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Dwight D. Eisenhower
Eisenhower was the 34th President of the United States from 1953 until 1961. He was a five-star general in the United States Army during World War II and served as Supreme Commander of the Allied Forces in Europe. -
McCarthyism
The practice of making accusations of subversion or treason without proper regard for evidence. -
Jonas Salk
Jonas was an American medical researcher and virologist. He discovered and developed the first successful polio vaccine. -
John F. Kennedy
John was an American politician who served as the 35th President of the United States from January 1961 until his assassination in November 1963. -
Betty Friedan
Betty Friedan was an American writer, activist, and feminist. A leading figure in the women's movement in the United States. -
Roy Benavidez
Benavidez was a member of the United States Army Special Forces and retired United States Army master sergeant who received the Medal of Honor for his valorous actions -
Abbie Hoffman
Hoffman was an American political and social activist and anarchist who co-founded the Youth International Party. -
House Un- American Activities Committee
Created to investigate disloyalty and subversive organizations. -
G.I. Bill
A law passed in 1944 that provided educational and other benefits for people who had served in the armed forces in World War II. -
Containment Policy
The policy used numerous strategies to prevent the spread of communism abroad. -
Baby Boom Generation
are people born during the demographic post–World War II baby boom approximately between the years 1946 and 1964. -
Truman Doctrine
An American foreign policy created to counter Soviet geopolitical hegemony during the Cold War. -
Cold War
The Cold War was a state of political and military tension after World War II between powers in the Western Bloc and powers in the Eastern Bloc. -
Marshall Plan
Was an American initiative to aid Western Europe, in which the United States gave $13 billion in economic support to help rebuild Western European economies -
Berlin Airlift
At the end of the Second World War, U.S., British, and Soviet military forces divided and occupied Germany. Also divided into occupation zones, Berlin was located far inside Soviet-controlled eastern Germany -
North Atlantic Treaty Organization (NATO)
also called the North Atlantic Alliance, is an intergovernmental military alliance based on the North Atlantic Treaty which was signed on 4 April 1949. -
Beatniks
a media stereotype propular throughout the 1950s to mid-1960s that displayed the more superficial aspects of the Beat Generation literary movement of the 1950s. -
Domino Theory
Was a theory prominent from the 1950s to the 1980s, that speculated that if one country in a region came under the influence of communism, then the surrounding countries would follow in a domino effect. -
1950's Prosperity
With World War II military production largely ending the Depression, the U.S. entered the 1950s with the highest standard of living in the world. The G.I. Bill, which provided housing, education and monetary benefits to veterans, was a prominent factor in this economic growth -
Rock n' Roll
A genre of popular music that originated and evolved in the United States during the late 1940s and early 1950s, from a combination of African-American genres such as blues, boogie-woogie, jump blues, jazz, and gospel music, together with Western swing and country music. -
1950's Culture
During the 1950s, a sense of uniformity pervaded American society. Conformity was common, as young and old alike followed group norms rather than striking out on their own. Though men and women had been forced into new employment patterns during World War II, once the war was over, traditional roles were reaffirmed. Men expected to be the breadwinners; women, even when they worked, assumed their proper place was at home. -
Korean War
The Korean War was a war between North and South Korea, in which a United Nations force led by the United States fought for the South, and China fought for the North, which was also assisted by the Soviet Union. -
Rosenberg Trial
Trial over the espionage prosecution of the couple accused of selling nuclear secrets to the Russians -
Ray Kroc
Ray was an American businessman and philanthropist. He joined McDonald's in 1954 and built it into the most successful fast food operation in the world. -
Vietnam War
Also known as the Second Indochina War, and known in Vietnam as Resistance War Against America or the American War, was a Cold War-era proxy war that occurred in Vietnam. -
Interstate Highway Act
Was the authorization of US$100,000 for the construction of 41,000 miles (66,000 km) of the Interstate Highway System supposedly over a 10-year period, it was the largest public works project in American history through that time. -
Space Race
was a 20th-century competition between two Cold War rivals, the Soviet Union (USSR) and the United States (US), for supremacy in spaceflight capability. -
1960s culture
The most memorable thing about the 60s was the counterculture and revolution in social norms about clothing, music, drugs, dress, sexuality, formalities, and schooling; and in others pejoratively to denounce the decade as one of irresponsible excess, flamboyance, and decay of social order. -
Cuban Missile Crisis
Was a 13-day confrontation between the United States and the Soviet Union concerning Soviet ballistic missiles deployment in Cuba. -
Lydon B. Johnson
often referred to as LBJ, was the 36th President of the United States from 1963 to 1969, assuming the office after serving as the 37th Vice President of the United States under President John F. Kennedy, from 1961 to 1963. -
Anti- War Movement
This was a social movement, usually in opposition to a particular nation's decision to start or carry on an armed conflict, unconditional of a maybe-existing just cause. The term can also refer to pacifism, which is the opposition to all use of military force during conflicts. -
Great Society
Was a set of domestic programs in the United States launched by Democratic President Lyndon B. Johnson. -
Gulf of Tonkin Resolution
This authorized President Johnson to take any measures he believed were necessary to retaliate and to promote the maintenance of international peace and security in southeast Asia. -
Miranda vs. Arizona
This had a significant impact on law enforcement in the United States, by making what became known as the Miranda rights part of routine police procedure to ensure that suspects were informed of their rights. -
Tet Offensive
Was one of the largest military campaigns of the Vietnam War, launched on January 30, 1968, by forces of the Viet Cong and North Vietnamese People's Army of Vietnam. -
Richard Nixon
Nixon was the 37th President of the United States, serving from 1969 to 1974 when he became the only U.S. president to resign the office -
Veitnamization
This was a policy of the Richard Nixon administration to end U.S. involvement in the Vietnam War through a program to "expand, equip, and train South Vietnam's forces and assign to them an ever-increasing combat role, at the same time steadily reducing the number of U.S. combat troops." -
1970s Culture
The hippie culture, which started in the latter half of the 1960s, waned by the early 1970s and faded towards the middle part of the decade, which involved opposition to the Vietnam War, opposition to nuclear weapons, the advocacy of world peace, and hostility to the authority of government and big business. -
26th Amendment
This changed a portion of the 14th Amendment. Section 1. The right of citizens of the United States, who are eighteen years of age or older, to vote shall not be denied or abridged by the United States or by any State on account of age. -
Bay of Pigs
Was a failed military invasion of Cuba undertaken by the CIA-sponsored paramilitary group Brigade 2506. -
War Powers Act
Was a federal law intended to check the president's power to commit the United States to an armed conflict without the consent of the U.S. Congress. -
1980s Culture
In some respects, the popular culture of the 1980s reflected the era’s political conservatism. For many people, the symbol of the decade was the “yuppie”: a baby boomer with a college education, a well-paying job and expensive taste. -
Rust Belt and Sun Belt
The Rust Belt is a term for the region straddling the upper Northeastern United States, the Great Lakes, and the Midwest States, referring to economic decline, population loss, and urban decay due to the shrinking of its once powerful industrial sector. The Sun Belt is a region of the United States generally considered to stretch across the Southeast and Southwest (the geographic southern United States). -
Iron Curtain
The notional barrier separating the former Soviet bloc and the West prior to the decline of communism that followed the political events in eastern Europe in 1989.
