What happened in 1955

45 events　World 2, Japan 4, North America 13, Europe 11, USSR / Russia 1, Asia 8, Middle East 1, Africa 2, Oceania 3

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Highlights of 1955

World2

  • Feb 24The Baghdad Pact (CENTO), originally known as Middle East Treaty Organization (METO), is signed between Iraq and Turkey.
  • Sep 15Vladimir Nabokov's controversial novel Lolita is published in Paris, by Olympia Press.

Japan4

  • AprPencil rocketItokawa Hideo and colleagues at the University of Tokyo fired a tiny 23 cm rocket horizontally. Japan's rocket development started here.
  • May 11Japanese National Railways' ferry Shiun Maru sinks after a collision with sister ship Uko Maru, in thick fog off Takamatsu, Shikoku, in the Seto Inland Sea of Japan; 166 passengers (many children) and 2 crew members are killed. This event is influential in plans to construct the Akashi Kaikyō Bridge (built 1986–98).
  • AugJapan's first transistor radioTokyo Tsushin Kogyo (later Sony) released the TR-55. Two years later the pocket-sized TR-63 sold well in the United States too, and it became a foothold for Japanese electronics makers going global.
  • Nov 15The Democratic Party of Japan and Japan Liberal Party merge to form the Japan Liberal Democratic Party, beginning the "1955 System".

North America13

  • Mar 20The movie adaptation of Evan Hunter's novel Blackboard Jungle premieres in the United States, featuring the famous single "Rock Around the Clock" by Bill Haley & His Comets. Teenagers jump from their seats to dance to the song.
  • Apr 12The Salk polio vaccine, having passed large-scale trials earlier in the United States, receives full approval by the Food and Drug Administration.
  • Aug 1The prototype Lockheed U-2 reconnaissance aircraft first flies, in Nevada.
  • Aug 28Black 14-year-old Emmett Till is lynched and shot in the head for allegedly whistling at a white woman in Money, Mississippi; his white murderers, Roy Bryant and J. W. Milam, are acquitted by an all-white jury.
  • Sep 3Little Richard records "Tutti Frutti" in New Orleans; it is released in October.
  • Sep 10The long-running Western television series Gunsmoke debuts, on the CBS network in the United States.
  • Sep 30Actor James Dean is killed when his automobile collides with another car at a highway junction, near Cholame, California.
  • Oct 5Disneyland Hotel opens to the public in Anaheim, California.
  • Oct 11mm film for projection is introduced, with the theatrical release of Rodgers and Hammerstein's musical film, Oklahoma!.
  • Nov 1A time bomb explodes in the cargo hold of United Airlines Flight 629, a Douglas DC-6B, over Longmont, Colorado, killing all 39 passengers and 5 crew members on board.
  • Dec 1In Montgomery, Alabama, Rosa Parks refuses to obey bus driver James F. Blake's order that she give up her seat to make room for a white passenger, and is arrested, leading to the Montgomery bus boycott.
  • Dec 5The Montgomery Improvement Association is formed in Montgomery, Alabama, by Dr. Martin Luther King Jr., and other Black ministers to coordinate the Montgomery bus boycott by Black people.
  • Dec 5The American Federation of Labor and the Congress of Industrial Organizations merge, to become the AFL–CIO.

Europe11

  • Apr 1EOKA starts a resistance campaign against British rule in the Crown colony of Cyprus.
  • May 6The Western European Union Charter becomes effective.
  • May 15The Austrian State Treaty, which restores Austria's national sovereignty, is concluded between the 4 occupying powers following World War II (the United Kingdom, the United States, the Soviet Union, and France) and Austria, setting it up as a neutral country.
  • Jun 11Le Mans disaster: Eighty-three people are killed when two racing cars collide in the 1955 24 Hours of Le Mans.
  • Jul 13Ruth Ellis is hanged for murder in London, becoming the last woman ever to be executed in the United Kingdom.
  • Jul 18Geneva Summit between the United States, Soviet Union, United Kingdom and France.
  • Jul 27El Al Flight 402 from Vienna (Austria) to Tel Aviv, via Istanbul, is shot down over Bulgaria. All 58 passengers and crewmen aboard the Lockheed Constellation are killed.
  • Sep 22Commercial television starts in the United Kingdom with the Independent Television Authority's first ITV franchises beginning broadcasting in London, ending the BBC monopoly.
  • Oct 26After the last Allied troops have left Austria, and following the provisions of the Austrian Independence Treaty, the country declares its permanent neutrality.
  • Dec 4The International Federation of Blood Donor Organizations is founded in Luxembourg.
  • Dec 31Austria becomes independent, under terms of the May 15 Austrian State Treaty.

USSR / Russia1

  • May 14Eight Communist Bloc countries, including the Soviet Union, sign a mutual defence treaty in Warsaw, Poland, that is called the Warsaw Pact (it will be dissolved in 1991).

Asia8

  • Jan 18Battle of Yijiangshan Islands: The Chinese Communist People's Liberation Army seizes the islands from the Republic of China (Taiwan).
  • Feb 19The Southeast Asia Treaty Organization (SEATO) is established, at a meeting in Bangkok.
  • Apr 11The Taiwanese Kuomintang put a bomb on the airplane Kashmir Princess, killing 16 but failing to assassinate the People's Republic of China leader, Zhou Enlai.
  • Apr 18The Asian-African Conference is held in Bandung, Indonesia.
  • May 18Free movement of residents between North and South Vietnam ends.
  • Aug 26Satyajit Ray's film Pather Panchali is released in India.
  • Oct 26Ngô Đình Diệm proclaims Vietnam to be a republic, with himself as its President (following the State of Vietnam referendum on October 23), and forms the Army of the Republic of Vietnam.
  • Nov 1Official start date of the Vietnam War between the Democratic Republic of Vietnam and Republic of Vietnam; the north is allied with the Viet Cong.

Middle East1

  • Sep 6Istanbul pogrom: Istanbul's Greek minority is the target of a government-sponsored pogrom.

Africa2

  • Jun 26The Freedom Charter of the anti-apartheid South African Congress Alliance is adopted, at a Congress of the People in Kliptown.
  • Aug 18The First Sudanese Civil War begins.

Oceania3

  • Jul 7The New Zealand Special Air Service is formed.
  • Nov 3The Rimutaka Tunnel opens on the New Zealand Railways, at 5.46 mi (8.79 km), the longest in the Southern Hemisphere at this time.
  • Nov 23The Cocos Islands in the Indian Ocean are transferred from British to Australian control.