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The Supreme Court of the United States orders that all public schools be integrated with deliberate speed.
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Rosa Parks, an African American seamstress, refuses to give up her seat on the bus to a white man, prompting a boycott that would lead to the declaration that bus segregation laws were unconstitutional by a federal court.
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Congressmen from Southern states call for massive resistance, the Southern Manifesto, to the Supreme Court ruling on desegregation.
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Interstate highway system begins with the signing of the Federal-Aid Highway Act.
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The first transatlantic telephone cable begins operation.
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Gordon Gould, an American physicist, invents the laser
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President Dwight D. Eisenhower is inaugurated for his second term in office.
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U.S. Congress approves the first civil rights bill since reconstruction with additional protection of voting rights
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The first attempt by the United States to launch a satellite into space fails when it explodes on the launchpad.
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The first major world's fair since the end of World War II opens in Brussels, Belgium and evokes a Cold War debate between the pavilions of the Soviet Union and the United States.
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Alaska is admitted to the United States as the 49th state to be followed on August 21 by Hawaii.
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The United States recognizes the new Cuban government under rebel leader Fidel Castro. Castro becomes the Premier of Cuba on February 16
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The Daytona 500 stock car race is run for the first time with Lee Petty taking the first checkered flag.
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Four black college students from North Carolina Agricultural and Technical College in Greensboro, North Carolina stage a sit-in at a segregated Woolworth lunch counter, protesting their denial of service.
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The 1960 census includes a United States population of 179,323,175, an 18.5% increase since 1950
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The presidential race to succeed two term president Dwight D. Eisenhower is won by Senator John F. Kennedy
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The Bay of Pigs invasion of Cuba is repulsed by Cuban forces in an attempt by Cuban exiles under the direction of the United States government to overthrow the regime of Fidel Castro.
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The construction of the Berlin Wall begins
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The Cuban Missile Crises begins.
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The Supreme Court of the United States ruled in the case of Abington School District vs. Schempp that laws requiring the recitation of the Lord's Prayer or Bible verses in public schools is unconstitutional.
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The Panama Canal incident occurs when Panamanian mobs engage United States troops, leading to the death of twenty-one Panama citizens and four U.S. troops
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Martin Luther King speaks at a civil rights rally on the courthouse steps of the Alabama State Capitol, ending the Selma to Montgomery, Alabama march for voting rights.
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The Voting Rights Act of 1965 is signed into law by President Lyndon B. Johnson. Two significant portions of the act; the outlawing of the requirement of potential voters to take a literacy test in order to qualify and the provision of federal registration of voters in areas with less than 50% of all voters registered.
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Thurgood Marshall is sworn into office as the first black Supreme Court Justice.
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Civil Rights leader Martin Luther King is assassinated in Memphis, Tennessee
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Presidential candidate, the Democratic Senator from New York, Robert F. Kennedy, is shot
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The Civil Rights march on Washington, D.C. for Jobs and Freedom culminates with Dr. Martin Luther King's famous "I Have a Dream" speech from the steps of the Lincoln Memorial. Over 200,000 people participated in the march for equal rights.
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Richard M. Nixon recaptures the White House from the Democratic party with his victory of Hubert H. Humphrey
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The Internet, called Arpanet during its initial development, is invented by the Advanced Research Projects Agency at the U.S. Department of Defense.
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A ban on the television advertisement of cigarettes goes into affect in the United States.
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The Senate approves a Constitutional Amendment, the 26th, that would lower the voting age from 21 to 18
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Walt Disney World opens in Orlando, Florida, expanding the Disney empire to the east coast of the United States
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The Watergate crisis begins when four men are arrested for breaking into the Democratic National Committee headquarters in the Watergate office building in Washington, D.C.
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Secretariat, wins the Belmont Stakes by 31 lengths, winning the Triple Crown of United States Thoroughbred Racing
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President Richard M. Nixon resigns the office of the presidency, avoiding the impeachment process and admitting his role in the Watergate affair. He was replaced by Vice President Gerald R. Ford, who, on September 8, 1974, pardoned Nixon for his role. Nixon was the first president to ever resign from office.
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At the railroad depot in Plains, Georgia, his home town, former Democratic Georgia governor Jimmy Carter opens his campaign headquarters for the 1976 presidential race.