David Halberstamwas a Pulitzer Prize-winning journalist andthe author of numerous books, includingThe Best and the Brightest,The Powers That Be, The Reckoning, Summer of '49,Playing for Keeps,andWar in a Time of Peace.He died in April 2007.
Gr 9 Up-Based on the book by David Halberstram. This portrait of the 1950s is drawn through film clips from classics such as Gentlemen Prefer Blones, Invasion of the Body Snatchers and The Wild One. Relive the decade through rare footage of those who changed history-from Ike to Elvis, Oppenheimer to Nixon, McCarthy to Marilyn, and Willie Mays to Martin Luther King.
The Fifties were more than just a mid-point decade in a century; they were to be the crucible in which the rest of the 20th century was forged. Halberstam ( The Next Century , LJ 1/92) here touches every thread in the warp and woof of the national fabric. This is the true drama of history: President Truman's firing of General Douglas MacArthur, the Eisenhower years, Senator Joe McCarthy's red-baiting, the early U.S. involvement in Indochina, the H-bomb, the purging of atomic scientist J. Robert Oppenheimer, the Supreme Court ordering the integration of schools, troops in Little Rock to enforce it, the Montgomery bus boycott, the rise of Martin Luther King, Russia's sputnik launch, and Castro's revolutionary Cuba. Halberstam also explores major social and cultural changes--the advent of national television, fast-food restaurants, the flight to the suburbs, huge cars with fins, the phenomenon of Elvis Presley, the contraceptive pill, and much more. A superb book; recommended for all libraries. Previewed in Prepub Alert, LJ 2/1/93.-- Chet Hagan, Berks Cty. P.L. System, Pa.
 |
Ask a Question About this Product More... |
|
