This picture preserves a moment few cameras ever caught — Republican Party Supporters And Democratic Party Supporters Fight With Snowballs In Front Of The Capitol. January 1921, Washington, USA. Made in 1921, it is the kind of image that turns a date in a history book into something you can actually see.
The 1920s roared with new money and new habits. Radio broadcasting began, cars became affordable for working families, jazz filled dance halls, and hemlines and haircuts shortened in ways that scandalized the older generation. News photography boomed alongside the tabloid press.
Most photography of the period chased celebrities and headlines, which makes surviving images of daily routine all the more precious. This is what the world actually looked like when nobody thought it was worth remembering.
