January 14 – George C. Wallace becomes governor of Alabama. In his inaugural speech, he defiantly proclaims "segregation now, segregation tomorrow, and segregation forever!"[1][2]
January 28 – African American student Harvey Gantt enters Clemson University in South Carolina, the last U.S. state to hold out against racial integration.
February 8 – Travel, financial and commercial transactions by United States citizens to Cuba are made illegal by the John F. Kennedy Administration.
March 5 – In Camden, Tennessee, country music superstar Patsy Cline (Virginia Patterson Hensley) is killed in a plane crash along with fellow performers Hawkshaw Hawkins, Cowboy Copas and Cline's manager and pilot Randy Hughes, while returning from a benefit performance in Kansas City, Kansas for country radio disc jockey "Cactus" Jack Call.
March 18 – Gideon v. Wainwright: The U.S. Supreme Court rules that the poor must have lawyers.
March 21 – The Alcatraz Island federal penitentiary in San Francisco Bay closes; the last 27 prisoners are transferred elsewhere at the order of Attorney General Robert F. Kennedy.
March 22 – The Beatles release their first album Please Please Me.
April 12 – Martin Luther King, Jr., Ralph Abernathy, Fred Shuttlesworth and others are arrested in a Birmingham protest for "parading without a permit".
April 15 – 70,000 marchers arrive in London from Aldermaston, to demonstrate against nuclear weapons.
April 16 – Martin Luther King, Jr. issues his Letter from Birmingham Jail.
April 20 – In Quebec, Canada, members of the terrorist group Front de libération du Québec, bomb a Canadian Army recruitment center, killing night watchman Wilfred V. O'Neill.
April 22 – Lester Bowles Pearson becomes the 14th Prime Minister of Canada.
April 29- Buddy Rogers becomes the first WWF Champion.
May 1 – The Coca-Cola Company debuts its first diet drink, TaB cola.
May 2 – Thousands of African Americans, many of them children, are arrested while protesting segregation in Birmingham, Alabama. Public Safety Commissioner Eugene "Bull" Connor later unleashes fire hoses and police dogs on the demonstrators.
May 15 – Mercury program: NASA launches Gordon Cooper on Mercury 9, the last mission (on ).
May 27 – The Freewheelin' Bob Dylan is singer-songwriter Bob Dylan's second studio album, and most influential, released by Columbia Records.
June 3 – Pope John XXIII dies.
June 11 – Alabama Governor George C. Wallace stands in the door of the University of Alabama to protest against integration, before stepping aside and allowing African Americans James Hood and Vivian Malone to enroll.
June 11 – President John F. Kennedy delivered a historic Civil Rights Address, in which he promises a Civil Rights Bill, and asks for "the kind of equality of treatment that we would want for ourselves."
June 17 – Abington School District v. Schempp: The U.S. Supreme Court rules that state-mandated Bible reading in public schools is unconstitutional.
June 22 – The Beatles played at the Borough Theatre in Abergavenny.
July 1 – ZIP Codes are introduced in the U.S.
August 28 – Martin Luther King, Jr. delivers his I Have A Dream speech on the steps of the Lincoln Memorial to an audience of at least 250,000, during the March on Washington for Jobs and Freedom.
September – Marvel Comics releases the first ever X-Men comic book
October 8 – Sam Cooke and his band were arrested after trying to register at a "whites only" motel in Louisiana. In the months following, he records A Change Is Gonna Come (song).
November 10 – Malcolm X makes a historic speech in Detroit, Michigan: Message to the Grass Roots
Nov.22: Lyndon Baines Johnson is sworn in as U.S. President after assassination of John F. Kennedy.
November 22 – The Beatles' second U.K. album, With The Beatles, is released
November 22 – John F. Kennedy assassination: In Dallas, Texas, United States President John F. Kennedy is shot to death, Texas Governor John B. Connally is seriously wounded, and Vice President Lyndon Baines Johnson becomes the 36th President. All television coverage for the next three days is devoted to the assassination, its aftermath, the procession of the horsedrawn casket to the Capitol Rotunda, and the funeral of President Kennedy. Stores and businesses shut down for the entire weekend and Monday, in tribute.
November 24 – Lee Harvey Oswald, alleged assassin of John F. Kennedy, is shot dead by Jack Ruby in Dallas, Texas on live national television. Later that night, a hastily arranged program, A Tribute to John F. Kennedy from the Arts, featuring actors, opera singers, and noted writers, all performing dramatic readings and/or music, is telecast on ABC-TV.
November 24 – Vietnam War: New U.S. President Lyndon B. Johnson confirms that the United States intends to continue supporting South Vietnam militarily and economically.
November 25 – U.S. President Kennedy is buried at Arlington National Cemetery. Schools around the natio
Answered By: Makwa - 11/14/2009 |