December 1960

[December 1], 1960 (Thursday)

• The Soviet Union launched Sputnik 6, a 5-ton satellite, into orbit with two dogs, Pchelka and Mushka, plus mice, insects and plants. The next day, the capsule was reported to have burned up on re-entry into the atmosphere at too steep an angle. According to later reports, a self-destruct system had been built to destroy the satellite if it did not re-enter at the correct time, in order to prevent it from landing outside the Soviet Union.
• The Congolese Army arrested Patrice Lumumba, deposed premier of the Congo, while he was on his way to Stanleyville to meet his supporters. Lumumba would be moved around the country and then shot to death on January 17, 1961.

  [December 2], 1960 (Friday)

• In the first time since 1397 that England's highest ranking religious leader had visited the Pope, the Most Reverend Geoffrey Francis Fisher, Archbishop of Canterbury and leader of the Anglican Church, talked with Pope John XXIII for about an hour at the Vatican.
• U.S. President Dwight D. Eisenhower authorized the use of one million dollars for the relief and resettlement of Cuban refugees, who had been arriving in Florida at the rate of 1,000 a week.

  [December 3], 1960 (Saturday)

• Camelot, the most expensive theatrical production to that time, made its Broadway debut, at the Majestic Theatre, with Richard Burton as King Arthur and Julie Andrews as Lady Guinevere.
• Redstone launch vehicle No. 3 was shipped to Cape Canaveral for the Mercury-Redstone 1A mission.
• Born:
• *Julianne Moore, American film and TV actress, winner of the 2015 Academy Award for Best Actress for Still Alice; in Fort Bragg, North Carolina
• *Igor Larionov, Russian ice hockey player who, in 1989, became the first Soviet player to join the NHL; in Voskresensk
• *Daryl Hannah, American film actress known for Splash; in Chicago

  [December 4], 1960 (Sunday)

• The request by the Islamic Republic of Mauritania to be admitted as the 100th member of the United Nations was vetoed in the Security Council by the Soviet Union, in response to the denial of the request of Mongolia to be admitted. In 1961, Sierra Leone would become the 100th member, followed by Mongolia and Mauritania.
• Born:
• *Glynis Nunn, Australian heptathlete, and 1984 Olympic gold medalist; in Toowoomba, Queensland
• *Fred Ramsdell, American immunologist, in Elmhurst, Illinois

  [December 5], 1960 (Monday)

• In the case of Boynton v. Virginia, the U.S. Supreme Court declared, by a 7 to 2 vote, that a law requiring permitting bus stations to exclude patrons on the basis of race, was unconstitutional under the Equal Protection Clause. The case had arisen when a law student at Howard University, Bruce Boynton, was fined for refusing to leave a "whites only" restaurant at the Trailways bus terminal in Richmond, Virginia.
• Born: Sarika, Indian film actress; as Sarika Thakur in New Delhi

  [December 6], 1960 (Tuesday)

• Public Land Order 2216 established the Izembek National Wildlife Range, which included Izembek Lagoon and its entire watershed near the tip of the Alaska Peninsula as "a refuge, breeding ground, and management area for all forms of wildlife".
• U.S. Secretary of the Interior Fred A. Seaton issued Public Land Order 2214, reserving of land as the Arctic National Wildlife Refuge.

  [December 7], 1960 (Wednesday)

• At the request of the government of Dade County, Florida, the U.S. government opened the first federal Cuban Refugee Center, located in Miami, with a staff of 14. By the end of 1961, the center had 300 employees.
• The United Nations Security Council was called into session by the Soviet Union, to consider Soviet demands that the U.N. seek the immediate release of former Congolese Premier Patrice Lumumba.
• The QH-50 DASH, a drone that could be guided by remote control, made its first successful unmanned landing, descending upon the USS Hazelwood.
• Died: Clara Haskil, 65, Romanian classical pianist

  [December 8], 1960 (Thursday)

• The government of Burma ratified a treaty with the People's Republic of China to define the boundary between the two nations. Burma agreed to cede 60 square miles of its northernmost territory to China, including three villages, and China ceded the 100 square mile "Mengmao triangle" at the juncture of two rivers southeast of the Burmese city of Bhamo.
• Hayato Ikeda, who had been Prime Minister of Japan since July 19 after the resignation of Nobusuke Kishi, formed a new government following the parliamentary election of November 20.
• The government of Congo-Leopoldville ordered a blockade of all United Nations surface transportation in the central African nation.
• The North Dakota Agricultural College was officially renamed North Dakota State University.

  [December 9], 1960 (Friday)

• The first episode of the long-running ITV soap opera Coronation Street aired in Britain. It was originally planned to be a 16-part series but became such a success that, running five times or more per week, it continued past its 10,000th episode in its 60th anniversary year. William Roache who played Ken Barlow in the first episode would still be in the show to this day.
• Entrepreneur Tom Monaghan and his brother James took over the operation of "DomiNick's Pizza" store at 301 West Cross Street in Ypsilanti, Michigan. In 1965, after the original owner declined to allow the use of his name for other locations, Tom Monaghan renamed his restaurant Domino's Pizza.
• NASA's Spacecraft No. 7 was delivered to Cape Canaveral for the Mercury 3 mission intended to be the first to put an American astronaut into space. Shepard would be launched in Mercury 3 on May 5, 1961, on a suborbital, 15-minute flight, reaching an altitude of.
• Japan and the Philippines signed a treaty of amity, commerce and navigation, their first ever. Japanese military forces had invaded the Philippines in World War II and had occupied the islands until the end of the war.
• French President Charles de Gaulle's visit to French Algeria was marked by bloody European and Muslim mob riots in Algeria's largest cities, resulting in 127 deaths.
• Born: Jeff "Swampy" Marsh, American animator, producer, and voice actor known for creating the Disney Channel cartoons Phineas and Ferb and Milo Murphy's Law; in Santa Monica, California
• Died: Hyperion, 30, British thoroughbred racehorse who won the British Triple Crown in 1943 and later a champion sire.

  [December 10], 1960 (Saturday)

• The first underwater park within the United States, the John Pennekamp Coral Reef State Park, was formally dedicated. The park covers and protects coral reefs, seagrass, and mangroves inside its boundaries.
• Born: Kenneth Branagh, Northern Irish actor and film director; in Belfast

  [December 11], 1960 (Sunday)

• Richard Paul Pavlick, a 73-year-old postal clerk from New Hampshire, loaded his car with dynamite and then parked outside the Kennedy family estate in Palm Beach, Florida, and prepared to kill President-elect John F. Kennedy, waiting for Kennedy to depart for Sunday mass. Pavlick changed his mind after seeing that Kennedy was accompanied by his wife and two small children. Pavlick was arrested four days later by Palm Beach city police.

  [December 12], 1960 (Monday)

• Television came to the South American nation of Ecuador as Red Telesistema de Ecuador began regular broadcasting at 5:00 in the afternoon on Channel 4 in Guayaquil. José Rosenbaum, a German-born radio station owner in Ecuador, had purchased three cameras and other TV equipment while visiting a trade fair in West Germany and then spent more than a year with engineers in setting up the station.
• The revision of the most commonly used Spanish-language version of the Holy Bible, the Reina-Valera, was released, and would soon outsell the original. The original version had been published in 1569. A more recent, but not as popular, revision would be released in 1995.

  [December 13], 1960 (Tuesday)

• In the U.S. presidential election, the Texas board of canvassers awarded all 24 of that state's disputed electoral votes to Democratic Party candidate John F. Kennedy, bringing his total from 249 to 273, three more than the 270 required to win. The decision came two hours after federal judge Ben C. Connally rejected a Republican lawsuit seeking a recount.
• While Emperor Haile Selassie I of Ethiopia was visiting Brazil, his Imperial Bodyguard staged a coup d'etat, taking many of the Imperial staff hostage, including Crown Prince Asfa Wossen, who was proclaimed as King. The coup failed within a few days, and Haile Selassie reigned as emperor until another coup in 1975.
• Commander Leroy A. Heath and his navigator, Lt. Henry L. Monroe, established a new world record for highest altitude attained in an airplane, reaching in an A3J Vigilante.
• Guatemala, El Salvador, Nicaragua and Honduras founded Sistema de la Integración Centroamericana, the Central American Integration System, often called the Central American Common Market.
• Died:
• *Isaac Foot, 80, British politician, former Secretary of Mines
• *John Charles Thomas, 69, American operatic baritone

  [December 14], 1960 (Wednesday)

• The first "Tied Test" in the history of Test cricket took place at the end of the match in Brisbane between the West Indies and Australia. At the end of the First Innings on December 10, Australia had a 505–453 lead. In the Second Innings, however, the West Indies had outscored Australia 284 to 232. When Australia's last batter, Lindsay Kline, came up for the 7th and final ball, the score had closed to 737 to 737. Kline hit the ball bowled by Wes Hall, and Ian Meckiff dashed toward the wicket for what would have been the winning run, but Joe Solomon fielded the ball and hit the stumps for the last out. "Until today," Percy Beames wrote in Melbourne's newspaper The Age, "there had not been a tie in Test cricket."
• The five-member electoral board of Illinois, with a majority of Republican members, unanimously certified the results of the November 6 popular balloting in the U.S. presidential election and awarded Democrat John F. Kennedy the state's 27 electoral votes. The board had considered Republican charges of voter fraud in Cook County and denied a request for a further election recount. Before the award of the Illinois block, Kennedy had 273, three more than the necessary 270 needed to win.
• In Stanleyville, Congo, Antoine Gizenga proclaimed himself to be the successor to Patrice Lumumba. For four months, Gizenga's forces controlled the Orientale and Kivu provinces, called Free Republic of the Congo, but on April 17, he surrendered in return for a post as a vice premier in the central government.
• By a vote of 89–0, the UN General Assembly Resolution 1514, the "Declaration on the Granting of Independence to Colonial Countries and Peoples" was adopted by the UN member nations. The United States, the United Kingdom, Australia, France, and five other nations abstained.
• The Organisation for Economic Co-operation and Development was created by the signing of an international convention by 18 European nations and the United States and Canada.
• Born: Ebrahim Raisi, 8th President of Iran from 2021 until his death in a helicopter crash in 2024; in Mashhad