Democrats and Republicans -- the Big Switch

During the Reconstruction era, Republicans dominated northern states, pushed for expansion of federal power, helped fund business with government money, created the state university system, supported social justice, and raised tariffs. Meanwhile in the South, these expansions in government power were opposed by the Democrat majority.

Sound like an alternate universe? Fast forward to 1936, when Democratic president Franklin D. Roosevelt won on the values of the New Deal, where he massively expanded government power by creating and overseeing pension programs and economic stimulators. He won in a landslide against Republican Alf Landon, who opposed these exercises of federal power.

So what happened in these decades that made the parties switch? When did the Democrats start desiring a big government and the Republicans start desiring a small one?

Some historians point to the turn of the century as influential Democratic politicians such as William Jennings Bryan began pushing for expanding government power to help citizens. This started blurring the lines. But why did he do this?

One answer lies in changing geographics during this time. Remember, states were being added to the Union throughout the 19th and 20th centuries, which means the parties had to cater to these new voting blocs to gain support and influence. While the Republican, Big Business platform was working well in the Northeastern metropolises, the small-time farmers in the newly founded Western states were being left out. So, the Democrats advocated for a bigger government to support these smaller farmers. Republicans were gradually driven to oppose this.

From a financial perspective, the party platforms didn't really switch. Republicans were always the Big Business party, and Democrats were more about the average individual, at least economically. Originally a bigger government helped republicans grow Big Business by raising tariffs and building infrastructure, but once these were implemented, a hands-off government became better for business.

But of course, there is much more to the story. It's very hard to summarize the Big Switch because there really wasn't one. We cannot forget the countless other parties, from Federalists to Dixiecrats to Populists to Progressives, who came and went. It hasn't always been just two parties fighting it out, and even today there are far more than two parties.

Not only that, but we have to note that the north and south have their own factions, Democrats and Republicans have their own factions, and each region and state has its own factions, and that gives us many different “types” of Democrats and Republicans.

There is also the 1968 election to consider. Modern historians agree that it ended the New Deal coalition and the post-war liberal consensus, marking America's slow shift to the right. This happened because of differing opinions on Cold War foreign policy (think about the Vietnam War), race relations, and economic policy.

Basically, there are a million factors which caused a very gradual shift between where Democrats and Republicans stand on the liberal to conservative scale. But a shift happened nonetheless.

https://www.livescience.com/34241-democratic-republican-parties-switch-platforms.html
http://factmyth.com/factoids/democrats-and-republicans-switched-platforms/
https://www.washingtonpost.com/news/monkey-cage/wp/2016/05/25/how-did-the-1968-election-change-u-s-politics-so-dramatically-this-new-book-explains/?utm_term=.65453e2110c1

Marilyn Monroe

 
Probably the most iconic "Blond Bombshell" Marilyn Monroe was an actress and model during the 1950s and was "emblematic of the era's attitudes towards sexuality".

Marilyn Monroe, originally Norma Jeane Mortensen and brunette, was born on June 1st of 1926 in Los Angeles California. In her early life Monroe struggled because of the events during her unfortunate childhood. With a father who had left before birth and a mother who was  admitted to a mental hospital for nearly killing Marilyn as a baby, Monroe moved around quite a bit in her early years jumping from foster home to foster home and later told stories of sexual assault and even rape at the raw age of 11.

In order to escape her troubled childhood and the foster care system Marilyn at the ripe age of 16 married her then boyfriend Jimmy Daugherty, an overseas merchant marine who served in the South Pacific. It was during this marriage that Monroe was discovered by a photographer and made into a successful model, however as quickly as it had begun Monroes marriage to Daugherty fizzled out ending with a divorce. With the divorce, Marilyn signed her first big film contract with 20th century fox as well as dyed her hair platinum blond and changed her name to Marilyn Monroe after the broadway star Marilyn Miller and Monroe for her mother's maiden name.

The starlet quickly took off as she stared in many movies such as " As Young As You Feel", " Monkey Business" and "Don't Bother to Knock", and in December of 1953, she cemented her status as one of America's leading sex symbols when she graced the cover of a brand new magazine called Playboy by Hugh Hefner. Monroe made Hefner's new entertainment magazine a success and was his first "sweetheart of the month". After that Marilyn's career sky rocketed as she took on the role of the dumb blond in movies like "Diamonds Are A Girl's Best Friend", "How to Marry a Millionaire" and "Gentlemen prefer blonds", she was even awarded Fastest Rising Star Award at the 1953 Photoplay awards.



Monroe went on to be a part of many other iconic films such as "The seven year itch" as well as at the Fox musical "there is no business like show business. Through all of her ventures Monroe was said to have grossed $200million for all her films by the time of her death as well as having been awarded multiple golden globes for her various preformances.

However aside from the glitz and glam of Hollywood during the 50s and 60s Monroe suffered from 2 very public failed marriages with baseball player Joe DiMaggio and playwright Arthur Miller as well as a drug abuse problem which eventually lead to her dying of an overdose at a prime at of 36.

While she lived a short life Marilyn had left her mark on Hollywood, and to this day Marilyn Monroe remains an icon in the entertainment and modeling industry, remembered for her striking appearance and bubbly blond bombshell persona.



https://www.biography.com/people/marilyn-monroe-9412123

http://www.pbs.org/wnet/americanmasters/marilyn-monroe-biography/61/

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Marilyn_Monroe

Austria in the Post-War World

After the end of WWII, the Nazi-German state was split apart. We already learned that Germany was partitioned into British, French, Soviet, and American sectors, as was its capital Berlin. But what is less known is that the same thing happened in Austria: the country as a whole and the capital of Vienna were divided among the same 4 allies.

When WWII ended, the Sudetenland (one of the first territories the Nazi's had taken) was returned to Czechoslovakia. Ethnic German citizens, like my grandmother and her parents, feared reprisals from other ethnic groups and fled to Austria. These refugees were distributed among different parts of Austria. My grandmother had family in the Austrian city of Bad Ischl, but the town had no more housing available for refugees, so they were forced to go to the nearby town of Bad Goisern (in the American sector of Austria). My grandmother was one year old at the time, and they were lucky to find housing in an apartment set aside for refugees.

However, other members of my family were less lucky. My great-grandmother's sister was living in East Germany when the Berlin Wall came down, and it wasn't until about 40 years later that they finally saw each other again. My grandmother wasn't able meet her own cousins until they were in their forties.

The Berlin Wall didn't come down until 1989, but there was one time when my grandma and grandpa were able to visit before while the partition was still in place. My mother and her siblings asked for a present (as all little kids do when their parents go on a trip), and my mom still remembers that all of the consumer goods (especially snack foods) were much poorer quality than what she had in non-Communist Austria. My mom's parents even brought her an East German, state-commissioned cassette about a boy named Alfons Zitterbacke. Just like other East German consumer products, it didn't live up to the standard of capitalist children's cassettes.

Sources: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Allied-occupied_Austria

Image: https://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/c/c6/Allied_occupation_in_Austria_%281945-1955%29.png

Sputnik: The Satellite and Rocket

The space race was a competition between the United States and the Soviet Union to see who had the better space technology. The space race started out as a race to gain more missiles, then it evolved into space when the USSR launched Sputnik (or PS-1) into space in 1957. It was launched at 29,000 km per hour (about 18,000 mph) completing one orbit every 96.2 minutes. It followed an elliptical orbit at a 65 degree incline, allowing it to pass over the US. The spacecraft did not have any sensors on it so it could not measure or receive any data, but it transmitted a constant signal at 20.005 and 40.002 MHz. These were common radio frequencies at the time and could be tuned to by any common amature radio. This made sure that everyone knew (and particularly americans) that the Soviet Union was in space and they were flying over them. The unmanned rocket that carried Sputnik(satellite) into orbit was also called Sputnik(rocket). It was a 267 ton two stage rocket based off of the R-7 Semyorka ICBM. The first stage had 4 boosters with a combine thrust of about 3.89 MN of force. This stage was designed to get all 267 tons (minus the weight of the constantly burned fuel) off of the Earth and into the lower atmosphere. The second stage with only 970 kN of thrust was designed to get the payload into LEO and into orbit.

Sources:

https://www.nps.gov/nr/twhp/wwwlps/lessons/101space/101space.htm

http://sputnik.tass.com/sputnik_one/

https://solarsystem.nasa.gov/missions/sputnik/indepth

http://mentallandscape.com/S_Sputnik1.htm

The Assassination Attempts on Fidel Castro

         After World War II, the United States secretly became engaged in a number of international political assassinations attempts on foreign leaders. For a considerable amount of time, U.S. Government officials completely denied any knowledge of this program since it would have been against the UN Charter. On March 5, 1972, Richard Helms, the CIA Director, declared that, "no such activity or operations be undertaken, assisted, or suggested by any of our personnel." However this really wasn't the case. Later on Helms said that there was a large pressure from the Kennedy administration to, "get rid of Castro." Between the years 1960-1963 there were many different attempts that involved the CIA, US Department of Defense, and the US State Department. 

     I read about a lot of different ideas the CIA came up with to try to assassinate Castro, most seemed as if they came out of a James Bond movie and were completely ridiculous. Here are a few that I thought were particularly interesting:

Castro scuba diving

The Painted Seashell
        CIA officials thought they could use Castro's love of scuba-diving to get to him. They planned to hide explosives inside a large seashell and paint it with exotic, vibrant colors to lure the attention of the ocean-loving communist. The hope was that the shell would be so beautiful that Castro would pick it up and, by doing so, trigger the explosive hidden underneath. Desmond Fitzgerald, the CIA's head of Cuban operations, went as far as to buy two books on Caribbean mollusks. However, Like many others, this idea was "discarded as impractical," according to the committee's report.

Contaminated Diving Suit
        Again, an attempt to get Castro through his love of the ocean, this time the CIA came up with an idea to contaminate one of Castro's diving suits with a fungus that would produce a chronic skin disease. The diving suit, as well as the snorkel which would be infected, were meant to be given to Castro by the American lawyer James Donovan, who had been very involved in hostage negotiations with the Castro This plan also fell through however after Donovan gave Castro a different suit. Helms later called the plan "absurd" and said the suit never even left the laboratory.

The Poisoned Pen
     Another CIA plan was to kill Castro using a hypodermic needle concealed within a pen. The needle would be so fine that "the victim would not notice its insertion," according to the Church Committee. The needle was to be rigged with poison and injected into Castro by a "highly placed Cuban official" who was in discussions with the CIA. However, the Cuban official "did not think much of the device" and complained that surely the CIA could come up with something more sophisticated than that. Perhaps this plan would have worked had the official not suffered from bad timing. He was offered the pen on Nov. 22, 1963, the same date as John F. Kennedy's assassination. The agency withdraw its support of the attempt on Castro's life and the official never took the pen to Cuba.




The Exploding Cigar
      Lastly, and perhaps most famous of all the attempts was the exploding cigar. In 1960 the CIA poisoned a box of his favorite cigars. Just a year after Castro rose to power in Cuba, the agency spiked the cigars with a toxin strong enough to kill anybody who put it in their mouth. The cigars were delivered to an "an unidentified person" in 1961, but it's unclear what happened to them after that. This seemed to happen very frequently, some how the plan would fall apart just at the end.

Sources:
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Assassination_attempts_on_Fidel_Castro

https://www.nbcnews.com/storyline/fidel-castros-death/fidel-castro-cia-s-7-most-bizarre-assassination-attempts-n688951

Thurgood Marshall: An American Hero

American heroes come from all backgrounds. They have accomplished things that exemplify what it means to be a citizen of this country. They have struggled through the restrictions of this nation to become the person they are today. It could be made an argument that each of the Supreme Court justices that have served in history are American heroes. However, if there is one justice that symbolized a beacon of hope for so many Americans and caused legitimate policy change changing the lives of Americans for the better to this day, it would be Justice Thurgood Marshall.

Born in Baltimore on July 2nd, 1908, Marshall always was reading the Constitution for his misbehavior in school, and by the time he graduated in 1925 from high school, he knew it like the back of his hand. At Lincoln University in Oxford, Pennsylvania, Marshall wasn't the greatest student at first. He got suspended for hazing with his fraternity and would focus much more on his social life. But by the time he graduated, he was able to focus and ended up graduating near the top of his class.

Rejected from the University of Maryland Law School because he was black, he ended up at Howard, the famous HBCU. After graduating and denying a Harvard scholarship, he decided to pursue opening his own practice. Unable to get many paying cases, he never turned down a single one. This would lead to a precedent of volunteering. He eventually joined onto the NAACP and their legal efforts in desegregating the US in all aspects. Becoming one of the most well-known lawyers in all of the United States, he won 29 out of the 32 cases he argued in front of the SCOTUS. Then, he got the opportunity of a lifetime.

Brown v. Board of Education was the single most influential Supreme Court case in the 20th century. His argument helped remove the "separate but equal" doctrine in the United States and made it illegal to have segregated schools. After this landmark case, he became a national figure. He was nominated to the US Second Circuit Court of Appeals by JFK in September of 1961. In July of 65, Marshall became the solicitor general, appointed by President Johnson, and he was nominated and later confirmed as a Supreme Court justice on August 30th, 1967.

Through his 24 years on his bench as a liberal, he helped lead initiatives on equality of all people. Furthermore, as a big supporter of federal over state governments, he wanted to get rid of capital punishment significantly. As the court became significantly conservative, he got the name "The Great Dissenter" for always speaking against the decisions that he didn't support.

To be an American hero, one must be able to sacrifice their well-being for the betterment of the nation as a whole. Thurgood Marshall especially embodies this idea because he has been able to set aside his comforts to speak for the silenced and act for those who weren't able to do so. As the first black Supreme Court justice, he set an opportunity for all Americans to know that one day, they would get their opportunity to serve on the bench, knowing that this country is truly for all Americans.


Sources:
https://www.oyez.org/justices/thurgood_marshall
https://www.britannica.com/biography/Thurgood-Marshall

Free Speech No Longer

The First Amendment of the United States protects all forms of free speech and expression that does not intend on hurting or threatening the republic. However, during WW2, and later through the Cold War, the United States government inspired fear in Americans of the circumstances at hand, and later resulted in some of the most egregious restrictions on free speech in our nation's history.

Prior to the Second World War, the worst restrictions on free speech in American history took place in 1798 with the Sedition Act. When the Federalists were fearful of the growing power and influence of the Republicans, they passed a law that banned any speech that was,“false, scandalous and malicious writing," against their party. This restricted press printing information about politics, and many groups were censored and at least 26 people were placed in jail as a result. This ultimately was repealed only once the Jefferson team won the 1800 election and they repealed all  parts of the Alien and Sedition Acts except for the Alien Enemies Act.

Fast forward to 1940 and the commencement of the Second World War. The Smith Act, previously known as the Alien Registration Act of 1940, made it a criminal offense for anyone to advocate for overthrowing the government, organize with these groups, or even be a member of any of these groups. This resulted many groups, such as the Communist Party of the United States of America and the Socialist Workers Party, from being able to freely express their political beliefs. Many members were prosecuted and thrown into jail.

For the next seventeen years, Americans were being unfairly prosecuted and imprisoned for their expression of how they believed the United States could be better. But in 1957, the Supreme Court ruled in Yates v. United States that all the people convicted under the Smith Act would be reverse their convictions and have their cases retried. Furthermore, they demanded a new level of strict scrutiny, and they also wanted to ask for a clear difference between the force to overthrow a specific principle versus overthrowing the actual government. 

After the Smith Act was reversed, the United States finally allowed clear expression of their opinions on the government. This did increase the amount of vocal support of Communism in the United States through the 60s, and in many ways, this act proved that the Supreme Court was in favor of the people speaking freely about how they can make the government better, setting a precedent for the culmination of the Civil Rights Movement.

Sources:

https://www.oyez.org/cases/1956/6

https://www.britannica.com/event/Smith-Act

http://www.history.com/topics/alien-and-sedition-acts

Bay of Pigs

When Fidel Castro overthrew the pro-American dictator who had ruled over Cuba, Fulgencio Batista, in 1959, he immediately pushed for Cubans to have more control of their own country. While before American companies had owned half of Cuba’s sugar plantations as well as most of its other industries, Castro nationalized many of these sectors and took them away from American corporations. In response, Eisenhower decided to approve a secret CIA plan to train a group of 1,400 Cuban exiles, who were living in Florida, to invade Cuba. This would become known as the Bay of Pigs invasion.
The plan for the invasion wasn’t carried out until the start of Kennedy’s presidency. Kennedy had his doubts about the plan, and was adamant on keeping American involvement a secret. However the CIA was able to convince him that this operation would be “both clandestine and successful,” neither of which was proven to be true.
The precursor to the actual landing of the Cuban exiles was a bombing of a Cuban airfield a couple days before. Intended to destroy the Cuban air force, the bombing accomplished little due to the fact that Castro was made aware of the plan and had moved the planes. The old World War II B-26 bombers used to carry out this segment of the plan were flown by Cubans and were painted to look like planes from the Cuban air force in order to conceal the role of the US. However, photos of the attacking planes were taken, which revealed that they were in fact American planes. Alarmed by this and not wanting to cause further uproar, Kennedy canceled the second bombing which was part of the original plan.
In order to train the Cuban exiles, the CIA had established bases in Guatemala. While the mission was supposed to be kept secret, knowledge about it became widespread among the Cuban population in Miami where the recruiting happened. This meant Castro was aware of the plan as early as October of 1960, well before it was carried out in April of 1961. The destination of the landing was decided to be in a remote area of Cuba’s southern coast, called the Bay of Pigs. This was so that US involvement was less likely to be discovered and so there would be less Cuban resistance.
When the landing occurred, news immediately broke out because a radio station which had not been spotted earlier began broadcasting news of the attack. Everything went terribly wrong from the start. Ships hit previously undetected coral reefs and sank. Paratroopers, who were to interfere with transportation, dropped into the incorrect area. Cuban planes, which had not been destroyed by the bombing, shot invaders, sank ships, and took out the exiles’ air support. Bad weather damaged equipment and ammunition. The invaders’ supporting B-26 bombers arrived an hour late and were swiftly shot down. After under a day of fighting, the invaders surrendered after being pinned down at the beach by 20,000 Cuban soldiers. Around 100 of the Cuban exiles had been killed with around 1,200 of them being captured.
In the aftermath of this military fiasco, the US government unofficially backed up attempts to negotiate the return of the captured soldiers. An agreement was eventually made with Castro, which was 53 million dollars worth of baby food and medicine in return for the prisoners.  In order to achieve redemption for the failure, Kennedy continued to pursue plans to remove Castro from power, resulting in Operation Mongoose, a plan to sabotage and destabilize Castro’s government and economy.

https://www.jfklibrary.org/JFK/JFK-in-History/The-Bay-of-Pigs.aspx

https://www.britannica.com/event/Bay-of-Pigs-invasion

http://www.history.com/topics/cold-war/bay-of-pigs-invasion

Consumerism in the 1950s

Marked as a period of American consumerism, the 1950s was a period in which spending for pleasure and desire became more ubiquitous. The idiom "keeping up with the Joneses" referred to "keeping" up with your next door neighbor and the new items that they purchased, in fact during the 1950s, the economy grew by 37% compared to the period before of the Great Depression and the World Wars. This rising economy led people to want to spend more and therefore boosted it even further.

What contributed to American consumerism was how it was advertised; the 1950s placed the "Consumer" on a pedestal, making the word "consumer" a synonym of "patriotic". Basically, the more one spent, the more they were contributing to their country and therefore the more patriotic they were towards America.There was no shortage of material though, the 1950s was when many domestic products that we take for granted were developed and more common such as the dishwasher, washing machines and dryer, frozen foods, air conditioners and one of the most important, the television.

Television became the primary source of entertainment, replacing the radio. While we may view this early device as less sophisticated, this was the time when television adverts were the most effective way of convincing people of items they needed. By 1949, 250,000 televisions were being bought in America every month. 

Advertisements pandered to their audience by portraying an idealized modern family that was able to enjoy luxuries like cars and family time. This was because they wanted to break away from the dark era before and look towards the futures. Children were even targetted with these adverts through soft drinks (coca cola), clothes and magazines. Automobile purchasing increased greatly with the advertisement portraying that an automobile exuded prosperity. No longer was the car a luxury but a need, with adverts speaking of owning two cars for families. Soon, most families would have one car if not multiple.

Despite this age of advertising, gender roles were used as a method to advertise to their American audience. Often, women were shown as being submissive to men, restricted to their domestic duties. Kellogg's had slogans such as "The Harder A Wife Works, The Cuter She Looks". Some even used domestic violence with the instant coffee company "Chase and Stubborn" with the slogan "If your husband ever finds out you're not "store-testing" for fresher coffee..." and then showed a man mid action of hitting his wife. In Van Heusen tie advertisements, it showed women serving a man breakfast in bed, the words "show her it's a man's world" meant to mean that men were dominant and their Van Heusen ties helped exude that masculinity over them. 

Advertisements like these may shock us today at their obvious sexism but during this time of consumerism, even our most popular brands today used these tactics to appeal to their audience.

Sources:

http://www.businessinsider.com/vintage-sexist-and-racist-ads-2011-6

http://smallbusiness.chron.com/caused-advertising-industry-boom-1950s-69115.html

http://adage.com/article/adage-encyclopedia/history-1950s/98701/

http://www.businessinsider.com/26-sexist-ads-of-the-mad-men-era-2014-5/#51-show-her-its-a-mans-world-2

A Comparison of the 50's to the 20's

We learned that the 50's were a time of nationwide economic prosperity, a rise of the middle class, and changing societal values. Sound familiar? Here are a few similarities and differences between these two postwar decades.

(Since I wasn't sure how to make a table on the blog, I took screenshots from a Google doc I made)

https://1drv.ms/p/s!AnRbdYYwn-0rgQu_2oRzm3RcWacl
https://prezi.com/uwgqbgdzxfx1/america-in-the-20s-and-50s/

Wolfgang Engels - The Man Who Drove a Tank through the Berlin Wall

During the 27 years the Berlin Wall was up, an estimated 5,000 people were able to escape from East Berlin to freedom in West Berlin. While many of these stories have the escapees attempting to escape in a discreet and quiet manner, there are some exceptions, including the story of Wolfgang Engels.

Wolfgang Engels was born in 1943 in the German city of Dusseldorf and later moved to the East part of Berlin with his mother. Being raised in a socialist household, he did not have many qualms with the Soviet Union. In fact, he could have easily escaped East Berlin when he was a soldier overseeing the initial construction the Berlin Wall 1961, but instead chose to stay.


Two years later, he changed his mind- not out of some ideological disillusionment like many other people- but out of anger against the Soviet Union's actions. In spring of 1963, Engels and some friends were planning to attend a concert in a cafe near the wall. While they were trying to find the cafe, they were falsely accused of trying to escape East Berlin and arrested. Luckily, they managed to escape prosecution due to their ingenuity and the clothes they were wearing.

While that incident created some resentment towards the government, his mother's reaction was the straw that broke the camel's back. Engels's mother, a member of the Stasi secret police, believed the authorities were correct in their actions and scolded him. Disgusted at sight of seeing someone so blindly loyal to the government, Engels made the decision to escape. “That’s what shocked me, that a person can adhere so firmly to the idea that ‘the Party is always right’,” Engels recalled.

A PSW 152, the vehicle Engels used
to drive into the Berlin Wall

Over the next few weeks, Engels befriended a group of army drivers and got them to show him how
their armored vehicle worked. Then, a few days before the German national holiday on May 1, Engels stole the vehicle and, using the large amount of military traffic at the time as cover, drove to an open field in front of the wall.

"I'm leaving for the West, who's coming?" he yelled. When no one responded, he hit the gas and drove straight into the wall. Despite his momentum, he was unable to break through, and the doors of the vehicle were still on the East Berlin side of the wall. Desperate, he got out of the car and climbed up the wall, only to get stuck in the barbed wire.

The hole Engels made when he crashed into the wall

A border patrol soldier saw Engels stuck in the barbed wire and opened fire. The first bullet shot him into his back and out his front. The next bullet barely missed - it hit the wall and the splinters of the bullet dug into his flesh.

It was around this time that West Berlin soldiers noticed the commotion and opened fire on the East Berlin guard to cover Engels. A group of men who were drinking at a nearby bar rushed out to free Engels from the barbed wire and brought him into the bar where he awoke.

"When I turned my head and saw all the Western brands of liquor on the shelf, I knew that I had made it," Engels later said, recounting the events of his escape.

Not long later, paramedics came to the bar and brought Engels to a hospital, where he spent three weeks recovering. After his recovery, he found that his mother had formally disowned him, and all attempts to contact her were blocked. It wasn't until 1990, a year after the fall of the Berlin wall, that he would see her again.

Left: Wolfgang Engels at the cite of his escape, over 50 years later
Right: Engels in the hospital after his escape

Sources:

https://www.thelocal.de/20141031/wolfgang-engels-berlin-wall-25-years-daring-escape

http://abcnews.go.com/International/berlin-wall-turns-50-rebuild-barbed-wire/story?id=14298563

Segregation and the Little Rock Nine

The 1950s is a decade that seems to be highly romanticized in the media. Movies and TV shows portray a time of fun and excitement, full of music, diners, fashion, and new technology. Today, many Americans forget the horrors of segregation that took place during this time. It may have been a good life for middle-class white Americans, but southern black Americans had a much different experience.

Segregation was a major part of southern life. On May 17, 1954, the U.S. Supreme Court ruled that the segregation of public schools was unconstitutional. However, it was not clear how integration would be achieved. White southerners were outraged at this decision and they fought to keep schools separated between races. This was the case at Central High School in Little Rock, Arkansas.

The Capital Citizens Council and the Mothers' League of Central High School met together and formulated a plan to stop the integration of schools. Despite the opposition, nine black students enrolled to be the first African Americans attending Central High School: Minnijean Brown, Ernest Green, Elizabeth Eckford, Thelma Mothershed, Gloria Ray, Melba Patillo, Terrence Roberts, Carlotta Walls, and Jefferson Thomas. Their actions made a significant impact on the nature of public schools and they later became known as the Little Rock Nine.

The students were recruited by Daisy Bates, president of the Arkansas NAACP. She warned them that it would take a significant amount of strength and determination to attend Central High School against the wishes of white southerners. The Little Rock Nine received counseling session to mentally prepare them for the intense opposition and discrimination that would take place.

These black students were filled with hope and determination, but the obstacles were nearly insurmountable. Governor Orval Faubus stated that he would do anything in his power to prevent the integration of black students into white schools. He used the National Guard to block their enrollment. Three weeks later, on September 25, the Little Rock Nine were accompanied by US Army troops as they entered Central High School.

This was a major triumph for southern blacks, but it didn't get much easier from there. These black students were repeatedly harassed and physically tormented. Nonetheless, many of the Little Rock Nine were able to complete high school and go on to distinguished careers.

https://www.theguardian.com/world/2017/sep/24/little-rock-arkansas-school-segregation-racism
http://kingencyclopedia.stanford.edu/encyclopedia/encyclopedia/enc_little_rock_school_desegregation_1957/
http://www.history.com/topics/black-history/central-high-school-integration

National Defense Education Act (1958)

Sputnik.

Every time Americans heard the word, they were reminded of their failure. Many Americans had taken pride in their technological advancements and thought that they were well ahead of the rest of the world in industrialization and development. It caught many off guard when the Soviet Union launched the first satellite into space- if the Russians were able to do this, what else was America lagging behind in? How could this happen?

And so the focus shifted from missiles to stars, and the Space Race began. One of the first acts passed during this time period includes the National Defense Education Act (NDEA). Originally, the NDEA was just a simple piece of legislation proposed by Alabama Democrat Lister Hill that called for federal funding of education. The bill seemed to have no hope of passing as it had previously failed to gain the votes it needed in the House. However, now that Americans were losing their sense of technological superiority, chief clerk of the Senate’s Education and Labor Committee, Stewart McClure, proposed that if they renamed “education” with “defense” it would be able to pass. Although Congress resisted the idea of funding education with federal dollars, many Americans demanded action from them after Sputnik. By framing it with the word “defense”, they hoped to play on the constant fear of war and hysteria that many Americans felt pressured by. When proposing the bill, the House described, “It is no exaggeration to say that America’s progress in many fields of endeavor in the years ahead—in fact, the very survival of our free country—may depend in large part upon the education we provide for our young people now.”

In 1958, the National Defense Education Act was passed. It authorized the usage of over one billion dollars to achieve its goals and went on to become one of the most successful government initiatives in education ever. Through the NDEA, the government was able to establish a precedent for federal funding of higher education, providing low cost loans, and boosting the quality of colleges and universities. Primarily, it aimed to develop STEM education and inspire scientists that could change score in the Space Race. On the side, the act helped to expand college libraries and infrastructures. The effects of this are obvious- in 1960, only 3.6 million students were in college, but by 1970, the number doubled and 7.5 million were enrolled. Thanks to the fear that Sputnik caused, more Americans were more educated than ever before.

Overall, the NDEA impacted much of the youth population during the 50’s and 60’s and increase interest in vigorous science and math courses. Because of this, America remains a top technological competitor in the global marketplace today.

Sources

• https://www.senate.gov/artandhistory/history/minute/Sputnik_Spurs_Passage_of_National_Defense_Education_Act.htm
• http://history.house.gov/HouseRecord/Detail/15032436195
• https://files.eric.ed.gov/fulltext/EJ835843.pdf

Discrimination in the Fifties

               While the 1950s is well known for great social change regarding race and equality, however before 1954 with the Brown vs. The Board of Education decision discrimination and racism was still just as commonplace as the decades preceding.

               In Memphis, Tennessee, racial segregation was a grounded part of society and racism thrived in the area. For example, there were no black policemen in the entire city until 1948. This reveals how corrupt the situation is that continues the persecution and minimization of black American's in society. It was not uncommon to see members of the Ku Klux Klan out on the streets and committing microagressions against the black community.
                While racism continued on all the way to the 50's, it slowly became clear that the tables were beginning to turn. Starting with Executive order 9981, the order to desegregate the military, minorities began to seize the equality and freedoms endowed by the founding fathers. This order came in 1948 and soon(ish) after came the decision to desegregate schools in 1954. closely followed by the arrest of Rosa Parks, her choice to not give up her bus seat ignited the revolution known as the Civil Rights Movement.
                  Unfortunately, the Civil Rights movement brought severe backlash. The 1950s and 60s saw a surge in KKK activity including; violence, lynchings, and bombings of black schools and churches. Also, the KKK used the rise in McCarthyism to scapegoat black Americans as seen here:

Despite decades of oppression, a surge at a crucial point, the Civil Rights Movement continued to persevere and succeed to gain rights and liberties, equal to that of any other man.
Sources:
http://www.history.com/topics/ku-klux-klan
https://courses.lumenlearning.com/boundless-ushistory/chapter/social-effects-of-the-war/
http://www.history.com/topics/ku-klux-klan

Television in the 1950s

The 1950s was a relatively happy decade as Americans had finally escaped the horrors of World War II and the Great Depression. As the war ended, soldiers returned home to their lovers and ran off to the suburbs to start a family. The nature of these suburbs didn't allow for much diversity in styles of homes, hobbies, activities, clothing, or almost any other aspect of life. Thus, it is no surprise that the television gained popularity incredibly quickly. Once one family purchased a television, every other family was eager to get their hands on one. The combination of consumerism and the "keeping up with the Joneses" mentality caused the television to become increasingly common in American homes.

In the same fashion of the radio, television became a unifying force across America. Wealthy families in the city would be watching the same programs as those who lived on a farm. Television brought together American citizens regardless of region or social class. The most popular shows were Gunsmoke, I Love Lucy, The Ed Sullivan Show, and Father Knows Best. Television provided a way for people of all ages to relax and laugh together, just as it does today.

Companies quickly learned to take advantage of the new television culture. In 1949, the amount of money spent on advertisements was $58 million; by 1969, that number jumped to $1.5 billion. The increase in television commercials largely contributed to consumerism. People were anxious to buy any new product that was advertised on the television screen.

Beyond advertising and entertainment, television was also used to spread propaganda. The film Duck and Cover (1952) featured Bert the Turtle, who taught children what to do in the case of a nuclear explosion. Meet King Joe was another form of capitalist propaganda. This film portrayed an average young man who enjoyed life in the American workforce. Joe enjoyed decent wages, advanced technology, and a high standard of living due to the effects of capitalism. From a young age, children watched these cartoons and were indoctrinated by American values.



http://www.softschools.com/timelines/television_timeline/31/
https://livinghistoryfarm.org/farminginthe50s/life_17.html
https://www.filmpreservation.org/sponsored-films/screening-room/meet-king-joe-1949