The postwar baby boom began in 1946, peaked in 1957, and fizzled out in 1964. But just as the World War II generation was about done having babies, and the baby boomers themselves were about to begin, a new and more convenient way to prevent pregnancies was discovered. Historians may one day call “the pill” the suicide tablet of the West. It was first licensed in 1960. By 1963, 6 percent of American married women were using Dr. Rock’s invention; by 1970, 43 percent were “on the pill.”
