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American Passages: A Literary Survey

Becoming Visible – Timeline

1940s

– Saul Bellow, The Dangling Man (1944), The Victim (1947)
– Gwendolyn Brooks, A Street in Bronzeville (1945), “The White Troops Had Their Orders But the Negroes Looked Like Men” (1945), Annie Allen (1949)
– Arthur Miller, All My Sons (1947), Death of a Salesman (1949)
Executive Order 9066 signed by President Roosevelt, ordering all persons of Japanese ancestry out of the Pacific military zone to inland internment camps (1942; ends 1945)
All Girls Professional Baseball League (1943-54)
Filipino Naturalization Act (1946)
Jackie Robinson becomes the first African American to officially play Major League Baseball (1947)

[5135] Arnold Eagle, THE TALMUD STUDENT (1935) courtesy of Arnold Eagle Estate.

[3061] Anonymous, SPOKANE NATIVE AMERICAN SOLDIERS NAMED LOUIS BROWN AND WILLIE ANDREWS (1942) courtesy of Library of Congress, American Memory

1950s

– Bernard Malamud, The Natural (1950), The Assistant (1957), “The Magic Barrel” (1958)
– Saul Bellow, “Looking for Mr. Green” (1952), The Adventures of Augie March (1953), Henderson the Rain King (1959)
– Ralph Ellison, Invisible Man (1952)
– James Baldwin, Go Tell It on the Mountain (1953), The Amen Corner (1955), Notes of a Native Son(1955), Giovanni’s Room (1956)
– Gwendolyn Brooks, Maud Martha (1953), Bronzeville Boys and Girls (1956)
– Arthur Miller, The Crucible (1953), A Memory of Two Mondays (1955), A View from the Bridge (1955)
– Paule Marshall, Brown Girl, Brownstones (1959)
– Grace Paley, Little Disturbances of Man (1959)
– Philip Roth, Goodbye Columbus (1959), “Defender of the Faith” (1959)
Korean War (1950-53)
Racial segregation in schools banned (1954)
Rosa Parks arrested for refusing to give up her seat on a bus; sparks Montgomery bus boycott (1955)
Supreme Court rules that bus segregation is illegal (1956)
Voting Rights Bill passed by Congress (1957)
President Eisenhower sends U.S. Army troops to Little Rock, Arkansas, to enforce desegregation in public schools (1957)

[6241] Anonymous, ANTI-COMMUNIST POSTER SHOWING RUSSIAN SOLDIER AND JOSEPH STALIN STANDING OVER GRAVES IN FOREGROUND; CANNONS AND PEOPLE MARCHING TO SIBERIA IN BACKGROUND (1953) courtesy of Library of Congress [LC-USZ62-117876].

1960s

– Gwendolyn Brooks, “We Real Cool” (1960), “A Bronzeville Mother Loiters in Mississippi. Meanwhile a Mississippi Mother Burns Bacon” (1960), In the Mecca (1968)
– Bernard Malamud, The Tenant (1960), The Fixer (1966)
– James Baldwin, Nobody Knows My Name (1961), Another Country (1962), The Fire Next Time (1963), “Going to Meet the Man” (1965)
– Paule Marshall, Soul Clap Hands and Sing (1961)
– Arthur Miller, The Misfits (1961), After the Fall (1964), Incident at Vichy (1965), The Price (1968)
– Philip Roth, Letting Go (1962), When She Was Good (1967), Portnoy’s Complaint (1969)
– Saul Bellow, Herzog (1964)
– Ralph Ellison, Shadow and Act (1964)
– N. Scott Momaday, The Journey to Tai-me (1967), House Made of Dawn (1968), The Way to Rainy Mountain (1969)
Greensboro sit-in protests begin (1960)
Civil rights march on Washington, D.C. (1963)
President John F. Kennedy assassinated (1963)
Civil Rights Act (1964)
Vietnam War (1964-75)
Malcolm X assassinated (1965)
Voting Rights Act (1965)
Black Panther Party for Self Defense founded by Huey Newton and Bobby Seale (1965)
Martin Luther King Jr. assassinated (1968)

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