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Lunch Counter Sit-In at Woolworth's In Greenboro, NC
Non-violent protest by young African-American students at a segregated Woolworth's lunch counter in Greensboro, North Carolina, sparked a sit-in movement that soon spread to college towns throughout the region. -
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1960's Timeline
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FDA approves the pill
The Food and Drug Administration (FDA) approves the world's first commercially produced birth-control bill. -
First Televised Presidential Debates
Massachusetts Democratic Senator John F. Kennedy and Republican Vice President Richard M. Nixon face each other in a nationally televised presidential campaign debate. -
Bay of Pigs Invasion
Fidel Castro drove his guerilla army into Havana and overthrew General Fulgencio Batista, the nation’s American-backed president. For the next two years, officials at the U.S. State Department and the Central Intelligence Agency attempted to push Castro from power. -
Peace Corps Established
President John F. Kennedy issues Executive Order #10924, establishing the Peace Corps as a new agency within the Department of State. The same day, he sent a message to Congress asking for permanent funding for the agency, which would send trained American men and women to foreign nations to assist in development efforts. -
Soviets Launch First Man In Space
Soviet cosmonaut Yuri Alekseyevich Gagarin becomes the first human being to travel into space. During the flight,Gagarin became the first man to orbit the planet -
Freedom Riders
13 African-American and white civil rights activists launched the Freedom Rides, a series of bus trips through the American South to protest segregation in interstate bus terminals. -
Rachel Carson Publishes Silent Spring
Silent Spring is a book written by Rachel Carson and published by Houghton Mifflin on September 27, 1962. The book is widely credited with helping launch the contemporary American environmental movement. -
James Meredith Admitted Into the Segregated University of Mississippi
After a legal battle, an African-American man named James Meredith attempted to enroll at the University of Mississippi. Chaos briefly broke out on the Ole Miss campus, with riots ending in two dead, hundreds wounded and many others arrested, after the Kennedy administration called out some 31,000 National Guardsmen and other federal forces to enforce order. -
Cuban Missile Crisis (Oct.14-28)
13-day political and military standoff in over the installation of nuclear-armed Soviet missiles in Cuba, just 90 miles from U.S. shores. -
Medger Evers Is Murdered
Evers was assassinated by Byron De La Beckwith, a member of the White Citizens' Council. As a veteran, Evers was buried with full military honors at Arlington National Cemetery. His murder and the resulting trials inspired civil rights protests, as well as numerous works of art, music, and film. -
March on Washington
200,000 Americans gathered in Washington, D.C., for a political rally known as the March on Washington for Jobs and Freedom. Organized by a number of civil rights and religious groups, the event was designed to shed light on the political and social challenges African Americans continued to face across the country. -
Martin Luther King Jr. Makes His "I Have a Dream" Speech
"I Have a Dream" is a public speech delivered by American civil rights activist Martin Luther King, Jr. on August 28, 1963, in which he called for an end to racism in the United States. Delivered to over 250,000 civil rights supporters from the steps of the Lincoln Memorial during the March on Washington, the speech was a defining moment of the American Civil Rights Movement.[ -
"Hot Line" Established Between U.S and U.S.S.R
Two months after signing an agreement to establish a 24-hour-a-day "hot line" between Moscow and Washington. The hot line was supposed to help speed communication between the governments of the United States and the Soviet Union and help prevent the possibility of an accidental war. -
16th Street Baptist Church Bombng
16th Street Baptist Church in Birmingham, Alabama was bombed on Sunday, September 15, 1963 as an act of racially motivated terrorism. The explosion at the African-American church, which killed four girls. -
Buddhist Monk Sets Himself on Fire In Protest
Crowds gathered to protest in Hue after the South Vietnamese government prohibited Buddhists from carrying flags on Buddha's birthday. Government troops opened fire to disperse the dissidents, killing nine people, Diems government blamed the incident on the Vietcong and never admitted responsibility. The Buddhist leadership quickly organized demonstrations that eventually led to seven monks burning themselves to death. -
John F. Kennedy Assassinated
Assassinated while traveling through Dallas, Texas, in an open-top convertible. Lee Harvey Oswald allegedly fired three shots from the sixth floor, fatally wounding President Kennedy and seriously injuring Governor Connally. Kennedy was pronounced dead 30 minutes later at Dallas' Parkland Hospital. -
Beatles Become Popular In U.S
Beatlemania had overtaken Great Britain, the Beatles still had the challenge of the United States. Despite already having achieved one number-one hit in the U.S. and had been greeted by 5,000 screaming fans when they arrived at the New York airport, it was the Beatles' February 9, 1964, appearance on The Ed Sullivan Show. -
Cassius Clay Becomes World Heavweight Champion
Cassius Clay, defeats champion Sonny Liston in a technical knockout to win the world heavyweight boxing crown. -
Civil Rights Act Passes In U.S.
Ended segregation in public places and banned employment discrimination on the basis of race, color, religion, sex or national origin, is considered one of the crowning legislative achievements of the civil rights movement. -
Warren Report on JFK's Assassination Issued
889-page final report was presented to President Johnson on September 24, 1964 and made public three days later. It concluded that Lee Harvey Oswald acted alone in killing Kennedy and wounding Texas Governor John Connally and that Jack Ruby also acted alone when he killed Oswald two days later. -
U.S. Sends Troops to Vietnam
This was the first commitment of American combat troops in South Vietnam and there was considerable reaction around the world to the new stage of U.S. involvement in the war. -
Malcom X Assassinated
Shortly after repudiating the Nation of Islam, he was assassinated by three of its members. -
Los Angeles Riots (Watts Riots) August 11-17
Race riot which took place in the Watts neighborhood of Los Angeles from August 11 to 17, 1965. The six-day unrest resulted in 34 deaths, 1,032 injuries, 3,438 arrests, and over $40 million in property damage. -
Mao Zedong Launches the Cultural Revolution
China's Communist leader Mao Zedong launched what became known as the Cultural Revolution in order to reassert his authority over the Chinese government -
National Organization for Women (NOW) Founded
NOW was founded on June 30, 1966, in Washington, D.C., by 28 people attending the Third National Conference of State Commissions on the Status of Women, the successor to the Presidential Commission on the Status of Women. -
Mass Drafts Protests In U.S.Sep.25 1965 to Jan. 1966
The protests were part of a movement in opposition to the Vietnam War and took place mainly in the United States. From September 1965 to January 1966, 170,000 men had been drafted and another 180,000 enlisted. By January, 2,000,000 men had secured college deferments. -
Black Panther Party Established
Black revolutionary socialist organization active in the United States from 1966 until 1982. The Black Panther Party achieved national and international notoriety through its involvement in the Black Power movement and U.S. politics of the 1960s and 1970s. -
Thurgood Marshall Becomes e First African-American U.S. Supreme Court Justice
On June 13, 1967, President Johnson nominated Marshall to the Supreme Court following the retirement of Justice Tom C. Clark. Marshall was confirmed as an Associate Justice by a Senate vote of 69–11 on August 30, 1967. The first African American Supreme Court Justice. -
Tet Offensive
Forces of the Viet Cong and North Vietnamese Army against South Vietnam, the United States, and their allies. It was a campaign of surprise attacks against military and civilian commands and control centers throughout South Vietnam -
My Lai Massacre
Vietnam War mass murder of between 347 and 504 unarmed civilians in South Vietnam on March 16, 1968. It was committed by the U.S. Army soldiers. -
Martin Luther King Assassinated
King had been standing on the balcony in front of his room at the Lorraine Motel in Memphis, Tennessee, when, without warning, he was shot. The .30-caliber rifle bullet entered King's right cheek, traveled through his neck, and finally stopped at his shoulder blade. King was immediately taken to a nearby hospital but was pronounced dead at 7:05 p.m. -
Robert F. Kennedy Assassinated
After winning the California and South Dakota primary elections for the Democratic nomination for President of the United States, Kennedy was shot as he walked through the kitchen of the Ambassador Hotel and died in the Good Samaritan Hospital twenty-six hours later. -
Neil Armstrong Becomes the First Man on the Moon
Apollo 11 mission, astronaut Neil Armstrong opened the hatch of the lunar module and stepped out onto the ladder. Once at the bottom of the ladder, Armstrong stepped onto the surface of the moon and became the very first man on the moon. -
Rock-and-Roll Concert at Woodstock Aug.15-18
500,000 young people from across the United States converged on Max Yasgur's 600-acre dairy farm in Bethel, New York. The Woodstock Music Festival became an icon of the 1960s hippie counterculture.