The US Since 1945

Our first unit exam will be on Wednesday, Feb 22nd. It covers 1945-1963, which is Parts I and II in History of Our Time and Chapters 1-7 of Moss, Moving On.

Here’s the study guide (PDF). The exam will be open anything-printed. You can use textbooks, written notes, and notebooks. Internet access and mobile devices are not permitted. If you take your class notes on laptop, you can use it but I’ll arrange the seating in the room so that your laptop screen faces me.

Friday’s class will begin a new unit, on the long 1960s, with a look at the “Great Society” under Johnson. Reading is MO 118-126 and HOT 77-92.

This week’s agenda:

Monday 2/13 = Politics of the 1950s and the Election of 1960
Reading: MO 90-99 and HOT 66-76 (Port Huron, Young Americans for Freedom, JFK Inaugural)
*bring the HOT book to class so we can talk about these documents*

Also Monday 3:30 pm in Library, Rm 117 – a screening of James Dean in Rebel Without a Cause – feel free to bring friends.

Wednesday 2/15 = Congress Day #3, considering legislation and social issues of the 1950s

Friday 2/17 = Life in “Camelot” aka the Kennedy Years
Reading: MO 97-117 plus HOT 46-51. In addition, please choose one of the links below, and explore the digital archive of primary sources related to the Cuban Missile Crisis. You should choose, and be able to discuss in class, at least one document, recording or film.
JFK Library and Museum
History and Politics Out Loud (audio recordings, requires RealPlayer and a good internet connection)
The National Security Archive
Revelations from the Russian Archives (Library of Congress)
The Avalon Project
President Kennedy’s Television Address
“The Cuban Crisis,” Universal Studios newsreel from 25 October 1962

Looking ahead, a couple of reminders: on Monday 2/20 there’s no school, and Wednesday 2/22 will be the first in-class exam, covering 1945-1963.

Download the Study Guide for the exam here (PDF)

Links for today’s class:
One man’s nostalgia for his teenage years in the ’50s (with the soundtrack to match)
The first Rock’n’Roll DJ, Alan Freed (aka The Moondog) on radio
Buddy Holly and the Crickets, on the Arthur Murray Dance Party, 1957
Doing “The Stroll” on Seventeen, a local Idaho American Bandstand-type program, 1958
Which looks pretty tame next to these rockabilly lindy-hoppers from the same era
Trailer, “Rebel Without a Cause” (1954)
Trailer, “Teenage Doll,” also 1957 about the girl gang of the “Vandalettes”
1954 Senate Judiciary Subcommittee Hearings on Juvenile Delinquency, April 1954
The Committee’s 1955 Interim Report: “Comic Books and Juvenile Delinquency”

I am planning to show one of these three films next Monday Feb 13th at 3:30 pm. I know not everyone can make it, and so it’s optional – but if you’re free, come on over. The location will be LRC-117 on the lowest level of the library building.

Please vote in the poll below the description of the three films (descriptions adapted from Rotten Tomatoes)

Blackboard Jungle (1955) The first film to use rock’n’roll in its soundtrack, this gritty urban drama tells the story of war veteran Richard Dadier (Glenn Ford) wants to begin his career as a teacher and is given an assignment at a boys high school in inner-city New York. However, he soon discovers the school is overrun by delinquents who steal, destroy property, refuse to respect authority, and threaten the female teachers with rape. While most of the faculty have given up and meekly let the delinquents do what they want, Dadier is determined to bring order back to his classroom.

Rebel Without a Cause (1955) This landmark juvenile-delinquent drama follows Jimmy Stark (James Dean) who can’t help but get into trouble, Judy (Natalie Wood) who is basically a good kid but behaves wildly out of frustration over her inability to communicate with her deliberately distant father. Both are part of a group of troubled teens who end up settling a score with a dangerous drag race. Released right after James Dean’s untimely death, Rebel Without a Cause almost seems like a eulogy when seen today, since so many of its cast members — James Dean, Natalie Wood, Sal Mineo, Nick Adams — died young.

On the Waterfront (1954) This classic story of mob informers was based on a number of true stories and filmed on location in and around the docks of New York and New Jersey. Starring Marlon Brando as a washed-up boxer who stumbles onto corruption and murder. Featuring Brando’s famous “I coulda been a contendah” speech, On the Waterfront has often been seen as an allegory of “naming names” against suspected Communists during the anti-Communist investigations of the 1950s. Director Elia Kazan famously informed on suspected Communists before a government committee — unlike many of his colleagues, some of whom went to prison for refusing to “name names” and many more of whom were blacklisted from working in the film industry for many years to come. On the Waterfront won Oscars for Best Picture, Best Director, Best Adapted Screenplay, Best Actor for Brando, and Best Supporting Actress for Eva Marie Saint.

All this week, we’ll be looking at the world between 1945-1960 from several different angles:

Mon 2/6 – Postwar Suburbanization & the Baby Boom = demographics and the changing landscape of how and where Americans lived. Reading is HOT 55-65 (Hines, Marchand and Myers) + MO 57-63. Why does Hines argue they were the “luckiest generation”? Do you think that is true? Why or why not?

Wed 2/8 – Labor and the Economy. Reading is MO 45-50 and 58-67, plus these two additional readings in PDF form: “The Cold War and the Feminine Mystique” by Sara Evans, and “American Workers and the New World Order,” by Jacqueline Jones. You may want to compare their points of view – are they in agreement about the impact of the postwar economy on the American workforce, and the way in which that impact was gendered?

Links:
“To Secure These Rights,” full text at Truman library
CBS Edward R. Murrow, Harvest of Shame (1960)

Fri 2/10 – Juvies? Postwar Youth Culture. Reading is MO 90-99 plus a PDF packet that includes two readings from the 1950s that show society’s anxiety about young people’s values and behavior. Download that packet here.

To go with our discussion of labor issues and youth culture and get us ready for a day of Congressional hearings in the following week, I’ll be showing a classic fifties film at 3:30 pm on Monday, Feb 13th. It will either be Blackboard Jungle or Rebel Without a Cause or On the Waterfront. I know many of you work during that time so attendance isn’t required but it may be of interest if you can make it. I’ll announce the location when I have a room reserved.

Today we’ll explore the influence, look, and emerging technology of the pervasive medium of television in the 1950s. We will likely screen and discuss a number of short clips from this list and you might enjoy checking out the rest on your own:

“Leave it To Beaver,” starring the iconic & perfect Cleaver family: the wise parents Ward & June, and the earnest good sons, Wally & “the Beaver” (9:46)

“Somewhere That’s Green,” sung by Ellen Greene, from the feature film musical Little Shop of Horrors (1986), a nostalgic 1980s tribute to sci-fi films of the 1950s; in this scene the main character Audrey (a battered floozy) imagines leaving the dismal city and moving to the suburbs to live a Levittown American Dream as a June-Cleaver-esque housewife. (4:25)

Popular kids shows of the 1950s included Westerns like “The Lone Ranger,” a masked man and his faithful (nonwhite) sidekick fight crime & Indians in the Old West. (2:49)

Other popular children’s programs included Howdy Doody, and Lassie.

“Two Ford Freedom” – a 1950s filmed commercial for Ford, in which a housewife explains the ease and benefits of owning a second car. (1:39)

Undated commercial for Brylcreem, a men’s hair product – showing the use of catchy musical jingles in this era. (1:00)

The fabulous, glamorous, ultra-feminine TV star Dinah Shore pitches for Chevrolet (her show’s sponsor) in this 1952 commercial, “See the USA in Your Chevrolet,” that not only advertises the new model of car, but also the gleaming new interstate highway system just being dreamed & built in the 1950s. (1:33)

Speaking of women on television, this unusual game show/ reality show had women competing for the honor of being “Queen for a Day” based on who had the worst, most depressing and most pathetic life. It’s a fascinating look at America’s underclass, argues one scholar, in years when everyone on TV seemed to be white and wealthy. This particular clip also contains a commercial for “Rinso” and was filmed in Kinescope from a live broadcast. (2:49)

Another classic sitcom of the 1950s, “http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ScLNAVwmjgQ“>I Love Lucy,” which was innovatively filmed in Hollywood rather than sent out live from New York–which meant it has been successfully syndicated on TV ever since. In this episode, Lucy has tried to raise eggs, and is incubating them inside her blouse. (4:49)

One unusual TV star of this era was a Catholic bishop from New York named Fulton J. Sheen, whose program, “Life is Worth Living” was a huge surprise hit on Sunday evenings. His “chalk talks” and sermons attracted Protestants and Catholics alike with his easy wit, self-deprecating humor and grand religious regalia. In this clip (filmed before a live studio audience), Sheen rails against godless Communism. (2:51).

Before TV went west to Hollywood, anthology drama series modified Broadway-type plays for the small screen. A classic of this genre, filmed live, was 1953 Philco Playhouse’s “Marty,” about a lonely young working man looking for love in a New York City dance hall. (Part 1 of 4)

Talk about a pop-culture mashup: Elvis Presley and Debra Paget on the Milton Berle Show in 1956 – a prime-time variety show which bridged to the old early 20th century live vaudeville entertainment and was a something of a forerunner to the Tonight Show and SNL. (2:32)

“I Led Three Lives” was a drama series based on the life of Herbert Philbrick, an FBI agent charged with infiltrating Communist subversive cells–with plots seemingly ripped straight from McCarthy’s Senate committee hearings. Two episodes here: “Radioactive” and “Army Infiltration.”

By the end of the decade, Chairman of the FCC Newton Minow thought TV was a “vast wasteland” and he said so in a speech to the National Association of Broadcasters on 9 May 1961. Audio and transcript of the speech are here – you may be impressed at how relevant his criticisms still are.

For other vintage TV clips, try these sources:
Internet Archive
Retro Youtube
Paley Center for Media (formerly Museum of Television and Radio in NYC)
TV4U
OldiesTelevision
KineVideo (no online streaming, though)

On Monday 1/30 we talked about the Korean War, as a case study in American postwar foreign policy and geopolitical strategy.

On Wednesday 2/1 we’ll have our second Congress Day, and take up some of the legislative and foreign policy concerns of the late 1940s and early 1950s. Remember to bring your laptops!

Links for Wed:
Truman’s Inauguration, including transcript of his speech
Short clip of Truman’s Inaugural speech

For Friday 2/3, please read MO 72-74 and this PDF of an article by Georganne Scheiner, “Would You Like to be Queen for a Day?” We’ll be talking about television and broadcast media in the 1950s.

If you’re curious about the show, we’ll screen some clips in class – Youtube has a few posted to it.

I think we’ll stick to our original reading schedule, despite having given McCarthy short shrift on Friday (I really enjoyed our productive discussion on the term limits amendment, and I’ve updated the “Day1” link on the Congress Wiki to show what we did).

So, Monday we’ll talk about American foreign policy in Asia in the late 1940s/early 1950s, including the Korean War and the glimmerings of the start of the conflict in Vietnam. Reading is MO 34-40 and 86-89. You may also want to explore some of these online resources – some are better than others, so depending on your level of knowledge and interest, take a look.

The official Korean War Memorial on the Mall in Washington DC frames the “Forgotten War” this way – is this a fair assessment, in your view?

Online Resources for the Korean War:
BBC-History Korean War Overview
US Navy History site on the Korean War
History.com Topics: Korean War
Korean War Sources from the Truman Presidential Library
Korean War Sources from the Eisenhower Presidential Library
“Between the Eternities” – a blog post about visiting the DMZ in October 2011

Reading: HOT 18-37 (HUAC, McCarthy and Haynes/Klehr) + MO 40-44, 50-56, 79-82

*Don’t forget: Bring the HOT book with you to class*

Resources:
Political Cartoons about McCarthy by Herblock
“The Cold War Turns Hot” – documents from the Truman Presidential Library
McCarthyism and the Red Scare – documents from the Eisenhower Presidential Library
McCarthyism, Korea and the Cold War – Wisconsin Historical Society

Wed 1/25 will be our first of the Congress Days and you’ll receive your committee assignment. Please bring your laptop so you can begin researching the committee.

Thanks, Prof. Hangen

(laptop illustration, used under Creative Commons license from ichibod)