What Happened in 1959?

MAJOR EVENTS:

• Fidel Castro’s forces victorious in Cuban revolution
• Alaska and Hawaii become U.S. states
• U.S. and Canada complete St. Lawrence Seaway
• Vice President Richard Nixon engages Soviet leader Khrushchev in an informal "kitchen debate" at a Moscow trade show where U.S. kitchen appliances are on exhibit

BUSINESS & ECONOMY:

• Congress passes legislation cracking down on union racketeering
• President Eisenhower intervenes to halt protracted steel and longshoremen’s strikes

SCIENCE & TECHNOLOGY:

• Soviet space probe Lunik III photographs far side of the moon
• Xerox launches the first commercial copier
• Boeing 707 Jet Airliner comes into service significantly shortening transatlantic flight time

SPORTS:

• World Series: Los Angeles over Chicago, 4-2
• Jack Nicklaus wins USGA Amateur golf championship

ARTS & ENTERTAINMENT:

• Movies: Suulenly Last Summer, Ben Hur, Anatomy of a Murder, Hiroshima Mon Amour
• Songs: Mack the Knife, High Hopes, Personality, Kansas City, Battle of New Orleans
• TV Shows: Maverick, Rawhide, Fibber McGee and Molly, Peter Gunn, Real McCoys, Dennis the Menace
• Books: Goodbye, Columbus, Philip Roth; Goldfinger, Ian Fleming; The Miracle Worker, William Gibson; The Status Seekers, Vance Packard; The Tin Drum, Günter Grass; Advise and Consent, Allen Drury
• Scandal strikes the popular TV quiz show $64,000 Question when a contestant admits his winning performances were rigged
• Musicals Gypsy, The Sound of Music debut
• U.S. Post Office bans D.H. Lawrence’s Lady Chatterley’s Lover from the mails on obscenity grounds
• Film director Cecil B. De Mille dies
• First Grammy Awards

EVERYDAY LIFE:

• Studies determine that more Americans have died in auto accidents than in all U.S. wars combined
• Playboy magazine debuts, featuring Marilyn Monroe as its first centerfold

FUN FACTS:

• New York City considers lobbying for statehood