Many of the new parents moved to homes in the new suburbs built outside the urban environment of cities. An estimated seventy-eight million Americans were born between nineteen forty-six and nineteen sixty-four. The increase in births after the war produced what became known as the baby boom generation. From nineteen fifty to nineteen sixty, the number of children between the ages of five and fourteen increased by more than ten million. People felt the need for a family and security after the long, difficult years of the war. Suddenly, it seemed like every family started having babies. In nineteen thirty-six, during the Great Depression, the average American mother gave birth to only two children. By nineteen hundred, the average woman had only three or four children. Families began to have fewer and fewer children. So it was good to have many children.īut over the years birth rates fell. Families needed a lot of help on the farm. In the early years of America, the average mother had eight to ten children. One hundred years later, in eighteen ninety, the population was sixty-three million.īy nineteen fifty, there were more than one hundred fifty million people living in the United States. At that time, the country had about four million people. The first census took place in seventeen ninety. The United States counts its population every ten years. Maybe I better add a few more rooms back here.”Ī couple in a marketing film for the home building industry. HUSBAND: “Yeah, the children … Children? Say, how many are you planning on? Not more than six, I hope. WIFE: “And we’ll have the living room right in here, and the kitchen right here so we can see the children playing in the yard.” Today, we look at the growth of suburbs and other changes in the American population in the years after World War Two. They bought newly built homes in suburban communities outside busy cities. Millions of Americans moved out of cities and small towns. And many were now earning enough money to find that better life. Many Americans were no longer satisfied with their old ways of life. Factories stopped producing war materials and began to produce goods for peacetime.Īt the same time, other changes began to take place in society.

Soldiers began to come home and find jobs. Life in the United States began to return to normal.

World War Two finally ended in August of nineteen forty-five.

Baby boom ww2