TEACHING with DOCUMENTS the Twentieth Century: 1946-2001 TEACHING with DOCUMENTS the Twentieth Century: 1946-2001
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TEACHING WITH DOCUMENTS The Twentieth Century: 1946-2001 TEACHING WITH DOCUMENTS The Twentieth Century: 1946-2001 A Selection of Units for Middle School and High School Made possible through a grant from the William E. Simon Foundation New York • 2018 Timeline Illustration Credits: Top row, left to right: Berlin Airlift airplane being loaded with supplies, August 18, 1948 (Harry S. Truman Library and Museum); Greyhound bus carrying Freedom Riders attacked by a white mob outside Anniston, Alabama, May 14, 1961 (Birmingham Civil Rights Institute); Lyndon B. Johnson taking the oath of office on Air Force One, photograph by Cecil W. Stoughton, November 22, 1963 (Lyndon B. Johnson Presidential Library); Near Woodstock, photograph by Ric Manning, August 18, 1969 (Creative Commons BY 3.0); Sandra Day O’Connor, painting by Jean Marcellino, 2006 (National Portrait Gallery, Smithsonian Institution, gift of Jean Marcellino); Cleanup after the Exxon Valdez oil spill, Prince William Sound, Alaska, May 11, 1989 (National Archives and Records Administration); Remains of the World Trade Center in New York City, photograph by Paul Morse, September 14, 2001 (George W. Bush Presidential Library and Museum). Bottom row, left to right: Nurse with patient in J. H. Emerson iron lung, ca. 1950 (National Museum of Health and Medicine); Hawaii Statehood air mail stamp, 1959 (National Postal Museum, Smithsonian Institution); President Lyndon B. Johnson signing the Civil Rights Act of 1964 (Lyndon B. Johnson Presidential Library); Chairman Mao and President Nixon in China, February 29, 1972 (Richard Nixon Library and Museum); “Home is where you dig” [sign over the fighting bunker of Private First Class Edward, Private First Class Falls, and Private First Class Morgan of the 1st Battalion, 7th Regiment, during Operation Worth, Vietnam], 1968 (National Archives and Records Administration); Ronald Reagan and Mikhail Gorbachev in Washington, DC, December 8, 1987 (Ronald Reagan Presidential Library and Museum); President George H. W. Bush in Saudi Arabia, November 22, 1990 (George Bush Presidential Library and Museum). To learn more, visit gilderlehrman.org. ISBN 978-1-932821-95-6 © 2018 The Gilder Lehrman Institute of American History l 49 West 45th Street, Second Floor l New York, New York 10036 gilderlehrman.org Cover Image: Buzz Aldrin on the moon, July 20, 1969 (NASA) Contents Preface _________________________________________________ 5 A Historical Introduction to the Twentieth Century: 1946–2001 ___ 6 The Origins of the Cold War ________________________________ 9 America’s First Ladies on Twentieth-Century Social Issues _______ 25 Martin Luther King Jr.’s “I Have a Dream” Speech ______________ 41 Going to the Moon: Science Fiction v. Science History __________ 57 The Lessons and Legacy of the Vietnam War __________________ 75 The Fall of the Berlin War _________________________________ 91 Osama Bin Laden’s Declaration of Jihad against Americans _____ 107 Timeline: The Twentieth Century: 1946–2001 ______________Pocket TEACHING WITH DOCUMENTS The Twentieth Century: 1946-2001 5 Preface This book, Teaching with Documents: The Twentieth The Gilder Lehrman Institute of American History was Century: 1946–2001, covers seven important themes in the founded in 1994 by philanthropists Richard Gilder and Lewis second half of the twentieth century, from the foundations of Lehrman to improve history education in K–12 schools and the Cold War at the end of World War II and the civil rights to make history accessible to every student. Our programs and women’s rights movements through the Vietnam War center on the belief that knowledge and understanding and the 9/11 attacks in 2001. Documents and graphic and of American history set students on a course of ongoing multimedia materials include speeches, letters, articles, intellectual inquiry, engaged citizenship, and achievement. photographs, cartoons, paintings, and video clips. To that end, we develop resources for teachers as well as students, among them the TLTH programs, teacher Over the past twenty years, the Gilder Lehrman Institute seminars, online courses, an online master’s degree program of American History has worked with history, social in American History and an AP US History Study Guide. Our studies, and English language arts teachers at every level website provides American history content, including essays to introduce primary sources in classrooms across the and videos by leading scholars, primary source documents country. Close reading of such texts not only builds content for all eras in American history, teaching resources, and knowledge but also supports a variety of pedagogical classroom materials. strategies. The Gilder Lehrman Institute’s Teaching with Documents series is designed to help educators use Teaching with Documents is the newest addition to our compelling primary source documents to build integrated classroom-ready materials. The Gilder Lehrman Institute literacy skills that will directly impact student understanding continually strives to enrich its offerings for teachers. Visit and performance. Those skills include our website, gilderlehrman.org, to learn more about our programs and resources—and sign up to get updates! • Writing based on textual evidence • Developing vocabulary Tim Bailey, Director of Education The Gilder Lehrman Institute of American History • Analyzing documents and graphic materials • Unlocking primary source documents through Acknowledgments: scaffolded shared-reading strategies The publication of this book, Teaching with Documents: The • Attaining a better understanding of complex Twentieth Century: 1946–2001, has been made possible by a primary sources through text-based questioning grant from the William E. Simon Foundation. • Interacting in a dynamic classroom environment • Studying literature and multimedia elements Contributors to the volume include Tim Bailey, Director integrated into social studies content of Education, Gilder Lehrman Institute; Ron Nash, Senior Education Fellow, Gilder Lehrman Institute; and Toby Developing such teaching units is one part of Teaching Smith, Master Teacher, Gilder Lehrman Institute. Together, Literacy through History™ (TLTH), the Gilder Lehrman they have more than 70 years of experience teaching Institute’s comprehensive professional development program American history to middle and high school students and for educators. The program takes an interdisciplinary they are leaders in developing innovative ways to integrate approach to classroom instruction. The Institute conducts primary sources in the classroom. TLTH programming in school districts across the United States, offering workshops with master teachers, seminars As always, we thank Richard Gilder and Lewis Lehrman, with eminent historians, and classroom-ready curriculum whose generosity and vision make possible all programs at materials. the Gilder Lehrman Institute. © 2018 The Gilder Lehrman Institute of American History, New York 6 TEACHING WITH DOCUMENTS The Twentieth Century: 1946-2001 A Historical Introduction to the Twentieth Century: 1946–2001 The second half of the twentieth century was a time of Russia’s approval—invaded South Korea, precipitating an amazing achievements as well as bitter conflicts; as man first immediate American response. The Korean War was the first set foot on the moon, war raged in Vietnam. This period in open military conflagration of the Cold War. And in 1955, history also saw a new world order evolve into the Cold War. when NATO accepted the Federal Republic of Germany as a These monumental shifts began with World War II. The war member, Russia formed the Warsaw Pact to prevent future cast America onto the world stage as a mighty economic invasions of Soviet territory and tighten control over Eastern and military giant. It rescued the country from the Great Europe. Depression, created full employment, and for the first time Cold War anticommunism was not limited to foreign in a generation increased real income for American workers. policy. From the hearings of the House Unamerican Moreover, the poorest 40 percent of the population saw its Activities Committee (HUAC) in the immediate postwar share of the national income grow, while the top 5 percent years to the launching of McCarthyism in 1950, fear of witnessed a decline. Technology boomed, and the computer domestic communism dominated political discourse in the age began. African Americans and women experienced more United States. Both Democrats and Republicans celebrated dramatic change than they had in decades. And the contours American democracy and capitalism; they agreed there were of postwar diplomacy took shape in response to issues no fundamental problems with American society, and that dividing the Western Allies from the Soviet Union. Although any problems that did exist could be solved by incremental the war lasted only four years for the United States, its reform. The anchor of this consensus was anticommunism, impact endured for generations. both as a foreign policy toward the Soviet Union and as a Domestically, the war triggered massive social changes. political stance rejecting left-of-center politics. More than 6.5 million women took jobs for the first time, In spite of this political consensus, the Civil Rights increasing the female labor force by 57 percent. African Movement surged forward in the postwar years, creating Americans joined the Armed Forces in record numbers, and the foundation for a decade of rapidly expanding protest. two million left