924. ReVista. Baker Library Historical Collections, Harvard Business School, 1924. https://revista.drclas.harvard.edu/making-a-difference-repatriating-photographs-revista/. 

Morey, Lindsey. “Blood For Bananas: United Fruit’s Central American Empire.” Roots of Contemporary Issues, 2014. https://history.wsu.edu/rci/sample-research-project/. 

Ramirez Cabal, Mariana. “The Dark Side of Bananas: Imperialism, Non-State Actors, and Power.” Harvard International Review, June 9, 2023. https://hir.harvard.edu/the-dark-side-of-bananas-imperialism-non-state-actors-and-power/.

stefanieviera

Stefanie Viera is a 3rd year History and Humanities & Global Studies double major who is taking the Discovering Digital History course in the spring of 2025. She currently work at the Jane Addams Papers Project as an Editorial Assistant.

The Radium Girls, a group of girls who sued the United States Radium Corporation 1928, were a prime example of the struggles and shortcomings of the “New Woman” of the 1920s. The new woman, as opposed to the 19th century woman, as seen in the picture of Louise Brooks on the right, was a woman who worked outside of the house, typically only until she had a husband, at which point she would be expected to give up her job. While new women could be any race, and typically were lower or middle class, the most widely depicted new women were middle class white women, who worked in “feminized” jobs, like dial painting, education, secretary work, or retail.   

The Radium Girls specifically were employed in a factory-esque setting in which they were paid by the number of dials that they produced and painted per hour. They were encouraged by the radium company to lick the paintbrush periodically so that the dials they were painting had finer lines and they could produce dials faster. As opposed to other women at the time, whose work was “largely devalued and poorly paid” ¹ working in Radium was a highly coveted job because it was a “well-paid skilled labor” for women in the 1920s.² In this case, the Radium Girl differs from the “New Woman” that characterized the 1920s because their work was paid at a higher rate than other feminized jobs. 

While the new woman struggled to find work, and worked for poor pay in monotonous or harsh conditions, even after obtaining a degree, the Radium Girls were at first highly respected due to the advertisement and consumption of Radium in the 1920s. As Radium grew into an important part of the consumer culture of the 1920s, it was a desirable job to work with the new glowing substance. As seen in the advertisement to the right, Radium was originally advertised as a panacea for any beauty or health issue: health tonics, tooth paste, hair creams and many more items fell victim to the radium craze. Radium was even used as a wide scale treatment in hospitals, and was mixed with water and given as a cure-all to a variety of different patients as a cure for any illness.³ Radium girls would even use the radium to paint their nails or other parts of their body in order to create a glow in the dark look. These women were not informed of the negative effects of Radium, even though many officials in the company already knew about the effects by the time that Radium was being widely consumed. But due to US Radium Company’s greed and want for success in the growing consumerism market, specifically dominated by the “new women” who now had “pin money” from their jobs, they continued to push the poisonous radium on the public. Consumerism was another growing issue from the 1920s discussed in The Modern Temper, specifically as women had more money to spend, they wanted to follow the trends of higher-status women, thus leading to a growing market that focused more on advertising to a larger audience. 

In the end, despite the appearance of a “better work” and “better life” for the Radium Girls, they ended up suffering just as much as the minority women who worked in factory jobs and “encountered harsh conditions and discrimination” for low pay.⁴ These women were continuously ingesting Radium in small doses, and over the years, ended up dying tragic and often gruesome deaths due to radium poisoning. The suffering of the Radium Girls fits into the larger trend of the early 20th century of the fight for equal rights and the struggle for worker’s protections in a growing industrialized market. After the Radium Girls’ trial, they all received a settlement from US Radium Company, which did not last them for long, as they all died within a few years of the trial. But, their trial had a lasting effect on the workers rights movement, and increased the demand for workers comp pay, women’s rights in the workplace, and enforced the judicial decision that employers could be held responsible for employee’s health and safety. 

Overall, the Radium Girls were a “New Woman” of the 1920s. They worked outside of the home, in a feminized field, and received a ‘woman’s pay.’ They spent the majority of the money they earned in the budding consumerist market, and they even used the radium to decorate their bodies in order to appear more good looking or intriguing. At the end of the day, working as a radium girl gave the girls “an individual public existence, a public identity of her own, and a sense of her own worth.”⁵ Even though they all died from their exposure and ingestion of radium, they became a household name—especially in New Jersey—and a spearhead for worker’s rights. The radium girls connect to so many different branches of the 1920s, like consumer culture, women’s rights, and worker health and safety regulations, which shows just how much of a ‘public existence’ they really gained from their work.

1. Dumenil, Lynn. The Modern Temper: American Culture and Society in the 1920s. United States: Hill and Wang, 2024, 122.  ︎
2. Balkansky, Arlene. “Radium Girls: Living Dead Women: Headlines & Heroes.” The Library of Congress, March 19, 2019. Accessed February 18, 2025. https://blogs.loc.gov/headlinesandheroes/2019/03/radium-girls-living-dead-women/. 
   ︎
3. Elgert, Patrick. “Radium: A Medical Treatment of the Early 20th Century.” Historical Medical Library. Accessed February 18, 2025. https://histmed.collegeofphysicians.org/for-students/radium/. ︎
4. Dumenil, 117. ︎
5. Dumenil, 126. ︎

hannahsteinlauf

Hannah Steinlauf is a senior history major with a minor in museum and exhibition studies at Ramapo College. She is a student research aide for the Jane Addams Papers Project. She is a member of the Ramapo College Dance Company and Tri Sigma. Hannah is going to attend Trinity College Dublin for a masters degree in Public History after graduation.

Discovery of Radium

Radium, the 88th element on the periodic table, was discovered by Marie and Paul Curie in 1898. The couple noticed that their samples glowed blue in dark or limited light, due to the element’s radioactivity, which sparked a broader interest in the element. From the start of the discovery of radium, there was an interest in the luminescence of the chemical, but there was also a concern over the health and safety of people interacting with the element on a daily basis. Strict limits were almost immediately put in place for scientists and doctors who interacted with radioactive substances on a daily basis, but the same protections were not put in place for factory workers such as the radium girls. Marie Curie herself said that she was “surprised that the U.S. Government would permit the handling of such dangerous substances as radium in such a careless manner.” ¹ She even claimed that the ingesting of radium in the way that dial painters did was “criminal.”

Despite Marie and many other health professionals’ knowledge of the dangers of repeated exposure to radium, it was very quickly advertised to the public as “a wondrous and powerful element: a cure for cancer, and a source of beauty and vitality.”² Radium was advertised for any issue beauty or health related. Starting in the 1920s, working with radium was seen as a respectable, covetable job by many women looking to work outside the home, even though the dangers were already known to many scientists. 

United States Radium Corporation

The establishment of the United States Radium Corporation (USRC) factory in Orange, New Jersey in 1917 increased daily interaction with radium, specifically in groups of young girls aged 15-30. At the factory, girls were employed and paid approximately a penny and a half per watch dial that they completed. In an effort to make dials quicker and earn a higher daily wage, girls were instructed to do the “lip, dip, paint” technique to make the paint brushes have a finer tip, which in turn would make the lines on the watch dial more precise. By doing this, they could produce more watches per day. But, this also meant that they were ingesting more radium on a daily basis, as they pointed the tips of the paintbrushes in between their lips between every few dials they made.

During the height of World War I, the factory reached its peak production as watches were sent overseas to help men see the time in darkness. Over 300 girls were employed and painting watch dials during that time, and by 1924, approximately 50 had died and their deaths were attributed to radium-related ailments. While USRC did not take responsibility for the deaths yet, women who had been healthy five years prior contracted extreme diseases, like radium necrosis, also known as “radium jaw,” (as seen in the picture on the right) loose teeth, mouth ulcers, severe anemia, bone shrinkage and fractures. One of the sisters of the five girls who went on trial, Molly Maggia, died in 1922, and her death was attributed to syphilis, like many of the other radium girls dying in the early 20s. Dr. Martland, a New Jersey investigative surgeon, later attributed her death to radium poisoning, as he was studying the deaths of other radium girls.

Many of the girls who died in the early years before the trial had their reputations tarnished with accusations of syphilis, and they did not receive proper respect or diagnoses until years after they died. Similar to this is the case of Miss Eckert, a radium girl whose death was attributed to “shock from operation” and later re-diagnosed as radium poisoning. As the radium girl’s trial began, an autopsy was performed, which “showed that she was so full of radium that her bones fairly glistened in the dark.”³ Before the official start of the trial, and even as the girls were awaiting their decisions from the jury as the USRC continued to ask for a continuance, they continued to get sicker. In a sad interview with the Courier-Post, Quinta Maggia McDonald, sister of the now deceased Mollie Maggia, laments: “No, I no longer have any hope. I face the inevitable unflinchingly. What else can I do? I don’t know when I will die.” ⁴The map below details just a few key points in the history of Radium, from its discovery, to the deaths of many girls involved in the trial.

Five Girls and Their Fight for Justice

In January 1928, Grace Fryer, Edna Hussman, Katherine Schaub, Quinta Maggia Mcdonald and Albina Maggia Larice began their lawsuit against the USRC. Grace, the leader of the five girls suing USRC, tried to find a lawyer for many years before the trial officially began, as she noticed the frequent and irregular deaths of her friends and coworkers. She wanted to sue for compensation of medical bills, business malpractice and misinformation for the hazards of radium that they were ingesting daily. But, because of the strength and influence of the USRC, it took Grace over 2 years to find a lawyer willing to represent the girls. By the time that they found Raymond Berry, an attorney willing to take on the case, two of the girls were bedridden, and none of them could even raise their hands to take an oath. All of the girls already knew they were dying, like Edna Hussman admits in her interview with the Evening Courier, and they just wanted to win “because with the money us girls could have some of the comforts and joys of life before we go” rather than struggling to pay their increasing hospital bills.⁵ So the trial was less about getting the girls justice – they already knew they were doomed – and more about holding the USRC financially responsible for them, and potentially for future illnesses as well.

One of the biggest struggles of the radium girls trial was obviously ensuring that the USRC admitted their knowledge of the dangers of radium, and took responsibility for the death and illnesses of dial painters. One of the other more practical struggles of the trial was ensuring the girls could even attend. As they were all sick and dying, they needed many doctors appointments which took precedence during their days. Additionally, the USRC kept asking for a continuance, and trying to force the trial back, in hopes that the girls would just die, and the trial would die down. While many people argued that a trial or settlement needed to occur quickly before the girl’s deaths, the date kept being pushed back. Finally, evidence was pulled from a  judgement of medical statistics by Dr. Frederick Hoffman done in 1925 showed that out of the 12 dying dial painters studied, 10 of them had necrotic lesions on the jaw bones directly connected to radium intake.⁶ USRC, unable to deny the obvious radiation poisoning of the girls who ingested radium, offered a settlement. The girls decided not to proceed with the trial, and to take the money.  

The USRC offered the girls each $10,000 as well as $600 per year, for the rest of their lives, however short those were. They also agreed to pay the full medical and dental bills of the girls, which laid the precedent for the case of the Radium Girls from the Ottawa, Illinois plant in 1937. Even though the girls won their case, they were not the winners in the end, as they died before they, often poor, severely sick, and just ‘awaiting the inevitable.’ Many people saw these girls’ deaths as a repercussion for them working outside of the home. An Evening Courier article says that the girls’ struggle for representation and for payout from the trial was “just one more little illustration of some of the cons of this “career outside of the home” business.” ⁷ Even on their deathbeds, the girls were being criticized for working outside of the home, and this article makes it seem as if they had just stayed home, they would never have gotten radium poisoning in the first place. This trial brought to light just a few of the misogynistic ideals girls faced in the 1920s, whether it was their struggle to find a job in the first place, their struggle to find a lawyer, or the criticism that if they had not taken this job, they would not be dying of radium poisoning in the first place.

Significance — The 1920’s and Beyond

New Women in the 1920’s

The Radium Girls connection to other radium based deaths like those in Ottawa were not the only important aspect of their case. They also related to many broader cultural themes of the 1920s, like the New Woman. The New Woman was an idealized woman in the 1920s who worked outside of the house, typically only until she had a husband, at which point she would be expected to give up her job. The most widely depicted new women were middle class white women, who worked in “feminized” jobs, like dial painting, education, secretary work, or retail. The Radium Girls, with their non-unionized work, “feminized” pay, and gendered job opportunity are a prime example of the New Woman that became so popular in the 1920s.

As Radium grew into an important part of the consumer culture of the 1920s, it was a desirable job for women to work with the new glowing substance. As seen in the advertisement on the right, Radium was originally advertised as a panacea for any beauty or health issue: health tonics, tooth paste, hair creams and many more items fell victim to the radium craze. Radium girls would frequently use the radium to paint their nails or other parts of their body in order to create a glow in the dark look. These women were not informed of the negative effects of Radium, even though many officials in the company already knew about the effects by the time that Radium was being widely consumed. But due to US Radium Company’s greed and want for success in the growing consumerism market, specifically dominated by the “new women” who now had “pin money” from their jobs, they continued to push the poisonous radium on the public.

Consumerism was another growing issue from the 1920s specifically as women had more money to spend, they wanted to follow the trends of higher-status women, thus leading to a growing consumerist market that focused more on advertising to a larger audience of women. While the New Woman was dominated by middle and upper class women who had the freedom to do what she wanted, lower class women aspired to be like them and follow the trends they laid out. So, when women like the one in the advertisement said that they used radium for their hair or nails, lower class women purchase more radium based beauty products in order to follow the culture outlined by other women.

In the end, despite the appearance of a “better work” and “better life” for the Radium Girls, they ended up suffering just as much as the minority women who worked in brutal factory jobs and “encountered harsh conditions and discrimination” for low pay.⁸ These women were continuously ingesting Radium in small doses, and over the years, ended up dying tragic and often gruesome deaths due to radium poisoning. Despite their tragic deaths, the Radium Girls, like other New Women, had a lasting effect on consumer culture in the 1920s, and on women’s rights in general. 

Overall, the Radium Girls were a real life example of the 1920s idea of a “New Woman.” They worked outside of the home, in a feminized field, and received a ‘woman’s pay.’ They spent the majority of the money they earned in the budding consumerist market, and they even used the radium to decorate their bodies in order to appear more good looking or intriguing. At the end of the day, working as a radium girl gave the girls “an individual public existence, a public identity of her own, and a sense of her own worth.”⁹ Even though they all died from their exposure and ingestion of radium, they became a household name—especially in New Jersey. 

Worker’s Protections

The radium girls connect to so many different lasting themes of the 1920s, like consumer culture and women’s rights, but also worker’s health and safety regulations. Although the Occupational Safety and Health Administration was not made for another 50 years after the Radium Girls trial, they did have an effect on women workers rights. Women were typically not protected by the workers rights unions of the times, as unions did not extend membership to women workers in factories. For women who did not work in factories, typical women’s jobs, such as dial painting, secretarial work, or teachers, were not yet unionized. 

For instance, there were many safeguards for medical professionals working with radiation as early as 1903, long before the US Radium Corporation built their New Jersey factory.¹⁰ While there had been minor cases of radiation burns or poisoning in the early 20th century, more serious examples of burns from exposure to X-rays and radiation in doctors were found, reported, and handled by 1911.¹¹ In response to this health risk to medical professionals, there were increased health and safety regulations for physicians and medical professionals. In order to protect the professionals from the harmful effects of radiation, medical professionals had a strict limited exposure to X-rays and protection via medical shielding when handling radioactive substances. These medical professionals, after a few deaths in the early 20th century, were now effectively protected in order to limit future radiation-based illnesses.

While the harmful effects of radium were known and protected in doctors, women working in dial painting did not have the same protections while they worked with radium. For example, after the Radium Girls court case, “the New Jersey workers’ compensation laws were changed slightly, but not enough to help those who developed cancer and became disabled many years after their exposure.”¹² While there were many issues brought up after their death, like this article written by the The Courier News which charges US Radium with murder of the girls, very few actual changes were made in the direct years after the trial.¹³  It was only after the deaths of many girls that doctors like Dr. Martland or Dr. Hoffman attributed their deaths to radium. The protections laid out for women working in radium were often bare bones, and usually did not financially support the women in the years after their employment for the illnesses they contracted.  

It was not until the 1950s, when working on the Manhattan Project, that the radium girls got their justice and finally created protections for people working with radium. Through a study of the dead and alive radium girls during the 1950s, doctors established “the level of radioactivity associated with cancer and other changes in the skeleton and soft tissues.¹⁴ When realizing that the girls still had radioactive substances present in their bodies as long as ten, twenty, or thirty years after their death, the girls played a key part in establishing “maximum permissible standards for all workers exposed to radiation.”¹⁵ People argued, in some cases thirty years after the girls had died, that their increased exposure and consumption to radium was not only inhumane, but was also the cause for their extreme diseases and sicknesses. So, even though the radium girls did not get the justice they deserved in their lifetime, the study of their bodies and their illnesses in the 1950s established the expectations for radiation exposure.

Conclusion

Overall, the story of the radium girls is a tragic tale of a group of women who, in a struggle for freedom, self-sufficiency, and success in the 1920s, ended up dying gruesome deaths. These women left their home in an effort to make money in a recently “womanized” field painting watch dials. These watch dials were often painted with radium, in order to make them glow in the dark, so they could be more useful to men off at war in the dark or at night. Dial painters were instructed to “lip, dip, paint” for a finer line on the watches they painted, even though the negative health effects of radium were already known. The girls struggled to get legal representation or medical protections when they realized the harmful effects of radium on their bodies, and many of them died with their names tainted by accusations of syphilis.

The effects of the radium girls trial connect to broader trends of the 1920s, and beyond. While they related to the “new woman,” they also showcased how the lives of these working women often weren’t as free or as glamorous as the idealized perception of them was. They worked in poor conditions, for an unequal pay to male counterparts, and in the case of the radium girls, they died with their reputations tainted and in gruesome or painful ways. The consumption and advertisement of radium despite the known negative effects of the substance shows the poor morals of maybe people who just wanted to profit off of the easily consumable glowing substance. Finally, even though it was years after their trial occurred, the radium girls’ suffering helped regulate radiation exposure and bring awareness to women’s rights in the workplace. The radium girls, even though they struggled significantly during their lives, are remembered and given the attention they deserve in their death as they are credited with bringing to the public eye the harmful effects of radium.

Suggested Further Reading

Coursey, Bert M. “The National Bureau of Standards and the Radium Dial Painters.” Journal of Research of the National Institute of Standards and Technology, 14 Feb. 2022, nvlpubs.nist.gov/nistpubs/jres/126/jres.126.051.pdf. 

Warren, Christian. “Toxic Purity: The Progressive Era Origins of America’s Lead Paint Poisoning Epidemic.” The Business History Review 73, no. 4 (1999): 705–36. https://doi.org/10.2307/3116131.

Bibliography

“Amelia Malia ‘Mollie’ Maggia (1896-1922).” Find a Grave, www.findagrave.com/memorial/99916653/amelia_malia-maggia. Accessed 12 Mar. 2025. 

Balkansky, Arlene. “Radium Girls: Living Dead Women: Headlines & Heroes.” The Library of Congress, March 19, 2019. Accessed February 18, 2025. https://blogs.loc.gov/headlinesandheroes/2019/03/radium-girls-living-dead-women/. 

Cowen, Ron. “New Jersey’s ‘Radium Girls’ and the NIST-Trained Scientist Who Came to Their Aid.” NIST, Ron Cowen, 24 Jan. 2025, www.nist.gov/blogs/taking-measure/new-jerseys-radium-girls-and-nist-trained-scientist-who-came-their-aid. 

Dumenil, Lynn. The Modern Temper: American Culture and Society in the 1920s. United States: Hill and Wang, 2024. 

Elgert, Patrick. “Radium: A Medical Treatment of the Early 20th Century.” Historical Medical Library. Accessed February 18, 2025. https://histmed.collegeofphysicians.org/for-students/radium/. 

Fry, Shirley A. “Studies of U.S. Radium Dial Workers: An Epidemiological Classic.” Radiation Research 150, no. 5 (1998), S23. https://doi.org/10.2307/3579805.

“Government Moves To Protect Women in Radium Work” The Courier News, (Bridgewater, NJ), December 24, 1928, p. 15.

Hunt, Vilma R. “A Brief History of Women Workers and Hazards in the Workplace.” Feminist Studies 5, no. 2 (1979). https://doi.org/10.2307/3177594.

Moore, Kate. The Radium Girls: The Dark Story of America’s Shining Women. Naperville, ILL: Sourcebooks, Inc, 2016.

“Once Beautiful Blonde Aged By Radium Poison: Edna Hussman, DOOMED” Evening Courier, (Camden, NJ), May 23, 1928.

“Radium Victim’s Bones Glistened Says Physician” The Bayonne Times, (Bayonne, NJ), May 25, 1928, p. 2. 

“Radium Victim Tells How She Awaits Doom” Courier-Post, (Camden, NJ), May 22, 1928, p. 2. 

“Try ‘n Get It” Evening Courier, (Camden, NJ), May 3, 1928, p. 8. 

1. Vilma R. Hunt. “A Brief History of Women Workers and Hazards in the Workplace.” Feminist Studies 5, no. 2 (1979), 281. ︎
2. Arlene Balkansky. “Radium Girls: Living Dead Women: Headlines & Heroes.” The Library of Congress, March 19, 2019. Accessed February 18, 2025.
   
   ︎
3. “Radium Victim’s Bones Glistened Says Physician” The Bayonne Times, (Bayonne, NJ), May  25, 1928, p. 2.
   
   ︎
4. “Radium Victim Tells How She Awaits Doom” Courier-Post, (Camden, NJ), May 22, 1928, p. 2. 
   
   ︎
5. “Once Beautiful Blonde Aged By Radium Poison: Edna Hussman, DOOMED” Evening Courier, (Camden, NJ), May 23, 1928.
   
   ︎
6. Shirley A. Fry “Studies of U.S. Radium Dial Workers: An Epidemiological Classic.” Radiation Research 150, no. 5 (1998), S23.
   
   ︎
7. “Try ‘n Get It” Evening Courier, (Camden, NJ), May 3, 1928, p. 8. 
   
   ︎
8. Lynn Dumenil. The Modern Temper: American Culture and Society in the 1920s. United States: Hill and Wang, 2024, 117. 
   
   ︎
9. Dumenil, 126. ︎
10. Hunt, 280. ︎
11. Hunt, 280. ︎
12. Hunt, 281. ︎
13. “Government Moves To Protect Women in Radium Work” The Courier News, (Bridgewater, NJ), December 24, 1928, p. 15.
    
    ︎
14. Hunt, 282. ︎
15. Hunt, 282. ︎

hannahsteinlauf

Hannah Steinlauf is a senior history major with a minor in museum and exhibition studies at Ramapo College. She is a student research aide for the Jane Addams Papers Project. She is a member of the Ramapo College Dance Company and Tri Sigma. Hannah is going to attend Trinity College Dublin for a masters degree in Public History after graduation.

In 1929, New York City filled the air with the heat and beat of classic Jazz. Many filled the nights with laughter, endless sleep, and dancing. Through all of New York, its popularity and lifestyle had seized the dream of millions. The city of lights that filled each street corner captured a significant historical moment. Even so, not everyone shared this beautiful moment and enjoyed the music when clubs continued to peak in popularity. Instead, lying in the dark streets, areas where police did not patrol, and ignorant of the possibilities, Albert Fish, also known as the “Moon Maniac“, filled the streets with evil. In the darkness, Albert Fish stalked his victims and did not hesitate to take away their life, a life that could have been long-lived. Still, New York’s streets held significant importance to our generation but avoided highlighting the potential danger that awaited. 

Albert Fish grew up in Washington, DC. There, he had found a lifestyle that suited him to a work life. Instead, Albert Fish’s childhood was filled with tremendous amounts of suffering. Albert Fish was the youngest in the family. He had three older siblings who later on contributed to his life of sadness. Among his family members, many were diagnosed with mental illnesses. His uncle, for example, had developed mania, while one of the two siblings was diagnosed with schizophrenia, and her sister was diagnosed with a “mental affliction” . Unfortunately for Albert, his suffering did not end there as later on in his life, many more came to be diagnosed with mental illnesses, one of them being his mother

The childhood of enjoyment and livelihood Albert Fish had wished to capture as a little boy was repeatedly redirected. Unfortunately, Albert was put in an orphanage where he spent most of his childhood. Albert Fish was physically abused in this Orphanage and grew up in an environment where he was fighting for his life. After years of countless abuse and neglect from those involved with the Orphanage, he was later taken out of the Thai environment by his mother. The history of abuse and negligence continuing in Albert Fish’s life has led to his mental corruption. Albert Fish was not only mentally broken but also started filling up a pool of hate and violence. 

In Albert Fish’s adult life, he took upon the opportunity for a field of change and decided to move to the city of opportunities, New York City, in 1890. Instead of living a life filled with opportunities and potential success, Albert Fish lived a life of evil. Albert Fish filled the streets of New York with terror and preyed on those who were vulnerable. Before his inhumane acts, he started by sexually assaulting male children. This was the beginning of what awaited Albert Fish. 

Little by little, his actions of violence began to grow, each becoming more brutal than the last encounter. Even so, the murder of Grace Budd was different from the other cases. Through the trails and mind of Albert Fish, he took the necessary steps to get away as a suspect.

The enjoyment and laughter that once filled the state of New York shifted into an environment of shock, filled with tension and sadness. The death of Grace Budd left many to wonder what happened to the 10-year-old child. In May 1928, Albert Fish introduced himself to the Budd family when he formally found interest in Grace Budd’s older brother. Albert Fish used another name to disguise his tracks when he decided to pursue his impulsive, horrific actions against Edward Budd. Soon after connecting with the Budd family, Albert Fish shifted his attention to Grace Budd after meeting her. After that encounter, Albert Fish did not hesitate to create a gate of opportunity to move his motives and scheming towards Grace Budd. With this shift of intention, Albert Fish seized the chance to take advantage of Grace Budd. The lies and deception had led to Albert Fish bringing Grace Budd to East Irvington, New York. In the abandoned house, there is where Albert Fish has committed the atrocious murder of Grace Budd, strangling the poor 10-year-old child Grace Budd to death.

1934 Wisteria Cottage building where Albert Fish claimed to murder Grace Budd and disassemble her body for cannibalistic motives

Unfortunately, as time has passed, the case has been apprehended due to multiple roadblocks. The only information and update investigators could follow up with was what appeared to be Grace Budd’s body. As stated in Brooklyn Daily Eagle on December 14, 1934, “…in Worthington Woods, between Ardsley and Elmsford, not far from where the skull of Grace Budd was found, unearthed other parts of a child’s skeleton, believed to be that of the Budd girl. Through the investigation, different pieces and bones were discovered from previous victims of Albert Fish. The ongoing investigation led to more discoveries about the older man Albert Fish and his horrendous actions behind closed doors.

Even though Albert Fish committed the crime in the year 1928, his deception and lies led to his avoidance of getting caught. Still, Albert Fish didn’t stop tormenting the Budd family. Even after the loss of a daughter, a friend, and a sister, Albert Fish would later, in the year 1934, send a letter to the Budd family anonymously, explaining all the horrific things he did to Grace Budd. In November 1930, the Budd family received a letter from Albert Fish. Even though Grace Budd’s disappearance has not been solved yet, receiving a letter jump started another investigation in hopes of finding closure to unanswered questions.

This letter that was sent to the family was a gateway opportunity for the parents to find out who had abducted Grace Budd. An investigator named King has successfully cracked the mystery of who the serial killer is. Through his success and findings, King tracked Albert Fish’s previous apartment, where he found other letters leading to a match. Now, the investigators knew the killer’s name, Albert Fish. Albert Fish’s luck had run out. The man who once terrorized the city would be put in ruins. He will be tracked and arrested for the heinous, inhumane crimes he has committed. On December 13, 1934, Albert Fish was caught and arrested for all the murders he had committed. 

To such an extent, the families and friends who were victims of Albert Fish’s awful murders will find some relief knowing that they have caught the man behind these killings. Unfortunately, those who have lost family or even a friend can not bear the loss. Rest assured, justice was brought to Albert Fish and served. On January 16, 1936, Albert Fish was executed by the electric chair. The streets of New York that once filled the horrors of Albert Fish were once replaced and slowly uplifted by the relief that a maniac wasn’t lurking in the dark areas of New York. 

Timeline of Albert Fish: Grace Budd Murder Case

https://www.sutori.com/en/story/albert-fish-grace-budd-murder-case–mcaUrwuKSAjAsS2YywaUt4zg

Bibliography: 

“Albert Fish.” Wikipedia, March 15, 2024. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Albert_Fish. 

“Grace Budd: Albert Fish.” Newspapers.com. Accessed April 3, 2024. https://www.newspapers.com/article/the-brooklyn-daily-eagle-grace-budd-al/129753874/?locale=en-US.

Carney, Courtney Patterson. “Jazz and the Cultural Transformation of America in the 1920s.” LSU Scholarly Repository. Accessed April 3, 2024. https://repository.lsu.edu/gradschool_dissertations/176/#:~:text=Jazz%20greatly%20increased%20in%20popularity,defining%20the%20early%20twentieth%20century.

Amelia Earhart 

Amelia Mary Earhart was born on July 24, 1897 in Kansas. She was the first child of Samuel “Edwin” and Amelia “Amy” Earhart. She had one younger sister, Grace Muriel “Muriel.” Earhart’s mother did not believe in raising her children in a traditional manner. This belief manifested through homeschooling taught by Amy Earhart. Additionally, she allowed her daughters to play outside in a non-traditional manner. Amelia and Grace climbed trees and hunted rats with rifles, which displeased their maternal grandmother.

The Earhart’s experienced financial insecurity. Edwin occasionally worked as a claims officer for railroads. However, he was in and out of jobs due to alcoholism. Around 1915, Earhart’s maternal grandmother died and left the Earhart’s a substantial inheritance. This inheritance helped the Earhart’s improve their financial status.

Edwin encouraged both Amelia and Grace to get involved with airplanes. In 1920, Earhart’s father bought her a ticket to ride with pilot Frank Hawks. Frank Hawks, like other World War I pilots, used their skills to make money after the war. Pilots (not just military pilots) would buy old decommissioned World War I planes and travel throughout the United States offering plane rides. Other forms of entertainment included “barnstorming.” Barnstorming, which gained popularity in the 1920s, involved daredevil pilots performing stunts and tricks. Barnstormers would also travel to different areas. Charles Lindbergh before his first solo transatlantic flight in 1927, was barnstormer. Some pilots worked delivering air mail.

Flight Training 

Earhart’s flight with Hawks inspired her to look into flight lessons. In January of 1921, her father took her to Kinner Field. Kinner Field, owned by Winfield “Bert” Kinner, became the first municipality-owned airport in South Gate, Los Angeles, California. Kinner Field was a two-hundred thirty acre field with a small hangar and a runway. Earhart struck a deal with Neta Snook. Snook, who was the field manager, was the only woman employed at Kinner Field. Earhart would pay Snook’s one dollar a minute rate with Liberty Bonds. They scheduled their first lesson together the day after they met. 

For Earhart’s first lesson, she flew a dual controlled Canuck. A dual control airplane has two controls. One control is designated to the student while the other is for the teacher. This Canuck had a top speed of sixty miles per hour and a landing speed of forty miles per hour. Snook taught Earhart how to taxi. Taxiing a plane involves moving an aircraft on the ground. By February 1921, Earhart recorded four hours in the air.

On July 24, 1922, Earhart bought her first airplane with the help of her mother. The airplane, designed and owned by Bert Kinner, was a model of the Kinner Airster. The Kinner Airster was a two seater biplane with a single engine. Earhart painted the plane yellow and named it The Canary. The design flaws of the Kinner Airster caused several accidents. He first crash occurred when one of the plane’s faulty engines failed to help the plane gain altitude and caused Earhart to crash into a group of trees near the runway.

Although there are no official records, Earhart completed her first solo flight before December 15, 1921. On December 15, 1921, she received her National Aeronautic Association license. To receive this license, she had to fly solo. Shortly after receiving her license, she flew a Kinner Airster in an air show at the Sierra Airdrome in Pasadena, California.

Earhart began receiving aerobatic training from John “Monte” Montijo. Montijo helped Earhart with advanced aeronavigation and aerobatics. With these lessons, she set her first flying record on October 22, 1922. At an air meet at Rogers Field (California), Earhart reached a height of fourteen thousand feet in a plane with an open cockpit and with no air supply. Her record was acknowledged by the Aeronautical Club of Southern California. On May 15, 1923, Earhart became the sixteenth woman in the world to receive a license from the Federation Aeronautique Internationale.

From the period of 1923 through 1927, Earhart went through financial troubles. She had relocated from California to Boston, Massachusetts. She had joined the local chapter of the National Aeronautic Association. During this time, she went through numerous menial jobs while periodically flying as a hobby on weekends. On October 15, 1927, Earhart picked up flying lessons administered by Dennison Aviation Corporation. These lessons cost her twenty dollars an hour.  

Flight over the Atlantic Ocean

Earhart received a call from Hilton Railey in 1927. Railey had asked Earhart if she wanted to fly across the Atlantic Ocean. Railey was searching for a substitute for a transatlantic flight. The previous pilot, Amy Phipps Guest, could not make the flight and suggested a woman pilot. Earhart and Railey came to several agreements: Earhart would not be paid (her “reward” was to be exposed and post-flight opportunities) and she would be able to check equipment. Earhart was named captain. The crew for the flight consisted of Earhart, Wilmer Stultz (pilot), Louis Gordon (mechanic), E.P. Elmer (technology advisor), William Rogers (flight charts), and Dr. James Kimball (weather advisor). The crew was to fly in a Fokker plane named Friendship. A famous Fokker is the iconic red fighter plane flown by Manfred von Richtofen, the Red Baron, during World War I.

Friendship was a modified Fokker seaplane. The fuel tanks, which were located in the wings and cabin, held nine hundred gallons of fuel. The wingspan of the Fokker was seventy two feet. A red/orange painted body contrasted with golden wings, the goal of these colors was to aid rescuers if the plane crashed. Friendship was outfitted with pontoons, which aided in water landings but made take off difficult.  

The crew took off from Boston Harbor on July 3 at 6:30 AM in front of multiple reporters. Friendship’s average speed is estimated to have been one hundred fourteen miles per hour. They flew by Nova Scotia, Canada by 8:55 AM in the morning. They landed at Halifax Naval Air Station, on the east coast of Canada. Stultz and Gordon took weather reports from the naval station and they were in the air shortly after. Friendship resumed its flight north towards Trepassey, Newfoundland and Labrador, Canada. Approximately halfway through their journey, the crew encountered fog and were forced to return to Halifax Naval Air Station. The following morning, the crew took off again for Trepassey. They arrived at Trepassey at 2:00 PM. While at first this flight was kept a secret, the flight had since made international news. 

The crew going to make the transatlantic flight consisted of Earhart, Stultz and Gordon. There were several failed attempts to takeoff. There were three attempts on June 6 and eight on June 12. The weight of cargo and fuel as well as rough seas were the cause of Friendship’s failed takeoffs. 

On June 17, 1928 at 11:40 AM, the crew of Friendship took off for from Trepassey to cross the Atlantic Ocean. The plane encountered fog approximately three hundred miles into the journey. At around six in the evening, Earhart made the last radio contact before the radio died. Stultz took up the navigation. On June 18, the crew was still in the air using the emergency fuel tank. Stultz landed the plane in the water off the coast of Burry Port, Wales at 1:00 PM. Friendship was one hundred forty miles from their original landing point, Southampton, England. A crowd had gathered to watch the crew disembark and to see Earhart, who had become the first woman to fly across the Atlantic. 

Earhart and crew traveled to London, England. In London, Earhart had become a celebrity and was offered business deals as well as requests for autographs. On June 28, 1928, Earhart, Stultz, and Gordon boarded the S.S. Roosevelt to return to America. 

Earhart continued her aviation career. In 1932, she became the first woman to complete a nonstop solo flight across the Atlantic Ocean. For this flight, she received the United States Distinguished Flying Cross. In 1937, she attempted to become the first woman to circumnavigate the globe. However, Earhart, along with her navigator Fred Noonan disappeared during this attempt. They were last seen in New Guinea on July 2, 1937. After a year and a half, both Earhart and Noonan were declared dead. 

Public Figure

Amelia Earhart became a celebrity, especially as she continued to break records and fly. Newspapers dubbed her “Lady Lindy” and other nicknames that referred to how similar she looked to Charles Lindbergh. Earhart was not fond of this nickname. In 1928 she explained, “I’m not Lindy Lady, Lady Lindy, the girl Lindy, I’m just Amelia Earhart.”¹

Amelia Earhart advocated for women in aviation. On November 2, 1929, Earhart and ninety-eight other women pilots founded the Ninety Nines. These women were ninety-nine of two hundred eighty five licensed women pilots. Earhart served as the first president of this organization beginning in 1931. The goal of this organization was to support women in aviation and to create connections. In multiple newspaper interviews, Earhart advocated for women pilots and for women to become aviators.

Significance  

Amelia Earhart is a representative of the “new woman” of the 1920s. Earhart had short hair, entered a male-dominated industry, wore clothes unconventional for a woman and worked to break aviation records. Her style and attitude was similar to those of a flapper. She also worked for her own money to pay for costs associated with aviation.

Railey’s plan of orchestrating the flying of the first women across the Atlantic Ocean was sparked by “Atlantic Fever.” This phenomenon, as well as Earhart’s agreement to complete the flight, is representative of the public’s fascination with airplanes. In the post-World War I era, pilots had become celebrities and made a living at airshows. 

Bibliography

“Code Messages Bring Lovers Together Again,” The Paterson Evening News, July 11, 1928, p. 22. 

“Girl Lindbergh Crosses Atlantic in 20 Hours After Unexpected Take-off From Trepassey Bay; Lands Voluntarily in Bristol Channel Inlet,” The Courier-News, June 18, 1928, p. 1. 

Jones, Russell Douglass. “Heroes of the Sky: Adventures in Early Flight.” Technology and Culture 45, no. 2 (2004): 368–72. https://www.jstor.org/stable/40060748.

“Miss Earhart First Women To Fly To England,” The Grand Island Daily Independent, June 18, 1928, p. 1.

PBS. “Amelia Earhart.” Pbs.org, 2019. https://www.pbs.org/wgbh/americanexperience/features/earhart-timeline/.

Rich, Doris L. Amelia Earhart: A Biography. Washington, D.C.: Smithsonian Institution Press, 2010.

Winters, Kathleen C. Amelia Earhart: The Turbulent Life of an American Icon. St. Martin’s Press, 2010.

mkukan

Michelle Kukan is a spring 2023 student of Discovering Digital History at Ramapo College. She is a sophomore studying history, American studies and museum & exhibition studies. She is a volunteer for Mahwah Museum’s Veterans Project and works on the Jane Addams Paper Project.

Newark Metropolitan Airport, also known as EWR, is located at 3 Brewster Rd, Newark, New Jersey. It is located on the border of the cities Newark and Elizabeth, a driveable distance from from both New York City and northern New Jersey. While it is considered property of the City of Newark, it is operated and managed by the Port Authority of New York and New Jersey. EWR is considered a milestone in both aviation and local history, as it was the first commercial airport in its area. Opening on October 1, 1928, it predates the opening of LaGuardia airport on December 2, 1939. Newark Metropolitan Airport was, and still is, a major transportation hub for both domestic and international flights.

Divisions in Story (H5)

Create divisions in your post using the H5 header. This can make longer text easier to read.

Significance (H3)

Insert paragraphs here that tell the reader why you selected [TOPIC] to explore and how you think they fit into the story of the 1920s. Was this event or person widely known at the time and has our view of them changed over time? Does this story complicate our ideas about the 1920s or reinforce them?

Bibliography

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“R/Newjersey – Happy Birthday to the First Major Airport in NYC Metro Area: Newark Metropolitan Airport, Currently Newark Liberty International Airport, Opened on on This Date in 1928. the Top 3 Domestic / International Destinations from Newark Are Orlando, Fort Lauderdale, Miami / London, Tel Aviv, and Toronto.” reddit, 2021. https://www.reddit.com/r/newjersey/comments/pz7p3l/happy_birthday_to_the_first_major_airport_in_nyc/

“Infrastructure: New Jersey (NJ) Newark Liberty International Airport (EWR).” NYCdata | Infrastructure. Baruch College, Zicklin School of Business, 2021. https://www.baruch.cuny.edu/nycdata/infrastructure/airport_newark.html#:~:text=Newark%20opened%20on%20October%201,by%20the%20United%20State%20Army.

Lewis, James, ed. “EWR Turns 80 A History of Newark Liberty International Airport.” Newark Public Library, October 11, 2016. https://www.npl.org/ewr-turns-80-a-history-of-newark-liberty-international-airport/

Jacob Gonzalez

Jacob is a Communication Arts student at Ramapo College. Although creating custom merchandise and promotional products is his passion, he has a soft spot for discovering interesting and obscure history.

jgonzalezdesigns.myportfolio.com