The 1950s Nuclear Age Timeline

In 1945, American troops returned home, many starting new lives and families. Between 1946 and 1964, 76.4 million baby
boomers were born. Over 13 million homes went up from 1948 to 1958. Most were affordable, cookie-cutter houses fashioned
after the phenomenally successful Levittown, Long Island. William J. Levitt had pioneered the suburb by building
neighborhoods of nearly identical, quickly built housing. America's movement to the suburbs spurred the growth of shopping
malls, drive-ins, and supermarkets. Many saw the 1950's as a return to prosperity and social "normality."
The prosperity and social normality was tinged with a "Red" hysteria, however. Americans saw communism on the march
everywhere. By the end of the 1940's, Americans had seen the Soviets try to cut off Berlin from the West, Mao's Communist
Party come to power in China, and the Soviet Union explode its first atomic bomb. In 1947, President Truman had outlined
what became known as the Truman Doctrine: "I believe that it must be the policy of the United States to support free peoples
who are resisting subjugation by armed minorities or by outside pressures." A State Department official, George Kennan, later
fleshed out the Truman Doctrine, introducing the policy of "containment," which meant the United States would contain the
Soviet Union's influence anywhere in the world. The "containment of the Communist threat" colored U.S. foreign policy
decisions for decades to come.
At home, politicians found it politically expedient to be hard on communism. A former Communist Party member charged
former Roosevelt advisor, Alger Hiss, with being a Communist spy. Hiss denied the charges before the House Un-American
Activities Committee, which investigated alleged communist subversion in the U.S. government. The statute of limitations
protected Hiss from espionage charges, but he was later found guilty of perjury. At the same time, Americans learned that
respected Los Alamos scientist Klaus Fuchs had been passing atomic secrets to the Soviet Union. Other conspirators testified
that they had passed the secrets to Julius and Ethel Rosenberg. The Rosenbergs were convicted and executed as spies. Their
defenders--then and now--claimed the Rosenbergs were framed, convicted, and executed in an anti-Semitic and anti-
Communist frenzy.

1950
President Truman orders the Atomic Energy Commission to develop the hydrogen bomb (H-bomb).

February 1950
Senator Joseph McCarthy launches a crusade to rout out communism in America. "McCarthyism" is born.

June 1950
The Korean War begins as North Korean forces invade South Korea.

December 1951
The first usable electricity from nuclear fission is produced at the National Reactor Station, later called the Idaho National
Engineering Laboratory.

October 1952
Operations begin at the Savannah River Plant in Aiken, South Carolina, with the startup of the heavy water plant.

December 1953
In his Atoms for Peace speech, President Eisenhower proposes joint international cooperation to develop peaceful applications
of nuclear energy.

January 1954
U.S. Secretary of State John Foster Dulles announces U.S. policy of massive retaliation, that the United States would respond
to any Communist aggression.
The first nuclear submarine, U.S.S. Nautilus, is launched.

April 1954
The Army-McCarthy hearings aired on television for five weeks. Senator Joseph McCarthy, chairman of the Senate Permanent
Subcommittee on Investigations, charged that the Secretary of the Army, Robert T. Stevens, and Army Counsel, John G.
Adams, were hampering the committee's attempts to uncover communists in the military. McCarthy failed to prove his charges.
The hearings, given broad television and newspaper coverage, helped to end the anti-Communist witch hunt. By the end,
Senator McCarthy was publicly disgraced. The Senate condemned McCarthy.

August 1954
The Atomic Energy Act of 1954 was passed to promote the peaceful uses of nuclear energy through private enterprise and to
implement President Eisenhower's Atoms for Peace Program. The Act allowed the Atomic Energy Commission to license
private companies to use nuclear materials and build and operate nuclear power plants. This act amended the Atomic Energy
Act of 1946, which had placed complete power of atomic energy development in the hands of the Atomic Energy Commission.
July 1955
On July 17, 1955, Arco, Idaho became the first U.S. town to be powered by nuclear energy. The demonstration lasted for one
hour in the 1,350-person community. The National Reactor Testing Station, now called the Idaho National Engineering
Laboratory, supplied the power from its Borax-III reactor. It was part of the Atomic Energy Commission's (AEC) Five-Year
Reactor Development Program in the mid-1950's. The AEC tested five types of experimental reactors. The Borax-III was an
early prototype of a boiling water reactor, a type of reactor which still produces electricity for utilities today.

October 1956
In February 1956, Soviet Premier Khrushchev denounced his predecessor, Josef Stalin, and his intolerance for other brands of
communism. This gave hope to many in Eastern Europe who soon began demanding that their countries be able to determine
their own fates. A labor dispute in Poland grew into national riots in mid-1956. The Soviets used force to stop the riots, but
later compromised with the Polish by letting them choose the chairman of the Polish Communist Party. Meanwhile, Hungary's
new government, backed by local revolutionary councils throughout Hungary, announced that it was pulling out of the Warsaw
Pact and becoming neutral. The Warsaw Pact was a military alliance between the Soviet Union and Eastern bloc countries
established in May 1955. In October 1956, Soviet troops moved in to crush the revolt. Hungarians appealed to the United
States for help, but the United States was not able to do anything in Eastern Europe, short of all out war.

November 1956
Soviet Premier Nikita Khrushchev tells the West, "History is on our side. We will bury you."

July 1957
On July 12, 1957, the Sodium Reactor Experiment in Santa Susana, California generated the first power from a civilian nuclear
reactor. Southern California Edison bought the electricity generated by the sodium-graphite reactor. It was part of the Atomic
Energy Commission's (AEC) Five-Year Reactor Development Program in the mid-1950's. The AEC tested five types of
experimental reactors. This reactor used sodium rather than water as a coolant. The reactor provided power until 1966.

September 1957
The United States set off the first underground nuclear test, code-named Rainier, in a mountain tunnel in the remote desert 100
miles from Las Vegas on September 19, 1957. Rainier was part of a series, known as Operation Plumbob, conducted at the
Nevada Test Site to test warheads scheduled for production. Seismic waves from Rainier were detected 2,300 miles away in
Alaska. -Nuclear Test gallery

October 1957
Radiation is released when the graphite core of the Windscale Nuclear Reactor in England catches fire.
Sputnik
The Soviet Union launches Sputnik, the first spacecraft.

The International Atomic Energy Agency (IAEA) is formed to promote the peaceful uses of nuclear energy and to provide
international safeguards and an inspection system to ensure nuclear materials aren't diverted from peaceful to military uses.

December 1957
The first U.S. large-scale nuclear powerplant begins operating in Shippingport, Pennsylvania.

October 1959
The Dresden-1 Nuclear Power Station in Illinois achieves a self-sustaining nuclear reaction. It's the first U.S. nuclear
powerplant built entirely without government funding. Commonwealth Edison operated Dresden-1.