History of the United States since 1944

Background to the 1940s WWI - Treaty of Versailles Roaring 20’s / European depression ’29 stock market fall 1933 Roosevelt wins on “good neighbor” plan

U.S. withdraws from Nicaragua Hitler given extraordinary powers

1937 Axis treaty: Germany, Japan, Italy 1940 U.S. and Latin American nations treaties

Hitler moves all directions at war U.S. begins giving aid to allies

1940s 41 Roosevelt & Churchill – Atlantic charter

Four Freedoms Attack on Hawaii

42 Japan and Germany stopped War pulls Americans together

43 War production peaks Big Companies American Blacks – 200 month becoming officers

44 National elections D-Day Return to Philippines IMF/ World Bank

End of the War 45 Yalta

Atomic bomb 46 Churchill calls Soviet Union – Iron Curtain 47 Truman doctrine

Marshall plan for recovery of Europe First jet airplanes

48 Elections Truman recognizes Israel

49 Post-war prosperity NATO UN Much more verbal minorities; beginning of modern civil

rights movement

Beginning of the 50’s

1950 Korean war begins Soviet Union explodes atomic bomb

1952 Eisenhower becomes President Interstate highway system Balanced economy Television becomes popular

1954 McCarthy hearings Ed Sullivan show begins Ballad of Davy Crockett Brown v Board of Ed

Late 1950s Kerouac – on the road Rosa Parks – civil rights Presley – black soul/ adapted to rock & roll Pollack – beginnings of modernism: no fixed

meaning, interpretation is all Riseman – the lonely crowd Big business leads to social uniformity MLK “To resist without bitterness; to be cursed and not reply; to be beaten and not hit back.” 1959 – sit ins

The 1960s and the Great Society 1961-63 – height of civil unrest; forced change ’62 - Engel v. Vitale prayer in schools Civil rights ’63 – Voting rights ’64 Black Panthers (Newton; Cleaver) Watts ’65 – Detroit ’67 ’65 – Kent State; Vatican II ’66 – Mao, Che Guevara, Ho Chi Minh Timothy Leary, Bob Dylan, the Beattles ’68 – Tet, King, Kennedy ’69 – Woodstock, Vietnam, Apollo 11 ’69 – Chavez, Friedan, NOW

1970s Nixon doctrine – shift responsibilities to other nations Limits of technology Limits of radical change ‘70 – Earth Day; OSHA ’72 – Head Start; Watergate ’74 – Ford replaces Nixon ’74 – oil shortage; limits of “friendships” ’75 – inflation and recession ’76 – Carter election ’77 – malls and mass culture ’78 – Camp David Accords ’79 – recognition of China; Moral Majority; John Paul II

1980s FACTS about this decade. 

Population: 226,546,000 National Debt: 1980 - $914,000,000,000 National Debt: 1986 - $2,000,000,000,000 Average salary: $15,757 Life Expectancy: Male 69.9  Female 77.6 Minimum Wage:  $3.10 Charity: 1989 - $115,000,000,000

Donald Trump; Ronald Reagan; Sandra Day O’Conor; Geraldine Ferraro; Jesse Jackson; Medicare 1980; Tom Clancy; Stephen King; Carl Sagen; Bill Cosby; Cable TV; MTV; CNN; genetic engineering; Colin Powell; Berlin Wall