FDA Approves First Oral Birth Control Pill
https://youtu.be/jChyGqk0BO8 In May 1960, the US Food and Drug Administration (FDA) cleared Enovid, an oral contraceptive developed by G.D. Searle and Company, for commercial use. By June 23, “the Pill” — as the oral contraceptive was commonly known — was on the...
First Kidney Dialysis Shunt
https://youtu.be/xG82t_a3-i0 In March 1960 the first kidney dialysis shunt, developed by Dr. Belding H. Scribner, was planted in a kidney patient in Seattle Washington. The process, enabling ambulatory dialysis, first developed in the 1940s by Dr. Willem J. Kolff, had...
Mao’s Great Leap Forward
https://youtu.be/60_Q-kAZbXA The Great Leap Forward in the People's Republic of China was an economic and social campaign from 1958 to 1962 that was launched by Chairman Mao Zedong in an attempt to restructure the country from an...
President Eisenhower Has Heart Attack
At West Point, Dwight Eisenhower began chain smoking three or four packs of cigarettes a day. In September 1955 he suffered a massive heart attack after golfing in Denver, Colorado. Seven weeks later he left the hospital, and in February 1956 doctors...
1950s Cigarette TV Commercials
These were the cultural and media messages I received when I began clandestine smoking at age 13. https://youtu.be/Z023OAz4fkI https://youtu.be/wibHcZ4FNbU https://youtu.be/c9or3KCrgQM https://youtu.be/Hr4duBBcCpA...
Jonas Salk and the Polio Vaccine
The first effective polio vaccine was developed in 1952 by Jonas Salk and his team at the University of Pittsburgh. Shortly thereafter, a key laboratory technique that enabled mass production of the vaccine was invented by Leone N. Farrell and her team...
Chinese Treatment of Prisoners of War
The issue of Chinese treatment of UN prisoners of war is controversial. Cold war attitudes were often reflected in early reports which had limited actual data. On occasion, the Chinese People's Liberation Army was reported to provide emergency medical treatment for...
The Killer That Stalked New York
https://youtu.be/uw6F9O9FGco The Killer That Stalked New York was a 1950 American motion picture starring Evelyn Keyes, Charles Korvin and William Bishop. Shot in New York in a semi-documentary style, the plot concerns a smallpox outbreak...
Mother Teresa
In October 1950, Mother Teresa and the small community formed by her former pupils received permission from the Diocese of Calcutta (Kolkata) India to identify as a Catholic organization. Her order the Missionaries of Charity, subsequently received approval...
Polio Epidemics
https://youtu.be/PfoxqghXxEs In 1950 Polio was one of the most serious communicable diseases among children in the United States. Thousands of children were infected by the virus, and many were paralyzed or died. Source: Our World in Data Hospitals developed special...
Heart Pacemaker
https://youtu.be/Zd_Weg6Dlw4 In 1950, Canadian electrical engineer John Hopps built the first external pacemaker based upon observations by cardio-thoracic surgeons at Toronto General Hospital. With vacuum tube technology, powered by AC...
MASH
The Mobile Army Surgical Hospital (MASH) was a fully functional hospital unit maintained by the U.S. Army Medical Corps in a combat zone. MASH units, established in August 1945, were deployed during the Korean War and later...
CIA Mind Control
https://youtu.be/NUW-frxo2X4 In 1950 the director of the U.S. Central Intelligence authorized Project BLUEBIRD to discover methods of: conditioning personnel to prevent unauthorized extraction of informationcontrol of an individual by the application of special...
Cigarettes Linked to Cancer
https://youtu.be/gCMzjJjuxQI 1949 Camel ad In 1950 The Journal of the American Medical Association published two articles linking smoking and cancer: Tobacco Smoking as a Possible Etiological Factor in Bronchogenic Carcinoma: A Study of Six Hundred and...
Dianetics
In May 1950 the magazine Astounding Science Fiction published Dianetics: The Modern Science of Mental Health by L. Ron Hubbard. Dianetics divides the mind into: (1) the conscious analytical mind (2) the subconscious reactive mind (3) the somatic mind...
First Kidney Transplant
https://youtu.be/EP9gnlmEyo8 In June 1950 Dr. Richard Lawler performed the first successful kidney transplantation. The donor kidney was removed from a patient who had died of cirrhosis of the liver. The recipient was a 44-year-old woman with polycystic kidney...
James Forrestal Dies
James Vincent Forrestal (February 1892 – May 1949) was a strong supporter of naval battle groups centered on aircraft carriers. In 1940 President Franklin D. Roosevelt nominated Forrestal for the newly established position of Undersecretary of the Navy....
The Tragedy of Billie Holiday
https://youtu.be/tZJoVPFoYPM In January 1949 Police broke into a room in the Mark Twain Hotel in San Francisco and arrested Billie Holiday and her manager John Levy on charges of possession of opium. Her defense attorney Jake Erlich, fingered Levy as an informer and...
World Health Organization
The concept of an international health organization was first suggested in 1945 by the Chinese United Nations delegate Dr. Szeming Sze. Although the initial resolution failed, at an international conference the following year, all 51 member countries of the...
Dr. Benjamin Spock
The Common Sense Book of Baby and Child Care, published in 1946, sold over 50 million copies by the time of Spock's death in 1998. The book has also been translated into 39 languages. Prior to Spock's book, child care experts recommended rigid...
My Japan
This propaganda film was produced by the U.S. Treasury Department in 1945 in an effort to promote War Bond sales. My Japan might be described as a heavy-handed attempt to elicit angry responses from American citizens regarding Japan's audacity as well as contempt for...
Was Hitler High?
A new book by Norman Ohler makes sensational claims that not only Adolf Hitler, but much of the civilian population of Nazi Germany, was high on drugs. While there is evidence that methamphetamines (e.g. Pervitin) were extensively used by the armed...
U.S. Pilot Defects
For years a devotee of the ultra-conservative radio ministry of Father Charles Edward Coughlin, a 23 year-old USAAF P-38 pilot named Martin James Monti defected to the Axis powers in October 1944. Why a young American might actually defect to the Axis is hard to...
Finish the Job
This propaganda film was produced in 1944 to inspire Americans to finish the war
Buzz Bombs – Vergeltungswaffen
https://youtu.be/s0EE5ZGKJyE