Happy and Paranoid: The cold War and the Euphoric Fifties

1945-1968

UNIT XVI: APUSH

(1 weeks)

Essential Questions (EQ)

Should foreign policy be dictated by realistic or idealistic goals?

What role should a world-power play during peace-time?

Reading Assignments

Date --reading completed

American History Chapter 29

American History Chapter 30

Free Response QuestionãOutlines

1. How did American foreign policy change throughout the era of the Cold War (from 1945 to 1965)? What accounted for these changes? (Be sure to read both chapters before doing this. Also, look at Brinkley pp. 841-843 to learn about Kennedyπs policy of ≥flexible response.≤)

2. What factors led to the increased economic development in the fifties, in spite of the warπs end?

3.. In what ways did the United Statesπ involvement in WWII bring about long-lasting, fundamental change in its national power, economic condition, and domestic political atmosphere. (you should refer back to the last unit a bit as you do this outline.

Document Based Questionãin class.

Major Assignments/Projects and Assessment (There will also be minor homework assignments and quizzes that are not mentioned on this sheet.)

Date to be completed

Chapter 29: America and the Cold War

Contrast Americanπs post war vision with that of the Soviet Union and Britain

Casablanca Conference Jan. 1943

Teheran Conference Nov. 1943 (check out that spelling Sam!)

Explain the dispute over poland

How did Yalta (feb 1945) deal with the questions over the future of Poland and Germany?

UN conference april 1945 and US congressional response. Different than the League of Nations?

Rooseveltπs death April 12, 1945

Contrast Trumanπs attitude toward the Russians with Rooseveltπs attitude

Potsdam Conference July 1945

Why was Chiang Kai Shek so annoying to the Allies?

Mao Zedong. Americas approach towards?

Why did America turn to restoring Japan?

Explain the Truman (Containment) Doctrine. What countries did it first pertain to Why?

George F. Kennan

What was the idea behind the Marshall Plan? Sec. Of State George C. Marshall. How much money? What success was there?

How did the US bolster its military capabilities in the late 1940s?

Hydrogen Bomb

What did the National Security Act of 1947 do? New agencies?

Stalinπs Berlin Blockade. Why? What happened? Result?

NATO: Purpose and Soviet Response

What events in 1949 changed the direction of the Cold War

NSC-68: called for what?

What prevented another depression after the war?

GI Bill

Increase in inflation

Sharp rise in labor unrest; reasons? Trumanπs response?

How did reconversion affect women and minorities?

What was the Fair Deal? Why was it initially unsuccessful? What was accomplished after 1948?

Conservative Congressπs attempts?

Taft-Hartly Act

Election of 1948: how was the Dem party fragmented. Who were the opponents? Platforms? Why was this such an upset? Congressional elections?

Trumanπs successes and failures after the elecion

Trumanπs other efforts at ending discrimination

Fears and optimism originating from discussion of atomic bomb/ energy

Cause of Korean war? How did it become a stalemate? Truman/MacArthur dispute. Dates of war

Office of Defense Mobilization

Positive and negative effects of Korean war

What factors combined to create the anticommunist paranoia that led to the rise of Joseph McCarthy?

HUAC and the attack on Hollywood

Alger Hiss, Whitaker Chambers and the Pumpkin papers, Richard Nixon and the long-term results.

Trumanπs employee loyalty program of 1950

McCarran Internal Security Act 1950

Julius and Ethel Rosenberg

Joseph McCarthy and his special subcommittee. How did he exploit the mood of hysteria? what angers/fears did he appeal to? What tactics did he use?

Election of 1948: Candidates and issues. outcome

Chapter 30: The Affluent Society

What caused the low unemployment rate and GNP growth from 1945 to 1960?

Changes in the birth rate? Why? Effect on economy.

Suburban growth and affect on econ.

Economic growthπs effect on average American?

What factors caused the remarkable growth in the west?

How did the economic developments of the 1950s seem to confirm Keynesian economics?

How did Americans change the views on the ways that the country would have to end poverty?

Describe the drift toward consolidation in business and agriculture. What effects did it have?

What was the ≥post war contract≤? What was its intended purpose?

How did union membership fair in the 1950s?

AFL-CIO

Jimmy Hoffa

Limited gains of unorganized workers (problems in the South)

Ignore all Brinkleyπs jabber about antibiotics (man thatπs annoying), unless you like it; just be aware about mass production of penicillin after 1948

Vaccinations

Salk vaccine

Decrease in infant mortality; increase in lifespan

DDT

Invention of TV (and our minds have been rotting ever since) and transistors (donπt get bogged down in the detailsãBrinkley must find all this very interesting); set the stage for the computer

UNIVAC (election of 1952) and IBM

Hydrogen bomb: fusion not fission; missile research

ICBMπs

Minuteman

Polaris

Shock of Sputnik: impact on US

NASA

Apollo program

spaceshuttle

Increase in the middle class (size): what made it so powerful?

Oh my gosh! Is that a Hofstadter reference? I canπt believe it! Whatπs the consensus?

Increase in consumer credit

How was the prosperity of the 1950s and 1960s consumer driven?

Shift to the suburbs: reasons for leaving the city

William Levitt and new methods of home building: who bought these homes? What was the demand? Why did they move to the burbs? The appeals.

Racial components of suburbs; different types of suburbs

Prevailing gender roles reinforced

Spockπs Baby and Child Care

Contradictory pressures on women

Increase in women in the work force

Growth of tv; advertising, etc.

Social consequences of TV

TVπs homogenizing message

TV contribution to social conflict

Increase in vacationing

Increase in national park usage; what was the cause?

Significance of Echo Park; rebirth of the Sierra Club

White v. blue collar workers;

Growth of specialized education

National Defense Education Act 1958 (birthplace of the AP program)

The Organization Man and the Lonely Crowd

Saul Bellowπs The Adventures of Augie March and JD Salingerπs The Catcher in the Rye (great books by the way.)

The Beat movement: Ginsbergπs Howl and Kerouacπs On the Road (even more great lit. ahä)

Troubled youth culture (and things havenπt changed much since?) and James Dean (three good films mentioned)

Rock and roll: its influences. Elvis Presley

Rise of rock and the radio and disc jockeys

American bandstand and dick clark

What groups in America lay outside the prosperity of the 1950s?

The Other America

Did the economic expansion reduce poverty? Eliminate it? Give stats. ; what percentage of the poor were permanently poor? Which were the poorest groups?

Plight of farmers and declining farm prices; cotton in the south

Black urban migration; where did the whites go in the cities?

Mexican and Puerto Rican migration (west side story)

Different explanations for continued poverty in inner-city communities

Loss of blue collar jobs

Urban renewal: what was it good at?

Increased juvenile crime (makes me want to watch Westside Story.

Brown v. Board of Education; Supreme Courtπs reasoning.

How did people in the Deep South respond to Brown v. the Board of Ed.

Little Rock, Arkansas; sept 1957: What happened? What did Eisenhower do that was almost uncharacteristic of himself?

Rosa Parks and the Montgomery Bus Boycott: what were its successes?

Martin Luther King Jr.: his strategy of non-violence

Jackie Robinson

Civil Rights Act of 1957: What did it indicate?

Why did the Civil rights movement occur when it did?

General overview of Eisenhower as President

What type of people did he appoint to office, etc.

Eisenhowerπs general inclination; examples?

What was Eisenhowerπs attitude toward and response to the welfare state. (Soc. Sec, etc)

Federal Highway Act of 1956

Election of 1956

Army-McCarthy hearings and the downfall of McCarthyism

John Foster Dulles

Massive retaliation: what was it, and how was it economically pleasant?

Armistice in Korea: outcome

Ho Chi Minh: Why did he expect/hope for American help? Why did Americans rebuff him and support the French?

Who paid Franceπs bills for Vietnam?

Dien bien Phu

Geneva Accords July 1954

North v. south Vietnam

How did Ngo Dinh Diem fail to fulfill his end of the Geneva Accords? Did America condone his action?

What role did the US play in the creation of the modern state of Israel?

Why was the US committed to friendliness and stability in the Middle East? How was this approach implemented in Iran?

What led to the Suez Crisis of 1956? What position did the US take?

What led to increasing animosity toward the US on the part of many Latin Americans? What did the Guatemalan incident reveal about American intentions?

What led to Fidel Castroπs rise in Cuba? How did the US deal with his new regime?

What happened in Hungary in 1956? How did the US respond?

What happened in the U2 crisis of 1960? How did it dampen US/Soviet relations?