1950

Joe McCarthy, the U.S. Senator, gains national attention and begins his anti-communist crusade with his Lincoln Day speech.

Richard Nixon is first elected to the United States Senate.

Studebaker, a popular car company, is beginning its financial downfall.

Television is becoming widespread (in black and white format) and becomes the most popular means of advertising.

North Korea, South Korea engage in warfare as North Korea attacks on June 25, beginning the Korean War.

Marilyn Monroe soars in popularity with five new movies including The Asphalt Jungle and All About Eve, and attempts suicide after death of lover Johnny Hyde. Monroe would later (1954) be married for a brief time to Joe DiMaggio (the rhyme in the previous verse).

1951

Ethel and Julius Rosenberg were convicted on March 29 for espionage. They maintained that they were innocent even at their executions.

H-Bomb is in the middle of its development as a nuclear weapon, announced in early 1950 and first tested in late

1952.

Sugar Ray Robinson, the boxer, obtains the world’s middleweight title.

Panmunjeom, the border village in Korea, is the location of truce talks between the parties of the Korean War.

Marlon Brando is nominated for the Academy Award for Best Actor for his role in A Streetcar Named Desire.

The King and I opens on Broadway on March 29.

The Catcher in the Rye, a controversial novel by J. D. Salinger, is published.

1952

Dwight D. Eisenhower is first elected as U.S. president, winning by a landslide margin of 442 to 89.

Vaccine for polio is privately tested by Jonas Salk.

Queen Elizabeth II (then Princess Elizabeth) succeeds to the throne of the United Kingdom and the Commonwealth Realms upon the death of George VI.

Rocky Marciano defeats Jersey Joe Walcott, becoming the world Heavyweight champion.

Liberace has a popular 1950s television show for his musical entertainment.

George Santayana Philosopher, essayist, poet, and novelist George Santayana, dies on September 26.

1953

Joseph Stalin dies on March 5, yielding his position as leader of the Soviet Union.

Georgy Maksimilianovich Malenkov succeeds Stalin for six months following his death.

Gamal Abdel Nasser acts as the true power behind the new Egyptian nation as Muhammad Naguib’s minister of the interior.

Sergei Prokofiev, the composer, dies on March 5, the same day as Stalin.

Winthrop Rockefeller establishes Winrock Enterprises and Winrock Farms atop Petit Jean Mountain near Morrilton, Arkansas.

Roy Campanella, an African American baseball catcher for the Brooklyn Dodgers, receives the National League’s Most Valuable Player award for the second time.

Communist bloc is a group of communist nations dominated by the Soviet Union at this time.

1954

Roy Cohn resigns as Joseph McCarthy’s chief counsel and enters private practice with the fall of McCarthy.

Juan Perón spends his last full year as President of Argentina before a September 1955 coup.

Arturo Toscanini is at the height of his fame as a conductor, performing regularly with the NBC Symphony Orchestra on national radio.

Dacron is an early artificial fiber made from the same plastic as polyester.

Battle of Dien Bien Phu. A village in North Vietnam falls to Viet Minh forces under Vo Nguyen Giap, leading to the creation of North Vietnam and South Vietnam as separate states.

“Rock Around the Clock” is a hit single released by Bill Haley & His Comets in May, spurring worldwide interest in rock and roll.

1955

Albert Einstein dies on April 18 at the age of 76.

James Dean achieves success with East of Eden and Rebel Without a Cause, gets nominated for an Academy Award for Best Actor, and dies in a car accident on September 30.

1955 World Series as the Brooklyn Dodgers win the World Series for the only time. (There is cheering in the background of the song during this line.)

Davy Crockett is a Disney television series about the legendary frontiersman of the same name.

Peter Pan is broadcast on TV live and in color from the 1954 version of the stage musical starring Mary Martin on March 7.

Elvis Presley signs with RCA Records on November 21, beginning his pop career.

Disneyland opens on July 17 as Walt Disney’s first theme park.

1956

Brigitte Bardot appears in her first mainstream film And God Created Woman and establishes an international reputation as a French “sex kitten”.

Budapest is the site of the 1956 Hungarian Revolution.

Alabama is the site of the Montgomery Bus Boycott which ultimately led to the removal of the last race laws in the USA.

Nikita Khrushchev makes his famous Secret Speech denouncing Stalin’s “cult of personality” on February 23.

Princess Grace Kelly releases her last film, High Society, and marries Prince Rainier III of Monaco.

Peyton Place, the best-selling novel by Grace Metalious, is published. Though mild compared to today’s prime time, it shocked the reserved values of the ’50s.

Suez Crisis The Suez Crisis boils as Egypt nationalizes the Suez Canal on October 29.

1957

Little Rock, Arkansas is the site of an anti-integration standoff, as Governor Orval Faubus stops the Little Rock Nine from attending Little Rock Central High School and President Eisenhower deploys the 101st Airborne Division to counteract him.

Boris Pasternak, the Russian author, publishes his famous novel Doctor Zhivago.

Mickey Mantle is in the middle of his career as a famous New York Yankees’ outfielder and American League All-Star for the sixth year in a row.

Jack Kerouac publishes his first novel in seven years, On the Road.

Sputnik is the first artificial satellite, launched by the Soviet Union on October 4, the start of the space race.

Zhou Enlai, Premier of the People’s Republic of China, survives an assassination attempt on the Charter jet Kashmir Princess.

The Bridge on the River Kwai is released as a film adaptation of the 1954 novel and receives seven Academy Awards.

1958

Lebanon is engulfed in a political and religious crisis.

Charles de Gaulle is elected first president of the French Fifth Republic following the Algerian Crisis.

California baseball begins as the Brooklyn Dodgers and New York Giants move to California and become the Los Angeles Dodgers and San Francisco Giants. They are the first major league teams west of Kansas City.

Charles Starkweather homicides capture the attention of Americans, killing eleven people before he is caught in a massive manhunt in Douglas, Wyoming.

Thalidomide: Mothers taking the drug Thalidomide had children born with congenital birth defects caused by the sleeping aid and antiemetic, which was also used at times (although not in the USA) to treat morning sickness.

1959

Buddy Holly dies in a plane crash on February 3 with Ritchie Valens and J. P. Richardson (“The Big Bopper”), in a day that had a devastating impact on the country and youth culture. The event was immortalized by Don McLean as “The Day the Music Died” in his famous tribute song American Pie. (As an intro to this stanza, Billy Joel mimics Buddy Holly’s trademark “hiccup” style, singing a-UH-uh-oh…).

Ben-Hur wins eleven Academy Awards as a film based around the New Testament starring Charlton Heston.

Monkeys in space: Able and Miss Baker are the first living beings to successfully return to Earth from space aboard the flight Jupiter AM-18.

Mafia are the center of attention for the FBI and public attention builds to this organized crime society with an historically Sicilian-American origin.

Hula hoops reach 100 million in sales as the latest toy fad.

Fidel Castro comes to power after a revolution in Cuba and visits the United States later that year on an unofficial twelve-day tour.

Edsel: Production of this car marketing disaster (Ford spent $400 million developing it) ends after only two years.