1951

Years: 1948 1949 1950 - 1951 - 1952 1953 1954
Decades: 1920s 1930s 1940s - 1950s - 1960s 1970s 1980s
Centuries: 19th century - 20th century - 21st century 1951 in art 1951 in aviation 1951 in film 1951 in literature 1951 in music 1951 in radio 1951 in science 1951 in sports 1951 in television 1951 in Canada

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Events

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January-February

January 9 - United Nations headquarters officially opens (New York City).
January 15 - Ilse Koch, The "Witch of Buchenwald," wife of the commandant of the Buchenwald concentration camp, is sentenced to life imprisonment in a court in West Germany.
January 17 - Korean War: Chinese and North Korean forces capture Seoul.
January 20 - Avalanches in the Alps - 240 die and 45.000 are buried for a time in Switzerland, Austria and Italy
January 27 - Nuclear testing at the Nevada Test Site begins with a one-kiloton bomb dropped on Frenchman Flats, northwest of Las Vegas, Nevada.
February 1 - United Nations General Assembly declares that China is the aggressor in the Korean War
February 12 - Marriage of Muhammad Reza Shah to Soraya Esfandiary Bakhtiari
February 27 - The Twenty-second Amendment to the United States Constitution, limiting Presidents to two terms, is ratified.

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March-June

March 1 - the city Yaizu, located in Shizuoka, Japan, is founded
March 6 - The trial of Ethel and Julius Rosenberg begins.
March 7 - Korean War: Operation Ripper - In Korea, United Nations troops led by General Matthew Ridgeway begin an assault against the Chinese "volunteers".
March 12 - The Dennis the Menace comic strip appears in newspapers across the U.S. for the first time.
March 14 - Korean War: For the second time, United Nations troops recapture Seoul.
March 14 - West Germany joins UNESCO
March 29 - Red Scare: Ethel and Julius Rosenberg are convicted of conspiracy to commit espionage. On April 5 they are sentenced to receive the death penalty.
March 30 - Remington Rand delivers the first UNIVAC I computer to the United States Census Bureau.
April 1 - Australia, New Zealand, United States security treaty signed in San Francisco.
April 1 - Female suffrage in Greece
April 11 - Stone of Scone found in Scottish church
April 18 - Treaty of Paris (1951) adopted, establishing European Coal and Steel Community (ECSC); see EU.
May 1 - Opera house of Geneve almost destroyed in a fire
May 15 - Military coup in Bolivia
June 14 - UNIVAC I is dedicated by U.S. Census Bureau.
June 15 - July 1- In New Mexico, Arizona, California, Oregon, Washington, and British Columbia, thousands of acres (several km²) of forests were destroyed in fires.

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July-October

July 5 - William Shockley invents the junction transistor.
July 10 - Korean War: At Kaesong, armistice negotiations begin.
July 14 - In Joplin, Missouri, George Washington Carver National Monument becomes the first United States National Monument in honor of an African American.
July 20 - King Abdullah I of Jordan is assassinated while attending Friday prayers in Jerusalem.
September 1 - The United States, Australia and New Zealand all sign a mutual defense pact, called the ANZUS Treaty (for "Australia, New Zealand, United States").
September 8 - Treaty of San Francisco: In San Francisco, California, 48 nations sign Sign a peace treaty with Japan in formal recognition of the end of the Pacific War.
September 10 - The United Kingdom begins an economic boycott of Iran
October 16 - Liaquat Ali Khan, first Prime Minister of Pakistan assassinated in Rawalpindi
October 18 - Yitzhak Bezner, Israeli official, meets leading Japanese industrialists as part of a mission to establish Israeli-Japanese economic ties.
September 20 - NATO accepts Greece and Turkey as members
September 26-28 - Blue sun seen over Europe; effect is due to ash coming from the Canadian forest fires four months previously
October 7 - Malayan Emergency - communist insurgents kill British commander Sir Henry Gurney
October 16 - Assassination of Liaquat Ali Khan, president of Pakistan
October 21 - Storm in southern Italy - over 100 dead
October 26 - Winston Churchill re-elected British Prime Minister; his foreign minister is Anthony Eden
October 27 - Farouk of Egypt declares himself also as a king of Sudan - no support

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November-December

November 1 - First military exercises for nuclear war, with infantry troops included, in the Nevada desert
November 11 - Juan Peron re-elected president of Argentina
November 20 - Po river floods in northern Italy
November 10 - Direct-dial coast-to-coast telephone service begins in the United States.
November 24 - The Broadway play Gigi opens starring little known actress Audrey Hepburn playing the lead character (the play ran for six months and led to Hepburn's film debut in Roman Holiday).
December 6 - State of emergency in Egypt due to increasing riots
December 13 - Water tank collapses in Tucamcari, New Mexico - 4 dead, 200 buildings destroyed
December 24 - Libya becomes independent from Italy

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Unknown date

A fourth, and final, forest fire starts in the Tillamook Burn; but unlike earlier fires this one only burns 32,700 acres (132 km²), and within area already affected by the earlier fires.
IBM United Kingdom formed

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Year in topic

1951 in film
- An American in Paris
- The African Queen, starring Humphrey Bogart and Katharine Hepburn
- A Streetcar Named Desire
- Flying Leathernecks starring John Wayne
1951 in literature
- The Catcher in the Rye
1951 in music
- The release of "Rocket 88", a song by Jackie Brenston and his Delta Cats. Some music historians consider this record to be the first rock and roll recording.
1951 in sports
1951 in television
- January 3 - Dragnet airs on television for the first time (NBC).
- May 28 - The U. S. Supreme Court upholds the FCC's approval of the CBS color television system
- June 25 ? CBS presents its first commercial color telecast with Arthur Godfrey, Ed Sullivan, and Faye Emerson.
- June - RCA demonstrates its new electronic color system.
- August 11 - The first baseball games televised in color, a double-header between the Brooklyn Dodgers and the Boston Braves
- September 4 - The first coast-to-coast TV broadcast in the United States, featuring President Truman.
- September 22 - The first live sporting event seen coast-to-coast in the United States, a college football game between Duke and the University of Pittsburgh, is televised on NBC.
- October 3 - The first live coast-to-coast network telecast of a World Series game in the United States
- October 15 - I Love Lucy debuts on CBS.
- December 24 - The first televised opera written for television, Amahl and the Night Visitor, airs on NBC.
- Ernie Kovacs' Time for Ernie and Ernie in Kovacsland television shows premiere. Kovacs pushes the limits of television technology with his use of camera tricks and special effects.

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Births

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January-March

January 6 - Kim Wilson, rock musician
January 12 - Kirstie Alley, actress
January 12 - Rush Limbaugh, radio personality
January 30 - Phil Collins, musician
February 6 - Princess Daphné of Belgium
February 15 - Melissa Manchester, singer
February 15 - Jane Seymour, actress
February 20 - Gordon Brown, British politician
February 25 - Don Quarrie, Jamaican sprinter
March 4 - Kenny Dalglish footballer and football manager
March 4 - Chris Rea, British singer and musician
March 17 - Kurt Russell, actor
March 24 - Tommy Hilfiger, fashion designer

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April-June

April 6 - Bert Blyleven, baseball pitcher
April 7 - Janis Ian, singer and songwriter
April 10 - Steven Seagal, actor
April 11 - Doris McGowen Beck Angleton, Houston, Texas socialite (d. 1997)
April 13 - Peabo Bryson, pop singer
April 13 - Peter Davison, actor and the fifth Doctor Who
April 13 - Max Weinberg, drummer
April 29 - Dale Earnhardt, stock car racer (NASCAR) (d. 2001)
May 15 - Jonathan Richman, musician
May 23 - Anatoly Karpov, chess world champion
May 26 - Sally Ride, astronaut
May 30 - Stephen Tobolowsky, actor
June 2 - Larry Robinson, Hockey Hall of Fame defenseman
June 14 - Paul Boateng, British politician, first black Cabinet minister
June 17 - Mary McAleese, eighth President of Ireland
June 20 - Tress MacNeille, voice actress (The Simpsons, Animaniacs, Rugrats)

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July-December

July 3 - Richard Hadlee, New Zealand cricketer
July 5 - Rich "Goose" Gossage, baseball pitcher
July 8 - Anjelica Huston, actress
July 10 - Cheryl Wheeler, singer/songwriter
June 28 - Lloyd Maines, country music musician and record producer
July 24 - Chris Smith, British politician, first "out" gay MP
August 3 - Marcel Dionne, Hockey Hall of Famer
August 20 - Greg Bear, science fiction author
August 23 - Akhmad Kadyrov, President of Chechnya
August 23 - Queen Noor of Jordan
August 24 - Orson Scott Card, science fiction author
September 7 - Julie Kavner, voice actress (The Simpsons)
September 12 - Joe Pantoliano, actor (The Matrix, The Sopranos)
September 22 - David Coverdale, singer
September 29 - Maureen Caird, Australian hurdler
October 3 - Dave Winfield, Baseball Hall of Famer
October 6 - Manfred Winkelhock, auto racing driver
October 10 - Ratu Epeli Ganilau, Fijian soldier and statesman.
November 15 - Alamgir Hashmi, poet, scholar, professor
November 19 - Lord Falconer, British lawyer and politician
November 30 - Christian Bernard, F.R.C., Rosicrucian, Imperator of AMORC
December 17 - Ken Hitchcock, NHL coach

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Deaths

January 10 - Sinclair Lewis, writer
February 9 - Eddy Duchin, musician
February 13 - Lloyd C. Douglas, author
February 18 - Lyman Gilmore, Choctaw Native American airplane pioneer
February 19 - André Gide, author
February 21 - Choudhary Rahmat Ali, founding father of Pakistan (b. 1895)
March 6 - Ivor Novello, actor, musician, composer
March 10 - Shidehara Kijuro, Japanese prime minister
March 25 - Eddie Collins, Baseball Hall of Famer (b. 1887)
March 25 - Oscar Micheaux, pioneer African-American, filmmaker/author
April 4 - Al Christie, early Hollywood director/producer
April 6 - Robert Broom, paleontologist
April 22 - Horace Donisthorpe, myrmecologist
April 23 - Charles G. Dawes, former U.S. vice-president
May 7 - Warner Baxter, actor
May 30 - Hermann Broch, Austrian author
June 13 - Ben Chifley, Australian Prime Minister
June 21 - Charles Dillon Perrine, astronomer (b. 1867)
July 9 - Harry Heilmann, Baseball Hall of Famer (b. 1894)
July 13 - Arnold Schoenberg, Austrian composer
July 20 - King Abdullah, King of Jordan
July 23 - Robert J. Flaherty, filmmaker
July 29 - Hozumi Shigeto, Japanese author
August 14 - William Randolph Hearst, publisher and newspaper baron
August 15 - Artur Schnabel, pianist
August 21 - Constant Lambert, composer
October 16 - Liaquat Ali Khan, first Prime Minister of Pakistan
November 5 - Reggie Walker, South African athlete
November 9 - Sigmund Romberg, composer

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Nobel Prizes

Physics - John Cockcroft, Ernest Walton
Chemistry - Edwin McMillan, Glenn T. Seaborg
Medicine - Max Theiler
Literature - Pär Lagerkvist
Peace - Léon Jouhaux


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