Category: Uncategorized

04/24/11

Civil Rights act of 1964

5 days after Kennedy’s  death in 1964, Lyndon Johnson was in presidency and quickly established the Civil Rights act of 1964.  This act protected the rights of people based on their race, and sex.  This act prohibited discrimination in employment, hospitals, schools, restaurants, hotels, and theaters.  This act was a huge step in eliminating racism and discrimination as the previous decade saw much of it.  The civil rights movement which was started in 1955 was ongoing and the act of 1964 led to future movements and historical speeches such as Martin Luther King’s “I had a dream apeech” in 1968.

04/11/11

Rosie the Riveter

A new group of working women developed in the United States during WWII. Women worked prior to the war also, but they were more commonly of lower economic status and minorities. The war broke the cultural labor divide which existed in society, women were no longer limited to working at home and men outside. Women joined the workforce more and more as the need of labor increased and men went off to war. This led to more and more women taking on the role of temporary labor force in war industries.

In order to reach out to a larger community of women, the government launched propaganda campaigns so sell the need and importance of women in industry. This tactic created an image of a “working gal” called Rosie the Riveter. She was the ideal image of an American woman and worker. Her example reached out to women regardless of their age, class and race. Women boldly took on factory jobs, leaving their old jobs behind in order to complete the new demand for labor.

04/11/11

Good Golley Miss Molley

Custom Les Paul Gibson Guitar

[kml_flashembed movie="http://www.youtube.com/v/kZ6h0kyqSRk" width="425" height="350" wmode="transparent" /]

The 50’s experienced the outbreak of rock music. Like we all know, music, or any kind of art for that matter, is a reflection of reality. Music in particular does a great job of reflecting the views of society and in the 50s Rock-n-Roll took off. The content of the music contained 2 central themes. One theme was a reflection on politics the other adressed women whos role was rappidly c h anging in the times. This time period has seen outrage over the Vietnam War and a controlling theme in rock was fighting back against the man. Also u can see withtin the females referenced in songs a shift in the role of women. They were having a much expanded role in the 50’s. Rock also served to break down the racial divide, another societal theme during the 50s. Crowds repetately integrated themselves during Little Richard concerts and black performers began to perform at white venues.

04/11/11

Montegomery Boycott

The bus where Rosa Park stood up to the injustices of the Jim Crow laws

 

Rosa Parks defies the Jim Crow laws by refusing to give up her seat to a white passenger

During the 1950’s, the United States had in effect a series of injust laws the oppressed African Americans called the Jim Crow law’s. These law’s encouraged segregation by forcing African Americans to use separate facilities then the whites such as segregated public bathrooms or specific seating arrangements on public bus’s as well as bussiness’s that excludes African American patrons. Some of these unjust laws were deemed unconstitutional after the actions that were taken by Rosa Parks, a African American civil rights activist.

On December 1, 1955, Rosa Parks defied one of the bias Jim Crow laws that were in effect. She refused to give up her seat to a white passenger and was arrested for her actions. Her arrest inspired a boycott of the montegomery bus company that lasted about a year and ended when the supreme court renounced that segregation in public transportation was constitutional.

04/11/11

Golden Age era in America

In the 1950’s right after world war 2 the golden age arose.  People were finding jobs, with ease and different types of customs came about.  People started watching T.V. as well as listening to music on the regular.  The 1950’s was the period of the baby boom as many troops returned home and wanted to start families with their wives.  To today the movies we watch the music we listen to and many events we see trace back to the golden age as it was a start of new trends and ways of living life.  People became much more relaxed and no longer had to worry about supporting their families as the Depression was done and the threat of communism came down.

During the 1950's America came out of a vitctorious war and a depression and entered the golden age
04/10/11

Don’t you just love humanity?

Here is the article that I was referring to when I mentioned the Soviet Doomsday machine. It’s a miracle that humanity has existed for as long as it has…

http://www.wired.com/politics/security/magazine/17-10/mf_deadhand?currentPage=all

04/6/11

Boom Boom Baby Boom!

During the 1950s many changes began to occur across the nation. The war was over, soldiers were coming home, and businesses started booming. As more skyscrapers were being built, residents were being pushed out to move into the suburbs causing a great rise in suburban communities. Not only was their a rise in the communities, but the average family began increasing and the baby boom occurred.

The average family had 4 children, as women began marrying younger to keep from pre-marital sex. The change in mentality from pre-war to post-war changed the way Americans lived. Feminism was no more and the technological advances such as the barcode and credit cards were invented.

04/4/11

The Hollywood Ten

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=3nublLQDGbU

In there was a Hollywood blacklist that consisted of  a list of actors, writers, directors, musicians and other entertainers. Their political beliefs and associations, regardless of their validity, caused them to be targets. This blacklist was created around mid 20th century. In 1947, a group of screenwriters and directors were the first to be victims of this blacklist when they chose not to give their testimonies.They were banned from further working in the entertainment industry. It was not until 1960 that the blacklist was thrown away. Because they were banned, we missed out on a decade worth of entertainment. That is 10 years of movies, shows, or of the such that could’ve topped movie charts for centuries to come.

04/4/11

Warsaw Pact vs. Nato

After World War 2 the world was seperated into to two parts, half supported the War Saw pact which was formed by the Soviet Union, which also supported Communism, and half was with Nato which was formed by the Americans.  This could have been prevented easily as Communism was a huge factor in causing the wars and major conflicts of the 1940’s and 50’s.  In 1955 when the Warsaw pact was formed, 8 eastern europe communist states were members of the warsaw pact.  Nato which was formed in 1949, still has many members and continues to support democracy around the world.

04/4/11

Containing Communism

Spreading American values and culture has always been the goal of the nation since the very beginning of  World War I. This interest in spreading democracy and later on encouraging a capatilistic world, helped to fuel both WWII and the Cold War. In this attempt to make the world more safe for democracy to exist, the U.S. started its own battle with communism. Additional efforts extended a helping hand to European nations which desperately needed the help after falling apart post Cold War.  Examples supporting this are the Truman Doctrine and the Marshall Plan. This informally changed American foregin policy in regrard to the U.S.S.R. No longer was the U.S. trying to build relations with the nation or suggest friendship (detente), but rather preferred a policy of containment of the U.S.S.R’s expansion.

How did the Cold War start? Who started it and for what reason it was fought are all questions which are important, but can all pretty much be answered by one word: containment. The fear of the spread of communism as the U.S.S.R expanded posed a direct threat to the U.S. In accordance with American ideals and capitalism, a world with safe choice of communism would possibly even create an uproar in the U.S. as well. In order to prevent this from happening, American foreign policy in Europe changed quickly.

04/3/11

Containing Communism

After WWII concluded, peace did not last very long. Tension began to grow between the two superpowers as the Soviet Union began to establish communist governments in eastern European countries. The Soviets began to spread their communist beliefs around the world. The United States reacted to this situation by implementing the “Containment Policy” to prevent the spread of Communism.

I believe if the Containment policy was not put into affect, the world would be a very different place. The United States might not have interviened in Vietnam and communism may had spread throughout south east Asia. If there was no Containment policy, the United States may not have assisted South Korea during the Korean war and the entire peninsula may have been taken over by the Communist party.

03/21/11

The Depressed Economy and Happy Food

(Picture from the Franklin D. Roosevelt Library, courtesy of the National Archives and Records Administration.)

During the Great Depression most were very poor and could barely afford food which they needed to survive. The picture shows a very long food line in New York City. In the video I have chosen Clara who lived through the great depression showed us how her mom made pizza. On nights when mom made bread she will take a piece of the bread dough and they will have dinner for the night. Their budget conscious pizza makes my pizza look very high class. My first cooking book actually was a book full of recipes from the Great Depression era and I notice that they try to substitute anywhere they can for cheaper products and they used lard to replace butter and oil. I feel like the messages that these two sources communicate about the Depression is that although times where tough people still found away to make it thru and they looked forward to the little things like the way Clara describes about how her family gathered around the lamp.

03/20/11

New Deal:Reviving the Economy

Cartoon by C.K. Berryman on 1933

During the election of 1932, Franklin Delano Roosevelt was able to easily win the presidency because the incumbent, Herbert hoover was heavily disliked mainly for the occurrence of the Great Depression during his term as president. Once elected into office, FDR carried out a sequence of economic reforms and programs in order to resolve the issues that were caused by the depression. These chains of reforms were known as the “New Deal”

            During the first hundred days of Roosevelt’s administration, he launched numerous reforms in an effort to fix the economy such as creating new jobs for unemployed civilians and to improve the nation’s banking system by assuring the people that their saving’s will not be lost if the banks were to fail again. Those programs are what are being represented by the stockings hanging on the fire place in the political cartoon and the message being conveyed through this cartoon is that FDR is expecting these programs to turn the economy around even though the programs is having little effect on curing the depression.

03/19/11

Poverty on Top of Depression

A large line is formed outside of a soup kitchen as the unemployed line up for their daily rations.

 

A photograph of one of the many shacks built by and for the victims of the failed economy. These shacks were built in parks nationwide during the depression and were called “Homerville’s”

 

These two photographs illustrate the struggles that the average American people had to endure during the great depression. After the economic bubble burst, many Americans had lost their jobs as well as their savings that were kept in the bank. When the smoke cleared, about 25% of American’s were left unemployed and impoverished. Some unlucky Americans even lost their houses and were left homeless. The homeless went to parks and built shacks out of scrap metal and any other materials that they could find. These shantytowns were called Hooverville’s, named after president Hoover because many Americans blamed Hoover for the occurrence of the depression. In order to aid many of the poverty stricken people who could not afford food, soup kitchens opened up nationwide to supply the poor with food. People would wait on line all day in order to get a piece of bread and a bowl of soup.

03/17/11

Planes, Trains, and Automobiles

The roots of the “Roaring Twenties” can easily be traced to the unprecedented growth of the new American automotive industry. Basically created because of Henry Ford’s perfection of the process of mass production with his development of the moving assembly line in the early part of the 20th century, the rapid expansion of the industry gave way to one of the most prolific eras of economic boom in American history.

1920's Automobile Factory

In chapter 20, Foner mentions that “The automobile was the backbone of economic growth.” Citing that the production of cars had tripled annually during the 1920’s. What is the most significant aspect in measuring the success of the 1920’s with the explosion of the auto industry, however, is that although Automotive factories would seem to replace the steel and textile factories that were the driving force behind the inturstrial boom of the late 19th century, it would actually bring expansion and success to the production of  “steel, rubber, oil production, road construction, and other sectors of the economy. It prompted tourism and the growth of suburbs…” (Foner, 722)

Many economists believe that the production of steel is one of, if not the, most important factors in determining the health, and direction of the economy – high levels of steel production mean high levels of new construction, and in the production of cars. This still holds true today (for further explanation see,  \”Steel Industry Will Signal Recession\’s End\”).

-C. Salama

03/14/11

Whose fault is it!

blame game by Nate Collier (ca. 1931 – 1932)

Many say it all started with the stock market crash of 1929, but there were so many other factor that contributed to the Greatest Depression the world has seen.  Was it the bank, lack of international trade, was it capitalism.  Something was definitely unbalanced, and led to extreme poverty.

Dorothea Lange‘s Migrant Mother depicts destitute pea pickers in California, centering on Florence Owens Thompson, age 32, a mother of seven children, in Nipomo, California, March 1936.

When ever I think about the depression, and even during my research of photographs, the picture above seems to carry the greatest effect on me. This woman is carrying her two small children, and a look of pure sadness and lost that one just can’t fake.  She looks poor, and while doing some research found that she had 7 children traveling and looking for work. That’s a lot of mouths to feed.  I can’t imagine how hard that was.  At least now, there are government supports and aids for some of the poor.

I close these two photographs to show how on the large scale of things, that many things may have been responsible for the Great depression, but at the end of the day, many families suffered for it.  The hardship was real even if the real reason isn’t quite clear.

03/14/11

Worse Way to End the 1920’s

People are waiting on line for food. Ironically, they stand under a poster glorifying the American standard of living.

People lined up in London to protest about the Great Depression

The Great Depression not only hit the United States but effected the global economy. In the first picture there are people waiting on a line to get food. During this period, most people couldn’t afford anything and even the wealthy became poor in one day. Ironically, the pictures shows a poster saying how great the standard of living the United States is. It goes to show that it doesn’t matter where they are and how prosperous the country was, the Great Depression was affected globally.  The second picture shows another line of people in London where they protested about the lack of food and to get relief from this disaster. In both pictures, it shows that both countries had obstacles in fighting the Great Depression.

03/14/11

Poverty during The Depression

Both of these pictures convey the tough living conditions poor children had to endure during the time of the depression.  One of the pictures shows homeless children sitting on the street as their father’s were probably out looking for a source of food in order to survive.  The other picture shows a family who had to eat there christmas dinner around a small wooden table with probably just enough food to get by.  The children did not even have chairs to sit on as the poverty level was that bad.  Both of these images show how not only were adults left without jobs, but kids also had to suffer and live in ghetto’s for most of their childhoods as the depression went all the way to 1941.