Key People & Organizations

Frank Kamney

• WW2 vertan w/PhD in astrophysics from Harvard, fired from the defense department in 1957 for being gay.

• organized people fired from federal government jobs or dishonorably discharged from the U.S. military based on their sexuality, to picket in front of the White House,

• co-founded the Mattachine Society of Washington DC, the first U.S. gay rights organization, playing a pivotal role in the pre-Stonewall homophile movement and effort to decriminalize homosexuality in the 1960s.

Joseph McCarthy

• Republican senator from Wisconsin, rose to national prominence in 1950 after claiming to have a list of communists working in the State Department, igniting the 1950s Red Scare.

• launched communist "witch hunts" and red-baiting smear campaigns against public figures, political rivals, military officers, and those deemed socially deviant (gays).

• censured by the Senate in 1954 following a televised hearing that depicted him as having no decency.

The House Un-American Activities Committee (HUAC)

• congressional committee (1938) to investigate “un-American” activities, reorganized after WW2 with the explicit mission of uncovering and containing communist influence. 100+ investigations from 1949-1954.

• in 1947, HUAC subpoenaed the “Hollywood 10” who refused to report on their political affiliation and were all charged with contempt of Congress and blacklisted from Hollywood.

• in 1948-50, Nixon (representative) exposed Alger Hiss, a former high-ranking State Department official, as a Soviet spy, ultimately charged with perjury. set the stage for McCarthyism.

Harry Truman

• 33rd president (1945-1953) after FDR’s sudden death, authorized the atomic bomb in WW2, presidency defined by the cold war.

• in 1947 gave $400 million in aid to Turkey and Greece to rebuild and resist communism, similarly, Marshall plan (1948) provided economic aid to European countries.

• the Truman Doctrine became the policy of communist containment and US global responsibility to protect democracy.

• in 1948 election promised a “fair deal” for workers, farmers, and civil rights, with a nationalized healthcare but was defeated by Congress

Federal Housing Administration (FHA)

• New Deal organization to increase access to home ownership by insuring mortgages and protecting lenders from financial loss in the event of a default.

• in return, lenders were required to offer low interest rates and extended terms of up to twenty or thirty years, making homes affordable to a much larger segment of the population.

• critical role in the postwar economic boom, fueling the rise of the suburbs and the massive construction of single-family home, but denied racial minorities mortgages based off redlining and segregation.

Rachel Carson

• biologist and conservationist who challenged agricultural pesticide use and proposed interconnectedness of ecological/environmental well-being and human health.

• her 1962 book Silent Spring is credited with advancing the global environmental movement and shifting public perception.

• Silent Spring gained attention from President JFK, and eventually led to the first Earth Day in 1970 and the creation of the Environmental Protection Agency (EPA).

Nikita Khrushchev

• leader of the Soviet Union during the Cold War (1958-64), known for de-Stalinization policies, and promoted “peaceful coexistence” with the West while still engaging in Cold War confrontations.

• aiming to protect Cuba and balance U.S. power, he stationed nuclear missiles in Cuban Missile Crisis, leading to a tense 13-day standoff with president Kennedy before agreeing to remove them.

• invest in ag and space, sucessful launch of Sputnik 1, first satleite in 1957. obsession with American corn production led him to plow millions of acres in Kazakstan resulting in Soviet Dust Bowl.

Norman Borlaug

• father of the Green Revolution (1940-70), pioneered hybrid semi-dwarf wheat varieties in Mexico and later Asia to fight famine. massively increased food production worldwide and won Nobel peace prize.

• genetically modified high-yielding, disease-resistant crops, wheat, corn, and rice, utilizing modern agricultural practices, including synthetic fertilizers, pesticides, and intensive irrigation systems.

• staunch advocated for continued fertilizer and pesticide use, including DDT (banned in 1972), to sustain yields. led to environmental degradation.

the Mexican Agricultural Program (MAP)

• initiative launched by Norman Borlaug to improve agricultural productivity in Mexico, utilizing new plant breeding techniques to increase wheat yields and combat hunger, led to hybrid dwarf wheat.

• meant to reduce reliance on imports of wheat and maize and focus on production, higher yield per acre, but relied on vast quantities of fertilizers and pesticides.

• funded by the Rockefeller Foundation from 1943-1961.

Martin Luther King Jr.

• Baptist minister and the preeminent leader of the American civil rights movement from the mid-1950s until his death in 1968, advocated for nonviolent protest and Black Christianity ideals.

• president of MAI, coordinated the year-long Montgomery Bus Boycott (1955-56). helped crated Southern Christian Leadership Conference (SCLC) in 1957.

• Birmingham Campaign Marches (1963), March on Washington & I Have A Dream Speech (1963), Selma-to-Montgomery marches (1965) prompted President Johnson to sign Voting Rights Act of 1965.

Rosa Parks

• African American civil rights activist known for igniting the Montgomery Bus Boycott by refusing to give up her seat on a segregated bus on December 1, 1955.

• her arrest led to the formation of the Montgomery Improvement Association (MIA), which coordinated a year-long boycott of the city’s buses.

• the boycott ended December 20, 1956 when the Supreme Court ordered the integration of the public transportation system.

Student Nonviolent Coordinating Committee (SNCC)

• wave of student-led direct action, such as the 1960 Greensboro sit-ins, represented a new, younger, and more confrontational student-led approach to activism.

• summer 1964, SNCC and Congress of Racial Equality (CORE) launch Freedom Summer in Mississippi to register African American voters and establish schools in a state with a notorious history of racial discrimination.

• by late 1960s, frustrated by slow progress, leader Stokely Carmichael turned org away from nonviolence and interracial roots, began advocating for "Black Power," focusing exclusively on cultivating Black institutions and interests.

Fannie Lou Hamer

• known for her powerful speeches and role in the Mississippi Freedom Democratic Party, advocating for racial justice, equality, and voting rights in the 1960s.

• outspoken leader in Mississippi and spoke at the 1964 Democratic convention in Atlantic City, exposing the injustices faced by Black voters trying to cast their ballot.

• she challenged that the Mississippi electorate had to be all white.

Betty Friedan

• feminist and author of "The Feminine Mystique," (1963) which sparked the second wave of feminism, critiquing the idealized domesticity of the suburban housewife as an unfulfilling and lonely lifestyle.

• co-founder of the National Organization for Women (NOW) (1966), a less radical movement challenging gender roles and ending discrimination in the workplace, the right to an abortion, and federal and state support for childcare.

• argued unhappiness was not a personal failing or a problem with individual marriages, but rather a systemic social issue. primarily represented the views of white middle-class and elite women who did not work out of necessity.

American Indian Movement (AIM)

• Red Power Movement civil rights group that utilized direct action and militant rhetoric to advocate for indigenous rights. since 1973 tribes have used court system to hold Government accountable for broken treaties.

• 1972 Trail of Broken Treaties Caravan had members drive all across the country from the West Coast to D.C. to protest broken government promises and treaties.

• in 1973 200 Sioux members occupied Wounded Knee, resulting in federal government reexamining treaty rights, with indigenous people not as an ethnicity but a sovereign nation.

Phyllis Schlafly

• prominent conservative Catholic activist who became a leading figure in the New Right and the religious right during the 1970s, known for her defeat of the popular Equal Rights Amendment (ERA).

• founded the organization STOP ERA (an acronym for "Stop Taking Our Privileges") to halt its ratification in the states. argued would undermine traditional gender roles, family values, and motherhood.

• she successfully lobbied legislators and organized large counter-rallies for the rights of "millions of happily married women," shifting the political tide until the amendment expired in 1982.

Richard Nixon

• 37th POTUS (1969-1974), who won the 1968 election by appealing to the "silent majority" of middle-class Americans who were anxious about the social upheavals, antiwar protests, and late 1960s urban riots. ultimately moderate.

• strategy of détente, pulling out of Vietnam (1973), seeking to stabilize the international system by thawing relations with Cold War rivals, and China's allies had to assume responsibility for their own defense.

• unauthorized bombings of communist supply lines in Cambodia and Laos, sparking massive domestic protests, forced to resign following the Watergate Scandal, the 1972 DNC break-in and subsequent cover-up.

The Moral Majority

• political organization founded in 1979 by Baptist minister Jerry Falwell. it mobilized evangelicals to bring conservative religious principles into the political mainstream. registered 2 million Reagan voters in 1980.

• "pro-life, pro-family, pro-morality, and pro-American" platform to combat what its members "permissive" liberal culture and an increase in public immoral behavior.

• revival of the country by standing against the Equal Rights Amendment, feminist and homosexual revolution, opposing abortion, and upholding traditional family values and Christian principles, including school prayer.

Jimmy Carter

• 39th POTUS (1977-81), reacted to the economic and energy crisis by asking Americans to consume less self-indulgence and lower their expectations that the American government and welfare would solve everything.

• presided over a period of high inflation and economic/wage stagnation, and an energy crisis in 1979 when the Iranian Revolution overthrew the US-backed king and cut off oil imports to the United States.

• successful negotiating between Israel and Egypt on the Camp David Accords, but fumbled the Iran Hostage Crisis, in which 52 Americans were held for 444 days. massively unpopular by the 1980 election.

Organization of Petroleum Exporting Countries (OPEC)

• cartel of 12 member countries that make up the world’s leading oil producers and created the first American energy crisis following the 1973 Oil Embargo as retaliation for American military intervention in the Middle East.

• by the end of 1973, the global price of oil had quadrupled, and stagflation ensued through Nixon, Ford, and Carter’s presidencies (1981).

Ronald Reagan

• 40th POTUS (1981-89), leader of the New Right, traditional values, and free-market Reaganomics to reduce government intervention in the economy, including 1981 tax cut and tax reform act of 1986.

• implemented supply-side economics “Reagonomics”, cutting taxes for corporations and wealthy individuals to encourage investment and "trickle down" to create jobs and higher wages. most just benefited the rich.

• Soviet Union as evil empire, but made peace w/Gorbachev, national debt nearly tripled due to the combination of tax cuts and military spending, indifferent towards AIDS epidemic, illegally sold missiles to Iran in Iran-Contra affair.

Geroge W. Bush

• 43rd POTUS (2001-09), barely won through SC decision. after 9/11, he initiated the War on Terror, the Bush Doctrine gave the US the right to unilaterally and preemptively make war on any regime or terrorist organization.

• include Operation Enduring Freedom invasion of Afghanistan (2001) to topple the Taliban, and invasion of Iraq (2003) due to weapons of mass destruction, which were never actually found.

• massive tax cuts, No Child Left Behind education reform, and Medicare prescription drug benefits, but faced criticism for handling of Hurricane Katrina and the financial crisis of 2008, and bailing out banks.

Jim Hansen

• climate scientist known for his research on climate change and advocacy for policies to mitigate global warming.

• testified before Congress in 1988, warning about the dangers of greenhouse gas emissions and is often referred to as one of the first scientists to alert the public to climate change.

• he was one of the first to analyze global temperature variations from 1880 to 1985. found human activity as a primary driver of climate change.