World Events
Population: 3.039 billion
Nobel Peace Prize: Albert John Luthuli (South Africa)
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.
ommunist 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
U.S. Events
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
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
John F. Kennedy defeats Richard Nixon in a closely-fought presidential race.
Sit-in at Greensboro, N.C., diner that did not serve blacks receives national attention. Background: Civil Rights
Sports
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)
Entertainment
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)
Grammy Awards
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)
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
Deaths
Boris Pasternak
Emily Post
Lawrence Tibbett
Clark Gable