Born in 1957

If you were born in 1957, you were born into a year that sent the country's confidence wobbling for the first time in a while. On October 4th, the Soviet Union launched Sputnik—a beach-ball-sized sphere beeping from orbit—and the American sense of technological superiority took a very hard hit. Suddenly the science teachers were urgent figures, Congress was funding programs, and the word "satellite" was on everyone's lips with varying degrees of dread.

Eisenhower stayed calm and the economy was still booming, but something had shifted. On the lighter side, American Bandstand went national in August, and Dick Clark became the den father of a generation. "All Shook Up" and "Jailhouse Rock" kept Elvis in command of the airwaves.

*The Bridge on the River Kwai* was the serious film everyone felt obligated to see. West Side Story opened on Broadway and redefined what a musical could do. Ford launched the Edsel in September in a blaze of advertising that would become a business school legend for all the wrong reasons—the public took one look at the grille and kept walking.

Hula hoops were still a year away, but the drive-in was in its golden age, teenagers fogging up the windows of their parents' Fords on Friday nights while the speaker crackled and the popcorn went cold. The TV set was on in the living room every evening without fail.