1st+in+History


 * Historical Firsts and other reminders … **

Enter **Mr. Potato Head**, the first toy ever advertised on Television , and released in 1952.

1955 [|1955: Harlow H. Curtice]  Helped steer U.S. into new age of wide-open affluence Disneyland first opens  for business in California  James Dean is killed in his new sports car

=== Jonas Salk invented a polio vaccine  which was given to more than seven million American students. === Songs: Rock Around the Clock Maybellene Sixteen Tons I Hear You Knockin’

=== [|1956: Hungarian Patriot] Launched <span style="color: black; font-family: 'Times New Roman',serif; font-size: 14.5pt;">first revolt <span style="color: black; font-family: 'Times New Roman',serif; font-size: 10.5pt;"> behind Soviet's "Iron Curtain" === <span style="color: black; font-family: Arial,sans-serif; font-size: 10pt;">solar powered wrist watch was invented. <span style="font-family: Arial,sans-serif; font-size: 10pt;">Songs: Heart Break Hotel Don't Be Cruel The Green Door Blue Suede Shoes Blueberry Hill Be-Bop-A-Lula
 * <span style="color: black; font-family: Arial,sans-serif; font-size: 10pt;">Summer Olympics - Melbourne, Australia **

<span style="color: blue; font-family: Arial,sans-serif; font-size: 10.5pt;">[|1957: Nikita Khrushchev] <span style="color: black; font-family: 'Times New Roman',serif; font-size: 10.5pt;">Scored an immense propaganda victory over U.S. with launch of Sputnik <span style="font-family: Arial,sans-serif; font-size: 10pt;">Tomorrowland in Disneyland opens; [|Elvis appears in his first motion picture], __<span style="font-family: Arial,sans-serif; font-size: 10pt;">Love Me Tender. __ <span style="font-family: Arial,sans-serif; font-size: 10pt;">Songs: Jail House Rock, Chances Are, Bye Bye Love, All Shook Up, That'll Be The Day, You Send Me

<span style="color: blue; font-family: Arial,sans-serif; font-size: 10.5pt;">[|1958: Charles De Gaulle] <span style="color: black; font-family: 'Times New Roman',serif; font-size: 10.5pt;">Crisis in Algeria brought WWII hero back to power in France <span style="font-family: 'Times New Roman',serif; font-size: 10pt;">the <span style="font-family: 'Times New Roman',serif; font-size: 13.5pt;">first plastic Coke bottle appeared <span style="font-family: 'Times New Roman',serif; font-size: 10pt;">.
 * <span style="color: black; font-family: Arial,sans-serif; font-size: 10pt;">The Hula Hoop **<span style="color: black; font-family: Arial,sans-serif; font-size: 10pt;"> started in Australia as an exercise ring ( made of Bamboo ), a small American toy company Wham-O saw the hoop and made it in plastic and introduced it in 1958 renamed it the Hula-Hoop and it became an instant success with children and parents making it the success of the year.

<span style="font-family: Arial,sans-serif; font-size: 10pt;">Songs: At The Hop, It's All in the Game, Get a Job, To Know Him is to Love Him, Great Balls of Fire

<span style="color: blue; font-family: Arial,sans-serif; font-size: 10.5pt;">[|1959: Dwight D. Eisenhower] <span style="color: black; font-family: 'Times New Roman',serif; font-size: 10.5pt;">Rallied NATO allies by facing up to high-flying Khrushchev <span style="color: black; font-family: Arial,sans-serif; font-size: 13.5pt;">First released in 1959, Barbie Dolls <span style="color: black; font-family: Arial,sans-serif; font-size: 10pt;"> only grew over the years.

The first diet cola sold.
<span style="font-family: Arial,sans-serif; font-size: 10pt;">Popular movies were __<span style="font-family: Arial,sans-serif; font-size: 10pt;">Pillow Talk __<span style="font-family: Arial,sans-serif; font-size: 10pt;"> and __<span style="font-family: Arial,sans-serif; font-size: 10pt;">Rio Bravo __<span style="font-family: Arial,sans-serif; font-size: 10pt;">; Family Circus comic first appears; __<span style="font-family: Arial,sans-serif; font-size: 10pt;">Bye, Bye Birdie __<span style="font-family: Arial,sans-serif; font-size: 10pt;"> appears on Broadway <span style="font-family: Arial,sans-serif; font-size: 10pt;">Songs: Mack the Knife, Sleep Walk, Mr. Blue, Donna, My Happiness

<span style="color: blue; font-family: Arial,sans-serif; font-size: 10.5pt;">[|1960: U.S. Scientists] <span style="color: black; font-family: 'Times New Roman',serif; font-size: 10.5pt;">Scored inpressive gains while struggling to keep pace with Soviets <span style="color: black; font-family: Arial,sans-serif; font-size: 10pt;">In the realm of board games, ingenuity continued to develop and games like **Operation** arrived, utilizing a simple electric board concept to buzz a losing player for missing their goal. **Etch-a-sketch** made its <span style="color: black; font-family: Arial,sans-serif; font-size: 13.5pt;">first appearance <span style="color: black; font-family: Arial,sans-serif; font-size: 10pt;"> in 1960. <span style="color: black; font-family: Arial,sans-serif; font-size: 10pt;">The <span style="color: black; font-family: Arial,sans-serif; font-size: 13.5pt;">first debate for a presidential election was televised <span style="color: black; font-family: Arial,sans-serif; font-size: 10pt;">. It was between Senator John F. Kennedy and Richard M. Nixon. Nixon seemed nervous, but Kennedy stood tall. The debate on TV changed many people's minds about Kennedy. <span style="color: black; font-family: Arial,sans-serif; font-size: 10pt;">This year NASA sent up ECHO, the <span style="color: black; font-family: Arial,sans-serif; font-size: 13.5pt;">first communications satellite to be seen with the naked eye <span style="color: black; font-family: Arial,sans-serif; font-size: 10pt;">. <span style="color: black; font-family: Arial,sans-serif; font-size: 10pt;">American "U2" spy plane shot down over the USSR.
 * <span style="color: black; font-family: Arial,sans-serif; font-size: 13.5pt;">Summer Olympics - Rome, Italy -- First Televised **

<span style="color: blue; font-family: Arial,sans-serif; font-size: 10.5pt;">[|1961: John F. Kennedy] <span style="color: black; font-family: 'Times New Roman',serif; font-size: 10.5pt;">Won battle for White House against Richard Nixon in squeaker <span style="color: black; font-family: Arial,sans-serif; font-size: 10pt;">John F Kennedy moves into the White House. He gives his famous speech - "Ask not what your country can do for you, but what you can do for your country." <span style="color: black; font-family: Arial,sans-serif; font-size: 10pt;">The <span style="color: black; font-family: Arial,sans-serif; font-size: 13.5pt;">soviets have sent the first man into space <span style="color: black; font-family: Arial,sans-serif; font-size: 10pt;"> and the Americans need a man in space, too. The event came on May 5, 1961. Alan Shepard was sent to space in the "Freedom 7". On May 25, Kennedy wanted to have a man on the moon and back before the decade was over.

<span style="color: blue; font-family: Arial,sans-serif; font-size: 10.5pt;">[|1962: Pope John XXIII] <span style="color: black; font-family: 'Times New Roman',serif; font-size: 10.5pt;">Opened the windows of his age-old Church, sparks revolution <span style="color: black; font-family: Arial,sans-serif; font-size: 10pt;">John Glenn became the <span style="color: black; font-family: Arial,sans-serif; font-size: 13.5pt;">first man to orbit the earth - 3 times <span style="color: black; font-family: Arial,sans-serif; font-size: 10pt;">. It was a five hour flight. <span style="color: black; font-family: Arial,sans-serif; font-size: 10pt;">Rachel Carson, a scientist and writer, warned that our earth would die of pollution and chemicals. Especially chemicals that were developed to kill bad insects. DDT was a real bad chemical. It killed bad insects, along with good insects, along with plants, along with animals. She wrote the book Silent Spring with a warning. At least five states banned DDT.

<span style="color: blue; font-family: Arial,sans-serif; font-size: 10.5pt;">[|1963: Martin Luther King, Jr.] <span style="color: black; font-family: 'Times New Roman',serif; font-size: 10.5pt;">Led civil rights cause by arming troops with dreams and oratory <span style="color: black; font-family: Arial,sans-serif; font-size: 10pt;">The **Easy Bake Oven** was released in 1963 as an extension of the 1950s “homebody” image so often illustrated on TV for young girls.

<span style="color: black; font-family: Arial,sans-serif; font-size: 10pt;">Martin Luther King Jr. made the speech, "I have a Dream" on August 28, 1963. More than 200,000 peaceful demonstrators came to Washington DC to demand equal rights for Black and Whites. Part of the speech was - "I have a dream that my four little children will one day live in a nation where they will not be judged by the color of their skin but by the content of their character…" <span style="color: black; font-family: Arial,sans-serif; font-size: 10pt;">President Kennedy is assassinated in Dallas, Texas on November 22. Kennedy's assassin, Lee Harvey Oswald, was never sent to trial. While being moved by police to a different jail, a man named Jack Ruby shot Oswald. Who killed President Kennedy nobody knows for sure.

<span style="color: blue; font-family: Arial,sans-serif; font-size: 10.5pt;">[|1964: Lyndon Johnson] <span style="color: black; font-family: 'Times New Roman',serif; font-size: 10.5pt;">President began to forge his Great Society <span style="color: black; font-family: Arial,sans-serif; font-size: 10pt;">The Beatles, a British rock and roll band became VERY popular. The "Fab Four", John, Paul, George, and Ringo, were played on radio stations all over the world. They were seen on the "Ed Sullivan Show". They performed concerts that were quickly sold out. All the frenzy over the group became known as "Beatlemania", which was only the beginning. <span style="color: black; font-family: Arial,sans-serif; font-size: 10pt;">This was the <span style="color: black; font-family: Arial,sans-serif; font-size: 13.5pt;">[|first year the cigarette boxes had a warning printed] <span style="color: black; font-family: Arial,sans-serif; font-size: 10pt;"> on it "Smoking can be hazardous to your health". It had not occurred to the US government to give the warning that smoking lead to cancer and lung problems. <span style="color: black; font-family: Arial,sans-serif; font-size: 10pt;">The <span style="color: black; font-family: Arial,sans-serif; font-size: 13.5pt;">[|first Civil Rights bill was passed to stop racial discrimination] <span style="color: black; font-family: Arial,sans-serif; font-size: 10pt;">.
 * <span style="color: black; font-family: Arial,sans-serif; font-size: 13.5pt;">GI Joe **<span style="color: black; font-family: Arial,sans-serif; font-size: 13.5pt;">, first released in 1964 <span style="color: black; font-family: Arial,sans-serif; font-size: 10pt;"> is considered one of the biggest toys of the decade. The simple doll formula that had been successful in every decade before it was turned to the military and the imaginations of young boys. The result was a toy which found great success after decades of military operation and going into the Vietnam era.
 * <span style="color: black; font-family: Arial,sans-serif; font-size: 10pt;">Summer Olympics - Tokyo, Japan **

<span style="color: blue; font-family: Arial,sans-serif; font-size: 10.5pt;">[|1965: Gen. William Westmoreland] <span style="color: black; font-family: 'Times New Roman',serif; font-size: 10.5pt;">Oversaw struggling U.S. grunts in Vietnam <span style="color: black; font-family: Arial,sans-serif; font-size: 10pt;">The world's <span style="color: black; font-family: Arial,sans-serif; font-size: 13.5pt;">first roofed stadium was built, the Houston Astrodome <span style="color: black; font-family: Arial,sans-serif; font-size: 10pt;">.