……. (1953) Oconee County Girls Basketball team was playing in the State Tournament in Macon. I remember being there and seeing the game halted for the public announcement of the death of Stalin. I can see Oconee’s Mary Jo Shelnutt at midcourt holding the ball. When Stalin’s death was announced, there were cheers and applause from the crowd……

AVOC

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March 23, 2010

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Oconee Remembered 1940’s & 1950’s # 10 – National & World Events - Part 1

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By Wendell Dawson, Editor, AVOC, Inc

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The 1940’s was an eventful decade: Pearl Harbor, WW II, Roosevelt’s death, Harry Truman becoming President; the Atom Bomb and the development of television.     T V had a very substantial impact on life of the 1950’s.

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My memory of President Franklin Roosevelt (32^nd President) and WW II is sketchy and mostly learned later in history books and newspapers.    I remember my mother talking about the holocaust but not understanding it until later.   Roosevelt was popular in the South after the Depression.   REA came and public works built a lot of buildings including the Oconee County Courthouse.  In the 30’s and 40’s, radio was how citizens heard the President and FDR was famous for his “fireside chats”.  I remember he was tired and old looking near the end of WW II and that he died at Warm Springs on April 12, 1945.

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FDR Radio Address was medium for reaching citizens

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Franklin Delano Roosevelt (32^nd President) in later years

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Little White House at Warm Springs where President Franklin Roosevelt died.

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With television President Harry Truman (33^rd President) came into our homes in the early 50’s.   The Dave Garroway Today show came on early and I watched it before going to school.   I remember the program interviewing President Truman on one of his morning walks. The Today Show was broadcast from the RCA Exhibition Hall, in New York, with clocks tuned to various time zones on the walls, and a window on the street where people congregated in the mornings to be captured by the NBC cameras and wave to the folks back home.   In June 1958, some OCHS graduates (including me) went to the site of the show and watched it from the sidewalk.   Today debuted on January 14, 1952,

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Harry S. Truman (33^rd President)

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Dave Garroway hosted Today show

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President Truman on morning walk

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Harry Truman Walking in Independence after Presidency

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I remember Truman relieving General Douglas MacArthur as commander of the United Nations forces in Korea.   MacArthur wanted to engage the Chinese at the Yalu River and Truman wanted to contain the war.   After relieving MacArthur, President Truman was a target of a lot of criticism and opprobrium- as have been other Presidents.   MacArthur’s address to congress was broadcast on the radio- “Old soldiers just fade away….”.    President Truman became very unpopular and did not seek re-election- he was the last President that could have served three terms (he completed most of Roosevelt’s last term).   In spite of all that, he was loudly cheered by the 1952 convention.   Since then, Truman’s place in history has been more positive and greatly elevated from the emotion of the time.   Of course, with political correctness, there is world condemnation of the use of the Atom Bomb.   However, that action ended the war and saved a lot of lives.

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General Douglas MacArthur was WW II hero and Commander in Korea until relieved of duty by President Truman

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We also watched the 1952 Democrat and Republican Conventions that nominated Dwight Eisenhower and Adlai Stevenson.    The conventions were held during the day.   It was later in the summer and our garden was producing a lot of beans, butterbeans, peas and corn.   We shelled a lot of beans, peas and butterbeans during those conventions and shucked a lot of corn.   It probably helped ignite my lifetime interest in government, politics and history.

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Eisenhower Campaign Button Ca 1952

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President Dwight David Eisenhower (33^rd President)

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Adlai Stevenson of IL was Democratic Nominee for President in 1952 and 1956

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President Eisenhower in Oval Office

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Joseph Stalin  who was the Russian Leader (Dictator) during WWII died March 5, 1953 (aged 74).   Stalin had been ruthless and responsible for deaths of millions.  At the time of his death, the Oconee County Girls Basketball team was playing in the State Tournament in Macon.   I remember being there and seeing the game halted for the public announcement of the death of Stalin.   I can see Oconee’s Mary Jo Shelnutt at midcourt holding the ball.   When Stalin’s death was announced, there were cheers and applause from the crowd.   Stalin was viewed as the cruelest dictator in the world at the time.

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Joseph Stalin, Russian Leader during and Post WW II - Era of the Iron Curtain