The
Republic of Cameroun became independent at midnight local time (2300 12/31/59 GMT) with the lowering of the French tricolor, and the raising of a new tricolor (red, yellow and green) flag at
Yaoundé. The former
French Cameroons colony had been under a U.N. Trusteeship during a transition period, and Prime Minister
Ahmadou Ahidjo headed the government pending the adoption of a constitution. United Nations Secretary-General
Dag Hammarskjöld, along with
Henry Cabot Lodge, the American Ambassador to the U.N., were present, along with the Soviet First Deputy Premier,
Frol Kozlov, who announced that the Soviets would recognize the new government. Marxist
Félix-Roland Moumié, who had previously been supported by the Soviet Union, continued to wage a campaign of terrorism against the Ahidjo government, and thirty people were killed on the Republic's first day.[1][2]
The peaceful
New Year's Day March, a civil rights march at the airport of
Greenville, South Carolina, took place with 250 African-American people protesting racial segregation. On October 25, a delegation of
NAACP members had been waiting for the arrival of baseball great
Jackie Robinson when they were told to move to a colored waiting room at the airport. Led by the chairman of the local
Congress of Racial Equality (CORE), the Reverend J.S. Hall, the march concluded with the reading of a resolution by Rev. Matthew D. McCullough while a crowd of 200 White people listened.[3]
The symbolic "
Doomsday Clock" on the cover of the
Bulletin of the Atomic Scientists was moved back five minutes, from "two minutes to midnight" (where it had been since 1953) to "seven minutes to midnight".[4]
Three cities in Norway were created through mergers—
Smøla (from Edøy, Brattvær, and Hopen);
Evje og Hornnes (from Evje and Hornnes); and
Sirdal (from Tonstad and Øvre Sirdal).
Midnight, January 1, 1960, is the point from which dates are measured under
SAS System,
Stata and
R computer programming software.
Died:Margaret Sullavan, 50, American film actress; of an accidental overdose of barbiturates
At the Senate Caucus room in Washington, U.S. Senator
John F. Kennedy of
Massachusetts formally announced that he would seek the Democratic nomination for President of the United States. Addressing a question about whether being a Roman Catholic would affect his chances of winning, Senator Kennedy told them "I would think that there is really only one issue involved in the whole question of a candidate's religion, that is, does a candidate believe in the separation of church and state?"[5]
The CBS Sports Spectacular made its debut at 3:00 EST, with
Bud Palmer, with the aim of showing "sports you seldom see". The first show featured a complete game between basketball's
Harlem Globetrotters and their foils at that time, the Baltimore Rockets.[7]
The
Bank of France issued the first bills for the nouveau franc worth one hundred ancients francs, and brought back the
centime coin, replacing the old franc. The new franc, at roughly five to U.S. dollar, had become legal tender on January 1. To prepare the French for the changeover, the old-style bills had been overstamped with new value and the initials "N.F."[8]
The
steel strike of 1959 was settled, three weeks before an injunction under the Taft-Hartley Act was set to expire, as Labor Secretary James P. Mitchell and Vice-President Richard M. Nixon mediated the dispute between the United Steelworkers Association and eleven steel manufacturers.[10]
Died:Albert Camus, 46, French writer, was killed in a car accident while riding in a Facel-Vega sports car driven by his publisher, Michel Gallimard. At 1:54 a.m. local time, near
Villeneuve-la-Guyard,
Yonne département, the car left the road and struck a tree. An unfinished, 144-page manuscript of Camus' latest novel was found near the wreckage. The First Man would finally be published 35 years later.[11]
The Massachusetts Supreme Court ruled that a trust fund, set up by
Benjamin Franklin's will in 1791 to assist "young married artificers", could not be divided before its 1991 maturity date, despite the fact that there were no more
artificers who would benefit. Started by Franklin with the deposit of 1,000 pounds sterling, the fund had grown to $1,578,098 by 1960.[12] By the time the monies were split between Massachusetts and Pennsylvania in 1991, the Fund was worth more than $6.5 million.[13]
British Prime Minister
Harold Macmillan began a six-week, 20,000-mile (32,000 km) tour of Britain's current and former African colonies, not returning to London until February 15.[14]
Le Monde broke the news of a confidential report, made to the French government by the International Red Cross, documenting the French Army's
torture in Algeria.[15][16]
At the
Johns Hopkins University Hospital in
Baltimore, an emergency room intern, Dr. Henry Thomas, became the first person to save a life following CPR training. The technique of "closed chest compression" had been shown to Dr. Thomas and other physicians by Dr. James Jude whom developed it, but CPR had previously only been attempted during surgery. The patient, 45-year-old Eugene Barnes, had collapsed while removing his shirt for an examination. Dr. Thomas applied
cardiopulmonary resuscitation and kept Barnes alive during a 22-minute wait for a defibrillator, and Barnes went on to a full recovery. The rest of the world would learn about CPR in the July 9, 1960, issue of the Journal of the American Medical Association.[17]
National Airlines Flight 2511 exploded in mid-flight at 18,000 feet (5,500 m) and crashed into a swamp at 2:00 a.m. near
Bolivia, North Carolina, killing all 34 on board. The 29 passengers had been put on the Douglas DC-B for their Miami to New York flight, after their flight on a Boeing 707 had been cancelled. Killed in the crash was attorney Julian Frank, whose life had been insured by Dr. Robert Spears, listed as one of the dead from the 1959 crash of
National Airlines Flight 967. Investigators concluded that Frank had unwittingly carried a bomb on board the plane inside his carry-on luggage. Dr. Spears was found and arrested in Arizona.[18][19]
The
Associations Law officially came into force in
Iraq (coinciding with Army Day), allowing the legal registration of political parties. Prior to the adoption of this law, political parties had been banned in Iraq since 1954.[20][21]
Scent of Mystery, presented by
Mike Todd Jr. in "
Smell-O-Vision", made its debut, at Chicago's Cinestage Theater, with a system that provided, then cleared, different aromas consistent with the scenes in the film.[22]
Representatives of Engineering and Contracts Division and Flight Systems Division (FSD) met to discuss future
wind tunnel test needs for advanced Mercury projects. After Alan B. Kehlet remarked on available test facilities, Caldwell C. Johnson and H. Kurt Strass presented their ideas on advanced configurations. Johnson had been working on modifications to the existing Mercury configuration rather than on advanced configuration concepts. Strass suggested that advanced work be classed as either modifications refining the design of the present Mercury or new concepts in configuration design. Johnson consented to design models for both program categories.[24]
For the first time, a
Polaris missile reached its target using its own inertial guidance system, rather than being directed from a ground station. The shot from
Cape Canaveral came a few hours after President Eisenhower's final
State of the Union speech, describing the new era of nuclear submarines armed with the Polaris missiles. "Impossible to destroy by surprise attack," said Ike, "they will become one of our most effective sentinels for peace."[25][26]
The
Soviet Union announced that it would be testing a long-range rocket over an area in the North Pacific Ocean, and warned other nations not to send ships through a designated 280-mile (450 km) by 160-mile (260 km) area between January 15 and February 15.[27]
David Cooper Nelson became the first convict to be executed in
New Mexico's
gas chamber, and the last. The legislature had replaced the electric chair with gas, and would later adopt lethal injection as its mode of capital punishment.[28]
Lee Harvey Oswald, an American defector to the
Soviet Union, was personally welcomed by the Mayor of
Minsk, given a free apartment, and then set up in a new job as a metal worker in the Byelorussian Radio and Television factory.[29]
Kenneth Kaunda, the 35-year-old leader of the
Zambian African National Congress, was released from prison on orders of the British Governor of
Northern Rhodesia, Sir Evelyn Hone, a few weeks before Prime Minister Macmillan was scheduled to come to Lusaka. When Northern Rhodesia became the
Republic of Zambia, Kaunda would become its first President.[31]
On his 47th birthday, Vice-President
Richard M. Nixon became a candidate for the Republican nomination for the President of the United States, by giving his assent to the placing of his name on the ballot for primary elections in Oregon, New Hampshire and Ohio.[32]
The United States would defend the Nationalist Chinese islands of
Quemoy and
Matsu from aggression by Communist China, U.S. Secretary of the Army
Wilber M. Brucker said at a news conference in
Taipei, marking a change in American policy. The U.S. treaty to defend the island of
Taiwan from attack did not include the two islands in the
Taiwan Strait.[34] The issue of whether the United States should go to war with China over the two islands would become an issue in the 1960 presidential campaign.
U.S. SenatorTheodore F. Green of
Rhode Island, at 92, the oldest person to ever serve in either house of Congress up to that time, announced that he would not run in 1960 for a fifth term.[35] Green served from 1935 to 1961 and would die at age 98 in 1966. U.S. Senator
Strom Thurmond would surpass Green's record in 1995, serving until his death in 2003 at 100 years old.
Henry Lee Lucas, who would confess to more than 600 murders in 1985, then recant, took his first life, stabbing his 74-year-old mother, Viola, at her home in
Tecumseh, Michigan. Sentenced to 40 years in prison, but released in 1970, Lucas then resumed killing, and was ultimately convicted of 11 homicides.[36][37]
After seven years, a
state of emergency in the British East African colony of
Kenya, was lifted by the Governor,
Sir Patrick Renison. Proclaimed in 1952 after terrorism by the black nationalist group, the
Mau Mau, the emergency regulations set curfews, restricted travel, and required the licensing of printing presses.[38]
The first discussions were held in the White House to discuss covert action to overthrow Cuba's new revolutionary socialist government led by prime minister
Fidel Castro. A special group, created by the National Security Council's order #5412, approved "Operation Zapata".[39]
The Soviet Ministry of Internal Affairs (
MVD) was abolished, and replaced by separate agencies in the 15 republics.[40]
Born:
Sir
Matthew Bourne, English choreographer known for his innovations and adaptations of classic ballets (including his 1995 restaging of Tchaikovsky's Swan Lake) and films; in
Walthamstow[41]
Goddess Bunny (stage name for Sandra "Sandie" Crisp), Transgender entertainer, drag queen, actress, and model; in
Santa Monica, California (died from COVID-19, 2021)[42]
The
Reserve Bank of Australia, authorized by 1959 legislation, began operation, as did the ten-member Reserve Bank Board, which makes decisions on the monetary policy of Australia.[43]
The day after Soviet leader
Nikita Khrushchev asked the
Supreme Soviet of the USSR to formally approve his proposal to reduce the Soviet armed forces by nearly one-third, the 1,300 members in both houses gave their unanimous assent. The reduction, from 3,623,000 men to 2,423,000 men, had been announced by Khrushchev the day before in a speech to the joint session, with a plan to shift defense expenditures to nuclear weapons and missiles. "Should any madman launch an attack on our state or on other socialist states," Khrushchev said, "we would literally be able to wipe the country or countries that attack us off the face of the Earth."[45][46]
Eight
Chicago policemen were arrested in early morning raids on their homes, and charged with burglary, and several carloads of stolen merchandise were seized from the homes. By the end of the month, 15 city cops had been indicted for what Mayor Daley called "the most disgraceful and shocking scandal in the police department's history." The arrests followed a revelation, by a 23-year-old burglar, that several members of the Chicago PD had assisted him in burglarizing businesses in areas they had been assigned to patrol.[47]
The
U.S. Navy issued an operation plan for the Project Mercury recovery force, providing for procedures according to specified areas and for space recovery methods. Procedures for
Mercury-Redstone and
Mercury-Atlas missions were covered.[23]
Nobusuke Kishi, the
Prime Minister of Japan, departed from Tokyo's Haneda Airport at 8:09 a.m., in order to sign an unpopular treaty with the United States on American soil, but not before avoiding a rioting crowd of at least 500
Zengakuren, leftist students who had occupied the airport in protest. Several thousand police were required to disperse the gathering.[48]
It was announced that U.S. President
Dwight D. Eisenhower would make a ten-day tour of the
Soviet Union from June 10 to June 19, 1960, as the guest of Soviet First Secretary
Nikita S. Khrushchev.[49] The visit would never take place, and was called off after the
U-2 incident in May.
Walter C. Williams, Associate Director of Project Mercury Operations, proposed the establishment of a Mercury-Redstone Coordination Committee to monitor and coordinate activities related to Mercury-Redstone flight tests.[23] Williams also proposed that the Mercury-Atlas flight test working group become an official and standing coordination body. This group brought together representation from the Space Task Group,
Air Force Ballistic Missile Division,
Convair Astronautics,
McDonnell Aircraft Corporation, and the
Atlantic Missile Range. Personnel from these organizations had met informally in the past on several occasions.[23]
Major General
Jacques Massu, the commander of the French Army in Algeria, criticized his boss in an interview with Hans Ulrich Kempski of the German newspaper Süddeutsche Zeitung. President Charles De Gaulle, who came into power with the Army's support in 1958, was outraged by Massu's statement that "Perhaps the Army made a mistake."[50]
Capital Airlines Flight 20 crashed near
Holdcroft, Virginia, while en route from Washington to Norfolk, apparently killing all forty-six passengers and four crew members on impact. The first persons on the scene heard no cries, and the
Vickers Viscount was soon consumed by a fire that burned for five hours.[51][52]
In keeping with a concept of using certain off-the-shelf hardware items that were available for the manufacture of Project Mercury components, companies around
London,
England, were visited throughout 1959. Potential English vendors of such items as the SARAH beacon batteries (later chosen), miniature indicators, time delay mechanisms,
hydrogen-peroxide systems, and
transducers were evaluated. A report of the findings was submitted on this date.[23]
The Soviet Union successfully test-fired the first
ICBM, the
R-7 Semyorka, demonstrating a range of at least 7,760 miles (12,490 km) when it reached a target area in the Pacific Ocean. The explosion on impact, at 8:05 p.m. Moscow time (1705 GMT, 12:05 p.m. EST), was observed by the crew of a
Qantas aircraft.[55]
"
Miss Sam", a
rhesus monkey, was launched on board the rocket
Little Joe 1B from
Wallops Island, reaching an altitude of 48,900 feet (14,900 m) and a maximum speed of 2,021.6 miles per hour (3,253.4 km/h) before returning safely to Earth, clearing the way for human
astronauts.[23][56][57]
In the third worst mine disaster in history,
437 coal miners were killed at the Coalbrook North Colliery at Coalbrook,
South Africa, when a 3-square-kilometre (1.2 sq mi) section collapsed, filling the mine shaft with methane.[58][59][60]
At a meeting to draft fiscal year 1962 funding estimates for Project Mercury, the total purchase of
Atlas launch vehicles was listed as 15, and the total purchase of
Mercury spacecraft was listed as 26.[23]
Avianca Flight 671 from New York to Montego Bay, Jamaica, crashed and burned when its landing gear collapsed on touchdown, killing 37 of the 46 persons on board.[61]
Died:Wu Lien-teh, 80, Chinese physician who halted the pneumonic plague epidemic of 1910 in China
France's President de Gaulle fired Major General Massu from his post as commander of the troops in
French Algeria, following Massu's critical interview. European Algerians were outraged by the firing, precipitating the "
week of the barricades".[62]
At the Boston Garden,
Sugar Ray Robinson lost his world middleweight boxing title in an upset to
Paul Pender, a 29-year-old firefighter from Brookline, Massachusetts. Pender outpointed Robinson in fifteen rounds.[63]
As many as 5,000 European residents of French Algeria, including members of the French home guard, sealed off parts of
Algiers and then withdrew behind the barricades. In the
crisis that followed, leaders of the French Army told Prime Minister
Michel Debre that they would disregard orders to attack the insurgents. When the local police clashed with the demonstrators, 24 people were killed and 136 injured.[66]
McDonnell delivered the first production-type Mercury spacecraft to the Space Task Group at
Langley Research Center in less than 1 year from the signing of the formal contract. This spacecraft was a structural shell and did not contain most of the internal systems that would be required for
human spaceflight. After receipt, the Space Task Group instrumented the spacecraft and designated it for the
Mercury-Atlas 1 (MA-1) flight.[23]
Wilt Chamberlain set an NBA record that still stands, for "Most points, rookie, game", with 58 points for the Philadelphia Warriors against the Detroit Pistons, in
Bethlehem, Pennsylvania. The record was tied, by Chamberlain, on February 21 of his rookie year.[69]
Belgium agreed to grant its African colony, in the
Belgian Congo, independence, setting a date of June 30, 1960, and elections to be held in May.[70]
After 22 ballots to select the new
National Football League Commissioner,
Marshall Leahy had seven votes,
Austin Gunsel had four, but neither candidate had the required 10 of 12 majority needed for the 12-team league. The compromise was the little-known general manager of the
Los Angeles Rams, 33-year-old
Pete Rozelle. Rozelle would go on to lead the NFL to become the most popular professional sports league in the United States.[71]
In
Burnsville, West Virginia, Burnsville High School student Danny Heater set an interscholastic record for basketball, scoring 135 points in a 173–43 win over
Widen, West Virginia's high school team.[72]
A river of lava from the
Kilauea Volcano spilled over the last earthen dike that had protected the village of
Kapoho, Hawai'i, and began the destruction of the town, whose 300 residents had been evacuated. By Saturday, Kapoho was gone.[75]
Following Japan's signing of the new security treaty with the United States, the
Soviet Union announced that it was cancelling plans to return the islands of
Habomai and
Shikotan, captured during World War II, to Japan.[76]
Construction began on the
Baitul Mukarram mosque in
Dhaka,
East Pakistan. The structure, designed by Abdul Hussain Thariani, is now the National Mosque of Bangladesh.
Thirty-one people were trampled to death in
Seoul,
South Korea, when a crowd surged forward to catch a train.[32]
The 12-team NFL expanded for the first time since 1949, awarding the franchise for the
Dallas Cowboys for 1960, and for the
Minnesota Vikings for 1961.[77]
China and Burma (now
Myanmar) signed an agreement specifying the boundary between the two nations.[78]
Died:Zora Neale Hurston, 69, African-American author who would attain posthumous fame in the 1970s
Facing a challenge from rebelling European settlers in French Algeria, France's President Charles de Gaulle went on television in his Army uniform, in order, he said, "to stress that I am speaking as General de Gaulle as well as chief of state". Having announced before that the future of French territory in Algeria would be left to the Algerian Arab majority, de Gaulle emphasized that he would not yield to Europeans "who dream of being usurpers". Following the speech, the French Army ended speculation about whether they would side with the Algerian Europeans against the Paris government, and ordered all home guardsmen, inside the barricades, to report to their headquarters. When the order was disobeyed, the Army moved in to end the rebellion.[79]
Joseph McNeill, a 17-year-old college freshman, was turned away by a waitress with the words, "We don't serve Negroes," when he tried to get something to eat at the bus terminal in Greensboro, North Carolina. When he talked about it with three friends at North Carolina Agricultural and Technical College, the four African-American students decided that they would take a stand against segregation. The next day, the four would sit down at the Woolworth's Department Store lunch counter and refuse to get up until they were served, and the "sit-in" was created as a form of civil disobedience.[81]
At
Tawfiq, a
skirmish between soldiers from
Israel and
Syria (at that time, part of the
United Arab Republic with
Egypt) left 12 Syrians and 7 Israelis dead. UAR President Gamal Abdel Nasser sent Egyptian troops back into the Sinai in response.[82]
Six
chimpanzees were rated as being trained and ready to support Mercury-Redstone or Mercury-Atlas missions. Other chimpanzees were being shipped from Africa to enter the
animal training program.[23]
References
^"Terrorists Kill 30 at Birth Of New Nation". Oakland Tribune. January 1, 1960. p. 1.
^The World Almanac and Book of Facts, 1961, p155; "Hat Thrown Into Ring By Kennedy", Oakland Tribune, January 2, 1960, p1
^2006 Year Book Australia (Australian Bureau of Statistics, 2005), p53
^"Dramatic Specials Top TV Fare For The Week", The Times Recorder (Zanesville, OH), January 3, 1960, pB-7
^"France Starts Year With A New Franc", Winnipeg Free Press, January 2, 1960, p14
^J.A.S. Grenville and Bernard Wasserstein, The Major International Treaties of the Twentieth Century: A History and Guide with Texts (Taylor and Francis, 2001) p524
^"Steel Dispute Settled; 39-Cent Hike Reported – Nixon Given Praise for Major Coup", Oakland Tribune, January 4, 1960, p1
^Campbell, James (2003). Exiled in Paris: Richard Wright, James Baldwin, Samuel Beckett, and others on the Left Bank.
University of California Press. p. 239.
^"Ben Franklin Trust Fund Must Be Held". Amarillo Globe-Times. January 7, 1960. p. 21.
^Merom, Gil (2003). How Democracies Lose Small Wars: State, Society, and the Failures of France in Algeria, Israel in Lebanon, and the United States in Vietnam.
Cambridge University Press. p. 148.
^Eisenberg, Mickey S. (1997). Life in the Balance: Emergency Medicine and the Quest to Reverse Sudden Death.
Oxford University Press. pp. 125–126.
^
ab"34 Dead in Airliner Explosion, Crash; Adm. McDonnell, Congressional Medal of Honor Holder, Is Victim; Debris Found in Carolina Swamp". Oakland Tribune. January 6, 1960. p. 1.
^ This article incorporates text from this source, which is in the
public domain. Grimwood, James M.; Hacker, Barton C.; Vorzimmer, Peter J.
"PART I (A) Concept and Design April 1959 through December 1961". Project Gemini Technology and Operations - A Chronology. NASA Special Publication-4002.
NASA. Retrieved 17 February 2023.
^"Polaris Flies On Its Own Over 900-Mile Course". Oakland Tribune. January 8, 1960. p. 5.
^"Soviet 'Invades' Target Area For U.S. Missiles in Pacific". Oakland Tribune. January 8, 1960. p. 5.
^Robert J. Tórrez, Myth of the Hanging Tree: Stories of Crime and Punishment in Territorial New Mexico (University of New Mexico Press, 2008), p52; "State Gas Chamber Works-- Nelson's Life Snuffed Out", Clovis (NM) News-Journal, January 8, 1960, p1
^Dick Russell, The Man Who Knew Too Much (Carroll & Graf Publishers, 2003), p117
^"Rams File Suit to Keep Cannon From AFL", San Antonio Express, January 12, 1960, p12-A
^"Japan Reds, Cops Battle At Airport", Oakland Tribune, January 16, 1960; James A. A. Stockwin, Governing Japan: Divided Politics in a Major Economy (Blackwell, 1999), pp51–52
^"Ike's Russian Visit Set for June 10–19", The Bridgeport Telegram, January 18, 1960, p1
^Berstein, Serge (1993). The Republic of De Gaulle, 1958-1969. Cambridge University Press. p. 41.
^Crowder, Michael (1984). The Cambridge History of Africa. Vol. 8. Cambridge University Press. p. 712.
^"At 33 and 50 G's, Rozelle New NFL Czar in Shocker", Press-Telegram (Long Beach, CA), pD-1
^"Burnsville Boy Gets 135 Points In 173–43 Win", Charleston (WV) Gazette, January 27, 1960, p18; Floyd Conner, Basketball's Most Wanted: The Top 10 Book of Hoops' Outrageous Dunkers, Incredible Buzzer-beaters, and Other Oddities (Brassey's, 2001), p52
^"Oakland Wins Pro Football Franchise", Oakland Tribune, January 31, 1960, p1; Ed Gruver, The American Football League: A Year-by-year History, 1960–1969 (McFarland, 1997), pp101–102
The
Republic of Cameroun became independent at midnight local time (2300 12/31/59 GMT) with the lowering of the French tricolor, and the raising of a new tricolor (red, yellow and green) flag at
Yaoundé. The former
French Cameroons colony had been under a U.N. Trusteeship during a transition period, and Prime Minister
Ahmadou Ahidjo headed the government pending the adoption of a constitution. United Nations Secretary-General
Dag Hammarskjöld, along with
Henry Cabot Lodge, the American Ambassador to the U.N., were present, along with the Soviet First Deputy Premier,
Frol Kozlov, who announced that the Soviets would recognize the new government. Marxist
Félix-Roland Moumié, who had previously been supported by the Soviet Union, continued to wage a campaign of terrorism against the Ahidjo government, and thirty people were killed on the Republic's first day.[1][2]
The peaceful
New Year's Day March, a civil rights march at the airport of
Greenville, South Carolina, took place with 250 African-American people protesting racial segregation. On October 25, a delegation of
NAACP members had been waiting for the arrival of baseball great
Jackie Robinson when they were told to move to a colored waiting room at the airport. Led by the chairman of the local
Congress of Racial Equality (CORE), the Reverend J.S. Hall, the march concluded with the reading of a resolution by Rev. Matthew D. McCullough while a crowd of 200 White people listened.[3]
The symbolic "
Doomsday Clock" on the cover of the
Bulletin of the Atomic Scientists was moved back five minutes, from "two minutes to midnight" (where it had been since 1953) to "seven minutes to midnight".[4]
Three cities in Norway were created through mergers—
Smøla (from Edøy, Brattvær, and Hopen);
Evje og Hornnes (from Evje and Hornnes); and
Sirdal (from Tonstad and Øvre Sirdal).
Midnight, January 1, 1960, is the point from which dates are measured under
SAS System,
Stata and
R computer programming software.
Died:Margaret Sullavan, 50, American film actress; of an accidental overdose of barbiturates
At the Senate Caucus room in Washington, U.S. Senator
John F. Kennedy of
Massachusetts formally announced that he would seek the Democratic nomination for President of the United States. Addressing a question about whether being a Roman Catholic would affect his chances of winning, Senator Kennedy told them "I would think that there is really only one issue involved in the whole question of a candidate's religion, that is, does a candidate believe in the separation of church and state?"[5]
The CBS Sports Spectacular made its debut at 3:00 EST, with
Bud Palmer, with the aim of showing "sports you seldom see". The first show featured a complete game between basketball's
Harlem Globetrotters and their foils at that time, the Baltimore Rockets.[7]
The
Bank of France issued the first bills for the nouveau franc worth one hundred ancients francs, and brought back the
centime coin, replacing the old franc. The new franc, at roughly five to U.S. dollar, had become legal tender on January 1. To prepare the French for the changeover, the old-style bills had been overstamped with new value and the initials "N.F."[8]
The
steel strike of 1959 was settled, three weeks before an injunction under the Taft-Hartley Act was set to expire, as Labor Secretary James P. Mitchell and Vice-President Richard M. Nixon mediated the dispute between the United Steelworkers Association and eleven steel manufacturers.[10]
Died:Albert Camus, 46, French writer, was killed in a car accident while riding in a Facel-Vega sports car driven by his publisher, Michel Gallimard. At 1:54 a.m. local time, near
Villeneuve-la-Guyard,
Yonne département, the car left the road and struck a tree. An unfinished, 144-page manuscript of Camus' latest novel was found near the wreckage. The First Man would finally be published 35 years later.[11]
The Massachusetts Supreme Court ruled that a trust fund, set up by
Benjamin Franklin's will in 1791 to assist "young married artificers", could not be divided before its 1991 maturity date, despite the fact that there were no more
artificers who would benefit. Started by Franklin with the deposit of 1,000 pounds sterling, the fund had grown to $1,578,098 by 1960.[12] By the time the monies were split between Massachusetts and Pennsylvania in 1991, the Fund was worth more than $6.5 million.[13]
British Prime Minister
Harold Macmillan began a six-week, 20,000-mile (32,000 km) tour of Britain's current and former African colonies, not returning to London until February 15.[14]
Le Monde broke the news of a confidential report, made to the French government by the International Red Cross, documenting the French Army's
torture in Algeria.[15][16]
At the
Johns Hopkins University Hospital in
Baltimore, an emergency room intern, Dr. Henry Thomas, became the first person to save a life following CPR training. The technique of "closed chest compression" had been shown to Dr. Thomas and other physicians by Dr. James Jude whom developed it, but CPR had previously only been attempted during surgery. The patient, 45-year-old Eugene Barnes, had collapsed while removing his shirt for an examination. Dr. Thomas applied
cardiopulmonary resuscitation and kept Barnes alive during a 22-minute wait for a defibrillator, and Barnes went on to a full recovery. The rest of the world would learn about CPR in the July 9, 1960, issue of the Journal of the American Medical Association.[17]
National Airlines Flight 2511 exploded in mid-flight at 18,000 feet (5,500 m) and crashed into a swamp at 2:00 a.m. near
Bolivia, North Carolina, killing all 34 on board. The 29 passengers had been put on the Douglas DC-B for their Miami to New York flight, after their flight on a Boeing 707 had been cancelled. Killed in the crash was attorney Julian Frank, whose life had been insured by Dr. Robert Spears, listed as one of the dead from the 1959 crash of
National Airlines Flight 967. Investigators concluded that Frank had unwittingly carried a bomb on board the plane inside his carry-on luggage. Dr. Spears was found and arrested in Arizona.[18][19]
The
Associations Law officially came into force in
Iraq (coinciding with Army Day), allowing the legal registration of political parties. Prior to the adoption of this law, political parties had been banned in Iraq since 1954.[20][21]
Scent of Mystery, presented by
Mike Todd Jr. in "
Smell-O-Vision", made its debut, at Chicago's Cinestage Theater, with a system that provided, then cleared, different aromas consistent with the scenes in the film.[22]
Representatives of Engineering and Contracts Division and Flight Systems Division (FSD) met to discuss future
wind tunnel test needs for advanced Mercury projects. After Alan B. Kehlet remarked on available test facilities, Caldwell C. Johnson and H. Kurt Strass presented their ideas on advanced configurations. Johnson had been working on modifications to the existing Mercury configuration rather than on advanced configuration concepts. Strass suggested that advanced work be classed as either modifications refining the design of the present Mercury or new concepts in configuration design. Johnson consented to design models for both program categories.[24]
For the first time, a
Polaris missile reached its target using its own inertial guidance system, rather than being directed from a ground station. The shot from
Cape Canaveral came a few hours after President Eisenhower's final
State of the Union speech, describing the new era of nuclear submarines armed with the Polaris missiles. "Impossible to destroy by surprise attack," said Ike, "they will become one of our most effective sentinels for peace."[25][26]
The
Soviet Union announced that it would be testing a long-range rocket over an area in the North Pacific Ocean, and warned other nations not to send ships through a designated 280-mile (450 km) by 160-mile (260 km) area between January 15 and February 15.[27]
David Cooper Nelson became the first convict to be executed in
New Mexico's
gas chamber, and the last. The legislature had replaced the electric chair with gas, and would later adopt lethal injection as its mode of capital punishment.[28]
Lee Harvey Oswald, an American defector to the
Soviet Union, was personally welcomed by the Mayor of
Minsk, given a free apartment, and then set up in a new job as a metal worker in the Byelorussian Radio and Television factory.[29]
Kenneth Kaunda, the 35-year-old leader of the
Zambian African National Congress, was released from prison on orders of the British Governor of
Northern Rhodesia, Sir Evelyn Hone, a few weeks before Prime Minister Macmillan was scheduled to come to Lusaka. When Northern Rhodesia became the
Republic of Zambia, Kaunda would become its first President.[31]
On his 47th birthday, Vice-President
Richard M. Nixon became a candidate for the Republican nomination for the President of the United States, by giving his assent to the placing of his name on the ballot for primary elections in Oregon, New Hampshire and Ohio.[32]
The United States would defend the Nationalist Chinese islands of
Quemoy and
Matsu from aggression by Communist China, U.S. Secretary of the Army
Wilber M. Brucker said at a news conference in
Taipei, marking a change in American policy. The U.S. treaty to defend the island of
Taiwan from attack did not include the two islands in the
Taiwan Strait.[34] The issue of whether the United States should go to war with China over the two islands would become an issue in the 1960 presidential campaign.
U.S. SenatorTheodore F. Green of
Rhode Island, at 92, the oldest person to ever serve in either house of Congress up to that time, announced that he would not run in 1960 for a fifth term.[35] Green served from 1935 to 1961 and would die at age 98 in 1966. U.S. Senator
Strom Thurmond would surpass Green's record in 1995, serving until his death in 2003 at 100 years old.
Henry Lee Lucas, who would confess to more than 600 murders in 1985, then recant, took his first life, stabbing his 74-year-old mother, Viola, at her home in
Tecumseh, Michigan. Sentenced to 40 years in prison, but released in 1970, Lucas then resumed killing, and was ultimately convicted of 11 homicides.[36][37]
After seven years, a
state of emergency in the British East African colony of
Kenya, was lifted by the Governor,
Sir Patrick Renison. Proclaimed in 1952 after terrorism by the black nationalist group, the
Mau Mau, the emergency regulations set curfews, restricted travel, and required the licensing of printing presses.[38]
The first discussions were held in the White House to discuss covert action to overthrow Cuba's new revolutionary socialist government led by prime minister
Fidel Castro. A special group, created by the National Security Council's order #5412, approved "Operation Zapata".[39]
The Soviet Ministry of Internal Affairs (
MVD) was abolished, and replaced by separate agencies in the 15 republics.[40]
Born:
Sir
Matthew Bourne, English choreographer known for his innovations and adaptations of classic ballets (including his 1995 restaging of Tchaikovsky's Swan Lake) and films; in
Walthamstow[41]
Goddess Bunny (stage name for Sandra "Sandie" Crisp), Transgender entertainer, drag queen, actress, and model; in
Santa Monica, California (died from COVID-19, 2021)[42]
The
Reserve Bank of Australia, authorized by 1959 legislation, began operation, as did the ten-member Reserve Bank Board, which makes decisions on the monetary policy of Australia.[43]
The day after Soviet leader
Nikita Khrushchev asked the
Supreme Soviet of the USSR to formally approve his proposal to reduce the Soviet armed forces by nearly one-third, the 1,300 members in both houses gave their unanimous assent. The reduction, from 3,623,000 men to 2,423,000 men, had been announced by Khrushchev the day before in a speech to the joint session, with a plan to shift defense expenditures to nuclear weapons and missiles. "Should any madman launch an attack on our state or on other socialist states," Khrushchev said, "we would literally be able to wipe the country or countries that attack us off the face of the Earth."[45][46]
Eight
Chicago policemen were arrested in early morning raids on their homes, and charged with burglary, and several carloads of stolen merchandise were seized from the homes. By the end of the month, 15 city cops had been indicted for what Mayor Daley called "the most disgraceful and shocking scandal in the police department's history." The arrests followed a revelation, by a 23-year-old burglar, that several members of the Chicago PD had assisted him in burglarizing businesses in areas they had been assigned to patrol.[47]
The
U.S. Navy issued an operation plan for the Project Mercury recovery force, providing for procedures according to specified areas and for space recovery methods. Procedures for
Mercury-Redstone and
Mercury-Atlas missions were covered.[23]
Nobusuke Kishi, the
Prime Minister of Japan, departed from Tokyo's Haneda Airport at 8:09 a.m., in order to sign an unpopular treaty with the United States on American soil, but not before avoiding a rioting crowd of at least 500
Zengakuren, leftist students who had occupied the airport in protest. Several thousand police were required to disperse the gathering.[48]
It was announced that U.S. President
Dwight D. Eisenhower would make a ten-day tour of the
Soviet Union from June 10 to June 19, 1960, as the guest of Soviet First Secretary
Nikita S. Khrushchev.[49] The visit would never take place, and was called off after the
U-2 incident in May.
Walter C. Williams, Associate Director of Project Mercury Operations, proposed the establishment of a Mercury-Redstone Coordination Committee to monitor and coordinate activities related to Mercury-Redstone flight tests.[23] Williams also proposed that the Mercury-Atlas flight test working group become an official and standing coordination body. This group brought together representation from the Space Task Group,
Air Force Ballistic Missile Division,
Convair Astronautics,
McDonnell Aircraft Corporation, and the
Atlantic Missile Range. Personnel from these organizations had met informally in the past on several occasions.[23]
Major General
Jacques Massu, the commander of the French Army in Algeria, criticized his boss in an interview with Hans Ulrich Kempski of the German newspaper Süddeutsche Zeitung. President Charles De Gaulle, who came into power with the Army's support in 1958, was outraged by Massu's statement that "Perhaps the Army made a mistake."[50]
Capital Airlines Flight 20 crashed near
Holdcroft, Virginia, while en route from Washington to Norfolk, apparently killing all forty-six passengers and four crew members on impact. The first persons on the scene heard no cries, and the
Vickers Viscount was soon consumed by a fire that burned for five hours.[51][52]
In keeping with a concept of using certain off-the-shelf hardware items that were available for the manufacture of Project Mercury components, companies around
London,
England, were visited throughout 1959. Potential English vendors of such items as the SARAH beacon batteries (later chosen), miniature indicators, time delay mechanisms,
hydrogen-peroxide systems, and
transducers were evaluated. A report of the findings was submitted on this date.[23]
The Soviet Union successfully test-fired the first
ICBM, the
R-7 Semyorka, demonstrating a range of at least 7,760 miles (12,490 km) when it reached a target area in the Pacific Ocean. The explosion on impact, at 8:05 p.m. Moscow time (1705 GMT, 12:05 p.m. EST), was observed by the crew of a
Qantas aircraft.[55]
"
Miss Sam", a
rhesus monkey, was launched on board the rocket
Little Joe 1B from
Wallops Island, reaching an altitude of 48,900 feet (14,900 m) and a maximum speed of 2,021.6 miles per hour (3,253.4 km/h) before returning safely to Earth, clearing the way for human
astronauts.[23][56][57]
In the third worst mine disaster in history,
437 coal miners were killed at the Coalbrook North Colliery at Coalbrook,
South Africa, when a 3-square-kilometre (1.2 sq mi) section collapsed, filling the mine shaft with methane.[58][59][60]
At a meeting to draft fiscal year 1962 funding estimates for Project Mercury, the total purchase of
Atlas launch vehicles was listed as 15, and the total purchase of
Mercury spacecraft was listed as 26.[23]
Avianca Flight 671 from New York to Montego Bay, Jamaica, crashed and burned when its landing gear collapsed on touchdown, killing 37 of the 46 persons on board.[61]
Died:Wu Lien-teh, 80, Chinese physician who halted the pneumonic plague epidemic of 1910 in China
France's President de Gaulle fired Major General Massu from his post as commander of the troops in
French Algeria, following Massu's critical interview. European Algerians were outraged by the firing, precipitating the "
week of the barricades".[62]
At the Boston Garden,
Sugar Ray Robinson lost his world middleweight boxing title in an upset to
Paul Pender, a 29-year-old firefighter from Brookline, Massachusetts. Pender outpointed Robinson in fifteen rounds.[63]
As many as 5,000 European residents of French Algeria, including members of the French home guard, sealed off parts of
Algiers and then withdrew behind the barricades. In the
crisis that followed, leaders of the French Army told Prime Minister
Michel Debre that they would disregard orders to attack the insurgents. When the local police clashed with the demonstrators, 24 people were killed and 136 injured.[66]
McDonnell delivered the first production-type Mercury spacecraft to the Space Task Group at
Langley Research Center in less than 1 year from the signing of the formal contract. This spacecraft was a structural shell and did not contain most of the internal systems that would be required for
human spaceflight. After receipt, the Space Task Group instrumented the spacecraft and designated it for the
Mercury-Atlas 1 (MA-1) flight.[23]
Wilt Chamberlain set an NBA record that still stands, for "Most points, rookie, game", with 58 points for the Philadelphia Warriors against the Detroit Pistons, in
Bethlehem, Pennsylvania. The record was tied, by Chamberlain, on February 21 of his rookie year.[69]
Belgium agreed to grant its African colony, in the
Belgian Congo, independence, setting a date of June 30, 1960, and elections to be held in May.[70]
After 22 ballots to select the new
National Football League Commissioner,
Marshall Leahy had seven votes,
Austin Gunsel had four, but neither candidate had the required 10 of 12 majority needed for the 12-team league. The compromise was the little-known general manager of the
Los Angeles Rams, 33-year-old
Pete Rozelle. Rozelle would go on to lead the NFL to become the most popular professional sports league in the United States.[71]
In
Burnsville, West Virginia, Burnsville High School student Danny Heater set an interscholastic record for basketball, scoring 135 points in a 173–43 win over
Widen, West Virginia's high school team.[72]
A river of lava from the
Kilauea Volcano spilled over the last earthen dike that had protected the village of
Kapoho, Hawai'i, and began the destruction of the town, whose 300 residents had been evacuated. By Saturday, Kapoho was gone.[75]
Following Japan's signing of the new security treaty with the United States, the
Soviet Union announced that it was cancelling plans to return the islands of
Habomai and
Shikotan, captured during World War II, to Japan.[76]
Construction began on the
Baitul Mukarram mosque in
Dhaka,
East Pakistan. The structure, designed by Abdul Hussain Thariani, is now the National Mosque of Bangladesh.
Thirty-one people were trampled to death in
Seoul,
South Korea, when a crowd surged forward to catch a train.[32]
The 12-team NFL expanded for the first time since 1949, awarding the franchise for the
Dallas Cowboys for 1960, and for the
Minnesota Vikings for 1961.[77]
China and Burma (now
Myanmar) signed an agreement specifying the boundary between the two nations.[78]
Died:Zora Neale Hurston, 69, African-American author who would attain posthumous fame in the 1970s
Facing a challenge from rebelling European settlers in French Algeria, France's President Charles de Gaulle went on television in his Army uniform, in order, he said, "to stress that I am speaking as General de Gaulle as well as chief of state". Having announced before that the future of French territory in Algeria would be left to the Algerian Arab majority, de Gaulle emphasized that he would not yield to Europeans "who dream of being usurpers". Following the speech, the French Army ended speculation about whether they would side with the Algerian Europeans against the Paris government, and ordered all home guardsmen, inside the barricades, to report to their headquarters. When the order was disobeyed, the Army moved in to end the rebellion.[79]
Joseph McNeill, a 17-year-old college freshman, was turned away by a waitress with the words, "We don't serve Negroes," when he tried to get something to eat at the bus terminal in Greensboro, North Carolina. When he talked about it with three friends at North Carolina Agricultural and Technical College, the four African-American students decided that they would take a stand against segregation. The next day, the four would sit down at the Woolworth's Department Store lunch counter and refuse to get up until they were served, and the "sit-in" was created as a form of civil disobedience.[81]
At
Tawfiq, a
skirmish between soldiers from
Israel and
Syria (at that time, part of the
United Arab Republic with
Egypt) left 12 Syrians and 7 Israelis dead. UAR President Gamal Abdel Nasser sent Egyptian troops back into the Sinai in response.[82]
Six
chimpanzees were rated as being trained and ready to support Mercury-Redstone or Mercury-Atlas missions. Other chimpanzees were being shipped from Africa to enter the
animal training program.[23]
References
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^The World Almanac and Book of Facts, 1961, p155; "Hat Thrown Into Ring By Kennedy", Oakland Tribune, January 2, 1960, p1
^2006 Year Book Australia (Australian Bureau of Statistics, 2005), p53
^"Dramatic Specials Top TV Fare For The Week", The Times Recorder (Zanesville, OH), January 3, 1960, pB-7
^"France Starts Year With A New Franc", Winnipeg Free Press, January 2, 1960, p14
^J.A.S. Grenville and Bernard Wasserstein, The Major International Treaties of the Twentieth Century: A History and Guide with Texts (Taylor and Francis, 2001) p524
^"Steel Dispute Settled; 39-Cent Hike Reported – Nixon Given Praise for Major Coup", Oakland Tribune, January 4, 1960, p1
^Campbell, James (2003). Exiled in Paris: Richard Wright, James Baldwin, Samuel Beckett, and others on the Left Bank.
University of California Press. p. 239.
^"Ben Franklin Trust Fund Must Be Held". Amarillo Globe-Times. January 7, 1960. p. 21.
^Merom, Gil (2003). How Democracies Lose Small Wars: State, Society, and the Failures of France in Algeria, Israel in Lebanon, and the United States in Vietnam.
Cambridge University Press. p. 148.
^Eisenberg, Mickey S. (1997). Life in the Balance: Emergency Medicine and the Quest to Reverse Sudden Death.
Oxford University Press. pp. 125–126.
^
ab"34 Dead in Airliner Explosion, Crash; Adm. McDonnell, Congressional Medal of Honor Holder, Is Victim; Debris Found in Carolina Swamp". Oakland Tribune. January 6, 1960. p. 1.
^ This article incorporates text from this source, which is in the
public domain. Grimwood, James M.; Hacker, Barton C.; Vorzimmer, Peter J.
"PART I (A) Concept and Design April 1959 through December 1961". Project Gemini Technology and Operations - A Chronology. NASA Special Publication-4002.
NASA. Retrieved 17 February 2023.
^"Polaris Flies On Its Own Over 900-Mile Course". Oakland Tribune. January 8, 1960. p. 5.
^"Soviet 'Invades' Target Area For U.S. Missiles in Pacific". Oakland Tribune. January 8, 1960. p. 5.
^Robert J. Tórrez, Myth of the Hanging Tree: Stories of Crime and Punishment in Territorial New Mexico (University of New Mexico Press, 2008), p52; "State Gas Chamber Works-- Nelson's Life Snuffed Out", Clovis (NM) News-Journal, January 8, 1960, p1
^Dick Russell, The Man Who Knew Too Much (Carroll & Graf Publishers, 2003), p117
^"Rams File Suit to Keep Cannon From AFL", San Antonio Express, January 12, 1960, p12-A
^"Japan Reds, Cops Battle At Airport", Oakland Tribune, January 16, 1960; James A. A. Stockwin, Governing Japan: Divided Politics in a Major Economy (Blackwell, 1999), pp51–52
^"Ike's Russian Visit Set for June 10–19", The Bridgeport Telegram, January 18, 1960, p1
^Berstein, Serge (1993). The Republic of De Gaulle, 1958-1969. Cambridge University Press. p. 41.
^Crowder, Michael (1984). The Cambridge History of Africa. Vol. 8. Cambridge University Press. p. 712.
^"At 33 and 50 G's, Rozelle New NFL Czar in Shocker", Press-Telegram (Long Beach, CA), pD-1
^"Burnsville Boy Gets 135 Points In 173–43 Win", Charleston (WV) Gazette, January 27, 1960, p18; Floyd Conner, Basketball's Most Wanted: The Top 10 Book of Hoops' Outrageous Dunkers, Incredible Buzzer-beaters, and Other Oddities (Brassey's, 2001), p52
^"Oakland Wins Pro Football Franchise", Oakland Tribune, January 31, 1960, p1; Ed Gruver, The American Football League: A Year-by-year History, 1960–1969 (McFarland, 1997), pp101–102