The 1960s, Episode 1: The Cold War

The Spring 2025 class is about the tumultuous decade of the 1960s. In order to understand most of the major events and themes of the 1960s, it is necessary to recognize the Cold War, and how it touched nearly all aspects of life and society in the United States and around the world. In fact, the Cold War shrank the world dramatically, as the USSR & the USA stuck their foot in nearly every corner of the world to influence politics, war, and the economy on a global perspective. This episode is an introduction for the class as a whole, and then there's a brief survey of communism and the Cold War that followed the spread of communism.