Pleasantville

A common saying people have embedded in our minds is that the past between 1950s and 1960s is considered as “The Good Ol’ Days” or “The Golden Age.” These assumptions were made due to the prosperity and growth of the nation however the truth is that many Americans felt disadvantaged. After WWII women became confined to the home where they were expected to care for the family. Many housewives did not like these conditions because they felt as though they were slaves in their own little worlds by losing rights they had gained during the war. The only work women were wanted for was for cooking, cleaning, laundering, sewing, taking care of children, etc. Many women became discouraged due to the fact they no longer felt important in society.

In the beginning, some people try to appear that everything about them is "in black and white, until later their true colors come out (Anthony Liccione). In literature, authors show a character's true colors through their actions throughout the book. In the beginning of Fitzgerald's The Great Gatsby, he presents Tom as an immoral person through his actions.

The television gave much of the country something to do. It reflected the homogenization of the United States. People began to envision a futuristic nuclear world after the start of the Space Race between the United States and Russia to land on the moon. The United States launched Alan Shepard into space after the Soviets launched “Sputnik” in 1957 as we launched our first man in 1961. Meanwhile, computers were developed into large room size machines to do simple computations and made things portable. One of the characteristics of the mass media during the 1950’s, as the T.V., was that the sitcoms was directed to make viewers think about the idea of the perfect family living the American dream. The only problem with those T.V sitcoms was that not every American family fitted into that mold. For example, Jews, Hispanics, African-Americans, Asians, and other minorities were not portrayed as part of that image that most people wanted to imitate because these T.V. families were white-collar, middle class, and Caucasian.

At the start of the decade, society and the way people lived changed drastically. Women specifically were viewed in a different way. Before the 1920s, women were portrayed as the “typical housewife”. Women were supposed to stay home, cook, clean, and raise the children. During the 1920s, women were changing the culture and the stereotype of a “typical housewife”. Women began to go

the house becoming the homemaker once the war was over. The 1950s has also been

The appearance of color in Pleasantville showed that the town and citizens were undergoing change, and that this change was making the inhabitants feel free and similar to people from the ‘90s. When objects and people around town quickly turned from black-and-white to color, many of the older, more traditional citizens of the town resisted the change. Pleasantville mayor Big Bob speaks of the changes, “up until now, everything around here has been, well, pleasant. Recently certain things have become unpleasant. Now, it seems to me that the first thing we have to do is to separate out the things that are pleasant from the things that are unpleasant” (Pleasantville). Big Bob and a large group of citizens, mostly consisting of the older men of the town, form a group of people trying to keep the town “pleasant,” or not colored. This group begins putting up signs around town banning colored people, similar to situations that African Americans dealt with before the civil rights movement. They also harass all the colored people on the streets, and even vandalize and destroy Bill Johnson’s shop for having colorful art on the windows. Finally, the group has meetings featuring all the influential non-colored people in town, and this new assembly draws similarities to Nazism with their symbols and beliefs.

Some historians have argued that 1950s America marked a step back for the advancement that women made during WWII. What contributed to this “return to domesticity” and do you believe that the the decade was good or bad for women?

While the 1950’s had been very conservative, the stay-at-home housewives, the perfect families and home lives, children of the baby boom soon alternated this into a very different kind of

Upon returning from his annual two-week vacation in early July of 2002, the treasurer of the Spring Valley Forest Products Corporation, a Mr. Fred Firr, found the firm's audited balance sheet as of June 30 on his desk. Close scrutiny of the company's financial condition as reported in this document suggested to Mr. Firr that the cash flow picture for the enterprise was deteriorating. In times gone by, the firm had been able to maintain sizeable cash balances in its bank of account, Tippecanoe Trust Company, during the major portion of the fiscal year, and had found only modest seasonal borrowings necessary. Recently, however, a lengthening of credit terms to customers necessitated by intense

Keysville, Virginia, which is located in Charlotte County (Southern Virginia), was home to many citizens in the 1860s, around the time of the Civil War. Keysville was known for growing tobacco at the time, which was the number one cash crop in the town and also the state of Virginia. However, the tobacco industry and other cultural issues were drastically changed once the Civil War was over. You may be wondering, what does the period after the Civil War, also known as the Reconstruction Era, have to do with a little town like Keysville? Many people are unfamiliar with the repercussions that came after the Civil War and impacted the smaller towns in the South. Keysville, Virginia was affected in many ways, big and small, by the Reconstruction

The roles and expectations for women in the 1950s differed in many ways from today’s society. “Society placed high importance and many expectations on behavior at home as well as in public” (Colorado.edu). In the 1950s women were considered “housewives”. Women’s sole purpose was to maintain the home, take care of the children, provide meals, and be obedient wives. “Good wives” listened to their

During WWII, the two-breadwinner vision of the family suffered further setbacks. As May puts it, women entered war production, but they did not give up on reproduction..Economic hardship was no longer a barrier to marriage, as it had been in the 1930s, and dependents' allowances eased the burdens of families if the breadwinners were drafted. But perhaps most important was the desire to solidify relationships and establish connections to the future when war made life so uncertain. (May p.59-60) While the culture venerated female workers, it also promoted a return to domesticity after the war, a return encouraged by the gender bias of the GI Bill. Meanwhile, men were encouraged through pin-ups and propaganda to believe they were fighting for their own slice of the domestic, consumerist good life.

As the baby boom added to the reasons for women to stay or to return to domesticity, there were other factors at work. Not only were there more children to increase their home-based responsibilities, but there were geographical reasons that separated women from men. The suburban explosion in the late 1940s and 1950s was

In the 1920s-1940s, women were encouraged to step outside of the home and work, but on the other hand, women were also encouraged to be stay-at-home mothers. Women should stay at home if they have the ability to do so. However, women should not feel like they have to be isolated from the rest of the world with chores and children all day.

The 1950’s were considered to be a time where life was full of bliss, who wouldn’t want to be untroubled? Life in the 1950’s was simple and structured, and now it seems as though the “Happy days” have disappeared. The 1950’s are considered “The Happy Days” because life was so well put together back then and now, it seems, it has all fallen apart. The 1950 TV shows, like Leave it to Beaver, has the American society believing that life was “perfect”. Seeing the shows makes one imagine that the family life was splendid, the style was flawless and modest, everyone got along, neighbors were friendly, and that the changes happening were for the best. In a way that was very true. People in the society knew their place; In a typical 1950’s family, the father and mother had specific roles they had to fulfill, and even the children had certain responsibilities. The men were the head of the household and usually worked to provide for the family. The women of the 1950’s society were stay at home moms, occasionally working a job as teachers or nurses. Men and women of that time were well mannered, clean, and classy. When the man and woman walked down the street, the man would walk on the outside or the road side to protect the woman from traffic. Men would also tip there hats as a kind gesture when they walked past a woman. Life just seemed to be in place in the 1950’s, yes, it wasn’t perfect, but it seemed much more put together than what society is like now.