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127-723: In the late 1930s, during the Great Depression , it featured prominently in the architecture of the immense public works projects sponsored by the Works Progress Administration and the Public Works Administration , such as the Golden Gate Bridge and Hoover Dam . The style competed throughout the period with the modernist architecture , and came to an abrupt end in 1939 with the beginning of World War II. The style

254-634: A deflationary spiral started in 1931. Farmers faced a worse outlook; declining crop prices and a Great Plains drought crippled their economic outlook. At its peak, the Great Depression saw nearly 10% of all Great Plains farms change hands despite federal assistance. At first, the decline in the U.S. economy was the factor that triggered economic downturns in most other countries due to a decline in trade, capital movement, and global business confidence. Then, internal weaknesses or strengths in each country made conditions worse or better. For example,

381-545: A movie palace , during the rise of the motion picture industry in the late 1920s. In 1925, Adolph Zukor 's Paramount Publix Corporation, the theater division of Paramount Pictures , one of the great studio-theater chains, began a construction program resulting in some of the finest theaters built. Publix assigned the design of the Oakland Paramount to 38-year-old San Francisco architect Timothy L. Pflueger (1892–1946) of Miller and Pflueger . The Paramount opened at

508-418: A silver standard , almost avoided the depression entirely. The connection between leaving the gold standard as a strong predictor of that country's severity of its depression and the length of time of its recovery has been shown to be consistent for dozens of countries, including developing countries . This partly explains why the experience and length of the depression differed between regions and states around

635-591: A cost of $ 3 million on December 16, 1931. Pflueger was also the designer of the Castro Theatre in San Francisco. The Art Deco design referred to the 1925 Exposition Internationale des Arts Décoratifs et Industriels Modernes in Paris. The term Art Deco has been used only since the late 1960s, when there was a revival of interest in the art and fashion of the early 20th century. The Paramount organ

762-455: A favorite gathering place. In the 1950s, popcorn machines and candy counters were installed, and on the lobby walls the incandescent lights were taken out and replaced by neon tubing in red and blue. In 1953, it played the first CinemaScope movie The Robe with Richard Burton and Jean Simmons . The 1957 Elvis Presley 's Jailhouse Rock attracted a thousand young people. At the end of the 1950s theaters were losing patrons to television, but

889-604: A former privately run bank, bearing no relation to the U.S. government (not to be confused with the Federal Reserve ). Unable to pay out to all of its creditors, the bank failed. Among the 608 American banks that closed in November and December 1930, the Bank of United States accounted for a third of the total $ 550 million deposits lost and, with its closure, bank failures reached a critical mass. In an initial response to

1016-467: A greater reduction in credit. On 5 April 1933, President Roosevelt signed Executive Order 6102 making the private ownership of gold certificates , coins and bullion illegal, reducing the pressure on Federal Reserve gold. British economist John Maynard Keynes argued in The General Theory of Employment, Interest and Money that lower aggregate expenditures in the economy contributed to

1143-494: A massive decline in income and to employment that was well below the average. In such a situation, the economy reached equilibrium at low levels of economic activity and high unemployment. Paramount Theatre (Oakland, California) The Paramount Theatre is a 3,040-seat Art Deco concert hall located at 2025 Broadway in Downtown Oakland . When it was built in 1931, it was the largest multi-purpose theater on

1270-600: A modern industrial city handled shortages of money and resources. Often they updated strategies their mothers used when they were growing up in poor families. Cheap foods were used, such as soups, beans and noodles. They purchased the cheapest cuts of meat—sometimes even horse meat—and recycled the Sunday roast into sandwiches and soups. They sewed and patched clothing, traded with their neighbors for outgrown items, and made do with colder homes. New furniture and appliances were postponed until better days. Many women also worked outside

1397-402: A monetary contraction first-hand were forced to join the deflationary policy since higher interest rates in countries that performed a deflationary policy led to a gold outflow in countries with lower interest rates. Under the gold standard's price–specie flow mechanism , countries that lost gold but nevertheless wanted to maintain the gold standard had to permit their money supply to decrease and

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1524-763: A notable Art Deco mural called Flight, which was destroyed and then restored in the 1980s. Union Station in Los Angeles was partially designed by John Parkinson and Donald B. Parkinson (the Parkinsons) who had also designed Los Angeles City Hall and other landmark Los Angeles buildings. The structure combines Art Deco , Mission Revival , and Streamline Moderne style, with architectural details such as eight-pointed stars, and even elements of Dutch Colonial Revival architecture . The Art Deco period saw an enormous increase in travel and tourism, by trains, automobiles, and airplanes. Several luxury hotels were built in

1651-458: A rather severe Greco-Roman facade decorated with deco styles shallow reliefs and/or deco styled interior decoration featuring murals , tile mosaics and sculpture. A common motif among this architecture is the use of stylized or simplified pilasters . Typical elements of PWA Moderne buildings include: Examples of PWA buildings and structures include: WPA Moderne has been used to describe restrained architecture at historic places such as

1778-567: A serious issue in the 1930s. Support for increasing welfare programs during the depression included a focus on women in the family. The Conseil Supérieur de la Natalité campaigned for provisions enacted in the Code de la Famille (1939) that increased state assistance to families with children and required employers to protect the jobs of fathers, even if they were immigrants. In rural and small-town areas, women expanded their operation of vegetable gardens to include as much food production as possible. In

1905-480: A small cadre of Labour, but the vast majority of Labour leaders denounced MacDonald as a traitor for leading the new government. Britain went off the gold standard , and suffered relatively less than other major countries in the Great Depression. In the 1931 British election, the Labour Party was virtually destroyed, leaving MacDonald as prime minister for a largely Conservative coalition. In most countries of

2032-713: A standstill agreement froze Germany's foreign liabilities for six months. Germany received emergency funding from private banks in New York as well as the Bank of International Settlements and the Bank of England. The funding only slowed the process. Industrial failures began in Germany, a major bank closed in July and a two-day holiday for all German banks was declared. Business failures were more frequent in July, and spread to Romania and Hungary. The crisis continued to get worse in Germany, bringing political upheaval that finally led to

2159-537: Is a classic surviving example. Following the lead of the skyscrapers of New York City, smaller in scale but no less ambitious in design, Art Deco office buildings and department stores appeared in cities across the United States. They were rarely built by banks, which wanted to appear conservative, but were often built by retail chains, public utilities, automobile companies and technology companies, which wanted to express modernity and progress. Syracuse, New York

2286-658: Is a consensus that the Federal Reserve System should have cut short the process of monetary deflation and banking collapse, by expanding the money supply and acting as lender of last resort . If they had done this, the economic downturn would have been far less severe and much shorter. Modern mainstream economists see the reasons in Insufficient spending, the money supply reduction, and debt on margin led to falling prices and further bankruptcies ( Irving Fisher 's debt deflation). The monetarist explanation

2413-627: Is enthusiastically supported by guests and staff members alike who often dress up in costume as movie characters. In order to accommodate the large number of people attending on the High Holy Days , since 2001 Oakland's Temple Sinai has held its main High Holy Day services at the Paramount, filling the entire 1,800 seats on the mezzanine of the theater, and most of the 1,200 seats in the balcony. The Black Filmmakers Hall of Fame

2540-559: Is home to the Niagara Mohawk Building , in Syracuse, New York , completed in 1932. was originally the home of the nation's largest electricity supplier. The facade, by the firm of Bley and Lyman, was designed to express the power and modernity of electricity; it features a statue called "The Spirit of Light" 8.5 meters high, made of stainless steel, as the central element of the facade. The Guardian Building , originally

2667-449: Is similar to Streamline Moderne , often with zigzag ornamentation added. The structures reflect a greater use of conservative and classical elements and have a monumental feel. They include post offices, train stations, public schools, libraries, civic centers, courthouses, museums, bridges, and dams across the country. Banks were also built in the style because such buildings radiated authority. The architecture frequently expressed itself in

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2794-493: Is supported by the contrast in how the crisis progressed in, e.g., Britain, Argentina and Brazil, all of which devalued their currencies early and returned to normal patterns of growth relatively rapidly and countries which stuck to the gold standard , such as France or Belgium. Frantic attempts by individual countries to shore up their economies through protectionist policies – such as the 1930 U.S. Smoot–Hawley Tariff Act and retaliatory tariffs in other countries – exacerbated

2921-637: Is the movie theater. The Art Deco period coincided with the birth of the talking motion picture, and the age of enormous and lavishly decorated movie theaters. Many of these movie theaters still survive, though many have been divided in the interior into smaller screening halls. Among the most famous examples are the Paramount Theatre in Oakland, California , which had a four-story high grand lobby, entered through twenty-seven doors, and could seat 3,746 people. Radio City Music Hall , located within

3048-462: Is veneer. He designed the "Art Case" piano for Steinway & Sons company. He also created a number of other furniture pieces in this style, including a humidor (cigar storage). There was no specific Art Deco style of painting in the United States, though paintings were often used as decoration, especially in government buildings and office buildings. In the 1932 the Public Works of Art Project

3175-539: The 1932 election , Hoover was defeated by Franklin D. Roosevelt , who from 1933 pursued a series of " New Deal " policies and programs to provide relief and create jobs, including the Civilian Conservation Corps , Federal Emergency Relief Administration , Tennessee Valley Authority , and Works Progress Administration . Historians disagree on the effects of the New Deal, with some claiming that

3302-1074: The Administration Building for the City of Grand Forks at the Grand Forks Airport (built 1941–43) in North Dakota, the Municipal Auditorium and City Hall (Leoti, Kansas) (built 1939–42) in Kansas, and the Kearney National Guard Armory in Nebraska. (See Category:WPA Moderne architecture ). Relative to the Public Works Administration , which terminated in 1944, the Works Progress Administration program, terminated in 1943, focused on smaller, often rural, projects providing employment. Great Depression The Great Depression

3429-582: The New York Bank of United States – which produced panic and widespread runs on local banks, and the Federal Reserve sat idly by while banks collapsed. Friedman and Schwartz argued that, if the Fed had provided emergency lending to these key banks, or simply bought government bonds on the open market to provide liquidity and increase the quantity of money after the key banks fell, all the rest of

3556-770: The San Francisco Maritime Museum (1936), originally built as a public bath house next to the beach, and the Pan-Pacific Auditorium in Los Angeles, built in 1935 and closed in 1978. It was declared a historic landmark, but it was destroyed by a fire in 1989. The style of decoration and industrial design was influenced by modern aerodynamic principles developed for aviation and ballistics to reduce air friction at high velocities. The bullet shapes were applied by designers to cars, trains, ships, and even objects not intended to move, such as refrigerators , gas pumps , and buildings. One of

3683-539: The coming to power of Hitler's Nazi regime in January 1933. The world financial crisis now began to overwhelm Britain; investors around the world started withdrawing their gold from London at the rate of £2.5 million per day. Credits of £25 million each from the Bank of France and the Federal Reserve Bank of New York and an issue of £15 million fiduciary note slowed, but did not reverse,

3810-608: The 1920s and 1930s, particularly attracting visitors from the Northeast United States during the winter. A large number of Art Deco hotels were built, which have been grouped together into an historical area, the Miami Beach Architectural District , and preserved, and many have been restored to their original appearance. The district has an area of about one square kilometer, and contains both hotels and secondary residences, all about

3937-447: The 1937 recession that interrupted it). The common view among most economists is that Roosevelt's New Deal policies either caused or accelerated the recovery, although his policies were never aggressive enough to bring the economy completely out of recession. Some economists have also called attention to the positive effects from expectations of reflation and rising nominal interest rates that Roosevelt's words and actions portended. It

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4064-533: The 30s and 40s often combined elements of neoclassical, Beauxs-Arts, and Art Deco. This style is called PWA Moderne , Federal Moderne, Depression Moderne, Classical Moderne, Stripped Classicism , or Greco Deco. These building-scale New Deal artworks were built during and shortly after the Great Depression as part of relief projects sponsored by the Public Works Administration (PWA) and the Works Progress Administration (WPA). The style draws from traditional motifs such as Beaux-Arts classicism and Art Deco and

4191-543: The America's most famous artists, including Grant Wood , Reginald Marsh , Georgia O'Keeffe and Maxine Albro took part in the program. The celebrated Mexican painter Diego Rivera also took part in the program, painting a mural. The paintings were in a variety of styles, including regionalism , social realism , and American scenic painting. A few murals were also commissioned for Art Deco skyscrapers, notably Rockefeller Center in New York. Two murals were commissioned for

4318-577: The Art Deco atmosphere. Because of its high cost of construction, Art Deco was usually used only in large office buildings, government buildings and theaters, but it was sometimes used in smaller structures, such as diners and gas stations, particularly along highways. A notable example is the U-Drop Inn in Shamrock, Texas , located along U.S. Highway 66 . It was built in 1936, and is now owned by

4445-813: The British crisis. The financial crisis now caused a major political crisis in Britain in August 1931. With deficits mounting, the bankers demanded a balanced budget; the divided cabinet of Prime Minister Ramsay MacDonald's Labour government agreed; it proposed to raise taxes, cut spending, and most controversially, to cut unemployment benefits 20%. The attack on welfare was unacceptable to the Labour movement. MacDonald wanted to resign, but King George V insisted he remain and form an all-party coalition " National Government ". The Conservative and Liberals parties signed on, along with

4572-694: The City of Shamrock, and is an historical landmark. In the late 1930s and early 1940s, a number of diners modeled after the cars of streamlined trains were produced, and appeared in different cities in the United States. In a few cases, real railroad cars were transformed into diners. A few survive, including the Modern Diner in Pawtucket, Rhode Island which is a registered landmark. The art deco style also lended itself well to furniture. Consistent with many other household objects and buildings, furniture during this period became simplified, yet pleasing to

4699-530: The Depression. Businessmen ignored the mounting national debt and heavy new taxes, redoubling their efforts for greater output to take advantage of generous government contracts. During World War I many countries suspended their gold standard in varying ways. There was high inflation from WWI, and in the 1920s in the Weimar Republic , Austria , and throughout Europe. In the late 1920s there

4826-521: The Dow returning to 294 (pre-depression levels) in April 1930, before steadily declining for years, to a low of 41 in 1932. At the beginning, governments and businesses spent more in the first half of 1930 than in the corresponding period of the previous year. On the other hand, consumers, many of whom suffered severe losses in the stock market the previous year, cut expenditures by 10%. In addition, beginning in

4953-489: The Federal Reserve did not act to limit the decline of the money supply was the gold standard . At that time, the amount of credit the Federal Reserve could issue was limited by the Federal Reserve Act , which required 40% gold backing of Federal Reserve Notes issued. By the late 1920s, the Federal Reserve had almost hit the limit of allowable credit that could be backed by the gold in its possession. This credit

5080-478: The General Electric Building, by John Walter Cross . It was covered from top to bottom with zig-zags and geometric patterns, and had a highly ornamental crown with geometric spires and lightning bolts of stone. The exterior featured bas-relief sculptures by Leo Friedlander and Lee Lawrie , and a mosaic by Barry Faulkner that required more than a million pieces of enamel and glass. While

5207-442: The Great Depression is right, or the traditional Keynesian explanation that a fall in autonomous spending, particularly investment, is the primary explanation for the onset of the Great Depression. Today there is also significant academic support for the debt deflation theory and the expectations hypothesis that – building on the monetary explanation of Milton Friedman and Anna Schwartz – add non-monetary explanations. There

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5334-642: The Great Depression. According to the U.S. Senate website, the Smoot–Hawley Tariff Act is among the most catastrophic acts in congressional history. Many economists have argued that the sharp decline in international trade after 1930 helped to worsen the depression, especially for countries significantly dependent on foreign trade. Most historians and economists blame the Act for worsening the depression by seriously reducing international trade and causing retaliatory tariffs in other countries. While foreign trade

5461-481: The New Deal prolonged the Great Depression, as they argue that National Industrial Recovery Act of 1933 and National Labor Relations Act of 1935 restricted competition and established price fixing. John Maynard Keynes did not think that the New Deal under Roosevelt single-handedly ended the Great Depression: "It is, it seems, politically impossible for a capitalistic democracy to organize expenditure on

5588-607: The Opening the Oakland Symphony had sold out nearly all seats on subscription sales and sold out a majority of individual concerts. But even with the house full the Paramount Theatre proved a financial burden to the Oakland Symphony. In addition the Oakland Symphony financed renovation costs with a $ 1 million loan. Rather than continue absorbing the Paramount's operating losses, the Oakland Symphony transferred

5715-411: The Paramount management responded with talent shows, prize nights, and advertising campaigns. For a second time the Paramount closed on September 15, 1970, because it no longer was able to compete with smaller movie theaters in the suburbs. The Paramount's last film was Let It Be (1970) with The Beatles . In 1971, a Warner Bros. movie, The Candidate , starring Robert Redford , was filmed using

5842-519: The Paramount returned to its true calling as a movie house, showing Buster Keaton 's The General (1926), a silent film accompanied by the Wurlitzer . In 1988, Casablanca (1942), starring Humphrey Bogart and Ingrid Bergman , launched the first movie series. The 2002 feature was Peter Sellers in Dr. Strangelove (1964). In 2002 it showed Wizard of Oz (1939), with Judy Garland , and in 2004

5969-516: The Paramount showed several classic movies: Harvey (1950), starring James Stewart , Viva Las Vegas (1964) starring Elvis Presley and Ann-Margret , The Graduate (1967) with Dustin Hoffman and Anne Bancroft , and The Bad and the Beautiful (1952) starring Kirk Douglas and Lana Turner . The Paramount Movie Classics series continues scheduling screenings throughout the year and

6096-576: The Paramount to the City of Oakland in 1975 for $ 1 in exchange for 40 years of free rent. They continued with that agreement until the Oakland Symphony Orchestra filed for Chapter 7 bankruptcy in September 1986. Seeing an opportunity, a group of seven private citizens banded together and approached city officials with the idea of managing and operating the Paramount on behalf of the city as a nonprofit organization. They agreed, and

6223-518: The Paramount was being completed. When it reopened in May 1933, it was under the management of Frank Burhans, the manager of the Warfield Theatre in San Francisco. He was commissioned to get the Paramount out of debt, and his method for achieving this was to operate without either a stage show or an orchestra, and to unscrew light bulbs in an effort to reduce energy expenses. The Paramount showed

6350-486: The Paramount. 1995 – Poet Maya Angelou read from her work at a benefit at Paramount for the St. Paul's Episcopal School. 1999 – Actress Halle Berry was at the Paramount for the premiere of Introducing Dorothy Dandridge , an HBO docudrama. 2007 – Former Congressman Ron Dellums was sworn in on Monday, January 8, as Oakland's 48th mayor in a public ceremony at the Paramount Theatre. A crowd of 1,900 people gathered for

6477-544: The U.K. economy, which experienced an economic downturn throughout most of the late 1920s, was less severely impacted by the shock of the depression than the U.S. By contrast, the German economy saw a similar decline in industrial output as that observed in the U.S. Some economic historians attribute the differences in the rates of recovery and relative severity of the economic decline to whether particular countries had been able to effectively devaluate their currencies or not. This

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6604-490: The U.S. unemployment rate down below 10%. World War II had a dramatic effect on many parts of the American economy. Government-financed capital spending accounted for only 5% of the annual U.S. investment in industrial capital in 1940; by 1943, the government accounted for 67% of U.S. capital investment. The massive war spending doubled economic growth rates, either masking the effects of the Depression or essentially ending

6731-612: The Union Trust Building, is a rare example of a bank or financial institution using Art Deco. Its interior decoration was so elaborate that it became known as the "Cathedral of Commerce". The San Francisco architect Timothy L. Pflueger best known for the Paramount Theatre in Oakland, California, was another proponent of lavish Art Deco interiors and facades on office buildings. The interior of his downtown San Francisco office building, 450 Sutter Street , opened in 1929,

6858-622: The United States, agricultural organizations sponsored programs to teach housewives how to optimize their gardens and to raise poultry for meat and eggs. Rural women made feed sack dresses and other items for themselves and their families and homes from feed sacks. In American cities, African American women quiltmakers enlarged their activities, promoted collaboration, and trained neophytes. Quilts were created for practical use from various inexpensive materials and increased social interaction for women and promoted camaraderie and personal fulfillment. Oral history provides evidence for how housewives in

6985-543: The United States, remained on the gold standard into 1932 or 1933, while a few countries in the so-called "gold bloc", led by France and including Poland, Belgium and Switzerland, stayed on the standard until 1935–36. According to later analysis, the earliness with which a country left the gold standard reliably predicted its economic recovery. For example, The UK and Scandinavia, which left the gold standard in 1931, recovered much earlier than France and Belgium, which remained on gold much longer. Countries such as China, which had

7112-638: The Wall Street crash, after which the slide continued for three years, which was accompanied by a loss of confidence in the financial system. By 1933, the U.S. unemployment rate had risen to 25 percent, about one-third of farmers had lost their land, and about half of the country's 25,000 banks had gone out of business. Many people, unable to pay mortgages or rent, became homeless and relied on begging or charities to feed themselves. The U.S. federal government initially did little to help. President Herbert Hoover , like many of his fellow Republicans , believed in

7239-605: The West Coast, seating 3,476. Today, the Paramount is the home of the Oakland East Bay Symphony and the Oakland Ballet. It regularly plays host to R&B , jazz , blues , pop , rock , gospel , classical music , as well as ballets , plays, stand-up comedy , lecture series, special events, and screenings of classic movies from Hollywood's Golden Era. The Paramount Theatre was built as

7366-757: The Wiltern Theater. Because the art deco style is known for its simplicity and lack of ornament, it is also a significantly less costly design. Wirt Rowland, another furniture artist of this period, is known better for his creation of the Guardian Building in Detroit. He designed every bit of furniture within the rooms as well. Frank Pollaro, known best for his creation of the Muppet Marquetry Desk, specialized in recreating French art deco furniture. His preferred material to work with

7493-614: The acrobatic Seven Arconis, Patsy Marr, and the Sunkist Beauties in a chorus-line finale. In June 1932 the Paramount closed, unable to meet operating expenses of more than $ 27,000 per week. Competing with Paramount was the Fox Oakland Theater , which had opened in 1928. The Paramount stayed closed for nearly a year. The days when movie theaters could support not just the showing of movies, but entire orchestras, stage shows, and uniformed attendants, were over, just as

7620-509: The balcony seat and eighty-five cents for a seat in the orchestra. The program also included a Fox Movietone News newsreel, a Silly Symphony animated cartoon The Spider and the Fly , and the music of the Paramount's own 16-piece house orchestra, under the direction of Lew Kosloff. Last on the program was the stage show Fanchon & Marco's "Slavique Idea", a forty-minute revue featuring Sam Hearn, comedians Brock and Thompson, dancer LaVonne Sweet,

7747-460: The banks would not have fallen after the large ones did, and the money supply would not have fallen as far and as fast as it did. With significantly less money to go around, businesses could not get new loans and could not even get their old loans renewed, forcing many to stop investing. This interpretation blames the Federal Reserve for inaction, especially the New York branch . One reason why

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7874-573: The beginning of the Depression. The Depression was preceded by a period of industrial growth and social development known as the " Roaring Twenties ". Much of the profit generated by the boom was invested in speculation , such as on the stock market , which resulted in growing wealth inequality . Banks were subject to minimal regulation under laissez-faire economic policies, resulting in loose lending and widespread debt. By 1929, declining spending had led to reductions in manufacturing output and rising unemployment . Share values continued to rise until

8001-465: The behavior of housewives. The common view among economic historians is that the Great Depression ended with the advent of World War II . Many economists believe that government spending on the war caused or at least accelerated recovery from the Great Depression, though some consider that it did not play a very large role in the recovery, though it did help in reducing unemployment. The rearmament policies leading up to World War II helped stimulate

8128-482: The best of the new motion pictures, including such features as Dancing Lady (1933) with Joan Crawford and Clark Gable , Dames (1934) with Dick Powell , and The Gay Divorcee (1934) with Fred Astaire and Ginger Rogers . The Great Depression gave way to World War II, and the Port of Oakland became a major departure and arrival point for servicemen. The Paramount's comfortable chairs and spacious lounges were

8255-418: The ceremony. 2011 – Hosting of the premiere for the 2011 film Moneyball . The cast as well as some Oakland Athletics players and executives attended the premiere. 2012 – Abel Gance 's film Napoléon had four screenings from March 24 to April 1 as part of the San Francisco Silent Film Festival . Accompanied by a live orchestra, Napoléon was shown at the original 20 frames per second and ending with

8382-410: The collapse in global trade, contributing to the depression. By 1933, the economic decline pushed world trade to one third of its level compared to four years earlier. While the precise causes for the occurrence of the Great depression are disputed and can be traced to both global and national phenomena, its immediate origins are most conveniently examined in the context of the U.S. economy, from which

8509-404: The costume designs of Léon Bakst for the Ballets Russes , and in the catalogs of the fashion designers Paul Poiret . The illustrations of Georges Barbier , and Georges Lepape and the images in the fashion magazine La Gazette du bon ton perfectly captured the elegance and sensuality of the style. In the 1920s, the look changed; the fashions stressed were more casual, sportive and daring, with

8636-475: The crash was a mere symptom of more general economic trends of the time, which had already been underway in the late 1920s. A contrasting set of views, which rose to prominence in the later part of the 20th century, ascribes a more prominent role to failures of monetary policy . According to those authors, while general economic trends can explain the emergence of the downturn, they fail to account for its severity and longevity; they argue that these were caused by

8763-442: The crisis, the U.S. Congress passed the Smoot–Hawley Tariff Act on 17 June 1930. The Act was ostensibly aimed at protecting the American economy from foreign competition by imposing high tariffs on foreign imports. The consensus view among economists and economic historians (including Keynesians , Monetarists and Austrian economists ) is that the passage of the Smoot–Hawley Tariff had, in fact, achieved an opposite effect to what

8890-633: The decade. The Depression had devastating economic effects on both wealthy and poor countries: all experienced drops in personal income , prices ( deflation ), tax revenues, and profits. International trade fell by more than 50%, and unemployment in some countries rose as high as 33%. Cities around the world , especially those dependent on heavy industry , were heavily affected. Construction virtually halted in many countries, and farming communities and rural areas suffered as crop prices fell by up to 60%. Faced with plummeting demand and few job alternatives, areas dependent on primary sector industries suffered

9017-422: The decline of railroad travel, most of the building was converted to other uses, including the Cincinnati Museum Center, though it is still used as an Amtrak station. The Marine Air Terminal at LaGuardia Airport , built in 1939, was the first terminal for overseas flights from New York; it served the flying boats of Pan American World Airways which landed in the harbor. It survived destruction, and still contains

9144-408: The depression. Not all governments enforced the same measures of protectionism. Some countries raised tariffs drastically and enforced severe restrictions on foreign exchange transactions, while other countries reduced "trade and exchange restrictions only marginally": The gold standard was the primary transmission mechanism of the Great Depression. Even countries that did not face bank failures and

9271-500: The domestic price level to decline ( deflation ). There is also consensus that protectionist policies, and primarily the passage of the Smoot–Hawley Tariff Act , helped to exacerbate, or even cause the Great Depression. Some economic studies have indicated that the rigidities of the gold standard not only spread the downturn worldwide, but also suspended gold convertibility (devaluing the currency in gold terms) that did

9398-402: The drop in demand. Monetarists believe that the Great Depression started as an ordinary recession, but the shrinking of the money supply greatly exacerbated the economic situation, causing a recession to descend into the Great Depression. Economists and economic historians are almost evenly split as to whether the traditional monetary explanation that monetary forces were the primary cause of

9525-427: The economies of Europe in 1937–1939. By 1937, unemployment in Britain had fallen to 1.5 million. The mobilization of manpower following the outbreak of war in 1939 ended unemployment. The American mobilization for World War II at the end of 1941 moved approximately ten million people out of the civilian labor force and into the war. This finally eliminated the last effects from the Great Depression and brought

9652-632: The end of the month. A large sell-off of stocks began in mid-October. Finally, on 24 October, Black Thursday , the American stock market crashed 11% at the opening bell. Actions to stabilize the market failed, and on 28 October, Black Monday, the market crashed another 12%. The panic peaked the next day on Black Tuesday, when the market saw another 11% drop. Thousands of investors were ruined, and billions of dollars had been lost; many stocks could not be sold at any price. The market recovered 12% on Wednesday but by then significant damage had been done. Though

9779-719: The exception of the Eiffel Tower . As a result, the United States soon took the lead in building tall buildings. The first skyscrapers had been built in Chicago in the 1880s in the Beaux-Arts or neoclassical style. In the 1920s, New York City architects used the new Art Deco style to build the Chrysler Building and the Empire State Building . The Empire State building was the tallest building in

9906-500: The explanations of the Keynesians and monetarists. The consensus among demand-driven theories is that a large-scale loss of confidence led to a sudden reduction in consumption and investment spending. Once panic and deflation set in, many people believed they could avoid further losses by keeping clear of the markets. Holding money became profitable as prices dropped lower and a given amount of money bought ever more goods, exacerbating

10033-468: The exposition, and the government sent a delegation to the expo. Their resulting reports helped spread the style to America. Other influences included German expressionism , the Austrian Secession , Art Nouveau , Cubism , and the ornament of African and Central and South American cultures. American Art Deco architecture took different forms in different regions of the country, influenced by

10160-472: The eye. This included metal bars as chair support, rounded feet, and decorated edges, all coming together to create a complex simplicity. There were many furniture designers during this period including Kem Webber, Wirt Rowland, and some who continue to use the style later on, including Frank Pollaro. Kem Webber is known for designing the furniture in the Warner Brother's Wester Theater, now known as

10287-503: The few women in the labor force, layoffs were less common in the white-collar jobs and they were typically found in light manufacturing work. However, there was a widespread demand to limit families to one paid job, so that wives might lose employment if their husband was employed. Across Britain, there was a tendency for married women to join the labor force, competing for part-time jobs especially. In France, very slow population growth, especially in comparison to Germany continued to be

10414-602: The first production vehicles in this style was the Chrysler Airflow of 1933. It was unsuccessful commercially, but the beauty and functionality of its design set a precedent; streamline moderne meant modernity. It continued to be used in car design well after World War II. Art Deco was often associated with airplanes, trains and airships and was frequently chosen as the style for new transport terminals. The semi-dome of Cincinnati Union Terminal (1933) measures 180 feet (55 m) wide and 106 feet (32 m) high. After

10541-505: The first week of June, 540 million in the second, and 150 million in two days, 19–20 June. Collapse was at hand. U.S. President Herbert Hoover called for a moratorium on payment of war reparations . This angered Paris, which depended on a steady flow of German payments, but it slowed the crisis down, and the moratorium was agreed to in July 1931. An International conference in London later in July produced no agreements but on 19 August

10668-538: The goddess of grain and fertility, at the top of the Chicago Board of Trade . Made of aluminum, it stands 31 feet (9.4 meters) tall, and weighs 6,500 pounds. Ceres was chosen because the Chicago Board of Trade was one of the largest grain and commodities markets in the world. The Art Deco style appeared early in the graphic arts, in the years just before World War I. It appeared in Paris in the posters and

10795-606: The government tried to reshape private household consumption under the Four-Year Plan of 1936 to achieve German economic self-sufficiency. The Nazi women's organizations, other propaganda agencies and the authorities all attempted to shape such consumption as economic self-sufficiency was needed to prepare for and to sustain the coming war. The organizations, propaganda agencies and authorities employed slogans that called up traditional values of thrift and healthy living. However, these efforts were only partly successful in changing

10922-519: The help of restoration project manager Peter Botto, new, wider seats were installed, the distance between rows was increased to provide more leg room, and a replica of the original carpet was laid throughout the theater. Two bars, one on the mezzanine and one on the lower level, and a new box office were added. Skidmore, Owings & Merrill were consultants for the restoration, with Milton Pflueger & Associates assisting. The Paramount reopened on September 22, 1973, in its original 1931 splendor. Following

11049-519: The home, or took boarders, did laundry for trade or cash, and did sewing for neighbors in exchange for something they could offer. Extended families used mutual aid—extra food, spare rooms, repair-work, cash loans—to help cousins and in-laws. In Japan, official government policy was deflationary and the opposite of Keynesian spending. Consequently, the government launched a campaign across the country to induce households to reduce their consumption, focusing attention on spending by housewives. In Germany,

11176-470: The initial crisis spread to the rest of the world. In the aftermath of World War I , the Roaring Twenties brought considerable wealth to the United States and Western Europe. Initially, the year 1929 dawned with good economic prospects: despite a minor crash on 25 March 1929, the market seemed to gradually improve through September. Stock prices began to slump in September, and were volatile at

11303-664: The interior of the Paramount as one of the principal locations. Hope surfaced in October 1972 when the Oakland Symphony Orchestra Association (OSO), in need of a new home, purchased the Paramount for $ 1 million, half of which was donated by the seller, National General Theaters—formerly the Fox Theaters-West Coast —with the other half coming from generous private donors. The popcorn machines and candy counters were removed. With

11430-563: The lack of an adequate response to the crises of liquidity that followed the initial economic shock of 1929 and the subsequent bank failures accompanied by a general collapse of the financial markets. After the Wall Street Crash of 1929 , when the Dow Jones Industrial Average dropped from 381 to 198 over the course of two months, optimism persisted for some time. The stock market rose in early 1930, with

11557-584: The lobby, one by John Steuart Curry and another, Man at the Crossroads , by Diego Rivera. The owners of the building, the Rockefeller family, discovered that Rivera, a Communist, had slipped an image of Lenin into a crowd in the painting, and had it destroyed. The mural was replaced with another by the Spanish artist José Maria Sert . One of the largest Art Deco sculptures is the statue of Ceres ,

11684-646: The local tastes, cultural influences, or laws. In the 1920s, the style was often referred to as the "vertical style", referring to the new look of skyscrapers appearing in America's cities. In the 1930s and 40s, more horizontal, streamlined or "moderne" buildings became popular. Government buildings commissioned by the Works Progress Administration , with their fusion of moderne and classical elements, are called "WPA Moderne" or "Modern classic". The Art Deco style had been born in Paris , but no buildings were permitted in that city which were higher than Notre Dame Cathedral with

11811-516: The management structure has remained to this day. Walking into the main lobby, with its gold ornamentation along the walls, curving staircase, and glowing light fixtures, is like taking a trip back through Old Hollywood. Public tours of the Paramount Theatre are given on the first and third Saturdays of each month, excluding holidays and holiday weekends. Documented in 1972 by the Historic American Buildings Survey ,

11938-521: The market entered a period of recovery from 14 November until 17 April 1930, the general situation had been a prolonged slump. From 17 April 1930 until 8 July 1932, the market continued to lose 89% of its value. Despite the crash, the worst of the crisis did not reverberate around the world until after 1929. The crisis hit panic levels again in December 1930, with a bank run on the Bank of United States ,

12065-414: The mid-1930s, a severe drought ravaged the agricultural heartland of the U.S. Interest rates dropped to low levels by mid-1930, but expected deflation and the continuing reluctance of people to borrow meant that consumer spending and investment remained low. By May 1930, automobile sales declined to below the levels of 1928. Prices, in general, began to decline, although wages held steady in 1930. Then

12192-423: The monetary base and by not injecting liquidity into the banking system to prevent it from crumbling, the Federal Reserve passively watched the transformation of a normal recession into the Great Depression. Friedman and Schwartz argued that the downward turn in the economy, starting with the stock market crash, would merely have been an ordinary recession if the Federal Reserve had taken aggressive action. This view

12319-502: The most to make recovery possible. Every major currency left the gold standard during the Great Depression. The UK was the first to do so. Facing speculative attacks on the pound and depleting gold reserves , in September 1931 the Bank of England ceased exchanging pound notes for gold and the pound was floated on foreign exchange markets. Japan and the Scandinavian countries followed in 1931. Other countries, such as Italy and

12446-427: The most. The outbreak of World War II in 1939 ended the Depression, as it stimulated factory production, providing jobs for women as militaries absorbed large numbers of young, unemployed men. The precise causes for the Great Depression are disputed. One set of historians, for example, focuses on non-monetary economic causes. Among these, some regard the Wall Street crash itself as the main cause; others consider that

12573-582: The need to balance the national budget and was unwilling to implement expensive welfare spending . In 1930, Hoover signed the Smoot–Hawley Tariff Act , which taxed imports with the intention of encouraging buyers to purchase American products, which worsened the Depression because foreign governments retaliated with tariffs on American exports. In 1932, Hoover established the Reconstruction Finance Corporation , which offered loans to businesses and support to local governments. In

12700-554: The new style; the Waldorf-Astoria on Park Avenue in New York City, built in 1929 to replace a beaux-arts style building from the 1890s, was the tallest and largest hotel in the world when it was built. The city of Miami Beach, Florida developed its own particular variant of Art Deco, and the style remained popular there until the late 1940s, well after other American cities. It became a popular tourist destination in

12827-483: The physical volume of exports fall, but also the prices fell by about 1 ⁄ 3 as written. Hardest hit were farm commodities such as wheat, cotton, tobacco, and lumber. Governments around the world took various steps into spending less money on foreign goods such as: "imposing tariffs, import quotas, and exchange controls". These restrictions triggered much tension among countries that had large amounts of bilateral trade, causing major export-import reductions during

12954-480: The policies prolonged the Depression instead of shortening it. Between 1929 and 1932, worldwide gross domestic product (GDP) fell by an estimated 15%; in the U.S., the Depression resulted in a 30% contraction in GDP. Recovery varied greatly around the world. Some economies, such as the U.S., Germany and Japan started to recover by the mid-1930s; others, like France, did not return to pre-shock growth rates until later in

13081-459: The political situation in Europe. In their book, A Monetary History of the United States , Milton Friedman and Anna J. Schwartz also attributed the recovery to monetary factors, and contended that it was much slowed by poor management of money by the Federal Reserve System . Chairman of the Federal Reserve (2006–2014) Ben Bernanke agreed that monetary factors played important roles both in

13208-840: The public. In December 2007, the Oakland Ballet celebrated the 35th anniversary of Ronn Guidi's Nutcracker at the Paramount Theatre, with Michael Morgan conducting the music of Tchaikovsky . The Paramount has hosted concerts by a wide variety of acts since the mid-1970s, including Bob Marley & The Wailers , Bruce Springsteen & The E Street Band, Prince , James Brown , Diana Ross , Bonnie Raitt , Al Green , Jeff Beck , Lionel Richie , B.B. King , Anita Baker , Brian Wilson , Elvis Costello , Gladys Knight , Lucinda Williams , and Nelly Furtado . 1974 1975 1976 1977 1978 1986 1988 1991 1992 1994 1995 1996 1997 1998 1999 2000 2001 2002 2003 2004 2005 2006 2007 2008 2011 It wasn't until 1987 that

13335-485: The same height, none higher than twelve or thirteen stories. Most have classic Art Deco characteristics; clear geometric shapes spread out horizontally; aerodynamic streamline features; and often a central tower breaking the horizontal, topped by a spire or dome. A particular Miami Art Deco feature is the palette of pastel colors, alternating with white stucco. The decoration features herons, sea shells, palm trees and sunrises and sunsets. The neon lighting at night highlights

13462-434: The scale necessary to make the grand experiments which would prove my case—except in war conditions." According to Christina Romer , the money supply growth caused by huge international gold inflows was a crucial source of the recovery of the United States economy, and that the economy showed little sign of self-correction. The gold inflows were partly due to devaluation of the U.S. dollar and partly due to deterioration of

13589-477: The skyscraper Art Deco style was mostly used for corporate office buildings, it also became popular for government buildings, since all city offices could be contained in one building on a minimal amount of land. The city halls of Los Angeles, California and Buffalo, New York were built in the style, and the new state capital building in Baton Rouge, Louisiana . Another important genre of Art Deco buildings

13716-471: The skyscraper complex of Rockefeller Center in New York City, was originally a theater for stage shows when it opened in 1932, but it quickly changed to the largest movie theater in the United States. It seats more than five thousand people, and still features a stage show of dancers. In the 1930s, the streamline style appeared in movie theaters in smaller cities. The movie theater in Normal, Illinois (1937)

13843-517: The theater was entered into the National Register of Historic Places on August 14, 1973, and became a California Registered Historical Landmark in 1976 and a U.S. National Historical Landmark in 1977. Michael Morgan was music director from September 1990 until his death in August 2021. With its May 18, 2007, performance of George Gershwin 's Porgy and Bess sold out, the Oakland East Bay Symphony opened its final rehearsal to

13970-529: The woman models usually smoking cigarettes. American fashion magazines such as Vogue , Vanity Fair and Harper's Bazaar quickly picked up the new style and popularized it in the United States. It also influenced the work of American book illustrators such as Rockwell Kent . In the 1930s a new genre of posters appeared in the United States during the Great Depression. The Federal Art Project hired American artists to create posters to promote tourism and cultural events. Government and public buildings of

14097-499: The world for forty years. The decoration of the interior and exterior of the skyscrapers was classic Art Deco, with geometric shapes and zigzag patterns. The Chrysler Building, by William Van Alen (1928–30), updated the traditional gargoyles on Gothic cathedrals with sculptures on the building corners in the shape of Chrysler radiator ornaments. Another major landmark of the style was the RCA Victor Building , now

14224-476: The world, recovery from the Great Depression began in 1933. In the U.S., recovery began in early 1933, but the U.S. did not return to 1929 GNP for over a decade and still had an unemployment rate of about 15% in 1940, albeit down from the high of 25% in 1933. There is no consensus among economists regarding the motive force for the U.S. economic expansion that continued through most of the Roosevelt years (and

14351-624: The world. The financial crisis escalated out of control in mid-1931, starting with the collapse of the Credit Anstalt in Vienna in May. This put heavy pressure on Germany, which was already in political turmoil. With the rise in violence of National Socialist ('Nazi') and Communist movements, as well as investor nervousness at harsh government financial policies, investors withdrew their short-term money from Germany as confidence spiraled downward. The Reichsbank lost 150 million marks in

14478-778: The worldwide economic decline and eventual recovery. Bernanke also saw a strong role for institutional factors, particularly the rebuilding and restructuring of the financial system, and pointed out that the Depression should be examined in an international perspective. Women's primary role was as housewives; without a steady flow of family income, their work became much harder in dealing with food and clothing and medical care. Birthrates fell everywhere, as children were postponed until families could financially support them. The average birthrate for 14 major countries fell 12% from 19.3 births per thousand population in 1930, to 17.0 in 1935. In Canada, half of Roman Catholic women defied Church teachings and used contraception to postpone births. Among

14605-658: Was a scramble to deflate prices to get the gold standard's conversation rates back on track to pre-WWI levels, by causing deflation and high unemployment through monetary policy. In 1933 FDR signed Executive Order 6102 and in 1934 signed the Gold Reserve Act . The two classic competing economic theories of the Great Depression are the Keynesian (demand-driven) and the Monetarist explanation. There are also various heterodox theories that downplay or reject

14732-505: Was a severe global economic downturn from 1929 to 1939. The period was characterized by high rates of unemployment and poverty; drastic reductions in liquidity , industrial production, and trade; and widespread bank and business failures around the world. The economic contagion began in 1929 in the United States , the largest economy in the world, with the devastating Wall Street stock market crash of October 1929 often considered

14859-478: Was a small part of overall economic activity in the U.S. and was concentrated in a few businesses like farming, it was a much larger factor in many other countries. The average ad valorem (value based) rate of duties on dutiable imports for 1921–1925 was 25.9% but under the new tariff it jumped to 50% during 1931–1935. In dollar terms, American exports declined over the next four years from about $ 5.2 billion in 1929 to $ 1.7 billion in 1933; so, not only did

14986-669: Was built by Wurlitzer for the Paramount Publix theaters: a four-manual, twenty-rank model called the Publix I (Opus 2164), which cost $ 20,000 in 1931. The gala premiere on December 16, 1931, was attended by Kay Francis , star of the opening film, The False Madonna , and cast members Conway Tearle , Charles D. Brown, Marjorie Gateson , and William Boyd (not yet known as Hopalong Cassidy). Notable guests included California's governor James Rolph and Oakland mayor Fred N. Morcom. Tickets were first-come, first-served: sixty cents for

15113-556: Was created to give work to artists unemployed because the Great Depression. In a year, it commissioned more than fifteen thousand works of art. It was succeeded in 1935 by the Federal Arts Project of the Works Progress Administration , or WPA. prominent American artists were commissioned by the Federal Art Project to paint murals in government buildings, hospitals, airports, schools and universities. Some

15240-474: Was endorsed in 2002 by Federal Reserve Governor Ben Bernanke in a speech honoring Friedman and Schwartz with this statement: Let me end my talk by abusing slightly my status as an official representative of the Federal Reserve. I would like to say to Milton and Anna: Regarding the Great Depression, you're right. We did it. We're very sorry. But thanks to you, we won't do it again. The Federal Reserve allowed some large public bank failures – particularly that of

15367-523: Was entirely covered with hieroglyphic-like designs and ornament, resembling a giant tapestry. Streamline Moderne (or Streamline) was a variety of Art Deco which emerged during the mid-1930s. The architectural style was more sober and less decorative than earlier Art Deco buildings, more in tune with the somber mood of the Great Depression. Buildings in the style often resembled land-bound ships, with rounded corners, long horizontal lines, iron railings, and sometimes nautical features. Notable examples include

15494-597: Was founded in 1973 in Oakland . They held elegant events that honored such screen legends as Clarence Muse , Hattie McDaniel , Billy Dee Williams , Melvin Van Peebles , and Danny Glover with the Oscar Micheaux Awards. Some of the events were hosted at Oakland's Paramount Theatre. In 2001 Harry Belafonte , Eubie Blake and Diahann Carroll was inducted in the Filmmakers Hall of Fame at

15621-426: Was given by American economists Milton Friedman and Anna J. Schwartz . They argued that the Great Depression was caused by the banking crisis that caused one-third of all banks to vanish, a reduction of bank shareholder wealth and more importantly monetary contraction of 35%, which they called "The Great Contraction ". This caused a price drop of 33% ( deflation ). By not lowering interest rates, by not increasing

15748-500: Was in the form of Federal Reserve demand notes. A "promise of gold" is not as good as "gold in the hand", particularly when they only had enough gold to cover 40% of the Federal Reserve Notes outstanding. During the bank panics, a portion of those demand notes was redeemed for Federal Reserve gold. Since the Federal Reserve had hit its limit on allowable credit, any reduction in gold in its vaults had to be accompanied by

15875-508: Was intended. It exacerbated the Great Depression by preventing economic recovery after domestic production recovered, hampering the volume of trade; still there is disagreement as to the precise extent of the Act's influence. In the popular view, the Smoot–Hawley Tariff was one of the leading causes of the depression. In a 1995 survey of American economic historians, two-thirds agreed that the Smoot–Hawley Tariff Act at least worsened

16002-598: Was rediscovered in the 1960s, and many of the original buildings have been restored and are now historical landmarks. American Art Deco has roots in the style moderne popularized at the 1925 International Exhibition of Modern Decorative and Industrial Arts , Paris , from which the name Art Deco would be drawn retroactively ( Exposition internationale des arts déco ratifs et industriels modernes ). The United States did not officially participate, but Americans—including New York City architect  Irwin Chanin and others—visited

16129-470: Was the rollback of those same reflationary policies that led to the interruption of a recession beginning in late 1937. One contributing policy that reversed reflation was the Banking Act of 1935 , which effectively raised reserve requirements, causing a monetary contraction that helped to thwart the recovery. GDP returned to its upward trend in 1938. A revisionist view among some economists holds that

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