Post War America 1945-1960’sDomestic Policy and Popular Culture for the

1950’s and early 1960’s.

1930-1945

1945-1960

Truman

• Election of 1948 – Dewey (R) vs. Truman (D) Truman wins!

• Two third party candidates – Strom Thurmond (Dixiecrats) and Henry Wallace (Progressive)

• Truman’s Fair Deal –

• Increased minimum wage and social security benefits and attempts Civil Rights legislation.

• Successfully desegregated the military by 1948 with Executive order 9981.

Domestic Programs • Election of 1952 – Eisenhower

(R) vs. Stevenson (D) Eisenhower wins!

• Eisenhower promises a smaller role for the federal government.

• He ended and limited some government programs but extended others.

• The election of 1956 will be a repeat of the election of 1952.

JFK and “The New Frontier”

• Election of 1960 – JFK(D) vs. Nixon (R) – Kennedy wins!

• The New Frontier – a campaign of social programs focusing on education, health insurance and urban development.

• Kennedy also asked for more funds for space exploration – it was his challenge to be the first to put a man on the moon. He never saw his goal realized.

“Ask not what your country can do for you,

but what you can do for your country.”

LBJ and “The Great Society”• An attempt to

eliminate poverty. Johnson declared a “War on Poverty”

• Medicare and Medicaid, Head Start were just a few of the programs.

The greatest legacy of the Great Society are the questions it stillleaves us to struggle with. How can the federal government help disadvantaged citizens? How much help can a society providewith out weakening the private sector? How much help can peoplereceive without losing motivation to fight hardships on their own?

The American Civil Rights Movement

Montreal Royals Jackie Robinson poses on April 18,1946. Robinson is playing in the Negro Leagues in 1946.

Jackie Robinson, first Negro to ever be admitted into the major leagues, photographed right after he signed his contract with the Brooklyn Dodgers at the Dodgers office, April 10, 1947

Super star Wille Mays!

Some kid named Aaron played in Milwaukee!.

Good enough to headline in Las Vegas but not goodEnough to stay in the hotels! A trailer outback wasGood enough for Blacks in the 1950’s and 1960’s!

The Warren Court orders desegregation of schools in the 1950’sAnd supports continued Civil Rights changes in the 1960’s!

The refusal of the public school to admit Brown, then nine years old in 1951, because she was black led to the Brown v. Board of Education of Topeka, Kansas. In 1954, the U.S. Supreme Court overruled the "separate but equal" clause and mandated that schools nationwide must be desegregated.

The Brown victory ends segregation in Public Schools.Thurgood Marshall the Attorney for Linda Brownbecomes the first African AmericanSupreme Court Justice.

Mrs. Rosa Parks is fingerprinted by Dep. Sherriff D.H. Lackey in Montgomery, Ala., after refusing to give up her seat on a bus for a white passenger on Dec. 1, 1955. Parks' refusal to give up her seat led to a boycott of buses by blacks in Dec. 1955, a tactic organized by the Rev. Dr. Martin Luther King

We Shall over come

The Rev. Martin Luther King Jr., center, the first defendant called to trial in the racial bus boycott, held a press conference on March 19, 1956 on the steps of the Montgomery County courthouse where he and 92 others are on trial. They are charged with the violation of the anti-boycott law. King's wife, Coretta is by his side.

Arrested in the 1950’s! Awarded the Medal of Freedom in the 1990’s

Empty busses in Montgomery! Hit them where it hurts!

A bombed out bus, it seems some locals in the “South” were unhappy!Integration and Civil Rights Protest were violently opposed by some!!

Looking for a Movie Review: Mississippi Burning is good choice.

A new bus load of "freedom riders," including four white college professors and three Negro students, arrives in Montgomery, AL, May 24, 1961, under guard of police and National Guard. Center, with glasses, is Rev. William S. Coffin, Jr. At left, partly hidden, is Dr. David E. Swift, and behind him, wearing glasses, is Dr. John D. Maguire.

White robed Ku Klux Klansmen, hooded but unmasked, are shown parading in single file in front of Rich's, Atlanta's largest department store. Klan leaflets passed out to shoppers called for action now to maintain segregation.

National Guard Brig. Gen. Henry Graham, center, informs Alabama Gov. George C. Wallace that the guard was under federal control as the two met at the door of Foster Auditorium at the University of Alabama in Tuscaloosa, Ala., June 11, 1963. Wallace, who had vowed to prevent integration of the campus, gave way to federal troops.

Students at West End High yell, wave flags and a picture of Gov. George Wallace as they demonstrate at Birmingham, Ala., following admittance of two black students, September 10, 1963.

Rev. Ralph Abernathy, left, and Rev. Martin Luther King Jr. lead a column of demonstrators as they attempt to march on Birmingham, Ala., city hall April 12, 1963. Police intercepted the group short of their goal.

The Rev. Martin Luther King, left, of the Southern Christian Leadership Conference, and Malcolm X, heading a new group known as Muslim Mosque, Inc., flash their biggest smiles for photographers March 26, 1964 at the Capitol.

Marchers stream across the Alabama River in this March 21, 1965 photo on the first of a five day, 50 mile march to the state capitol at Montgomery. Rep. John Lewis, D-Ga., who as a young civil rights leader was clubbed by police, won House approval on Tuesday May 14, 1996 of a bill designating

the march route from Selma, Ala. to Montgomery a national historic trail.

                              

50% of Americans don’t vote!

School Desegregation begins following the Brown Decision

It’s not voluntary in places like Little Rock Arkansas

America begins a rapid period of social and political change in the 1950’s and 1960’s

A shoe store in the Watts area of Los Angeles, CA, collapses in flames as the city's wave of violence moves into it's fourth day, August 14, 1965.

Dr. Martin Luther King Jr., right, is seen addressing a public gathering in the riot-torn area of Los Angeles on Aug. 18, 1965.Dr. King opposedViolent protestsLike the WattsRiots of 1965!

Two youths, with lampshades from a looted store, run down a street in the Watts section of Los Angeles in this August 13, 1965, file photo taken during the Watts Riots. The six days of violence left 34 dead and resulted in $40 million of property damage.

King founded the Southern Christian Conference in 1957, advocating nonviolent action against America's racial inequality. Awarded the Nobel Peace Prize in 1964. The Rev. Martin Luther King Jr. acknowledges the crowd at the Lincoln Memorial for his "I Have a Dream" speech during the March on Washington, D.C., on Aug. 28, 1963. The march was organized to support proposed Civil rights legislation.

100 years after the Civil War!

• Despite his difficulties fighting the war in Vietnam President Johnson(LBJ) pushed to pass two key civil rights laws

• 1. The Civil Rights Act of 1964 - which made segregation illegal in all public places and made it easier to prosecute those in violation of the law.

• 2. The Voting Rights Act of 1965 – outlawed literacy tests and poll taxes and gave federal authorities the right to register voters.

Watts, New York, Newark, Washington DC, Chicago, Detroit, Milwaukee, LA, Boston,Philadelphia all saw riots in the1960’s!

A National Guardsman stands at the ready at an intersection during the summer riots of 1967. A terrible new slogan had replaced the South's "We shall overcome." It was "Burn, baby, burn." And frustration and despair erupted from the sidewalks of the northern cities where blacks saw little change following the

Voting Rights Act of 1965.

1968 a Pivotal Year in US History:Assassinations of Martin Luther King inApril and Robert Kennedy in June. InVietnam the Tet Offensive has changed American attitudes toward the “WAR”!

                                           

The balcony of the Lorraine Motel, Mulberry Street, Memphis, Tenn., April 6, 1968, just after Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr.'s assassination, April 4, 1968. memorial plaque and wreaths on Dr. King's balcony.

Clouds of smoke rising from burning buildings in Washington, D.C. on April 5, 1968. The fires resulted from rioting and demonstrations after the assassination of Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr. in Memphis, Tenn. on April 4.

After the assassination of Martin Luther King Jr., buildings smolder after arsonists and looters rioted in Chicago, Ill.

Coretta King, wearing hat and gloves, and her four children view the body of slain civil rights activist leader Dr. Martin Luther King Jr., in Atlanta, Ga., on April 7, 1968. The children are, from left, Yolanda, 12, Bernice, 5, Martin III, 11, and Dexter 7. Dr. King was assassinated in Memphis, Tenn. on April 4.

How far have we come?????

• No one would deny that there are many more opportunities today available to minorities. However, we still deal with race issues in the U.S. Unfortunately, now it is hidden below the surface and some would argue more dangerous.

GI Blues a classicElvis flick features“Troubles with Twins!”

The baby boom was a time when American’s wanted to get back to a sense of what is important - family! Those people born roughlyfrom 1946 to 1961. Roughly 10 million more than any other generation at 65 million.

Baby BoomerBill Clinton 1948!

Urban sprawl and suburban growth!

Levittown, N.Y., in 1948 the mass-produced suburb was a concept, created by William Levitt to resolve the postwar housing crisis! It represented the future of suburbia -- an entirely new kind of home and non-urban culture – Ozaukee County today! Affording one's own personal home became a primary goal after the end of World War II.Today a majority of Americans live in suburbs.

New residents move into their Levitt homes in Levittown, N.Y. in early October, 1947. The town on New York's Long Island was America's first mass-produced suburb. Each home is the same!

Home price $7900

This is a July 1985 aerial photo of Levittown, N.Y., on Long Island, which shows that many of the original low-cost Cape Cod houses built after World War II were altered by their owners.

Charles and Kathleen Weber pose in front of their home at 52 Oaktree Lane in Levittown, N.Y., Nov. 15, 1996. This original Levitt cape model was purchased by the Weber’s in 1948.

Consumer/EconomicBoom?????

What goes in aNew House?

How do you get to work?

A 1955 Carrier Corp. air conditioning advertisement, "The New Silhouette Room Air Conditioner“. Without air conditioning, who would live in Phoenix?

Phil Bustos of Trinidad, Colo., displays the television set he just bought for $29 at a Washington's Birthday sale in Washington, D.C., Feb. 22, 1954.

Nearly every household in the United States has at least one televison set and viewers have their sets on an average of seven hours daily by July 1, 1954!

A home entertainment center --- 1950’s Style!

A July 1,1952 photo of CBS-TV Washington newsman, Walter Cronkite.

TV dinner innovator Gerry Thomas displays a present day version of his invention at his home Oct. 25, 1999, in Paradise Valley, Ariz. This year, as Swanson celebrates the 45th anniversary of the archetypal home meal of convenience.

1947 Howdy Dowdy the first nationally popular kid’s TV program!

Harriet Nelson, flanked by the three men in her life, from left, Ricky, Ozzie and David prepare to celebrate the 12th anniversary of "The Adventures of Ozzie and Harriet" on the air on Sept. 23, 1955.

Watch a segment

I Love Lucy

The Honeymooners

Quiz Shows are Born in the 1950’s,so are scandals!

Charles Van Doren appears as a witness before congress investigating rigged question-answer programs in Washington, D.C. on Nov. 2, 1959. Van Doren testifies he was given answers and coached in mannerisms on the "Twenty One" game show. He won $129,000 on the television quiz show.

Leave it to Beaver

Children sprint across a drawbridge and into the castle that marks the entrance to Fantasyland at the opening of Walt Disney's Disneyland in Anaheim, California, July 17, 1955.

Annette Funicello, a "Mouseketeer" on Walt Disney's TV series the "Mickey Mouse Club”

This contruction photo from early 1951 shows the building of a bridge over the Hackensack River in Secaucus, N.J., on the not yet completed New Jersey Turnpike. Construction of the Interstate Highway SystemWill begin under President Eisenhower.

Millionth Refrigerator atWestinghouse

Post War Manufacturing Boom

Impressed by Germany’s Autobahn Ike orders the building of theInterstate Highway System!

Newly constructed I-91 in Brattleboro, Vt.

What two seasons doesWisconsin have???

Winter & Construction!

Customers line up outside the first McDonald's hamburger stand which was opened in 1948 by brothers Dick and Maurice McDonald in San Bernadino, Calif. Six years later, a Chicago milkshake mixer salesman named Ray Kroc acquired franchise rights. The world's No. 1 fast-food chain, McDonald's has 24,500 restaurants in 115 countries, and 40 million customers a day generating $12.4 billion inrevenue.

"An Early McDonald's"The new automobile-centered landscape of postwar America transformed many patterns of life, including eating, as this early McDonald's in Des Plaines, Illinois, suggests.

Suburban America of Today

The GI Bill

• Passed during WWII

• Guarantees US soldiers their jobs when they return home from the war.

• Granted free tuition for colleges and tech schools.

GI BillSchool, Homes, Books

Theory of Human Capital

Education is Income!!

95% of the Class of 2010 Plan to Continue in a two or four year School!

Education is Income!Less than 8th grade $11,000/ yr

8th Grade Grads $13,000/yr

9 – 11th Grade $16,727/yr

High School Grad $24,500/yr

Tech School Grad $31,000/yr

1- 3 years College $32,000/yr

College Grads $44,000/yr

$440,000

$520,000

$669,080

$980,000

$1,240,000

$1,280,000

$1,760,000

Economic Boom!

• The Housing Boom• The Highway and

Auto Building Boom• New Technologies

Boom• The Baby Boom• Plenty of Jobs with

increasing Pay and Benefits!

President 1952 –1960Ike supported the building of the Interstates, the Saint Lawrence Seaway, School Desegregation, and Space Exploration!

U.S. Army Maj. Gen. Gladeon M. Barnes, Dr. John G. Brainerd, and Dr. John W. Mauchly observe the function table of the ENIAC supercomputer on Feb. 9, 1946.

ENIAC, a 30-ton electronic machine at the University of Pennsylvania. In the 1980s the National Society of Professional Engineers named ENIAC as one of the 10 most outstanding engineering achievements of the past 50 years.

                                  

                 

                                    

               

The Era of the Western, George Bailey,Mr. Smith,A gun fighter?!

41 TwinFranklin, Wisconsin

Location: Franklin, Wisconsin-- On Hwy 41 between Rawson Avenue and Hwy 100.  From I-94, take the Rawson Avenue exit and head west on Rawson for half a mile.  Turn left at the 27th Street (Hwy 41) intersection.  The theatre will be on the right side of 27th Street, about 1.5 miles down the road.

Comments: This is currently the largest drive-in in the state.  But with a Walmart, Sam's Club, and a big new Menards just a mile north on 41, this theatre could soon be sold so that the next big shopping complex can be built.

This theater was sold in the summer of 2002

The first "drive-in" church in North Hollywood, Calif., on July 10, 1949

Frank's Butcher Shop after meat rationing was discontinued, November 24, 1945.

A long line of women wait patiently in the rain in New York, September 21, 1946, in front of a meat market at 14th Street and the Avenue of the Americas for a chance to get to the counter before all the meat on hand is sold. Some of the women were in line at daybreak.

Fear of the Cold War!A Civil Defense Drill from1955!

The ballad singers of the 1940’s & 1950’s become theArtists that adults listen to while the teens scene goes toRock n Roll!!!!!!

Dick Clark selects a 45-record for American Bandstand, a televised dance show devoted to young people and their music.

1950’s Juke Box Hits:

This is a photo of Bill Haley taken in January, 1957. He is the lead singer of the rock-and-roll group "The Comets," whose famous song is "Rock Around the Clock.“The first rock tune to sell a 1,000,000 copies—1954!

Bill Haley & the CometsRock Around the ClockThe song that signals the Birth of Rock!

Listen to the KingSing Hound DogElvis

23-year-old rock 'n' roll sensation Elvis Presley, right, indicates that he had no sleep the night before reporting with other inductees at his local Memphis draft board March 24, 1958.

Elvis Presley – Rock n Roll Icon

Chubby Checker – The Twist

• Dance Craze of the 1950’s.

• Unfortunately 30 years from now we won’t be able to show your dance crazes

Come on let’s twist!

A 1959 photo of the Everly Brothers Phil, left, and Don.

Listen to:Fats Domino

Rock Concert 1956

The Evolution of Dance

Terry Tullos, 3, of Laurel, Mississippi, stands on President Truman's desk at the White House, January 14, 1948 as he hands him a letter of introduction from Gov. F.L. Wright of Mississippi. Terry, who walks with the aid of braces, has been selected as poster child for the 1948 March of Dimes campaign of the National Foundation for Infantile Paralysis.

Dr. Jonas K. Salk, who developed the first polio vaccine, poses in his laboratory in Pittsburgh, Pa., April 7, 1955. Poliomyelitis, known as polio, causing paralysis and death, was a virus that swept the United States from 1942-1953. President Franklin D. Rooseveltwas left partially paralyzed when he contracted the disease as an adult. The epidemic peaked in 1950 when over 33,000 cases were reported, and the virus spread to Asia and Europe.

Dr. Richard Mulvaney of Mclean injects the new polio vaccine into the arm of six-year-old Randall Kerr, the first of some 100 children to be innoculated at McLean in Washington, D.C. on April 26, 1954. The vaccine against poliomyletis is being tested in selected areas across the nation.

Seven-year-old Mimi Meade winces from the sting as Dr. Richard Mulvaney inoculates her April 26, 1954 in McClean, Va., with the new Salk polio vaccine. Mrs. John Lucas, a registered nurse, holds Mimi's arm steady as she gets one of the first injections of the countrywide test.

First and second graders at St. Vibiana's school are among the first to inoculated for polio with the Salk vaccine in Los Angeles, Calif., April 18, 1955.

Introduced for the Christmasseason in 1959, she has become the #1 doll in history.

Barbie doll creator Ruth Handler, left, gets a kiss from Kristi Cooke, an actress dressed as a Barbie doll, during the 35th birthday celebration for the doll at FAO Schwartz in New York City on March 9, 1994. Handler, who created Barbie, the world's most popular doll, died Saturday April 27, 2002. She was 85. Handler, who also co-founded the Mattel toy company, died at Century City Hospital, a hospital spokesperson said without releasing details.

School Playground 1958