Unit 8: The Modern State and the Age of Liberalism, 1945-1980
Chapter 26: Triumph of the Middle Class, 1945-1963
Guiding Questions and Identifications
1. What factors contribute to the rise of a middle class consumer society? What pressures might
middle class consumers feel during the 1950s?
2. President Eisenhower famously warned of the effects of the growing “military-industrial complex”
in his farewell speech. What is this concept and why was it vital to this period of unmatched
economic growth in America? What are the effects that Eisenhower warns about? Are they still a
concern to America more than 60 years later?
3. Explain the aspects of the contradictions in American society to conform to the various ideals, such
as domesticity and consumerism, while other ideas about sex, homosexuality, teen culture, women
in the workforce, etc. become more common.
4. How did the process of suburbanization affect various classes of American society, both positively
and negatively? What two main factors spurred this move to newly-built homes outside of urban
centers?
Identifications:
26.1 Postwar Prosperity and the Affluent Society
kitchen debate
Bretton Woods
World Bank
International Monetary Fund
Dwight D. Eisenhower
military-industrial complex
Sputnik
National Defense Education Act
The Affluent Society
The Other America
Veterans Administration
collective bargaining
teenager
Beats (not the over-priced headphones, you product of the modern consumer society)
Miles Davis
Allen Ginsberg
Jack Kerouac
Billy Graham
26.2 The American Family in the Era of Containment
baby boom
Dr. Benjamin Spock
26.3 A Suburban Nation
Shelley v. Kraemer
Two factors spurring the move to the suburbs
National Interstate and Defense Highways Act
William J. Leavitt
Sunbelt
Kerner Commission