1950s American automobile culture has had an enduring influence on the culture of the United States, as reflected in popular music, major trends from the 1950s and mainstream acceptance of the "hot rod" culture. The American manufacturing economy switched from producing war-related items to consumer goods at the end of World War II, and by the end of the 1950s, one in six working Americans were employed either directly or indirectly in the automotive industry. The United States became the world's largest manufacturer of automobiles, and Henry Ford's goal of 30 years earlier—that any man with a good job should be able to afford an automobile—was achieved. A new generation of service businesses focusing on customers with their automobiles came into being during the decade, including drive-through or drive-in restaurants and greatly increasing numbers of drive-in theaters (cinemas).
The decade began with 40 million registered automobiles on the road, most of which predated World War II and were in poor condition; no automobiles or parts were produced during the war owing to rationing and restrictions. By 1950, most factories had made the transition to a consumer-based economy, and more than 8 million cars were produced that year alone. By 1958, there were more than 67 million cars registered in the United States.
As part of the U.S. national defenses, to support military transport, the National Highway System was expanded with Interstate highways, beginning in 1955, across many parts of the United States. The wider, multi-lane highways allowed traffic to move at faster speeds, with few or no stoplights on the way. The wide-open spaces along the highways became a basis for numerous billboards showing advertisements.
The dawning of the Space Age and Space Race were reflected in contemporary American automotive styling. Large tailfins, flowing designs reminiscent of rockets, and radio antennas that imitated Sputnik 1 were common, owing to the efforts of design pioneers such as Harley Earl.
Interstate Highway System
The Dwight D. Eisenhower National System of Interstate and Defense Highways (commonly called the Interstate System or simply the Interstate) is a network of freeways that forms a part of the National Highway System of the United States.
While serving as Supreme Commander of the Allied forces in Europe during World War II, Eisenhower had gained an appreciation of the German Autobahn network as an essential component of a national defense system, providing transport routes for military supplies and troop deployments. Construction was authorized by the Federal Aid Highway Act of 1956, and the original portion was completed 35 years later. The system has contributed in shaping the United States into a world economic superpower and a highly industrialized nation.
The Interstate grew quickly, along with the automobile industry, allowing a new-found mobility that permeated ways of American life and culture. The automobile and the Interstate became the American symbol of individuality and freedom, and, for the first time, automobile buyers accepted that the automobile they drove indicated their social standing and level of affluence. It became a statement of their personality and an extension of their self-concepts.
Suburbanization The United States' investment in infrastructures such as highways and bridges coincided with the increasing availability of cars more suited to the higher speeds that better roads made possible, allowing people to live beyond the confines of major cities, and instead commute to and from work.
After World War II, land developers began to buy land just outside the city limits of larger cities to build mass quantities of inexpensive tract houses. One of the first examples of planned suburbanization is Levittown, Pennsylvania, which was developed by William Levitt beginning in 1951 as a suburb of Philadelphia. The promise of their own single-family home on their own land, together with a free college education and low-interest loans given to returning soldiers to purchase homes under the G.I. Bill, drove demand for new homes to an unprecedented level. Additionally, 4 million babies were born every year during the 1950s. By the end of the baby boom era in 1964, almost 77 million "baby boomers" had been born, fueling the need for more suburban housing, and automobiles to commute them to and from the city centers for work and shopping.
By the end of the 1950s, one-third of Americans lived in the suburbs. Eleven of the United States's twelve largest cities recorded a declining population during the decade, with a consequent loss in tax revenues and city culture. Only Los Angeles, a center for the car culture, gained population. Economist Richard Porter commented that "The automobile made suburbia possible, and the suburbs made the automobile essential."
Decline of the inner city More people joined the middle class in the 1950s, with more money to spend, and the availability of consumer goods expanded along with the economy, including the automobile. Americans were spending more time in their automobiles and viewing them as an extension of their identity, which helped to fuel a boom in automobile sales. Most businesses directly or indirectly related to the auto industry saw tremendous growth during the decade. New designs and innovations appealed to a generation tuned into fashion and glamour, and the new-found freedom and way of life in the suburbs had several unforeseen consequences for the inner cities. The 1950s saw the beginning of white flight and urban sprawl, driven by increasing automobile ownership. Many local and national transportation laws encouraged suburbanization, which in time ended up damaging the cities economically.
As more middle-class and affluent people fled the city to the relative quiet and open spaces of the suburbs, the urban centers deteriorated and lost population. At the same time that cities were experiencing a lower tax base due to the flight of higher income earners, pressures from The New Deal forced them to offer pensions and other benefits, increasing the average cost of benefits per employee by 1,629 percent. This was in addition to hiring an average of 20 percent more employees to serve the ever shrinking cities. More Americans were driving cars and fewer were using public transportation, and it was not practical to extend to the suburbs. At the same time, the number of surface roads exploded to serve the ever-increasing numbers of individually owned cars, further burdening city and country resources. During this time, the perception of using public transportation turned more negative. In what is arguably the most extreme example, Detroit, the fifth largest city in the United States in 1950 with 1,849,568 residents, had shrunk to 706,585 by 2010, a reduction of 62 percent.
In some instances, the automotive industry and others were directly responsible for the decline of public transportation. The Great American streetcar scandal saw GM, Firestone Tire, Standard Oil of California, Phillips Petroleum, Mack Trucks and other companies purchase a number of streetcars and electric trains in the 1930s and 1940s, such that 90 percent of city trolleys had been dismantled by 1950. It was argued that this was a deliberate destruction of streetcars as part of a larger strategy to push the United States into automobile dependency. In United States v. National City Lines, Inc., many were found guilty of antitrust violations. The story has been explored several times in print, film and other media, for example in Who Framed Roger Rabbit, Taken for a Ride and The End of Suburbia.
Women's rights The automobile unions played a leading role in advancing the cause of women's rights. In 1955, the United Auto Workers Union (UAW) organized the UAW Women's Department to strengthen women's role in the union and encourage participation in the union's elected bodies. In a move that was met with some hostility by Teamsters leaders, the U.S. Division of Transport Personnel had in 1943 instructed Teamsters Union officials that women should be allowed full employment as truck drivers. That proved to be only a temporary wartime measure, but a change of heart among Teamsters leadership by the mid-1950s led to the Equal Pay Act of 1963. Women in the auto industry were considered leaders in the movement for women's rights.
Motorsports
Hot rodding
The increasing popularity of hot rodding cars (modifying them to increase performance) is reflected in part by the creation of special-interest magazines catering to this culture. Hot Rod is the oldest such magazine, with first editor Wally Parks, and founded by Robert E. Petersen in 1948, with original publication by his Petersen Publishing Company. Hot Rod has licensed affiliation with Universal Technical Institute.
The relative abundance and inexpensive nature of the Ford Model T and other cars from the 1920s to 1940s helped fuel the hot rod culture that developed, which was focused on getting the most linear speed out of these older automobiles. The origin of the term "hot rod" is unclear, but the culture blossomed in the post-war culture of the 1950s.
Hot Rod magazine's November 1950 cover announced the first hot rod to exceed 200 mph. The hand-crafted car used an Edelbrock-built Mercury flathead V8 and set the record at the Bonneville Salt Flats. This region has been called the "Holy Grail of American Hot Rodding", and is often used for land speed racing, a tradition that grew rapidly in the 1950s and continues today.
Hot rodding was about more than raw power. Kustom Kulture started in the 1950s, when artists such as Von Dutch transformed automobile pin striping from a seldom-used accent that followed the lines of the car into a freestyle art form. Von Dutch was as famous for his "flying eyeball" as he was for his intricate spider-web designs. As the decade began, hand-drawn pin striping was almost unheard of, but by 1958 it had become a popular method of customizing the looks of the hot rod. As the decade progressed, hot rodding became a popular hobby for a growing number of teenagers as the sport literally came to Main Street.
Drag racing Drag racing has existed since the first cars, but it was not until the 1950s that it started to become mainstream, beginning with Santa Ana Drags, the first drag strip in the United States. The strip was founded by C. J. "Pappy" Hart, Creighton Hunter and Frank Stillwell at the Orange County Airport auxiliary runway in southern California, and was operational from 1950 until June 21, 1959.
Hot Rod editor Wally Parks created the National Hot Rod Association in 1951, and it is still the largest governing body in the popular sport. , there are at least 139 professional drag strips operational in the United States. One of the most powerful racing fuels ever developed is nitromethane, which dramatically debuted as a racing fuel in 1950, and continues as the primary component used in Top Fuel drag racing today. While nitromethane had been around for years and was used as an industrial solvent, it was first used as a racing fuel in 1954.
NASCAR
The National Association for Stock Car Auto Racing (NASCAR) is the second most popular spectator sports in the United States behind the National Football League (NFL). It was incorporated on February 21, 1948, by Bill France Sr. and built its roots in the 1950s. Two years later in 1950 the first asphalt "superspeedway", Darlington Raceway, was opened in South Carolina, and the sport saw dramatic growth during the 1950s. Because of the tremendous success of Darlington, construction began of a , high-banked superspeedway near Daytona Beach, which is still in use.