1946

MAJOR EVENTS:

• Winston Churchill warns of an "iron curtain" falling over Soviet-dominated Eastern Europe
• UN General Assembly meets for the first time; John D. Rockefeller donates money for a UN headquarters in New York
• Nuremburg war crimes trial returns death sentences for 12 Nazis, including Ribbentrop and Goering; 2 life sentences; and 2 acquittals. Goering commits suicide before his scheduled execution.

BUSINESS & ECONOMY:

• U.S. industry idled by widespread labor strikes; federal government takes control of railroads
• Most wartime price controls eliminated

EVERYDAY LIFE:

• Dr. Benjamin Spock's Baby and Child Care influences millions of new and expectant parents throughout the U.S.
• Strapless bras become popular, ushering in a trend toward bare-shouldered women's fashions
• "Tide", the first detergent designed for automatic clothes washing machines, introduced
• First electric clothes dryers
• Suntan lotions, developed for troops during World War II, marketed to consumers for the first time

FUN FACTS:

• Shortest recorded boxing match ever; Couture defeats Walton in 10.5 seconds with one punch
• Americans eat a record 714 million gallons of ice cream

1947

MAJOR EVENTS:

• President Truman formulates "Truman Doctrine" of providing aid to countries whose governments are threatened with overthrow
• U.S. Secretary of State George Marshall calls for a European recovery effort, popularly called the "Marshall Plan."
• India and Pakistan proclaimed independent nations
• Britain nationalizes its coal industry
• Britain's Princess Elizabeth marries Phillip Mountbatten, Duke of Edinburgh

BUSINESS & ECONOMY:

• Congress passes Taft-Hartley Act, restricting labor unions
• Henry Ford dies, leaving behind a fortune of over $600 million
• Americans are able to purchase the first new cars manufactured since the beginning of World War II

SCIENCE & TECHNOLOGY:

• First airplane to break the speed of sound
• Thor Heyerdahl sails from Peru to Polynesia on a raft to prove theory of human migration
• Transistor invented at Bell Laboratories
• Holography invented
• "Broad spectrum" antibiotic introduced to fight typhus

SPORTS:

• World Series:New York Yankees over Brooklyn, 4-3 (first televised World Series)
• Jackie Robinson becomes the first African-American player in a major league baseball team (Brooklyn Dodgers)

ARTS & ENTERTAINMENT:

• Movies: Gentleman's Agreement
• TV Shows: Kraft Television Theatre, Small Fry Club (programming limited to approximately 18 hours per week)
• Books:Doktur Faustus, Thomas Mann; The Diary of Anne Frank; I, the Jury, Mickey Spillaine
• House Un-American Activities Committee begins investigating alleged Hollywood ties to communism
• Tennessee Williams' A Streetcar Named Desire wins Pulitzer Prize

EVERYDAY LIFE:

• The "New Look" of long, full skirts becomes the rage of female fashion
• Over 1 million veterans enroll in college through the G.I. Bill
• First food processors
• Inventor Earl Tupper invents Tupperware, and with it the "Tupperware party," a unique way of marketing the products directly to homemakers

FUN FACTS:

• North America and Europe both experience severe winters. New York is hit with 28 inches of snow (Dec. 17), while Britain has its harshest winter in over 50 years
• First documented sightings of "flying saucers"
• Drive-in theatres become a booming industry

1948

MAJOR EVENTS:

• Mahatma Gandhi assassinated in India
• House Un-American Activities Committee accuses Alger Hiss of spying for the Soviet Union
• Communists seize power in Czechoslovakia
• U.S. Congress ratifies Marshall Plan, approving $17 billion in European aid
• State of Israel created; admits over 200,000 European war refugees
• Soviet Union seals off land routes to Berlin; West responds with massive airlift of provisions
• President Harry S Truman re-elected in upset over Thomas E. Dewey
• President Truman integrates the U.S. Armed Forces

BUSINESS & ECONOMY:

• U.S. continues to cope with severe postwar inflation while rocked by labor unrest
• United Auto Workers succeed in linking wage increases to cost-of-living index in contract with General Motors
• Congress enacts federal rent controls

SCIENCE & TECHNOLOGY:

• Alfred Kinsey's Sexual Behavior in the Human Male is the first large-scale study of individuals' sexual habits, with stunning revelations about infidelity, homosexuality and other issues
• U.S. government conducts extensive missile tests in New Mexico desert
• 200-inch telescope at Mount Palomar begins operation
• Cortisone introduced as an arthritis treatment
• "Big bang" theory of the universe's origin postulated
• Orville Wright dies

SPORTS:

• World Series: Cleveland over Boston, 4-2
• Olympics held in London
• "Citation" wins Preakness, Belmont and Kentucky Derby
• Boxer Joe Louis retires
• Babe Ruth dies

ARTS & ENTERTAINMENT:

• Movies: Hamlet, Macbeth (Orson Welles), The Naked City, Oliver Twist, The Fallen Idol
• Songs: Nature Boy, Buttons and Bows, All I Want for Christmas is my Two Front Teeth
• TV Shows: Howdy Doody, Philco TV Playhouse, Toast of the Town, Kraft Television Theatre, Meet the Press
• Books: The Big Fisherman, Lloyd C. Douglas; Crusade in Europe, Dwight D. Eisenhower; Cry, the Beloved Country, Alan Paton; The Ides of March, Thorton Wilder; Tales of the South Pacific, James Michener; The Naked and the Dead, Norman Mailer
• Long-playing (33-1/3 RPM) record invented
• Boxing and wrestling are TV's prime attractions

EVERYDAY LIFE:

• Selective Service inaugurated, providing a continuous peacetime military draft until repealed in 1973
• New York's Idlewild Airport opens (renamed JFK Airport in 1963)
• Swiss outdoorsman George de Mestral invents Velcro
• Noted food critic Duncan Hines founds a company to make prepackaged cake mixes

FUN FACTS:

• Popcorn sold on a mass scale for the first time
• "Scrabble" introduced

1949

MAJOR EVENTS:

• Communists forces gain power in China; nationalists flee to Taiwan
• North Atlantic Treaty Organization established
• Soviet Union detonates its first atomic bomb
• Israel admitted to U.N.
• Soviet Union lifts Berlin blockade; Berlin airlift ends
• Apartheid becomes official government policy in South Africa
• West Germany, East Germany formally established as nations
• Vietnam, Indonesia gain sovereignty

BUSINESS & ECONOMY:

• Nearly 500,000 steel workers strike

SCIENCE & TECHNOLOGY:

• U.S. Air Force's Lucky Lady completes first non-stop around-the-world flight
• Electron microscopy developed

SPORTS:

• World Series: New York Yankees over Brooklyn, 4-1

ARTS & ENTERTAINMENT:

• Movies:The Third Man, All the King's Men
• Songs: So In Love, Riders in the Sky, Diamonds are a Girl's Best Friend, Rudolph the Red-Nosed Reindeer, Some Enchanted Evening
• TV Shows: Texaco Star Theatre, Candid Camera, Colgate Theatre, Kukla Fran & Ollie
• Books: The Man with the Golden Arm, Nelson Algren; The Jacaranda Tree, H.E. Bates; Guard of Honor, James Gould Cozzens; Love in a Cold Climate, Nancy Mitford; 1984, George Orwell; This I Remember, Eleanor Roosevelt
• South Pacific opens on Broadway
• Arthur Miller's play Death of a Salesman wins Pulitzer Prize

EVERYDAY LIFE:

• Americans buy 100,000 television sets a week
• "Pyramid clubs" in which participants send each other money in hopes of receiving large amounts of money themselves, become a fad
• Editor Russel Lyons coins the terms "highbrow," "middlebrow" and "lowbrow."

FUN FACTS:

• "Silly Putty" introduced

1950

MAJOR EVENTS:

• North Korea invades South Korea; U.N. forces arrive to counter the invasion, but are forced to withdraw. President Truman declares state of emergency after Communist China becomes involved in the conflict.
• Communist Chinese forces occupy Tibet
• Senator Joseph McCarthy warns of communist infiltration of State Department
• Failed assassination attempt on President Truman by Puerto Rican nationalists
• Congress passes laws that restrict communists and communist parties in the U.S.
• Accused communist spy Alger Hiss convicted of perjury
• National Council of Churches formed

SCIENCE & TECHNOLOGY:

• Antihistamines become popular as cold relief medications
• New York's Brooklyn-Battery Tunnel opens

SPORTS:

• World Series: New York Yankees over Philadelphia, 4-0

ARTS & ENTERTAINMENT:

• Movies: Sunset Boulevard, All About Eve
• Songs: A Bushel and a Peck, Good Night Irene, Mona Lisa, C'est Si Bon
• TV Shows: Arthur Godfrey and Friends, Lux Video Theatre, Fred Waring Show, Your Show of Shows, Your Hit Parade, Fireside Theatre
• Books: The Martian Chronicles, Ray Bradbury; Across the River and Into the Trees, Ernest Hemmingway; Darkness at Noon, Sidney Kingsley; The Way West, A.B. Guthrie, Jr.
• "Cool jazz" gains popularity
• Guys and Dolls premieres
• George Bernard Shaw dies

EVERYDAY LIFE:

• TV hero Hopalong Cassidy peaks in popularity

FUN FACTS:

• 14 million television sets sold in U.S., increasing the number in service by ten-fold

1951

MAJOR EVENTS:

• North Korean offensive pushes beyond the 38th parallel; truce negotiations fail
• Congress passes 22nd Amendment, limiting a President to two terms
• Julius and Ethel Rosenberg convicted of passing U.S. nuclear secrets to the Soviet Union; both are sentenced to death
• General Douglas MacArthur relieved of command in Korea
• Sen. Estes Kefauver begins investigation of gambling and organized crime

BUSINESS & ECONOMY:

• Businessman J.S. Coxey leads unemployment protest in Washington

SCIENCE & TECHNOLOGY:

• Mass production of penicillin and streptomycin reaches records
• Electricity generated from nuclear power for the first time

SPORTS:

• World Series: New York Yankees over New York Giants, 4-2

ARTS & ENTERTAINMENT:

• Movies: The African Queen, An American in Paris, Strangers on a Train, A Streetcar Named Desire
• Songs:Hello Young Lovers, Getting to Know You, Cry, Kisses Sweeter than Wine, In the Cool, Cool, Cool of the Evening
• TV Shows: I Love Lucy, Adventures of Ellery Queen, Captain Video, What's My Line
• Books: A Man Called Peter, Catherine Marshall; Lie Down in Darkness, William Styron; Desirée, Annemarie Selinko; From Here to Eternity, James Jones; The Caine Mutiny, Herman Woulk; The Catcher in the Rye, J.D. Salinger
• Color television introduced; first color broadcast transmitted from CBS in New York
• The King and I opens on Broadway
• Robert Frost and Carl Sandberg both publish collections of poetry titled Complete Poems

EVERYDAY LIFE:

• In response to the growing popularity of television, movie theatres experiment with a variety of attractions, including wide-screen projection and 3-D effects

1952

MAJOR EVENTS:

• Dwight Eisenhower elected President over Adlai Stevenson by wide margin; Republicans gain control of White House and both houses of Congress
• Korean conflict continues as truce attempts fail
• Princess Elizabeth of Britain coronated queen upon the death of her father, King George VI
• U.S. begins construction of first nuclear submarine, the Nautilus
• U.S. detonates world's first hydrogen bomb
• Republican Vice-Presidential candidate Richard Nixon defends himself against charges of maintaining a secret slush fund in his "Checkers" speech, broadcast on national television
• Violent protests erupt in Egypt
• Britain develops atomic bomb

BUSINESS & ECONOMY:

• Green-tinted chlorophyll becomes a popular additive to a variety of food and medicinal products as a breath aid (a benefit soon to be disputed by many doctors and scientists)

SCIENCE & TECHNOLOGY:

• First contraceptive pill developed
• Dr. Jonas Salk develops polio vaccine

SPORTS:

• World Series: New York Yankees over Brooklyn, 4-3
• Olympics held in Helsinki, Finland
• John Cobb sets a water speed record of 206.89 m.p.h. on Loch Ness, Scotland; is killed in process

ARTS & ENTERTAINMENT:

• Movies: Limelight, High Noon, The Greatest Show on Earth
• Songs: It Takes Two to Tango, Your Cheatin' Heart, Wheel of Fortune
• TV Shows: Our Miss Brooks, Jackie Gleason Show, I Love Lucy, Dina Shore, Adventures of Ozzie and Harriet, George Burns and Gracie Allen Show
• Books: The Old Man and the Sea, Ernest Hemmingway; East of Eden, John Steinbeck; The Grass Harp, Truman Capote; The Power of Positive Thinking, Norman Vincent Peale
• Revised Standard Version of the Bible published

EVERYDAY LIFE:

• 1952 presidential campaigns are the first to be broadcast on television
• Microwave ovens made available for domestic use; first models are the size of refrigerators and cost over $1,200

1953

MAJOR EVENTS:

• Nikita Khrushchev wins power struggle in Soviet Union after the death of Josef Stalin
• Josef Broz Tito elected president of Yugoslavia
• Convicted spies Julius and Ethel Rosenberg executed
• Korean armistice signed
• U.S. Department of Health, Education and Welfare (now Health and Human Services) created
• Soviet Union detonates its first hydrogen bomb

BUSINESS & ECONOMY:

• President Eisenhower ends all wage, salary and price controls

SCIENCE & TECHNOLOGY:

• U.S. Air Force test pilot Chuck Yeager sets speed record in X-1 rocket plane
• An expedition led by Sir Edmund Hillary is the first to reach the summit of Mount Everest
• James Watson and Francis Crick determine the structure of DNA
• Alfred Kinsey publishes Sexual Behavior in the Human Female
• First clear evidence linking lung cancer to cigarette smoking

SPORTS:

• World Series: New York Yankees over Brooklyn, 4-2 (fifth consecutive win)
• St. Louis Browns move to Baltimore to become the Orioles
• Boston Braves move to Milwaukee

ARTS & ENTERTAINMENT:

• Movies: Roman Holiday, From Here to Eternity, The Robe (first major motion picture filmed in wide-screen CinemaScope)
• Songs: Doggie in the Window, I Believe, Stranger in Paradise, I Love Paris
• TV Shows: Twenty Questions, Red Skelton Show, GE Theatre, Make Room for Daddy
• Books: Casino Royale, Ian Fleming; Battle Cry, Leon Uris

EVERYDAY LIFE:

• TV Guide debuts; on the cover of the first issue are Lucille Ball and her newborn son, Desi Arnaz IV

1954

MAJOR EVENTS:

• Supreme Court rules that race-based segregation in schools is unconstitutional
• Sen. Joseph McCarthy conducts nationally televised inquiries into communist infiltration of the Army; his activities inspire a backlash and a condemnation by the Senate
• Soviet Union rejects proposals to reunify Germany
• CIA intervenes in Guatemala, helping to overthrow government
• U.S. Southeast Asian and Pacific nations form the Southeast Asian Treaty Organization (SEATO)
• Radical Puerto Rican nationalists attack House of Representatives, shooting five congressmen
• U.S. and Canada begin construction of an early-warning radar system in northern Canada

BUSINESS & ECONOMY:

• New York Stock Exchange prices reach their highest level since 1929

SCIENCE & TECHNOLOGY:

• Increasing global concern about nuclear fallout and radioactive waste disposal
• Dr. Jonas Salk begins inoculating schoolchildren with his polio vaccine
• Physicist and nuclear pioneer J. Robert Oppenheimer dismissed from government projects due to his political beliefs
• First successful kidney transplant

SPORTS:

• World Series: New York Giants over Cleveland, 4-0
• Philadelphia Athletics move to Kansas City
• Sports Illustrated debuts

ARTS & ENTERTAINMENT:

• Movies: On the Waterfront, Rear Window, The Seven Samauri
• Songs: Hernando's Hideaway, Three Coins in a Fountain, Mister Sandman, Young at Heart
• TV Shows: Jack Benny Show, Adventures of Rin Tin Tin, George Gobel Show, Mr. Wizard, Disneyland
• Books: A Stillness at Appomattox, Bruce Catton; The Lord of the Rings, J.R.R. Tolkien; Lord of the Flies, William Golding
• First annual Newport Jazz Festival held

EVERYDAY LIFE:

• 29 million U.S. households have television sets, double the number in service three years before
• Billy Graham leads an increasing interest in Christian revival meetings
• Davy Crockett becomes a national fad; sales of "coonskin" caps soar

FUN FACTS:

• Sales of comic books reach 20 million copies a month
• The phrase "under God" added to the Pledge of Allegiance

1955

MAJOR EVENTS:

• Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr. leads the first major event of the U.S. civil rights movement, a bus boycott in Montgomery, Alabama
• President Eisenhower suffers heart attack, is hospitalized for three weeks
• World War II Allies sign treaty restoring Austria's independence
• Interstate Commerce Commission orders all U.S. interstate trains and buses to end segregation practices

BUSINESS & ECONOMY:

• The AFL and CIO labor unions merge

SCIENCE & TECHNOLOGY:

• UHF television developed
• Artificial diamonds created for the first time
• Albert Einstein dies

SPORTS:

• World Series: Brooklyn over New York Yankees, 4-3
• "Sugar" Ray Robinson wins world boxing championship

ARTS & ENTERTAINMENT:

• Movies: Marty, The Seven Year Itch, The Rose Tattoo, Smiles of a Summer Night
• Songs: Rock Around the Clock, The Yellow Rose of Texas, Davy Crockett, Love is a Many Splendored Thing
• TV Shows: Truth or Consequences, Lawrence Welk Show, The Honeymooners, Gunsmoke, Name that Tune, $64,000 Question, Lassie, You'll Never Get Rich
• Books: The Man in the Gray Flannel Suit, Sloan Wilson; Lolita, Vladimir Nabokov; Witness for the Prosecution, Agatha Christie

EVERYDAY LIFE:

• Disneyland opens in Anaheim, California
• Rudolph Flesch publishes Why Johnny Can't Read, a stinging criticism of U.S. education

FUN FACTS:

• Pink clothes for men become a fashion rage

1956

MAJOR EVENTS:

*Dwight Eisenhower re-elected President, defeating Adlai Stevenson handily for a second time

*Soviet leader Khrushchev publicly denounces Stalin, begins official policy of "de-Stalinization" in the USSR

*Egypt seizes Suez Canal; Britain and France respond with force; U.S. and Soviet Union help negotiate a cease-fire

*Israel invades Sinai Peninsula

*Soviet troops suppress a popular uprising against the communist regime in Hungary

*Congress approves Highway Act, which allows for construction of the U.S. interstate highway system

*Fidel Castro begins revolution in Cuba

*Italian ocean liner Andrea Doria sinks after colliding with another vessel

 

BUSINESS & ECONOMY:

*Atomic Energy Commission approves development of commercial nuclear power plants

*IBM founder Thomas J. Watson dies

SCIENCE & TECHNOLOGY:

*First transatlantic telephone cable goes into operation

*Dr. Albert Sabin develops oral polio vaccine

SPORTS:

World Series: New York Yankees over Brooklyn, 4-3

Olympic Games held in Melbourne, Australia

 

ARTS & ENTERTAINMENT:

Movies: The Ten Commandments, Lust for Life, Around the World in 80 Days, The Man with the Golden Arm, The Seventh Seal

Songs: Don't Be Cruel, Blue Suede Shoes, Hound Dog, I Could Have Danced All Night, On the Street Where You Live

TV Shows: Danny Thomas Show, Perry Como Show, Ed Sullivan Show, Alfred Hitchcock Presents, December Bride, This is Your Life

Books: Peyton Place, Grace Metalious; Profiles in Courage, John F. Kennedy; The Last Hurrah, Edwin O'Connor; The Organization Man, W.H. Whyte

 

*Rock and roll becomes a national phenomenon, fueled by the popularity of Elvis Presley

*My Fair Lady opens in New York

*Grace Kelly marries Monaco's Prince Rainier III

*Artist Jackson Pollock dies

EVERYDAY LIFE:

Interstate highway system authorized, helping to fuel a long-term trend toward the populating of suburban communities, often at the expense of established urban neighborhoods

1957

MAJOR EVENTS:

• Soviet Union inaugurates the "Space Age" by launching Sputnik I, the world's first artificial satellite. A month later Sputnik II carries a dog into orbit, making that dog the first living being to enter space.
• President Eisenhower announces "Eisenhower Doctrine," pledging defense of Middle Eastern nations against communism
• Federal troops ordered to enforce integration of schools in Little Rock, Arkansas
• Israel withdraws from Sinai Peninsula
• European Common Market created
• Britain detonates hydrogen bomb; U.S. conducts first underground nuclear test
• Despite record-setting filibuster by Sen. Strom Thurmond, Congress approves the first significant civil rights legislation since the Civil War

BUSINESS & ECONOMY:

• Teamsters union expelled from the AFL-CIO for failing to deal with organized crime

SCIENCE & TECHNOLOGY:

• Successful Sputnik satellites mark the beginning of the "Space Race," with intensive efforts by both the U.S. and Soviet Union to achieve space milestones.
• 67 nations participate in International Geophysical Year of earth science research
• Growth-producing hormone discovered
• Interferon discovered

SPORTS:

• World Series: Milwaukee over New York Yankees, 4-3
• At age 13, Bobby Fischer becomes a chess champion
• New York Giants move to San Francisco; Brooklyn Dodgers move to Los Angeles

ARTS & ENTERTAINMENT:

• Movies: The Bridge on the River Kwai, The Prince and the Showgirl, Twelve Angry Men, Love in the Afternoon
• Songs: Young Love, Tonight, Wake Up Little Susie, That'll Be the Day, Jailhouse Rock
• TV Shows: Phil Silvers Show, Father Knows Best, Price is Right, American Bandstand, Twenty-One, Leave it to Beaver, Nat "King" Cole Show
• Books: On the Road, Jack Kerouac; Atlas Shrugged, Ayn Rand; The Cat in the Hat, Dr. Seuss
• West Side Story and The Music Man open in New York
• And God Created Woman, a film starring Bridgette Bardot, becomes a controversial sensation; many communities ban the film based on its supposed sexual content
• Humphrey Bogart dies

EVERYDAY LIFE:

• "Beatnik" enters the vernacular as a description of the emerging "Beat Generation" counterculture movement

FUN FACTS:

• 71 cities have populations of one million or more in 1957; 40 years earlier such cities numbered only 16