Time Magazine Person of the Year 1953-1963 Quiz

Answer: Konrad Adenauer

Although he was not a Nazi, Adenauer was a skilled administrator. He is given credit for the by-pass or belt line highway system. The Nazis respected Adenauer but twice he was imprisoned by them.

"Time" said this: "Konrad Adenauer had already guided the hated land of the Hun and the Nazi back to moral respectability... Though she still lacked a formal peace treaty, and the Iron Curtain fenced her off from half her land and from 18 million countrymen... Adenauer's West Germany last year emerged as the strongest country on the Continent save Soviet Russia."

Answer: John Foster Dulles

Dulles believed that the best way to combat the spread of communism was not by trying to contain it but it meet it head-on even if that meant to the brink of war. He was not above CIA foreign operations into countries with communist threats.

It was the efforts of Dulles at 1954's Berlin Conference, a rare coming together of the foreign ministers of the world's powers, that prompted "Time" to grant the award. Here is what "Time" said:

"[At Berlin], Dulles pressed Molotov with greater skill and force than any U.S. diplomat had ever shown in dealing with the Communists. With one sharp stroke after another, he stripped the Communists naked of the pretense that they really wanted peace at anything less than their own outrageous price. If millions remained deluded by... the Malenkov line, that was not the fault of Dulles..."

Answer: Harlow H. Curtice

Curtice worked his way to the top first at AC Spark Plugs, then the Buick Division, and finally to the top post at GM. In 1954 there was a general feeling that a business slump or recession was imminent. Curtice's optimism and investment in the future were a rallying force.

"Time" said: "... In the early days of 1954, there was gloomy talk of a slowing-and possible end-to the postwar boom. Though the economy was still strong, business was falling off and the total of jobless was growing, along with uncertainty about the future. In this critical period, "Red" Curtice stood up before 500 of the nation's top businessmen and...and gave his own pronouncement on the future. General Motors he said, would spend $1 billion to expand its plants for the increase in auto sales to come..."

Answer: Hungary

The October 23 revolution lasted only a few days, spurred on my students, intellectuals, and Hungarian citizens. Russia used its overwhelming power to subdue the rebels in a few days but in that victory it further lost the confidence of the Western powers and the struggle became a symbol for strong stands against communist expansion.


"Time" said: "The Man of the Year had many faces, but he was not faceless; he had many names, but he was not nameless. History would know him by the face, intense, relentless, desperate and determined, that he had worn on the evening of Oct. 23 in the streets of Budapest; history would know him by the name he had chosen for himself during his dauntless contest with Soviet tanks: the Hungarian Freedom Fighter"

Answer: Nikita Khrushchev

Khrushchev could be as irritating as he could be charming. Witness later his off-the-cuff debate with Richard Nixon and the image of his banging shoe at the United Nations.

"Time" said: "... Khrushchev was as extraordinary a dictator as the world has ever seen. Not since Alexander the Great had mankind seen a despot so willingly, so frequently, and so publicly drunk. Not since Adolf Hitler had the world known a braggart so arrogantly able to make good his own boasts. In 1957 Nikita Khrushchev did more than oversee the launching of man's first moons... Few men had traveled so far so fast."

Answer: Charles de Gaulle

de Gaulle truly symbolized France. While Petain and Laval betrayed their country during World War Two, de Gaulle was the leader of the Free French. Even after he retired from public life, he returned for ten years to form the Fifth Republic and provide France its needed leadership. He resigned in 1969 as one of his personal ideals, to have the president elected by popular vote, was defeated.

"Time" said: "Eight months ago Charles De Gaulle, soldier, scholar and writer, was a recluse... a man whose role in history had ended a dozen years earlier. Today he is Premier and President-elect of France's Fifth Republic and exercises more direct power over his country's affairs than any other democratically chosen leader in the Western world. 'His personal prestige,' says a British expert on France, 'is higher than that of any Frenchman since Napoleon.'"

Answer: Scientists

Pauling was a bio-chemist noted for his theories on quantum chemistry and molecular biology.

Teller was Hungarian born and is often referred to as 'father of the hydrogen bomb'.

Van Allen, an astronomer, is noted for the 'Van Allen Belt' named for him.

Twelve others are mention but these three had the most name recognition.

"Time" said it had chosen 15 U.S. scientists, "...because that number embodies about the right inclusiveness and exclusiveness, U.S. because the heart of scientific inquiry now beats strongest in this country. They are representative of all science-with its dependence on the past, its striving and frustrations in the present, and its plans, hopes and, perhaps, fantasies for the future."

Answer: John Kennedy

An assassin's bullet deprived him of a full term. However, in 1961, "Time" recognised that Kennedy was a highly popular national figure with a populist's touch.

"Time" listed his many qualities; "[he] had a way with the people-a presence that fits many moods, a style that swings with grace from high formality to almost prankish casualness, a quick charm, the patience to listen, a sure social touch, an interest in knowledge and a greed for facts, a zest for play matched by a passion for work."

Answer: John XXIII

The election came as a complete surprise to John XXIII as he had purchased a round-trip ticket back to Venice. His term was short but he did initiate the Second Vatican Council to review the Church in modern times but died before the work was completed.

"Time" said: "So rare are councils-there have been only 20 in the nearly 2,000 years of Christian history-that merely by summoning Vatican II ... Pope John made the biggest individual imprint on the year. But revolutions in Christianity are even rarer... John's historic mission is fired by a desire to endow the Christian faith with "a new Pentecost," ... It is aimed not only at bringing the mother church of Christendom into closer touch with the modern world, but at ending the division that has dissipated the Christian message for four centuries."

Answer: Martin Luther King Jr.

As with John Kennedy, it is difficult to calculate what impact and accomplishments King might have achieved had he too not been gunned down. But in his passing, he became a martyr and a lingering voice for non-violence that echoed Mahatma Gandhi.

"Time" said "King preaches endlessly about nonviolence...(but) he himself has been stabbed in the chest, and physically attacked three more times; his home has been bombed three times. His mail brings him a daily dosage of opinion in which he is by turn vilified and glorified. One letter says: "This isn't a threat but a promise-your head will be blown off as sure as Christ made green apples." But another ecstatically calls him a "Moses, sent to lead his people to the Promised Land...""