The Suburban Ideal
This 1944 act provided veterans with low-interest mortgages and college tuition, fueling the growth of the American middle class.
What is the G.I. Bill?
This landmark 1954 Supreme Court case ruled that "separate but equal" in public schools was unconstitutional
What is Brown v. Board of Education?
Her refusal to give up her bus seat in Montgomery, Alabama, sparked a 381-day boycott of the city's bus system
Who is Rosa Parks?
Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr. advocated for this type of peaceful protest, inspired by the teachings of Gandhi
What is civil disobedience?
This term describes the 1950s social pressure to "fit in," follow traditional gender roles, and mirror the lifestyle of one's neighbors in the growing suburbs
What is conformity?
This term describes the 1950s social trend of mass-produced housing developments, often associated with the "suburban ideal".
What is Levittown (or suburbanization)
This 1896 case, which established the "separate but equal" doctrine, was overturned by the Brown decision.
What is Plessy v. Ferguson?
This 14-year-old’s 1955 murder in Mississippi and his mother's decision to have an open-casket funeral drew international attention to racial violence.
Who is Emmit Till?
In 1960, four students in Greensboro, NC, started this type of protest at a Woolworth’s lunch counter, a tactic that quickly spread to Nashville
What is a sit-in?
Often blamed for juvenile delinquency by critics of the time, this new genre of music—led by figures like Elvis Presley—blended rhythm and blues with country music.
What is rock n' roll
Post-WWII prosperity led to an increase in these types of professional, office-based roles, as opposed to manual labor "blue-collar" jobs.
What are "white collar" jobs?
This Tennessee-based school trained many civil rights leaders, including Rosa Parks and Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr., in the tactics of nonviolent protest.
What is the Highlander Folk School?
This group of nine African American students required federal troop protection to integrate Central High School in Arkansas in 1957
Who is the Little Rock Nine?
This civil rights leader was instrumental in the Nashville sit-ins and went on to help found the Student Nonviolent Coordinating Committee (SNCC)
Who is James Lawson?
This group of mid-century writers and artists, including Jack Kerouac and Allen Ginsberg, famously rejected the era's consumerism and conformity through their "counterculture" lifestyle.
Who are the beatniks?
Innovations like the Frigidaire and the widespread use of these financial tools allowed 1950s Americans to embrace a culture of consumerism.
What are credit cards?
Thurgood Marshall, who argued the Brown case, represented this organization dedicated to legal equality for African Americans.
What is the NAACP?
This fearless student leader of the Nashville sit-ins and founding member of SNCC famously confronted Mayor Ben West on the steps of City Hall, asking him if he felt it was wrong to discriminate against a person based solely on their race.
Who is Diane Nash?
These activists rode interstate buses into the segregated South in 1961 to challenge the non-enforcement of Supreme Court rulings against segregated busing.
Who were the Freedom Riders?
By 1960, 9 out of 10 American homes owned one of these, which became the primary medium for spreading pop culture, news, and the "ideal" American image.
What is a television?
This 1956 legislative act, championed by President Eisenhower, fundamentally changed the American landscape and allowed for faster travel between cities and suburbs
What is the Interstate Highway Act?
This phrase from the Supreme Court's second Brown ruling (1955) ordered schools to desegregate, but its vagueness led to significant delays.
What is "with all deliberate speed"
This activist and journalist from Memphis was a key leader in the anti-lynching movement and a founder of the NAACP
Who is Ida B. Wells?
Written while he was incarcerated, this famous document by Dr. King defended the strategy of nonviolent resistance to racism.
What is "Letter From a Birmingham Jail"?
This business model, which exploded in the 1950s with companies like McDonald’s and Holiday Inn, promoted cultural conformity by ensuring consumers received the exact same product or service regardless of their location
What is a franchise?