November 1960

[November 1], 1960 (Tuesday)

• The Benelux Economic Union came into existence in accordance with the terms of a treaty signed by the three participating nations, Belgium, Netherlands and Luxembourg.
• U.S. President Dwight D. Eisenhower said that the United States would "take whatever steps are necessary" to defend the Guantanamo Naval Base in Cuba, "because of its importance to the defense of the entire hemisphere".
• Prime Minister Harold Macmillan of the United Kingdom announced that American nuclear submarines would be based at the Holy Loch, on the Firth of Clyde at Scotland.
• The Goddard Space Flight Center computing and communications center began operations, with two IBM 7090 computers, operating in parallel, to compute the smoothed exact position at all times of Project Mercury flights, to predict future spacecraft positions, and shift the coordinates to provide acquisition information for all observation sites. The importance of the Goddard computers would be graphically demonstrated when they predicted the amount of overshoot within seconds after landing during Scott Carpenter's Mercury-Atlas 7 ) mission on May 24, 1962. Goddard Center's action significantly reduced the time to find and recover the Carpenter.
• The recording by Elvis Presley of the song "Are You Lonesome Tonight?", originally written in 1926 by Roy Turk and Lou Handman, was released.
• The University of Kalyani was established, in Kalyani, West Bengal, India.
• Born:
• *Fernando Valenzuela, Mexican major league baseball player; in Navojoa, Sonora state
• *Tim Cook, American businessman and current CEO of Apple Inc.; in Mobile, Alabama

  [November 2], 1960 (Wednesday)

• In the case of R v Penguin Books Ltd, a jury in London concluded that Penguin Books had not broken Britain's Obscene Publications Act, clearing the way for the sale, in the United Kingdom, of 200,000 paperback copies of the book Lady Chatterley's Lover.
• The Unsinkable Molly Brown, a musical written by Meredith Willson, premiered on Broadway, opening at the Winter Garden Theater and running for 533 performances.
• Born: Anu Malik, Indian Bollywood film score composer; in Bombay
• Died:
• *Otoya Yamaguchi, 17, Japanese assassin, hanged himself in his jail cell three weeks after stabbing Inejirō Asanuma to death.
• *Dimitri Mitropoulos, 64, Greek pianist, conductor and composer died of a cerebral haemorrhage, after collapsing during a rehearsal

  [November 3], 1960 (Thursday)

• Explorer 8 was launched to study the Earth's ionosphere. The satellite, which confirmed the existence of a helium layer in the upper atmosphere, stopped functioning later in the year but would remain in orbit for more than 50 years until returning into Earth's atmosphere on March 28, 2012.
• Died: Félix-Roland Moumié, 35, Cameroonian Marxist leader, was assassinated by a fatal dose of thallium, received earlier while he was visiting Geneva.

  [November 4], 1960 (Friday)

• The Soviet news agency TASS was forced to deny that Soviet leader Nikita Khrushchev had been overthrown in a coup, after a rumor reported in a Vienna evening newspaper was repeated worldwide. The story began earlier in the day when a man, claiming to be an Austrian employee of the Soviet Embassy, told the Abend Presse that he had learned from an indiscreet Soviet employee that disgraced former leader Georgi Malenkov had replaced Khrushchev. The German-language paper then ran the banner headline, "Struggle For Power In Moscow: Khrushchev ousted, Malenkov Successor". Western newspapers repeated the news, usually with the caveat that it was unconfirmed, before TASS debunked it.
• As John F. Kennedy arrived at the Chicago Stadium for a pre-election rally, Jaime Cruz Alejandro forced his way through the crowd to get as close as he could to Kennedy's open convertible, then fought with police after running from them. He was found to be carrying a loaded.25 caliber pistol. Moments later, Reverend Israel Dabney was caught attempting to carry a.38 revolver into the coliseum. Both men said that they were carrying the weapons for self-defense and were later released.
• Filming of The Misfits, starring Clark Gable and Marilyn Monroe, was finished. It proved to be the last film for both legendary actors. Gable, who had performed many of his own stunts, had a heart attack the next day and died on November 16. Monroe would die in 1962 during the filming of the never completed Something's Got to Give.
• Anacafé, the Asociación Naacional del Café, was founded in Guatemala City to increase the world market share of coffee grown in Guatemala.

  [November 5], 1960 (Saturday)

• The People's Republic of China successfully built and launched its first anti-ship cruise missile, basing it upon a Soviet weapon. The R-2, known popularly as the silkworm missile, had a range of.
• Dorrence Darling II, a football player for Illinois State University, broke his leg during a game. Poor medical treatment led to an amputation, and "the Darling case" would become a benchmark in medical malpractice law, legally presuming a hospital to be responsible for the mistakes of physicians to whom it extended privileges.
• Died:
• *Ward Bond, 57, American TV actor and star of the western series Wagon Train, died of a heart attack while in Dallas, where he was scheduled to appear at the halftime show of an NFL game between the Cowboys and the Los Angeles Rams. His death came days after filming his ninth episode of the 1960–1961 season. His final show would be telecast on February 22, 1961.
• *Johnny Horton, 35, American country music singer known for "The Battle of New Orleans", was killed in an automobile accident when his car collided with a truck near Cameron, Texas
• *Mack Sennett, 80, American silent film actor, director and producer, known for the Keystone Cops
• *August Gailit, 69, Estonian novelist

  [November 6], 1960 (Sunday)

• One person was killed and 18 injured by a bomb that had been placed inside a subway car in New York City. The bomb was the fifth to have exploded in New York City on a Sunday since October 2, and the first to have taken a life. The five bombings had injured a total of 58 people to that time, including the fatal injury to Sandra Breland, a 15-year-old Brooklyn resident.
• Died: Erich Raeder, 84, German naval commander during World War II

  [November 7], 1960 (Monday)

• DFS Group, the first major network of duty-free stores, began operations with a shop at the airport in Hong Kong where luxury goods were sold to international travelers with the duty pre-paid and forms filled out by the store. DFS Group now has locations around the world.
• In the worst plane crash in the history of Ecuador, all 37 people on a Companía Ecuatoriana Aérea flight were killed when the Fairchild F-27 crashed into the side of the 14,623 foot high Atacazo volcano. The plane had been making an approach to Quito following takeoff from Guayaquil.
• A transit of Mercury took place from 14:34 UTC to 19:12 UTC. The Sun-Mercury-Earth alignment happens 13 times in a century and had last taken place on May 5, 1957, and would not happen again until May 9, 1970.
• On the day before the U.S. presidential election, Republican candidate Richard M. Nixon appeared on the first telethon in the history of presidential campaigning. From 2:00 to , on ABC, CBS and NBC, Nixon answered questions called in, by viewers, to a Detroit studio.
• Born: Santos Rodriguez, police shooting victim; in Dallas, Texas
• Died:
• *A. P. Carter, 68, American gospel singer and father of June Carter Cash
• *Leon Dabo, 95, American landscape artist

  [November 8], 1960 (Tuesday)

• In the 1960 United States presidential election, a record number of American voters turned out to make their choice between Democratic candidate and U.S. Senator John F. Kennedy and Republican candidate and U.S. Vice President Richard M. Nixon. With 270 electoral votes needed to win, Kennedy received 303. The popular vote was the closest in history. Kennedy won slightly more than Nixon by a margin of of one percent of the total votes cast.
• Little Joe 5, the first of the series with a McDonnell production Mercury spacecraft, was launched from Wallops Island to check the spacecraft in an abort simulating the most severe launch conditions. The launch was normal until 15.4 seconds after lift-off, at which time the escape rocket motor was prematurely ignited. The spacecraft did not detach from the launch vehicle until impact and was destroyed. Since the test objectives were not met, a repeat of the mission was planned.

  [November 9], 1960 (Wednesday)

• The day after the American presidential election, Vice President Nixon conceded defeat to Senator Kennedy at EST, 17 minutes after the news came that Kennedy had won Minnesota's 11 electoral votes. With 270 needed to win, victory in Minnesota took Kennedy to at least 272.
• Nicaragua was invaded by exiles who crossed over from Costa Rica and captured the border towns of Jinotepe and Diriamba. The United States Navy was directed to the area on November 17 and the rebels were defeated by December.
• Died:
• *Ernst Wilhelm Bohle, 57, German Nazi leader
• *Yoshii Isamu, 74, Japanese poet

  [November 10], 1960 (Thursday)

• The uncensored, Penguin Books edition of Lady Chatterley's Lover went on sale in England and Wales, eight days after a London jury had concluded that it was not obscene, and became an instant bestseller.
• According to claims published later in the Fortean Times and attributed to Russian journalist Yaroslav Golovanov, "A cosmonaut called Byelokonyev died on board a spaceship in orbit." No evidence has been found to corroborate Golovanov's statement.
• Born: Neil Gaiman, British writer of short fiction, novels, comic books, audio theatre, and screenplays, in Portchester, Hampshire, England