1950s

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The 1950s (pronounced nineteen-fifties; commonly abbreviated as the "Fifties" or the "'50s") (among other variants) was a decade that began on January 1, 1950, and ended on December 31, 1959.

Throughout the decade, the world continued its recovery from World War II, aided by the post-World War II economic expansion. The period also saw great population growth with increased birth rates and the emergence of the baby boomer generation. Despite this recovery, the Cold War developed from its modest beginnings in the late 1940s to a heated competition between the Soviet Union and the United States by the early 1960s. The ideological clash between communism and capitalism dominated the decade, especially in the Northern Hemisphere.

In the United States, a wave of anti-communist sentiment known as the Second Red Scare aka McCarthyism resulted in Congressional hearings by both houses in Congress. In the Soviet Union, the death of Joseph Stalin would lead to a political campaign and reforms known as "de-Stalinization" initiated by Nikita Khrushchev leading to the deterioration between the relationship of the Soviet Union and China in the 1950s.

The beginning of the Cold War led to the beginning of the Space Race with the launch of Sputnik 1 in 1957; the United States would create NASA in response in 1958. Along with increased testing of nuclear weapons (such as RDS-37 and Upshot–Knothole) called the arms race, the tense geopolitical situation created a politically conservative climate.

The beginning of decolonization in Africa and Asia also took place in this decade and accelerated in the following decade albeit would lead to several conflicts throughout the decade and so on. Wars include the First Indochina War, Malayan Emergency, Korean War, the Algerian War, the First Sudanese Civil War, the Vietnam War, the Cuban Revolution, and the Suez Crisis. Coups include the Egyptian Revolution, the Iranian coup d'état, the Guatemalan coup d'état, the 14 July Revolution in Iraq, and the Pakistani coup d'état in 1958.

Television became a common innovation in American homes during the 1950s culminating in the Golden Age of TV. This led many to purchase more products and upgrade whatever they currently had resulting in mass consumerism. While outside of America, it would take a few decades for TV to become commonplace in other countries.

The 1950s saw a turning point for polio with the successful discovery of the polio vaccine. Following the widespread use of poliovirus vaccine in the mid-1950s, the incidence of poliomyelitis declined rapidly in many industrialized countries while it would gradually decline for the next few decades in developing countries reducing the number of death rates from this disease.

During the 1950s, the world population increased from 2.5 to 3.0 billion, with approximately 1 billion births and 500 million deaths.

• Cold War conflicts involving the influence of the rival superpowers of the Soviet Union and the United States.
  • Korean War (1950–1953) – The war, which lasted from June 25, 1950, until the signing of the Korean Armistice Agreement on July 27, 1953, started as a civil war between North Korea and the Republic of Korea (South Korea). When it began, North and South Korea existed as provisional governments competing for control over the Korean peninsula, due to the division of Korea by outside powers. While originally a civil war, it quickly escalated into a war between the Western powers under the United Nations Command led by the United States and its allies and the communist powers of the People's Republic of China and the Soviet Union.
    On September 15, General Douglas MacArthur conducted Operation Chromite, an amphibious landing at the city of Inchon (Song Do port). The North Korean army collapsed, and within a few days, MacArthur's army retook Seoul (South Korea's capital). He then pushed north, capturing Pyongyang in October. Chinese intervention the following month drove UN forces south again. MacArthur then planned for a full-scale invasion of China, but this was against the wishes of President Truman and others who wanted a limited war. He was dismissed and replaced by General Matthew Ridgway. The war then became a bloody stalemate for the next two and a half years while peace negotiations dragged on.
    The war left 33,742 American soldiers dead, 92,134 wounded, and 80,000 missing in action (MIA) or prisoner of war (POW). Estimates place Korean and Chinese casualties at 1,000,000–1,400,000 dead or wounded, and 140,000 MIA or POW.
  • First Indochina War (1946–1954).
  • The Vietnam War began in 1955. Diệm instituted a policy of death penalty against any communist activity in 1956. The Viet Minh began an assassination campaign in early 1957. An article by French scholar Bernard Fall published in July 1958 concluded that a new war had begun. The first official large unit military action was on September 26, 1959, when the Viet Cong ambushed two ARVN companies.^[1]
• Arab–Israeli conflict (from the early 20th century)

• Suez Crisis (1956) – The Suez Crisis was a war fought on Egyptian territory in 1956. Following the nationalisation of the Suez Canal in 1956 by Gamal Abdel Nasser, the United Kingdom, France and Israel subsequently invaded. The operation was a military success, but after the United States and Soviet Union united in opposition to the invasion, the invaders were forced to withdraw. This was seen as a major humiliation, especially for the two Western European countries, and symbolizes the beginning of the end of colonialism and the weakening of European global importance, specifically the collapse of the British Empire.
• Algerian War (1954–1962) – An important decolonization war, it was a complex conflict characterized by guerrilla warfare, maquis fighting, terrorism against civilians, use of torture on both sides and counter-terrorism operations by the French Army. The war eventually led to the independence of Algeria from France.

• Malayan Emergency (1948–1960) – a guerrilla war in British Malaya that led to the independence of the Federation of Malaya.
• Cuban Revolution (1953–1959) – The 1959 overthrow of Fulgencio Batista by Fidel Castro, Che Guevara, and other forces resulted in the creation of the first communist government in the Western hemisphere.
• The Mau Mau began retaliating against the British in Kenya. This led to concentration camps in Kenya, a British military victory, and the election of moderate nationalist Jomo Kenyatta as leader of Kenya.
• First Sudanese Civil War (1955–1972)
• The Wind of Destruction began in Rwanda in 1959 following the assault of Hutu politician Dominique Mbonyumutwa by Tutsi forces. This was the beginning of decades of ethnic violence in the country, which culminated in the 1994 Rwandan genocide.
• Hungarian Revolution of 1956 – A massive, spontaneous popular uprising in the Soviet satellite state of Hungary against that country's Soviet-backed Marxist-Leninist regime, inspired by political changes in Poland and the Soviet Union. The uprising, fought primarily by students and workers, managed to fight the invading Soviet Army to a standstill, and a new, pro-reform government took power. While the top Soviet leaders even considered withdrawing from Hungary entirely, they soon crushed the Revolution with a massive second invasion, killing thousands of Hungarians and sending hundreds of thousands more into exile. This was the largest act of internal dissent in the history of the Soviet Bloc, and its violent suppression served to further discredit the Soviet Union even among its erstwhile supporters.
• 1951 Nepalese revolution – The overthrow of the autocratic Rana regime in Nepal and the establishment of democracy in Nepal.

Prominent coups d'état of the decade included:

• 1952 Egyptian Revolution: A group of army officers led by Mohammed Naguib and Gamal Abdel Nasser overthrew King Farouk and the Muhammad Ali Dynasty in July 1952.
• On March 10, 1952, Fulgencio Batista led a bloodless coup to topple the democratically elected government in Cuba.
• 1953 Iranian coup d'état: In August 1953, a coup jointly led by the United States and United Kingdom and codenamed Operation Ajax, overthrew Prime Minister Mohammed Mosaddeq.
• 1953 Pakistani constitutional coup: Governor-General Ghulam Mohammad, supported by Field Marshal Ayub Khan, dismissed the prime minister and dissolved the Constituent Assembly.
• 1954 Guatemalan coup d'état: The democratically elected government of Colonel Jacobo Arbenz Guzmán was ousted by Colonel Carlos Castillo Armas in an operation organized by the American Central Intelligence Agency.
• The 1954 Paraguayan coup brings Alfredo Stroessner to power.
• 14 July Revolution in Iraq: The Hashemite monarchy was overthrown and the Iraqi Republic was established, with Abd al-Karim Qasim as Prime Minister.
• May 1958 crisis in France: General Jacques Massu took over Algiers and threatened to invade Paris unless Charles de Gaulle became head of state.
• The 1958 Pakistani coup d'état: The first President of Pakistan Iskander Mirza abrogated the Constitution of Pakistan and declared martial law, and lasted until October 27, when Mirza himself was deposed by General Ayub Khan.

• Decolonization of former European colonial empires. The French Fourth Republic in particular faced conflict on two fronts within the French Union, the Algerian War and the First Indochina War. The Federation of Malaya peacefully gained independence from the United Kingdom in 1957. French rule ended in Algeria in 1958, Vietnam left French Indochina in 1954. The rival states of North Vietnam and South Vietnam were formed. Cambodia and the Kingdom of Laos also gained independence, effectively ending French presence in Southeast Asia. Elsewhere, the Belgian Congo and other African nations gained their independence from France, Belgium, and the United Kingdom.
• Large-scale decolonization in Africa first began in the 1950s. In 1951, Libya became the first African country to gain independence in the decade, and in 1954 the Algerian War began. 1956 saw Sudan, Morocco, and Tunisia become independent, and the next year Ghana became the first sub-saharan African nation to gain independence.

• European Common Market – The European Communities (or Common Markets), the precursor of the European Union, was established with the Treaty of Rome in 1957.
• On November 1, 1950, two Puerto Rican nationalists staged an attempted assassination on U.S. President Harry S. Truman. The leader of the team Griselio Torresola had firearm experience and Oscar Collazo was his accomplice. They made their assault at the Blair House where President Truman and his family were staying. Torresola mortally wounded a White House policeman, Leslie Coffelt, who shot Torresola dead before expiring himself. Collazo, as a co-conspirator in a felony that turned into a homicide, was found guilty of murder and was sentenced to death in 1952 but then his sentence was later commuted to life in prison.
• On July 7, 1950, the first Group Areas Act was promulgated by the Parliament of South Africa and implemented over a period of several years. The passing of the Act contributed significantly to the period of institutionalised racial segregation and discrimination in South Africa known as Apartheid, which lasted from 1948 to 1991. One of the most famous uses of the Group Areas Act was the destruction of Sophiatown, a suburb of Johannesburg, which began on 9 February 1955.
• Establishment of the Non-Aligned Movement, through the Bandung Conference of 1955, consisting of nations not formally aligned with or against any major power bloc.

• The U.S. ended its occupation of Japan, which became fully independent. Japan held democratic elections and recovered economically.
• Within a year of its establishment, the People's Republic of China had reclaimed Tibet and intervened in the Korean War, causing years of hostility and estrangement from the United States. Mao admired Stalin and rejected the changes in Moscow after Stalin's death in 1953, leading to growing tension with the Soviet Union.
• In 1950–1953, France tried to contain a growing communist insurgency led by Ho Chi Minh. After their defeat in the Battle of Dien Bien Phu in 1954 France granted independence to the nations of Cambodia, Laos, and Vietnam. At the Geneva Conference of 1954 France and the Communists agreed to divide Vietnam and hold elections in 1956. The U.S. and South Vietnam rejected the Geneva accords and the division became permanent.
• The Chinese Civil War, which had started officially in 1927 and continued until the Second World War had ended on May 7, 1950. It resulted in the previous incumbent government in China, the Republic of China, retreating to the islands of Taiwan and Hainan until the Landing Operation on Hainan Island.

• Africa experienced the beginning of large-scale top-down economic interventions in the 1950s that failed to cause improvement and led to charitable exhaustion by the West as the century went on. The widespread corruption was not dealt with and war, disease, and famine continued to be constant problems in the region.
• Egyptian general Gamel Abdel Nasser overthrew the Egyptian monarchy, establishing himself as President of Egypt. Nasser became an influential leader in the Middle East in the 1950s, leading Arab states into war with Israel, becoming a major leader of the Non-Aligned Movement and promoting pan-Arab unification.
• In 1957, Dr. Kwame Nkrumah, after a series of negotiations with the then British empire, secured the independence of Ghana. Ghana was hitherto referred to as Gold Coast, a colony of the British Empire.

• In 1950, Greenland (27 May) became a Colony of the Kingdom of Denmark. North Greenland and South Greenland were united with one governor.^[2]
• In 1953, Greenland (5 June) was made an equal and integral part of Denmark as an amt.
• In 1954, the CIA orchestrated the overthrow of the Guatemalan government of Jacobo Arbenz and installed Carlos Castillo Armas.
• In 1956, the Montgomery bus boycott occurred against the policy of racial segregation on the public transit system of Montgomery, Alabama, US. It was a foundational event in the civil rights movement, sparked by activist Rosa Parks, and officially ended when the federal ruling Browder v. Gayle took effect and led to a Supreme Court decision that declared the Alabama laws that segregated buses were unconstitutional.^[3]
• In 1957, Dr. François Duvalier came to power in an election in Haiti. He later declared himself president for life, and ruled until his death in 1971.
• In 1958, the military dictatorship of Venezuela was overthrown.
• In 1959, Alaska (3 January) and Hawaii (21 August) became the 49th and 50th states respectively of the United States.
• In 1959, Fidel Castro overthrew the regime of Fulgencio Batista in Cuba, establishing a communist government in the country. Although Castro initially sought aid from the US, he was rebuffed and later turned to the Soviet Union.
• NORAD signed in 1959 by Canada and the United States creating a unified North American air defense system.
• Brasília was built in 41 months, from 1956, and on April 21, 1960, became the capital of Brazil

• With the help of the Marshall Plan, post-war reconstruction succeeded, with some countries (including West Germany) adopting free market capitalism while others adopted Keynesian-policy welfare states. Europe continued to be divided into Western and Soviet bloc countries. The geographical point of this division came to be called the Iron Curtain.
• Because previous attempts for a unified state failed, Germany remained divided into two states: the capitalist Federal Republic of Germany in the west and the socialist German Democratic Republic in the east. The Federal Republic identified itself as the legal successor to the fascist dictatorship and was obliged in paying war reparations. The GDR, however, denounced the fascist past completely and did not recognize itself as responsible for paying reparations on behalf of the Nazi regime. The GDR's more harsh attitude in suppressing anti-communist and Russophobic sentiment lingering in the post-Nazi society resulted in increased emigration to the west.
• While the United States military maintained its bases in western Europe, the Soviet Union maintained its bases in the east. In 1953, Joseph Stalin, the leader of the Soviet Union, died. This led to the rise of Nikita Khrushchev, who denounced Stalin and pursued a more liberal domestic and foreign policy, stressing peaceful competition with the West rather than overt hostility. There were anti-Stalinist uprisings in East Germany and Poland in 1953 and Hungary in 1956.
• The Coronation of Elizabeth II took place on June 2, 1953, months after the death of her father King George VI. Elizabeth II was crowned Queen of the United Kingdom and other Commonwealth realms at Westminster Abbey in London in a first ever televised broadcast.

Natural:

• On August 15, 1950, the 8.6 M_w Assam–Tibet earthquake shakes the region with a maximum Mercalli intensity of XI (Extreme), killing between 1,500 and 3,300 people.
• On January 18, 1951, Mount Lamington erupted in Papua New Guinea, killing 3,000 people.
• On January 31, 1953, the North Sea flood of 1953 killed 1,835 people in the southwestern Netherlands (especially Zeeland) and 307 in the United Kingdom^[4]
• On September 9, 1954, the 6.7 M_w Chlef earthquake shakes northern Algeria with a maximum Mercalli intensity of XI (Extreme). The shock destroyed Orléansville, left 1,243–1,409 dead, and 5,000 injured.
• On October 11, 1954, Hurricane Hazel crossed over Haiti, killing 1,000.
• On August 19, 1955, Hurricane Diane hit the northeastern United States, killing over 200 people, and causing over $1.0 billion in damage.
• On June 27, 1957, Hurricane Audrey demolished Cameron, Louisiana, US, killing 400 people.
• In April 1959, the Río Negro flooded central Uruguay.
• Typhoon Vera hit central Honshū on September 26, 1959, killing an estimated 5,098, injuring another 38,921, and leaving 1,533,000 homeless. Most of the damage was centered in the Nagoya area.
• On December 2, 1959, Malpasset Dam in southern France collapsed and water flowed over the town of Fréjus, killing 412.

Non-natural:

• On March 12, 1950, an Avro Tudor plane carrying a rugby team crashed in Wales, killing 80 people.
• In early December 1952, the Great Smog of London caused major disruption by reducing visibility and even penetrating indoor areas, far more severely than previous smog events, called "pea-soupers". Government medical reports in the weeks following the event estimated that up to 4,000 people had died as a direct result of the smog and 100,000 more were made ill by the smog's effects on the human respiratory tract.
• On June 18, 1953, a USAF Douglas C-124 Globemaster II crashed after takeoff from Tachikawa, Japan, killing all 129 on board.
• On January 10, 1954, BOAC Flight 781, a new de Havilland Comet jetliner, disintegrated in mid-air due to structural failure and crashed off the Italian coast, killing all 35 on board.
• On June 30, 1956, a United Airlines Douglas DC-7 and a Trans World Airlines Lockheed L-1049 Super Constellation collided above the Grand Canyon in Arizona, killing all 128 people on board both aircraft.
• On July 25, 1956, the Italian ocean liner SS Andrea Doria collided with the Swedish ocean liner MS Stockholm off the Nantucket, Massachusetts, coastline. 51 people were killed and the Andrea Doria sank the next morning.
• On February 6, 1958, in an incident known as the Munich air disaster, British European Airways Flight 609 crashed on its third attempt to take off from a slush-covered runway at Munich-Riem Airport in Munich, West Germany. 23 people on board were killed (including 8 players of the Manchester United F.C. soccer team).
• On April 21, 1958, a mid-air collision between United Airlines Flight 736 and a USAF fighter jet killed 49 people.
• On August 14, 1958, a KLM Lockheed Constellation crashed into the Atlantic Ocean off the coast of Ireland, killing all 99 people aboard.

• The United States was the most influential economic power in the world after World War II under the presidency of Dwight D. Eisenhower.

In the 1950s, the median age of newlyweds declined to its lowest point, a level not seen since.^[5] By 1954, nearly half of American brides were teenagers, often marrying men just a few years older. These brides sought husbands who were stable providers. A strong economy and low unemployment rates supported widespread prosperity, expanding the middle class and making affordable housing accessible. This economic environment enabled young couples to marry early, granting teenage brides notable purchasing power that marketers actively targeted.^[6]

During this period, a gap in educational attainment emerged, with college degrees yielding higher earning potential than high school diplomas.^[7] Given prevailing cultural norms, more men pursued higher education while their wives contributed financially by entering the workforce. Recognizing this support, some schools even awarded the “PhT” (Putting Husband Through) diploma to acknowledge wives who helped their husbands complete their degrees.^[8]

Credit cards gained widespread popularity in the 1950s starting with the Diners Club Card in New York and soon after expanded to multiple countries.^[9]

Inflation was moderate during the decade of the 1950s. The first few months had a deflationary hangover from the 1940s but the first full year ended with what looked like the beginnings of massive inflation with annual inflation rates ranging from 8% to 9% a year. By 1952 inflation subsided. 1954 and 1955 flirted with deflation again but the remainder of the decade had moderate inflation ranging from 1% to 3.7%. The average annual inflation for the entire decade was only 2.04%.^[10]

Prominent assassinations, targeted killings, and assassination attempts include:

The recently invented bipolar transistor, though initially quite feeble, had clear potential and was rapidly improved and developed at the beginning of the 1950s by companies such as GE, RCA, and Philco. The first commercial transistor production started at the Western Electric plant in Allentown, Pennsylvania, in October, 1951 with the point contact germanium transistor. It was not until around 1954 that transistor products began to achieve real commercial success with small portable radios.

A breakthrough in semiconductor technology came with the invention of the MOSFET (metal–oxide–semiconductor field-effect transistor), also known as the MOS transistor, by Mohamed Atalla and Dawon Kahng at Bell Labs,^[11] in November 1959.^[12] It revolutionized the electronics industry,^[13] and became the fundamental building block of the Digital Revolution.^[14] The MOSFET went on to become the most widely manufactured device in history.^[15][16]

Television, which first reached the marketplace in the 1940s, attained maturity during the 1950s and by the end of the decade, most American households owned a TV set. A rush to produce larger screens than the tiny ones found on 1940s models occurred during 1950–52. In 1954, RCA intro Bell Telephone Labs produced the first Solar battery. In 1954, a yard of contact paper could be purchased for only 59 cents. Polypropylene was invented in 1954. In 1955, Jonas Salk invented a polio vaccine which was given to more than seven million American students. In 1956, a solar powered wrist watch was invented.

In 1957, a 184-pound (83 kg) satellite named Sputnik 1 was launched by the Soviets. The space race began four months later as the United States launched a smaller satellite.

• Charles H. Townes builds the Maser in 1953 at the Columbia University.
• The Soviet Union launches Sputnik 1, the first artificial satellite to orbit the Earth on October 4, 1957.
• The United States conducts its first hydrogen bomb explosion test.
• The invention of the modern Solar cell.
• The first Passenger jets enter service.
• The U.S. uses Federal prisons, mental institutions and pharmacological testing volunteers to test drugs like LSD and chlorpromazine. Also started experimenting with the transorbital lobotomy.
• President Harry S. Truman inaugurated transcontinental television service on September 4, 1951, when he made a speech to the nation. AT&T carried his address from San Francisco and it was viewed from the west coast to the east coast at the same time.
• Luna 2 touched down on the surface of the Moon, making it the first spacecraft to land on lunar surface, and the first to make contact with another celestial body on September 13, 1959.

• 1950 – an immunization vaccine is produced for polio.
• 1951 – the first human cervical cancer cells were cultured outside a body, from Henrietta Lacks. The cells are known as HeLa cells and are the first and most commonly used immortalised cell line.
• 1952 – Francis Crick and James Watson discover the double-helix structure of DNA. Rosalind Franklin contributed to the discovery of the double-helix structure.
• 1952 – the Apgar score, a scale for newborn viability, is invented by Virginia Apgar.
• 1953 – the first transistor computer is built at the University of Manchester
• 1954 – the world's first nuclear power plant is opened in Obninsk near Moscow.
• 1956 – one of the first forms of correction fluid is invented by Bette Nesmith Graham, the founder of the Liquid Paper company
• 1957 – the Immunosuppressive drug Azathioprine, used in rheumatoid arthritis, granulomatosis with polyangiitis, Crohn's disease, ulcerative colitis, and in kidney transplants to prevent rejection, is first synthesized by Gertrude B. Elion and George H. Hitchings.^[17]
• The first successful ultrasound test of the heart activity.
• NASA is organized.

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  Pez candies were released in the 1950s, and became well known in pop culture.
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  In the 1950s poodle skirts were popular with women, as were leather jackets with men. Pictured is a 1950s leather jacket label.
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  The jukebox was particularly popular in the 1950s, and was used as entertainment in public establishments such as diners and malt/soda shops.
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  TV shows like I Love Lucy, The Adventures of Ozzie and Harriet, and Father Knows Best were popular during the original Golden Age of Television era.
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  The 1950s were the true birth of the rock and roll music genre, led by figures such as Elvis Presley (pictured), Chuck Berry, Buddy Holly, Jerry Lee Lewis and others.
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  Four Olympic Games were held in the 1950s, Oslo and Helsinki in 1952, Cortina d'Ampezzo and Melbourne in 1956 (all during the Cold War).
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  Motorcycle clubs became more prominent in the 1950s. Pictured is a vintage 1950s motorcycle toy.
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  The 1950s was the beginning period of rapid television ownership. In their infancy, television screens existed in many forms, including round.
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  The creation and expansion of many multinational restaurant chains still in existence today, including the likes of McDonald's, IHOP, Pizza Hut, Denny's and Burger King, all occurred in the 1950s.
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  Many famous children's books released in the 1950s, including The Cat in the Hat, Charlotte's Web and Harold and the Purple Crayon.

Popular music in the early 1950s was essentially a continuation of the crooner sound of the previous decade, with less emphasis on the jazz-influenced big band style and more emphasis on a conservative, operatic, symphonic style of music. Frank Sinatra, Tony Bennett, Frankie Laine, Patti Page, Judy Garland, Johnnie Ray, Kay Starr, Perry Como, Bing Crosby, Rosemary Clooney, Dean Martin, Georgia Gibbs, Eddie Fisher, Teresa Brewer, Dinah Shore, Kitty Kallen, Joni James, Peggy Lee, Julie London, Toni Arden, June Valli, Doris Day, Arthur Godfrey, Tennessee Ernie Ford, Guy Mitchell, Nat King Cole, and vocal groups like the Mills Brothers, The Ink Spots, The Four Lads, The Four Aces, The Chordettes, The Fontane Sisters, The Hilltoppers and the Ames Brothers. Jo Stafford's "You Belong To Me" was the #1 song of 1952 on the Billboard Top 100 chart.

The middle of the decade saw a change in the popular music landscape as classic pop was swept off the charts by rock-and-roll. Crooners such as Eddie Fisher, Perry Como, and Patti Page, who had dominated the first half of the decade, found their access to the pop charts significantly curtailed by the decade's end.^[18] Doo-wop entered the pop charts in the 1950s. Its popularity soon spawns the parody "Who Put the Bomp (in the Bomp, Bomp, Bomp)".

Rock-n-roll emerged in the mid-1950s with Little Richard, Elvis Presley, Chuck Berry, Sam Cooke, Jackie Wilson, Gene Vincent, Fats Domino, James Brown, Bo Diddley, Buddy Holly, Bobby Darin, Ritchie Valens, Duane Eddy, Eddie Cochran, Brenda Lee, Bobby Vee, Connie Francis, Neil Sedaka, Pat Boone, Ricky Nelson, Tommy Steele, Billy Fury, Marty Wilde and Cliff Richard being notable exponents. In the mid-1950s, Elvis Presley became the leading figure of the newly popular sound of rock and roll with a series of network television appearances and chart-topping records. Chuck Berry, with "Maybellene" (1955), "Roll Over Beethoven" (1956), "Rock and Roll Music" (1957) and "Johnny B. Goode" (1958), refined and developed the major elements that made rock and roll distinctive, focusing on teen life and introducing guitar solos and showmanship that would be a major influence on subsequent rock music.^[19] Bill Haley, Presley, Jerry Lee Lewis, The Everly Brothers, Carl Perkins, Johnny Cash, Conway Twitty, Johnny Horton, and Marty Robbins were Rockabilly musicians. Doo-wop was another popular genre at the time. Popular Doo Wop and Rock-n-Roll bands of the mid to late 1950s include The Platters, The Flamingos, The Dells, The Silhouettes, Frankie Lymon and The Teenagers, Little Anthony and The Imperials, Danny & the Juniors, The Coasters, The Drifters, The Del-Vikings and Dion and the Belmonts.

The new music differed from previous styles in that it was primarily targeted at the teenager market, which became a distinct entity for the first time in the 1950s as growing prosperity meant that young people did not have to grow up as quickly or be expected to support a family. Rock-and-roll proved to be a difficult phenomenon for older Americans to accept and there were widespread accusations of its being a communist-orchestrated scheme to corrupt the youth, although rock and roll was extremely market-based and capitalistic.

Jazz stars in the 1950s who came into prominence in their genres called bebop, hard bop, cool jazz and the blues, at this time included Lester Young, Ben Webster, Charlie Parker, Dizzy Gillespie, Miles Davis, John Coltrane, Thelonious Monk, Charles Mingus, Art Tatum, Bill Evans, Ahmad Jamal, Oscar Peterson, Gil Evans, Jerry Mulligan, Cannonball Adderley, Stan Getz, Chet Baker, Dave Brubeck, Art Blakey, Max Roach, the Miles Davis Quintet, the Modern Jazz Quartet, Ella Fitzgerald, Ray Charles, Sarah Vaughan, Dinah Washington, Nina Simone, and Billie Holiday.

The American folk music revival became a phenomenon in the United States in the 1950s to mid-1960s with the initial success of The Weavers who popularized the genre. Their sound, and their broad repertoire of traditional folk material and topical songs inspired other groups such as the Kingston Trio, the Chad Mitchell Trio, The New Christy Minstrels, and the "collegiate folk" groups such as The Brothers Four, The Four Freshmen, The Four Preps, and The Highwaymen. All featured tight vocal harmonies and a repertoire at least initially rooted in folk music and topical songs.

On 3 February 1959, a chartered plane transporting the three American rock and roll musicians Buddy Holly, Ritchie Valens and J. P. "The Big Bopper" Richardson goes down in foggy conditions near Clear Lake, Iowa, killing all four occupants on board, including pilot Roger Peterson. The tragedy is later termed "The Day the Music Died", popularized in Don McLean's 1971 song "American Pie". This event, combined with the conscription of Presley into the US Army, is often taken to mark the point where the era of 1950s rock-and-roll ended.

The 1950s are known as the Golden Age of Television by some people. Sales of TV sets rose tremendously in the 1950s and by 1950 4.4 million families in America had a television set. Americans devoted most of their free time to watching television broadcasts. People spent so much time watching TV, that movie attendance dropped and so did the number of radio listeners.^[20] Television revolutionized the way Americans see themselves and the world around them. TV affects all aspects of American culture. "Television affects what we wear, the music we listen to, what we eat, and the news we receive."^[21]

European cinema experienced a renaissance in the 1950s following the deprivations of World War II. Italian director Federico Fellini won the first foreign language film Academy Award with La Strada and garnered another Academy Award with Nights of Cabiria. Sidney Poitier became the first Black actor to receive an Academy Award nomination for Best Actor for the 1958 film The Defiant Ones (an award he later won in the 1960s).

Similarly with the mid-1950s rush of Rock and Roll and teenage rebellion, the films of Marlon Brando and James Dean had a profound effect on American culture.

In Hollywood, the epic Ben-Hur grabbed a record 11 Academy Awards in 1959 and its success gave a new lease of life to motion picture studio MGM.

Beginning in 1953, with Shane and The Robe, widescreen motion pictures became the norm.

The "Golden Era" of 3D cinematography transpired during the 1950s.

Animated films in the 1950s presented by Walt Disney included Cinderella, Alice in Wonderland, Peter Pan and Lady and the Tramp, followed by Sleeping Beauty. Duck Dogers first appeared in 1953.

In the early 1950s abstract expressionism and artists Jackson Pollock and Willem de Kooning were enormously influential. However, by the late 1950s Color Field painting and Barnett Newman and Mark Rothko's paintings became more in focus to the next generation.

Pop art used the iconography of television, photography, comics, cinema and advertising. With its roots in dadaism, it started to take form towards the end of the 1950s when some European artists started to make the symbols and products of the world of advertising and propaganda the main subject of their artistic work. This return of figurative art, in opposition to the abstract expressionism that dominated the aesthetic scene since the end of World War II was dominated by Great Britain until the early 1960s when Andy Warhol, the most known artist of this movement began to show Pop Art in galleries in the United States.

The 1950s saw the birth of the teenager and with it rock n roll and youth fashion dominating the fashion industry. In the UK the Teddy boy became both style icons and anti-authoritarian figures. While in America Greasers had a similar social position. Previously teenagers dressed similarly to their parents but now a rebellious and different youth style was being developed. This was particularly noticeable in the overtly sexual nature of their dress. Men wore tight trousers, leather jackets and emphasis was on slicked, greasy hair.

New ideas meant new designers who had a concept of what was fashion. Fashion started gaining a voice and style when Christian Dior created “The New Look” collection. The 1950s was not only about spending on luxurious brands but also the idea of being comfortable was created. It was a time where resources were available and it was a new type of fashion. Designers were creating collections with different materials such as: taffeta, nylon, rayon, wool and leather that allowed different colors and patterns. People started wearing artificial fibers because it was easier to take care of and it was price effective.^[22] It was a time where shopping was part of a lifestyle.

Different designers emerged or made a comeback on the 1950s because as mention before it was a time for fashion and ideas. The most important designers from the time were:

Christian Dior: everything started in 1947 after World War II was over. Christian Dior found that there were a lot of resources in the market. He created the famous and inspirational collection named “The New Look.” This consisted on the idea of creating voluminous dresses that would not only represent wealth but also show power on women. This collection was the first collection to use 80 yards of fabric.^[22] He introduced the idea of the hourglass shape for women; wide shoulders, tight waistline and then voluminous full skirts. Dior was a revolutionary and he was the major influence for the next collections. He is known for always developing new ideas and designs, which led to a rapid expansion and becoming worldwide known.^[23] He had pressure to create innovative designs for each collection and Dior did manage to provide that to the consumers. He not only made the hourglass shape very famous but he also developed the H-line as well as the A and Y-Lines. Dior was a very important designer, he changed the way fashion was looked on the world but most importantly he reestablished Paris as a fashion capital.^[23]

Cristobal Balenciaga: Cristobal Balenciaga a Spanish designer who opened his first couture house in 1915. In 1936, he went to Paris in order to avoid the Spanish Civil War, there he had inspiration for his fashion collections. His designs were an inspiration for emerging designers of the time. His legacy is as important as the one from Dior, revolutionaries.^[23] He was known for creating sack dresses, heavy volumes and balloon skirts.^[24] For him everything started when he worked for Marquesa de Casa Torre who became his patron and main source of inspiration. Marquesa de Casa Torre helped Balenciaga enter the world of couture.^[23] His first suit was very dramatic. The suit consisted on cutout and cut-ins the waist over a slim skirt, something not seen before.^[23] Balenciaga was a revolutionary designer who was not afraid to cut and let loose because he had everything under control. In the 1950s and 1960s his designs were well known for attention to color and texture. He was creating different silhouettes for women, in 1955 he created the tunic, 1957 the sack dress and 1958 the Empire styles.^[25] He was known for moving from tailored designs to shapeless allowing him to show portion and balance on the bodies.^[23] Showing that his designs evolved with time and maintained his ideologies.

Coco Chanel: Her style was well known over the world and her idea of having functional luxurious clothing influenced other designers from the era. Chanel believed that luxurious should come from being comfortable that is why her designers were so unique and different from the time period, she also achieved her looks by adding accessories such as pearl necklaces.^[26] Chanel believed that even though Dior designs were revolutionary for the time period they did not managed to represent the women of the time. She believed women had to wear something to represent their survival to another war and their active roles in society.^[27] Coming back from a closed house of fashion was not easy for Chanel and competing against younger designers.^[27] The Chanel suit was known as a status symbol for wealthy and powerful women.^[27] Chanel influenced over the years and her brand is still one of the most influential brands for fashion.

• Inaugural season of Formula One

• 1952 Summer Olympics held in Helsinki, Finland
• 1952 Winter Olympics held in Oslo, Norway
• 1956 Summer Olympics held in Melbourne, Australia
• 1956 Winter Olympics held in Cortina d'Ampezzo, Italy

• 1950 World Cup hosted by Brazil, won by Uruguay
• 1954 World Cup hosted by Switzerland, won by West Germany
• 1958 World Cup hosted by Sweden, won by Brazil

The 1958 World Cup is notable for marking the debut on the world stage of a then largely unknown 17-year-old Pelé.

• Aleksey Innokentevich Antonov, Chief of General Staff of the Unified Armed Forces Warsaw Treaty Organization
• Eugene R. Black, President World Bank
• William Sterling Cole, Director-general International Atomic Energy Agency
• Manuel Fraga Iribarne, Secretary-general Latin Union
• André François-Poncet, Chairman of the Standing Commission International Red Cross and Red Crescent Movement
• Louis Goffin, Secretary-general Western European Union
• Walter Hallstein, President of the European Commission
• Fritz Hess, Director Universal Postal Union
• Ivan Stepanovich Konev, Commander-in-chief of the Unified Armed Forces Warsaw Treaty Organization
• Henri St. Leger, Secretary-general International Organization for Standardization
• Robert C. Lonati, Secretary-general World Tourism Organization
• David A. Morse, Director-general International Labour Organization
• Arnold Duncan McNair, Baron McNair, President of the European Court of Human Rights
• Ove Nielsen, Secretary-general International Maritime Organization
• Maurice Pate, Executive Director United Nations Children's Fund
• Robert Schuman, President of the European Parliamentary Assembly
• Gustav Swoboda, Chief of the Secretariat World Meteorological Organization
• José Guillermo Trabanino Guerrero, Secretary-general Organization of Central American States
• Eric Wyndham White, Executive Secretary World Trade Organization

• 
  Marlon Brando 1951
• 
  John Wayne 1952
• 
  Marilyn Monroe 1953
• 
  James Dean 1955
• 
  Sophia Loren 1959

• 
  John Ford
• 
  Elia Kazan
• 
  Akira Kurosawa
• 
  Billy Wilder

• 
  Elvis Presley 1956
• 
  Fats Domino c. 1956
• 
  Jerry Lee Lewis c. 1957
• 
  Everly Brothers c. 1958

• 
  Bill Haley & His Comets c. 1954
• 
  The Platters 1955
• 
  The Clovers 1955
• 
  Buddy Holly & The Crickets 1958

• 
  Jackie Robinson
• 
  Willie Mays
• 
  Mickey Mantle
• 
  Sugar Ray Robinson

• List of decades
• 1950s in television
• 1950s in literature
• Post-World War II Boom
• 1950s American automobile culture
• Silent Generation (the majority of children who had grown up during the Great Depression had matured in this decade).

The following articles contain brief timelines which list the most prominent events of the decade:

1950 • 1951 • 1952 • 1953 • 1954 • 1955 • 1956 • 1957 • 1958 • 1959

• Bessel, Richard and Dirk Schumann, eds. Life after Death: Approaches to a Cultural and Social History of Europe During the 1940s and 1950s (2003), essays by scholars on recovery from the war
• Judt, Tony. Postwar: A History of Europe Since 1945 (2005)
• London Institute of World Affairs, The Year Book of World Affairs 1957 (London 1957), comprehensive reference book covering 1956 in diplomacy, international affairs and politics for major nations and regions
• Hart, John Fraser. “The 1950s.” Annals of the Association of American Geographers 69, no. 1^[1] (1979): 109–14.
• Khanin, G. I. “The 1950s: The Triumph of the Soviet Economy.” Europe-Asia Studies 55, no. 8 (2003): 1187–1211.^[2]
• Barnosky, Jason. “The Violent Years: Responses to Juvenile Crime in the 1950s.” Polity 38, no. 3 (2006): 314–44.^[3]
• McKinney, Ross E., and Gary DeKock. “The 1950s.” Water Environment & Technology 15, no. 4 (2003): 46–51.^[4]

• Montgomery, John. The Fifties (1960), On Britain.
• Sandbrook, Dominic. Never had it so good: a history of Britain from Suez to the Beatles Hachette UK, (2015).
  • Bering, Henrik. "Taking the great out of Britain." Policy Review, no. 133, (2005), p. 88+. online review
• Wybrow, Robert J. "Britain Speaks Out, 1937-87" (1989), Summaries of public opinion polls in Britain

• Dunar, Andrew J. America in the fifties (2006)
• Halberstam, David. The Fifties (1993) excerpt and text search
• Levine, Alan J. The Myth of the 1950s (2008) excerpt and text search
• Marling, Karal Ann. As Seen on TV: The Visual Culture of Everyday Life in the 1950s (Harvard University Press, 1996) 328 pp.
• Miller, Douglas T. and Marion Nowak. The fifties: the way we really were (1977)
• Stoner, John C., and Alice L. George. Social History of the United States: The 1950s (2008)
• Wills, Charles. America in the 1950s (Decades of American History) (2005)

Wikimedia Commons has media related to 1950s.

• Heroes of the 1950s – slideshow by Life magazine
• "The Golden Age of Couture: Paris and London 1947–57, exhibition about 1950s fashion". Victoria and Albert Museum.
• Footage from the 1950s
• 1950s Video Timeline