Articles from 1959
This well-illustrated article appeared in a middle class American magazine in 1959 and it reported on the rising international sentiments that signaled to the dominate Western powers that the old diplomacy of the wealthier white nations had to change. It will help to explain why the United States re-fashioned their immigration laws in 1965.
Cold War Politics and People of Color (Pageant Magazine, 1959) Read More »
In 1959 an eyewitness to American Prohibition recalled the unbridled glee that spread throughout the land when the Noble Experiment called it quits (December 5, 1933):
The legal celebrations that were held on the first night of repeal were mostly in keeping with the wet organizations’ desire to show that this was an historic moment far more important for the freedom of choice it restored to the public. In New Orleans cannons were shot off, whistles blown and city-wide parades held to greet repeal. Boston bars, permitted by lenient local authorities to stock up with legal booze into the night, were so packed by ten o’clock that a latecomer was lucky to get inside the doors, much less get a drink. The next day there were long lines of 100 and more people in front of liquor stores from early morning until closing…
Happy Days Are Here Again! (Pageant Magazine, 1959) Read More »
In this 1959 article Alabama wordsmith Wyatt Blasingame did his level-headed best to explain the sluggish reasoning that made up the opinions of his friends and neighbors as to why racial integration of the nation’s schools was a poor idea. He observed that even the proudest Southerner could freely recognize that African-Americans were ill-served by the existing school system and that they were due for some sort of an upgrade – they simply wished it wouldn’t happen quite so quickly. The journalist spent a good deal of column space explaining that there existed among the Whites of Dixie a deep and abiding paranoia over interracial marriage.
Their line of thinking seems terribly alien to us, but, be assured, Southern white reasoning has come a long way since 1923…
The Old Southern View of Integration (Pageant Magazine, 1959) Read More »
The Coronet entertainment writer was quite correct when he identified Sidney Poitier (1927 – 2022) as the first actor of African descent to earn beaucoup bucks and achieve leading-man status in dramatic rolls in Hollywood. Born and raised in the Bahamas, Poitier’s predecessors in the film colony were many, but they were all song and dance men. The attached column clearly outlines what made Poitier such an actor apart.
Guess Whose Coming to Hollywood… (Coronet Magazine, 1959) Read More »
How Pasternak’s Russian novel, Doctor Zhivago
The Book that Shook the Kremlin (Coronet Magazine, 1959) Read More »
The B-17 Flying Fortress was the most fabulous combat plane ever built. Like Douglas’ unretireable DC-3 airliner, the B-17 is history written in metal, a pivot of progress which helped influence an entire generation.
Perhaps more than any other plane, the B-17 beat Hitler. Its 640,036 tons of bombs on Europe, nearly the total dropped by all other U.S. planes combined, knocked out much of his industry, oil and railroads… The B-17 unveiled the era of strategic air power and turned man’s eye to the stratosphere and beyond.
Click here to read about the P-47 fighter plane.
The B-17 (Coronet Magazine, 1959) Read More »
The B-17 Flying Fortress was the most fabulous combat plane ever built. Like Douglas’ unretireable DC-3 airliner, the B-17 is history written in metal, a pivot of progress which helped influence an entire generation.
Perhaps more than any other plane, the B-17 beat Hitler. Its 640,036 tons of bombs on Europe, nearly the total dropped by all other U.S. planes combined, knocked out much of his industry, oil and railroads… The B-17 unveiled the era of strategic air power and turned man’s eye to the stratosphere and beyond.
Click here to read about the P-47 fighter plane.
The B-17 (Coronet Magazine, 1959) Read More »
It was said to be the lowest form of advertising – when ad copy on TV or radio productions was disguised as theatrical content. It was widespread and it was called clouting.
They Called it ”Clouting” (Pageant Magazine, 1959) Read More »
This three page reminiscence provides an example of the persuasive power of film and it tells the tale of an important event at a small industrial building in Hollywood, California, that housed the Navy Film Services Depot between 1942 and 1945.
Taking the Offensive was the name given to this small, low budget training film that was produced on that dusty sun-bleached street and it didn’t appear to be anything terribly special to the NCOs who produced it at the time – but they learned later that their film provided a badly needed shot in the arm to the then untested officers and men of one particular heavy cruiser that was destined to tangle with three Japanese ships the next day.
Click here to read about the Battle of the Coral Sea
The Navy Training Film that Won A Naval Engagement (Coronet Magazine, 1959) Read More »
Here are the six who top the FBI list of most dangerous lady criminals-at-large; find one and you may prevent murder…
Women Criminals (Pageant Magazine, 1959) Read More »
