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 Diane di Prima  Zorro was an unusual 1950s television show, as its hero was Hispanic.  Dr. Alfred Kinsey revolutionized the way Americans looked at sex.  Thelonius Monk pioneered a new form of jazz called bebop.   Eisenhower's farewell address warned the country of a growing military-industrial complex | |||||
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RATINGS: Sites are rated from 1 owl (good) to a high of 5 owls. Read more- Ralph Ellison's Invisible Man
Ralph Ellison's book Invisible Man was a scathing critique of the culture of the '50s that often championed material wealth over social equality. Read a review of this groundbreaking work that appeared in The Nation in 1952. The review discusses Ellison's ideas about disenchantment, the novel's structural incoherence, and experience, and the place of all three in the 1950s.
- Rebels: Painters and Poets of the 1950s
There were dozens of people in the 1950s who rejected societal norms through their artwork and lifestyle. They used words, music, and painting to rebel against the bland cookie-cutter mentality of the established power structure and mass-marketed culture. This exhibit from the National Portrait Gallery includes paintings, sketches, photographs, and poems from some of these artists who defied the norm.
- Literary Kicks
Buddhism, bebop, and being cool were Beat Generation staples. From Kerouac's metaphorically rambling prose to Neal Cassady's illegal antics, this rogue counterculture's brilliant yet reckless lifestyle is chronicled in this richly hyperlinked Literary Kicks site. Dig?
- Operation Wetback
Between the years 1944 and 1954, the number of illegal aliens coming into the United States from Mexico rose 6,000 percent, due in part to U.S. government policy allowing thousands across the border in retaliation to Mexican policies. The scurrilously named Operation Wetback attempted to send most of them back, claiming that their presence was detrimental to both the economy and society. This Handbook of Texas site provides history and commentary on both the reception of the immigrants in the U.S. and the efforts to return them to Mexico.
- The Beat Page
The artistic and literary stie RookNet presents an encyclopedia-style guide to the leaders of the Beat Generation. The images in the four-page gallery are an excellent resource, as are the concise biographies of more than 15 key writers of the era. Each biography includes poems by that author and excerpts from his or her works (note that many of the works are for sale on an adjoining page).
Diane Di Prima In the poem "The Window," this First lady of the Beats wrote "this kind of bird flies backwards / and this love / breaks on a windowpane / where no light talks."
- The Edward Hopper Scrapbook
The Smithsonian American Art Museum presents this haunting online scrapbook of Edward Hopper. Clippings, letters, and photographs of this famous painter offer a glimpse into his career, which spanned the 1920s to his death in 1968. Browse through each page and read the brief commentary about some of his most renowned works, which characterized the American lifestyle as one of loneliness in contrast to the happy-go-lucky media portrayal of life in America.
- History of the Kinsey Institute
Women don't enjoy sex. People are either homosexual or heterosexual, but can't be both. These are just two of the countless myths that the collective research dubbed the Kinsey Report debunked. A groundbreaking, scientific look at the sexual behavior of men and women, the publication shattered myths about homosexuality, masturbation, and countless other topics. Kinsey intensively interviewed thousands of people about their sexual proclivities and compiled the statistics. This Kinsey Institute website has a timeline of events, photos, hyperlinks, and even a short (but slow-loading) video clip of Kinsey.Kinsey's Heterosexual-Homosexual Rating Scale Kinsey saw hetero- and homosexual tendencies along a continuum, rather than mutually exclusive qualities of sexuality.
- Eisenhower's Farewell Address
"In the councils of government, we must guard against the acquisition of unwarranted influence, whether sought or unsought, by the military-industrial complex. The potential for the disastrous rise of misplaced power exists and will persist." This isn't a quote from a paranoid hippie student of the '60s — it was a caveat from President Eisenhower himself, delivered in his farewell address. The military-industrial complex grew during World War II, and though Eisenhower recognized its need, he cautioned citizens to be vigilant of the government's increasing power.
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