What was the technology like in the 1950s?

Answer 1

• electronics was vacuum tube based
• telephone exchanges used electromechanical relay based equipment
• almost all telephones were on party lines, even in large cities
• many small and medium sized towns still had to make all their calls through an operator until late in the 1950s
• mobile car phones were available in a few large cities but only about 12 calls could be active in one city at the same time and all calls went through an operator
• in most towns all long distance calls had to be made through an operator
• telephones that you could dial calls from had only rotary dials
• the phone company owned all telephones of any type
• many communities did not get live network programming, it was all prerecorded on tape and trucked to the various stations
• television was all black and white
• bills from many companies were printed on IBM 80 column punchcards, which had to be returned undamaged with the payment for it to be properly credited to your account
• the large spindle 45 RPM single record was at the peak of its popularity
• tape recorders were reel to reel and often very tricky to load with tape
• passenger trains still ran regularly and even many small towns were served by at least two different railroads
• interstate highways were only beginning to be built so most travel by car was on often dangerous two lane US and state highways
• most cars used large engines that consumed quite a bit of gasoline
• car tires were still fairly low quality and often lasted no longer than a single year
• car tires were bias ply (not radial)
• most airlines still used propeller driven gasoline engine airplanes and operated like a "flying bus system"
• etc.

Answer 2

In the fifties if you had a television, you would be the neatest kid on the block. Even though at the beginning they only had a few shows, anything would be fun ,in 1956 some scientists did a study on how much kids ages 10-16 watched television. The results showed that a average kid watched six hours of television a day which was equal to how long they went to school everyday.

In 1950 Paper Mate made it's first leak free ball point pen. The first copy machine was made 1950 also. The Chevrolet Corvette becomes the first car to have a all-fiberglass body in 1953. In 1954 Bell Telephone labs produce solar battery. In 1954 you could get a yard of contact paper for only 59 cents. Polypropylene was invented in 1954 . In 1955 Jonas Salk invented a polio vaccine which was given to more than seven million American students. In 1956 a solar powered wrist watch was invented. And finally in 1958 the first plastic coke bottle appeared.

Answer 3

Portable transistor radios were very popular in the 1950s along with the new televisions that were popping up in homes. Microchips and stored program computers were also popular at this time.