News and Events of 1960

Year by Year: 1900-2012 View a 1960 calendar

World Events

World Statistics

Population: 3.039 billion
population by decade

Nobel Peace Prize:
Albert John Luthuli (South Africa)

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American U-2 spy plane, piloted by Francis Gary Powers, shot down over Russia (May 1).
Khrushchev kills Paris summit conference because of U-2 (May 16).
Top Nazi murderer of Jews, Adolf Eichmann, captured by Israelis in Argentina (May 23)—executed in Israel in 1962.
Communist China and Soviet Union split in conflict over Communist ideology.
Senegal, Ghana, Nigeria, Madagascar, and Zaire (Belgian Congo) gain independence.
There are 900 US military advisers in South Vietnam. Background: Vietnam War

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U.S. Events

U.S. Statistics

President: Dwight D. Eisenhower
Vice President: Richard M. Nixon
Population: 180,671,158
Life expectancy: 69.7 years
Violent Crime Rate (per 1,000): 18.9
Property Crime Rate (per 1,000): 17.3
Homicide Rate (per 100,000): 4.7

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John F. Kennedy defeats Richard Nixon in a closely-fought presidential race.
Black sit-in at Greensboro, N.C., diner receives national attention. Background: Civil Rights

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Economics

US GDP (1998 dollars):   $526.6 billion
Federal spending:   $92.19 billion
Federal debt:   $290.5 billion
Consumer Price Index:   29.6
Unemployment:   5.5%
Cost of a first-class stamp:   $0.04

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Sports

Sports Links

Pro Football Summary

Pro Basketball Summary

Pro Baseball Summary

World Series

Pittsburgh d. NY Yankees (4-3)

NBA Championship

Boston d. St. Louis Hawks (4-3)

Stanley Cup

Montreal d. Toronto (4-0)

Wimbledon

Women: Maria Bueno d. S. Reynolds (8-6 6-0)
Men: Neale Fraser d. R. Laver (6-4 3-6 9-7 7-5)

Kentucky Derby Champion

Venetian Way

NCAA Basketball Championship

Ohio St. d. California (75-55)

NCAA Football Champions

Minnesota (AP, UPI, NFF) (8-2-0) & Mississippi (FW) (10-0-1)

1960 Summer Olympics

1960 Winter Olympics

Entertainment

Entertainment Awards

Pulitzer Prizes
Fiction: Advise and Consent, Allen Drury
Music: Second String Quartet, Elliott Carter
Drama: Fiorello! George Abbott, Jerome Weidman, Jerry Bock, and Sheldon Harnick

Oscars awarded in 1960
Academy Award, Best Picture: Ben-Hur, Sam Zimbalist, producer (MGM)

Nobel Prize for Literature: St. John Perse (Alexis St.-Léger Léger) (France)

1960 Emmy Awards

1960 Tony Awards

Grammys awarded in 1960
Record of the Year: "Mack the Knife," Bobby Darin
Album of the Year: Come Dance With Me, Frank Sinatra (Capitol)
Song of the Year: "The Battle of New Orleans," Jimmy Driftwood, songwriter

Miss America: Lynda Lee Mead (MS)

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Events

Seventy million people watch the presidential debate between Sen. John F. Kennedy and Vice President Richard Nixon.
John Coltrane forms his own quartet and becomes the voice of jazz's New Wave movement.
Ninety percent of U.S. homes have a television set.
Alfred Hitchcock's Psycho terrifies movie-goers and becomes one of the year's most successful films, as well as one of the most memorable psychological thrillers.

Movies

Psycho, The Apartment, The Sundowners, Sons and Lovers

Books

John Barth, The Sot-Weed Factor
Harper Lee, To Kill a Mockingbird
Flannery O'Connor, The Violent Bear It Away
Anne Sexton, To Bedlam and Part Way Back
William Styron, Set This House on Fire
John Updike, Rabbit, Run

Science

Nobel Prizes in Science

Chemistry: Willard F. Libby (US), for “atomic time clock” to measure age of objects by measuring their radioactivity

Physics: Donald A. Glaser (US), for invention of ""bubble chamber"" to study subatomic particles

Physiology or Medicine: Sir Macfarlane Burnet (Australia) and Peter Brian Medawar (UK), for discovery of acquired immunological tolerance

The first working laser is built by T. H. Maiman (US).
Echo I, the first communications satellite, is launched.
NASA launches Tiros I, the first weather satellite. Background: Space Exploration