When I originally viewed these objects, I did think about transistors, but did not mention it. I actually owned one of the early hand-held transistor radios.
The transistor exemplifies how one innovation leads to another, and that progression has led us to cell phone, essentially a tiny computer.

I would ask them to think back to before the Industrial Revolution and imagine a world with few machines at all, and what life was like during that time. I would want them to look at early patents for things like the Spinning Jenny, the Cotton Gin, and the Mechanical Reaper and to explain how these inventions improved life. It would be helpful and informative to fast forward to current day technology in the textile and agricultural industries for a comparison.

The invention of instant coffee is only one of the advancements made in the area of food processing. Others will be frozen foods and modern methods of canning. All of these will make it much easier to prepare food, not only for families, but for armies in both world wars.

The advertising shown on the can does not have any overt attraction for women. However, in the early 20th century, women were by and large the ones who ran the household, prepared the meals, etc. Advertising foods and household products does not give us information about the fact of more women participating in the work force or working in wartime industries.

The dishwasher represents a steady development of household conveniences that were a result of the Industrial Revolution. Items that may have previously been thought of as luxuries were sold now as essential goods through advertising that developed early in the twentieth century. Demand for these goods had to be created in order for business to continue to grow. One can think of things like the radio, the early refrigerators and washing machines which were now considered the mark of a prosperous household.

The Cold War was one of ideologies and two competing systems represented by the United States and the Soviet Union. Propaganda fueled the tension between "us" and "them". However, during the second world war, Americans had to be persuaded to join together with the Soviets in order to defeat Hitler. Again, this was accomplished through propaganda. All throughout the war, Churchill held his nose to work with "Uncle Joe" (Stalin). As the war began to wind down, Churchill became more and more alarmed at what he knew were the territorial ambitions of the Russians.
At the end of the war, Europe was destroyed and the USSR greatly weakened. The story of how the Soviets got control of all of eastern Europe is one that few people know about. Throughout the 1950s and 1960s, the United States enjoyed prosperity as never before. Wartime production of planes and tanks retooled to produce the plethora of automobiles and appliances that every household wanted. My relatives in Czechoslovakia were visited several times by my father "behind the iron curtain". He described to us the extreme poverty of people there and lack of opportunity. It is telling that the people in Russia suffered that way as well, as illustrated by Nixon and Kruschev in the "kitchen debates". One could argue that the collapse of the Soviet Union happened in part because the people no longer believed the lies they had been fed since 1945. It has even been suggested that since the collapse of communism in Russia, this is the end of history since capitalism has proven to be superior to communism. See Fukuyama's "The End of History and the Last Man."