1955

Years: 1952 1953 1954 - 1955 - 1956 1957 1958
Decades: 1920s 1930s 1940s - 1950s - 1960s 1970s 1980s
Centuries: 19th century - 20th century - 21st century 1955 in architecture 1955 in art 1955 in aviation 1955 in film 1955 in literature 1955 in music 1955 in radio 1955 in science 1955 in sports 1955 in television 1955 in Canada 1955 in India

1955 is a common year starting on Saturday.

Events

March 2:
- King Norodom Sihanouk of Cambodia abdicates the throne in favor of his father, King Norodom Suramarit.
- Severe flooding in North and Western Australia – 200 humans and tens of thousands of sheep dead, 44.000 homeless
March 25 - United States Customs seizes Allen Ginsberg's Howl as obscene.

May 5 - West Germany becomes a sovereign nation
May 9 - Cold War: West Germany joins NATO.
May 14 - Cold War: Eight communist bloc countries including the Soviet Union sign a mutual-defense treaty called the Warsaw Pact.
May 15 - First ascent of Makalu, fifth highest mountain.
May 20 – Peace talks with Mau Mau in Kenya fail again
May 25 - First ascent of Kanchenjunga, 3rd highest mountain.

Assassination of Florida judge Curtis Chillingworth
June 11 - On the Le Mans racetrack, three cars crash into spectator's grandstand - 70 dead, more than 100 injured
June 20 - Very long (7min 08sec) total solar eclipse visible in Southeast Asia. During the entire Second Millennium, only seven total solar eclipses exceeded seven minutes of totality. This was the next to last.

August 19 - In the Northeast United States, severe flooding caused by Hurricane Diane, claims 200 lives.
August 20 - Eight World Scout Jamboree opens in Niagara-on-the-Lake, Ontario, Canada.
August 20 - In Morocco, a force of Berbers from the Atlas Mountains region of Algeria, raid two rural settlements and kill 77 French nationals.
August 27 - The first edition of the Guinness Book of Records
August 28 - Emmett Till, a black teenager from Chicago, is murdered in Money, Mississippi, by white men angered because he whistled at a white woman while buying groceries.

September 11 - Dedication of the first Temple of the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints in Europe, the Bern Switzerland Temple.
September 14 - Konrad Adenauer travels to Moscow to establish diplomatic relations and to negotiate for the release of the remaining German prisoners of war in the Soviet Union
September 16 - A military coup in Argentina deposes Juan Peron.

October 2 - The ENIAC computer is deactivated.
October 7 - The last German prisoners of war are released from the Soviet Union
October 23 - The Saarland is once again part of West Germany, following a referendum
October 26 - Austrian independence is declared again forming the Second Republic with the declaration of everlasting neutrality and the state constitution.
October 29 - The Soviet battleship Novorossiisk strikes a World War II mine in the harbor at Sevastopol.

November 1 - The first international solar energy conference is held in Tucson, Arizona
November 1 - DC-6B explodes in mid air after takeoff in Denver, Colorado - 44 dead (later proves to be a time bomb placed by John Gilbert Graham)
November 2 – Entry into catacombs of Paris becomes illegal and punishable by a fine
November 20 - Train crash near Didcot, Oxfordshire - 10 dead, 99 injured
November 22 - Soviet Union nuclear test in Siberia.
November 23 - The Cocos Islands are transferred from United Kingdom to Australian control.
November 24 - Fokker F27 first flight.

December 1 - American Civil Rights Movement: In Montgomery, Alabama, seamstress Rosa Parks refuses to give her bus seat to a white man and is arrested for violating the city's racial segregation laws (Baptist minister Martin Luther King, Jr. later led the successful Montgomery Bus Boycott as a result).
December 7 - Clement Attlee resigns as leader of the Labour Party - his successor is Hugh Gaitskell.
December 19 - Sudanese Parliament declares independence.
December 31 - General Motors becomes the first American corporation to make sales of over one billion dollars in a year.

Dick Bruna draws Miffy for the first time.
Winston Churchill resigns as Prime Minister of Britain for the second time.
Mattachine Society, one of the first gay rights organizations, is founded in the City of New York.
Maurice Wilkes publishes a description of microprogramming in IEEE Spectrum.