1963: Encyclopedia II - 1963 - Events

1963 - Events

1963 - January

• January 1 - CSIRO scientist Dr Gilbert Bogle and Mrs Margaret Chandler are found dead, believed to have been poisoned, in bushland near the Lane Cove River, Sydney. Known as the Bogle-Chandler case.
• January 11 - The Whisky A Go-Go night club in Los Angeles, the first disco in the USA, is opened.
• January 14 - George Wallace becomes governor of Alabama.
• January 22 - Elysée treaty between France and Germany
• January 28 - Black student Harvey Gantt enters Clemson College in South Carolina, the last US state to hold out against racial integration
• January 29 - Charles De Gaulle vetos United Kingdom's entry into the EEC

1963 - February

• February 8 - Travel, financial and commercial transactions by United States citizens to Cuba are made illegal by the John F. Kennedy administration.
• February 11 - CIA Domestic Operations Division is created.
• February 21 - An earthquake in Libya destroys the village of Barce - 500 dead
• February 27 - Juan Bosch takes office as the 41st president of the Dominican Republic.
• February 27 - Female suffrage in Iran

1963 - March

• March 1 - Yoko Ono's marriage to American Christian fundamentalist filmmaker Anthony Cox is annulled
• March 4 - In Paris six people are sentenced to death for conspiring to assassinate President Charles de Gaulle.
• March 16 - Mount Agung erupts on Bali - 11,000 dead
• March 18 - Court decides poor must have lawyers (Gideon vs. Wainwright Supreme Court trial)
• March 21 - Alcatraz, a federal penitentiary on an island in San Francisco Bay, closes; the last 27 prisoners are transferred elsewhere at the order of Attorney General Robert F Kennedy.
• March 27 - In Britain Dr Beeching issues report calling for huge cuts to the UK's rail network.

1963 - April

• April 7 - Yugoslavia is proclaimed to be a Socialist republic and Josip Broz Tito is named President for life
• April 10 - The US nuclear submarine Thresher sinks 220 miles east of Cape Cod with all hands - 129 dead
• April 15 - 70,000 marchers arrive in London from Aldermarston to demonstrate against nuclear weapons
• April 16 - Martin Luther King composes "Letter from Birmingham Jail"
• April 20 – In Quebec, Canada, members of the Quebec terrorist group, the Front de libération du Québec, bomb the Canadian Armed Forces recruitment center, killing night watchman, Wilfred V. O'Neill.
• April 22 - Lester B. Pearson becomes Canada's fourteenth prime minister.
• April 21 thru April 23 - First election of the Supreme Institution of the Bahá'í Faith, known as the Universal House of Justice whose Seat is at the Bahá'í World Centre on Mount Carmel in Haifa, Israel.

1963 - May

• May 1 - The Coca-Cola Company debuts its first diet drink, TaB cola.
• May 2 - Berthold Seliger launches near Cuxhaven a rocket with three stages with a maximum flight altitude of more than 62 miles. It is the only sounding rocket developed in Germany.
• May 15 - Mercury program: NASA launches the last mission of the program, Mercury 9 (on June 12 NASA Administrator James E. Webb told Congress the program was complete)
• May 23 - Fidel Castro visits the Soviet Union
• May 25 - The Organisation of African Unity is established in Addis Ababa, Ethiopia

1963 - June

• June 1 - Kenya gains autonomy.
• June 2 - Slavery declared illegal in Saudi Arabia
• June 5 - Profumo Affair - British Secretary of State for War John Profumo resigns in a sex scandal
• June 11 – Buddhist monk Thich Quang Duc publicly sets himself on fire in Saigon, Vietnam, to protest against Ngo Dinh Diem's policies
• June 11 - Prime Minister of Greece Constantine Karamanlis resigns in protest of king's visit to Britain
• June 12 - Byron de la Beckwith shoots civil rights leader Medgar Evers in front of his home in Jackson, Mississippi.
• June 16 - Vostok 6: Valentina Tereshkova (USSR) becomes the first woman in space.
• June 17 - The United States Supreme Court ruled 8 to 1 in Abington School District v. Schempp against allowing the reciting of Bible verses and the Lord's Prayer in public schools.
• June 21 - Pope Paul VI is elected by College of Cardinals.
• June 30 - Ciaculli Massacre - mafia car bomb explodes in Ciaculli, Sicily, killing 7 police officers

1963 - July

• July 1 - ZIP Codes introduced in the USA
• July 5 - Diplomatic relations between the Israeli and the Japanese governments are raised to embassies' level.
• July 5 - The Catholic Church accepts cremation as a funeral practice
• July 26 - Earthquake in Skopje, Yugoslavia - 1800 dead
• July 26 - Syncom, the world's first geostationary (synchronous) satellite is orbited by NASA
• July 27 – Indonesian president-for-life Sukarno declares that he will crush Malaysia – official start of Indonesian Confrontation
• July 30 - Soviet newspaper Izvestia reports that Kim Philby has been given asylum in Moscow

1963 - August

• August 5 - United States, United Kingdom, and Soviet Union sign a nuclear test ban treaty.
• August 8 - The Great Train Robbery takes place in Buckinghamshire, England
• August 18 - American civil rights movement: James Meredith becomes the first black person to graduate from the University of Mississippi
• August 28 - Martin Luther King, Jr. delivers his "I have a dream" speech on the steps at the Lincoln Memorial in Washington D.C.

1963 - September

• September 5 - Christine Keeler arrested for perjury. On December 6 she is sentenced to nine months in prison.
• September 6 - The Centre for International Industrial Property Studies (CEIPI) is founded.
• September 7 - The Pro Football Hall of Fame opens in Canton, Ohio with 17 charter members.
• September 10 - Mafia boss Bernardo Provenzano is indicted for murder. He goes on the run and, as of 2005, is still a fugitive.
• September 15 - American civil rights movement: The 16th Street Baptist Church bombing results in 4 deaths and 22 injuries.
• September 16 – Federation of Malaysia formed through the merging of the Federation of Malaya and the British crown colony of Singapore, North Borneo (renamed Sabah) and Sarawak.
• September 18 – Rioters burn down British embassy in Jakarta to protest formation of Malaysia
• September 23 - King Fahd University for Petroleum and Minerals was was established by a Saudi Royal Decree as the College of Petroleum and Minerals
• September 25 - Denning Report on Profumo affair
• September 29 - Opening of second period of Second Vatican Council in Rome.

1963 - October

• October 9 - Uganda becomes a republic.
• October 9 - In northeast Italy, over 2,000 people are killed when a large landslide behind the Vajont Dam causes a giant wave of water to overtop it.

1963 - November

• November 2 - South Vietnamese President Ngo Dinh Diem is assassinated following a military coup
• November 6 - Vietnam War: Coup leader General Duong Van Minh takes over leadership of South Vietnam
• November 7 - Wunder von Lengede: In Germany, 11 miners are rescued from a collapsed mine after 14 days
• November 9 - 1963 Miike coal-mine explosion: In Japan, a coal mine explosion kills 458 and sends 839 carbon monoxide poisoning victims to the hospital
• November 14 - A volcanic eruption under the sea near Iceland creates a new island, Surtsey
• November 16 - Newspaper strike begins in Toledo, Ohio
• November 18 - Dartford Tunnel opens
• November 22 - John F. Kennedy assassination: In Dallas, Texas, U.S. President John F. Kennedy is assassinated, Texas Governor John B. Connally is seriously wounded, and Vice President Lyndon B. Johnson is sworn-in as the 36th President of the United States.
• November 23 - The first episode of the BBC television series Doctor Who is broadcast in the United Kingdom.
• November 24 - John F. Kennedy assassination: Alleged assassin Lee Harvey Oswald is mortally shot by Jack Ruby in Dallas, Texas on live national television.
• November 24 - Vietnam War: Newly sworn in U.S. President Lyndon B. Johnson confirms that the United States intends to continue supporting South Vietnam militarily and economically
• November 25 - John F. Kennedy assassination: The late U.S. President Kennedy is buried at Arlington National Cemetery.
• November 29 - John F. Kennedy assassination: U.S. President Lyndon B. Johnson establishes the Warren Commission to investigate the assassination of President Kennedy.
• November 29 - Trans-Canada Airlines Flight 831, a Douglas DC-8 carrying 118, crashes into a wooded hillside after taking-off from Dorval International Airport near Montreal, killing all 118 on board (for many years this was the worst air disaster in Canada's history).

1963 - December

• December 4 - Closing of second period of Second Vatican Council
• End of the Mercury program of United States manned spaceflight
• December 5 - The Seliger Forschungs- und Entwicklungsgesellschaft mbH demonstrates rockets for military use to representatives of the military of non-NATO-countries near Cuxhaven. Although these rockets landed via parachute at the end of their flight and no allied laws were violated, this action led to protests by the Soviet Union.
• December 12 – Kenya becomes independent with Jomo Kenyatta as a prime minister
• December 22 - Cruise ship Lakonia burns 180 miles north of Madeira with the loss of 128 lives
• December 24 - Cyprus Emergency - A brief civil war in Cyprus between Greek and Turkish Cypriots erupts
• December 31 - Federation of Rhodesia and Nyasaland formally dissolved

1963 - Unknown date

• David. H. Frisch and J. H. Smith prove radioactive decay of mesons is slowed by their motion. (See Einstein's special relativity and general relativity).
• Full deployment of SAGE, the semi-automated ground environment.
• TAT-3 cable goes into operation.
• Arecibo Observatory officially begins operation.
• Ostankino Tower in Moscow begins construction.
• The divorce case of the Duke and Duchess of Argyll causes scandal in the United Kingdom
• Harvey Ball invents the ubiquitous smiley
• One of the most spectacular years for vintage Port in the 20th Century.

Adapted from the Wikipedia article "Events", under the G.N U Free Docmentation License. Please also see http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki