In Major League Baseball, pitcher
Bill Monbouquette, playing for the
Boston Red Sox, pitched a
no-hitter against the
Chicago White Sox, one of five that year after only one had been pitched in 1961.[3] Besides Monbouquette, no-hitters were also pitched in May (by
Bo Belinsky of the Angels), two in the final week of June (on June 26 by Monbouquette's Red Sox teammate
Earl Wilson and on June 30 by the Dodgers'
Sandy Koufax), and a final one on August 26 by Minnesota's
Jack Kralick.
A
Nepal Airlines RNA
Douglas C-47A-DL (9N-AAH), en route from Kathmandu-
Gaucher Airport to
New Delhi, crashed near Tulachan Dhuri. The wreckage was discovered eight days later on a mountain top at 11,200 feet (3,400 m). All four crew and six passengers were killed, including
Nepal's ambassador to India.[4][5] Initial reports were that rescue teams had found the airliner, and that all ten people on board were safe.[6]
North American Aviation began a test program to qualify its emergency parachute recovery system for Project Gemini's Paraglider Development Program. The first test was successful, but the test series would end on November 15 when all recovery parachutes separated from the
spacecraft immediately after deployment and the test vehicle was destroyed on impact.[11]
In order to bring an end to the
Saskatchewan doctors' strike, a
special session of the legislature of
Saskatchewan amended the provincial Medical Care Insurance Act that had caused an unprecedented work stoppage by doctors and surgeons, adjourning after completing its work in less than 12 hours.[12]
Cominco Binani Zinc Ltd. was established on the banks of the
Periyar River in
Kerala, India.
President
John F. Kennedy decided to break ties with singer
Frank Sinatra after his brother, U.S. Attorney General
Robert F. Kennedy, reported to him about Sinatra's connections with organized crime. Sinatra was reportedly so enraged by the President's decision to no longer visit the singer's
Palm Springs home, that he took a sledgehammer and personally destroyed a
landing pad built to accommodate visits by the presidential helicopter,
Marine One.[13]
"
Tusko", a 14-year-old male
Indian elephant at the
Oklahoma City Zoo, was injected with 270 milligrams (4.2 gr) of the
hallucinogenLSD in an experiment by researchers at the
University of Oklahoma to simulate
musth, the periodic condition of aggressive behavior and rage by male elephants. Tusko collapsed five minutes after the injection and died less than two hours later.[14][15]
Died:Dean Cromwell, 82, American athletics coach, nicknamed "Maker of Champions", who coached the USC Trojans track team to 12 national championships, including nine consecutive titles from 1935 to 1943.
Nelson Mandela was arrested in
South Africa, and imprisoned for more than 27 years. After returning home from a tour that he had made of African nations, Mandela was being driven by Cecil Williams to
Johannesburg. Their car was near the village of Cedara, outside of
Howick, when a Sergeant Vorster recognized both men and pulled them over. Mandela, who identified himself as David Motsamayi, was taken to
Pietermaritzburg. While serving part of a five-year sentence for illegally leaving the country, he was tried and convicted on new charges in 1963 for sabotage and given a life sentence. He would not be released until February 11, 1990. In 1994, Mandela would be elected the first black
President of South Africa.[18]
Jamaica received its independence from the United Kingdom.
Princess Margaret of the UK and U.S. Vice-President
Lyndon B. Johnson were among the dignitaries who watched the lowering of the British flag in Kingston.[25]
Guillermo Valencia of the Conservative Party was sworn in as the new
President of Colombia, quietly succeeding
Alberto Lleras Camargo of the Liberal Party. Valencia's inauguration marked the first successful test of a unique agreement, whereby the Liberal and Conservative agreed to alternate the presidency every four years.[30]
Algeria's provisional government, led by Prime Minister
Benyoucef Benkhedda, stepped aside in favor of leftist Vice-Premier
Ahmed Ben Bella, who had returned to
Algiers from
Oran four days earlier.[31]
Elizabeth Ann Duncan, 58, became the last woman to be executed in the United States prior to the restoration of the death penalty in 1977. She was put to death in the
gas chamber at California's
San Quentin State Prison on the same day as the two men whom she had hired to murder her pregnant daughter-in-law. On November 17, 1958, Mrs. Olga Kupczyk Duncan and her unborn daughter had been beaten to death by Augustine Baldonado and Luis Moya, to whom Elizabeth had promised $8,000 which was never paid.[32][33][34]
Mercury spacecraft No. 9 (redesignated 9A) was phased into the Project Orbit program in preparation for the Mercury extended range or 1-day mission.[24]Atlas launch vehicle 113-D was delivered to Cape Canaveral for the
Mercury 8 mission of
Wally Schirra.[24]
Died:Don Davis, 28; of injuries sustained in a sprint car race three days earlier at
New Bremen, Ohio. Less than three months earlier, Davis had finished in fourth place in the
1962 Indianapolis 500.
CIA Director
John McCone provided his first memorandum to U.S. President Kennedy about surveillance that would lead to a U.S. and Soviet confrontation in the
Cuban Missile Crisis, describing an increase of Soviet shipments to Cuba, and his speculation that the Soviet Union was placing offensive missiles in the Caribbean island nation. McCone would give the President three more warnings in August.[37]
The
Herbert Hoover Presidential Library was dedicated and opened to the public in
West Branch, Iowa. Hoover, who had served as the 31st President of the United States (1929–1933) was present and was celebrating his 88th birthday.[38]
Harry Wexler, an American
meteorologist who had been researching the link between depletion of
stratospheric ozone and
aerosol propellants, died of a
heart attack while on vacation. Wexler had accepted an invitation to deliver a lecture entitled "The Climate of Earth and Its Modifications" at the
University of Maryland Space Research and Technology Institute. Another twelve years would pass before the first papers about the effect of
chlorofluorocarbon on the
ozone layer were published. "Had Wexler lived to publish his ideas", an author would comment later, "they would certainly have been noticed and could have led to a different outcome and perhaps an earlier coordinated response to the issue of stratospheric ozone depletion."[40]
Andriyan Nikolayev became the third Soviet
cosmonaut, and the fifth man to orbit the Earth, when the Soviet Union launched
Vostok 3 from
Baikonur Cosmodrome.[24][41] Although the Soviets maintained the practice of not announcing the launch until after it had happened, live video of a Soviet cosmonaut in orbit was broadcast for the first time.[42]
The Mercury spacecraft
reaction control system test was completed. Data compiled from this test was used to evaluate the thermal and thruster configuration of the Mercury extended range or 1-day mission spacecraft.[24]
King Kong vs. Godzilla debuts theatrically in Japan, becoming the 2nd-highest grossing movie in Japanese filmography, earning ¥352 million at the Japanese box office, under a ¥150 million budget.[43]
Pyotr Bolotnikov of the Soviet Union set the new world record for the
10,000 metres race in Moscow, perfecting the world record he already held.
The Soviet Union launched
Vostok 4 from Baikonur Cosmodrome, with cosmonaut
Pavel Popovich on board, marking the first time that two crewed spacecraft were in orbit at the same time. The two
Vostok capsules came within 6.5 km (4.0 mi) of one another, and the cosmonauts established ship-to-ship radio contact.[24][44][45]Arthur C. Clarke would write later that the double launch "stunned the world", because the Soviet Union accomplishment "required synchronization of Herculean proportions at the launch site", with the second launch "at exactly the right moment to ensure the near-perfect
rendezvous... only their fourth manned space flight," something well beyond the American space program at the time.[42]
On the first anniversary of the creation of the
Berlin Wall, three minutes of silence were supposed to be observed at noon in West Berlin. Instead, angry crowds began hurling stones across the border at police in East Berlin, who responded by firing a water cannon across the Wall and into the crowd. After more stones were thrown by the Western protesters, tear gas grenades were fired from East Berlin, after which West Berlin riot police sent their own tear gas across the border. The clash ended after an hour, and there were no serious injuries.[46]
A thief started a fire at Mangurian Furniture in
Fort Lauderdale, Florida, that completely destroyed the building and caused over $315,000 in damage, and resulted in more stringent fire codes to be implemented in the city.[47]
Renato Daguin and Giovanni Ottin made the first complete ascent of the west face of the
Matterhorn.[48] This was the last face to have been completely ascended.
In the
Plymouth Mail Robbery, robbers armed with
submachine guns held up a U.S. Mail truck near
Plymouth, Massachusetts, and heisted its $1,500,000 cargo that had been en route to the Federal Reserve Bank in Boston. A man dressed as a police officer flagged the truck down, and two cars pulled out from side roads.[49] The caper was financed by mobster
Gennaro "Jerry" Angiulo and carried out under the direction of
John "Red" Kelley. Kelley would later arrange for the murder of six of the participants in the plot, would avoid prison by becoming a witness against his fellow criminals, and, after being relocated by the federal witness protection program, would eventually die of natural causes.[50]
For only the fifth time in its history, and for the first time in 35 years, the U.S. Senate invoked
cloture, the ending of a
filibuster against the
Communications Satellite Act of 1962. The vote was 63–27 in favor of ending debate, three more than the two-thirds necessary.[51] When it came up for a vote, the bill, establishing
COMSAT, passed the Senate 66–11 and the House 371–10. President Kennedy would sign it into law on August 31.[52]
North American began flight tests for the half-scale text vehicle (HSTV) for the Paraglider Development Program two months late. The instrumented HSTV was towed aloft by helicopter. Despite various minor malfunctions in all five test flights from August 14 to October 23, test results verified the stability of the wing/vehicle combination in free flight and the adequacy of control effectiveness.[11]
Died:Rudi Arnstadt, 35, East German border guard captain, was shot by Hans Plüschke, a 23-year-old West German border guard. Plüschke claimed to be returning fire after his patrol was shot at.[53]
Representatives of the
Netherlands and
Indonesia signed the
New York Agreement, with the Netherlands transferring administration of the
Western New Guinea colony to the
United Nations Trusteeship Council until May 1, 1963, after which the U.N. Temporary Executive Authority (UNTEA) and Indonesia would jointly administer the territory for a period of six years, during which the Western New Guineans were to be given a choice as to their future. In 1969, the territory would be incorporated into Indonesia.[54]
The
Australian Air Force's "Red Sales" aerobatic stunt flying team was wiped out when all four of its Vampire jets crashed, killing the six airmen aboard, during formation flying near the East Sale Air Force Base.[59]
South Africa legalized the sale of beer, wine and liquor to Africans and Asians for the first time. Previously, the privilege had been limited to White people only.[60]
Died:Lei Feng, 21, who had in 1957 been named as a "model worker" by the
People's Republic of China for good citizens to emulate, and in 1960, a "model soldier" of the
People's Liberation Army, died "after being accidentally killed by a falling telephone pole that had been run into by a truck".[61] He would become even more famous on March 5, 1963, when China Youth Daily would begin the "Learn from Lei Feng" campaign (Xiang Lei Feng tongzhi xuexi).[62][63]
The Agena status displays for Gemini were reviewed, and 8 were approved. These displays comprised seven green lights which, when on, indicated that various functions of the Agena were satisfactory. The eighth, a red light, would go on to indicate main engine malfunction. The Gemini Project Office also approved the list of commands (which would be set at 34 after review) required to control certain Agena functions during rendezvous and
docking maneuvers by the Gemini spacecraft.[11]
The four former colonies of
French India were formally transferred to Indian control with the exchange of the instruments of ratification by the French parliament of the 1954 transfer agreement. The four French territories (
Pondicherry,
Karaikal,
Yanam and
Mahé) would be merged to form the Union Territory of
Puducherry.[64]
The Air Force and NASA agreed to use a standard Atlas space booster for the Gemini program. The first standard vehicle was expected to be available by September 1963.[11]
Peter Fechter, aged 18, was killed by
East German border guards as he attempted to cross the
Berlin Wall into West
Berlin. Fechter's death has been described as "the most notorious incident of all"[66] in the 27-year history of the Wall, because Fechter slowly bled to death from his bullet wounds, in front of newspaper photographers and hundreds of spectators who were unable to assist him, and East German guards who refused to approach him until he died an hour later. In 1996, indictments would be returned against the two former guards, Rolf Friedrich and Erich Schreiber, who had shot Fechter.[67] They would be convicted of manslaughter on March 5, 1997, and placed on probation.
Television was first broadcast in
Indonesia, at the time a nation of 97,000,000 people, as Jakarta station
TVRI (Televisi Republik Indonesia) or The National Television Channel of Indonesia, began test broadcasting on Channel 5, coming directly from the Presidential Palace on the Indonesian independence day.[68] Regular broadcasting began on August 24, with transmission of the Asian Games.
Foy D. Kohler was confirmed by the U.S. Senate to be the new United States ambassador to the Soviet Union.[69]
Denied the right to an
abortion in her home state of
Arizona and anywhere else in the United States,
Sherri Finkbine received the procedure in
Stockholm.[70] Mrs. Finkbine, host of a children's TV show in
Phoenix, had been seeking to terminate her pregnancy since late
July after learning that a medicine she had taken was
thalidomide, which was found to cause severe birth defects, and her search for a legal abortion began the first nationwide debate in the U.S. over whether abortion should be legal.
An experiment in publishing a "worldwide newspaper" by
satellite was conducted from New York City, as seven newspaper pages were photographed, reduced in size, transmitted to the orbiting
Telstar satellite, and then received at ground stations on various continents.[71]
A group of 17 children from the Blessed Hope Missionary Baptist Church of
Quincy, Florida, ranging in age from 5 to 14 years old, drowned along with their Sunday school teacher when their boat capsized in
Lake Talquin. Seven of the children were from the same family.[72]
The
U.S. Department of Defense announced plans to develop a
Titan IIIlaunch vehicle powered by both
solid and
liquid fuel rocket motors with a total thrust of over 11 million newtons (2.5 million lbs). Scheduled to become operational in 1965, the Titan III would be used to launch the Air Force's
X-20 Dyna-Soar crewed spacecraft, as well as heavy uncrewed military satellites.
Martin Marietta Corporation had been selected as prime contractor for the project, at an estimated cost of between $500 million and $1 billion. At a
news conference the following day,
U.S. Defense SecretaryRobert S. McNamara cited the Titan III as a major step toward overtaking the Soviet Union in various phases of military space development.[76]
Fifteen people were killed in the crash of a
Panair do Brasil DC-8 airliner, after it skidded off the runway while attempting to take off from
Rio de Janeiro to
Lisbon. Another 90 were rescued, or escaped, from the flaming airliner.[77][78]
The source of what would be developed into the anti-cancer drug
taxol (paclitaxel) was discovered by a team of botanists, led by Dr. Arthur Barclay, who collected bark from a specific type of
Pacific yew tree, Taxus brevifolia Nutt, in the
Gifford Pinchot National Forest. Taxol, developed from the extract of the bark, is now used in treatment of ovarian and breast cancer.[79]
Hermann Höfle, 51, Nazi war criminal, hanged himself in prison in Austria, where he had been incarcerated since January 1961. He was awaiting trial for war crimes during
World War II.[82]
Richard Garrick, 83, Irish-born American film actor and director
An assassination attempt against French President
Charles De Gaulle failed, as he, his wife, and son-in-law were near
Petit Clamart, being driven in his
Citroën DS from Paris to the
Villacoublay Airfield. A team of 12 OAS gunmen, led by former French Air Force Lieutenant Colonel.
Jean Bastien-Thiry, attacked the limousine. The rear window and two tires of De Gaulle's car were shot out, and the President was struck by shattered glass, as ambushers fired more than 120 bullets at the automobile, but miraculously, nobody was injured.[83] Bastien-Thiry was arrested on September 17, and executed by firing squad on March 11, 1963.[84]
Soviet writer
Valery Tarsis was punished for his anti-government novel, The Bluebottle Fly. He was forcibly committed to the Kuschenko Psychiatric Hospital with a diagnosis of "expansive paranoia". He would not be released for six months, and would later describe the experience in his novel Ward 7.[85]
In the most dramatic attack on Cuba since the Bay of Pigs Invasion the year before, a suburb of Havana was shelled from speedboats operated by the
Cuban exile terrorist group Directorio Estudiantile. Operating from a 31-foot (9.4 m) boat, the attackers, led by Manuel Salvat, fired 60 artillery shells at buildings in
Miramar, an upscale section of the Havana suburb of
Playa. Nine rooms of the Icar Hostel, formerly the Hotel Rosita de Hornedo, were damaged, and 20 people were injured. The boat departed after seven minutes.[88][89][90]
TVRI or Televisi Republik Indonesia (Indonesian National Television Channel), the first national television network of Indonesia, made its official debut with a broadcast of the opening of the
1962 Asian Games in
Jakarta.
Venera 2MV-1 No.1, also called Sputnik 19, was launched from the
Baikonur Cosmodrome,[92] with the aim of being the first craft to land on the planet
Venus. However, the probe never succeeded in leaving low Earth orbit and re-entered the atmosphere three days later.[93] At the time, Soviet policy was to never announce a space mission until after it was launched, and to never announce a failed launch.[94]
The last major event of baseball's
Negro American League was played, as the annual
East-West All-Star Game took place at Municipal Stadium in Kansas City, Missouri. In the final season of the NAL, there were only four teams. The defending NAL champions, the
Kansas City Monarchs, along with members of the
Birmingham Black Barons, paced the West team in a 5–2 win.[95]
The Soviet national newspaper Pravda denounced the
European Economic Community (known then as the "Common Market"), as "an imperialist agency intensifying aggressive activity against the Communist nations".[96]
NASA launched the
Mariner 2 space probe toward the planet
Venus, lifting off from Florida at 1:58 a.m. (658 UTC) local time.[97] As the first successful mission to another planet, Mariner 2 would reach Venus on December 14, 1962, gathering data for 42 minutes and approaching within 21,600 miles (34,752 km).[98] The launch came a month after the failed American launch of
Mariner 1 to Venus, and three days after the Soviet launch of Sputnik 19 to Venus.
The proposed
Twenty-fourth Amendment to the United States Constitution, outlawing the
poll tax, was submitted to the states for ratification. The House of Representatives voted 295–86 to approve the resolution, which had passed the U.S. Senate 77–16 on March 27.[99] By 1962, only two American states (Alabama and Mississippi) still used the poll tax to deter African-Americans from voting, and only three others (Arkansas, Texas and Virginia) had a poll tax law.[100] The Amendment would be ratified on January 23, 1964, when South Dakota would become the 38th of 50 states to approve it.[101]
At a meeting in
Guangzhou between China's Prime Minister
Zhou Enlai and North Vietnam's Prime Minister
Pham Van Dong, the People's Republic committed to supplying the Viet Cong, at China's expense, "with enough weapons to arm 230 infantry battalions".[102]
Born:Sjón (Sigurjón Birgir Sigurðsson), Icelandic novelist, poet and lyricist; in
Reykjavík
At a spacecraft production evaluation meeting, Gemini Project Office and McDonnell revised the projected launch date of the
first Gemini flight from
August 1963 to
September 1963. Delays in the delivery of components from vendors caused the revision. The first crewed flight and second Gemini mission remained scheduled for
November 1963.[11]
Photographs by an American U-2 spy plane over Cuba first revealed the presence there of Soviet
SA-2 missiles, for anti-aircraft defense. Offensive, nuclear-armed missiles would not be discovered in Cuba until later flights, precipitating the
Cuban Missile Crisis.[106]
An American U-2 spyplane, flying from Japan, accidentally drifted over the Soviet Union's
Sakhalin Island, the only known incursion after the
1960 U-2 incident. The U.S. State Department formally apologized to the Soviet Union following a protest.[108]
The Supremes recorded their fourth single, "
Let Me Go the Right Way", at Studio A of "Hitsville U.S.A.", the Motown Records recording studios at 2648 West Grand Boulevard in Detroit.[109]
Al Tomaini, 50, retired American circus performer billed as "The Tallest Man in the World" (verified as being 8 feet 4.5 inches (2.553 m) tall in 1931); in
Gibsonton, Florida, of complications after the removal of a pituitary gland tumor a few weeks earlier.[110]
Gemini Project Office outlined plans for checking out the spacecraft at Cape Canaveral. Gemini preflight checkout would follow the pattern established for Mercury, a series of end-to-end functional tests to check the spacecraft and its systems completely. To implement the checkout of the Gemini spacecraft, the Hangar S complex at Cape Canaveral would be enlarged. Major test stations would be housed at Hangar AR, an existing facility adjacent to Hangar S. The required facilities were scheduled to be completed by March 1, 1963, in time to support the checkout of Gemini spacecraft No. 1, which was due to arrive at the Cape by the end of
April 1963.[11]
Trinidad and Tobago, consisting of the two southernmost islands of the
West Indies, became independent after 165 years as a British colony. As midnight approached in
Port of Spain on August 30, the British flag was slowly lowered as the Royal Marine Band played Taps, and after a moment of silence, the new nation's red, white and black flag was quickly run up the flagpole as the National Guard and police bands played the new national anthem, Forged from the Love of Liberty.
Eric Williams served as the nation's first Prime Minister, while former governor
Solomon Hochoy became Governor-General.[111]
^"Soviet nuclear test in 40-megaton range",Regina Leader-Post, August 6, 1962, p1
^Blunsden, John (September 1962). "Skyfall över Tysklands GP" [Deluge on German GP]. Illustrerad Motor Sport (in Swedish). No. 9. Lerum, Sweden. p. 24.
^FOIA.CIA.govArchived November 5, 2010, at the
Wayback Machine; "The Cuban Missile Crisis", by Dino Brugioni, in Events That Shaped the Nation (Richard C. Phalen, ed.) (Pelican Publishing, 2001) p161
In Major League Baseball, pitcher
Bill Monbouquette, playing for the
Boston Red Sox, pitched a
no-hitter against the
Chicago White Sox, one of five that year after only one had been pitched in 1961.[3] Besides Monbouquette, no-hitters were also pitched in May (by
Bo Belinsky of the Angels), two in the final week of June (on June 26 by Monbouquette's Red Sox teammate
Earl Wilson and on June 30 by the Dodgers'
Sandy Koufax), and a final one on August 26 by Minnesota's
Jack Kralick.
A
Nepal Airlines RNA
Douglas C-47A-DL (9N-AAH), en route from Kathmandu-
Gaucher Airport to
New Delhi, crashed near Tulachan Dhuri. The wreckage was discovered eight days later on a mountain top at 11,200 feet (3,400 m). All four crew and six passengers were killed, including
Nepal's ambassador to India.[4][5] Initial reports were that rescue teams had found the airliner, and that all ten people on board were safe.[6]
North American Aviation began a test program to qualify its emergency parachute recovery system for Project Gemini's Paraglider Development Program. The first test was successful, but the test series would end on November 15 when all recovery parachutes separated from the
spacecraft immediately after deployment and the test vehicle was destroyed on impact.[11]
In order to bring an end to the
Saskatchewan doctors' strike, a
special session of the legislature of
Saskatchewan amended the provincial Medical Care Insurance Act that had caused an unprecedented work stoppage by doctors and surgeons, adjourning after completing its work in less than 12 hours.[12]
Cominco Binani Zinc Ltd. was established on the banks of the
Periyar River in
Kerala, India.
President
John F. Kennedy decided to break ties with singer
Frank Sinatra after his brother, U.S. Attorney General
Robert F. Kennedy, reported to him about Sinatra's connections with organized crime. Sinatra was reportedly so enraged by the President's decision to no longer visit the singer's
Palm Springs home, that he took a sledgehammer and personally destroyed a
landing pad built to accommodate visits by the presidential helicopter,
Marine One.[13]
"
Tusko", a 14-year-old male
Indian elephant at the
Oklahoma City Zoo, was injected with 270 milligrams (4.2 gr) of the
hallucinogenLSD in an experiment by researchers at the
University of Oklahoma to simulate
musth, the periodic condition of aggressive behavior and rage by male elephants. Tusko collapsed five minutes after the injection and died less than two hours later.[14][15]
Died:Dean Cromwell, 82, American athletics coach, nicknamed "Maker of Champions", who coached the USC Trojans track team to 12 national championships, including nine consecutive titles from 1935 to 1943.
Nelson Mandela was arrested in
South Africa, and imprisoned for more than 27 years. After returning home from a tour that he had made of African nations, Mandela was being driven by Cecil Williams to
Johannesburg. Their car was near the village of Cedara, outside of
Howick, when a Sergeant Vorster recognized both men and pulled them over. Mandela, who identified himself as David Motsamayi, was taken to
Pietermaritzburg. While serving part of a five-year sentence for illegally leaving the country, he was tried and convicted on new charges in 1963 for sabotage and given a life sentence. He would not be released until February 11, 1990. In 1994, Mandela would be elected the first black
President of South Africa.[18]
Jamaica received its independence from the United Kingdom.
Princess Margaret of the UK and U.S. Vice-President
Lyndon B. Johnson were among the dignitaries who watched the lowering of the British flag in Kingston.[25]
Guillermo Valencia of the Conservative Party was sworn in as the new
President of Colombia, quietly succeeding
Alberto Lleras Camargo of the Liberal Party. Valencia's inauguration marked the first successful test of a unique agreement, whereby the Liberal and Conservative agreed to alternate the presidency every four years.[30]
Algeria's provisional government, led by Prime Minister
Benyoucef Benkhedda, stepped aside in favor of leftist Vice-Premier
Ahmed Ben Bella, who had returned to
Algiers from
Oran four days earlier.[31]
Elizabeth Ann Duncan, 58, became the last woman to be executed in the United States prior to the restoration of the death penalty in 1977. She was put to death in the
gas chamber at California's
San Quentin State Prison on the same day as the two men whom she had hired to murder her pregnant daughter-in-law. On November 17, 1958, Mrs. Olga Kupczyk Duncan and her unborn daughter had been beaten to death by Augustine Baldonado and Luis Moya, to whom Elizabeth had promised $8,000 which was never paid.[32][33][34]
Mercury spacecraft No. 9 (redesignated 9A) was phased into the Project Orbit program in preparation for the Mercury extended range or 1-day mission.[24]Atlas launch vehicle 113-D was delivered to Cape Canaveral for the
Mercury 8 mission of
Wally Schirra.[24]
Died:Don Davis, 28; of injuries sustained in a sprint car race three days earlier at
New Bremen, Ohio. Less than three months earlier, Davis had finished in fourth place in the
1962 Indianapolis 500.
CIA Director
John McCone provided his first memorandum to U.S. President Kennedy about surveillance that would lead to a U.S. and Soviet confrontation in the
Cuban Missile Crisis, describing an increase of Soviet shipments to Cuba, and his speculation that the Soviet Union was placing offensive missiles in the Caribbean island nation. McCone would give the President three more warnings in August.[37]
The
Herbert Hoover Presidential Library was dedicated and opened to the public in
West Branch, Iowa. Hoover, who had served as the 31st President of the United States (1929–1933) was present and was celebrating his 88th birthday.[38]
Harry Wexler, an American
meteorologist who had been researching the link between depletion of
stratospheric ozone and
aerosol propellants, died of a
heart attack while on vacation. Wexler had accepted an invitation to deliver a lecture entitled "The Climate of Earth and Its Modifications" at the
University of Maryland Space Research and Technology Institute. Another twelve years would pass before the first papers about the effect of
chlorofluorocarbon on the
ozone layer were published. "Had Wexler lived to publish his ideas", an author would comment later, "they would certainly have been noticed and could have led to a different outcome and perhaps an earlier coordinated response to the issue of stratospheric ozone depletion."[40]
Andriyan Nikolayev became the third Soviet
cosmonaut, and the fifth man to orbit the Earth, when the Soviet Union launched
Vostok 3 from
Baikonur Cosmodrome.[24][41] Although the Soviets maintained the practice of not announcing the launch until after it had happened, live video of a Soviet cosmonaut in orbit was broadcast for the first time.[42]
The Mercury spacecraft
reaction control system test was completed. Data compiled from this test was used to evaluate the thermal and thruster configuration of the Mercury extended range or 1-day mission spacecraft.[24]
King Kong vs. Godzilla debuts theatrically in Japan, becoming the 2nd-highest grossing movie in Japanese filmography, earning ¥352 million at the Japanese box office, under a ¥150 million budget.[43]
Pyotr Bolotnikov of the Soviet Union set the new world record for the
10,000 metres race in Moscow, perfecting the world record he already held.
The Soviet Union launched
Vostok 4 from Baikonur Cosmodrome, with cosmonaut
Pavel Popovich on board, marking the first time that two crewed spacecraft were in orbit at the same time. The two
Vostok capsules came within 6.5 km (4.0 mi) of one another, and the cosmonauts established ship-to-ship radio contact.[24][44][45]Arthur C. Clarke would write later that the double launch "stunned the world", because the Soviet Union accomplishment "required synchronization of Herculean proportions at the launch site", with the second launch "at exactly the right moment to ensure the near-perfect
rendezvous... only their fourth manned space flight," something well beyond the American space program at the time.[42]
On the first anniversary of the creation of the
Berlin Wall, three minutes of silence were supposed to be observed at noon in West Berlin. Instead, angry crowds began hurling stones across the border at police in East Berlin, who responded by firing a water cannon across the Wall and into the crowd. After more stones were thrown by the Western protesters, tear gas grenades were fired from East Berlin, after which West Berlin riot police sent their own tear gas across the border. The clash ended after an hour, and there were no serious injuries.[46]
A thief started a fire at Mangurian Furniture in
Fort Lauderdale, Florida, that completely destroyed the building and caused over $315,000 in damage, and resulted in more stringent fire codes to be implemented in the city.[47]
Renato Daguin and Giovanni Ottin made the first complete ascent of the west face of the
Matterhorn.[48] This was the last face to have been completely ascended.
In the
Plymouth Mail Robbery, robbers armed with
submachine guns held up a U.S. Mail truck near
Plymouth, Massachusetts, and heisted its $1,500,000 cargo that had been en route to the Federal Reserve Bank in Boston. A man dressed as a police officer flagged the truck down, and two cars pulled out from side roads.[49] The caper was financed by mobster
Gennaro "Jerry" Angiulo and carried out under the direction of
John "Red" Kelley. Kelley would later arrange for the murder of six of the participants in the plot, would avoid prison by becoming a witness against his fellow criminals, and, after being relocated by the federal witness protection program, would eventually die of natural causes.[50]
For only the fifth time in its history, and for the first time in 35 years, the U.S. Senate invoked
cloture, the ending of a
filibuster against the
Communications Satellite Act of 1962. The vote was 63–27 in favor of ending debate, three more than the two-thirds necessary.[51] When it came up for a vote, the bill, establishing
COMSAT, passed the Senate 66–11 and the House 371–10. President Kennedy would sign it into law on August 31.[52]
North American began flight tests for the half-scale text vehicle (HSTV) for the Paraglider Development Program two months late. The instrumented HSTV was towed aloft by helicopter. Despite various minor malfunctions in all five test flights from August 14 to October 23, test results verified the stability of the wing/vehicle combination in free flight and the adequacy of control effectiveness.[11]
Died:Rudi Arnstadt, 35, East German border guard captain, was shot by Hans Plüschke, a 23-year-old West German border guard. Plüschke claimed to be returning fire after his patrol was shot at.[53]
Representatives of the
Netherlands and
Indonesia signed the
New York Agreement, with the Netherlands transferring administration of the
Western New Guinea colony to the
United Nations Trusteeship Council until May 1, 1963, after which the U.N. Temporary Executive Authority (UNTEA) and Indonesia would jointly administer the territory for a period of six years, during which the Western New Guineans were to be given a choice as to their future. In 1969, the territory would be incorporated into Indonesia.[54]
The
Australian Air Force's "Red Sales" aerobatic stunt flying team was wiped out when all four of its Vampire jets crashed, killing the six airmen aboard, during formation flying near the East Sale Air Force Base.[59]
South Africa legalized the sale of beer, wine and liquor to Africans and Asians for the first time. Previously, the privilege had been limited to White people only.[60]
Died:Lei Feng, 21, who had in 1957 been named as a "model worker" by the
People's Republic of China for good citizens to emulate, and in 1960, a "model soldier" of the
People's Liberation Army, died "after being accidentally killed by a falling telephone pole that had been run into by a truck".[61] He would become even more famous on March 5, 1963, when China Youth Daily would begin the "Learn from Lei Feng" campaign (Xiang Lei Feng tongzhi xuexi).[62][63]
The Agena status displays for Gemini were reviewed, and 8 were approved. These displays comprised seven green lights which, when on, indicated that various functions of the Agena were satisfactory. The eighth, a red light, would go on to indicate main engine malfunction. The Gemini Project Office also approved the list of commands (which would be set at 34 after review) required to control certain Agena functions during rendezvous and
docking maneuvers by the Gemini spacecraft.[11]
The four former colonies of
French India were formally transferred to Indian control with the exchange of the instruments of ratification by the French parliament of the 1954 transfer agreement. The four French territories (
Pondicherry,
Karaikal,
Yanam and
Mahé) would be merged to form the Union Territory of
Puducherry.[64]
The Air Force and NASA agreed to use a standard Atlas space booster for the Gemini program. The first standard vehicle was expected to be available by September 1963.[11]
Peter Fechter, aged 18, was killed by
East German border guards as he attempted to cross the
Berlin Wall into West
Berlin. Fechter's death has been described as "the most notorious incident of all"[66] in the 27-year history of the Wall, because Fechter slowly bled to death from his bullet wounds, in front of newspaper photographers and hundreds of spectators who were unable to assist him, and East German guards who refused to approach him until he died an hour later. In 1996, indictments would be returned against the two former guards, Rolf Friedrich and Erich Schreiber, who had shot Fechter.[67] They would be convicted of manslaughter on March 5, 1997, and placed on probation.
Television was first broadcast in
Indonesia, at the time a nation of 97,000,000 people, as Jakarta station
TVRI (Televisi Republik Indonesia) or The National Television Channel of Indonesia, began test broadcasting on Channel 5, coming directly from the Presidential Palace on the Indonesian independence day.[68] Regular broadcasting began on August 24, with transmission of the Asian Games.
Foy D. Kohler was confirmed by the U.S. Senate to be the new United States ambassador to the Soviet Union.[69]
Denied the right to an
abortion in her home state of
Arizona and anywhere else in the United States,
Sherri Finkbine received the procedure in
Stockholm.[70] Mrs. Finkbine, host of a children's TV show in
Phoenix, had been seeking to terminate her pregnancy since late
July after learning that a medicine she had taken was
thalidomide, which was found to cause severe birth defects, and her search for a legal abortion began the first nationwide debate in the U.S. over whether abortion should be legal.
An experiment in publishing a "worldwide newspaper" by
satellite was conducted from New York City, as seven newspaper pages were photographed, reduced in size, transmitted to the orbiting
Telstar satellite, and then received at ground stations on various continents.[71]
A group of 17 children from the Blessed Hope Missionary Baptist Church of
Quincy, Florida, ranging in age from 5 to 14 years old, drowned along with their Sunday school teacher when their boat capsized in
Lake Talquin. Seven of the children were from the same family.[72]
The
U.S. Department of Defense announced plans to develop a
Titan IIIlaunch vehicle powered by both
solid and
liquid fuel rocket motors with a total thrust of over 11 million newtons (2.5 million lbs). Scheduled to become operational in 1965, the Titan III would be used to launch the Air Force's
X-20 Dyna-Soar crewed spacecraft, as well as heavy uncrewed military satellites.
Martin Marietta Corporation had been selected as prime contractor for the project, at an estimated cost of between $500 million and $1 billion. At a
news conference the following day,
U.S. Defense SecretaryRobert S. McNamara cited the Titan III as a major step toward overtaking the Soviet Union in various phases of military space development.[76]
Fifteen people were killed in the crash of a
Panair do Brasil DC-8 airliner, after it skidded off the runway while attempting to take off from
Rio de Janeiro to
Lisbon. Another 90 were rescued, or escaped, from the flaming airliner.[77][78]
The source of what would be developed into the anti-cancer drug
taxol (paclitaxel) was discovered by a team of botanists, led by Dr. Arthur Barclay, who collected bark from a specific type of
Pacific yew tree, Taxus brevifolia Nutt, in the
Gifford Pinchot National Forest. Taxol, developed from the extract of the bark, is now used in treatment of ovarian and breast cancer.[79]
Hermann Höfle, 51, Nazi war criminal, hanged himself in prison in Austria, where he had been incarcerated since January 1961. He was awaiting trial for war crimes during
World War II.[82]
Richard Garrick, 83, Irish-born American film actor and director
An assassination attempt against French President
Charles De Gaulle failed, as he, his wife, and son-in-law were near
Petit Clamart, being driven in his
Citroën DS from Paris to the
Villacoublay Airfield. A team of 12 OAS gunmen, led by former French Air Force Lieutenant Colonel.
Jean Bastien-Thiry, attacked the limousine. The rear window and two tires of De Gaulle's car were shot out, and the President was struck by shattered glass, as ambushers fired more than 120 bullets at the automobile, but miraculously, nobody was injured.[83] Bastien-Thiry was arrested on September 17, and executed by firing squad on March 11, 1963.[84]
Soviet writer
Valery Tarsis was punished for his anti-government novel, The Bluebottle Fly. He was forcibly committed to the Kuschenko Psychiatric Hospital with a diagnosis of "expansive paranoia". He would not be released for six months, and would later describe the experience in his novel Ward 7.[85]
In the most dramatic attack on Cuba since the Bay of Pigs Invasion the year before, a suburb of Havana was shelled from speedboats operated by the
Cuban exile terrorist group Directorio Estudiantile. Operating from a 31-foot (9.4 m) boat, the attackers, led by Manuel Salvat, fired 60 artillery shells at buildings in
Miramar, an upscale section of the Havana suburb of
Playa. Nine rooms of the Icar Hostel, formerly the Hotel Rosita de Hornedo, were damaged, and 20 people were injured. The boat departed after seven minutes.[88][89][90]
TVRI or Televisi Republik Indonesia (Indonesian National Television Channel), the first national television network of Indonesia, made its official debut with a broadcast of the opening of the
1962 Asian Games in
Jakarta.
Venera 2MV-1 No.1, also called Sputnik 19, was launched from the
Baikonur Cosmodrome,[92] with the aim of being the first craft to land on the planet
Venus. However, the probe never succeeded in leaving low Earth orbit and re-entered the atmosphere three days later.[93] At the time, Soviet policy was to never announce a space mission until after it was launched, and to never announce a failed launch.[94]
The last major event of baseball's
Negro American League was played, as the annual
East-West All-Star Game took place at Municipal Stadium in Kansas City, Missouri. In the final season of the NAL, there were only four teams. The defending NAL champions, the
Kansas City Monarchs, along with members of the
Birmingham Black Barons, paced the West team in a 5–2 win.[95]
The Soviet national newspaper Pravda denounced the
European Economic Community (known then as the "Common Market"), as "an imperialist agency intensifying aggressive activity against the Communist nations".[96]
NASA launched the
Mariner 2 space probe toward the planet
Venus, lifting off from Florida at 1:58 a.m. (658 UTC) local time.[97] As the first successful mission to another planet, Mariner 2 would reach Venus on December 14, 1962, gathering data for 42 minutes and approaching within 21,600 miles (34,752 km).[98] The launch came a month after the failed American launch of
Mariner 1 to Venus, and three days after the Soviet launch of Sputnik 19 to Venus.
The proposed
Twenty-fourth Amendment to the United States Constitution, outlawing the
poll tax, was submitted to the states for ratification. The House of Representatives voted 295–86 to approve the resolution, which had passed the U.S. Senate 77–16 on March 27.[99] By 1962, only two American states (Alabama and Mississippi) still used the poll tax to deter African-Americans from voting, and only three others (Arkansas, Texas and Virginia) had a poll tax law.[100] The Amendment would be ratified on January 23, 1964, when South Dakota would become the 38th of 50 states to approve it.[101]
At a meeting in
Guangzhou between China's Prime Minister
Zhou Enlai and North Vietnam's Prime Minister
Pham Van Dong, the People's Republic committed to supplying the Viet Cong, at China's expense, "with enough weapons to arm 230 infantry battalions".[102]
Born:Sjón (Sigurjón Birgir Sigurðsson), Icelandic novelist, poet and lyricist; in
Reykjavík
At a spacecraft production evaluation meeting, Gemini Project Office and McDonnell revised the projected launch date of the
first Gemini flight from
August 1963 to
September 1963. Delays in the delivery of components from vendors caused the revision. The first crewed flight and second Gemini mission remained scheduled for
November 1963.[11]
Photographs by an American U-2 spy plane over Cuba first revealed the presence there of Soviet
SA-2 missiles, for anti-aircraft defense. Offensive, nuclear-armed missiles would not be discovered in Cuba until later flights, precipitating the
Cuban Missile Crisis.[106]
An American U-2 spyplane, flying from Japan, accidentally drifted over the Soviet Union's
Sakhalin Island, the only known incursion after the
1960 U-2 incident. The U.S. State Department formally apologized to the Soviet Union following a protest.[108]
The Supremes recorded their fourth single, "
Let Me Go the Right Way", at Studio A of "Hitsville U.S.A.", the Motown Records recording studios at 2648 West Grand Boulevard in Detroit.[109]
Al Tomaini, 50, retired American circus performer billed as "The Tallest Man in the World" (verified as being 8 feet 4.5 inches (2.553 m) tall in 1931); in
Gibsonton, Florida, of complications after the removal of a pituitary gland tumor a few weeks earlier.[110]
Gemini Project Office outlined plans for checking out the spacecraft at Cape Canaveral. Gemini preflight checkout would follow the pattern established for Mercury, a series of end-to-end functional tests to check the spacecraft and its systems completely. To implement the checkout of the Gemini spacecraft, the Hangar S complex at Cape Canaveral would be enlarged. Major test stations would be housed at Hangar AR, an existing facility adjacent to Hangar S. The required facilities were scheduled to be completed by March 1, 1963, in time to support the checkout of Gemini spacecraft No. 1, which was due to arrive at the Cape by the end of
April 1963.[11]
Trinidad and Tobago, consisting of the two southernmost islands of the
West Indies, became independent after 165 years as a British colony. As midnight approached in
Port of Spain on August 30, the British flag was slowly lowered as the Royal Marine Band played Taps, and after a moment of silence, the new nation's red, white and black flag was quickly run up the flagpole as the National Guard and police bands played the new national anthem, Forged from the Love of Liberty.
Eric Williams served as the nation's first Prime Minister, while former governor
Solomon Hochoy became Governor-General.[111]
^"Soviet nuclear test in 40-megaton range",Regina Leader-Post, August 6, 1962, p1
^Blunsden, John (September 1962). "Skyfall över Tysklands GP" [Deluge on German GP]. Illustrerad Motor Sport (in Swedish). No. 9. Lerum, Sweden. p. 24.
^FOIA.CIA.govArchived November 5, 2010, at the
Wayback Machine; "The Cuban Missile Crisis", by Dino Brugioni, in Events That Shaped the Nation (Richard C. Phalen, ed.) (Pelican Publishing, 2001) p161