The generation before baby boomers is known as the Silent Generation or Traditionalist Generation. This generation is generally defined as people born from 1928 to 1945. They are called the Silent Generation because they were more cautious than their parents. They were too young to participate in World War II but may have participated in the Korean War of the early 1950s. The Silent Generation started out in poverty, but as America became the most prosperous country in the world in the 1950s, they became perhaps the richest generation in U.S. history. Most people of the Silent Generation are the parents of Generation X and younger baby boomers. Their own parents most commonly belonged to either the Greatest Generation or the Lost Generation.