That's how it was... Audio guide "The 20s of the XNUMXth century. A romp through Madrid"

In the 20s, Madrid underwent an important transformation that consolidated it as a modern metropolis.

The opening of the Gran Vía, completed in this decade, was, without a doubt, the urban reform with the greatest impact in the capital after the launch of the Ensanche. The layout of the new street involved the demolition of 358 buildings, the disappearance of 19 streets, the renovation of another 32 and the construction of 83 new properties, many of which offered an imposing appearance that gave the city the appearance of a large city. similar to other European capitals.

The urban landscape underwent a radical transformation, causing the depopulation of the overcrowded old town and the expulsion of the popular classes to the suburbs as a result of rising rents. At the same time, the wealthiest strata also left the bustling urban center in search of the tranquility and space offered by the streets of Ensanche.

The main streets of the center were the location of new companies that arose from the spectacular development of the service sector, which, during this period, became the engine of the city's economic growth. White-collar workers (office workers, civil servants, liberal professionals...), on the rise, shared space with an uncontrolled automobile fleet made up of trams, private cars and buses, which caused quite a few traffic problems from the early hours of the morning.

Completing the effervescent image that the city offered, a multitude of new establishments appeared that deployed innovative commercial strategies with a view to attracting customers eager to consume novelties.

Tradition and modernity go hand in hand in an era in which we can already glimpse the great social changes that the XNUMXth century will experience.

The 20s were the preamble to a new lifestyle.
which is shown through rapidly expanding media. The press, radio and advertisements dazzled with images full of sophistication that disseminated behavioral models featuring men and women who exuded elegance, so fashion soon became more than just an aesthetic element and became the most direct business card of the individual.

However, Madrid still remained a city with marked social inequalities, where slums proliferated and a population barely survived with occupations that, in many cases, could not even be considered jobs. Despite this, in these years the mortality rate was reduced and the city grew, helped by immigration, until it reached one million inhabitants on the eve of the proclamation of the Second Republic.

Thus, a large city emerged with a complex organization, which caused the emergence of new professions and the transformation of old trades, while improvements in working conditions led to the emergence of a middle class made up of employees who enjoyed greater benefits. income and a better quality of life.

The extension of culture and education to increasingly broader sectors of the Madrid population, together with the prominence of the white-collar proletariat and the full incorporation of women into the salaried labor market, confirmed that new times were arriving, times
exchange.

Institutions such as the famous Student Residence or the Señoritas Residence emerged or were consolidated, the first official center aimed at promoting university education for women in Spain, directed by María de Maeztu, and construction work on the University City began. It was also a moment of resurgence
scientist with the creation of important research centers, at the head of which were personalities such as Santiago Ramón y Cajal, Ramón Menéndez Pidal, Blas Cabrera y Felipe, Miguel Catalán Sañudo or Pío del Río Hortega.

The protest action of labor organizations, which acquired greater strength and a leading presence in the life of the city, was decisive in the application of measures aimed at improving working conditions and achieving social rights for workers. During these years, the labor movement conquered some of its historical demands, such as Sunday rest, increased wages and, especially, the institutionalization of the eight-hour work day.

The reduction in working hours and the increase in wages allowed a good part of the population to abandon the thresholds of subsistence and have free time and resources for consumption. The workers thus began to dedicate themselves to the practice of sports, to frequent popular libraries and to enjoy mass spectacles such as cinema or football.

The new times came accompanied by a multitude of scientific advances and inventions that changed the history of humanity.

Aviation, which had already demonstrated its potential during World War I, took off in Spain in the 20s with the launch of the first air transport lines, such as the Spanish Air Transport company, established in Madrid in 1925 with headquarters in the Getafe airport, which served the route between Madrid, Seville and Lisbon.

The relevant Spanish contribution to the field of aeronautics came from the hand of great inventors such as Juan de la Cierva y Codorníu or Heraclio Alfaro Fournier and pilots such as Benito Loygorri Pimentel or María
Bernaldo de Quirós y Bustillo. She would not be the only woman who stood out in this era marked by innovation: in 1929, Pilar Careaga Basabe managed to be the first Spanish woman to obtain a degree in Industrial Engineering, also becoming the first to drive a train.

In Madrid, means of transport experienced rapid development during this decade as an inevitable response to the demographic and urban growth of the city, so that in 1921 it already had a fleet of 4.188 vehicles and a metro network of three and a half kilometers. . At the same time, household appliances burst into the daily lives of Madrid residents, thanks to the incorporation of electricity into the domestic sphere.

The world was changing by leaps and bounds, modernity was spreading unstoppably. New means of transportation, electrical devices that made people's lives easier, means of communication capable of connecting those who lived thousands of kilometers away, incredible
technological and scientific advances… Wherever you looked, everything was innovation.

Driven by the cultural flourishing brought about by the so-called 'Silver Age', theater developed in the capital above other shows, becoming a mass phenomenon that, unrelated to the advancement of cinema, experienced a time of splendor in these years. .

In Madrid, dozens of theaters opened their doors (Español, Comedia, Reina Victoria, Zarzuela, Eslava, Latina, Price, Apolo, Novedades, Lara, Princesa...) that programmed classic works, comedies and zarzuelas, although many of them alternated the works theater with the projection of films, as was the case at the Price, where wrestling and boxing matches were also offered.

During the second half of the decade, the theater became the favorite show of the Madrid public, eager to see the performances of the great figures of the moment, especially the female ones, such as Margarita Xirgu, Catalina Bárcena, María Ladrón de Guevara or
Laura Pinillos, who interpreted the texts of fashionable authors: Jacinto Benavente, Pedro Muñoz Seca, the Machado brothers or Carlos Arniches. Also the followers of folklore and the magazine saw how Pastora Imperio, Encarnación López (La Argentinita), Conchita Piquer, Celia Gámez, Consuelo Portela (La Chelito), Consuelo Reyes (La Yankee) and Ángel Sampedro (Angelillo) triumphed.

In 1926, while Raquel Meller, queen of cuplé, conquered New York and Boston, Madrid was experiencing tango fever, illustrated magazines dedicated their covers to Celia Gámez and cuplet player Amalia de Isaura was the protagonist of a controversy after being photographed dressed in a man's suit. . Entertainment culture had definitively established itself as an indispensable element in the lives of Madrid residents. Thus the leisure society was born.

If anything reflects the metamorphosis that occurred at this time, it was the rise of the written press. During the first years of the decade, there was great competition in the daily press published in the capital, with up to 27 newspapers of all types and political orientation, whose morning and afternoon editions carried information to every corner of the city. .

To confront the business group that controlled El Liberal and El Heraldo, the Graphic Press Society, directed by Nicolás Mª de Urgoiti, created the morning newspaper El Sol in 1917, which was joined three years later by La Voz as an afternoon newspaper. El Sol had many of the country's most brilliant pens and the cartoonist Luis Bagería, the photographer Alfonso Sánchez Portela and personalities of the stature of Unamuno, Baroja, Valle Inclán, Machado, Ortega y Gasset and Pérez de Ayala collaborated. It was the first Spanish newspaper that began to publish photos received by telephone, just as they already did
The Times and Le Matin. Among the rest of the newspaper titles, ABC, El Debate, El Imparcial, El Liberal and La Libertad stood out.

Along with them, Blanco y Negro, Mundo Gráfico, Nuevo Mundo and La Esfera were some of the main illustrated magazines, although others with a wide variety of topics were also published: tourism and travel, fashion, humor, literary, political or bullfighting.

The world was changing by leaps and bounds and the media became speakers of the new times for a society that sought to move forward and progress. The public wanted to know what was happening in their city, in their country, even in other parts of the world that they had never heard of before. The need to know was born and the people of Madrid, who were not going to be less, were also eager for information.