The 1950s Science and Technology: Chronology

1950:      The Sulzer weaving machine, employing an automatic loom, begins modern commercial production of cloth.

1950:      Scientists at the University of Wisconsin implant an embryo (early form of life developed from a fertilized egg) in the uterus of a cow.

1951:      A Swedish dentist constructs the first air-powered, high-speed dental drill.

1951:      Chrysler introduces the first production-model car with power steering.

1951:      The nuclear testing station at Arco, Idaho, produces electricity from nuclear power.

1951:      Marion Donovan develops "The Boater," the first disposable diaper.

1951:     April Remington-Rand sells the first commercially available computer, the UNIVAC I.

1952:      George Jorgensen, a U.S. Army private, travels to Denmark where he under-goes an operation to change his sex and emerges as Christine Jorgensen.

1952:     November 1 The first full-scale test of a crude hydrogen bomb takes place on Elugelab Island in the Pacific Ocean.

1953:      The Raytheon Company patents a "high-frequency dielectric heating apparatus," otherwise known as a microwave oven.

1953:      Mathematician Norbert Wiener introduces the new field of "cybernetics" (the study of control and communication in the animal and the machine).

1954:      Charles H. Townes proves that light energy can be amplified. The phenomenon is called a laser.

1954:      The first regularly operated bevatron (atom smasher) is built in Berkeley, California.

1954:      The commercial transistor radio debuts on the U.S. market.

1954:      Odeco, Inc. employs the first mobile, submersible oil-drilling unit for offshore drilling in the Gulf of Mexico.

1954:      Bell Laboratories develops the photo-voltaic cell, which converts sunlight into electricity.

1955:      Scientists first hear radio emissions originating on the planet Jupiter.

1955:      Multiple-track recording, in which songs are recorded with voice on one track and music on another, is introduced, resulting in the commercialization of stereophonic sound equipment and phonograph records.

1955:      The Field-Ion microscope, which can indirectly see individual atoms, is developed.

1955:      A home freezer that can maintain a minus-27-degree Fahrenheit temperature is introduced.

1955:     January The nuclear submarine Nautilus makes its first dive, lasting one hour, in Long Island Sound.

1955:     June The British ship Monarch begins laying transatlantic cable between Great Britain and the United States.

1955:     October–November Pan American Airways purchases Boeing 707 and Douglas DC-8 jet aircraft, signaling the birth of the commercial jet age in the United States.

1956:      Fifteen thousand women in Puerto Rico and Haiti volunteer to test the effectiveness and safety of the oral contraceptive birth control pill.

1956:      Bell Laboratories produces a transistorized computer.

1956:      Burroughs markets the E-101 desktop computer for scientists and mathematicians.

1956:      The "Ampex" system produces taped television shows of comparable quality to live shows.

1956:      The Mid-Oceanic Ridge, a formation of mountains and rifts that circles the world under the oceans, is discovered.

1956:     September 25 The first eastbound telephone call is completed using the transatlantic cable.

1957:      Doppler navigation, a device for accurately determining aircraft position and airspeed, makes civil aviation safer.

1957:      Hoover develops a spin clothes dryer.

1957:      Fifty-six countries participate in the International Geophysical Year, sponsored by the International Council of Scientific Unions.

1957:     October 4 The Soviet Union launches its Sputnik satellite.

1958:      The first U.S. artificial satellite orbits Earth.

1958:      Bifocal contact lenses are developed.

1958:      Pan American Airway flies the first commercial transatlantic route in a jet.

1958:     July The Explorer IV satellite verifies the presence of a radiation belt around Earth.

1959:      The first commercial copy machine is introduced by Xerox.

1959:      Transistors are placed on silicon chips for the first time.

1959:      Sony produces the first transistorized black-and-white television set in the United States.

1959:     April 25 The Saint Lawrence Seaway, an engineering marvel that provides sea access from the Atlantic Ocean to the Great Lakes, opens to shipping.