1950s DBQ – Outside Information
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Federal Highway Act of 1956
FHA & VA loans
“Bedroom Communities”
“Liberal Consensus”
Segregationist background of Social
Security exclusions
Rural black southerners migrate to
northern cities
“Cult of Domesticity”
Little Rock integration (Eisenhower
sends federal troops to Little Rock;
Governor Orval Faubus; Southern
reaction to integrated schools = close
many public schools)
Church bombing in Birmingham, Ala.
Ole Miss integration & James
Meredith
? Betty Friedan & Feminine Mystique
(1963)
? Rachel Carson & Silent Spring
(1962)
Industry & Labor Pacts
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McCarthyism & related details
Loyalty oaths
Rock & Roll
Beats & counterculture
Civil Rights Movement (Brown v
Board, Rosa Parks & Montgomery Bus
Boycott; NAACP; Jackie Robinson)
Thurgood Marshall & The Warren
(Supreme) Court
Company Man
Man in the Grey Flannel Suit
Nuclear family
Growth of national media
Hollywood Ten & blacklists
Growth of National consumer culture
National advertising; increased use of
psychology in advertising
John Kenneth Galbraith – “The
Affluent Society”
Sputnik & education spending
Urban decay and poverty
1950s DBQ Documents
Document A:
• Do more than JUST talk
about a few teachers being
fired/investigated
• Low-level analysis; this is a
typical symbol of
McCarthyism
• Shows restlessness &
fearfulness
• Fear = conformity/order
• Loss of political & social
freedom (no room for
messy dissent)
• Majority rule without
minority rights
Document B:
• Do more than just say what the
benefit was or who the new
beneficiaries are
• Indicator of the “liberal
consensus” around gov’t
means there was more political
unity, especially on the ideas of
economic security
• Expansion to previously
excluded groups shows a
growth in support for
economic security (could
describe the history of
exclusded groups in S.S. policy)
• Mostly still reinforcing the
status quo here
1950s DBQ Documents
Document C:
• Avoid lengthy restatement of exact
numbers from graphs;
• Better to talk more of the trends
(“steady suburbanization growth”;
“population of suburbs increases by
50%)
• City pop remains steady; but are
becoming more diverse (with
nonwhites, esp. blacks moving from
South)
• All the movement creates change &
disruption
• “White flight” = avoiding change ->
orderly suburbs
• Cities are more diverse and thus
inherently more disorderly (but this
disorder is increasing not declining) and
is a BIG part of America at this time as
well.
Document D:
• Poor interpretation: LOTS of
women going into work; Proof of
women’s equality; (NOT yet true)
• Economic & orderly: the reason
for many women to work is to
pursue MORE material wealth
• Proof of domestic order: these
working decisions are
discretionary – most women
could choose to work or not
because their basic household
wealth was good
• Cult of Domesticity hasn’t gone
away but is fading
• ANALYSIS DANGER: Feminine
Mystique (not yet); but this is a
great opportunity to suggest
hidden discontent and
FORESHADOW the seeds of
change
1950s DBQ Documents
Document E
• This one is tough. I might have
written comments but I didn’t hold
many mistakes against you on this
one b/c you may not know enough
about the show.
• National comedy show. Orderly in
that we’re all watching the SAME
stuff.
• CBS: National television network
• Is the rapid growth of TV showing
that life is so tranquil & orderly that
we need to escape?
• Pretty. Eventually subservient.
• Disorder: Lucy constantly seeking
personal celebrity and fulfillment;
undermines her husband often for
the sake of her own ambition
Document F
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Limited analysis: only identifying the civil
rights struggle or focusing merely on the Little
Rock Nine
Integration creates disorder!
White backlash against civil rights is
DISORDERLY (bombings, threats, harassment,
“unladylike” behavior here)
Blacks clamoring for change is embracing the
order & economic opportunity that whites
enjoyed (could be used to show support for
Halberstam); but their struggle creates
considerable disorder
This is a BIG social & political matter that
defines the era (contradicts economic
emphasis)
Eisenhower is enforcing order (respect for
rule of law & authority of courts) despite his
personal reluctance
OR… considering the intensity of white
resistance, ultimate compliance is evidence of
exactly how orderly Americans were
“White flight” & closing of southern public
schools creates chaos, but also shows a
desperate striving by white to keep the old
social order
1950s DBQ Documents
Document G
• Traditional family model in a
typical family activity
reinforced
• Emphasis on consumer culture
• Advertising increases and
promotes more consumerism
and conformity
• Typical American living room
• Television promoting
standardized cultural
entertainment (orderly)
• Isolates folks socially
(individual/household
entertainment vs. community
activity)
Document H
• BASIC ANALYSIS BUT GOOD:
Very regimented &
predictable (orderly)
• BASIC ANALYSIS BUT GOOD:
New, well furnished
(economic)
• Sameness of houses = more
sameness/conformity in
people’s lifestyles
• “Bedroom communities”
means segregation of genders
during the day (limits social
change) and even people’s
routines of living were
standardized
• Separates from politically &
socially active cities