1963

January 11 - The Whiskey-a-Go-Go night club in Los Angeles, the first disco in the USA, is opened.
January 14 - George Wallace becomes governor of Alabama.
January 22 - Elys�e treaty between France and Germany
February 8 - Travel, financial and commercial transactions by United States citizens to Cuba are made illegal by the John F. Kennedy administration.
February 11 - CIA Domestic Operations Division is created.
March 4 - In Paris six people are sentenced to death for conspiring to assassinate President Charles de Gaulle.
March 21 - Alcatraz, a federal penitentiary on an island in San Francisco Bay, closes.
March 27 - In Britain Dr Beeching issues report calling for huge cuts to the UK's rail network See Beeching axe.
April 7 - Yugoslavia is proclaimed to be a Socialist republic and Josip Broz Tito is named President for life.
April 22 - Lester B. Pearson becomes Canada's fourteenth prime minister.
May 15 - Mercury program: NASA launches the last mission of the program, Mercury 9 (on June 12 NASA Administrator James Webb told Congress the program was complete).
May 25 - In Addis Ababa, Ethiopia, the Organisation of African Unity is established.
June 16 - Valentina Tereshkova (USSR) becomes the first woman in space.
June 22 - Pope Paul VI is elected by College of Cardinals.
August 5 - United States, Great Britain, and Soviet Union sign a nuclear test ban treaty.
August 8 - The Great Train Robbery takes place in Buckinghamshire, England
August 18 - American civil rights movement: James Meredith becomes the first black person to graduate from the University of Mississippi.
August 28 - Martin Luther King delivers his "I have a dream" speech on the steps at the Lincoln Memorial in Washington D.C
September 15 - American civil rights movement: The 16th Street Baptist Church bombing results in 4 deaths and 22 injuries.
September 29 - Opening of second period of Second Vatican Council in Rome.
October 9 - Uganda becomes a republic.
October 9 - In northeast Italy, over 2,000 people are killed when the Vaiont Dam breaks after a large landslide behind the dam causes water to overtop it.
November 2 - South Vietnamese President Ngo Dihn Diem is assassinated following a military coup.
November 6 - Vietnam War: Following the November 1 coup and murder of President Ngo Dinh Diem, coup leader General Duong Van Minh takes over leadership of South Vietnam.
November 7 - Wunder von Lengede: In Germany, 11 miners are rescued from a collapsed mine after 14 days.
November 9 - 1963 Miike coal-mine explosion: In Japan, a coal mine explosion kills 458 and sends 839 carbon monoxide poisoning victims to the hospital.
November 22 - John F. Kennedy assassination: In Dallas, Texas, US President John F. Kennedy is assassinated, Texas Governor John B. Connally is seriously wounded, and US Vice-President Lyndon B. Johnson is sworn-in as the 36th President of the United States.
November 24 - John F. Kennedy assassination: Alleged assassin Lee Harvey Oswald is mortally shot by Jack Ruby in Dallas, Texas on live national television.
November 24 - Vietnam War: Newly sworn in US President Lyndon B. Johnson confirms that the United States intends to continue supporting South Vietnam militarily and economically.
November 25 - John F. Kennedy assassination: The late US President John F. Kennedy is buried at Arlington National Cemetery.
November 29 - John F. Kennedy assassination: US President Lyndon B. Johnson establishes the Warren Commission to investigate the assassination of President John F. Kennedy.
November 29 - A Douglas DC-8 carrying Trans-Canada Airlines Flight 831 crashes into a wooded hillside after taking-off from Dorval Airport near Montreal, killing all 118 on board (for many years this was the worst air disaster in Canada's history).
December 4 - Closing of second period of Second Vatican Council.
End of the Mercury program of United States manned spaceflight
Frisch and Smith prove radioactive decay of mesons is slowed by their motion. (See Einstein's Special Relativity and General Relativity).
Syncom, the world's first geostationary (synchronous) satellite is orbited by NASA.
Full deployment of SAGE, the semi-automated ground environment.
TAT-3 cable goes into operation.
Geneticist J. B. S. Haldane coins the word "clone".
Arecibo radio telescope officially begins operation.
Ostankino Tower in Moscow begins construction.
The divorce case of the Duke and Duchess of Argyll causes scandal in Great Britain

Year in topic

1963 is the year dubbed "Annus Mirabilis" by British poet Philip Larkin.

1963 in film
- Tom Jones
- Alfred Hitchcock's The Birds
- Charade starring Cary Grant and Audrey Hepburn
- McLintock! starring John Wayne
1963 in literature
1963 in music
- February 11 - The Beatles tape 10 tracks for their 1st album, including Please, Please Me (released on March 2).
1963 in sports
- January 29 - First inductees into the "Pro Football" Hall of Fame are announced
1963 in television
- May 15 - First television pictures transmitted from a U.S. manned space capsule ("Faith 7.") Due to the poor picture quality, only NBC carries the transmission, and on tape-delay, not live
- September 2 ? CBS becomes first network to expand its evening network news from 15 to 30 minutes.
- September 9 - NBC expands its evening network news program to 30 minutes
- November 22 - regular television programming is suspended following news of John F. Kennedy's assassination
- November 23 - first episode of Dr Who is broadcast in the UK.
- November 24 - Jack Ruby murders John F. Kennedy's suspected assassin Lee Harvey Oswald live on television.
- The television remote control is authorized by the FCC.

Births

January 14 - Steven Soderbergh, director
January 21 - Hakeem Olajuwon, basketball
January 23 - Gail O'Grady, actress
January 26 - Andrew Ridgeley, musician
February 9 - Travis Tritt, country music singer
February 11 - Todd Benzinger, American baseball player
February 17 - Michael Jordan, basketball legend
February 19 - Seal, singer
February 20 - Charles Barkley, American basketball player
February 21 - William Baldwin, actor
February 22 - Vijay Singh, golfer
March 4 - Jason Newsted, former bassist of Metallica
March 10 - Neneh Cherry, musician
March 18 - Vanessa Williams, actress, singer, Miss America
March 27 - Quentin Tarantino, actor, director, writer, producer
March 27 - Xuxa, Brazilian television personality
April 4 - Graham Norton, talk show host
April 9 - Joe Scarborough, American cable news host
April 26 - Jet Li, martial arts fighter, actor
May 11 - Natasha Richardson, actress
May 25 - Mike Myers, actor, comedian
June 23 - Colin Montgomerie, golfer.
June 25 - George Michael, singer
July 24 - Karl Malone, basketball
July 30 - Lisa Kudrow, American actress
August 3 - James Hetfield, Metallica frontman and co-founder
September 10 - Randy Johnson, baseball pitcher, five-time Cy Young Award winner
October 10 - Daniel Pearl, journalist (+2002)
October 26 - Natalie Merchant, singer/songwriter/musician
November 18 - Dante Bichette, baseball player
December 2 - John Kennedy Morrisey, entertainer/athlete/storyteller
December 18 - Brad Pitt, actor

Deaths

January 5 - Rogers Hornsby, Baseball Hall of Famer
January 29 - Robert Frost, poet
January 30 - Francis Poulenc, composer
February 11 - Sylvia Plath, poet/novelist.
March 4 - William Carlos Williams, writer
March 5 - Patsy Cline and Cowboy Copas, country music singers
April 6 - Otto Struve, astronomer (+ 1897)
may 31 - Edith Hamilton, educator and author
June 3 - Pope John XXIII
October 11 - Edith Piaf, French singer
October 11 - Jean Cocteau, writer
November 1 - Ngo Dinh Diem, President of South Vietnam
November 22 - John F. Kennedy is assassinated in Dallas, Texas, by Lee Harvey Oswald
November 22 - Aldous Huxley, novelist
November 22 - C.S. Lewis - novelist, Christian apologist, and English professor
November 24 - Lee Harvey Oswald, shot by Jack Ruby
December 1 - Amy Elizabeth Thorpe, American spy in WW II
December 5 - Karl Amadeus Hartmann, composer
December 28 - Paul Hindemith, German composer
Suzanne Duchamp, Dada painter
Theodore Roethke - American poet

Nobel Prizes

Physics - Eugene Paul Wigner, Maria Goeppert-Mayer, J. Hans D. Jensen
Chemistry - Karl Ziegler, Giulio Natta
Medicine - Sir John Carew Eccles, Alan Lloyd Hodgkin, Andrew Fielding Huxley
Literature - Giorgos Seferis
Peace - International Committee of the Red Cross, League of Red Cross Societies

Miscellaneous

Harvey Ball invents the ubiquitous smiley

1963

Events

Year in topic

Births

Deaths

Nobel Prizes

Miscellaneous