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On the date

Saturday, January 6, 1951

From the day

Perspective: The Street Photographer · Sight

The flash of my Leica catches a woman in a cinched wool coat pausing before a newsstand, her silhouette sharp against the charcoal haze of a New York winter. Headlines scream of sanctions and the distant thunder of the Peiping regime, threatening to put a kibosh on the fragile peace we’ve clung to since the last Great War. I duck into the diner for heat, watching the neon flicker over a sign advertising gas for $0.27 a gallon, a price that feels like a weight on every working man’s pocket. A child at the corner table ignores his eggs, mesmerized by the bright vinyl circles of his new Colorforms set while the world outside grows cold and uncertain.

Memories from that day

No memories yet. Add yours if you remember this day.

The must-have

Colorforms

On This Day

  • Korean War: Beginning of the Ganghwa massacre, in the course of which an estimated 200–1,300 South Korean communist sympathizers are slaughtered.

    Wikipedia →

Slang

Slang of the decade

General

blastflickkiboshshades

Greaser

cruisin'daddy-odibsknuckle sandwichpad

Beatnik

cooldigfar outhipsquare

Catchphrases of 1951

  • I like Ike

Tech Check

UNIVAC I (Commercial Computer), Power Steering & Video Tape Recorder (Early).

Cost of Living (1950)

Loaf of Bread

$0.14

Gallon of Gas

$0.27

Average Home

$7,354

New Car

$1,510

Time Elapsed

27,544 days ago

(75 years, 169 days)