Setting the Scene
📖 Setting the Scene
History glossary
- What was the assembly line?
- Moving belt carried parts past stationary workers, each doing one task — Henry Ford's system that made mass production possible
Don't just list causes — show how they CONNECT. This is what gets top marks:
Earn the mark scheme marks
🧠 Memory Aids: Lock In the Key Facts
The WCRAM mnemonic (already in your deepdive — this is your main cause-recall tool):
- W — World War One gave America industrial capacity
- C — Credit (hire purchase) let people buy on borrowed money
- R — Republican policies: low taxes, high tariffs, no regulation
- A — Advertising created demand and a consumer culture
- M — Mass production made goods cheap enough to buy
The "60-80 rule" for credit statistics: Remember that 60% of cars and 80% of radios were bought on credit by 1929. Both numbers are higher than you'd expect — which is exactly why examiners love them. If you can remember 60 and 80, you'll always have a strong statistic ready.
The Model T price journey: 850 → 290 — Think of it as nearly cutting the price by two-thirds. In 1908, only the wealthy could afford a car at $850. By 1925, a Ford worker earning $5 a day could save up for a Model T at $290. That's the story of mass production in two numbers.
The Dow Jones: 63 → 381 — The stock market grew sixfold in eight years (1921–1929). An easy way to remember this is "six times bigger, all built on speculation." When confidence cracked in October 1929, those same investors tried to sell all at once — and the whole thing collapsed.
Key dates to know cold:
- 1908 — Ford launches the Model T (first mass-market car)
- 1913 — Ford introduces the moving assembly line at Highland Park
- 1921 — Republican boom begins (Harding presidency, Mellon as Treasury)
- 1922 — Fordney-McCumber Tariff (high tariff protectionism)
- 1925 — Model T costs $290 (from $850 in 1908)
- 1929 — 27 million cars on US roads; Dow Jones peaks at 381; Wall Street Crash
Visual association — "The Factory and the Credit Card": Picture a huge gleaming factory (mass production) connected by a long chain to a credit card (hire purchase). The factory makes goods cheaply; the credit card lets ordinary people buy them. That chain of connection is the heart of the boom. When the credit card maxed out in 1929, the whole chain snapped.
Now try it yourself
Quiz · Question 1 of 12
By how much did Henry Ford's assembly line reduce the time to build a Model T car?
Tap an answer to check it
This topic in real past papers
Every real exam question we've found on the economic boom, with a full worked answer.