US History II

This unit will bring us up to the present, with a special focus on the 1960s and 1970s, and a project that makes you the historian of an event in recent history. The main chapters for this unit are 28 and 31, with the online quiz covering chapters 29-30. There are 2 SkillBuilders and a project in addition to the quiz. The unit exam will take place during the scheduled final exam period, even though it is not a comprehensive final.

Mon 4/15 No Class – Patriot’s Day

Wed 4/17 Liberalism’s High Tide and War in Vietnam. Reading ACH Ch 28 p. 848-863.

Fri 4/19 Days of Rage, 1968-1972. Reading ACH Ch 28 p. 863-870. SkillBuilder #7 due.

Mon 4/22 Watergate. Reading ACH Ch 28 p. 870-876.

Wed 4/24 Workshop Day – the Sixties. Review ACH Ch 28 & bring the Fernlund book to class.

Fri 4/26 Search for Order in an Era of Limits. Reading ACH Ch 29 (skim). Quiz #4 opens online (Chapter 29-30, closes on 5/3). SkillBuilder #8 due.

Mon 4/29 History Now Project Workshop. No assigned reading.

Wed 5/1 End of the Cold War and Globalization. Reading ACH Ch 30-31 p. 931-949.
Useful link: Maps of the World (University of Texas Libraries)
Also: Happy May Day – it’s a BIG DEAL around the world!

Fri 5/3 – no class today – make sure you’ve taken the online quiz before it closes 9:00 am

Mon 5/6 In Our Century. Reading: ACH Ch 31 p. 962-974. History Now Project Due.
Useful link: What’s your “Bubble” Score?

Exam #4: 5/10 8:30 am for the 8:30 class, and 5/13 8:30 am for the 9:30 class

Online Sources:

“15 Minutes with Levitt of Levittown,” Pageant Magazine, April 1952, 82-87. (Source: OldMagazineArticles.com)

Good Housekeeping Magazine – full issues, focus only on 1945-1950. Source: Cornell University Library.

Billboard Magazine – full issues, focus only on 1945 – 1963. Source: Billboard.

Civil Defense Brochures of the Kennedy Era. (Source: PopCult)

I will be on campus for my regular office hours today but class is cancelled.

Please review Chapter 26 in preparation for our workshop on Wednesday 4/10. The Exam 3 study guide is here.

Also remember that the online Quiz (Chapter 27) is open now on Blackboard, and closes on Friday morning 4/12. Since that’s our exam day, you want to make sure you take care of it early in the week so it doesn’t interfere with your exam studying.

Thanks, and see you Wednesday!
Prof. Hangen

Mon 4/1 – Cold War America. Reading: ACH Ch 25 (skim/take notes on entire chapter) 

Wed 4/3 – Workshop Day: McCarthyism. Review ACH Ch 24-25 – BRING LAPTOPS, please

Fri 4/5 – The Middle Class Triumphant. Reading ACH Ch 26 p. 787-806. Quiz opens up, on Chapter 27. SkillBuilder #6 due. Exam study guide will be handed out.

Mon 4/8 – Gender, Sex and the Family in the ’50s. Reading: ACH Ch 26 p. 807-815

Wed 4/10 – Workshop Day: the Suburbs. Review ACH Ch 26

Fri 4/12 – Exam #3 in class. Online Quiz closes at 9:00 am.

Photo: consider the “nuclear” family (in both senses of the word) at the lively blog Envisioning the American Dream – perfect for this unit!

1954 trailer for THEM!

“I have in my hand…”

Anticommunism dominated American politics and culture in the late 1940s and early 1950s. The name of the junior senator from Wisconsin, Joseph McCarthy, has since become synonymous with the entire Second Red Scare era, although his own political career peak was only from 1950 to 1954. McCarthyism seemed to many a kind of cultural hysteria, a madness, infecting Congress and Washington, Hollywood, workplaces, and public life. To others, it was a deadly earnest effort to keep America free from subversion and potential nuclear annihilation.

Inspired by the NCAA tournament (March Madness), today’s workshop is a Sweet Sixteen bracket of primary sources relating to Senator McCarthy and McCarthyism. Who will dominate?

Working in groups, you have ten minutes to decide the winner between various sets of primary sources by trying to convince the other team your document is more important/interesting/useful to historians. By 15 past the hour, we will have our champion #1 source of the McCarthy era.

Remember to use your primary source analysis skills as you build your case: Who wrote or made this? When? Why? What does it say? What does it NOT say? What point of view or political ideology does it express? How could historians use it now; what message does it provide about McCarthy or his cultural context?

Some of the documents are in paper form, others you’ll need to access online:

Herblock Cartoons (pick ONE winner in the first round from your assigned group of 3)

Newsman Edward R. Murrow’s closing oratory for his TV show “See it Now” March 9, 1954

1952 Wisconsin Republican Primary Campaign Brochure, “What Has McCarthy Done for Wisconsin?”

Senate Censure of Joseph McCarthy (1954)