With the return Albert back to the Anderson fold, life quickly returned to the norm. His neighbors quickly became tired of his stories as well as his family members, so he ceased and desisted to tell them. His children continued to grow and mature, as did our country. There were good and bad times, our 25th President William Mckinley was shot and assassinated on the grounds of the Pan-American Exposition in the Temple of Music in Buffalo, New York, on September 6, 1901, six months into his second term. He was shaking hands with the public when an anarchist, Leon Czolgosz, shot him twice in the abdomen. McKinley died on September 14 of gangrene caused by the wounds. He was the third American president to be assassinated, following Abraham Lincoln in 1865 and James A. Garfield in 1881.

McKinley enjoyed meeting the public and was reluctant to accept the security available to his office. Secretary to President George B. Cortelyou feared that an assassination attempt would take place during a visit to the Temple of Music and took it off the schedule twice, but McKinley restored it each time.

Czolgosz had lost his job during the economic Panic of 1893 and turned to anarchism, a political philosophy adhered to by recent assassins of foreign leaders. He regarded McKinley as a symbol of oppression and was convinced that it was his duty as an anarchist to kill him. He was unable to get near the president during an earlier visit, but he shot him twice as McKinley reached to shake his hand in the reception line at the temple. One bullet grazed McKinley; the other entered his abdomen and was never found.

McKinley initially appeared to be recovering, but his conditions deteriorated on September 13 as his wounds became gangrenous. He died at 2:15 am. on September 14 and was succeeded by his vice president, Theodore Roosevelt. Czolgosz was sentenced to death and executed in the electric chair, and Congress passed legislation to officially charge the Secret Service with the responsibility for protecting the president.

In September 1901, William McKinley was at the height of his power as president. Elected in 1896, during the serious economic depression resulting from the Panic of 1893, he had defeated his Democratic rival, William Jennings Bryan. McKinley led the nation both to a return to prosperity and to victory in the Spanish–American War in 1898, taking possession of such Spanish colonies as Puerto Rico and the Philippines. Re-elected handily in a rematch against Bryan in 1900, according to historian Eric Rauchway, “it looked as if the McKinley Administration would continue peaceably unbroken for another four years, a government devoted to prosperity”.

McKinley’s original vice president, Garret Hobart, had died in 1899, and McKinley left the choice of a running mate to the 1900 Republican National Convention. In advance of the convention, New York’s Republican political boss, Senator Thomas C. Platt, saw an opportunity to politically sideline his state’s governor, former Assistant Secretary of the Navy Theodore Roosevelt, by pushing for his nomination as vice president. Roosevelt accepted the nomination and was elected on McKinley’s ticket.

During the next decade or so the Anderson family continued to grow and prosper, Thomas married a lovely 17 year old bride named Lilian Ackerman in 1909, and his younger sister Karola also was married, since her story is not germane to our story, we will not discuss her any further. The family was close knit, and the siblings resultingly all settled around Sauk Centre. With the exception of the death of Albert’s and Josephine’s eldest son Johan in 1918 in Europe during the last year of the “War to End All Wars,” little of note took place.

The same can not be said about our country, since the Anderson’s did not live in a cocoon, these events had dirrect effects on them, whether it be in their economic fluidity or in the case of the death of Johan were quite substantial, it behoves us to discuss them in some detail.

The period from 1901 to 1914 in American history is primarily known as the “Progressive Era,” marked by significant social and political reforms aimed at addressing issues like corporate power, labor conditions, and environmental conservation, with major events including the rise of Theodore Roosevelt as president, the construction of the Panama Canal, increased regulation of businesses, and a surge in immigration to the United States.

• Theodore Roosevelt’s Presidency:After President William McKinley was assassinated in 1901, Theodore Roosevelt took office and became a leading figure in the Progressive movement, advocating for “trust-busting” to break up monopolies, conservation of natural resources, and consumer protection. 
• Panama Canal Construction:The United States secured the right to build the Panama Canal through the Hay-Bunau-Varilla Treaty in 1903, significantly impacting global trade and U.S. influence in the region. 
• Progressive Reforms:
  • Pure Food and Drug Act (1906): Established federal regulations to ensure food safety and labeling. 
  • Meat Inspection Act (1906): Implemented standards for meat processing to protect consumers from contaminated products. 
  • Clayton Antitrust Act (1914): Further strengthened laws against monopolies and unfair business practices. 
• Labor Movements:
  • Industrial Workers of the World (IWW): A radical labor union that advocated for workers’ rights across various industries. 
  • Rise of Labor Unions: Increased unionization led to strikes and negotiations for better working conditions. 
• Immigration Wave:The early 20th century saw a large influx of immigrants from Southern and Eastern Europe, leading to challenges in assimilation and social concerns. 
• Social Reform:
  • Women’s Suffrage Movement: Growing activism for women’s right to vote gained momentum during this period. 
  • Child Labor Laws: Legislation was passed to limit child labor in factories. 

On the international arena, there were many events taking place, some in the public eye and others in secret in the smoke filled halls of many European governments. I will call this time the prelude to World War I.

The “prelude to World War 1” refers to the period of escalating tensions and complex alliances in Europe leading up to the war, primarily marked by growing nationalism, militarism, imperialism, and a series of crises in the Balkans, culminating in the assassination of Archduke Franz Ferdinand of Austria-Hungary in 1914, which acted as the immediate trigger for the war. World War I, which lasted from 1914 until 1918, introduced the world to the horrors of trench warfare and lethal new technologies such as poison gas and tanks. The result was some of the most horrific carnage the world had ever seen, with more than 16 million military personnel and civilians losing their lives.

It also radically altered the map, leading to the collapse of the sprawling Austro-Hungarian, Ottoman, and Russian empires that had existed for centuries and the formation of new nations to take their place. Long after the last shot had been fired, the political turmoil and social upheaval continued, and ultimately led to another, even bigger, and bloodier global conflict two decades later.

The catalyst or spark that started the war is well known, and as stated earlier was the assassination of Ferdinand and his wife Sophie, Duchess of Hohenberg, in 1914. But what is seldom discussed is the long and contorted path that brought the world to this outcome.

Here are eight of the events that led to the war.

1. Franco-Russian Alliance (1894)

Both Russia and France, which had been humiliated in the Franco-Prussian War of 1870-71, feared the rising power of Germany, which had already formed alliances with Austria-Hungary and Italy. So, the two nations decided to join forces for mutual protection as well. It was the start of what would become the Allied side, the Triple Entente, in World War I.

“To my mind, it is the coming together of the Triple Entente in stages—the Franco-Russian Alliance in 1894, the British-French Entente Cordiale of 1904, and the Anglo-Russian Entente of 1907—that really solidified the system of diplomatic agreements that formed the main antagonistic blocs that went to war in 1914,” Richard S. Fogarty, an associate professor of history at University at Albany, explains. “The alliance system was critical to shaping the war, and even in helping bring it on: it created a set of expectations about international rivalry and competition, determining what kind of war Europeans imagined and prepared for.”

2. First German Naval Law, (1898)

This legislation, advocated by Germany’s newly-appointed Secretary of the Imperial Navy, Admiral Alfred von Tirpitz, dramatically expanded the size of Germany’s battle fleet. It was the first of five laws dictating a buildup in which the Germans envisioned building a force that was superior to Britain’s Royal Navy.

“Tirpitz aimed at forcing Britain into an alliance with Germany on German terms,” explains Eugene Beiriger, an associate professor of history, peace, justice and conflict studies at DePaul University, and author of the 2018 book World War I: A Historical Exploration of Literature. Instead, the British responded by building even more ships, and by ending their late 1880s policy of “splendid isolation” to form alliances with Japan, France and Russia.

“The German Naval Laws created unintended consequences,” Beiriger says in an email. “They ended up alienating both the government and public of Britain prior to the war.”

3. The Russo-Japanese War (1904-1905)

Russia’s Czar Nicholas II wanted to obtain a port that gave his navy and commercial ships access to the Pacific, and he set his sites on Korea. The Japanese saw Russia’s rising aggressiveness as a menace and launched a surprise attack on Nicholas’ fleet at Port Arthur in China. The resulting war, fought both at sea and on land in China, was won by the Japanese, and as Beiriger notes, it helped shift power the power balance in Europe.

Russia’s allies France and Britain, which were allied with Japan, signed their own agreement in 1904 to avoid being pulled into the war. France later convinced the Russians to enter into an alliance with the British as well, laying the groundwork for their alliance in World War I. In addition, “Russia’s expansion in the East had been stopped by Japan,” Beiriger says. “This turned Russian ambitions westward, especially in the Balkans, and influenced hardliners within the government to not back down in future crises.” That Russian combativeness helped trigger World War I less than a decade later.

4. Austria-Hungary’s Annexation of Bosnia and Herzegovina (1908)

Under an 1878 treaty, Austria-Hungary was governing Bosnia and Herzegovina, even though technically they were still part of the Ottoman Empire. But after the Austro-Hungarian government annexed their territory, the move backfired. The two provinces’ mostly Slavic population wanted to have their own country, while Slavs in nearby Serbia had the ambition of appropriating the provinces themselves.

“In multi-ethnic empires, nationalistic fervor fueled resistance to distant rulers,” Doran Cart, senior curator of the National World War I Museum and Memorial, says. “Tension was powder-keg high in the Balkans, where Slavic people, aided by the Slavs of Russia, resisted the rule of Austria-Hungary.” Additionally, the move drew Russia, which saw itself as Serbia’s protector, toward a gradual showdown with the Austro-Hungarian regime.

5. The Second Moroccan Crisis (1911)

The French and Germans butted heads for several years over Morocco, where Germany’s Kaiser Wilhelm II meddled in an attempt to pressure the French-British alliance. In the First Moroccan Crisis in 1905, he actually sailed to Tangiers to express his support for the sultan of Morocco against French interests. But instead of backing away from the conflict, the British rose in support of France.

In the Second Moroccan Crisis in 1911, the German foreign secretary, Alfred von Kiderlen- Wächter, sent a naval cruiser to anchor in a harbor on the Moroccan coast, in reaction to a tribal revolt that the Germans thought was being backed by France as a pretext for seizing the country. Again, the British backed the French, and eventually, Germany was forced to agree to recognize a French protectorate in Morocco. The two crises pushed the British and French closer together, and only hastened an eventual confrontation with the Germans.

6. Italy Invades Libya (1911)

The modern Italian state, which didn’t begin until 1861, had been “largely left out of the scramble that built Britain, France, and other powers into worldwide empires,” Fogarty explains. The Italian government set its sights on Libya, a North African country that hadn’t been claimed by another Western European power, and decided to take it from the Ottoman Empire. The Italo-Turkish War ended with a peace treaty, but the Ottoman military left Libya and let the Italians colonize it. It was the first military conflict that featured aerial bombing, but as Fogarty notes, the real significance was that it exposed the shakiness of the Ottoman Empire and its slipping control over peripheral territories. That, in turn, was one of the factors that ultimately led to World War I, which Fogarty describes as “a war of empires, some expanding or seeking to expand, some keen to hold on to what they had, others trying desperately not to lose what they had left,”

7. The Balkan Wars (1912-13)

Serbia, Bulgaria, Montenegro and Greece, which had broken away from the Ottoman Empire during the 1800s, formed an alliance called the Balkan League. The Russian-backed alliance aimed to take away even more of the Turks’ remaining territory in the Balkans.

In the First Balkan War in 1912, Serbia, Greece and Montenegro defeated Ottoman forces, and forced them to agree to an armistice. But the Balkan League soon disintegrated, and in the Second Balkan War, the Bulgarians fought the Greeks and Serbs over Macedonia, and the Ottoman Empire and Romania jumped into the fray against the Bulgarians as well.

Bulgaria ultimately was defeated. The Balkan Wars made the region even more unstable. In the power void left by the Ottomans, tensions grew between Serbia and Austria-Hungary. That, in turn, led Austria-Hungary and its ally, Germany, to decide that a war with the Serbs would be needed at some point to strengthen Austria-Hungary’s position. “Many historians consider the Balkan Wars as the true beginning of the First World War,” Fogarty says.

8. Assassination of Archduke Franz Ferdinand (1914)

The archduke, who was heir to the Austro-Hungarian throne, went to Sarajevo to inspect the imperial troops stationed in Bosnia and Herzegovina. He and his wife Sophie were shot to death in their car by a 19-year-old Serbian revolutionary, Gavrilo Princip.

“The assassination highlighted the nationalism that was pulling the Austro-Hungarian Empire apart at the seams,” Fogarty explains, noting that Serbian extremists actually wanted Franz Ferdinand dead because they feared he was too moderate and would promote a power-sharing arrangement that would keep Slavic peoples in the empire.

“His assassination killed the idea, whether or not it was ever realistic to begin with, and radicalized Serbian defiance and Austrian determination to solve the nationalism problem for good, at least with respect to Serbia,” Fogarty says.

Instead, the tension between European powers increased as they took different sides in the crisis. As the U.K.’s Imperial War Museum notes, the killing put both Austria-Hungary and Russia, which saw itself as the Serbians’ protector, in a bind. Neither one of them wanted to back down and appear weak. Fearing a fight that would draw in Russia, Austria-Hungary turned for help to Germany, which promised backing if the Austro-Hungarians used force against the Serbians. German support emboldened Austria-Hungary to declare war on Serbia on July 28.

Two days later, Russia’s military mobilized, and the Germans saw that they, too, were in a bind. They didn’t want to fight both Russia and its ally France on two fronts simultaneously, so it became imperative to knock the French military out of the war before Russia was ready to fight. Germany declared war on Russia on August 1 and two days later declared war against France. German forces gathered on the border of neutral Belgium, which they planned to cross in order to invade France. Belgium called for help, and on August 4, Great Britain declared war on Germany. 

World War I had begun.

It is beyond the scope of this book to retell the history of the Great War as it is also knownand besides, there are many good histories on the subject. With the exception of the death of Johan, the particular details of the war and its battles have little relevance to our story. And to top it off our poor, Johan just doesn’t pass muster because if you exclude the emotional effects of the death of Johan, he only plays a small part in the history of the Anderson clan. Right or wrong, these are the facts of life. He never married, so he has no offspring, and his passing was way too early for him to accomplish anything of note, so he will unfortunately pass away into oblivion.

The post-war years were a story of contrasts and are commonly referred to as the “Roaring Twenties.” It was a time of significant economic prosperity, cultural change, and social upheaval, marked by the widespread adoption of new technologies, a booming stock market, and a vibrant jazz scene, which ultimately ended with the devastating Wall Street Crash of 1929, ushering in the Great Depression.

Below are a few key points of this era:

• Post-WWI Era:Following the end of World War I in 1918, the US experienced a period of economic growth and readjustment, including the influenza pandemic of 1918 which caused widespread death and disruption. 
• “Roaring Twenties”:This decade saw a rapid expansion of industries like automobiles, radio, and movies, leading to increased consumerism and a vibrant cultural scene often associated with flappers, jazz music, and a more relaxed social attitude. 
• Economic Prosperity:The US economy experienced significant growth during the 1920s, with rising stock prices and widespread investment. 
• Social Change:Women gained the right to vote, leading to increased participation in the workforce and social life. 
• Prohibition:The 18th Amendment enforced nationwide prohibition of alcohol, leading to widespread bootlegging and organized crime activity. 
• Immigration Restrictions:The Immigration Act of 1924 significantly limited immigration from Eastern and Southern Europe. 
• Political Landscape:Republican presidents like Warren G. Harding and Calvin Coolidge dominated the political scene, generally advocating for limited government intervention in the economy. 
• Wall Street Crash:The stock market crash of 1929, which began on Black Tuesday (October 29, 1929), marked the end of the “Roaring Twenties” and triggered the Great Depression.

The roaring twenties is often just mentioned as a prelude to the great depression and just an aberrancy in our history, I however believe it was much more that that, so I will spend a little time discussiong it. To begin with, I think it was the advent of consumerism. It was also the first time for people to just act frivilous and to have fun. The preceding Victorian era was filled with restrained and suppressed emotions and behaviors. People were just hard-working and industrious automatons that worked long hours with little free time, barely eking out an existence. Now, it was acceptable to raise hell. It was a period where everyone was carefree, prospering, and happy. In an economic sense, people were prospering. There was a certain charm about the 1920’s culture. It was a decade like no other. This “party” mainly took place in the United States, throughout Chicago, New York City, and Los Angeles and around in Europe and Australia in the bigger cities like Berlin, London, Paris, and Sydney.

The country’s money nearly doubled between 1920 and 1929, which led to a rich consumer society. A consumer society is a society where the buying and selling of products is the most significant activity. Thanks to national advertising and chain stores’ growth, people on either coast bought pretty much the same goods.  Most people listened to the same music, danced the same dances, and even used the same slang. The most famous symbol of this era was the “flapper.” It was the name given to women with bobbed hair, short skirts(knee-length), who smoked, drank, and spoke freely. 

Though, in reality, most women didn’t adopt the lifestyle, just the wardrobe. Even the women not labeled as “flappers” gained a new sense of freedom. 

These women could also now vote, thanks to the 19th Amendment. They could now work administrative and office jobs and participate in further building the consumer economy. Along with this, birth control contraptions were made available and made it possible for women to have fewer children. Plus, the inventions of new technology like washing machines and vacuum cleaners made house chores much more manageable.

Thanks to the Volstead Act, which was passed on January 16th, 1920, which closed down every tavern, barn, and saloon in the U.S. 

Section 1 of the 18th Amendment states, “After one year from the ratification of this article the manufacture, sale, or transportation of intoxicating liquors within, the importation thereof into, or the exportation thereof from the United States and all territory subject to the jurisdiction thereof for beverage purposes is hereby prohibited.”

This, along with the Volstead Act, made it illegal to manufacture and sell alcohol. However, it was not illegal to drink intoxicating liquors, so many people bought mountains of liquor before the ban went into effect. Thanks to the ban on alcohol it became fashionable to break the law. People started going to illegal speakeasies organized by crime figures like Al Capone, who allegedly had one thousand gunmen and almost half of Chicago’s police force as his employees.

Money was not scarce in the 1920s; for most people, it was the complete opposite. They had extra money to spend on ready-to-wear clothes and appliances like refrigerators. A lot of people started going to movie theatres, too. Radios were one of the biggest obsessions. Historians estimate that by the end of the 1920s, more than 12 million households had radios. Jazz became popular as an art form. Jazz bands started playing at venues like the Savoy in NYC and the Aragon in Chicago. Radios played jazz to listeners all over the U.S. 100 million gramophone jazz records were sold in 1927 alone. 

Though some of the older people were against the “indecency” of jazz music, youngsters loved the freedom dance provides. The Jazz Age inspired incredible authors like F. Scott Fitzgerlad wrote his iconic book: The Great Gatsby during the Roaring 20s.The main craze was the automobile. The Ford Model T cost 260 dollars in 1924! Low prices like these made cards a luxury that everyone could afford. By the end of the decade, it was a necessity to own a car. The number of service stations and motels grew to meet the number of drivers on the roads. 

The roaring twenties had its dark side as well, the Ku Klux Klan came back with a vengeance at its peak it had over 4 million members in the 1920s. Its resurgence was most assuredly brought on by the freedom that the blacks were now enjoying in society. They teased and insulted Catholics, Jews, African-Americans, and any immigrants. Prohibition advocates had already linked them with drinking and criminality, and for these people, the era was a time of raids, violence, and terror. The noble experiment of prohibition produced crime and a flourishing illegal liquor trade. From Los Angeles to Chicago to  New York, organized crime syndicates supplied speakeasies and underground establishments with large quantities of beer and liquor. These complex bootlegging operations used rivers and waterways to smuggle alcohol across state lines. Eventually, other criminal enterprises expanded and diversified from the bootlegging profits.

As organized crime syndicates grew throughout the Prohibition era, territorial disputes often transformed America’s cities into violent battlegrounds. Homicides, burglaries, and assaults consequently increased significantly between 1920 and 1933.

All the frivolity of the 20s came to an abrupt end with the advent of the Great Depression. Even organized crime and the Klan experienced reversals in their fortues during this period. In 1932, Prohibition was repealed, so it helped weaken the hold that organized crime had on the country. During the 1930s, the Klan’s membership also took a hit, and the last remnants of the organization temporarily disbanded in 1944. It wasn’t until the 1960s and the Civil Rights Acts that the Klan experienced another resurgence.

Thomas and Lilian Anderson raised quite a brood of children, including in order of birth James, Betty, June, Joseph, Frances, Gordon (AKA Grandpa Gordon), and Virginia Having already read the first two volumes, you well know that Grandpa Gordon is the key person here. Since I have already discussed in some depth the Anderson family experiences in the 20s in the first volume of this trilogy, I won’t bore you with any of these details. If you need some refreshing, please feel free to go back to chapter one, entitled “How it all Begun.”

I hope you found the history of the Anderson family informative and enjoyable. Unfortunately, most of the Andersons were just too busy living life to document much of the events surrounding it. We have to infer what their lives were like from other first-hand accounts and the historical events that helped to mold and shape their lives. One thing is for certain, their lives were most assuredly not easy, and the time for pursuing leisure activities were at a premium. With the exceptions of the two Anderson brothers, Hans and Charles, everyone else is fictional. I also want to specify that while I have made them brothers in my work of historical fiction, they were most assuredly not related in real life. They did, however, come from the same region in Sweden, so they may have ancestors in common.

This concludes the first half of this volume. The second half will take up where we left off at the end of the second volume with Peter having just completed his mission in life, finding out what happened to his younger sister Yua and exacting retribution on those responsible for her kidnapping and ultimately her death.