<P> This section of the Timeline of United States history concerns events from 1950 to 1969 . </P> <Ul> <Li> 1950--Senator Joseph McCarthy gains power, and McCarthyism (1950--1954) </Li> <Li> 1950--McCarran Internal Security Act </Li> <Li> 1950--Korean War begins </Li> <Li> 1950--The comic strip Peanuts, by Charles M. Schulz, is first published </Li> <Li> 1950--NBC airs Broadway Open House a late - night comedy, variety, talk show through 1951 . Hosted by Morey Amsterdam and Jerry Lester and Dagmar, it serves as the prototype for The Tonight Show </Li> <Li> 1950--Failed assassination attempt by two Puerto Rican nationals on President Harry S. Truman while the President was living at Blair House . </Li> <Li> 1951--22nd Amendment, establishing term limits for President . </Li> <Li> 1951--Mutual Security Act </Li> <Li> 1951--General Douglas MacArthur fired by President Truman for comments about using nuclear weapons on China </Li> <Li> 1951--The first live transcontinental television broadcast takes place in San Francisco, California from the Japanese Peace Treaty Conference . One month later, the situation comedy I Love Lucy premieres on CBS, sparking the rise of television in the American home and the Golden Age of Television . </Li> <Li> 1951--See It Now, an American newsmagazine and documentary series broadcast by CBS from 1951 to 1958 . It was created by Edward R. Murrow and Fred W. Friendly, Murrow being the host of the show . </Li> <Li> 1951--The Catcher in the Rye is published by J.D. Salinger and invigorates the rebellious youth of the period, eventually earning the title of a Classic with its profound impact . </Li> <Li> 1952--The debut of the Today show on NBC, originally hosted by Dave Garroway is the fourth longest running talk show on television . </Li> <Li> 1952--ANZUS Treaty enters into force </Li> <Li> 1952--Immigration and Nationality Act </Li> <Li> 1952--United States presidential election, 1952 (Dwight D. Eisenhower elected) </Li> <Li> 1953--Dwight D. Eisenhower inaugurated as President </Li> <Li> 1953--Rosenbergs executed </Li> <Li> 1953--Korean Armistice Agreement </Li> <Li> 1953--Shah of Iran returns to power in CIA - orchestrated coup known as Operation Ajax </Li> <Li> 1954--The Tournament of Roses Parade becomes the first event nationally televised in color </Li> <Li> 1954 - Detonation of "Bravo", a 15 megaton Hydrogen bomb on Bikini Atoll . 1,000 times more powerful than the Hiroshima and Nagasaki weapons, it vapourised three islands, displaced the islanders and caused long lasting contamination . </Li> <Li> 1954--Joseph McCarthy discredited in Army - McCarthy hearings </Li> <Li> 1954--The CIA overthrows Guatemala's president Jacobo Arbenz Guzmán (Operation PBSUCCESS) </Li> <Li> 1954--Saint Lawrence Seaway Act, permitting the construction of the system of locks, canals and channels that permits ocean - going vessels to travel from the Atlantic Ocean to the North American Great Lakes, is approved </Li> <Li> 1954--Brown v. Board of Education, a landmark decision of the Supreme Court, declares state laws establishing separate public schools for black and white students and denying black children equal educational opportunities unconstitutional </Li> <Li> 1954--The U.S. becomes a member of the Southeast Asia Treaty Organization (or SEATO) alliance </Li> <Li> 1954--Geneva Conference . U.S. rejects the French decision to recognize Communist control of North Vietnam . U.S. increases aid to South Vietnam . </Li> <Li> 1954--The People's Republic of China lays siege on Quemoy and Matsu Islands; Eisenhower sends in Navy to demonstrate an invasion of Taiwan would not be permitted </Li> <Li> 1954--The Dow Jones Industrial Average closes at an all - time high of 382.74, the first time the Dow has surpassed its peak level reached just before the Wall Street Crash of 1929 </Li> <Li> 1954--NBC airs The Tonight Show, the first late - night talk show, originally hosted by Steve Allen </Li> <Li> 1955--Ray Kroc opens a McDonald's fast food restaurant and, after purchasing the franchise from its original owners, oversees its national (and later, worldwide) expansion </Li> <Li> 1955--Rosa Parks incites the Montgomery bus boycott </Li> <Li> 1955--AFL and CIO merge in America's largest labor union federation </Li> <Li> 1955--Warsaw Pact, which establishes a mutual defense treaty subscribed to by eight communist states in Eastern Europe (including the USSR) </Li> <Li> 1955--Disneyland opens at Anaheim, California </Li> <Li> 1955--Jonas Salk develops polio vaccine </Li> <Li> 1955--Rock and roll music enters the mainstream, with "Rock Around the Clock" by Bill Haley & His Comets becoming the first record to top the Billboard pop charts . Elvis Presley also begins his rise to fame around this same time . </Li> <Li> 1955--Actor James Dean is killed in a highway accident </Li> <Li> 1956--President Eisenhower secures passages of Interstate Highway Act, which will construct 41,000 miles (66,000 km) of the Interstate Highway System over a 20 - year period </Li> <Li> 1956--The U.S. refuses to provide military support the Hungarian Revolution </Li> <Li> 1956--Elvis Presley appears on The Ed Sullivan Show for the first time . </Li> <Li> 1956--Marilyn Monroe marries playwright Arthur Miller . </Li> <Li> 1956--Jackson Pollock dies in a car crash </Li> <Li> 1956--United States presidential election, 1956 (Eisenhower re-elected) </Li> <Li> 1956--"In God We Trust" adopted as national motto </Li> <Li> 1957--Eisenhower Doctrine, wherein a country could request American economic assistance and / or aid from military forces if it was being threatened by armed aggression from another state </Li> <Li> 1957--Civil Rights Act of 1957, primarily a voting rights bill, becomes the first civil rights legislation enacted by Congress since Reconstruction </Li> <Li> 1957--Soviets launch Sputnik; "space race" begins </Li> <Li> 1957--Shippingport Atomic Power Station, the first commercial nuclear power plant in the U.S., goes into service </Li> <Li> 1957--Little Rock, Arkansas school desegregation </Li> <Li> 1958--National Defense Education Act </Li> <Li> 1958--NASA formed as the U.S. begins ramping up efforts to explore space </Li> <Li> 1958--Jack Kilby invents the integrated circuit </Li> <Li> 1959--The NBC western Bonanza becomes the first drama to be broadcast in color </Li> <Li> 1959--Cuban Revolution </Li> <Li> 1959--Landrum--Griffin Act, a labor law that regulates labor unions' internal affairs and their officials' relationships with employers, becomes law </Li> <Li> 1959--Alaska and Hawaii became the 49th and 50th U.S. states; to date, they are the final two states admitted to the union . </Li> </Ul> <Li> 1950--Senator Joseph McCarthy gains power, and McCarthyism (1950--1954) </Li>

Major events that took place in the 1950s
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