My favourite decade of the 1900s: the 1950s
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Seems funny to be referring to last century!
The 1900s were very busy years, and so much progress was made that some people are wishing things were still the way they used to be.
Life is so hectic these days (in the 2000s) that we hardly take the time to stop and enjoy some of the simpler things, such as musical afternoons with the family.
In the 1950s, we were getting a ittle more prosperous after the war years, and we dressed up to go out of the house always. Hat, gloves, ladylike handbag over one arm, pearls, and don't forget the cats-eye sunglasses!
Bobby loves
anything from the fifties or sixties
He plays music from these decades and the forties on his sax.Doesn't want to know about more up-to-date tunes!
That's him and my b-i-l Juan enjoying a beer and a joke.
1950s lifestyle
Life was much slower in the 1950s
We were less sophisticated then
Computers were unheard of, man hadn't been in space.
The man in the moon was made of green cheese, and Santa was very real.
Children were seen and not heard. No such thing as consumer society. We kept things and re-used them or redesigned them.
Education was basic and a thorough grounding for life as it was. The three Rs were roundly learned, and woe betide you if you didn't know them!
Discipline was simple — a swift kick up the you-know-where, or a clip in the ear — and immediate. You didn't talk back. Took it and learned from it.
The man in the moon was made of green cheese, and Santa was very real.
Children were seen and not heard. No such thing as consumer society. We kept things and re-used them or redesigned them.
Education was basic and a thorough grounding for life as it was. The three Rs were roundly learned, and woe betide you if you didn't know them!
Discipline was simple — a swift kick up the you-know-where, or a clip in the ear — and immediate. You didn't talk back. Took it and learned from it.
Houses were more modest
Living in the 1950s
- Daily life in 1950s. Local history topic in Learning Links from Lochend Family Learning Project, Easterhouse Glasgow.
- Web links to learn about 'Daily life in 1950s' for school topics. These are
provided as support for pupils in the Greater Easterhouse Area
through the Lochend Family Learning Project based at Greater Easterhouse Learning Network,
John Wheatley College.
What every fashionable lounge was wearing in 1950
Image courtesy The Memory Store.org.uk
What we lived like
from Amazon
1950s in Australia
Visit this link for good information
- 1950s - Decade in context
- 1950s in context
After decades of suffering through the Great Depression and World War II, the 1950s were prosperous, vibrant years for Australians. Employment was high and people were encouraged to spend their money freely.
Technology advanced rapidly after the war and soon transformed the lives of many Australians. Televisions provided a link to the rest of the world and cars gave people a new mobility that would change the nation's patterns of leisure and living.
In 1956, Melbourne hosted the Olympic Games. This fostered a great sense of national pride and cast the international spotlight onto Australia like never before.
FJ Holden car
An Australian classic car from the 1950s
An Australian icon: the FJ
a classic car collected by enthusiasts
The wonderful FJ is a car that lives on because collectors love them.
There are Holden owners clubs all over the country, but in the 1950s hardly anyone owned a car in Australia. Anyone 'wealthy' enough to own one was very lucky indeed.
There are Holden owners clubs all over the country, but in the 1950s hardly anyone owned a car in Australia. Anyone 'wealthy' enough to own one was very lucky indeed.
Buy your FJ freak a gift for Christmas
from Amazon
1950s technology in Australia
linking to an essay on the era
- Technology in 1950's Australia Essay | Student Essays Summary
- Technology in 1950's Australia Essay | Student Essays. Technology in 1950's Australia summary with 3 pages of encyclopedia entries, research information, and more.
1950s music
Rock and Roll was here to stay!
mid 1950s
Quote from Wikipedia:
First wave of Australian rock
In the mid-1950s, American rock and roll spread across the world. Sydney's independent record label Festival Records was the first to get on the bandwagon in Australia, releasing Bill Haley & His Comets' "Rock Around the Clock" in 1956. It became the biggest-selling Australian single ever.
American-born entrepreneur Lee Gordon, who arrived in Australia in 1953, played a key role in establishing the popularity of rock & roll with his famous "Big Show" tours, which brought to Australia many leading American rock'n'roll acts including Bill Haley & His Comets, Little Richard, Bo Diddley, Eddie Cochran, Gene Vincent, Buddy Holly & The Crickets and Jerry Lee Lewis.
Gordon was also instrumental in launching the career of Johnny O'Keefe, the first Australian rock star, who rose to fame by imitating Americans like Elvis Presley and Little Richard. O'Keefe and other "first wave" bands were popular until about 1961, when a wave of clean-cut family bands took their place.
Though mainstream audiences in the early sixties preferred a clean-cut style - epitomised by the acts that appeared on the Nine Network pop show Bandstand - there were a number of 'grungier' guitar-oriented bands in major cities like Sydney and Melbourne, who were inspired by American and British instrumental and surf acts like Britain's The Shadows - who exerted an enormous influence on Australian and New Zealand music prior to the emergence of The Beatles - and American acts like guitar legend Dick Dale and The Surfaris. Notable Australian instrumental groups of this period included The Atlantics, The Denvermen The Thunderbirds, The Planets, The Dee Jays, The Joy Boys, The Fabulous Blue Jays and The Whispers.
Jazz was another important influence on the first wave of Australian rock. Unlike the musicians in bands such as The Comets, or Elvis Presley's backing band, who had rockabilly or country music backgrounds, many musicians in Australian rock'n'roll bands - such as Johnny O'Keefe's famous backing group The Dee Jays - had a solid background in jazz.
Quote from Skwirk[dot]com[dot]au:
Rock 'n' roll swept onto Australian shores in 1955 with the release of Bill Haley's hit song Rock Around the Clock. Originating in America, this new style fused black American rhythm and blues music with the white-dominated country and western genre.
Rock 'n' roll was fast, rhythmic and exciting, and audiences loved it. Young Australians gathered in dance halls dressed in the latest rock 'n' roll fashions and performed dances like the jitterbug and the boogie-woogie.
Elvis Presley was known the world over as the king of rock 'n' roll. During the 1940s, singers like Bing Crosby and Frank Sinatra had been popular, but their fans were mostly young adults. Elvis Presley, however, tapped into the young teen market and thrilled audiences with his original style of music and hip-gyrating 'bad boy' image.
By the end of the decade, the airwaves were dominated by rock 'n' roll and Australian rock 'n' roll artists like Johnny O'Keefe and Col Joye were also achieving considerable chart success.
First wave of Australian rock
In the mid-1950s, American rock and roll spread across the world. Sydney's independent record label Festival Records was the first to get on the bandwagon in Australia, releasing Bill Haley & His Comets' "Rock Around the Clock" in 1956. It became the biggest-selling Australian single ever.
American-born entrepreneur Lee Gordon, who arrived in Australia in 1953, played a key role in establishing the popularity of rock & roll with his famous "Big Show" tours, which brought to Australia many leading American rock'n'roll acts including Bill Haley & His Comets, Little Richard, Bo Diddley, Eddie Cochran, Gene Vincent, Buddy Holly & The Crickets and Jerry Lee Lewis.
Gordon was also instrumental in launching the career of Johnny O'Keefe, the first Australian rock star, who rose to fame by imitating Americans like Elvis Presley and Little Richard. O'Keefe and other "first wave" bands were popular until about 1961, when a wave of clean-cut family bands took their place.
Though mainstream audiences in the early sixties preferred a clean-cut style - epitomised by the acts that appeared on the Nine Network pop show Bandstand - there were a number of 'grungier' guitar-oriented bands in major cities like Sydney and Melbourne, who were inspired by American and British instrumental and surf acts like Britain's The Shadows - who exerted an enormous influence on Australian and New Zealand music prior to the emergence of The Beatles - and American acts like guitar legend Dick Dale and The Surfaris. Notable Australian instrumental groups of this period included The Atlantics, The Denvermen The Thunderbirds, The Planets, The Dee Jays, The Joy Boys, The Fabulous Blue Jays and The Whispers.
Jazz was another important influence on the first wave of Australian rock. Unlike the musicians in bands such as The Comets, or Elvis Presley's backing band, who had rockabilly or country music backgrounds, many musicians in Australian rock'n'roll bands - such as Johnny O'Keefe's famous backing group The Dee Jays - had a solid background in jazz.
Quote from Skwirk[dot]com[dot]au:
Rock 'n' roll swept onto Australian shores in 1955 with the release of Bill Haley's hit song Rock Around the Clock. Originating in America, this new style fused black American rhythm and blues music with the white-dominated country and western genre.
Rock 'n' roll was fast, rhythmic and exciting, and audiences loved it. Young Australians gathered in dance halls dressed in the latest rock 'n' roll fashions and performed dances like the jitterbug and the boogie-woogie.
Elvis Presley was known the world over as the king of rock 'n' roll. During the 1940s, singers like Bing Crosby and Frank Sinatra had been popular, but their fans were mostly young adults. Elvis Presley, however, tapped into the young teen market and thrilled audiences with his original style of music and hip-gyrating 'bad boy' image.
By the end of the decade, the airwaves were dominated by rock 'n' roll and Australian rock 'n' roll artists like Johnny O'Keefe and Col Joye were also achieving considerable chart success.
What we listened to
from Amazon
1950s fashion
Fashionable clothes for us
in the 1950s
My mother was a dressmaker and we always had the latest fashions.
We loved to read Seventeen magazine and I always wanted a pale pink angora sweater like the girl in the Coca-Cola ad in the pink Pontiac. The stuff dreams were made of. (I'm very allergic to angora it turns out as I made myself a pale blue cardigan in the 60s.)
We wore rope petticoats to hold out our very full skirts, we had demure necklines, stockings with seams up the back of the legs (a nightmare to keep straight!), and wore wrist legth gloves — usually white — when we went to town.
We loved to read Seventeen magazine and I always wanted a pale pink angora sweater like the girl in the Coca-Cola ad in the pink Pontiac. The stuff dreams were made of. (I'm very allergic to angora it turns out as I made myself a pale blue cardigan in the 60s.)
We wore rope petticoats to hold out our very full skirts, we had demure necklines, stockings with seams up the back of the legs (a nightmare to keep straight!), and wore wrist legth gloves — usually white — when we went to town.
Brides wore white
in the 1950s
Dances were popular
read about the dances at this link
- 1950s dancing
- Dancing was a favourite entertainment, as was the formal Ball.
Saturday night at the Palais
Dancing until 10 or 11.
What we wore
books from Amazon
Fashions in the 1950s in Australia
links to web pages showing how we looked then
- 1950s fashion and beauty
- How we looked — or tried to look — in the 1950s
- 1950's Fashion, hair, style, clothing and grease in the 50's
- 1950's fashion, 1950s, fifties, fashion, Grease, history, sixties - Boomers Fifties Teen Idol Magazine.
- ballgowns
- Fashion Passion through Patterns
Ballgowns
home, ballgowns,
ballet, party, bridal,
square dance, , email
What's your memory of the fifties?
Share with us
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pubic hairs
Oct 15, 2010 @ 1:12 pm | delete
- meeeeeeeee
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Reply
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i
Oct 15, 2010 @ 1:13 pm | delete
- nice name there
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cdcraftee
Oct 10, 2010 @ 8:15 pm | delete
- Love anything to do with 'my' time in the '50's, so really enjoy your lens. Will be back to explore the links, but in the meantime, lensrolled to mine.
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Reply
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JanTUB
Oct 10, 2010 @ 10:42 pm | delete
- Life was simpler in tose days, that's for sure.
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Reply
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the777group
Sep 18, 2010 @ 4:10 am | delete
- Hi Jan, I've got to admit, the name Col Joye & The Joy Boys has always been a winner for me! I'm glad the jokes cheered you up & if you want to read my 2010 impressions of Australia, check my profile - I'm writing a series of articles about life in Coledale, NSW.
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Jan T tells all...
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by JanTUB
JanTUB
I have been quilting for more than a quarter of a century. (Sounds much longer than 25 years.) That's me in my studio in 2006.
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