GI Bill of Rights (1944)
Intended to help returning veterans adjust to civilian life by providing a means for gaining education and loans to buy homes, start businesses, etc.
Housing Crisis
With returning veterans starting new families, the US faced a housing shortage after WWII that was addressed by developers who came up with new ways to mass-produce houses
William Levitt
Used prefabrication techniques to quickly build affordable homes to meet the housing crisis; resulted in very standardized houses; Developer of Levittown
Suburbs
Residential communities surrounding cities that grew dramatically after WWII
Change in the divorce rate after WWII
Increased, largely as a result of social tensions created by changing gender roles during the war and unions that had been rushed by war
Change in employment after WWII
With the cancellation of $35 billion in defense contracts, unemployment increased and roughly 3 million people were looking for jobs
Change in prices after WWII
Without wartime OPA price controls, consumer product prices increased dramatically
Change in wages after WWII
With fewer jobs and more available workers, these dropped significantly
Congress' reaction to increased inflation post WWII
They reinstituted some of the wartime controls on prices, wages, rents, etc.
What saved the postwar economy in the US?
Pent up demand to spend to buy goods that had been limited with money that had been saved during the war combined with high defense spending during the Cold War era
The Buck Stops Here
Famous saying followed by Truman who was known for being honest, realistic, and willing to make tough decisions
Labor's reaction in 1946
Many went on strikes due to decreasing wages and increasing costs
How did Truman respond to the numerous strikes of 1946?
He used federal power to intervene by threatening to draft striking workers and to sieze industries
Had Enough
Slogan of the Republicans in 1946 when they made significant gains in Congress as people were dissatisfied with the state of the postwar nation under the Democrats
Truman's position on Civil Rights
He gave actual support to the issue, creating a Presidential Commission to make recommendations like a federal anti-lynching law and a ban on the poll tax; when he could not get congressional support for these measures, he issued an executive order to int
1948 Election
Truman (Democrat) v. Strom Thrumond (States' Rights/Dixiecrat) v. Thomas Dewey (Republican); Truman won in a surprising upset
Dixiecrats
Members of the States' Rights Democratic Party who split from Truman's Democratic party after his support of Civil Rights
Strom Thurmond
Governor of South Carolina who ran as the Dixiecrat candidate in 1948
Dewey Defeats Truman
Famous headline printed before the 1948 election results were made official claiming victory for the expected winner (the Republican candidate) who actually ended up losing to incumbent Truman
Give 'em hell, Harry" Campaign
Truman's response to the Congress' refusal to pass any of his laws leading up to the election of 1948 and making him look ineffective as president; included making whistlestops at many cities around the country taking the issue straight to the people; suc
Fair Deal
Truman's extension of FDR's New Deal
1952 Election
Adlai Stevenson (Democrat) v. Dwight D. Eisenhower (Republican); Eisenhower won
I like Ike
1952 Republican campaign playing on the popularity of war-hero candidate Eisenhower
Checkers Speech
Nixon's (the Republican VP candidate in 1952) response to claims that he was privately profiting from secret slush funds; claimed the only gift he ever accepted from a political supporter was a cocker spaniel that his kids fell in love with
Modern Republicanism
Eisenhower's position that government should be conservative when it comes to money and liberal when it comes to human beings; his middle-of-the-road approach to conservatism
Blue Collar Jobs
Jobs where workers manufacture goods for sale
While Collar Jobs
Jobs where workers perform services in fields like sales, advertising, insurance, and communications
Conglomerates
A major corporation that includes a number of smaller companies in unrelated industries (ex. General Electric)
Franchise
A company that offers simillar products or services in many locations (ex. McDonalds)
Conformity
Social trait valued in the 1950s where people would follow social norms/trends and think "inside the box
The Organization Man
A book describing the tendancies of 1950s organizations to create "company people" who fit into the corporate culture, were loyal to the company, and did not rock the boat
What areas of the country were growing in the 1950s?
The suburbs
Baby Boom
The population explosion that occured after WWII (late 1940s) and continued into the 1960s where the US birthrate soared
Factors that contributed to the baby boom
Reunion of husbands and wives after war, decreasing marriage age, desirability of large families, confidence in continued economic prosperity, advances in medicine
Dr. Jonas Salk
Developer of a vaccine to prevent polio
Dr. Benjamin Spock
Pediatrician who wrote the "Common Sense Book of Baby and Child Care" that encouraged parents not to spank or scold their children, to have children express themselves, and to have mothers stay at home
Women's Role in the 1950s
She was expected to be a good wife, mother, and homemaker
Betty Friedan
Author of the Feminine Mystique, a book that described how women were feeling unfulfilled by their lives as homemakers
What did lower gas prices and increased credit opportunities contribute to in teh 1950s?
Increased automobile sales and its consequences
How did life in the suburbs contribute to increased automobile ownership (and vice versa)?
Suburbs did not have public transportation systems and were more spawled out, so people needed cars to get around; additionally, many people lived far from their jobs in cities and needed to travel to work
Interstate Highway Act (1956)
Under DDE; Authorized the building of a nationwide highway newtwork; contributed to an increase in trucking and decline in railroads; caused towns near new highways to develop and prosper and towns away from them to suffer
New problems associated with automobiles
Pollution, fatal accidents, noise, traffic jams, flight of upper-class and middle-class whites out of cities, movement of businesses out of cities, decline of cities
Consumerism
Buying material goods; became equated with success in the 1950s
What new products became available during the 1950s?
Timesaving household appliances (washing machines, dryers, blenders, freezers, dishwashers), TVs, tape recorders, hi-fi record players, etc
Planned Obsolescence
Marketing strategy where manufacturers purposely designed products to wear out or become outdated so that consumers would purchase more in a short period of time
Credit Cards
Began to be used in the 1950s allowing people to buy now, pay later
Advertising Age
Advertising became a huge industry in the 1950s through billboards, radio, newspapers, magazines, and the new medium of TV
Mass Media
Means of communication that reach large audiences; in 1950s, the main means of this was the television
Federal Communications Commission (FCC)
The government agency that regulates and licenses television, telephone, telegraph, radio, and other communications industries
Stereotypes
These were very common on television shows; for example, women were always the ideal, stay-at-home mothers, men outnumbered women three to one, and few minorities were protrayed
Gunslingers
TV idealized white america, particularly the old west era of cowboys who engaged in frequent shoot-outs
How did radio survive the advent of TV?
Many stations turned to local programming or news, weather, music, and community issues that the national TV stations could not incorporate
What effect did TV have on the movie industry?
Initially, it decreased movie profits considerably, but movies began to take advantage of the technology only they could offer like big screens, color, and stereo-sound
Beat Movement
Counterculture, non-conformist movement centered in San Francisco, Los Angeles, and Greenwich Village, NYC; Included poets, artists, and writers who rejected structure
Beatniks
Followers of the beat movement such as Allen Ginsberg and Jack Kerouac
Rock 'n' Roll
New form of music that appealed to white audiences, but was usually produced by African-American musicians and blended rhythm and blues and country and pop; term coined by Alan Freed
Elvis Presley
The most famous rock 'n' roll musician
Jazz
Highly improvised style of music often dominated by African Americans
White Flight
The demographic trend of the 1950s where upper and middle class whites who could afford to moved out of the cities into the suburbs, leaving cities increasingly segregated and impoverished areas
The Other America
1962 book by Michael Harrington that illuminated the issue of poverty; necessary since many Americans in the suburbs did not recognize the true depth of poverty in America's inner cities
Urban Renewal
Proposed solution to the housing problem in inner cities created by the National Housing Act of 1949 that called for tearing down rundown neighborhoods and constructing low-income housing
Housing and Urban Development (HUD)
New cabinet position created to aid in improving conditinos in the inner cities
Urban Removal
Term coined to describe what actually happened when rundown neighborhoods were torn down in cities; Poor people were displaced from their homes, but there was not enough housing built to accomodate these people
Braceros
Mexican hired hands who had been allowed into the US to harvest crops on a short term basis to meet a labor shortage in agriculture, but many stayed illegally to escape poor conditions in Mexico
The Longoria Incident
Incident of prejudice against Mexican Americans when the only undertaker in a Texas town refused to provide funeral services for a Mexican American WWII war hero
GI Forum
Organized by Mexican-American veterans in 1948 to fight discrimination against Mexican Americans
Unity League of California
Founded by Ignacio Lopez to register Mexican-American voters and promote candidates who would represent their interests
Indian Reorganization Act (1934)
Moved federal Indian policy away from assimilation and toward autonomy (self government)
National Congress of American Indians
Founded in 1944 to ensure Native Americans had the same civil rights whites had and to enable Native Americans on reservation to retain their own customs
Termination Policy
Beginning in 1953; Federal government gave up its responsibility for Native American tribes, eliminated federal support, discontinued the reservation system, and distributed tribal lands among individual Native Americans; Bureau of Indian Affairs began a