The Eisenhower Years: Cold War, Confident Nation, Consumerism, Civil Rights Movement

1. 1946 to 1961: Four Main Themes • COLD WAR • A CONFIDENT NATION • CONSUMERISM • CIVIL RIGHTS MOVEMENT Was it a time of “happy days or anxiety, alienation and social unrest”?

2. The Eisenhower Years 1953-1961

3. PRESIDENT DWIGHT EISENHOWER • Nickname: "Ike" • Born: Oct. 14, 1890, in Texas • Died: March 28, 1969, in Washington, D.C. • Education: Graduate of West Point • WWII:Supreme Allied Commander during WWII • 34th President: Republican, 1953 to 1961 • VP: Richard Nixon

4. PRESIDENT DWIGHT EISENHOWER Issues/Events • Civil Rights • Plessy vs. Ferguson overturned • Public Schools Integrated • Rosa Parks • Montgomery Bus Strike • Rise of Martin Luther King • Little Rock Nine • Cold War • Ended the Korean War • Suez Canal • Hungary • Berlin • Sputnik • U-2 Spy Plane

5. Domestic Policy • Balanced, moderate • “Bland leading the bland” • Overall, a time of prosperity • New Deal a part of modern life • Expands farm aid, Social Security, housing, health services • Highway Act of 1956 • 42,000 miles of interstate highways linking major cities • Improve national defense • Good for jobs, trucking • Bad for the poor, public transportation

7. 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

8. The Culture of the Car Car registrations: 1945 --> 25,000,000 1960 --> 60,000,000 2-family cars doubles from 1951-1958 1956 -->Federal Interstate Highway Act--> largest public works project in American history! * Cost $32 billion * 42,000 miles of new highways built

9. The Culture of the Car 1959 Chevy Corvette 1958 Pink Cadillac

10. The Culture of the Car 1955 --> Disneyland opened in Southern California. (40% of the guests came from outside California, most by car.) Frontier Land Main Street Tomorrow Land

11. The Culture of the Car • The U. S. population was on the move in the 1950s. • NE & Mid-W ---> S & SW (“Sunbelt” states)

12. Foreign Policy • Korean War ends in a stalemate. • Shaped by John Foster Dulles • Truman too passive Brinksmanship • Push Communist nations to the brink of war, they will back down to U.S. nuclear superiority Massive Retaliation • Focus on nuclear weapons, air power • H-Bomb in 1953 • Criticized as “mutual extinction”

13. KOREAN WAR • Stalemate by 1953. • Pres. Eisenhower negotiated an end to war • Divided at 38th parallel • Communism contained • Remains divided today

14. Soviet Concerns • Stalin’s Death (1953) • Khrushchev (1956): “peaceful coexistence” • Hungarian Revolt (1956) • Suez Canal Crisis (1956 to 57) • Sputnik (1957) • Second Berlin Crisis (1958) • Khrushchev: “We will bury capitalism” • U-2 Incident (1960) • Support for Castro in Cuba (1959)

15. Nikita Khrushchev • New Soviet leader after Stalin’s death in 1953 to 1965. • Not as harsh as Stalin • Believed US and Soviet Union could “peacefully co-exist” with one another but the Soviet Union had to be as strong militarily as the US.

16. The Suez Crisis: 1956-1957

17. The Hungarian Uprising: 1956 Imre Nagy, HungarianPrime Minister • Promised free elections. • This could lead to the end of communist rule in Hungary.

18. Sputnik I (1957) The Russians have beaten America in space—they have the technological edge!

19. 1957 Russians launch SPUTNIK I • Facts on Sputnik • Aluminum sphere, 23 inches in diameter weighing 184 pounds with four steel antennae emitting radio signals. • Launched Oct. 4, 1957 • Stayed in orbit 92 days, until Jan. 4, 1958

20. 1957 Russians launch SPUTNIK I • Effects on the United States • Americans fear a Soviet attack with missile technology • Americans resolved to regain technological superiority over the Soviet Union • In July 1958, President Eisenhower created NASA or National Aeronautics and Space Agency • 1958 -->National Defense Education Act

21. Effects of Sputnik on United States • Atomic Anxieties: • “Duck-and-Cover Generation” • Atomic Testing: • Between July 16, 1945 and Sept. 23, 1992, the United States conducted 1,054 official nuclear tests, most of them at the Nevada Test Site. Americans began building underground bomb shelters and cities had underground fallout shelters.

23. Desert Research Institute • Between 1949 and 1963, the United States and Soviet Union conducted more than 100 above ground nuclear weapons tests. • Limited Test Ban Treaty in 1963 banned all above-ground testing sending nuclear tests underground. • On Oct. 26, 1963 at the Shoal underground nuclear test site 1,204 feet below the surface a nuclear detonation conducted in the Sand Springs Mountain Range about 30 miles southeast of Fallon, Nevada. • Produced a yield of 12.5 kilotons and analyzed seismic detection of underground nuclear tests in active earthquake areas. • The veiled purpose of the experiment may have been to discern the difference between Russian earthquakes and Russian nuclear testing.

24. U-2 Spy Incident (1960) Col. Francis Gary Powers’ plane was shot down over Soviet airspace.

25. U-2 SPY PLANE • On May 1, 1960, a U.S. U-2 high altitude reconnaissance aircraft was shot down over central Russia, forcing its pilot, Gary Powers, to bail out at 15,000 feet. • The CIA-employed pilot survived the parachute jump and was picked up by the Soviet authorities, who arrested him. • On May 5, Soviet leader Nikita Khrushchev announced the capture of the U.S. spy, and vowed that he would be put on trial. • After initial denials, U.S. President Dwight D. Eisenhower admitted on May 7 that the unarmed reconnaissance aircraft was indeed on a spy mission. • In response, Khrushchev cancelled a long-awaited summit meeting in Paris, and in August, Powers was sentenced to ten years in a Soviet prison for his confessed espionage. • However, a year-and-a-half later, on February 10, 1962, the Soviets released him in exchange for Rudolph Abel, a Soviet spy caught and convicted in the United States five years earlier. • Led to the Berlin Wall being built and the Cold War “heating up again”

26. McCarthyism • Claimed 205 communists working for State Department • Attacked wealthy & privileged—popular appeal • Even Eisenhower wouldn’t challenge him • Army hearings in 1954 televised • McCarthy exposed as a bully (“reckless cruelty”

27. red scare RED SCARE • Red Scare was Americans response to the fear of Communism • Senator Joseph McCarthy accused 205 US Govt. officials of being Communist. • McCarthyismto destroy or assassinate one’s character without proof and it ruined the careers of many Americans. Became a witch hunt that led to Americans pledging a “loyalty oath” to the United States…….

28. red scare1 RED SCARE

29. Popular Culture • Consumer-driven mass economy Television • By 1961, 55 million TV sets • 3 national networks, bland sit-coms, westerns, quiz shows, sports, • “vast wasteland” for children, culture Advertising • All media, aggressive • Shopping centers, credit cards • Change from “mom & pop” to franchises

30. Consumerism Americans were caught up in the “economic boom” that took place after WWII 1950 --> Introduction of the Diner’s Card

31. Consumerism Americans were becoming a consumer society…..Buying whatever new product that came out that would make their lives comfortable.

32. Television 1946--> 7,000 TV sets in the U. S.1950 --> 50,000,000 TV sets in the U. S. Television is a vast wasteland --> Newton Minnow, Chairman of Federal Communications Commission, 1961 • Mass Audience • TV celebrated traditional American values: • Superman-----Truth, Justice, and the American way!

33. Television Davy Crockett--King of the Wild Frontier Sheriff Matt Dillon, Gunsmoke The Lone Ranger (and his faithful sidekick, Tonto): Who is that masked man??

34. Television Family Shows --> glossy view of mostly middle-class suburban life. Wally and the Beav I Love Lucy Alice Kramden, The Honeymooners

35. Popular Culture Paperback books • Reading Increase despite television—1 million copies a day Records • Mass-marketed, inexpensive LP’s or 45’s • Rock and Roll music becomes popular with teenagers

36. elvis RISE OF THE TEENAGE CULTURE Elvis Presley Chuck Berry

37. Teen Culture In the 1950s --> the word “teenager” entered the American language. 1956 --> 13 mil. teens with $7 billion to spend a year. 1951 --> “race music” --> “ROCK ‘N ROLL” Elvis Presley --> “The King”

38. Teen Culture “Happy Days” OR“Juvenile Delinquency”? Marlon Brando inThe Wild One (1953) James Dean inRebel Without a Cause (1955)

39. Popular Culture Role of Women • Mass media reinforced traditional roles • Lower wages in the workplace Social Critics • Struggle against conformity • Wanted increased social spending • Beatniks • Jack Kerouac, Allen Ginsberg

40. Well-Defined Gender Roles Changing Sexual Behavior:Alfred Kinsey--> 1948 --> Sexual Behavior in the Human Male1953 --> 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

41. Teen Culture The “Beatnik” Generation:* Jack Kerouac --> On The Road * Allen Ginsberg --> poem, “Howl” * Neal Cassady * William S. Burroughs • Jack Kerouac is said to have responded:We’re a beat generation! • Against traditional values of the Great Depressions and WWII generation (their parents) • Would influence the “counter-culture” of the 1960’s

42. Conformity Corporate America • More white-collar jobs than blue-collar • Teamwork, conformity, strict dress codes • Big unions merge (AFL & CIO) • more conservative—industrial jobs making middle-class income • Suburbs, new cars, new schools, family vacations Religion • After WWII, organized religion expands, becomes more tolerant • 1000s of new churches, synagogues • Less interest in doctrine, more in socialization, identity

43. A Changing Workplace New Corporate Culture “The Company Man” 1947-1957 --> factory workers decreased by 4.3%, eliminating 1.5 million blue-collar jobs. By 1956 --> more white-collar than blue-collar jobs in the U. S 1956 --> Sloan Wilson’s The Man in the Gray Flannel Suit

44. Well-Defined Gender Roles Theideal 1950’s manwas the provider, protector, and the boss of the house. -- Life magazine, 1955 1956 --> William H. Whyte, Jr. --> The Organization Man * a middle-class, white suburban male is the ideal. Young Gentleman Family Man The Provider

45. Religious Revival Today in the U. S., the Christian faith is back in the center of things. -- Time magazine, 1954 Church membership: 1940 --> 64,000,000 1960 --> 114,000,000 Television Preachers 1. Catholic Bishop Fulton J. Sheen --> “Life is Worth Living” 2. Methodist Minister Norman Vincent Peale --> The Powerof Positive Thinking 3. Reverend Billy Graham --> ecumenical message; warned against the evils of Communism.

46. Religious Revival Hollywood: apex of the biblical epics. The Robe The Ten Commandments Ben Hur1953 1956 1959 It’s un-American to be unreligious! -- The Christian Century, 1954

47. Civil Rights Background • Post WWI & WWII movement to urbanareas • African Americans influencing party politics by the 1950s • Conflicting feelings about Cold War message of freedomand democracy

48. Landmark in Desegregation Brown v. Board of Education of Topeka (1954) Federal troops uphold in Little Rock, Ark. Little Rock 9 Montgomery Bus Boycott (1955) Rosa Parks, MLK, Jr. Civil Rights Acts of 1957 & 1960 First since Reconstruction SCLC Greensboro sit-in SNCC Civil Rights

49. Brown vs. board CIVIL RIGHTS Brown vs. Board of Education, Topeka, Kansas • May 1954, the Supreme Court overturned Plessy v. Ferguson and the "separate but equal" doctrine. • Segregation of children in public schools on the basis of race was unconstitutional and discrimination. • States ordered to integrate their schools.

50. Rosa parks CIVIL RIGHTS December 1955, Rosa Parks, a 42 yr. old Black woman was ordered by a Montgomery bus driver to give up her seat to white passengers. • Refused, arrested and fined $10 for sitting in the white section. • Blacks refused to ride buses until the law was changed. • Begins the Civil Rights Era as a national movement to bring about equality for Black Americans.