Snoopy, Charlie Brown and the rest of the Peanuts gang premiered in a comic strip by Charles Schulz in 1950

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Mickey Mantle joined  the New York Yankees in 1952.  The Yankees won the World Series that year, 4-2

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Dick Clark hosted the first American Bandstand in 1952.

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The first birth control pill was introduced in 1952, although it would not be available to the public for another 8 years.

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20 million households had television sets in 1953, up from under a 1 million in 1949.

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Elvis Presley recorded "That's All Right Mama" and several other singles in 1954.

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Ray Kroc bought out a hamburger franchise from McDonald brothers in 1955 and launched the empire of golden arches.  Harland Sanders began his Kentucky Fried Chicken franchise the same year.

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Disneyland, the first theme park in America opened in 1955

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Dr. Seuss published the captivating "The Cat in the Hat", a classic in children's literature, in 1957.

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American Express, Visa and the BankAmericard all appeared in 1958.

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The Guggenheim Museum designed by Frank Lloyd Wright opened in New York City in 1959

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The U. S. S. R. set off an international, space age buzz when it launched a rocket with two monkeys on board in 1959.

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The play "A Raisin in the Sun," directed by 29 year old Lorraine Hansberry in 1958, was a tale of the modern African American family.

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Rosa Parks refused to move to the back of the bus in 1955, and in 1956 a bus boycott organized by Martin Luther King brought the young preacher into the national eye.

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Elvis Presley topped the charts with "Love Me Tender," "Hound Dog" and "Heartbreak Hotel" in 1956

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Sugar "Ray" Robinson won the world boxing championship over Carl "Bobo" Olson in 1955.

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Francis Crick and James Watson discovered the "double helix" of DNA in 1953

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Baseball legend Hank Aaron began his career by joining the Milwaukee Braves in 1954.

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Republican Dwight D. Eisenhower was elected president in 1952.  Richard Nixon served as his Vice President.

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J. D. Salinger published "The Catcher in the Rye" in 1951.

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Power steering was introduced by the Chrysler Corporation in 1951

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A black bear cub was burned and orphaned in a New Mexico forest fire in 1950.  It was nursed back to health, and "Smokey the Bear" became the signal for forest fire prevention.

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Urbanization spilled into suburbia in 1950.  Over the next decade, land values increased, sometimes up to 3000%, in prime suburban neighborhoods, where population increased by 44%.

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North Korea invaded South Korea, sparking the Korean War in 1950

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Maureen Connolly became the youngest woman to win the US Open in tennis in 1951

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In musical theater, "The King and I" by Richard Rodgers and Oscar Hammerstein, hit Broadway in 1951.

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Rocky Marciano beat "Jersey" Joe Walcott to win the world heavyweight boxing championship in 1952.

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Josep Tito became president of liberal Communist state Yugoslavia in 1953

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African American novelist James Balwin published his first novel "Go Tell It On The Mountain" in 1953

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Vietnam was divided into northern and southern regions in 1954

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In Brown vs. Board of Education of Topeka, Kansas the Supreme Court ruled unanimously that racial segregation violated the 14th Amendment to the Constitution in 1954

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President Eisenhower applied his "domino theory" to Southeast Asia in 1954.