Meet The Press
Meet the Press has had the longest run of any television program in the United States. Although it began as a Saturday night program moderated by the charmingly Southern-accented Martha Rountree, it ultimately became a popular NBC Sunday morning show hosted by a...
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Brigadoon
Brigadoon, a musical by Alan Jay Lerner and Frederick Loewe, premiered on Broadway in 1947 and ran for 581 performances. A 1954 film version starred Gene Kelly and Cyd Charisse, and a 1966 television version starred Robert Goulet and Peter Falk. In the show, the...
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Kon-Tiki
Inspired by reports from Spanish Conquistadors of Inca rafts, native legends and archaeological evidence suggesting contact between South America and Polynesia, the Norwegian explorer and writer Thor Heyerdahl. made a balsa wood raft journey across the Pacific Ocean...
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Candid Camera
In 1947 Allen Funt broadcast The Candid Microphone radio show, featuring practical jokes and situations, on ABC radio. From 1948 -1954 CANDID MICROPHONE, hosted by Allen Funt, were produced by Ben and George Blake of the Columbia Movie Shorts Department. As a...
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Hollywood Black List
In October 1947 the House Un-American Activities Committee (created in 1938) re-convened in Washington D.C. for public hearings on alleged communist infiltration within the American motion picture industry. 50 top Hollywood executives decided to suspend those who...
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Post-WWII USSR
Here is an optimistic view of postwar relationships between Great Britain and the USSR. To get a sense of life in the USSR in 1947 it's worth fast forwarding through these interesting, rather upbeat color scenes of everyday life. You don't need to no Russian to...
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Jackie Robinson
Joining the Brooklyn Dodgers in 1947, Jackie Robinson became the first African-American in major league baseball. CAREER BATTING STATISTICS YEAR TEAM GP AB R H 2B 3B HR RBI BB SO SB CS AVG OBP SLG OPS WAR 1947 BKN 151 590 125 175 31 5 12 48 74 36 29 0 .297 .383 .427...
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Billy Graham
William Franklin Graham Jr. (1918 –2018) was an American Southern Baptist evangelist who held huge rallies, broadcasting sermons on radio and television from 1947 until his retirement in 2005. Graham repudiated racial segregation and emphasized the relationship...
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Partition of India
The 1947 partition of India into Hindu and Muslim majorities divided three provinces: Assam, Bengal and the Punjab. The division of >14 million people according to religious beliefs resulted in large-scale violence, with varying estimates between several...
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Groucho Marx
Julius Henry "Groucho" Marx (October 2, 1890 – August 19, 1977) was an American comedian with a devilishly-quick wit and and somewhat off-color humor. Marx had a long stage and screen career, making 13 feature films with his brothers. Groucho walked with an...
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Bazooka Bubble Gum
Packaged in red, white and blue, Bazooka bubble gum was first marketed in 1947 by the Topps Company of New York. In 1953 Bazooka packaging began to include small comic strips featuring a character known as Bazooka Joe (although I remember the boy named "Pud" from...
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Every Man Dies Alone
In 1947 the highly-controversial East German author Hans Fallada published Jeder Stirbt für sich Allein (Every Man Dies Alone), a novel about an ordinary married couple who, after their son was killed in action in 1942, distributed dissident postcards and leaflets in...
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Dead Sea Scrolls
In 1947 the Dead Sea Scrolls were discovered by a Bedouin at the caves of Qumran in Jordan. Although written before the Christian gospels, the scrolls contained many similarities, but also some differences from the traditional Masoretic text of the Hebrew Bible. ...
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Voice of America Calls USSR
Established in 1942 for Allied propaganda broadcasts during WWII, the Voice of America (VOA) continued broadcasts after the war aimed mostly at Western Europe. In September 1947, VOA began broadcasts aimed at the Soviet Union with: “Hello! This is New...
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Back in Time
These images seem reflective of the sense of hope and prosperity of post-WWII middle-America. I was only five years old at the time - yet many of these images seem familiar to me. How about you? ...
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Don’t Be a Sucker
This interesting War Department film from 1947, with anti-racist and anti-fascist themes, warns Americans not to let let fanaticism and hatred turn them into suckers. However, with the emerging Cold War, this rhetoric seems oddly out of synch.. In August 2017,...
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4th of July 1947
Things were looking up in 1947 observationalism.com Indo Surat.com Cost of Living 1947 The People History Average Cost of new house $6,600.00 Average wages per year $2,850.00 Cost of a gallon of Gas 15 cents Average Cost of a new car $1,300.00 Loaf of Bread 13...
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Mexican-Americans in WWII
Ethnic and racial discrimination in WWII-era America was a powerful social force. Just as the civil rights of African-Americans were restricted in the South, similar discrimination weighed heavily against many "Tejanos" of Mexican descent in the Southwest. ...
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Mickey Spillaine
Frank Morrison Spillane (March 9, 1918 – July 17, 2006), better known as Mickey Spillane, was an American cartoonist turned crime novelist, who wrote from the point of view of a private detective named Mike Hammer. "Bestselling writer of shoot-em-up crime novels" is...
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Enemy in the Mirror
Excerpts from the book: Once the shoji screen was closed, Kiyoshi said in a low voice, “It’s about the piece I submitted to the Chūō Kōron.” Fumiko took a deep breath. The Chūō Kōron was one of the few literary magazines that still dared to publish articles hinting...
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TELEVISION
Television shows in 1947 Series Debut Ended Picture Page (UK) October 8, 1936 1939 1946 1952 Starlight (UK) November 3, 1936 1939 1946 1949 For The Children (UK) April 24, 1937 1939 July 7, 1946 1950 The Voice of Firestone Televues 1943 1947 1949 1963 The World...
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Wolves at the Doorstep 1942
Somewhere between the attack on Pearl Harbor, the Bataan death march and the fierce fighting on Guadalcanal, many of us seem to have forgotten one of the most important American theaters in early WWII - The Battle of the Western Atlantic. In 1942, German...
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It’s A Wonderful Life
After a series of populist films in the 1930s (It Happened One Night, Mr. Deeds Goes to Town, Mr. Smith Goes to Washington, and You Can't Take It With You), Frank Capra read a forgotten story entitled The Greatest Gift written by Philip Van Doren Stern and turned...
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Memorial Day
Memorial Day 1946 - The ways of peace have not returned to us, and the results of war are still upon us. - Eleanor Roosevelt MAY 30, 1946 NEW YORK, Wednesday—This is the first Memorial Day since the end of the war in the Pacific and yet in spite of that fact, many...
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William Carlos Williams
This is a scene from the charming 2016 film Paterson (96% rating on Rotten Tomatoes) about a bus driver and erstwhile poet named Paterson who lives in Paterson, New Jersey with his wife who dreams of being a country music star and opening a cupcake business. This Is...
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