1961 - Wikipedia

Centuries: 19th century - 20th century - 21st century

Decades: 1900s 1910s 1920s 1930s 1940s 1950s - 1960s - 1970s 1980s 1990s 2000s

Years: 1956 1957 1958 1959 1960 - 1961 - 1962 1963 1964 1965 1966

1961 was the last year where it didn't make a difference if you read the year up side down until 6119[?].

Events

January 3 - President Dwight Eisenhower announced that the United States had severed diplomatic and consular relations with Cuba.
January 3 - An atomic reactor exploded at National Reactor Testing Station in Idaho Falls[?], Idaho, killing 3 military technicians.
January 7 - Following a four-day conference conference in Casablanca, five African chiefs of state announced plans for a NATO-type African organization to insure common defense. The Charter of Casablanca[?] involved were Morocco, the United Arab Republic, Ghana, Guinea, and Mali.[?]
January 12 - President Dwight Eisenhower gave his final State of the Union Address to Congress.
January 20 - John F. Kennedy becomes President of the United States
January 25 - In Washington, DC John F. Kennedy delivers the first live presidential news conference[?]. In it, he announces that the Soviet Union had freed the two surviving crewmen of a USAF RB-47[?] reconnaissance plan shot down by Soviet flyers over the Barents Sea July 1, 1960. (see RB-47H shot down[?])
January 25 - Acting to halt 'leftist excesses,' a junta comprised of two army officers and 4 civilians took over the rule of El Salvador, ousting another junta that had ruled for three months.
January 26 - John F. Kennedy appoints Janet G. Travell[?] to be his physician. This is the first time a woman held this appointment.
January 30 - President John F. Kennedy delivered his first State of the Union Address.
January 31 - Ham, a 37 pound male chimpanzee, was rocketed into space in a test of the Project Mercury capsule designed to carry U.S. astronauts[?] into space.
February 5 - The Sunday Telegraph[?] publishes its first issue.
February 11 - Trial of Adolf Eichmann begins in Jerusalem
February 14 - Discovery of the chemical elements: Element 103, Lawrencium, is first synthesized (Berkeley, California).
February 15 - A Boeing 707 crashes in Belgium killing 73, including the entire United States figure skating team and several coaches.
March 1 - President of the United States John F. Kennedy establishes the Peace Corps.
March 3 - Hassan II[?] becomes King of Morocco
March 8 - Max Conrad[?] circumnavigates the earth in eight days, 18 hours and 49 minutes setting a new world record.
March 15 - South Africa withdraws from the British Commonwealth
March 29 - The Twenty-third Amendment to the United States Constitution is ratified, allowing residents of Washington, DC to vote in presidential elections.
April 12 - Yuri Gagarin is the first man in space
April 17 - Bay of Pigs invasion of Cuba begins, ending in failure April 19
April 25 - Robert Noyce is granted the first patent for an integrated circuit.
April 27 - Sierra Leone is granted its independence from the United Kingdom.
May 14 - American civil rights movement: A Freedom Riders[?] bus is fire-bombed near Anniston, Alabama and the civil rights protestors are beaten by an angry mob.
May 19 - Venera program: Venera 1 becomes the first manmade object to fly-by another planet by passing Venus (however the probe had lost contact with earth a month earlier and did not send back any data).
May 21 - American civil rights movement: Alabama Governor John Patterson[?] declares martial law in an attempt to restore order after race riots break out.
May 24 - American civil rights movement: Freedom Riders[?] are arrested in Jackson, Mississippi for "disturbing the peace" after disembarking from their bus.
May 25 - Apollo program: President Kennedy announces before a special joint session of Congress his goal to initiate a project to put a "man on the moon" before the end of the decade.
May 28 - Peter Benenson's article "The Forgotten Prisoners" is published in several internationally read newspapers. This will later be thought of as the founding of the human rights organization Amnesty International
August 13 - Construction of the Berlin Wall begins. Movement between East Berlin and West Berlin remains restricted for the next 28 years, until November 9, 1989
December 31 - The Marshall Plan expires after having distributed more than $12 billion in foreign aid[?] to rebuild Europe.

Change of US presidency from Dwight D. Eisenhower (1953-1961) to John F. Kennedy (1961-1963)
JFK begins the Apollo program of U.S. manned spaceflight
The first quasar is discovered by Allen Rex Sandage[?] at Mt Palomar[?], California
South Africa withdraws from the British Commonwealth and declares itself an independent republic on May 31

Art, Culture & Fashion

1961 in film
- West Side Story
- The Guns of Navarone
- The Hustler
- Two Rode Together[?], starring Jimmy Stewart and Richard Widmark[?]
1961 in literature
1961 in music
1961 in sports
1961 in television
- January 5 - Mister Ed debuts.
- The Dick Van Dyke Show premieres
- John F. Kennedy holds the first live televised Presidential press conference

Births

January 5 - Suzy Amis[?], actress
January 13 - Julia Louis-Dreyfus, actress
January 21 - Blaise Cendrars, writer
January 26 - Wayne Gretzky, Ice hockey player
February 10 - George Stephanopoulos[?], political consultant, commentator
February 11 - Mary Docter[?], American speed skater
February 11 - Becky LeBeau[?], vocalist
February 11 - Carey Lowell[?], actress
February 13 - Henry Rollins, musician
February 21 - Davey Allison[?], automobile racer (+ 1993)
March 4 - Ray Mancini, boxer
March 14 - Kirby Puckett, baseball player
March 15 - Fabio[?], model
April 3 - Eddie Murphy, actor and comedian
April 6 - Gene Eugene, actor, lead singer of Adam Again
April 26 - Joan Chen[?], actress
May 6 - George Clooney, actor
May 13 - Dennis Rodman[?], basketball player, actor
May 14 - Tim Roth[?], actor
May 17 - Enya, singer, songwriter
May 29 - Melissa Etheridge, rock musician
July 1 - Diana, English princess
September 2 - Carlos Valderrama, footballer
December 30 - Douglas Coupland, author

Deaths

January 4 - Erwin Schrödinger, physicist
January 10 - Dashiell Hammett, writer
January 17 - Patrice Lumumba, Prime Minister of the Democratic Republic of the Congo
January 21 - Blaise Cendrars, writer
February 11 - Eduard R Verkade[?], Dutch actor/director
February 11 - Patrice Lumumba, 1st premier of Congo (Kinshasa)[?]?
February 26 - King Mohammed V of Morocco
March 3 - Paul Wittgenstein, pianist
May 13 - Gary Cooper, actor
June 1 - Melvin Jones, founder of Lions Clubs International
June 30 - Lee DeForest - inventor
October 11 - Chico Marx, member of the Marx Brothers

Nobel Prizes

Physics - Robert Hofstadter, Rudolf Ludwig Mössbauer
Chemistry - Melvin Calvin[?]
Medicine - Georg von Békésy[?]
Literature - Ivo Andric
Peace - Dag Hjalmar Agne Carl Hammarskjöld - awarded posthumously