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I lie King
Elvis Presley, a young man of
twenty or so from Memphis,
Tennessee, had become
wildly popular. The music he
sang was a combination of
black rhythm and blues,
gospel and country (hill
billy).
It had never been sung like
this by a white person.
After having listened for years
to the above mentioned
singers singing so sedately by
comparison, I'll never forget
how we reacted to
'Heartbreak Hotel' (hiccups
and all) and to 'You ain't
nothing but a hounddog'
sung by Elvis who threw
himself into a song with
abandon. We had to get used
to it, but then we liked it just
like the rest of the young
people did.
It was said that Elvis moved
his hips too much. On the Ed
Sullivan show, a popular tv-
show then, he couldn't be
shown from the waist down!
Elvis was crushed. It is also
said that he just couldn't
stand still and all those moves
were involuntary and just
Elvis. His audience loved it.
Elvis was not the only one
who did rock and roll, but he
popularized it as no other. He
was proclaimed the King, was
mobbed by screaming girls
everywhere he went, became
a millionair and built himself
a mansion; Graceland in
Memphis, Tennessee. That is
where the King - practically a
recluse by then - died on
August 16, 1977. But for the
young and for people of
Elvis' generation it is 'rock
and roll forever'.
A peppermint green
Chevrolet
We loved living in America.
We were young, saw all the
things we had only seen in
movies, were just as
enamored of cars as the rest
of the population and the
fifties were rather carefree.
It also was the decade that
brought us cars with
enormous fins and lots of
chrome trimming.
Now, I had seen a brandnew
1957 Chevrolet in
Amsterdam just before
leaving for the U.S.
It was peppermint green with
a white top and two beautiful
white fins in the back. I was
smitten by it and promised
myself that that would be the
car I would have as soon as I
got to the States.
When Wally introduced me
to a colleague of his, he also
introduced me to the man's
car: a white 1957 Chevy
convertible with red
upholstery. A dream.
Of course we had to wait for
ours, but after two years - we
were on our way to a friend
in Connecticut - we saw a
beautiful bronze and ivory
1957, V8, Chevy Belair, with
two gorgeous silver fins.
We decided to buy it and as
big and heavy and powerful
(no power steering then) as it
was, I got my driver's license
in it. It is still my favorite
among cars and today it is a
classic. I have always wanted
to save ours in the garage but
sadly we traded it in for a
very prosaic-looking station
wagon.
Prosperity
The fifties were wonderful
years. Things had quieted
down a bit around the world.
Eisenhower was an extremely
popular president and the
U.S. were on the verge of
great prosperity.
Tv became very popular,
n January 1950 there were
only four million tv-sets in the
U.S., whereas there were 44
million in January 1959
(according to U.S. Postal
Services Celebrate the
Century issue)
Drive-in movies were popular,
especially with teenagers who
now had some privacy and
young couples with children
who could bring them along
and not worry about baby
sitters. People moved to the
suburbs where for the first
time many owned their own
homes. The face of America
was changing and so was the
rest of the world.
The fifties saw the first
satelite, Explorer I.
The National Aeronautics and
Space Administration
(NASA) came into being and
many more Explorers would
follow. The fifties were
coming to a close and in the
next decade we would have a
young president with a vision.
We would no longer be
earthbound.
We would go to the moon.
FAR HOLIDAYS
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