My Look Back: 1948

Cheering fans at University of California Sporting Event
 Photo by Ralph Crane from the LIFE Photo Archive

I'm going to presume that the photograph from above is from a UC football game (I'd like to say as a UCLA alum, that is is a Bruin showdown, but I can't be certain).  This time around I'm taking a looksie at 1948 and it seemed fitting to include a quasi football related photograph since the season is now invading homes across the country on Sundays and Monday nights (well I know it is at my house).  63 years ago the post-war boom was in full swing with the first pre-fabricated homes being built in the U.S. and Europe as well as a rising popularity in bikinis (I don't know, bikinis + plus more homes, I'd say this could explain the baby boom).  Here are some other tidbits of events that took place in 1948.

• Mohandas Karamchan Gandhi is assassinated.
• The International Planned Parenthood Federation is founded by Margaret Sanger.
• BeBe Shopp from Minnesota is crowned Miss America. She is the first contestant to be crowned in an evening gown since the pageant was reinstated in 1935. (Don't you just love her name?).
• Babe Ruth passes away.
• 1948 is a leap year.
• A gallon of gas costs 16 cents and a movie ticket costs 60 cents.
• Porsche and NASCAR are founded.
• The board game Scrabble is first introduced.
• Ozzy Osbourne, Donna Summer, Johnny Ramone, and Samuel L. Jackson are born.
• The first color newsreel is shown by Warner Bros.  The news: The Tournament of Roses Parade and the Rose Bowl game.
• The first I-Spy books debut.
• Pillsbury introduces the first chocolate cake mix and the most popular things to watch on television are wrestling and boxing.