| A | B |
|---|
| Soviet Union | Russian-dominated Communist country |
| Joseph Stalin | Head of the USSR during World War II |
| Nikita Khrushchev | Head of the USSR after Joseph Stalin |
| Harry Truman | US president at the end of World War II |
| mushroom cloud | distinctive symbol of atomic explosion |
| radioactive fallout | long-term consequence of atomic explosions |
| Cold War | Period of US-Soviet tensions |
| NSC-68 | document which shaped early Cold War policy of US |
| Truman Doctrine | policy "to support free peoples who are resisting subjugation" |
| Polish Question | 1st conflict between US and USSR over Eastern Europea |
| Potsdam Conference | Meeting to decide division of Europe after World War II |
| Iron Curtain | imaginary/symbolic division between USSR and west |
| Winston Churchill | UK former Prime Minister who gave speech on "Iron Curtain" |
| George Kennan | state department official who defined containment policy |
| Marshall Plan | US program to rebuild Western Europe after World War II |
| Berlin airlift | US attempt to aid West Berlin in 1948 |
| NATO | military alliance uniting North Atlantic states (including USA) |
| Warsaw Pact | military alliance uniting Eastern Europe and USSR |
| Mao Zedong | leader of Chinese Communist Revolution |
| hydrogen bomb | more powerful version of atomic bomb |
| Korean War | "police action" to contain communism in Korea |
| The Shah | pro-US ruler of Iran (later overthrown by Islamic Revolution) |
| Nasser | leader of Egypt who claims Suez Canal |
| HUAC | House committee investigating US communists |
| Joe McCarthy | politician who capitalized on Second Red Scare |
| J. Edgar Hoover | Head of the FBI during Second Red Scare |
| Age of Conformity | Age of Affluence |
| suburbs | area that grew due to housing shortage after World War II |
| Baby Boom | jump in birth rate in 1950s |
| Dr. Benjamin Spock | author of famous baby-care book |
| interstate highway system | 1950s project which helped suburban growth |
| Levittowns | well-known company-sponsored suburban developments |
| United Auto Workers | one of several unions that compromised on workplace control to gain better wages |
| COLA | cost of living adjustment |
| beatniks | counter-culture of the 1950s |
| GI Bill | plan to fund college educations for veterans |
| Fair Deal | Truman's social welfare plan |
| Brown vs Board of Education | NAACP-supported lawsuit to end school segregation |
| separate but equal | precedent challenge and overturned by Brown vs. Board of Educaiton |
| Little Rock High School | early confrontation over public school desegragation |
| Rosa Parks | woman who started Montgomery Bus Boycott |
| Martin Luther King Jr | leader of peaceful resistance movement for Civil Rights |
| Kennedy-Nixon debates | first televised presidential debates |
| southern Democrats | Conservative (often racist) Democrats (also called Dixiecrats) |
| John Kenneth Galbraith | economic advisor to Kennedy |
| Thurgood Marshall | first black Supreme Court Justice |
| Warren Court | liberal Supreme Court which supported civil rights movement |
| James Meredith | black who tried to enroll in U of Mississippi |
| Great Society | anti-poverty program of Lyndon B. Johnson |
| Civil Rights Act | law that banned discrimination in public facilities |
| Voting Rights Act | law that banned literacy tests and other discrimination at the polls |
| Ku Klux Klan | secret white organization which opposed Civil Rights movement |
| ghettos | poor black inner-city areas |
| barrios | poor Hispanic inner-city areas |
| Watts riot | civil unrest over lack of opportunity for blacks |
| Stokely Carmichael and Malcom X | leaders of Black Power movement |
| Betty Friedan | author of "The Feminine Mystique" |
| Phyllis Schlafly | leader of women opposing feminist movement |
| Cesar Chavez | organizer of United Farm Workers Union |
| Mendez vs Minster | court case challenging segregation of Mexican Americans in schools |
| Equal Rights Amendment | Women's rights act, never ratified |
| Busing | a controversial method of school integration |
| birth control pill | considered a major cause of the sexual revolution |
| Fidel Castro | communist dictator of Cuba |
| Bay of Pigs | failed attempt by Kennedy to overthrow Castro |
| Cuban Missile Crisis | Cold War confrontation in which USSR threatened to place missiles in Cuba |
| Ho Chi Minh | leader of North Vietnam |
| Vietnam | formerly part of the French colonial empire |
| Ngo Dinh Diem | US-supported leader of South Vietnam |
| Viet Cong | communist Vietnamese guerillas |
| Gulf of Tonkin Resolution | Congressional bill to give Pres. Johnson a free hand in Vietnam |
| Tet Offensive | massive assault on US position by North Vietnamese in 1968 |
| My Lai massacre | slaughter of Vietnamese civilians by US troops |
| Cambodia | neighbor to Vietnam that was bombed under Pres. Nixon |
| Ho Chi Minh City | formerly known as Saigon, capital of Vietnam |
| Kent State | famous place where national guards fired on and killed student protestors |
| Jackson State | less well-known place where national guards fired on and killed student protestors |
| Pentagon Papers | official documents outlining course of Vietnam War |
| detente | Nixon's policy of negotiation during Cold War |
| SALT | Strategic Arms Limitation Talks |
| imperial presidency | idea that the president should have wide powers, not restricted by Congress or the courts |
| Watergate | break-in which revealed corruption in Nixon's reelection campaign |
| Woodward and Bernstein | reporters who investigated Watergate breakin |
| Archibald Cox | original special prosecutor for Watergate invsetigation |
| Mitchell, Haldeman, Ehrlichman, Dean | Nixon staffers implicated in Watergate investigation |
| oval office tapes | secret recordings kept by Nixon (and Johnson before him) of conversations in the president's office |
| Gerald Ford | Nixon Vice-President who granted him a pardon |
| Leon Jaworsky | special prosecutor who replaced Archibald Cox |
| oil embargo | action by Arab nations to influence US policy towards Israel |
| stagflation | high inflation coupled with high unemployment in the 1970s |
| OPEC | Organization of Petroleum Exporting Countries |
| Iran hostages | Americans taken hostage by Islamic Revolutionaries during Carter administration |
| trickle down economics | theory of Reagan that tax cuts for wealthy would indirectly benefit the poor |
| deterrence | theory that large military would prevent attacks on US |
| Teflon presidency | idea that criticism of Reagan never stuck |
| Reaganomics | theory that military spending could increase, taxes could decrease, and the budget could still be balanced |
| Bill Clinton | first president impeached since the Civil War |
| Geraldine Ferraro | first female Vice Presidential candidate from a major party |
| deregulation | removal of government oversight of companies |
| affirmative action | programs to increase minority university admissions and hiring |
| Savings and Loan Crisis | failure of lending institutions due to deregulation |
| Camp David Accords | Middle East peace settlement reached by Pres. Carter |
| Afghanistan | sometimes called the USSR's Vietnam |
| Moscow Summer Olympics | boycotted by Carter due to Afghanistan War |
| Panama Canal | territory returned to Panama by Carter |
| Evil Empire | Reagan's nick name for the Soviet Union |
| Nicaragua | site of US-sponsored attempt to overthrow the government in the 1980s |
| Iran-Contra Affair | attempt by Reagan officials to by-pass Congressional ban on funding Nicaraguan rebels |
| Oliver North | leading figure in Iran Contra |
| Mikhail Gorbachev | Soviet leader who espoused glasnost and perestroika |
| Persian Gulf War | military engagement to drive Iraq out of Kuwait |
| Nelson Mandela | first president of South Africa after ending of arpartheid |
