Virtual Hallway Display at Thinkers Lodge

​Display in hallway for Virtual Tour 
Who and what do you recognize? This display and these icons remind us what the world was like in the 1950.

Although this wall mural displays icons of the 1950s, its significance is far more ominous. There are two circles displayed: the smaller ones indicates the devastating tolls of deaths, injuries, and environmental destruction that the atomic bombs dropped on Hiroshima and Nagasaki, Japan on August 6 and August 9, 1945. "The bombs immediately devastated their targets. Over the next two to four months, the acute effects of the atomic bombings killed between 90,000 and 146,000 people in Hiroshima and 39,000 and 80,000 people in Nagasaki; roughly half of the deaths in each city occurred on the first day."  The larger circle represents the immense increase in destructive powers. "The largest nuclear weapon ever detonated, the Tsar Bomba, set off by the Soviet Union in 1961, produced an insane 50-megaton blast—about 3,333 times more powerful than the Little Boy bomb that leveled an entire city. The Tsar Bomba is the largest manmade explosion to date, sending a mushroom cloud up to more than 130,000 feet in altitude—about four and a half times the height of Mount Everest—as it sent shockwaves around the globe three times over."
 Read more to identify the icons on the mural.

1. Jackie Robinson broke the color barrier when he became the first black athlete to play Major League Baseball in the 20th century. He signed with the Brooklyn Dodgers in 1947, and was named Rookie of the Year that year, National League MVP in 1949 and a World Series champ in 1955.
2. Photo of women at computers were NASA technicians.  NASA was founded in 1958. It is significant that women played a significant role in doing the computations. Shetterly’s “Hidden Figures” tells the untold true story of the African American women mathematicians who worked at NASA during the Civil Rights era.
3. Kellogs Cornflake ad
4. Newspaper Article about Einstein who was vocal activist against nuclear weapons.  He was an activist.  However, he wrote President Roosevelt a letter urging that the bomb be built.
5. The Suez Canal Crisis: On October 29, 1956, Israeli armed forces pushed into Egypt toward the Suez Canal after Egyptian president Gamal Abdel Nasser (1918-70) nationalized the canal in July of that same year, initiating the Suez Crisis. The Israelis soon were joined by French and British forces, which nearly brought the Soviet Union into the conflict, and damaged their relationships with the United States. In the end, the British, French and Israeli governments withdrew their troops in late 1956 and early 1957.
6. Atomic Age Powwow article
7. Elvis Presley’s musical career began in 1954.
8. An ad with Cyrus Eaton and his shorthorn cattle was used by Nova Scotia tourist bureau to urge people to visit this beautiful province.
9. Chuck Berry is known as the father of rock ‘n roll and one who brought the worlds of black and whites together through music
10. James Dean was an actor known for his role in Rebel Without a Cause.  He died in a tragic car accident in 1955 when he was 24.
11. Rosa Parks is pictured with Martin Luther King in 1955. Parks refused to give up her seat in Montgomery, Alabama.  Although not the first to resist bus segregation, she was chosen to be central figure in court challenge after her arrest for civil disobedience in violating segregation laws in Alabama.
12. Soviet leader Nikita Khrushchev publicized Stalin's crimes, was a major player in the Cuban Missile Crisis and established a more open form of Communism in the USSR. He and Cyrus Eaton were friends.
13. Dr. Seuss, Theodore Seuss Geisel, wrote and illustrated more than 60 books. He attacked racism, fascism, isolationism, and anti-Semitism in political cartoons.  His first book was rejected by every publisher he submitted it to.  As a member of the military, he made animated training films and propaganda posters. Dr. Seuss was a Pulitzer prize in 1984 for contribution to children’s literature.
14. Joseph Stalin died in 1953.   Joseph Stalin ruled the Soviet Union for more than two decades, instituting a reign of terror while modernizing Russia and helping to defeat Nazism.
15. The Korean War was Fought from 1950 to 1953. Communist North Korea invaded its southern, democratic neighbor. Backed by the United Nations, with many of the troops furnished by the United States, South Korea resisted. The Korean War saw the United States follow its policy of containment as it worked to block aggression and halt the spread of Communism.  As such, the Korean War may be seen as one of the many proxy wars fought during the Cold War. 
16. An ad for atomic electric power. Nuclear Power had beneficial uses and seemed an alternative to fossil fuels.
17. Coffee ad for Maxwell coffee
18. Sputnik. The Soviet Union launched Sputnik into an elliptical low Earth orbit on 4 October 1957. It was visible all around the Earth and its radio pulses were detectable. This surprise success precipitated the American Sputnik crisis and triggered the Space Race, a part of the larger Cold War. The launch ushered in new political, military, technological, and scientific developments.
19. Bob Chambers created a series of political cartoons using variations of Rodin's Thinker to depict visual commentary on Thinkers Lodge, Cyrus Eaton, Khrushchev, and the Pugwash Conferences.  You will find mugs and t-shirts on sale depicting some of his cartoons.  
20. Fidel Castro was leader of socialist Cuba from 1958 until 2008.  Cyrus Eaton visited him and tried to help their cattle-breeding program. The Sea of Pigs and the Cuban Missile Crisis played significant roles in Cuban/Soviet Union/United States relationships.
21. Queen Elizabeth became queen in 1953 six years after she married Prince Phillip.
22. Edmond Hillary and Tanzing Norgay summitted Mount Everest in 1953.