1962 - What happened in 1962 ?

January 1962

Thursday 04:

New York City introduces a train that operates without a crew on-board.

Monday 08:

Harmelen train disaster.

Thursday 11:

Eruption of the Huascaran volcano in Peru; 4,000 deaths.

Wednesday 24:

Brian Epstein signs to manage The Beatles.

Tuesday 30:

Two of the high-wire Flying Wallendas are killed when their famous seven-person pyramid collapses during a performance in Detroit, Michigan.

February 1962

Monday 05:

French President Charles De Gaulle calls for allowing Algeria to be an independent nation.

Wednesday 07:

The United States Government bans all US-related Cuban imports and exports.

Saturday 10:

Captured American spy pilot Francis Gary Powers is exchanged for captured Soviet spy Rudolf Abel.

Wednesday 14:

First Lady Jacqueline Kennedy takes television viewers on a tour of the White House.

Tuesday 20:

Mercury program: While aboard Friendship 7, John Glenn orbits the earth three times in 4 hours, 55 minutes, becoming the first American to orbit the earth.

March 1962

Thursday 01:

American Airlines Flight 1 crashes on take off in New York.

Friday 16:

A Flying Tiger Line Super Constellation disappears in the western Pacific Ocean, with 107 people missing.

Sunday 18:

In Luxembourg, Isabelle Aubret wins the seventh Eurovision Song Contest for France singing "Un premier amour" (A first love).

Monday 19:

Algerian War of Independence: A ceasefire takes effect.

Friday 30:

Jack Paar hosts his last episode of The Tonight Show.

April 1962

Saturday 14:

Georges Pompidou becomes Prime Minister of France.

Thursday 26:

NASA's Ranger 4 spacecraft crashes into the Moon.

May 1962

Saturday 12:

Douglas MacArthur delivers his famous "Duty, Honor, Country" valedictory speech at West Point.

Tuesday 22:

Continental Airlines Flight 11 crashes after bombs explode.

Wednesday 23:

Drilling for the Montreal Metro commences.

Thursday 24:

American astronaut Scott Carpenter orbits the Earth three times in the Aurora 7 space capsule.

Thursday 31:

The West Indies Federation dissolves

June 1962

Sunday 03:

An Air France Boeing 707 jet crashed shortly after takeoff from Paris, killing 130.

Monday 11:

Frank Morris, John Anglin and Clarence Anglin become the only prisoners to apparently successfully escape from the prison on Alcatraz Island. No conclusive evidence has ever been found that they survived the escape attempt.

Friday 15:

Students for a Democratic Society complete the Port Huron Statement.

Saturday 16:

1962 - Two U.S. Army officers are killed in Saigon,Vietnam.

Friday 22:

An Air France Boeing 707 jet crashes in bad weather in Guadeloupe, West Indies killing 113

July 1962

Sunday 01:

1962 - Independence of Burundi.

Thursday 05:

Algeria becomes independent from France.

Tuesday 10:

Telstar, the world's first communications satellite, is launched into orbit.

Tuesday 17:

Nuclear testing: The "Small Boy" test shot Little Feller I becomes the last atmospheric test detonation at the Nevada Test Site.

Sunday 22:

Mariner program: Mariner 1 spacecraft flies erratically several minutes after launch and has to be destroyed.

August 1962

Monday 06:

Jamaica becomes independent.

Friday 17:

East German border guards kill 18-year-old Peter Fechter as he attempts to cross the Berlin Wall into West Berlin. He thus became the first victim of the wall

Wednesday 22:

The NS Savannah, the world's first nuclear-powered ship, completes its maiden voyage

Thursday 23:

First live television connection between the United States and Europe, via the Telstar satellite.

Friday 31:

Trinidad and Tobago become independent.

September 1962

Saturday 01:

Channel Television launches to 54,000 households in the Channel Islands.

Wednesday 12:

President John F. Kennedy declares the USA will get a man on the moon, and bring him back, by the end of the decade.

Thursday 20:

James Meredith, an African-American, is barred from entering the University of Mississippi.

Sunday 23:

Lincoln Center for the Performing Arts in New York City opens with the first building completed, Philharmonic Hall, now Avery Fisher Hall home of the New York Philharmonic.

Monday 24:

United States court of appeals orders the University of Mississippi to admit James Meredith.

October 1962

Friday 12:

Infamous Columbus Day Storm strikes the U.S. Pacific Northwest with record wind velocities; 46 dead and at least U.S. $230 million in damages

Saturday 13:

Who's Afraid of Virginia Woolf? opens on Broadway.

Sunday 14:

Cuban Missile Crisis begins: A U-2 flight over Cuba takes photos of Soviet nuclear weapons being installed.

Monday 15:

Cuban Missile Crisis: A stand-off ensues between the United States and the Soviet Union over Soviet nuclear weapons in Cuba.

Sunday 28:

Cuban Missile Crisis: Soviet Union leader Nikita Khrushchev announces that he had ordered the removal of Soviet missile bases in Cuba.

November 1962

Friday 02:

The Cuban Missile Crisis ends as President John F. Kennedy announces that Soviet nuclear missiles are to be withdrawn from Cuba.

Monday 05:

A mining accident kills 21 miners at the government-owned Kings Bay Coal Company on Svalbard, leading the Norweigian government to close the mine.

Tuesday 06:

Apartheid: The United Nations General Assembly passes a resolution condemning South Africa's racist apartheid policies and calls for all UN member states to cease military and economic relations with the nation.

Sunday 18:

Niels Bohr, Danish physicist, dies at the age of 77.

Saturday 24:

The West Berlin branch of the Socialist Unity Party of Germany forms a separate party, the Socialist Unity Party of West Berlin.

December 1962

Sunday 02:

Vietnam War: After a trip to Vietnam at the request of US President John F. Kennedy, US Senate Majority Leader Mike Mansfield becomes the first American official to not make an optimistic public comment on the war's progress.

Friday 07:

Prince Rainier III of Monaco revises the principality's constitution, devolving some of his power to advisory and legislative councils.

Sunday 09:

Tanganyika becomes a republic

Friday 14:

The Mona Lisa was assessed at US$100 million, the highest insurance valuance for a painting in history.

Friday 21:

Rondane National Park, the first national park in Norway, was established.