Murder and Mayhem - The Great Gatsby: Facts behind the Fiction

Part II

Primary Sources from the 1920s and The Great Gatsby

Students explore the American Memory collections to locate primary sources that illustrate some ideas/events/details in The Great Gatsby.

Introduction to the American Memory collections

1. Arrange for use of a computer lab.
2. On a large screen, demonstrate the various features of the American Memory collections, especially how to search by collection and keyword.
3. Allow students to practice their search skills. The How Do I Find It? section of the Learning Page workshop, Discovering American Memory, offers several different search activities.

Searching for primary source materials related to The Great Gatsby

1. Using the American Memory collections, students locate at least one primary source document/object from each of the following areas:
• News
• Sports
• Advertisements
• Lifestyle
• Entertainment
• Editorials
• Obituaries
• Business
2. To help students understand the types of articles found in different sections of the newspaper, you may want to pass out copies of local newspapers to use as examples.
3. Direct students to the American Memory collections.
4. Select "More browse options."
5. Select 1900-1929 in the Browse Collections by Time Period choices.
6. Select the following collections – deselect (remove the checks) collections that do not appear helpful.
• Advertising ~ Multiformat ~ 1850-1920
• Coolidge Era ~ Multiformat ~ 1924-1929
• Edison Companies ~ Film and Sound Recordings
• Factories, Westinghouse ~ Films ~ 1904
• Film, Animated ~ 1900-1921
• New York City ~ Films ~ 1898-1906
• Panoramic Photographs ~ 1851-1991
• Roosevelt, Theodore ~ Films ~ 1898-1919
• Sheet Music ~ 1850-1920
• Turn-of-the-Century America ~ Detroit Publishing Company ~ Photographs ~ 1880-1920
• Variety Stage ~ Multiformat ~ 1870-1920
• Washington, D.C. ~ Theodor Horydczak ~ Photographs ~ 1923-1959
• Woman Suffrage ~ Books and Pamphlets ~ 1848-1921
• Woman Suffrage ~ Photographs and Prints ~ 1850-1920
• Work and Leisure ~ Films ~ 1894-1915
• World War I and 1920 Election ~ Recordings
7. Have students conduct a "keyword" search by typing a term in the box at the top of the page.
8. To locate primary sources, students may use the suggested keywords below or try some of their own. Remind students that they are searching for primary sources which reflect ideas, events, or details featured in The Great Gatsby.
9. As students view each item, be sure that they note the time period. They are looking for items from around 1910-28.
10. Have students print the document/object, including the page with the bibliographic information.
11. Once each team has located at least one primary source for each of the categories, they should complete the Primary Sources from the 1920s and The Great Gatsby Analysis Guide.

Keywords

• News - prohibition, women's suffrage, World War I, military, election, politics, trials
• Sports - golf, golf women, polo, world series New York, yachting
• Advertising - advertisement home, advertisement cleaning, advertisement appliances, advertisement music, advertisement film, advertisement photography, advertisement fashion, advertisement cars
• Lifestyles - fashion, education, parties, cars, automobiles, vacations, home decorations, telephone, bar, dance club, photography, clothing
• Entertainment - film, music jazz, dance jazz, restaurants, dining, movies, radio, yachting, musicians, records, phonograph, dance clubs
• Editorials - editorials
• Obituaries - obituaries, death
• Business - stock market, Wall Street, financial investment, business, manufacturing

Overview  |  Teacher's Guide