1960s Virtual Timeline

  • SNCC formed

    SNCC formed
    The Student Nonviolent Coordinating Committee (SNCC, often pronounced /snɪk/ SNIK) was one of the major Civil Rights Movement organizations of the 1960s. It emerged from the first wave of student sit-ins and formed at an April 1960 meeting organized by Ella Baker at Shaw University.
  • First Televised Presidential Debate

    First Televised Presidential Debate
    On Sept. 26, 1960, 70 million American viewers watched the first of four televised presidential debates between candidates Richard Nixon and John F. Kennedy. They were the first debates ever to be held between the presidential nominees of the two major parties during the election season.
  • President Kennedy is elected

    President Kennedy is elected
    John F. Kennedy becomes the youngest man ever to be elected president of the United States, narrowly beating Republican Vice President Richard Nixon. He was also the first Catholic to become president.The campaign was hard fought and bitter
  • Russian send the first man into space

    Russian send the first man into space
    On 12 April 1961, Russian cosmonaut Yuri Gagarin became the first human to travel into space when he launched into orbit on the Vostok 3KA-3 spacecraft
  • Berlin Wall is constructed

    Berlin Wall is constructed
    Constructed by the German Democratic Republic (GDR, East Germany), starting on 13 August 1961, the Wall cut off (by land) West Berlin from virtually all of surrounding East Germany and East Berlin until government officials opened it in November 1989.
  • Roger Maris of the Yankees breaks Babe Ruth's single season home run record

    Roger Maris of the Yankees breaks Babe Ruth's single season home run record
    On October 1, 1961, New York Yankee Roger Maris becomes the first-ever major-league baseball player to hit more than 60 home runs in a single season.
  • SDS releases it Port Huron statement

    SDS releases it Port Huron statement
    The Port Huron Statement is a 1962 political manifesto of the North American student activist movement Students for a Democratic Society (SDS). It was written primarily by Tom Hayden, a University of Michigan student and then the Field Secretary of SDS, with help from 58 other SDS members, and completed on June 15, 1962, at a United Auto Workers retreat in Port Huron, Michigan (now Lakeport State Park), for the group’s first national convention
  • Marilyn Monroe dies

    Marilyn Monroe dies
    Marilyn Monroe was found dead on August 5, 1962, at her 12305 Fifth Helena Drive home in Los Angeles of a barbiturate overdose.
  • James Meredith registers at Ole Miss

    James Meredith registers at Ole Miss
    The Ole Miss riot of 1962, or Battle of Oxford, was fought between Southern segregationists and federal and state forces beginning the night of September 30, 1962; segregationists were protesting the enrollment of James Meredith, a black US military veteran, at the University of Mississippi
  • Cuban Missile Crisis

    Cuban Missile Crisis
    The Cuban Missile Crisis, also known as the October Crisis of 1962, the Caribbean Crisis, or the Missile Scare, was a 13-day confrontation between the United States and the Soviet Union.
  • "Dr.No" the first James Bond movie premiers

    "Dr.No" the first James Bond movie premiers
    Dr. No is a 1962 British spy film, starring Sean Connery, with Ursula Andress and Joseph Wiseman, filmed in Jamaica and England. It is the first James Bond film. Based on the 1958 novel of the same name by Ian Fleming, it was adapted by Richard Maibaum, Johanna Harwood, and Berkely Mather and was directed by Terence Young.
  • Dr. King's "I Have a Dream" Speech

    Dr. King's "I Have a Dream" Speech
    "I Have a Dream" is a public speech delivered by American civil rights activist Martin Luther King Jr. during the March on Washington for Jobs and Freedom on August 28, 1963, in which he calls for an end to racism in the United States and called for civil and economic rights.
  • John F Kennedy is assassinated

    John F Kennedy is assassinated
    John Fitzgerald "Jack" Kennedy, commonly referred to by his initials JFK, was an American politician who served as the 35th President of the United States from January 1961 until his assassination in November 1963.
  • The Beatles arrive in the United States

    The Beatles arrive in the United States
    February 1964 – First U.S. Concerts. An estimated four thousand Beatles' fans were present on 7 February 1964 as Pan Am Flight 101 left Heathrow Airport.
  • The Beatles appear on Ed Sullivan

    The Beatles appear on Ed Sullivan
    On February 9th, 1964, The Beatles, with their Edwardian suits and mop top haircuts, made their first American television appearance on The Ed Sullivan Show. A record setting 73 million people tuned in that evening making it one of the seminal moments in television history.
  • New York's World Fair begins

    New York's World Fair begins
    The 1964/1965 New York World's Fair held over 140 pavilions, 110 restaurants, for 80 nations (hosted by 37), 24 US states, and over 45 corporations to build exhibits or attractions at Flushing Meadows Park in Queens, NY.
  • Gulf of Tonkin Incident

    Gulf of Tonkin Incident
    The Gulf of Tonkin incident, also known as the USS Maddox incident, was an international confrontation that led to the United States engaging more directly in the Vietnam War.
  • Lyndon B Johnson defeats Barry Goldwater

    Lyndon B Johnson defeats Barry Goldwater
    The United States presidential election of 1964 was the 45th quadrennial presidential election. It was held on Tuesday, November 3, 1964. Incumbent Democratic President Lyndon B. Johnson defeated Barry Goldwater, the Republican nominee.
  • Malcolm X assassinated

    Malcolm X assassinated
    When Malcolm X was assassinated on February 21, 1965, many Americans viewed his killing as simply the result of an ongoing feud between him and the Nation of Islam.
  • Watts race riot

    Watts race riot
    The Watts riots, sometimes referred to as the Watts Rebellion, took place in the Watts neighborhood of Los Angeles from August 11 to 16, 1965.
  • First airing of "The Flinstones"

    First airing of "The Flinstones"
    It was originally broadcast from September 30, 1960, to April 1, 1966, in a prime time schedule, the first such instance for an animated series. The continuing popularity of The Flintstones rested heavily on its juxtaposition of modern everyday concerns in the Stone Age setting
  • "Star Trek" TV show airs

    "Star Trek" TV show airs
    The iconic series "Star Trek" follows the crew of the starship USS Enterprise as it completes its missions in space in the 23rd century.
  • San Francisco "Summer of Love" begins

    San Francisco "Summer of Love" begins
    The Summer of Love began on January 14, 1967, when some 30,000 people gathered in San Francisco's Golden Gate Park. They came to take part in counterculture poet Allen Ginsberg and writer Gary Synder's "Human Be-In" initiative, part of the duo's call for a collective expansion of consciousness.
  • First NFL Football Super Bowl

    First NFL Football Super Bowl
    The first AFL-NFL World Championship Game in professional American football, known retroactively as Super Bowl I and referred to in some contemporaneous reports, including the game's radio broadcast, as the Super Bowl, was played on January 15, 1967 at the Los Angeles Memorial Coliseum in Los Angeles.
  • Boxer Muhammad Ali refuses military service

    Boxer Muhammad Ali refuses military service
    On April 28, 1967, boxing champion Muhammad Ali refuses to be inducted into the U.S. Army and is immediately stripped of his heavyweight title. Ali, a Muslim, cited religious reasons for his decision to forgo military service.
  • Beatles release Sgt. Pepper's album

    Beatles release Sgt. Pepper's album
    Sgt. Pepper's Lonely Hearts Club Band is the eighth studio album by English rock band the Beatles. Released on 26 May 1967 in the United Kingdom and 2 June 1967 in the United States.
  • Thurgood Marshall nominated to the supreme court

    Thurgood Marshall nominated to the supreme court
    President Lyndon Johnson appoints U.S. Court of Appeals Judge Thurgood Marshall to fill the seat of retiring Supreme Court Associate Justice Tom C. Clark. On August 30, after a heated debate, the Senate confirmed Marshall's nomination by a vote of 69 to 11
  • Monterey Music Festival held

    Monterey Music Festival held
    The Monterey International Pop Music Festival was a three-day concert event held June 16 to June 18, 1967 at the Monterey County Fairgrounds in Monterey, California.
  • Tet Offensive

    Tet Offensive
    The Tet Offensive was a coordinated series of North Vietnamese attacks on more than 100 cities and outposts in South Vietnam. The offensive was an attempt to foment rebellion among the South Vietnamese population and encourage the United States to scale back its involvement in the Vietnam War.
  • Martin Luther King Jr. assassinated

    Martin Luther King Jr. assassinated
    Martin Luther King Jr., an American clergyman and civil rights leader, was shot at the Lorraine Motel in Memphis, Tennessee, on April 4, 1968. He was rushed to St. Joseph's Hospital, and was pronounced dead at 7:05 p.m. CST.
  • Robert Kennedy is assassinated

    Robert Kennedy is assassinated
    Robert Francis Kennedy was an American politician and lawyer who served as a United States Senator from New York from January 1965 until his assassination in June 1968.
  • Protests at the 1968 Democratic National Convention

    Protests at the 1968 Democratic National Convention
    On this day in 1968, at the Democratic National Convention in Chicago, tens of thousands of Vietnam War protesters battle police in the streets, while the Democratic Party falls apart over an internal disagreement concerning its stance on Vietnam.
  • LSD declared illegal by the U.S. government

    LSD declared illegal by the U.S. government
    Possession of LSD is banned federally in the U.S. after the passage of the Staggers-Dodd Bill (Public Law 90-639) which amended the Food, Drug, and Cosmetic Act.
  • Richard Nixon is elected

    Richard Nixon is elected
    The United States presidential election of 1968 was the 46th quadrennial presidential election, held on Tuesday, November 5, 1968. The Republican nominee, former Vice President Richard Nixon, defeated the Democratic nominee, incumbent Vice President Hubert Humphrey.
  • Stonewall riots

    Stonewall riots
    The Stonewall riots (also referred to as the Stonewall uprising or the Stonewall rebellion) were a series of spontaneous, violent demonstrations by members of the gay (LGBT) community[note 1] against a police raid that took place in the early morning hours of June 28, 1969, at the Stonewall Inn in the Greenwich Village neighborhood of Manhattan, New York City.
  • American astronauts land on the moon

    American astronauts land on the moon
    The United States' Apollo 11 was the first manned mission to land on the Moon, on 20 July 1969. There have been six manned U.S. landings (between 1969 and 1972) and numerous unmanned landings, with no soft landings happening from 22 August 1976 until 14 December 2013.
  • Manson family murders Sharon Tate

    Manson family murders Sharon Tate
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    On January 20, 1968, Tate married Roman Polanski, her director and co-star in 1967's The Fearless Vampire Killers. On August 9, 1969, Tate and four others were murdered by members of the Manson Family in the home she shared with Polanski.
  • Woodstock Concert

    Woodstock Concert
    The Woodstock Music & Art Fair—informally, the Woodstock Festival or simply Woodstock— was a music festival in the United States in 1969 which attracted an audience of more than 400,000
  • The Rolling Stones host the Altamont music festival

    The Rolling Stones host the Altamont music festival
    Altamont was the brainchild of the Rolling Stones, who hoped to cap off their U.S. tour in late 1969 with a concert that would be the West Coast equivalent of Woodstock, in both scale and spirit.