Necessary Trouble: Growing Up at Midcentury

Necessary Trouble describes Faust’s childhood, adolescence, and young adulthood during the 1950s and 60s, a time of social upheaval for almost every realm of American life. The civil rights movement began to gain momentum in the early 1950s. World War II revealed the contradiction of championing American ideals of freedom and democracy abroad while inequality and segregation continued to oppress Black people at home. Many African American soldiers were eager to achieve the “Double V”—victory in the war and the triumph of equality at home. The civil rights movement proceeded throughout the 1960s, forcing Americans to confront deeply embedded ideas of racism and white supremacy, particularly in the Southern States.

By the mid-1960s, the United States had also become involved in the growing Vietnam War. Initially, many Americans supported the cause of fighting against communist North Vietnam, but as the war became ever more costly and deadly, protests against the conflict increased. Many young men were drafted into the military, making the war personal for millions of American families.

Finally, the sexual revolution in the 1960s ushered in more liberal attitudes toward sex and gender norms. Throughout the 1960s, young people rebelled against authority and their parents’ conservative values. The development of the birth control pill gave women more autonomy over their sexuality and challenged traditional ideas about gender roles, relationships, and family structure. In Necessary Trouble, Faust explores how these various factors changed life in midcentury America and shaped her own sense of self as an American woman.