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Facts about the 50s

Facts about the 50s. Population: 151,684,000 (U.S. Dept. of Commerce, Bureau of the Census)* Life expectancy:   Women 71.1,  men  65.6 Average Salary:  $2,992 Cost of a loaf of bread:  $0.14. Chapter 27 : The Postwar Boom. Domestic Front

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Facts about the 50s

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  1. Facts about the 50s • Population: 151,684,000 (U.S. Dept. of Commerce, Bureau of the Census)* • Life expectancy:   Women 71.1,  men  65.6 • Average Salary:  $2,992 • Cost of a loaf of bread:  $0.14

  2. Chapter 27: The Postwar Boom Domestic Front GI Bill of Rights: Congress passes during World War II. Veterans can get college paid for, one year of unemployment benefits, and low interest loans for homes and businesses. Levittown: William Levitt built pre-fab, planned neighborhoods in the suburbs, starting in New York. • Led to growth of suburbs across country and an end to post war housing shortage • Led to image of 1950s, conformity and automobile

  3. Post War Economy • Early unemployment, rising prices, and labor strikes last for a few years • Talk of postwar depression • American economy boomed during the 1950s Why? • Suffered through depression and World War II during the last twenty years • People couldn’t spend money and had saved • Were now ready to spend in the 1950s

  4. Truman: Civil Rights 1948 • Executive order integrating the U.S. military • Executive order ending discrimination in the hiring of government employees Truman’s Fair Deal • Raised minimum wage, built low income housing in the cities, extended social security coverage but failed on national health insurance

  5. 1948 Presidential Election • Democrats: Harry Truman (303---24 million) • Republicans: Thomas Dewey (189---22 million) • Dixiecrats: Strom Thurmond (39---1.1 million) • Progressive: Henry Wallace (0---1.1 million) Results: • Democrats split (Truman/Thurmond/Wallace) • Dewey led all the polls (stop taking in Sept.) • Truman conducts a whistle stop train tour attacking Republican Congress for not passing his programs • Truman pulls off one of the biggest election upsets

  6. 1952 & 1956 Presidential Election • Democrats: Adlai Stevenson • Republicans: Dwight Eisenhower (Ike) • Eisenhower wins close election in 1952 and landslide victory in 1956 • Richard Nixon serves as Vice-President both terms Ike’s Dynamic Conservatism • Conservative with money and liberal with people • Raised minimum wage, extended social security and unemployment benefits, more money for public housing, created interstate highway system (economic and military reasons)

  7. 1950s Culture • White dominated • Traditional roles for men, women, & families • Suburban life • Social and work conformity • Baby boom (largest generation in U.S. history) • Automobile (suburbs & teen freedom/independence) • Consumerism (planned obsolescence/credit/advertising) • Fads: 3-D movies, drive-ins, hula hoops, silly putty, coonskin caps

  8. Television • 1950: 9% U.S. homes • 1960: 90% U.S. homes • Source of entertainment and news • Led to advertising, TV Guide, TV dinners, promotion of white America • Changed radio and movies

  9. “Rock N Roll” Music • New style of music • Term coined by disc jockey Alan Freed • Stars: Little Richard, Bill Haley & the Comets, Chuck Berry, and Elvis Presley

  10. 1950s Counter Culture • Beat movement • Beatniks • Anti-conformity and consumerism • Allen Ginsberg & Jack Kerouac: “On the Road” • Sets up 1960s movements The Other America • 40 million living in poverty: inner cities, elderly, single mothers, all minorities

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