Mr. Cal Thomas, a frequently cogent observer of human nature and culture, makes a great point here. It is one that is the focus of our Salient Cal Project, the book that encourages presenting the Twenties in perspective, featuring forgotten individuals and lost lessons. We look forward to amplifying Mr. Thomas’ point in the coming year and beyond. We agree that those Twenties are worth looking back on again. When we so often get a blurred, distorted rendition of the people and their times, isn’t it about time to look closer and hear what they have to say? They have had too little understanding in spite of the efforts of so many to bring them into truer, fairer focus. Stay tuned for more from The Salient Cal Project.

The Twenties are officially here again. Happy New Year!

“We cannot for long reap what we have not sown. We cannot hold what we do not pay for. The law of service cannot be evaded or repealed. Nor is it yet in the power of man under any system of government he can adopt or any organization of society he can form to make this a perfect world.

“But the ability to make the best of things, to secure progress, to learn from adversity is not to be disparaged or ignored. The creative energy of nature is not diminished but increased by the fallow season. Mankind requires a time for taking stock, for recuperation, for gathering energy for the next advance.

“That is the significance of the new year. We take a new inventory to see what we have, we take new bearings to see where we are, we correct our conduct by new resolutions. After all due allowance for error and relapse, such a course guarantees improvement. Perhaps the best resolve is to live so that next year new resolutions will be unnecessary.”

— CALVIN COOLIDGE

“The whole country, from the national government down, had been living on borrowed money. Pay day had come, and it was found our capital had been much impaired. In an address at Philadelphia I contended that the only sure method of relieving this distress was for the country to follow the advice of Benjamin Franklin and begin to work and save. Our productive capacity is sufficient to maintain us all in a state of prosperity if we give sufficient attention to thrift and industry. Within a year the country had adopted that course, which has brought an era of great plenty…

“In these two years [1921-1923] I witnessed the gigantic task of demobilizing a war government and restoring it to a peace-time basis. I also came in contact with many of the important people of the United States and foreign countries. All talent eventually arrives at Washington…” — Calvin Coolidge, Autobiography