1. Are the 1950s a resumption of the 1920s?
Do the developments of the 1950s constitute a social and economic revolution? or
Are the 1950s a resumption of the 1920s?
Note: 1950s =

2. Economic Prosperity The New Suburbs
Most prosperous period in American History: “Let the Good Times Roll”
GNP: $210 billion in 1946: $504 billion in 1960; $1 trillion in 1970
Personal Income: rose 250%
College students: 1.5 million in 1940 to 7.4 million in 1970 (500%)
Middle class doubles
Home ownership: 64%
90% own a television
Industrial production doubles
Agricultural production triples
30 million people move
The New Suburbs

3. Causes Federal Government Legislation
Servicemen’s Readjustment act (GI Bill)
Cold War military spending
NSC-68
Arms Race
Space Race
Federal Interstate Highway Act (1956)
National Defense Education Act (1958)
Pent-up demand and savings from WWII
Radio and Television
Baby Boom
Cheap energy: oil
Cold War Intercontinental Bomber

4. Demographic Changes: Baby Boom
It seems to me that every other young housewife I see is pregnant British visitor to America, 1958.
> 1 baby born every 7 seconds

5. Dr. Benjamin Spock and the Anderson Quintuplets
Demographic Changes: Baby Boom
Dr. Benjamin Spock and the Anderson Quintuplets
More schools, hospitals, playgrounds, etc.

6. Demographic Changes: Suburbanization
> William Levitt produced 150 houses per week.
Levittown, L. I.
1 story high
12’x19’ living room
2 bedrooms
tiled bathroom
garage
small backyard
front lawn
$7,990 or $60/month with no down payment.
By > 1/3 of the U. S. population in the suburbs.

7. SHIFTS IN POPULATION DISTRIBUTION, 1940-1970
Suburbanization
SHIFTS IN POPULATION DISTRIBUTION,
Central Cities % % 32.6% %
Suburbs % % 30.7% %
Rural Areas/ % % 36.7% %
Small Towns
U. S. Bureau of the Census.
3:00

8. The Ozzie & Harriet Show 1952-1966
Suburban Living: The Typical TV Suburban Families
The Donna Reed Show
Leave It to Beaver
Father Knows Best
The Ozzie & Harriet Show

9. Rise of the Sunbelt Sunbelt
Population shift from the Northeast and Rust belt Causes: Defense and space industries located in the Sunbelt Development of air conditioning “white flight” from the cities
Sunbelt

10. Technology and Innovation
Television
Mainframe computers
DNA helix discovered
Nuclear power
Jet airliners
Communications Satellites
Credit card: Diner’s Club
Fast food outlets
Disneyland
Birth control pill

11. Federal Interstate Highway Act (1956)
1956 : largest public works project in American history!
Cost $32 billion: 41,000 miles of new highways built
Based on the German autobahn system
Designed to move the military quickly

12. 1950 --> Introduction of the Diner’s Card
Consumerism
All babies were potential consumers who spearheaded a brand-new market for food, clothing, and shelter Life Magazine (May, 1958)
> Introduction of the Diner’s Card

13. Consumerism

14. The Culture of the Car
Car registrations: : 25,000, : 60,000,000
2-family cars doubles from
1958 Pink Cadillac
1957 Chevy Bel Air
1958 Corvette

15. The Culture of the Car
America became a more homogeneous nation because of the automobile.
First McDonald’s (1955)
Drive-In Movies
Howard Johnson’s
Disneyland (1955)

16. Television
> 7,000 TV sets in the U. S > 50,000,000 TV sets in the U. S.
Mass Audience --> TV celebrated traditional American values:
Superman --> Truth, Justice, and the American way!
Idyllic families and traditional gender roles
Superman
Lone Ranger
I Love Lucy
Bonanza

17. Well-Defined Gender Roles
The ideal modern woman married, cooked and cared for her family, and kept herself busy by joining the local PTA and leading a troop of Campfire Girls. She entertained guests in her family’s suburban house and worked out on the trampoline to keep her size 12 figure Life magazine, 1956
Mouseketeer “Annette”
The 50s Housewife
Marilyn Monroe

18. Well-Defined Gender Roles
The ideal 1950s man was the provider, protector, and the boss of the house Life magazine, 1955
> William H. Whyte, Jr. --> The Organization Man * a middle-class, white suburban male is the ideal.
Young Gentleman
Family Man
The Provider

19. Well-Defined Gender Roles
Changing Sexual Behavior: Alfred Kinsey --> > Sexual Behavior in the Human Male > Sexual Behavior in the Human Female
* premarital sex was common * extramarital affairs were frequent among married couples.
Kinsey’s results are an assault on the family as a basic unit of society, a negation of moral law, and a celebration of licentiousness Life magazine, early 1950s

20. Religious Revival
Today in the U. S., the Christian faith is back in the center of things Time magazine, 1954
Church membership: > 64,000, > 114,000,000
Television Preachers:
1. Catholic Bishop Fulton J. Sheen --> “Life is Worth Living”
2. Methodist Minister Norman Vincent Peale --> The Power of Positive Thinking
3. Reverand Billy Graham --> ecumenical message; warned against the evils of Communism.

21. Religious Revival Hollywood: apex of the biblical epics.
The Robe The Ten Commandments Ben Hur
It’s unAmerican to be unreligious! -- The Christian Century, 1954

22. Behavioral Rules of the 1950s
Obey Authority Don’t make waves: fit-in and conform Don’t think about sex Control your emotions Cleancut look Don’t read banned books

23. Fear, Insecurity, and Rebellion
Beatniks
Real Fears:
Nuclear Destruction
Communist aggression
Economic insecurity
Communist Subversion
Red Scares: McCarthyism
Civil Rights Movement
Rebellion:
Rise of the Teenager: youth culture
New Sexuality
Beatniks
Standardization Conformity
James Dean
Marlon Brando
5:20

24. Youth Culture
13 million teenagers Cars Dating Clothing Sexual Innuendo Rock n Roll: “devil’s music” or race music or a Communist plot American Bandstand Advertising
Marilyn Monroe: Playboy‘s First Cover Girl

25. Progress Through Science
UFO Sightings skyrocketed in the 1950s. Hollywood used aliens as an allegory for whom ??
War of the Worlds

26. Progress Through Science
Atomic Anxieties:
* “Duck-and-Cover Generation”
Atomic Testing:
* > U. S. exploded 217 nuclear weapons over the Pacific and in Nevada.

27. Progress Through Science
Hollywood:
* Reflected the growing fear of atomic energy.

28. Summary
In your estimation, what are the enduring social and cultural themes of the 1950’s? How would you rank them?
Did the tendencies toward social and cultural conformity and consensus mask latent anxieties and fears? If so, what were these fears and anxieties?