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  • There is no way US literacy in the 1950s was anywhere near 90% unless you excluded marginalized and minority populations.

    • Excellent point, and that's likely exactly how they counted it.

    • Think about it. In the 1950's, a lot of people couldn't afford a radio. Reading was the only way to entertain yourself at home. There were plenty of dime novels and pulps. Schools might not have had things like microscopes, but even the worst places could buy books the other schools were getting rid of.

      • By the 50’s it was extremely customary for most homes to have a TV and at the VERY LEAST a radio if they weren’t very well off. Radios were dirt cheap.

        You’re making the 50’s sound like the 1920’s.

        • Radios were dirt cheap.

          By my understanding, the materials were (and are) so inexpensive that building radios was actually a fairly popular hobby back then. An AM radio with decent reception is pretty simple to make.

          • You can build your own AM radio in less then an hour with a large metallic object (car, bike, large piece of scrap metal, basketball pole), some aluminum foil, a small piece of copper, a battery, and any sort of speaker.

            It’s a pretty common childhood science experiment where I am to build functional jerryrigged radio.

            But you are right, building functional AM radios was and is pretty common for how cheap the components are. Plus I’m pretty sure I can still go to a store and buy a small working radio for less then 20 bucks.

        • Jeez TV only arrived in South Africa in 1976. And some delusional people actually think the old government was good lmao

          • Woof, TV’s were already a popular concept before WW2 in the US, but their development was halted by the war. However once the war ended, television exploded in popularity with the establishment of a dedicated signal network, and it was a staple item in almost all homes by the mid/late 40’s.

            The South African regime was good if you were a Boer emerald mine owner. If you were anyone else? Not so much.

            • TV’s were already a popular concept before WW2 in the US

              "In 1945, there were probably fewer than 10,000 sets in the country. This figure soared to about 6 million in 1950, and to almost 60 million by 1960" -"Television." The World Book Encyclopedia. even that 6 million is hardly a "staple" in a country of 151 million. you gotta remember that for how enormous the amount of film there is pre-war, it was all for movie theaters, not home broadcast

              • Yes, but don't forget that you usually had 4-8 people per household, if not more, so its not like everyone is getting their very own individual television.

                Also I wasn't saying that television was massive, I said the concept of them were and there was immense research and development into the technology. Effort that was redirected because of the war. There was great interest into the technology and as soon as production was shifted from military to civilian goods, the number skyrocketed.

                "In 1946, 7,000 TV sets were sold; in 1948, 172,000 sets were sold; and in 1950, 5 million sets were sold. In the year 1950 per the United States Census, just under 20 percent of American homes contained a TV set, but by 1960 the figure had reached 90 percent." -Encyclopedia Britannica.

106 comments