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The world seemed to have shrunk in the 1960's. Daily television newscasts
informed people about the day's events and confronted them with current
issues, spurring many to become activists taking a stand against what
they felt were long-standing injustices and inequities. Optimism and
great hope at the beginning of the decade led people to new ideas
about freedom and democracy, but fear and disillusionment toward the
end of the decade resulted from widespread civil unrest, distrust
of the government over the Vietnam War and the assassinations of many
prominent social and political figures. |
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February 1
Black college students sit in at white-only lunch counter in
Greensboro, NC, introducing a new form of civil rights protest. |
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September 26
John F. Kennedy and Richard Nixon first televised presidential
candidates debate. |
Nov 8
Kennedy narrowly defeats Nixon in the presidential election. |
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April 17
Bay of Pigs invasion. |
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May 4
Freedom Riders begin bus travel to end segregation in interstate
transportation. |
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May 25
President Kennedy announced the dramatic and ambitious
goal of sending an American safely to the moon and back before
the end of the decade. |
August 13
East Germany closes its borders with West Berlin and begins
to build the Berlin Wall. |
Yo yo is a national craze. |
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Ray Kroc buys out the McDonald brothers and opens 200 restaurants
in southern California. |
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October 14
Cuban Missle Crisis. |
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June 26
President Kennedy delivers a speech at the Berlin Wall. |
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August 28
Civil Rights supporters march on Washington DC; Martin Luther
King delivers his "I Have a Dream" speech.
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November 22
President Kennedy is assassinated in Dallas; vice president
Lyndon B. Johnson is sworn in as president. |
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The Civil Rights Act passes. |
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February 21
Malcolm X is assassinated while speaking in Harlem. |
July
Riots break out in black sections of Brownsville, Harlem and
other cities. |
August 8
US ships attacked in the Gulf of Tonkin. Congress gives President
Johnson broad war powers. |
US troops in Vietnam number 180,000. US aircraft begin bombing
North Vietnam. |
October
War protests occur in over 40 cities. |
November 3
Lyndon B. Johnson becomes president in a landslide vicotry over
Barry Goldwater. |
Wham-o introduces the Superball. |
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Summer
Black riots occur in Chicago and twenty other cities. |
US troops in Vietnam number 400,000. |
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January 27
Three US astronauts are killed in a fire on the lauchpad at
Cape Kennedy. |
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July 23
Riots in Detroit bring in federal troops to control.
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US troops in Vietnam number 475,000. |
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April 4
Martin Luther King Jr. is assassinated in Memphis, TN; riots
in many cities. |
June 5
Senator Robert F. Kennedy is assassinated after winning California
Democratic primary. |
US troops in Vietnam number 500,000. |
Lake Erie declared dead from effects of pollution. |
November 5
Richard Nixon wins presidential election over Hubert Humphrey. |
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November 15
250,000 join war protest in Washington DC. |
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The books written in the 1960's reflect an era of great turmoil
and transition. Many books challenge the traditional ways of living
life or viewing the world and present new, radical ideas about how
society should function. Many emphasize the imagination, diversity,
individuality, and self-expression and examine tough social situations
that involve race, religion, and class and confront issues of individual
identity.
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Green Eggs and Ham by Dr. Seuss is published.
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To Kill A Mockingbird by Harper Lee is published. |
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The Snowy Day by Jack Ezra Keats is published.
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A Wrinkle in Time by Madeleine L'Engle is published.
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Where the Wild Things Are by Maurice Sendak is published.
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The Giving Tree by Shel Silverstein is published. |
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Charlie and the Chocolate Factory by Roald Dahl is published.
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The Autobiography of Malcolm X is published. |
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The Outsiders by S. E. Hinton is published. |
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The
1960's were a time of great change in music. The British Invasion
brought
about great changes to the musical style of the time; from psychedelia
to
Motown music was evolving from all the social influences of the 60's.
Pop
artists such as Andy Warhol were capitalizing on everyday commercial
art. |
Aretha Franklin releases her first album. |
Elvis Presley returns home after a two-year stint in the army.
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Alfred Hitchcock's masterpiece Psycho is released in
theaters. |
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April
The Supremes release their first single.
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August
The Marvelettes release "Please Mr. Postman" which becomes Motown's
first number one hit single. |
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The Audrey Hepburn classic Breakfast at Tiffany's is
released in theaters. |
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March 19
Bob Dylan releases first album the self-titled Bob Dylan.
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Soul-singer Marvin Gaye has his first hit with "Stubborn Kind
of Fellow." |
Jazz musician Miles Davis records his self-titled album at Carnegie
Hall and is nominated for a Grammy for Best Jazz Performance
by a Large Group, Instrumental. |
Marilyn Monroe dies of a drug overdose. |
Pop art makes the covers of the magazines Time, Life,
and Newsweek. |
James Bond debuts as Sean Connery play the British spy in Dr.
No. |
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The gladiator classic Ben Hur starring Charlton Heston
debuts in theaters. |
November 23
Folk-singer Joan Baez is on the cover of Time magazine
after releasing a concert album. |
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The world is introduced to singer "Little" Stevie Wonder who
at age 12 had his first number one hit with "Fingertips, Part
2" off of the album 12 Year Old Genius which was Motown's
first number one album. |
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Roy Lichtenstein paints Drowning Girl. |
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The true story of a prison escape by allied prisoners of War
makes its way to the big screen in The Great Escape starring
Steve McQueen and James Garner. |
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Stanley Kubrick's classic Dr. Strangelove starring Peter
Sellers is nominated for four Academy Awards including Best
Picture. |
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February 7
The Beatles land in New York City opening starting the British
Invasion that would bring bands such as the Rolling Stones,
The Who, and Cream over to the United States.
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March
Temptations release Meet the Temptations featuring songs
such as "The way you do the things you do." |
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Andy Warhol paints Campbell's Soup Can. |
Nine of the top ten singles in the US belong British bands,
as the British Invasion is still going strong. |
The musical The Sound of Music starring Julie Andrews
and Christopher Plummer is released in theaters. |
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Josef Albers paints his White Line Squares series. |
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Eero Saarinen's Gateway Arch is completed in St. Louis,
MO. |
Joan Baez is arrested during an anti-Vietnam demonstration.
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May 16
The Beach Boys release their first album, Pet Sounds.
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March 17
Grateful Dead release their first album starting a career that
would span three decades and cause a passionate following of
fans known as "Deadheads." |
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June 1
The Beatles release Sgt. Pepper's Lonely Heart's Club Band.
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I. M. Pei's National Center for Atmospheric Research is completed
in Boulder, CO. |
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Andy Warhol produces and does the album art for the Velvet Underground
album Velvet Underground and Nico which launches the
career of singer/songwriter Lou Reed. |
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Frank Stella paints Harran II. |
The Graduate starring Dustin Hoffman debuts in theaters.
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The Doors release their first album featuring such hits as "Break
on Through," "Light My Fire," and "The End." |
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The Hippie musical Hair debuts on Broadway. |
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The science fiction classic Planet of the Apes starring
Charlton Heston premieres in theaters. |
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Miles Davis is nominated for a Grammy for A Silent Way
which was also his first pop chart success in four years. |
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The Stanley Kubrick science fiction masterpiece 2001: A Space
Odyssey is released in theaters. |
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August 15-17
The Woodstock Festival takes place in upstate New York featuring
musicians such as Janis Joplin, Jimi Hendrix, and the Grateful
Dead.
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Butch Cassidy and the Sundance Kid starring Robert Redford
and Paul Newman as a pair of robbers in the Old West debuts
in theaters. |
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Mark Rothko paints a series of untitled works in brown, black,
and gray. |
Easy Rider, the hippie movie written by and starring
Dennis Hopper and Peter Fonda premieres in theaters. |
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the 1960’s, major scientific discoveries bridged impossible distances.
In the Space Race, the United States and the Soviet Union each sought
to demonstrate its superiority through impressive feats in rocketry
and spaceflight. As the decade began, computers were huge, filling
large rooms, and requiring several people to operate, but by the end
of the decade, computers became smaller and easier to use and could
communicate with each other over long distances. |
April 1
Tiros 1, the first weather satellite launched. |
July
Laser developed by Theodore H. Maimen. |
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Digital Equipment Corporation (DEC) released the PDP-1 computer
which sold for $120,000. |
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April 12
Yuri A. Gargarin is the first man in space; he orbits the
moon once in Soviet Vostok 1. |
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May 5
Alan B. Shepherd, Jr. is the first US astronaut into
space, in a suborbital flight in Mercury Freedom 7. |
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February 20
John H. Glenn, Jr. is the first American in orbit in Mercury
Friendship 7; he orbits the Earth three times. |
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J.C.R. Licklider writes memos about his "Intergalactic
Network" concept. |
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"Spacewar!" the first video game is invented by Steve
Russell at Massachusetts Institute of Technlogy (MIT) for the
PDP-1 computer. |
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June 16
Valentia Tereshkova is the first woman in space in Soviet
Vostok 6; she orbits the Earth 48 times. |
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The computer mouse is invented by Douglas Engelbart at Stanford
Research Institute (SRI). |
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July 3
US Ranger 7 relays the first close-range photographs
of the moon. |
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August
Paul Baran writes about distributed computing, in which
a group of computers ("nodes") are connected in such
a way to create a communications network that would survive
a major enemy attack. |
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March 18
Alexei A. Leonov makes the first spacewalk is from Soviet
Vokshod 2; duration is 12 minutes. |
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June 3
Edward White II makes the first US space walk from Gemini
4; duration is 22 minutes.
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Digital Equipment Corporation (DEC) releases the PDP-8, the
first "minicomputer," which sells for $18,000. |
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February 3
Soviet Luna 9 is the first spacecraft to soft=land on
the moon. |
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March
Soviet Luna 10 is the first spacecraft to orbit the
moon. |
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June 2
Surveyor 1 is the first US spacecraft to soft-land on
the moon. |
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Texas Instruments invents the first four-function handheld calculator,
which weighs nearly three pounds. |
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Data General Corporation introduces the Nova minicomputer, which
sells for $8,000. |
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December 9
Douglas Engelbart publicly debuts the computer mouse at
a conference in San Francisco.
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December 21
Apollo 8 is the first manned spacecraft to orbit the
moon, making 10 orbits on its 6-day mission. |
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July 20
In the Apollo 11 mission, Neil Armstrong and Edwin "Buzz"
Aldrin, Jr. make the first manned soft landing on the moon and
the first moonwalk.
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December
ARPANET has connected the first four universities in
the US. |
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