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Extension Activity
Assessment
Standards
Timeline
Teacher Resources
The Song

The lyrics to "We Didn't Start the Fire" list some of the historically significant people, ideas, and events of the twentieth century in chronological order.  Below is a timeline of the topics listed in the song.

1949

Harry Truman

Doris Day

Red China

Johnnie Ray

South Pacific

Walter Winchell

Joe DiMaggio

1950

Joe McCarthy

Richard Nixon

Studebaker

Television

North Korea

South Korea

Marilyn Monroe

1951

Rosenbergs

H-Bomb

Sugar Ray

Panmunjom

Brando

The King and I

The Catcher in the Rye

1952

Eisenhower

Vaccine

England's got a new Queen

Marciano

Liberace

Santayana good-bye

1953

Joseph Stalin

Malenkov

Nasser

Prokofiev

Rockefeller

Campanella

Communist Bloc

1954

Roy Cohn

Juan Peron

Toscanini

Dacron

Dien Bien Phu Falls

Rock Around The Clock

1955

Einstein

James Dean

Brooklyn's got a winning team

Davy Crockett

Peter Pan

Elvis Presley

Disneyland

1956

Bardot

Budapest

Alabama

Krushchev

Princess Grace

Peyton Place

Trouble in the Suez

1957

Little Rock

Pasternak

Mickey Mantle

Kerouac

Sputnik

Chou-En-Lai

Bridge on the River Kwai

1958

Lebanon

Charles de Gaulle

California Baseball

Starkweather Homicide

Children of Thalidomide

1959

Buddy Holly

Ben Hur

Space Monkey

Mafia

Hula hoops

Castro

Edsel is a no-go

1960

U-2

Syngman Rhee

Payola

Kennedy

Chubby Checker

Psycho

Belgians in the Congo

 1961

Hemingway

Eichmann

Stranger in a Strange Land

Dylan

Berlin

Bay of Pigs Invasion

1962

Lawrence of Arabia

British Beatle Mania

Ole Miss

John Glenn

Liston beats Patterson

1963

Pope Paul

Malcom X

British Politician Sex

JFK Blown away

1964

Birth Control

Ho Chi Minh

Richard Nixon back again

Moonshot

1965 - 1989

Woodstock

Watergate

Punk Rock

Begin

Reagan

Palestine

Terror on the Airline

Ayatollah's in Iran

Russians in Afghanistan

Wheel of Fortune

Sally Ride

Heavy Metal Suicide

Foreign Debts

Homeless Vets

AIDS

Crack

Bernie Goetz

Hypodermics on the Shore

China's under Martial Law

Rock & Roller Cola Wars

 

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