Pop History

The names of famous and influential people are scattered throughout the FiftiesWeb This is merely a short list for those of you who have been asked the question, Name Some Famous People.

FAMOUS PEOPLE
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The Arts - Writers, Playwrights, and Painters - This Page

The Arts - Writers, Playwrights, and Painters
Buy Earnest Hemingway Movies	Ernest Hemingway Born:1899 in Oak Park, Illinois Died: 7/2/1961 One of the great American writers of the 20th century. Hemingway's lean stories usually dealt with men living active, dangerous lives, soldiers, fishermen, athletes, bullfighters, who meet challenge and hardship with quiet courage. Works include "A Farewell to Arms" (1929),"To Have and Have Not" (1937), "For Whom the Bell Tolls" (1940), and "The Old Man and the Sea" (1952). Many of Hemingway's books were made into movies. He was awarded the 1954 Nobel Prize in literature Hemingway shot himself, committing suicide by gun as had his father before him.
Buy Tennessee Williams Movies	Tennessee Williams (Thomas Lanier Williams) Born: 3/26/1911 in Columbus, Mississippi Died: 2/24/1983 in New York City South's greatest playwright whose plays reflected his Southern experience. He achieved more fame when many of his plays were made into movies. Works include "The Glass Menagerie" (1945), "A Streetcar Named Desire" (1947 for which he won the Pulitzer), "Cat on a Hot Tin Roof" (1955 for which he won the Pulitzer) and "Night of the Iguana" (1961).
Buy Arthur Miller Plays	Arthur Miller Born:10/17/1915 in New York City Died: 2/10/2005 Leading American dramatist whose best known work, "Death of a Salesman" (1949) won the Pulitzer Prize. Other works include "The Crucible" (1953), "A View From the Bridge" (1955 also a Pulitzer Prize), "After the Fall" (1964) and the screenplay for "The Misfits" (1961). Miller's fame increased when he married Marilyn Monroe in 1956, later to divorce in 1961. In 1957 Miller was convicted of contempt of Congress for refusing to name names to the House Un-American Activities Committee. In 1958 United States Court of Appeals overturned the conviction.
Buy This Book	Dr. Benjamin Spock Born: 5/2/1903 in New Haven, Connecticut Died: 1998 Pediatrician whose book, "Baby and Child Care" (1946) would become the manual for the parents of Baby Boomers. Spock's book would be translated into 39 languages and sell more than 50 million copies, making it second in sales only to the Bible.
Buy This Book	J. D. Salinger Born:1/1/1919 in New York City Died: 1/27/2010 His work consists mainly of one book and some short stories. But what a book. "The Catcher in the Rye" (1951), a novel about a schoolboy at odds with society, was wildly popular with college students. In 1965, Salinger retreated from public life.
Buy This DVD	Herman Wouk Born: 5/27/1915 in New York City An American writer whose first major work, "The Caine Mutiny" (1951) was later turned into a popular movie starring Humphrey Bogart. Then came Marjorie Morningstar (1955) which was made into a movie starring Natalie Wood. Two later novels about World War II, The Winds of War (1971) and War and Remembrance (1978), were equally successful and formed the basis for two television miniseries.
Buy "Mike Hammer" Books	"Mickey" Spillane (Frank Morrison Spillane) Born: 3/9/1918 in Brooklyn, New York Died: 7/17/2006 Paperback novels enjoyed banner sales in the Fifties with Mickey Spillane's creation of Mike Hammer at the front of the pack. There have been 13 Mike Hammer books, 2 television series and many movies and made for TV movies. Spillane has sold over 130 million books.
	Jackson Pollack Born:1912 in Cody, Wyoming Died: 1956 Painter who's style is considered abstract expressionism. His experimentations led to the development of his famous “drip” technique, in which he energetically drew or “dripped” complicated linear rhythms onto enormous canvases. He was killed in an automobile accident.