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1961

Calendar year From Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia

1961
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1961 (MCMLXI) was a common year starting on Sunday of the Gregorian calendar, the 1961st year of the Common Era (CE) and Anno Domini (AD) designations, the 961st year of the 2nd millennium, the 61st year of the 20th century, and the 2nd year of the 1960s decade.

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From top to bottom, left to right: Soviet cosmonaut Yuri Gagarin becomes the first human to orbit the Earth aboard Vostok 1, marking the dawn of human spaceflight and intensifying the Space Race; the massive Tsar Bomba is detonated by the Soviet Union, becoming the most powerful nuclear weapon ever tested and demonstrating the terrifying scale of the nuclear arms race; the failed Bay of Pigs Invasion sees Cuban exiles backed by the United States attempt to overthrow Fidel Castro’s government, resulting in a major embarrassment for the Kennedy administration; the Berlin Crisis of 1961 culminates in the construction of the Berlin Wall by East Germany, physically and ideologically dividing East and West Berlin and becoming an enduring symbol of the Cold War; Dominican dictator Rafael Trujillo is assassinated, bringing his decades-long brutal rule to an end; the crash of Sabena Flight 548 near Brussels kills all 72 people on board, including the entire U.S. figure skating team, devastating American figure skating; the Anniston and Birmingham bus attacks target Freedom Riders in Alabama, where buses are firebombed and riders are brutally beaten, drawing national outrage and exposing violent resistance to desegregation; the Eritrean War of Independence begins as Eritrean rebels launch their first assault against Ethiopian forces, starting a thirty-year struggle for independence; and the Portuguese Colonial War erupts as independence movements rise against Portuguese rule in Africa, marking the beginning of a long and violent conflict.
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Events

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April 12: Soviet cosmonaut Yuri Gagarin becomes the first human to fly in outer space

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Births

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January

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Gabrielle Carteris
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Julia Louis-Dreyfus
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Wayne Gretzky

February

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Malu Dreyer
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David Graeber
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Henry Rollins
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Mark Latham

March

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Laurel Clark
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Kassie DePaiva
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Yanis Varoufakis
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Amy Sedaris

April

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Eddie Murphy
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Vincent Gallo
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Robert Carlyle
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George Lopez

May

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Joe Murray
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George Clooney
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John Corbett
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Tim Roth
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Kevin McDonald

June

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Yevgeny Prigozhin
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Sam Harris
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Michael J. Fox
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Maxi Priest
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Boy George
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Bidya Devi Bhandari
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Joko Widodo
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Ricky Gervais
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Iztok Mlakar

July

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Diana, Princess of Wales
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Forest Whitaker
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António Costa
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Zbigniew Zamachowski
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Elizabeth McGovern
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Milind Gunaji
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Woody Harrelson
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Gary Cherone
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Katherine Kelly Lang
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Laurence Fishburne

August

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Barack Obama
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Lauren Tom
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Mercedes Aráoz
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Brad Gilbert
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John Key
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Koji Kondo
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Manuel Merino
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Billy Ray Cyrus

September

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Eugenio Derbez
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Carlos Valderrama
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E.G. Daily
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Virginia Madsen
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Dave Mustaine
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Colin McFarlane
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James Gandolfini
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Chi McBride
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Julia Gillard

October

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Jodi Benson
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Rachel De Thame
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Kim Wayans
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Dylan McDermott
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Randy Jackson
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Peter Jackson

November

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Ralph Macchio
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Nadia Comăneci
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Meg Ryan
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Mariel Hemingway

December

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Matthew Waterhouse
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Ilham Aliyev

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Deaths

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Erwin Schrödinger
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Patrice Lumumba
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Carlos Luz
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Mohammed V of Morocco
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Oswald Rayner
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Victor d'Arcy
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Carlos Duarte Costa
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Eliseo Mouriño
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Zog I of Albania
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Padma Shumsher Jung Bahadur Rana
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Mbarek Bekkay
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Robert Garrett
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Gary Cooper
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Rafael Trujillo
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Carl Jung
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Jeff Chandler
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Nasuhi al-Bukhari
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Ernest Hemingway
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Ty Cobb
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Sir Sidney Holland
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Adnan Menderes
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Percy Chapman
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Dag Hammarskjöld
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Marion Davies
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Chico Marx
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Sergio Osmeña
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Anselmo Alliegro y Milá
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Sir Earle Page
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Kurt Meyer

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Nobel Prizes

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See also

References

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