The Way It Really Was

The decade of the Fifties gave birth to Rock and Roll. When Bill Haley's Rock Around The Clock became popular in 1952, the nation learned to swing to a whole new sound. But, Rock wasn't the only music of the Fifties. (Rewind the fifties jukebox) Other artists with other songs had folks humming' for much of the decade. Pat Boone, Perry Como and Patti Page - just to mention the "Ps". (Fifties Web) The feel-good innocence of a lot of the Fifties music reflects on the post World War II optimism in America. The young people of the time, an emerging force called teenagers, hadn't struggled through the war years. They were looking for something more exciting. They discovered that vitality in Rock and Roll. During the Fifties both styles of music co-existed quite nicely. Some of the music you associate with the Fifties was actually recorded in the Sixties.

Works by well-known dramatists still held audiences and won new admirers. Tennessee Williams' A Streetcar Named Desire, and Arthur Miller's Death of a Salesman were written in the 40's but were still very popular in the 50's. Eugene O'Neill finished Long Day's Journey into Night in 1952. Williams wrote Cat on a Hot Tin Roof and Baby Doll. Musicals were very well received. Richard Rodgers, Oscar Hammerstein II, and Joshua Logan won acclaim with South Pacific in 1952. One of the most emotionally charged plays of 1952 was The Diary of Anne Frank. Dance underwent change during this period. Martha Graham's work influenced dancers worldwide. In 1952, Alvin Ailey created the American Dance Theatre, which featured all-black casts, and dance styles that were culturally based and truly American in style. (1950's Theater-Type Standing Ashtray-Arrows) Radio's influence was still very great as is seen in the rapid growth of Rock and Roll . Music of Perry Como, Rosemary Clooney, Nat King Cole among others was listened to by people carrying small transistor radios. Music could be heard in any location because it was now portable.

Pollock. There was a fresh artistic outlook after World War II ended and the artistic world reflected this outlook. Abstract expressionism like Jackson Pollock, Barnett Newman, Willem de Kooning , Clyfford Still and Franz Klinereceived official recognition at the New York Museum of Modern Art . These artists, referred to as the New York School, were generally experimental. (Works of Art) Other abstract artists rebelled against the self-absorption of the New York School and delved into existentialism. Mark Rothko used large-scale color blocks to create an overpowering material presence. Painters like Robert Rauschenberg and Jasper Johns, also abstract artists, did not want the viewer to rely on what he saw to interpret a painting. Part of 1952 boom in consumerism-included housing. People could afford single-family dwellings and suburbia was born. A small suburban community called Levittown was built by William Levitt for returning servicemen and their families. An influence of Frank Lloyd Wright is seen in the popular Ranch style house. Designers like Bauhaus , who helped create the International style, influenced Ludwig Mies van der Rohe, Philip Johnson, Charles and Ray Eames and Eero Saarinen . Louis Kahn, architect of the Salk Institute, was a noted architect during this period.

America had just begun her recovery from World War II, when suddenly the Korean Conflict developed. The USSR became a major enemy in the Cold War. Senator Joseph McCarthy claimed to know that Communists had infiltrated the United States government at the highest levels. Americans were feeling a sense of national anxiety. Was America the greatest country in the world? Was life in America the best it had ever been? As the decade passed, literature reflected the conflict of self-satisfaction with 50's Happy Days and cultural self-doubt about conformity and the true worth of American values. Authors like Norman Vincent Peale, The Power of Positive Thinking, or Bishop Fulton J. Sheen -Life is Worth Living, indicate power of the individual to control his or her fate. The concern with conformity is reflected in David Riesman's The Lonely Crowd, John Kenneth Galbraith -The Affluent Society,William H. Whyte's The Organization Man, Ayn Rand - Atlas Shrugged, and Sloan Wilson's The Man in the Gray Flannel Suit. A new group of authors appeared on the scene in the form of the Beats, or the beat generation or some called them beatniks. (Fifties Web) Best known of these are Jack Kerouac - Kerouac's works - On the Road, Dharma Bums, The Town and The City, Mexico City Blues(Poetry), Lawrence Ferlinghetti A Coney Island of the Mind, Pictures of a Gone World, and Allen Ginsberg Howl . Gregory Corso, Neal Cassady, Michael McClure, Gary Snyder, William S. Burroughs were other beat authors giving voice to the anti-establishment movement. (1950's: Movies,