The 1950s were a decade marked by the post-World War II boom, the dawn of the Cold War and the Civil Rights Movement in the United States. “America at this moment,” said the former British Prime Minister Winston Churchill in 1945, “stands at the summit of the world.”
During the 1950s, it was easy to see what Churchill meant. The United States was the world’s strongest military power. Its economy was booming, and the fruits of this prosperity–new cars, suburban houses and other consumer goods–were available to more people than ever before.
However, the 1950s were also an era of great conflict. For example, the nascent civil rights movement and the crusade against communism at home and abroad in the Korean War exposed underlying divisions in American society.
These Kodachrome slides were found by Thomas Hawk that show what life of the U.S. looked like during the 1950s.
| Handwritten on slide, “Hotel El Rancho, Sacramento, California, June 23, 1950" |
| Handwritten on slide, "December 1951" |
| Handwritten on slide, "June 1951" |
| Handwritten on slide, "Cloudcrott, New Mexico, August 1953" |
| Handwritten on slide, "Jean, Carol, Margaret, Jo, Sandy, Cloudcroft, New Mexico, 1953" |
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