istoryworld
All Events
Le Corbusier begins a 15-year project designing Chandigarh as a new joint capital for Punjab and Hariyana
Appointed minister of housing in Churchill's new government, Harold Macmillan soon achieves the ambitious target of building 300,000 houses a year
Erwin Müller completes his development of the field ion microscope, the first instrument capable of observing atoms
US boxer Sugar Ray Robinson beats Jake Lamotta to take the middleweight title (for the first of five times)
The Twenty-Second Amendment to the US Constitution prevents anyone being elected for more than two presidential terms
Jacopo Arbenz, newly elected president of Guatemala, enrages the USA by expropriating the land of the United Fruit Company
Elia Kazan directs Vivien Leigh and Marlon Brando in the film of Tennessee Williams' A Streetcar Named Desire
Syntex, a small chemical company in Mexico City, develops the first oral contraceptive
Six European nations agree to joint coal and steel production through the European Coal and Steel Community (ECSC)
The new Iranian prime minister, Mohammed Mossadegh, passes the Oil Nationalization Act, seizing Britain's assets in the region
German-born US philosopher Hannah Arendt links Hitler's and Stalin's regimes in The Origins of Totalitarianism
The British spies Guy Burgess and Donald Maclean escape to the Soviet Union just ahead of their detection and arrest
An agreement is signed by which a joint Tibetan-Chinese authority will nominally govern Tibet
The Festival of Britain, on the south bank of the Thames in London, celebrates the end of wartime austerity
British architects Arnold Powell and John Moya design the Skylon as a central feature for the Festival of Britain
Gertrude Lawrence and Yul Brynner open on Broadway in the Rodgers and Hammerstein musical The King and I
Catcher in the Rye is US author J.D. Salinger's immensely successful first novel
British architect Basil Spence wins the competition to design a new cathedral for Coventry
UN and Chinese forces reach a stalemate in Korea, facing each other from fixed positions on either side of the 38th Parallel
British author John Wyndham creates a dark fantasy in his novel The Day of the Triffids
In Christ of St John of the Cross Salvador Dali paints an image of the crucified Christ seeming to fly on his cross
British-Canadian choreographer Celia Franca founds the National Ballet of Canada
The Batllistas, followers in Uruguay of José Batlle, attempt an unusual experiment in the reform of government
A Question of Upbringing begins Antony Powell's 'A Dance to the Music of Time'
King Abdullah of Jordan is assassinated on the Temple Mount in Jerusalem
