Chronology of Important Events 1944 - 1961
1944
Ballpoint pens go on sale.
GI Bill of Rights passed and signed, providing benefits to U.S. service veterans.
President Franklin D. Roosevelt wins unprecedented fourth term, defeating Republican Thomas Dewey.
D-Day, June 6, 1944.
General Dwight D. Eisenhower talks to paratroopers of the U.S. 101st Airborne Division before their departure for Normandy, June 5, 1944. [photo insert]
First German V1 and V2 Rockets fired.
Hitler escapes assassination attempt by members of his general staff.
Bretton Woods conferees (in July, New Hampshire) create International Monetary Fund (IMF) and the World Bank (International Bank for Reconstruction and Development) in hopes of averting another Great Depression.
Harry Dexter White and John Maynard Keynes at Bretton Woods [photo insert].
U.S., UK, USSR propose establishing a United Nations.
Books: Gunnar Myrdal, An American Dilemma: The Negro Problem and Modern Democracy (2 vols) published.
Movies: Casablanca (1942) wins 4 Academy Awards: Best Picture; Humphrey Bogart, Best Actor; Michael Curtiz, Best Director; and Best Screenplay.
1945
First computer built.
Microwave oven invented (see 1952).
The FCC creates the commercial (television) broadcasting spectrum of 13 channels, and receives 130 applications for broadcast licenses.
FDR dies in April.
December 3, 1945 Walter Reuther, UAW
Churchill, FDR, Stalin meet at Yalta in the Crimea.
Germans surrender.
Hitler commits suicide.
Potsdam Conference.
United Nations founded.
U.S. drops atomic bombs on Hiroshima and Nagasaki.
Japan surrenders.
Ho Chi Minh creates provisional government in Vietnam; declares independence of Vietnam.
British return Vietnam authority to French.
Decolonization and Independence movements begin in Africa and Asia.
Movies: Murder, My Sweet; National Velvet; They Were Expendable
Songs: “White Christmas” (1941) hits #1 again (and repeats in 1947)
Bob Hope USO show, Germany [photo insert].
White bluesman Johnny Otis assembles a combo for Harlem Nocturne that is basically a shrunk-down version of the big-bands of swing.
Mercury is founded in Chicago.
Jules Bihari founds Modern Records in Los Angeles, specializing in black music.
Bill Monroe’s Kentucky Waltz popularizes the “bluegrass” style .
1946
Bikinis are introduced in Paris. Micheline Bernardini wearing first bikini [photo insert].
Dr. Spock publishes The Common Book of Baby and Child Care.
1946 is generally recognized as the first year of the “Baby Boom” generation.
Strapless bras become popular, ushering in a trend toward bare-shouldered women’s fashions.
“Tide”—the first detergent designed for automatic clothes washing machines—introduced.
First electric clothes dryers available.
Suntan lotions, developed for troops during World War II, marketed to consumers for the first time.
Atomic Energy Commission established.
U.S. industry idled by widespread labor strikes; federal government takes control of railroads; most wartime price controls eliminated.
Jackie Robinson signs with Brooklyn Dodgers (plays next season).
Juan Perón becomes President of Argentina.
Nuremberg War Crimes Trials.
Winston Churchill gives “Iron Curtain” Speech.
Indochina war begins to liberate Vietnam from French control.
John Foster Dulles, Adlai Stevenson, and Eleanor Roosevelt at the United Nations [photo insert].
President Truman establishes Temporary Committee on Employee Loyalty.
HUAC (House UnAmerican Activities Committee) decides to investigate “communist” influence in Hollywood.
Movies: The Best Years of Our Lives, Notorious, Great Expectations
Songs: Tenderly, Come Rain or Come Shine, Zip-a-dee-doo-dah
TV Shows: Gillette Cavalcade of Sports, Esso Newsreel (programming limited to approximately 12 hours per week on two networks).
Books: Hiroshima, John Hersey; All the King’s Men, Robert Penn Warren
Muddy Waters cuts the first records of Chicago’s electric blues (rhythm and blues).
Lew Chudd founds Imperial Records in Los Angeles, specializing in black music.
The Metro-Goldwyn-Mayer (MGM) film company opens a recording business to sell their movie soundtracks.
1947
Polaroid cameras invented.
The transistor co-invented at Bell Labs.
First Levittowns constructed on Long Island, NY.
Levitt Cape, ca. 1947 [photo insert].
Chuck Yeager breaks the sound barrier.
Dead Sea Scrolls discovered.
Thor Heyerdahl sails from Peru to Polynesia on a raft to prove theory of human migration.
Over 1 million veterans enroll in college through the G.I. Bill.
First food processors.
Inventor Earl Tupper invents Tupperware, and with it the “Tupperware party,” a unique way of marketing the products directly to homemakers.
Henry Ford dies, leaving $600 million fortune [$ 5.7 billion in 2005 dollars].
North America and Europe both experience severe winters. New York is hit with 28 inches of snow (Dec. 17), while Britain has its harshest winter in over 50 years.
First documented sightings of “flying saucers.”
Drive-in theatres become a booming industry.
Boeing 377 Stratocruiser [photo insert].
Jewish refugees aboard the Exodus turned back by British.
India and Pakistan declared separate, independent nations.
Truman Doctrine [establishes ideological component of Containment] delivered 12 March 1947 before a Joint Session of Congress.
Marshall Plan [economic component of containment] proposed. George C. Marshall delivered speech at Harvard University, June 5
National Security Act establishes the Department of Defense, the National Security Council, and the Central Intelligence Agency.
President Truman establishes FELP (Federal Employee Loyalty Program) to counter Republicans and to rally Americans to his foreign policy of containment. Four million employees investigated during HST administration; 378 dismissed; another 2000 left jobs under cloud of suspicion.
Justice Department compiles “The List” of potential subversives (those with ties to communist, totalitarian, fascist, subversive movements) to help FELP. Although supposed to be kept secret, the List was published later in the year. Its publication gave Congress information with which to prosecute the Red Scare and private sector firms information that underlay the blacklisting program.
HUAC charges “Hollywood Ten” with contempt of Congress for refusing to cooperate with the Hollywood investigations. Despite protests by Lauren Bacall, Humphrey Bogart, and Gene Kelley, studio executives begin to “blacklist” any artists who refuse to cooperate with HUAC.
Congress passes over President Truman’s veto the Taft-Hartley Act, which in part, restrains unions’ abilities to strike.
Congress passes 22nd Amendment (limiting individuals to two terms as president); 36 states will need to ratify within 7 years.
Movies: Gentleman’s Agreement
TV Shows: Kraft Television Theatre, Small Fry Club (programming limited to approximately 18 hours per week), Pres. Truman first president to address the American people on TV from the White House (international food crisis; suggests meatless Tuesdays).
Meet the Press debut.
Milton Berle premiers Milton Berle Show Texaco Star Theatre variety show; will be on the air until 1956, then 1958-1959, 1966-1967 under various titles. Prime example of vaudeville roots of early comedy on television.
Books: Doktur Faustus, Thomas Mann; The Diary of Anne Frank; I, the Jury, Mickey Spillaine Tennessee Williams’ A Streetcar Named Desire wins Pulitzer Prize
Billboard’s writer Jerry Wexler coins the term “rhythm and blues” for Chicago’s electric blues.
Roy Brown writes and cuts Good Rockin’ Tonight in Texas.
Six majors control the music market: Columbia, RCA Victor, Decca, Capitol, MGM, Mercury.
Ahmet Ertegun founds Atlantic in New York to promote black music at the border between jazz, rhythm and blues and pop.
1948
“Big Bang” theory formulated.
Orville Wright dies.
Alfred Kinsey’s Sexual Behavior in the Human Male is the first large-scale study of individuals’ sexual habits, with stunning revelations about infidelity, homosexuality and other issues.
Boxer Joe Louis retires; Babe Ruth dies.
New York’s Idlewild Airport opens (renamed JFK Airport in 1963).
Swiss outdoorsman George de Mestral invents Velcro.
Noted food critic Duncan Hines founds a company to make prepackaged cake mixes.
Popcorn sold on a mass scale for the first time.
The game of “Scrabble” is introduced.
U.S. continues to cope with severe postwar inflation while rocked by labor unrest.
United Auto Workers succeed in linking wage increases to cost-of-living index in contract with General Motors.
Berlin Airlift.
Gandhi assassinated.
Policy of Apartheid begun in South Africa.
State of Israel founded.
Eleanor Roosevelt, whom Pres. Truman appointed as delegate to the United Nations, helped draft the UN Universal Declaration of Human Rights (Dec. 1948 adopted)
Congress enacts federal rent controls.
Congress gives $17 billion for Marshall Plan.
President Truman orders integration of all U.S. armed services.
Selective Service inaugurated, providing a continuous peacetime military draft until repealed in 1973.
Arthur Miller’s Death of a Salesman premieres and wins Pulitzer and New York Drama Critics’ Circle Award (1949).
Movies: Hamlet, Macbeth (Orson Welles), The Naked City, Oliver Twist, The Fallen Idol.
Songs: Nature Boy, Buttons and Bows, All I Want for Christmas is My Two Front Teeth.
TV Shows: Howdy Doody, Philco TV Playhouse, Toast of the Town, Kraft Television Theatre, Meet the Press; Boxing and wrestling are TV’s prime attractions.
Books: Crusade in Europe, Dwight D. Eisenhower; Cry, the Beloved Country, Alan Paton; The Ides of March, Thorton Wilder; Tales of the South Pacific, James Michener;
The Naked and the Dead, Norman Mailer.
Pete Seeger forms the Weavers, which start the “folk revival”.
Columbia introduces the 12-inch 33-1/3 RPM long-playing vinyl record.
Ed Sullivan starts a variety show on national television (later renamed “Ed Sullivan Show”).
The magazine “Billboard” introduces charts for “folk” and “race” records.
1949
First non-stop flight around the world (U.S. Air Force plane, Lucky Lady).
George Orwell publishes Nineteen Eight-Four.
“Silly putty” introduced.
Chinese Communists take control of China.
NATO established [military component of containment—North Atlantic Treaty Organization].
Soviet Union has atomic bomb.
Israel becomes member of United Nations.
Apartheid official government policy in South Africa.
East and West Germany become nations.
Smith Act (1940 antisubversion law) Trials begin. Eleven communist leaders charged with using ideas to bring down the government.
Board of Regents of the University of California imposed a requirement that all University employees sign an oath affirming not only loyalty to the state constitution, but a denial of membership or belief in organizations (including Communist organizations) advocating overthrow of the United States government.
Movies: The Third Man, All the King’s Men; Adam’s Rib
Songs: So In Love, Riders in the Sky, Diamonds are a Girl’s Best Friend, Rudolph the Red-Nosed Reindeer, Some Enchanted Evening.
TV Shows: Texaco Star Theatre, Candid Camera, Colgate Theatre, Kukla, Fran & Ollie.
Books: The Man with the Golden Arm, Nelson Algren; The Jacaranda Tree, H.E. Bates; Guard of Honor, James Gould Cozzens; Love in a Cold Climate, Nancy Mitford; This I Remember, Eleanor Roosevelt
South Pacific opens on Broadway February 21, 1949
Fats Domino cuts The Fat Man, a new kind of boogie.
Hank Williams’ Lovesick Blues reaches the top of the country charts.
Scatman Crothers cuts I Want To Rock And Roll (1949), with Wild Bill Moore on saxophone.
RCA Victor introduces the 45 RPM vinyl record.
1950
Population: Total Growth Rate Increase
World: 2,556,517,137 1.47 37,798,160
U.S. 152,271,000 2.07 3,083,000
APRIL: 5,343,000 TV sets are in American Homes.
MAY: 103 TV Stations in 60 cities
SEPTEMBER: 7,535,000 TV sets in USA
OCTOBER: 8,000,000 TV sets — 107 stations
3,880,000 U.S. homes have television sets (9% of all homes)
ATOMIC BOMBING HOW TO PROTECT YOURSELF published [photo insert].
First modern credit card introduced.
First organ transplant.
First Peanuts cartoon strip [photo insert].
Officer Leslie Coffelt, White House Police, was shot and killed by Puerto Rican nationalists while protecting President Truman at the Blair House on November 1, 1950.
Korean War Begins in June.
President Truman Orders Construction of Hydrogen Bomb.
U.S. commits $15 ml [$116.3 mil in 2005 dollars] and military mission and advisors to aid French in Indochina.
Bob Hope, Wosan, Korea 1950 [photo insert]
Senator Joseph McCarthy joins the Red Scare with his communist witch hunt in February.
Two of “Hollywood Ten” imprisoned; other 8 are convicted of contempt.
Alger Hiss found guilty of perjury—Richard Nixon’s political star rises.
In the summer,thirty-one “non-signer” University of California professors—including internationally distinguished scholars, not one of whom had been charged with professional unfitness or personal disloyalty—and many other UC employees were dismissed for refusing to sign the “loyalty oath.”
California enacts Levering Act requiring all state employees to sign loyalty oaths.
Movies: Sunset Boulevard, All About Eve, I Married a Communist; It Can’t Happen Here; Father of the Bride
Songs: A Bushel and a Peck, Good Night Irene, Mona Lisa, C’est Si Bon.
TV Shows: Arthur Godfrey and Friends, Lux Video Theatre, Fred Waring Show, Your Hit Parade, Fireside Theatre; TV hero Hopalong Cassidy peaks in popularity
Your Show of Shows 2/25/1950 - 6/6/1954 NBC Black and White 90 minutes Feb 1950 - June 1954 Sat. 9:00 - 10:30 Starring Sid Caesar and Imogene Coca With Carl Reiner and Howard Morris, Sid Caesar and Imogene Coca, The Jack Benny Show 10/28/1950 - 9/10/1965 CBS/NBC Black and White 30 minutes The Jack Benny Show Cast - Jack Benny
Mary Livingstone (Mrs. Jack Benny) (1950-1959) Don Wilson - Announcer Eddie “Rochester” Anderson as Rochester Van Jones (valet) Dennis Day, Mel Blanc, Artie Auerbach and Frank Nelson. Jack Benny moved his successful radio to show to TV slowly. First aired as a series of specials, then increasingly shown more often as the years passed. Benny, known for his repetitve 39th birthdays, had an unstated sense of humor. His exchanges with Rochester are classics of comedy.
Jack Benny [photo insert]
Books: The Martian Chronicles, Ray Bradbury; Across the River and Into the Trees, Ernest Hemmingway; Darkness at Noon, Sidney Kingsley; The Way West, A.B. Guthrie, Jr.
Guys and Dolls premieres; George Bernard Shaw dies
Jac Holzman founds Elektra in New York to promote new folk and jazz musicians.
The first major rhythm’n’blues festival is held in Los Angeles (the “Blues & Rhythm Jubilee”).
Dutch electronics giant Philips enters the recording business.
1951
Color TV introduced – CBS broadcasts first color program from NYC.
Mass production of penicillin and streptomycin reaches records.
Electricity generated from nuclear power for the first time.
22nd Amendment (limiting individual to 2 terms as president) ratified (Feb.)
Triggered by the attack on Truman, Congress enacted legislation that permanently authorized Secret Service protection of the President, his immediate family, the President-elect, and the Vice President, if he wishes. (Public Law - 82-79).
South Africans forced to carry ID cards identifying race.
Truman signs Peace Treaty with Japan, officially ending WWII.
Winston Churchill again Prime Minister of Great Britain.
President Truman relieves General Douglas MacArthur of command.
General Douglas MacArthur: Farewell Address to Congress delivered April 19, 1951.
Kefauver Crime Committee hearings of March 1951 first televised congressional hearings.
Duck and Cover—short film produced by Civil Defense to instruct school children how to react to an atomic bomb attack on their school.
The theme song:
There was a turtle by the name of Bert
and Bert the turtle was very alert;
when danger threatened him he never got hurt
he knew just what to do…
He ducked! [inhalation sound]
And covered!
Ducked! [inhalation sound]
Duck and Cover - the movie
U.S. Supreme Court upholds convictions from Smith Act trial.
Movies: The African Queen, An American in Paris, Strangers on a Train, A Streetcar Named Desire
Songs: Hello Young Lovers, Getting to Know You, Cry, Kisses Sweeter than Wine, In the Cool, Cool, Cool of the Evening.
TV Shows: I Love Lucy, Adventures of Ellery Queen, Captain Video, What’s My Line
Lucille Ball and Desi Arnaz [photo insert]
See It Now
9/11/1951 - 4/7/1958 CBS 30 minutes Black and White/Color Edward R Murrow, anchor
Fred W. Friendly and Edward R. Murrow, producers
See It Now pioneered many features which now seem synonymous with news reporting. They were the first to use their own footage and not newreel film. They introduced the use of field producers. Interviews were not rehearsed.
On a split screen, viewers of the first installment could see both the Golden Gate and Brooklyn Bridges - spanning the continent in a single moment. This was the first live commercial coast to coast broadcast.
For seven years Murrow, with cigarette smoke swirling about him, let Americans see the world from their TV screens.
Murrow was the first commentator to publicly condemn Senator Joseph McCarthy. Although many of his stands were courageous, he attracted controversy and this often worried sponsors.
Edward R. Murrow
Books: A Man Called Peter, Catherine Marshall; Lie Down in Darkness, William Styron; Desirée, Annemarie Selinko; From Here to Eternity, James Jones;
The Caine Mutiny, Herman Woulk; The Catcher in the Rye, J.D. Salinger
The King and I opens on Broadway
The white Cleveland disc jockey Alan Freed decides to speculate on the success of Leo Mintz’s store and starts a radio program, “Moondog Rock’n’Roll Party”, that broadcasts black music to an audience of white teenagers.
The first juke-box that plays 45 RPM records is introduced
1952
Car seat belts introduced
Jacques Cousteau discovers ancient Greek ship
Polio Vaccine created
Princess Elizabeth becomes Queen at age 25
Simone De Beauvoir publishes The Second Sex
First contraceptive pill developed
Dr. Jonas Salk develops polio vaccine
Microwave ovens the size of refrigerators and costing $1,200 [$8,535.75 in 2005] go on sale.
Eleanor Roosevelt left her post at the United Nations to campaign for Adlai Stevenson against Dwight Eisenhower.
Tuskegee Institute reports that, for the first time in the 71 years it has been keeping records, there were no lynchings of African Americans during the year.
HUAC opens second wave of Hollywood hearings.
President-elect Eisenhower in Korea, December 1952 [photo insert]
Movies: Limelight, High Noon, Moulin Rouge, The Greatest Show on Earth, Singin’ in the Rain
Songs: It Takes Two to Tango, Your Cheatin’ Heart, Wheel of Fortune
TV Shows: Our Miss Brooks, Jackie Gleason Show, I Love Lucy, Dina Shore, Adventures of Ozzie and Harriet, George Burns and Gracie Allen Show
Books: The Old Man and the Sea, Ernest Hemingway; East of Eden, John Steinbeck; The Grass Harp, Truman Capote; The Power of Positive Thinking, Norman Vincent Peale
Revised Standard Version of the Bible published
Alec Haley forms the Comets, the first rock and roll band
The Weavers, accused of being communists, are forced to dissolve
Sam Phillips founds Sun Records and declares “If I could find a white man who sings with the Negro feel, I’ll make a million dollars”
1953
DNA discovered
Hillary and Norgay climb Mt. Everest
Playboy founded by Hugh Hefner
Joseph Stalin Dies
Julius and Ethel Rosenberg executed for espionage
Screen Writers Guild allows producers to remove screen credits for writers with Communist ties.
Arthur Miller’s The Crucible premieres.
Dwight D. Eisenhower: “Atoms for Peace”
Movies: Roman Holiday, From Here to Eternity, The Robe (first major motion picture filmed in wide-screen CinemaScope)
Songs: Doggie in the Window, I Believe, Stranger in Paradise, I Love Paris
TV Shows: Twenty Questions, Red Skelton Show, GE Theatre, Make Room for Daddy
Books: Casino Royale, Ian Fleming; Battle Cry, Leon Uris
TV Guide debuts with a cover of Lucille Ball and her newborn son, Desi Arnaz IV
Bill Haley’s Crazy Man Crazy is the first rock and roll song to enter the Billboard charts
The Orioles’ Crying in the Chapel is the first black hit to top the white pop charts
Sam Phillips records the first Elvis Presley record in his Sun studio of Memphis using two recorders to produce an effect of “slapback” audio delay
What Things Cost in 1953: 2005 equivalent using inflation index (consumer prices):
Car: $1,850 $ 12,876.01
Gasoline: 29 cents/gal 2.02
House: $17,500 121,800.09
Bread: 16 cents/loaf 1.11
Milk: 94 cents/gal 6.54
Postage Stamp: 3 cents .21
Stock Market: 281
Average Annual Salary: $4,700 32,712.02
Minimum Wage: 75 cents per hour 5.22
1954
Britain sponsors an expedition to search for the Abominable Snowman
First atomic submarine launched
Report says cigarettes cause cancer
New York Stock Exchange prices reach their highest level since 1929
Roger Bannister breaks the four-minute mile
Henry Luce founded Sports Illustrated
In Brown v. Board of Education, the decision widely regarded as having sparked the modern civil rights era, the Supreme Court rules deliberate public school segregation illegal, effectively overturning “separate but equal” doctrine of Plessy v. Ferguson. Chief Justice Earl Warren, writing for a unanimous Court, notes that to segregate children by race “generates a feeling of inferiority as to their status in the community that may affect their hearts and minds in a way unlikely ever to be undone.” Thurgood Marshall heads the NAACP/Legal Defense Fund team winning the ruling.
Hernandez v. Texas becomes the first Mexican American discrimination case to reach the Supreme Court. The case involves a murder conviction by a jury that includes no Latinos. Chief Justice Earl Warren holds persons of Mexican descent are “persons of a distinct class” entitled to the protection of the Fourteenth Amendment.
The phrase “under God” added to the Pledge of Allegiance
Abdul Nasser seizes power in Egypt
SEATO (Southeast Asia Treaty Organization) established
Eisenhower refers to “domino theory” regarding Southeast Asia
Vietnamese Communists occupy Dien Bien Phu and Hanoi
U.S. signs pact with Taiwan
U.S. tests hydrogen bomb at Bikini Atoll
Geneva Accords (U.S. does not sign) dividing Vietnam and calling for national elections
CIA aids in the overthrow of the Guatemalan government
Eisenhower at the World Council of Churches Second Assembly, Evanston, IL; John Foster Dulles, Secretary of State on his left.
March 9th Edward R. Murrow’s “See it Now” television program exposes McCarthy’s tactics and falsehoods.
Army-McCarthy hearings broadcast on two television networks between April 22 and June 17
McCarthy-Welch Exchange: “Have You No Sense of Decency”
Senate condemns Sen. Joe McCarthy (December 2)
Movies: On the Waterfront, Rear Window, The Seven Samauri
Songs: Hernando’s Hideaway, Three Coins in a Fountain, Mister Sandman, Young at Heart
TV Shows: Jack Benny Show, Adventures of Rin Tin Tin, George Gobel Show, Mr. Wizard, Disneyland
Books: A Stillness at Appomattox, Bruce Catton; The Lord of the Rings, J.R.R. Tolkien; Lord of the Flies, William Golding
Joe Turner cuts the blues novelty Shake Rattle And Roll
The record companies switch from 78 RPMs to 45 RPMs
The first Newport Jazz Festival is held, the first jazz festival in the world
1955
James Dean Dies in Car Accident
McDonald’s Corporation Founded
Ford Motor Co. introduces Thunderbird
Alan Ginsberg publishes “Howl”
Davy Crockett (introduced in Dec. 1954) becomes a national fad; sales of “coonskin” caps soar
Disneyland opens in Anaheim, CA
AFL and CIO merge into one union of unions
President Eisenhower hospitalized for 3 weeks after heart attack (Sept-Oct)
Rudolph Flesch publishes Why Johnny Can’t Read
March 28, 1955 IBM’s Thomas Watson, Jr. June 25, 1955 Walter Reuther
Stan Musial
“Be sure to give mine special attention” [photo insert]
The baby boom generation pushed the limits of available school resources, contributing to overcrowding, substandard buildings, and teacher shortages. President Dwight Eisenhower hosted the first White House Conference on Education shortly after this cartoon appeared but he hesitated to secure needed funding.
Herblock, November 23, 1955
U.S. announces plans to orbit man-made satellite
Soviet Union announces plans to orbit man-made satellite
Albert Einstein dies in April at age 76.
Warsaw Pact Signed
Italy, W. Germany, and France establish European Union
W. Germany joins NATO
Rosa Parks refuses to move to the back of a Montgomery, Alabama, bus as required by city ordinance; boycott follows.
Interstate Commerce Commission bans segregation on interstate trains and buses.
Disneyland Gets Its Last Touches
(July 9, 1955, The New York Times)
(Anaheim, Calif. July 
- The final fantastic touches are being put on Disneyland. The $16,500,000 amusement park created by Walt Disney, the film producer, is scheduled to open July 18. It covers sixty acres and is calculated to draw about 5,000,000 visitors a year. Disneyland is situated in this citrus-ranching suburb twenty-two miles from Los Angeles. For it the appellation “amusement park” is inadequate; for it has no such banalities as rollercoasters, Ferris wheels and dodge-’ems in a milieu of honky tonk. In concept, it is an integrated juvenile world’s fair of fantasy. The entrance gate takes you into “Main Street - U.S.A.” - a re-creation of the typical American town of 1890. Like everything else in the park, down to railroad trains and park benches, “Main Street”, is built on a five-eighths scale.
Movies: Mister Roberts, Lady and the Tramp, Strategic Air Command, The Seven Year Itch.
Rebel Without A Cause and Blackboard Jungle establish a new role model for teenagers, the rebellious loner and sometimes juvenile delinquent
Songs: Rock Around the Clock, The Yellow Rose of Texas, Davy Crockett, Love is a Many Splendored Thing
TV Shows: Truth or Consequences, Lawrence Welk Show, The Honeymooners, Gunsmoke, Name that Tune, $64,000 Question, Lassie, You’ll Never Get Rich
Books: The Man in the Gray Flannel Suit, Sloan Wilson; Lolita, Vladimir Nabokov; Witness for the Prosecution, Agatha Christie
Pete Seeger releases the first album of African music by a white musician, Bantu Choral Folk Songs
1956
Elvis on Ed Sullivan’s Show
Grace Kelly marries Prince Rainier III of Monaco
T.V. Remote Control invented
Velcro introduced
President Eisenhower signs bill authorizing Interstate Highway System
More Americans working in white collar jobs than in blue collar jobs
IN GOD WE TRUST declared the national motto
Hungarian Revolution—Soviet troops enter Hungary
Khrushchev denounces Stalin
Suez Crisis
Pakistan becomes a Muslim nation
Japan joins United Nations
Coalition of Southern congressmen calls for massive resistance to Supreme Court desegregation rulings
Montgomery bus boycott ends in victory, December 21, after the city announces it will comply with a November Supreme Court ruling declaring segregation on buses illegal
Earlier in the year, Martin L. King’s home bombed. Autherine Lucy is first African American admitted to the University of Alabama
Playwright Arthur Miller appears before HUAC, but does not “name names.” (The following year, Miller is convicted of contempt of Congress.)
President Eisenhower and Indian Prime Minister Nehru at the White House, December, 1956
Movies: The Ten Commandments, Lust for Life, Around the World in 80 Days, The Man with the Golden Arm, The Seventh Seal, Invasion of the Body Snatchers, The Searchers
Songs: Don’t Be Cruel, Blue Suede Shoes, Hound Dog, I Could Have Danced All Night, On the Street Where You Live
TV Shows: Danny Thomas Show, Perry Como Show, Ed Sullivan Show, Alfred Hitchcock Presents, December Bride, This is Your Life
NBC News with Chet Huntley and David Brinkley (show began in 1948; Huntley and Brinkley would work together until 1970, when Huntley died. Top-rated news show.
David Brinkley Chet Huntley [photo insert]
Books: Peyton Place, Grace Metalious; Profiles in Courage, John F. Kennedy; The Last Hurrah, Edwin O’Connor; The Organization Man, W.H. Whyte
My Fair Lady opens in New York
Artist Jackson Pollock dies
Heartbreak Hotel starts Presley-mania
The rock’n’roll music of white rockers is called “rockabilly” (rock + hillbilly)
The popularity of rock and roll causes the record industry to boom and allows independent labels to flourish
1957
Dr. Seuss Publishes The Cat in the Hat
New York Giants move to San Francisco; Brooklyn Dodgers move to Los Angeles
“Beatnik” used to describe “Beat Generation” counterculture movement
U.S. Treasury begins adding IN GOD WE TRUST to all currency (coins, in an intermittent fashion, had the motto since the Civil War)
Births per thousand begin decline, signaling decline of “Baby Boom” (c. 1963/1964 ended)
European Economic Community Established
Soviet Satellite Sputnik Launches Space Age
Laika Becomes the First Living Animal to Orbit Space
International Atomic Energy Agency established
Great Britain explodes thermonuclear bomb
“Eisenhower Doctrine” pledges U.S. will defend the Middle Eastern nations against communism
Pres. Eisenhower suffers a stroke (Nov.); has difficulty speaking for over a month
AFL-CIO expel Teamsters for ties to organized crime
Arkansas Gov. Orval Faubus uses National Guard to block nine black students from attending a Little Rock High School; following a court order, President Eisenhower sends in federal troops to ensure compliance.
Congress enacts first significant Civil Rights legislation in 82 years—since Reconstruction. It established a Civil Rights Commission and a civil rights division in the Department of Justice and furnished a weak process for protecting voting rights. Pres. Eisenhower, who had supported the initial, stronger bill, admitted publicly that he did not understand parts of the bill that passed
U.S. Supreme Court, in a series of decisions, essentially halt Smith Act indictments (over 140 communist leaders had been indicted)
John Henry Faulk (with financial help from Edward R. Murrow) fights blacklisting of radio artists by AWARE (wins suit in 1962).
Movies: The Bridge on the River Kwai, The Prince and the Showgirl, Twelve Angry Men, Love in the Afternoon; The Spirit of St. Louis
And God Created Woman, a film starring Bridgette Bardot, becomes a controversial sensation; many communities ban the film based on its supposed sexual content
Songs: Young Love, Tonight, Wake Up Little Suie, That’ll Be the Day, Jailhouse Rock
TV Shows: Phil Silvers Show, Father Knows Best, Price is Right, American Bandstand, Twenty-One, Leave it to Beaver, Nat “King” Cole Show
Books: On the Road, Jack Kerouac; Atlas Shrugged, Ayn Rand
West Side Story and The Music Man open in New York
Humphrey Bogart dies
Max Mathews begins composing computer music at Bell Laboratories
Harry Belafonte’s Banana Boat launches “calypso”
1958
Boris Pasternak refuses Nobel Prize
Hope Diamond is donated to the Smithsonian
Hula Hoops Become Popular
Lego Toy Bricks First Introduced
Arnold Palmer wins his first Masters golf tournament
U.S. launches man-made satellite, Explorer I
NASA founded
Boeing B707 America’s first commercial jet airliner delivered
Vice President Nixon tour of South America met with protests
Chinese Leader Mao Tse-Tung Launches the “Great Leap Forward”
European Common Market established
Khrushchev leads USSR
Charles de Gaulle becomes President of France
U.S. Marines sent to Lebanon
Movies: Auntie Mame, Cat on a Hot Tin Roof, Defiant Ones, The Old Man and the Sea
TV Shows: You Asked for It, Wagon Train, To Tell the Truth, The Rifleman, Donna Reed Show, Have Gun Will Travel
Songs: Catch a Falling Star, Chipmunk Song, Volare, The Purple People Eater, At the Hop
Books: A Raisin in the Sun, Lorraine Hansberry; Exodus, Leon Uris; Dr. Zhivago, Boris Pasternak; Masters of Deceit, J. Edgar Hoover; Breakfast at Tiffany’s, Truman Capote;
The Affluent Society, John K. Gailbraith
The “Cha Cha” becomes a dance craze
New York’s Guggenheim Museum, designed by Frank Lloyd Wright, opens
The film company Warner Brothers enters the recording business
The Kingston Trio’s song Tom Dooley launches the folk revival
1959
The Sound of Music Opens on Broadway
U.S. Quiz Shows Found to be Fixed
Studies determine that more Americans have died in auto accidents than in all U.S. wars combined
Toy manufacturer Wham-O introduces the “Frisbee”
Barbie doll introduced
Alaska and Hawaii are admitted as states.
Hawaii, the 50th state, elects Hiram Fong (of Chinese ancestry) and Daniel Inouye (of Japanese ancestry) to represent them in Congress, the first two Asian Americans to serve in that body.
Castro Becomes Dictator of Cuba
April 1959, 2 months after Castro takes control in Cuba
International Treaty Makes Antarctica Scientific Preserve
U.S. and Canada complete St. Lawrence Seaway
Kitchen Debate Between Nixon and Khrushchev [link]
President Eisenhower and Nikita Khrushchev Camp David September 1959 (National Park Service) [photo insert]
Movies: The Entertainer, Rio Bravo, Some Like It Hot, North By Northwest, Ben Hur, Sleeping Beaut,y Suddenly Last Summer, Anatomy of a Murder, Hiroshima Mon Amour
Songs: Mack the Knife, High Hopes, Personality, Kansas City, Battle of New Orleans
TV Shows: Maverick, Rawhide, Fibber McGee and Molly, Peter Gunn, Real McCoys, Dennis the Menace
The Dobie Gillis Show premiers with “Beatnik” character Maynard G. Krebs (Bob Denver) in supporting role
Comedian Lenny Bruce appears on The Steve Allen Show.
Books: Goodbye, Columbus, Philip Roth; Goldfinger, Ian Fleming; The Miracle Worker, William Gibson; The Status Seekers, Vance Packard; The Tin Drum, Günter Grass; Advise and Consent, Allen Drury
The Drifters’ There Goes My Baby introduces Latin rhythm into pop music
Buddy Holly dies at 22 in a plane crash
Since 1955, the US market share of the four “majors” has dropped from 78% to 44%, while the market share of independent record companies increased from 22% to 56%
Since 1955, the US market has increased from 213 million dollars to 603 million, and the market share of rock and roll has increased from 15.7% to 42.7%
Television sets sold: 5,749,000 this year (85.9% of all households)
45,750,000 U.S. homes have television sets
What Things Cost in 1959: 2005 equivalent using inflation index (consumer prices):
Car: $2,200 $ 14,052.39
Gasoline: 30 cents/gal 1.92
House: $18,500 118,167.79
Bread: 20 cents/loaf 1.28
Milk: $1.01/gal 6.45
Postage Stamp: 4 cents .26
Stock Market: 679
Average Annual Salary: $5,500 35,130.97
Minimum Wage: $1.00 per hour 6.39
1960
Alfred Hitchcock’s Psycho Released
Lasers Invented
U.S.-French team aboard the deep-sea vessel Trieste dives to a record 35,800 feet in the Pacific
First studies linking cigarette smoking with heart disease
Church membership reaches 63% (114.5 million) (up from 50% in 1940)
Congo becomes independent of Belgium
Cyprus becomes independent republic
Soviet Union shoots down an American U-2 reconnaissance airplane over Soviet airspace and captures pilot Gary Powers; U.S. admit to spying over USSR
February 1, Lunch counter sit-in by four college students in Greensboro, N.C. begins and spreads through the South.
On April 17, the Student Non-Violent Coordinating Committee (SNCC) is founded.
Congress approves a watered-down voting rights act after a filibuster by Southern senators. The Civil Rights Commission (from the 1957 act) was retained, but the Southern politicians prevented establishment of Federal registrars in the states.
Movies: Psycho, Spartacus, La Dolce Vita, Inherit the Wind, Swiss Family Robinson
Songs: Itsy Bitsy Teeny Weenie Yellow Polka Dot Bikini, Let’s Do the Twist, Never on Sunday, Teen Angel, Stay, Are You Lonesome Tonight
TV Shows: Perry Mason, Bonanza, My Three Sons, The Untouchables, Andy Griffith Show, The Many Loves of Dobie Gillis, Walt Disney Presents
Books: The Affair, C.P. Snow; The Loneliness of the Long Distance Runner, Allan Sillitoe; To Kill a Mockingbird, Harper Lee; Rabbit, Run, John Updike; The Rise and Fall of the Third Reich, William L. Shirer
The Button-Down Mind Strikes Back, Bob Newhart. Second comedy album to hit top of the charts (prequel, The Button-Down Mind was the first); wins 3 Grammy Awards (Best Album, Best New Artist, Best Comedy Performance) the following year.
Twist is the biggest dance-craze in the year of the dance-crazes
Pioneering rock-and-roll DJ Alan Freed arrested in national investigation of “payola” in radio industry
Larry Parnes, Britain’s most famous impresario, arranges a show for the Silver Beetles in Liverpool
The word “reggae” is coined in Jamaica to identify a “ragged” style of dance music, with its roots in New Orleans rhythm and blues
1961
Dwight D. Eisenhower: Farewell Address, January 17, 1961.
John F. Kennedy: Inaugural Address delivered January 20, 1961.
Population: Total Growth Rate Increase
World: 3,080,063,747 1.80 56,018,983
U.S.: 183,691,000 1.67 3,020,000
Barbie doll introduced in Europe
First commercially available integrated circuits
Daniel Boorstin publishes The Image (New York: Vintage, 1961), an incisive critique of the media and “pseudo events”
Adolf Eichmann on Trial for Role in Holocaust
Bay of Pigs Invasion
Berlin Wall Built
Peace Corps Founded
Soviets Launch First Man in Space
NASA launches Alan Shepard in Freedom 7, first American human suborbital flight
Congress of Racial Equality (CORE) organizes Freedom Rides into the South to test new Interstate Commerce Commission regulations and court orders barring segregation in interstate transportation. Riders are beaten by mobs in several places, including Birmingham and Montgomery, Ala.
Movies: The Hustler, 101 Dalmatians, Breakfast at Tiffany’s, West Side Story, The Misfits, The Absent Minded Professor, Splendor in the Grass
Songs: Moon River, Where the Boys Are, Will You Love Me Tomorrow, Blue Moon, The Lion Sleeps Tonight
TV Shows: Bullwinkle, Walt Disney’s Wonderful World of Color, Hazel, Dick Van Dyke Show, Top Cat
Books: Stranger in a Strange Land, Robert Heinlein; Catch-22, Joseph Heller; The Carpetbaggers, Harold Robbins; The Making of the President: 1960, Theodore White; The Agony and the Ecstasy,
Irving Stone; The Winter of Our Discontent, John Steinbeck
Bob Dylan arrives at New York’s Greenwich Village
British bluesman Alexis Korner forms the Blues Incorporated, with a rotating cast that will include Charlie Watts, John Surman, John McLaughlin, Mick Jagger, Brian Jones, Keith Richard, Eric Burdon, Jack Bruce, Ginger Baker, etc.
The Tokens’ The Lion Sleeps Tonight uses operatic singing, Neapolitan choir, yodel, proto-electronics
The Beach Boys’ release Surfin in December and launch surf-music
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