Final Exam History Chapters 22-25

Cold War

A state of political hostility between the US and the Soviet Union characterized by threats, propaganda, and other measures short of open warfare, in particular. It began at the end of WWII and it was based in ideology between the superpowers and their respective allies. The significance of the cold war was that the United States emerged as the sole superpower in the world and ideology wise, capitalism trumped communism.

Strom Thurmond

An American politician who served for 48 years as a United States Senator from South Carolina. He was known for his pro-segregation policies and long-running tenure in Congress. He is significant because It showed how much farther civil rights had to go. The record for the longest filibuster goes to U.S. Sen. Strom Thurmond of South Carolina, who spoke for 24 hours and 18 minutes against the Civil Rights Act of 1957, according to U.S. Senate records.

Dorothea Lange

Dorothea Lange was an American documentary photographer and photojournalist, best known for her Depression-era work for the Farm Security Administration. She is remembered above all for revealing the plight of sharecroppers, displaced farmers and migrant workers in the 1930s, and her portrait of Florence Owens Thompson, Migrant Mother, Nipomo, California(1936), has become an icon of the period. Lange's photographs are significant because they humanized the consequences of the Great Depression and influenced the development of documentary photographs.

Francis Perkins

Frances Perkins Wilson was an American sociologist and workers-rights advocate who served as the U.S. Secretary of Labor from 1933 to 1945, the longest serving in that position, and the first woman appointed to the U.S. Cabinet. As a loyal supporter of her friend, Franklin D. Roosevelt, she helped pull the labor movement into the New Deal coalition.

Herbert Hoover

Herbert Clark Hoover was an American politician who served as the 31st President of the United States from 1929 to 1933 during the Great Depression. A Republican, as Secretary of Commerce in the 1920s he was significant because he introduced Progressive Era themes of efficiency in the business community and provided government support for standardization, efficiency and international trade.

1937 Neutrality Act

In January 1937, Congress passed a joint resolution outlawing the arms trade with Spain. The Neutrality Act of 1937 was passed in May and included the provisions of the earlier acts, this time without expiration date, and extended them to cover civil wars as well. This Act was significant because it pushed for peace and lifted the arms embargo and put all trade with belligerent nations under the terms of "cash-and-carry.

Joseph Stalin

Joseph Vissarionovich Stalin was a Georgian revolutionary, politician, and political theorist. He governed the Soviet Union from the mid-1920s until his death in 1953. Ideologically a Russian nationalist, he developed political theories known as Stalinism. He is significant because he transformed Russia from a minor rural country into a great and powerful industrial nation.

Iwo Jima

The Battle of Iwo Jima was a major battle in which the United States Marine Corps landed on and eventually captured the island of Iwo Jima from the Japanese Imperial Army during World War II. The American invasion, had the goal of capturing the entire island, including the three Japanese-controlled airfields, to provide a staging area for attacks on the Japanese main islands. It was significant because capturing an Island so close to the main island of Japan was essential for the final steps of defeating Japan.

Bonus March

The Bonus Army was the popular name for an assemblage of some 43,000 marchers—17,000 U.S. World War I veterans, their families, and affiliated groups—who gathered in Washington, D.C. in the summer of 1932 to demand cash-payment redemption of their service certificates. They requested early payment of cash bonuses due to them in 1945. The Great Depression had destroyed the economy, leaving many veterans jobless. It was significant because it was a sign that the government needed to do something to help suffering Americas during the Great Depression.

"Checkers speech"

The Checkers speech or Fund speech was an address made on September 23, 1952, by the Republican candidate for vice president of the United States, California Senator Richard Nixon. Nixon had been accused of improprieties relating to a fund established by his backers to reimburse him for his political expenses. It was significant because it was one of the first times that a politican used mass media to speak directly to the voters. Nixon used it to ask people to supprt him and to tell his side of a story and get people to relate to him.

Elbe River

The Elbe is one of the major rivers of Central Europe. In 1945, as World War II was drawing to a close, Nazi Germany was caught between the armies of the western Allies advancing from the west and the Soviet Union advancing from the east. On 25 April 1945, these two forces linked up near Torgau, on the Elbe. The river was significant in the war and the event was marked as Elbe Day. After the war, the Elbe formed part of the border between East Germany and West Germany.

HUAC

The House Un-American Activities Committee (HUAC) was created in 1938 to investigate alleged disloyalty and subversive activities on the part of private citizens, public employees, and those organizations suspected of having Communist ties. A committee of the U.S. House of Representatives, it is significant because it investigated allegations of communist activity in the U.S. during the early years of the Cold War (1945-91).

American Destroyer Greer

The USS Greer was a Wickes-class destroyer in the United States Navy, the first ship named for Rear Admiral James A. Greer (1833-1904). In what became known as the "Greer incident," she was significant because it became the first US Navy ship to fire on a German ship, three months before the United States officially entered World War II. The incident led President Franklin D. Roosevelt to issue what became known as his "shoot-on-sight" order.

WACs

The Women's Army Corps was the women's branch of the United States Army. It was created as an auxiliary unit, the Women's Army Auxiliary Corps on 15 May 1942 by Public Law 554, and converted to full status as the WAC on 1 July 1943. Members of the WAC were significant because they were the first women other than nurses to serve within the ranks of the United States Army and make a individual and significant contribution to the war effort.

Vance Packard

Vance Packard was an American journalist, social critic, and author. In The Hidden Persuaders, first published in 1957, Packard explores the use of consumer motivational research and other psychological techniques, including depth psychology and subliminal tactics, by advertisers to manipulate expectations and induce desire for products, particularly in the American postwar era. He was significant because he exposed the manipulation that was happening in the advertising and marketing world.