BRITAIN AND THE WORLD SINCE 1953
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| Nov21 | British Museum published a scientific report proving that the Piltdown Man discovery by Charles Dawson in 1912 was a hoax. |
| Nov24 | A Douglas B558 II reaches a speed of Mach 2.1 - 21,356kph |
| A landslide in New Zealand leads to a train collision and a death toll of 166 people | |
| Dec12 | Sir Winston Churchill wins the Nobel Prize for Literature |
| Dec23 | Lavrenty Beria (1899 - 1953) Soviet Minister of the Interior is executed for treason. He was responsible for a post-war purge of Stalins "opponents" many of whom were either executed or sent into "exile" |
| Jan8 | President Dwight Eisenhower proposes stripping convicted Communists of their U.S. citizenship. |
| Jan9 | The first electronic computer is displayed in New York |
| Jan 14 | Marilyn Monroe marries US baseball player Joe Di Maggio |
| Jan21 | USS Nautilus, the first nuclear-powered submarine was launched. |
| Mar 1 | USA detonate H-Bomb at Bikini Atoll in Pacific Ocean |
| Mar13 | Senator Joseph mcCarthy resigns from office |
| Mar25 | RCA manafactures the first colour television set |
| Apr2 | The first TV soap opera "The Grove Family" is shown on British TV |
| Apr5 | Elvis Presley records his debut single "That's Alright"(written by Arthur Cruddup) for Sam Phillips at Sun Records |
| Apr12 | Bill Haley and the Comets recorded the song "Rock Around the Clock"; it sold an estimated 25 million copies worldwide -- then the second biggest-selling single behind Bing Crosby's "White Christmas" |
| Apr14 | Robert Oppenheimer "the father of the atomic bomb" is removed from alll nuclear test projects due to the suspicion of communist sympathies |
| Apr18 | Colonel Nasser achieves power in Egypt overthrowing King Farouk |
| May6 | First sub 4 minute mile(3:59.4) by Roger Bannister at Ifley Road Athletics track Oxford. On 21st June in Turku Finland John Landy of Australia beat the record with a time of 3m.58.0s |
| May7 | French surrender to Vietminh after 55-day siege at DienBienPhu. The battle began on March 13 and marked the end of French imperial ambitions in the Far East. On 30June the French military occupation of Vietnam ended |
| May17 | US Supreme Court outlaws racial segregation in schools |
| Jun27 | The world's first atomic power station opened at Obnisnsk, near Moscow. |
| Jul3 | Food rationing officially ends in Britain with meat being the last item to be taken "off the ration" |
| Jul4 | West Germany beat Hungary 3-2 in the fifth World Cup Finals held in Switzerland |
| Jul10 | Gordon Richards rode his last mount at Sandown Park - the 21,834th of his near 34-year career. |
| Jul15 | Maiden flght of a Boeing 707 |
| Jul27 | Vietnam partitioned into North and South Vietnam after armistice |
| Jul31 | Mount Godwin-Austen (K2) is conquered by an Italian expedition led by Ardito Desio. It is the world's second highest peak, 28,250 ft (8,611 m) high, in the Karakorum range, N Kashmir, at the China-India border. |
| Aug4 | Britain's first supersonic fighter plane, the English Electric Lightning P-1, made its maiden flight. |
| Aug8 | Jim Peters collapses at the end of the Commonwealth Games marathon in Vancouver |
| Aug10 | Gordon Richards retires as a jockey after riding a record 4870 winners |
| Aug24 | Getulio Vargas the Brazilian President commits suicide after he is accused of conspiracy to murder an air force officer |
| Sep9 | A violent earthquake centred on the city of Oleansville in Algeria kills over 1500 people and leaves thousands homeless |
| Television broadcasting begins in Canada with a weather forcast | |
| Oct20 | A Dock strike commences in the U.K. that takes a month to resolve (Nov21 is the end of the strike) |
| Oct31 | Algerian Revolution against France begins |
| Nov12 | Ellis Island Immigration Centre New York closed |
| Dec2 | Sen. Joseph McCarthy was condemned by the
U.S. Senate for misconduct after his investigations of
thousands of he suspected to be communists. He gave his name to the political phrase "McCarthyism" |
| Dec21 | Dr Sam Shepherd's wife Marilyn is murdered, a murder that became the basis for the TV series The Fugitive. He is released nine years later after a retrial. |
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Last Updated 25/06/02 08:46