17. Prosperity in the 1950s was achieved without government assistance
In the 1950s, home ownership doubled across the United States. College attendance also reached new heights. Graduates found themselves eligible for higher-paying jobs. At the same time, union membership increased, and stronger labor unions achieved higher wages in manufacturing jobs. The demand for new homes led to increases in construction jobs. Across America, outside cities and towns, suburbs built of new homes led to flight from the urban centers. Demand in the suburbs led to new churches, schools, shopping centers, medical centers, and all the components of what became later known as suburban sprawl. But the hand of government was clearly behind much of the boom in housing and jobs. It came in the form of a World War II act designed for the benefit of the men and women who had served in uniform, the GI Bill of Rights.
Throughout the 1950s and ensuing decades of the 60s and 70s, the GI Bill allowed former servicemen and women to attend college when it would have been otherwise financially out of reach. It provided mortgage loans, without the necessity of a large down payment usually required by financial institutions. But the explosive growth of planned communities such as New York’s Levittown often excluded Blacks, regardless of their status as veterans. The first Levittown (several communities by that name were built) began construction in 1947 and was completed in 1951. Its builder, William J. Levitt, refused to sell his new homes to Blacks. The first Black to purchase a home in Levittown, New York did so in 1957, purchasing it from its previous owner, under the GI Bill. His family endured protests from neighbors, attacks on their home, and the eventual intervention of Martin Luther King.
