Type of bind: Paperback
Format: Bargain Price
Quantity: 1
Page Count: 352
Printing Date: August 01, 2000
Sale Popularity Level: 827568
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Only Yesterday deals with that delightful decade from the Armistice in November 1918 to the panic and depression of 1929-30. Here is the story of Woodrow Wilson's defeat, the Harding scandals, the Coolidge prosperity, the revolution in manners and morals, the bull market and its smash-up. Allen's lively narrative brings back an endless variety of half-forgotten events, fashions, crazes, and absurdities. Deftly written, with a humorous touch, Only Yesterday traces, beneath the excitements of day-to-day life in the 20s, those currents in national life and thought which are the essence of true history.
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Rated by buyers 
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I remember reading this book some 30 years ago. I don't know where I got it from and I no longer have it but it has coloured my thinking about finance, morals, the markets, everything about modern day life in the late 20th and early 21st century ever since. It has all come around again but thankfully and hopefully economists now know more about the way that the financial world works and the present difficulties will not last as long as the previous one - it took WW2 to get the Western world back on its feet!
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I read this for the very first time when I was in sixth grade and it continues to be one of my favorite books on the 1920's.
I will agree that maybe it's not the best place to start for a complete Jazz Age neophyte because it requires the reader to get over his/her modern-day attitudes, but after a little starter research, it's fascinating.
Obviously, since it was very first published in 1931, it lacks long-term analysis, which some people might find frustrating. Personally, I think that the fact that it was written when these events and views were still so fresh, and that it does not have modern ideas projected onto it, makes it a valuable and interesting comparison to later perspectives on the decade.
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This book is a wonderful source of information about the 1920s in the USA. It has lots of facts and makes them personal with anecdotes and the sort of details about daily life that textbooks omit. It was written shortly after the decade and still holds as one of the best sources of information about the decade.
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This is an excellent historical book, on the zeitgeist of the 1920's.It reflects upon all the major people,places,and things that define the epoch of American 1920's.If you had to read one book about that excessive time period of vanity,i would definately recommend this one.It's the best of the genre.Not all aspects of the 20s are covered here.Yet,it would be too cumbersome and boring to read if any longer.The parallels of the 20s to the later 1980's is quite amazing.The same beliefs developed,yet with different characters playing the parts.Time has not whithered the potent veracity of the book. If you're doing a history class project,Frederick Allen's respective on the 1920's,is the ideal quick reference from the era.
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Recently while doing research for an exhibition on the 1920s, I purchased this fabulous little book called Only Yesterday: An Informal History of the 1920s. Historian Frederick Lewis Allen wrote it in 1931, before Prohibition was even repealed!
I bought it because I wanted a contemporary perspective on the decade from someone who was there. I was astounded at his insight into a decade that he not only lived through, but also did not have much distance from.
As a rule, historians generally wait at least a decade in order to examine the recent past. When you are still living through it, you often don't have enough perspective to evaluate what the implications were or are going to be.
However, Allen was spot on with his analysis of the 1920s. He admits early in the text that he is not trying to make any sweeping historical observations, and he is keenly aware of the dangers of trying to interpret events that were so recent. Instead, he says he is writing to capture the spirit of the age, as he remembers it.
But I found that many of his statements were consistent with current historical scholarship of that era.
His analysis of the Red Scare was particularly insightful. He writes, "...upholders of every sort of cause, good, bad, and indifferent, all wrapped themselves in Old Glory and the mantle of the Founding Fathers and allied their opponents with Lenin...A cloud of suspicion hung in the air, and intolerance became an American virtue."
Considering he was writing only 10 years after fear of communism swept this country, I was impressed with his courage to be honest about what was really going on. Although by the end of the decade, people were no longer concerned about a communist revolution, those who led the charge were certainly still alive.
His attitude toward Prohibition represented the common thought of the era that the "noble experiment" was indeed a failure. Yet, it would be two years after his book was published that the 21st amendment was ratified.
He accurately describes the spirit of the times, writing, "In those days people sat with bated breath to hear how So-and-So had made very good gin right in his own cellar, and just what formula would fulfill the higher destiny of raisins, and how bootleggers brought liquor down from Canada."
The 1920s were of course a time of radical change in manner and morals. People rejected anything "old fashioned," looking instead to what was current and up-to-date. "It was better to be modern - and everybody wanted to be modern - and sophisticated, and smart, to smash the conventions and to be devastatingly frank," Allen writes. "And with a cocktail glass in one's hand it was easy at least to be frank."
Allen also writes about the Scopes "monkey trial" - challenging the teaching of evolution in schools - with a hint of humour that really captures the bewilderment of the locals: "It was a strange trial. Into the quiet town of Dayton flocked gaunt Tennessee farmers and their families in mule-drawn wagons and ramshackle Fords; quiet, godly people in overalls and gingham and black, ready to defend their faith against `foreigners,' yet curious to know what this new-fangled evolutionary theory might be."
When my book arrived, it was obviously a bit tattered. My copy was from the 1964 reprint, so it looked a bit dated from what you expect from modern history books. The print was quite small and seemed intimidating when I very first opened it. There is a 1997 and 2000 reprint available as well.
But it turned out to be the most interesting read of any book I used for my research!
Allen is witty, extremely intelligent, and has the unique perspective that can only be achieved by living through these events yourself.
If you are a Roaring Twenties enthusiast, or only casually interested in the era, I highly recommend this book. It provided me with a wealth of information, and lots of snappy quotes that really added to my exhibition.
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