50+ Lifestyles

What Was Happening in February 1921?

By Eloise Graham

Movies of the day were silent films. The “talkie” had not yet debuted. The silent movie “The Kid” written, produced, directed and staring Charlie Chaplin opened in February of 1921. Jackie Coogan and Lita Grey also starred.

The Shuberts built the Ambassador Theatre in New York in 1921. It was one of four theaters constructed on 48th and 49th Streets as part of their post-war rapid expansion. It is the only one still owned by the Shubert Organization. The plot of land that was used required that the auditorium be place diagonally in the building. This left little room for the wings or side area of the stage.

On February 22, the first daring, round-the-clock transcontinental airmail flight took place. It started out with four planes. Two westbound planes left New York’s Hazelhurst Field, while two other planes left San Francisco. The cost for a stamp was two cents.

An American literary magazine, the Little Review, was tried on an obscenity charge for publishing James Joyce’s Ulysses. The novel was banned in the United States. Anderson and Heap of the Little Review were fined $100 dollars.

Much of the world was still under British Rule. They had colonies in Africa, the Far East, India, Egypt, Near East and most of the Islands in the Atlantic Ocean. On February 12, Winston Churchill became British Prime Minister of Britain and its Colonies. The London Conference on the Near East begins: the issue being the Allies’ 1920 Treaty of Sevres, which had given part of Turkey Asia Minor to Greece.

British troops were sent to Ireland to occupy Dublin.