Who are icons from the 1950's?

Answer 1

Elvis Presley is one, James Dean, Marilyn Monroe, Humphrey Bogart depends on who you ask but Audrey Hepburn, Lucille ball, Elizabeth Taylor...but most of these are just actors/actress minus elvis

Answer 2

In the 1950's most Americans wore I like Ike buttons because, well...Everybody liked Ike. He was President in 1952 and everybody felt safe and secure after that big World War II but then the Soviets launched Sputnik and McCarthy went on a "witch hunt" looking for communists and J. Edgar Hoover was in the closet and dressing like a woman while snooping on the rest of the country. Ozzie and Harriet made everyone believe that Americans were clean and wholesome and while Robert Young convinced us that Father Knows Best. James Dean came from East of Eden to play a Rebel With Out A Cause. Elvis gyrated like a Hound Dog confirming to most parents of that day that the music he sang and played was a bunch of Jail House Rock. Marilyn Monroe explained in some very explicit ways why Gentlemen Prefer Blonds and why Diamonds are a Girls Best Friend. Consumerism made its auspicious debut in the 1950's after Americans had suffered through a Great Depression and made their sacrifices for the war effort.

The Civil Rights Movement began in the 1950's and Dr. Martin Luther King rose to national prominence. The United States Supreme Court made their seminal ruling in Brown v. Board of Education and Rosa Parks refused to sit in the back of the bus. Frank Sinatra rekindled his career and won the best supporting actor Oscar for his role in From Here to Eternity and invited music lovers to come fly with him. Desi Arnez became Ricky Ricardo so he might say I Love Lucy and Jackie Gleason became Ralph Kramden and kept threatening to give Alice a knuckle sandwich and send her straight to the moon. Rod Serling furrowed his eyebrows while an electric guitar went do, do, do, do, do, do, dum Dee Dee dum and he invited everyone to join him in The Twilight Zone while Jack Webb played Sgt Friday and asked for just the facts on Dragnet. Annette Funnicello and Cubby sang that now's the time to say good bye to all our company...M-I-C-K-E-Y M-O-U-S-E while kids also sang along with a goofy looking puppet named Howdy Doody.

The Hula Hoop entertained as well and little girls began their love affair with Barbie and little boys with match box cars. The first all fiber glass car was delivered by Chevrolet with the ultra cool Corvette and Jonas Salk gave hopes to millions with a vaccine that all but eradicated polio. Charlie Brown began falling for Lucy Van Pelt's pranks in Peanuts as it made its debut in the comic pages of newspapers and Gene Kelly sang in the rain dancing gracefully in an all together manly way. It was High Noon for Gary Cooper and Grace Kelly. Teen idols ever so hip, groovy and cool graced the pop charts like Fabian, Frankie Avalon and Ozzie and Harriet's little boy Ricky Nelson and on a cold and stormy wintry night a plane went down that took the lives of the Big Bopper, Richie Valens and Buddy Holly marking the day the music died.

It was a time of peace and prosperity then a time of Korean conflicts and cold wars. It was a time of American witch hunts for communist real and imagined. It was a time of change where an older generation watched the younger one radically change the face of music and bring us rock and roll. It was a time of sex pot actresses and tough guy macho men and it was a time for cool. It was the 1950's a time forevermore associated with fond nostalgia and a perception of innocence before the tumultuous sixties came and grabbed a sleepy America and shoved rebellion down its throat. It was the fabulous fifties forever then and forever now.