Key People

Key People

• Ethel and Julius Rosenberg- were excused of being spies for the Soviet Union. They were executed in June 1953.

Key People

• Senator Joseph McCarthy- took advantage of the people's concern about communism. He accused several people of being communists to gain power.

Key Terms

• HUAC- House Committee on Un-American Activities. It was formed to search out disloyalty and communists.

• Blacklists- a list of people who are condemned for having a Communist background

• McCarthyism- McCarthy’s anti-communist campaign.

Major Events • McCarthy's Downfall- In 1954, McCarthy made

accusations against the United States Army, which resulted in a nationally televised investigation. McCarthy’s bullying of witnesses alienated the audience and cost him public support. The Senate condemned him for improper conduct.

Brinkmanship Rules U.S.

• Brinkmanship- This is the theory that if a country will go to the brink of war then the other country will back down.

• Dwight D. Eisenhower- President of the united states during the cold war.(Below)

• Foster Dulles- The secretary of state for Eisenhower during the cold war. He created the term and theory of brinkmanship.(below)

The Race For War

• H-bomb – The H stands for hydrogen. This is a hydrogen bomb that was 67 times more powerful than the atom bomb which was used during Hiroshima and Nagasaki. Both countries United States and Russia both had this bomb during the cold war.(Below)

• Arms Race- this is when two countries compete with each other to see who can have the most superior weapons. This happened between the United States and Russia and started with Russia launching the Sputnik into space.

The Cold War becoming Contagious

• CIA- This stands for the Central Intelligence Agency. This was an agency created to gather secret information about foreign governments.

• Warsaw Pact- this was a military alliance group formed between East Europe and Russia. This was made to counter the western Europeans group called NATO.

• Eisenhower Doctrine- This was a statement that said the United States would protect the Middle East from any communist attacks from any country. This was a part of the policy known as containment.

• Nikita Khrushchev- He was the leader of Russia during the cold war against the United States.

Cold War Hits The Skies

• Francis Gary Powers- He was a pilot of the U-2 spy plane that spied on the Russians during the late 50’s and early 60’s.

• U-2 incident- This incident was when a spy plane was shot down in Russia and they captured its pilot.

• Some Trust with the soviets was lost because of the U-2 incident and anger grew. The soviets felt as if we were being dishonest and negotiation between the soviets became much harder.

GI Bill of Rights • Congress passed the GI Bill of Rights in 1944• The Bill was constructed to help ease veterans’ return to

civilian life• It guaranteed people a year’s unemployment benefits while

they looked for jobs, and offered low-interest, federally guaranteed loans

• Families used the Bill benefits to buy homes and start businesses

Housing Problems

• Many returning veterans returned home from war and faced severe housing shortage

• People began to leave the cities and settle in the suburbs

• Suburb is a residential town or community near a city

• William Levitt and Henry Kaiser used an efficient assembly line to build homes in the suburbs to help fix the housing shortages

Levittown

Next Man Up• Harry S. Truman abruptly became president after Franklin D. Roosevelt’s death in

1945• Truman took initiative right away by convincing the Congress to draft striking

workers into the army• Truman was blamed for the nation’s inflation and labor unrest, but was still

nominated president in 1948 by the Democrats• His “Give ‘em hell, Harry” campaign helped him win the election by such a small

margin to Dewey. • Dixiecrat was one of the Southern delegates who, to protest President Truman’s

civil rights policy, walked out of the 1948 Democratic National Convention and formed the States’ Rights Democratic Party

• The economic program Truman used was called the Fair Deal - an extension of Franklins New Deal- which included measures to increase minimum wage, to extend social security coverage, and to provide housing for low-income families

Ike Has Arrived • Dwight D. Eisenhower was commonly called “Ike” and became the

Republican President of the United States in 1952, winning 55 % of the popular vote against Adlai Stevenson

• Governor of Arkansas did not allow blacks to enroll in an all white high school

• Eisenhower raised minimum wage, extended social security and unemployment benefits, increased funding for public housing, and backed the creation of the interstate highways which increased his popularity greatly

• Ike became a more popular figure and was reelected in 1956

Racial Discrimination • The Brown vs. Board of Education of Topeka was a major

court case that the Supreme Court ruled stating public schools should be racially integrated

• In 1955 Rosa Parks sparked the Civil Rights Movement by refusing to give up her seat to a white man on the bus

• Orval Faubus, the governor of Arkansas tried to keep blacks out of an all-white high school in Little Rock in September 1957

• Eisenhower promoted his power by sending the First Airborne to help ensure that black students were able to attend class

Little Rock Nine

• The nine African – American students who were initially not allowed to enroll in an all white high school in Little Rock, Arkansas

Key Terms • Conglomerate

– A Major Corporation that includes a number of smaller companies in unrelated industries

• Franchise – A Company that offers similar products or services in many locations

• Baby Boom– A sudden increase of birthrate after World War 2 because of the soldiers coming home

• Dr. Jonas Salk– Created the vaccine for Poliomyelitis

• Consumerism – Buying material goods

• Planned Obsolescence– In order to encourage consumers to purchase more goods, manufacturers purposely

designed products to become obsolete

The Organization and the Organization Man• During the ‘50s,Businesses expanded rapidly• More White-Collar Jobs, Less Blue-Collar Jobs• Many of the white-collar workers work for a Conglomerate

– International Telephone and Telegraph (ITT) or General Electric (GE)

• Other type of Business is a Franchise– McDonald’s

• Franchises also help Conformity– Businesses did not want creative people to rock the corporate boat

• Created Personality tests to make sure employees were a good fit

Suburban Life• Cars, Highways, Affordable Gas, help pave the way for Suburbs • Suburban life Revolved around Children and the Baby Boom

made sure there were plenty– 4,254,784 babies born in 1957

• Advances in the Medical field made suburban life easier too– Dr. Salk helped find prevention in typhoid fever, and discovered

many drugs including the vaccine for “Polio”• Women's roles were mostly Housewives and subservient to

men All Them House…Doe

Consumerism Unbound

• 60% of Americans were middle class– They wanted to show off and buy things

• Corporations help with the consumerism theme with Planned Obsolescence, Credit, and Advertisements – Advertisers spent a combined amount of 6 billion

dollars in 1950

Don’t know if this one is Appropriate but I got a good laugh

Pop culture

• Some of the key terms in section 27.3 are:– Mass Media– Federal Communications Commission (FCC)– Beat Movement– Beatnik– Rock ‘n’ Roll

• This section is all about television, radio, movies, literature, and music in the 1950’s.

New Era Of the mass media• Mass Media is the form of communication that reaches a

large audience– The main forms of this were radio and television

• By 1960, 90% of Americans had a television in their home• The Federal Communications Commission (FCC) regulates

and licenses television, telephone, telegraph, radio, and other communications industries– They issued a freeze on all new televisions stations for 4 years.

• After the freeze, the number of stations jumped from 108 to almost 500

A Subculture emerges• A movement of music and literature called the beat

movement expressed the social and literary nonconformity of artists and poets.– The followers of this movement are called beatniks

• Beatniks lived a nonconformist life with little interest in material goods.– This movement brought about jazz music

• In the 1950’s, musicians added electric instruments to traditional blues music and called it Rock ‘n’ Roll– Alan Freed was one of the first people to play this music– The leader of this movement of music was Elvis Presley.– This kind of music captivated teenagers from across the country

African Americans and pop culture• African Americans played a large roll in the advancement of

music.– Some of the greatest performers and musicians were African

Americans• Nat Cole was the first African American to have a weekly

half-hour series on national television. • By 1954, there were 250 radio stations nationwide aimed

specifically at African American listeners.• African Americans were most of the 10% of America that

did not have a television– Therefore they took up the majority of radio stations

• This was a powerful force that helped segregation in the 1950’s

Key Terms/ Concepts • White Flight - “White Flight” is the action of upper middleclass whites in the

1950’s fleeing from the cities to the suburbs. During this time millions of white upper middle class families did this. This action largely affected the American government because it caused taxes to be lowered so the urban poor that moved into the cities could pay the taxes, and it caused business to be lost because the poor had less money to spend. (page 820)

Key terms/ concepts• Braceros – this was the name for Mexican hired hands in 1942, this was all

because when WWII begun agricultural workers were low and the government proposed the idea that braceros could be hired to harvest crops and would be aloud into the country for a short time basis. This main time basis was only 5 years from 1942-1947. (Page 822)

Key Terms/concepts• Termination policy – this was a new approach by the American government in

1953, this approach eliminated the American economic support for native Americans, discontinued the reservation system, and re-distributed tribal lands to individual native Americans. As an affect of this between 1954 and 1960 the American government withdrew financial support from 61 reservations. This policy ended up being a failure however, it was a failure because of the amount of relocated natives that were unable to attain jobs at the time and this of course led to the natives having no medical care. In 1963 the U.S. government abandoned this policy. (page 823)

Key terms/Concepts• Urban Renewal – this is the act of tearing down of buildings and business’s in

rundown inner city neighborhoods to make them better. This came into affect after the national housing act of 1949 was passed. Urban renewal was done to help the inner city housing problems of the time, and even though the rebuilt buildings did not always accommodate all of the displaced people, the building afterwards were in better condition (page 821)