1961

Events

January

• January 1 - Monetary reform in the Soviet Union.
• January 3
• * United States President Dwight D. Eisenhower announces that the United States has severed diplomatic and consular relations with Cuba.
• * Aero Flight 311 : Douglas DC-3C OH-LCC of Finnish airline Aero crashes near Kvevlax, on approach to Vaasa Airport in Finland, killing all 25 on board, due to pilot error: an investigation finds that the captain and first officer were both exhausted for lack of sleep, and had consumed excessive amounts of alcohol at the time of the crash.
• January 5
• * Italian sculptor Alfredo Fioravanti enters the U.S. Consulate in Rome, and confesses that he was part of the team that forged the Etruscan terracotta warriors in the Metropolitan Museum of Art.
• * After the 1960 military coup, General Cemal Gürsel forms the new government of Turkey.
• January 7 - Following a four-day conference in Casablanca, five African chiefs of state announce plans for a NATO-type African organization to ensure common defense. The Charter of Casablanca involves the Casablanca Group: Morocco, the United Arab Republic, Ghana, Guinea, and Mali.
• January 8 - In France, a referendum supports Charles de Gaulle's policies on independence for Algeria.
• January 9 - British authorities announce they have uncovered a large Soviet spy ring, the Portland spy ring, in London.
• January 17
• * President Dwight Eisenhower gives his final State of the Union Address to Congress. In a Farewell Address the same day, he warns of the increasing power of a "military–industrial complex."
• * Patrice Lumumba of the Republic of Congo is assassinated.
• January 23 - Congress of Venezuela adopts a new constitution.
• January 24 - 1961 Goldsboro B-52 crash: A B-52 Stratofortress, carrying two nuclear bombs, crashes near Goldsboro, North Carolina.
• January 25
• * In Washington, D.C., President John F. Kennedy delivers the first live presidential news conference. In it, he announces that the Soviet Union has freed the two surviving crewmen from the July 1 1960 RB-47 shootdown incident involving a USAF reconnaissance aircraft and a MiG-19 over the Barents Sea.
• * Acting to halt 'leftist excesses', a junta composed of two army officers and four civilians takes over El Salvador, ousting another junta that had ruled for three months.
• January 27 - Soviet submarine S-80 sinks in the Barents Sea, killing all 68 crew.
• January 28 - Supercar, the first family sci-fi TV series filmed in Supermarionation, debuts on ATV in the UK.
• January 30 - President John F. Kennedy delivers his first State of the Union Address.
• January 31 - Ham, a 37-pound male chimpanzee, is rocketed into space aboard Mercury-Redstone 2, in a test of the Project Mercury spacecraft, designed to carry United States astronauts into space.

  February

• February 1 - The United States tests its first Minuteman I intercontinental ballistic missile.
• February 4 - The Portuguese Colonial War begins in Angola.
• February 5-9 - In Congo, President Joseph Kasa-Vubu names Joseph Iléo as the new Prime Minister.
• February 12 - The USSR launches Venera 1 towards Venus.
• February 13 - The Congo government announces that villagers have killed Patrice Lumumba.
• February 14 - Discovery of the chemical elements: Element 103, Lawrencium, is first synthesized in Berkeley, California.
• February 15
• * United States President John F. Kennedy warns the Soviet Union to avoid interfering with the United Nations' pacification of the Congo.
• * Sabena Flight 548 crashes near Brussels, Belgium, killing 73, including the entire United States figure skating team and several coaches.
• * The total solar eclipse of February 15, 1961, visible in the southern part of Europe, occurs.
• February 26 - Hassan II is pronounced King of Morocco.

  March

• March-April - Drilling for Project Mohole is undertaken off the coast of Guadalupe Island, Mexico.
• March 1 - United States President John F. Kennedy establishes the Peace Corps.
• March 3 - Hassan II is crowned King of Morocco.
• March 8
• * Max Conrad circumnavigates the earth by light plane in 8 days, 18 hours and 49 minutes, setting a new world record.
• * The first U.S. Polaris submarines arrive at Holy Loch in Scotland.
• March 13
• * 1961 Kurenivka mudslide: A dam bursts in Kiev, USSR, killing 145.
• * United States delegate to the United Nations Security Council Adlai Stevenson votes against Portuguese policies in Africa.
• * United States President John F. Kennedy proposes a long-term "Alliance for Progress", between the United States and Latin America.
• * Cyprus joins the Commonwealth of Nations, becoming the first small country in the Commonwealth.
• * Black and white £5 notes cease to be legal tender in the UK.
• * Monash University in Melbourne, Australia takes in its first students.
• * A second B-52 crashes near Yuba City, California, after cabin pressure is lost and the fuel runs out. Two nuclear weapons are found unexploded.
• March 15
• * South Africa announces it will withdraw from the Commonwealth of Nations, upon becoming a republic. The nation rejoins the organization in 1994.
• * The Union of Peoples of Angola, led by Holden Roberto, attacks strategic locations in the north of Angola. These events result in the beginning of the colonial war with Portugal.
• March 18
• * A ceasefire takes effect in the Algerian War of Independence.
• * "Nous les amoureux" sung by Jean-Claude Pascal wins the Eurovision Song Contest 1961 for Luxembourg.
• March 29 - The Twenty-third Amendment to the United States Constitution is ratified, allowing residents of Washington, D.C. to vote in presidential elections.
• March 30 - The Single Convention on Narcotic Drugs is signed at New York.

  April

• April 5 - The New Guinea Council of Western Papua is installed.
• April 8 - British India Steam Navigation Company passenger ship blows up and sinks off Dubai; 238 passengers and crew are killed.
• April 10 - South African golfer Gary Player becomes the first non-American to win the Masters Tournament.
• April 11 - The trial of Nazi Adolf Eichmann begins in Jerusalem.
• April 12
• * Vostok 1: Soviet cosmonaut Yuri Gagarin becomes the first human in space, orbiting the Earth once before parachuting to the ground.
• * Albert Kalonji takes the title Emperor Albert I Kalonji of South Kasai.
• April 13 - In Portugal, a coup attempt against António de Oliveira Salazar fails.
• April 17
• * The U.S.-backed Bay of Pigs Invasion of Cuba begins; it fails by April 19.
• * The 33rd Academy Awards ceremony is held in Santa Monica, California: The Apartment wins most awards, including Best Picture.
• April 18 - Portugal sends its first military reinforcement to Angola.
• April 20 - Fidel Castro announces that the Bay of Pigs Invasion has been defeated.
• April 22 - Algiers putsch: Four French generals who oppose de Gaulle's policies in Algeria fail in a coup attempt.
• April 23 - Judy Garland performs in a legendary comeback concert at Carnegie Hall in New York City.
• April 24 - Swedish warship Vasa, sunk on her maiden voyage in 1628, is recovered from Stockholm Harbor.
• April 27
• * Sierra Leone becomes independent from the United Kingdom.
• * President Kennedy urges newspapers to consider national interest in times of struggle against "a monolithic and ruthless conspiracy", in an address before the American Newspaper Publishers Association.

  May

• May 1 - National Airlines Flight 337, internal to Florida, is forced by an armed hijacker to fly to Cuba, the first of a spate of such aircraft hijackings.
• May 4 - U.S. Freedom Riders begin interstate bus rides, to test the new U.S. Supreme Court integration decision.
• May 5 - Mercury program: Alan Shepard becomes the first American in space, aboard Mercury-Redstone 3.
• May 6 - Tottenham Hotspur F.C. becomes the first team in the 20th century to win the English league and cup double., this is the last time Tottenham have won the English League.
• May 8 - British intelligence officer George Blake is sentenced to 42 years imprisonment for spying, having been found guilty of being a double agent in the pay of the Soviet Union, the longest non-life sentence ever handed down by a British court.
• May 9 - In a speech on "Television and the Public Interest" to the National Association of Broadcasters in the United States, FCC chairman Newton N. Minow describes commercial television programming as a "vast wasteland".
• May 14 - Civil rights movement: A Freedom Riders bus is fire-bombed near Anniston, Alabama, and the civil rights protestors are beaten by an angry mob of Ku Klux Klan members.
• May 15 - J. Heinrich Matthaei alone performs the Poly-U-Experiment, and is the first person to recognize and understand the genetic code. This is the birthdate of modern genetics.
• May 16 - Park Chung Hee takes over in a military coup, in South Korea.
• May 19 - Venera 1 becomes the first man-made object to fly-by another planet by passing Venus.
• May 21 - Civil rights movement: Alabama Governor John Patterson declares martial law in an attempt to restore order, after race riots break out.
• May 22 - 1961 New South Wales earthquake.
• May 24 - Civil rights movement: Freedom Riders are arrested in Jackson, Mississippi for "disturbing the peace", after disembarking from their bus.
• May 25 - Apollo program: U.S. President Kennedy announces, before a special joint session of Congress, his goal to put a man on the Moon before the end of the decade.
• May 27 - Tunku Abdul Rahman, Prime Minister of Malaya, holds a press conference in Singapore, announcing his idea to form the Federation of Malaysia, comprising Malaya, Singapore, Sarawak, Brunei and North Borneo.
• May 28 - Peter Benenson's article "The Forgotten Prisoners" is published in several internationally read newspapers. This is later considered the founding of the human rights organization Amnesty International.
• May 30 - Rafael Leónidas Trujillo, ruler of the Dominican Republic since 1930, is killed in an ambush.
• May 31
• * In France, rebel generals Maurice Challe and Andre Zelelr are sentenced to 15 years in prison.
• * South Africa becomes a republic, and officially leaves the Commonwealth of Nations.
• * Benfica beats FC Barcelona 3–2 at Wankdorf Stadium, Bern and wins the 1960–61 European Cup in association football.