Going Home to the Fifties [Paperback]

William Yenne (Author)

Book Description

Publication Date: December 2002

With the postwar economic boom, a vast middle class emerged. Suburbs exploded across the country, and the new industrial complex cranked out cars, appliances, and home furnishings in record numbers. In Going Home to the Fifties, Bill Yenne guides readers through an idealized neighborhood of the period, from the schools, roads, and commuter trains to the homes, kitchens, and backyards -- all drawn from the fantasy worlds created by advertising. Color photos and illustrations are featured in this presentation of the ideal of 1950s suburban living.

Editorial Reviews

About the Author

Bill Yenne is the author of more than two dozen books, most on historical topics. He lives in San Francisco. --This text refers to an alternate Paperback edition.

Product Details

• Paperback: 144 pages
• Publisher: Last Gasp (December 2002)
• Language: English
• ISBN-10: 0867195657
• ISBN-13: 978-0867195651
• Product Dimensions: 9.8 x 9.1 x 0.5 inches
• Shipping Weight: 1.2 pounds
• Average Customer Review: 4.2 out of 5 stars  See all reviews (8 customer reviews)
• Amazon Best Sellers Rank: #1,834,723 in Books (See Top 100 in Books)

Customer Reviews

Most Helpful Customer Reviews

26 of 27 people found the following review helpful:

5.0 out of 5 stars A great look at the "good old days.", February 7, 2005

By 

J. Tate (Los Angeles) - See all my reviews
(REAL NAME)   

Amazon Verified Purchase

This review is from: Going Home to the Fifties (Paperback)

I've been fascinated with the 50's since I was a child. Almost everything I've read on the 50's has been clouded with cynicism. While reading this book, I really felt like I was transported back in time and into the minds of people who were living in this time. I felt it did a great job of explaining "materialism" and "housewives" (that had normally gotten such a bad reputation). I just don't think I can say enough good things about this book. I'm glad I bought it, and will hopefully share it with others who share my fascination and enthusiasm.

67 of 80 people found the following review helpful:

5.0 out of 5 stars At Long Last..., July 11, 2004

By 

A Positive Guy "Jay" (San Antonio, Texas United States) - See all my reviews

This review is from: Going Home to the Fifties (Paperback)

a book that celebrates that wonderful decade known as the 1950's and does so without irreverance, parody, or sarcasm. I came across the wonderful gem of a book quite by accident. For years, I had wished that someone would write a book that highlighted this time in American history and Bill Yenne does a SUPERB job.

Not only is the text informative, but the wonderful pictures and illustrations, along with real advertisements, make this book a must-have for the serious afficianado. Unfortunately, you can find books out there about the fifties, but they are written by those who want to make fun of that time and use intellectual sophistication to castigate this era in America. How do I know it was such a good time?

Well, I don't recall high school students shooting and knifing other students. Teen pregnancy numbers were quite low, movies had a point to them, drug abuse wasn't rampant, and some things were still honored and revered, such as church, country, and family. (No, I am not a Falwell/Robetrtson/Dobson right-wing fundamentalist.) But I am a moderate and I guess one of the many things I love about that time was its moderation and its optimism.

Here we were right after a world war, eager to achieve and enjoy the promise of America and full of boundless optimism about our future. President Eisenhower led with a fatherly hand, and people grew and flourished. The malcontent and sociopath were the exception rather than what seems like the rule today. People seemed to have some reference to the whole rather than just an apathetic, "I don't give a damn" attitude. There were no violent gangsta rap songs flooding the airwaves with hate, and wonder of wonders, the music was really good-now considered classic.

Yes, those halcyon days are gone now and we've "grown up." Just about anything goes and you don't have to look very far to find a social or psychic cesspool to wallow in. Being born in the late fifties, I know that my generation is the last to have enjoyed the fruitage of that great decade. But for a time, it was ours and it was sparkling, and it was the real deal.

So get this book and spend an afternoon savoring each delicious memory and picture. You can't help but feel better after you put the book down and in fact, will find yourself returning there again and again.

65 of 78 people found the following review helpful:

4.0 out of 5 stars Going home to the Fifties with Madison Avenue., December 16, 2003

By 

Robin Benson - See all my reviews
(REAL NAME)   

This review is from: Going Home to the Fifties (Paperback)

I was intrigued when I first saw this pop up on Amazon while looking for another book about the Fifties and I placed an order. Now having read and looked through it a more apt title would be 'Going Home to the White Middle Class Suburban Fifties'. The author covers the period with a rather narrow focus, concentrating mainly on home life in the newly built suburbs and the reason for this is because nearly all the interesting illustrations (paintings and photos) are images taken from ads of the time. There are chapters about The Living Room, In the Kitchen, The Bed and Bath, Watching Television, all areas where pictures from ads would be available but no chapter, for instance, about suburban shopping, supermarkets and malls were not heavy advertisers in mass-market magazines back then. It does seem odd to allow the availability of ad images to dictate the contents of a book about the recent past.

This does create some odd situations, page thirty-seven shows a Saturday Little League game with an Oldsmobile taking most of the space, page forty has a painting to show a village theater but it is dominated by a 1957 Oldsmobile, on pages forty-one and forty-two the five-day-a-week trek to collect commuter hubby from the train station uses a painting with six Chevrolets taking more space than the train.

The author covers the period in a straightforward way and I get the impression that it is the pictures that count rather than the words (set in a rather large type size) which just fill out the space between the two, three or four pictures on each spread. The captions are redundant as they only describe what can be seen in the pictures. There is a good index but no bibliography.

'Going Home to the Fifties does capture some of the feel of this wonderful period for the white middle classes and it was a neat idea to use the very images that helped to create this feeling but I think another book does a better job, the stunning 'All-American Ads: 50s' by Jim Heimann, 960 pages of color ads including many that had the pictures used in Bill Yenne's book but now you can see and read the whole ad.

*I've done two Listmanias on the 50s with over fifty books, especially visual ones.


***FOR AN INSIDE LOOK click on 'customer images' under the cover.