Assignment: American Society in the Cold War Era

Complete both parts of this assignment.

Part A: American Culture and Society in the 50s

From the following two lists, choose five events from each column. Identify the basic facts, dates, and purpose of the event in two to three sentences in the Identify column. Include why the event is significant in the significance column, and add a reference for your material in the reference column.

Fabulous 50s Culture
The Hula Hoop
Disneyland
McDonalds
The Mickey Mouse Club
Interstate Highways
Dishwashers
Drive-in Theaters
Levittown
Leave it to Beaver
I Love Lucy
American Bandstand
Elvis Presley
Chuck Berry
James Dean
Beats
Reverand Billy Graham
Cold War Society
Red Scare
House Committee on Un-American Activities (HUAC)
Ronald Reagan (President of the Screen Actors Guild, not as the future U.S. president)
Senator Joseph McCarthy
Fallout Shelter
Duck and Cover Drill
CIA
Sputnik
Cuba and Fidel Castro
Cold War Propaganda
Alger Hiss
The Korean War
Julius and Ethel Rosenberg

Event Identify Significance Reference

Part B: Select and complete one of the following:

Option 1: Cold War Soviet Spy
Option 2: Red Scare and McCarthyism

Option 1: Cold War Soviet Spy

For this assignment, imagine you are a Soviet (USSR) spy during the 1950s Cold War-era. You have been instructed to write an encrypted letter to your Soviet contact explaining the recent past and current U.S. Cold War policies, events, and practices. Once you have completed this letter, you will mail it to your contact in Paris, so he or she, in turn, will forward the message to a KGB agent in Moscow.

Resource: Historical and Scholarly Sources

Review the Historical and Scholarly document in this week's reading.

Complete a thorough investigation on actual Soviet Spies in the 1950s. You may use your textbook, primary and secondary sources, scholarly sources, and newspapers/magazines.

Create a letter of 750 words. You may use the letter template below.

Include at least five of the following events/policies:

• NATO
• The Marshall Plan
• Warsaw Pact
• The Truman Doctrine
• National Security Council Document Number 68 (NSC-68)
• Korean War
• The Office of Strategic Services (OSS)
• Central Intelligence Agency (CIA)
• Containment
• Eisenhower Doctrine
• Hungarian Revolution
• American U-2 Spy plan (1960)

Include one source for this assignment.

Format the text of your letter consistent with appropriate course-level APA guidelines.

Option 2: Red Scare and McCarthyism

In this scenario, you are a set designer for a Hollywood movie production company in 1952. You decide to write a letter to the editor of the Los Angeles Times against Senator Joseph's McCarthy's anti-communist pursuit of the entertainment industry in Hollywood.

Review the required reading on the Red Scare and McCarthyism.

Write a 750word letter to the editor.

Include many of the following terms in your essay:

• Hollywood Blacklist
• Ronald Reagan's HUAC testimony (1947)
• House Un-American Activities Committee
• Senator Joseph McCarthy
• Richard Nixon
• The Fifth Amendment
• Screen Actors Guild
• The Hollywood Ten
• Screen Writers Guild

Include one source besides your textbook.

Format the text of your letter consistent with appropriate course-level APA guidelines.

[Your street address]
[Your city]
[Your postcode]

[Day, Month, Year]

[Name and title of recipient]

Embassy of the Soviet Union
40-50 Boulevard Lannes
75116 Paris, France

Dear [recipient's name and title]

[Main body should be 700-1000 words and include five events/policies listed above]

Yours sincerely,
[Name]

References.