Suvarna Garge (Editor)

April 1964

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The following events occurred in April 1964:

Contents

April 1, 1964 (Wednesday)

  • Queen Elizabeth II became the Lord High Admiral of the United Kingdom as part of the reorganization of the defense of the nation. The post of First Lord of the Admiralty, held for the past year by the Earl Jellicoe, was abolished after 163 years. The position of Minister of Defence, held by Peter Thorneycroft, Baron Thorneycroft, became the Secretary of State for Defence.
  • The Trident jet airliner began regular service, with British European Airways Flight 564 from London to Zurich.
  • The Plymouth Barracuda was introduced by the Chrysler corporation.
  • Brazil's President João Goulart fled from Rio de Janeiro as rebel units of the 2nd Brazilian Army Corps approached the city to carry out a coup d'état. Goulart flew to Brasilia, then to his home in Porto Alegre, where he pledged to take command of the Brazilian 3rd Army in a bid to reclaim his office.
  • Died: Alejandro Lavorante, 27, Argentina heavyweight boxing champion, died 18 months after being knocked out on September 21, 1962. Earlier in the year, he had fought, and been knocked out by, both Archie Moore and Muhammad Ali. Lavorante never woke up after a bout with Johnny Riggins.

    • April 2, 1964 (Thursday)

  • Ranieri Mazzilli, the presiding officer of Brazil's Chamber of Deputies, was sworn in as the new President of Brazil, while João Goulart abandoned further efforts to fight the coup leaders. Goulart and his family drove from his ranch in São Borja, and crossed the border to reach Santo Tomé in Argentina. U.S. President Lyndon Johnson, who was in favor of the ouster of Goulart by anti-Communist forces, sent a cable to Mazzilli, and called the relationship between the U.S. and Brazil "a precious asset in the interest of peace and prosperity and liberty in this hemisphere and in the whole world." Mazzilli would step down on April 15 when the Brazilian Congress elected Humberto Castelo Branco to the Presidency.
  • Alfons Gorbach resigned as Chancellor of Austria and was succeeded by Josef Klaus, who would serve until 1970.
  • Mrs. Malcolm Peabody, 72, mother of Massachusetts Governor Endicott Peabody, was released on $450 bond after spending two days in a St. Augustine, Florida jail, for participating in an anti-segregation demonstration there.
  • Died: Carlos Hevia, 64, President of Cuba for three days (January 15 to January 18) in 1934.

    • April 3, 1964 (Friday)

  • Malcolm X gave his speech, "The Ballot or the Bullet", at the Cory Methodist Church in Cleveland, Ohio, calling on African-Americans to reconsider the policy of nonviolent resistance in pursuit of equal rights. "Don't be throwing out any ballots," he told the crowd; "A ballot is like a bullet. You don't throw your ballots until you see a target, and if that target is not within your reach, keep your ballot in your pocket." He closed by saying, "in areas where the government has proven itself either unwilling or unable to defend the lives and the property of Negroes, it's time for Negroes to defend themselves. This doesn't mean you're going to get a rifle and form battalions and go looking for white folks, although you'd be within your rights... If the white man doesn't want the black man buying rifles and shotguns, then let the government do its job. That's all... In 1964, it's the ballot or the bullet."
  • The Communist Party of the Soviet Union issued a statement calling the Communist Party of China "the main danger to the unity of the world communist movement", and called for a summit of the leaders of the world's communist parties. Printed in the party newspaper Pravda, the CPSU wrote that "Peking is steering a course toward a split among the communist parties, toward the setting up of factions and groups hostile to Marxism-Leninism."
  • Panama resumed diplomatic relations with the United States, after a split on January 17. An agreement between representatives of the two nations was signed at a meeting of the Council of the Organization of American States in Washington.
  • Born: Nigel Farage, British politician, in Farnborough, Kent
  • Died: John Haynes Holmes, 84, African-American activist and co-founder of the NAACP and the ACLU

    • April 4, 1964 (Saturday)

  • The Beatles held the top five positions in the Billboard Top 40 singles in America, an unprecedented achievement. The top songs in America as listed on April 4, in order, were: "Can't Buy Me Love", "Twist and Shout", "She Loves You", "I Want to Hold Your Hand", and "Please Please Me". "No one had ever done anything even close to this before," an author would note later, "and it is doubtful the conditions will ever exist for anyone to do it again." The Beatles also held the 31st, 41st, 46th, 58th, 65th, 68th and 79th spots in Billboard's Hot 100.
  • Three high school friends in Hoboken, New Jersey— Tony Conza, Peter DeCarlo and Angelo Baldassare— opened the first Blimpie submarine sandwich restaurant.

    • April 5, 1964 (Sunday)

  • Jigme Palden Dorji, the first Prime Minister of Bhutan, was shot and fatally wounded by an assassin while visiting the city of Phuntsholing. According to early reports, Dorji had been relaxing in a travelers home when the killer fired through an open window and shot him in the back. He died the next day.
  • Elections for the 99-seat Majlis an-Nuwwab began in Lebanon, and would continue on consecutive Sundays until May 3.
  • A United States Marine Corps F-8C fighter suffered a mechanical malfunction and crashed into a residential neighborhood at Hara Machida near Tokyo, killing four people on the ground and injuring 32 others. The aircraft's pilot ejected and was not seriously injured.
  • Died: Douglas MacArthur, 84, U.S. Army five-star general and hero of World War II and the Korean War.

    • April 6, 1964 (Monday)

  • Vatican City became associated with the United Nations with the creation of the Permanent Observer of the Holy See to the United Nations, allowing it to participate, but not to vote, in the UN General Assembly.
  • A group of 16 employees of the IBM company, led by Gene Amdahl and Gerrit Blaauw, filed a patent application for a data processing system machine. U.S. Patent number 3,400,371 would be granted on September 3, 1968.

    • April 7, 1964 (Tuesday)

  • IBM announced the System/360 mainframe computer system, the first commercially available system to use micro-miniaturized logic circuits. The new machine, which IBM chairman Thomas J. Watson, Jr. described as "the beginning of a new generation— not only of computers— but their application in business, science and government", was shown off at meetings in 165 cities before a total of 100,000 customers. The system could "accept messages from remote locations, no matter what the distance" and could "communicate simultaneously with 248 terminals". The most basic system had a storage of 8 kilobytes and the largest could accommodate 8 megabytes.
  • The Ayatollah Ruhollah Khomeini, a Shi'ite Muslim cleric who would eventually be the leader of Iran was released from prison in Tehran and permitted to relocate within to the city of Qom.
  • Born: Russell Crowe, New Zealand-born film actor, in Wellington
  • Died:
  • John Alan West, 53, English crime victim was murdered durign a burglary in his home in Workington. Gwynne Owen Evans and Peter Anthony Allen would be convicted of the murder and, on August 13, 1964, would become the last two people to be legally executed in the United Kingdom.
  • Bruce W. Klunder, 26, American Presbyterian minister, was accidentally killed in Cleveland, Ohio, while protesting the construction of a new school that would have reinforced the Ohio city's pattern of racially-segregated school districting. Klunder had and three other protesters attempted to block the path of a bulldozer by lying down in its path, and the machine backed over him.

    • April 8, 1964 (Wednesday)

  • The United States launched its first Project Gemini spacecraft, capable of accommodating two astronauts and a successor to the one-astronaut Project Mercury capsules. The unmanned Gemini 1 ship lifted off from Cape Kennedy in Florida at 11:00 a.m. and, along with the second stage of its Titan II rocket, reached orbit six minutes later. The craft would make 64 orbits over four days before burning up in the atmosphere on re-entry over the South Atlantic Ocean.
  • Sheikh Abdullah, the former head of government of the Indian state of Jammu and Kashmir, was released from incarceration by the government of India after more than ten years of confinement on accusations of seeking Kashmir independence. Abdullah returned to Srinagar to a hero's welcome.
  • Four of five railroad operating unions struck against the Illinois Central Railroad without warning, bringing to a head a 5-year dispute over railroad work rules.
  • From Russia with Love premièred in U.S. movie theaters.

    • April 9, 1964 (Thursday)

  • The United Nations Security Council adopted, by a 9–0 vote, a resolution deploring a British air attack on a fort in Yemen 12 days earlier, in which 25 persons were reported killed.

    • April 10, 1964 (Friday)

  • Verda Welcome, the first black state senator in Maryland, was shot in Baltimore.
  • Demolition of the Polo Grounds sports stadium commenced in New York City.
  • Glenn Gould, Canadian pianist, gave his last public concert.

    • April 11, 1964 (Saturday)

  • The Brazilian Congress elected Field Marshal Humberto de Alencar Castelo Branco as President of Brazil.

    • April 12, 1964 (Sunday)

  • Malcolm X gave another "The Ballot or the Bullet" speech, in Detroit.

    • April 13, 1964 (Monday)

  • The 36th Academy Awards ceremony was held.
  • Sidney Poitier became the first black person to win an Academy Award in the category Best Actor in a Leading Role, for his performance in Lilies of the Field
  • Malcolm X departed on the Hajj, the pilgrimage to Mecca.

    • April 14, 1964 (Tuesday)

  • A Delta rocket's third-stage motor ignited prematurely in an assembly room at Cape Canaveral, killing three people.
  • Died: Rachel Carson, 56, American marine biologist and conservationist, of a heart attack brought on by cancer and radiation treatment

    • April 15, 1964 (Wednesday)

  • Fifteen days after the 1964 Brazilian coup d'état, the Army Chief of Staff, Marshal Humberto de Alencar Castelo Branco, was inaugurated as president, with the intention of overseeing a reform of the political-economic system.
  • The trial of the Great Train Robbers concluded in Aylesbury, Buckinghamshire, with the judge describing the robbery as "a crime of sordid violence inspired by vast greed" and passing sentences of 30 years' imprisonment on seven of the robbers.

    • April 16, 1964 (Thursday)

  • The Donauturm, Austria's tallest structure, was opened by President Adolf Schärf
  • The Rolling Stones released their debut album, The Rolling Stones.
  • Sentences totaling 307 years were passed on 12 men who stole £2.6 million in used bank notes, after holding up the night mail train traveling from Glasgow to London in August 1963 – a heist that became known as the Great Train Robbery.
  • Representatives of NASA and Boeing signed the contract for the design and construction of the Lunar Orbiter.

    • April 17, 1964 (Friday)

  • In the United States, the Ford Mustang was officially unveiled to the public.
  • Jerrie Mock arrived in Columbus, Ohio, in a Cessna 180, completing a solo round-the-world flight and becoming the first woman to make such a journey.
  • Shea Stadium opened in Flushing, New York.
  • The U.S. Air Force completed Operation Helping Hand, an airlift that had started on March 28, after bringing 1,850 tons (1,678 metric tons) of relief equipment and supplies to Anchorage, Alaska, in the aftermath of the March 27 earthquake there.
  • Byron De La Beckwith was freed after his second trial for the murder of Medgar Evers ended with another hung jury.

    • April 18, 1964 (Saturday)

  • The 1964 Aintree 200 motor race was won by Jack Brabham.
  • Born:
  • Niall Ferguson, British economic historian, in Glasgow;
  • Zazie, French singer-songwriter, as Isabelle Marie Anne de Truchis de Varennes, in Boulogne-Billancourt

    • April 19, 1964 (Sunday)

  • In Laos, the coalition government of Prince Souvanna Phouma was deposed by a right-wing military group, led by Brigadier General Kouprasith Abhay. Not supported by the U.S., the coup would ultimately be unsuccessful. Souvanna Phouma was reinstated, and would remain Prime Minister until 1975.

    • April 20, 1964 (Monday)

  • U.S. President Lyndon Johnson in New York, and Soviet Premier Nikita Khrushchev in Moscow, simultaneously announced plans to cut back the production of materials for making nuclear weapons.
  • Nelson Mandela made his "I Am Prepared to Die" speech at the opening of the Rivonia Trial. The address would become an inspiration in the continuing anti-apartheid movement.
  • BBC2 started broadcasting in the United Kingdom.

    • April 21, 1964 (Tuesday)

  • A Vickers Viscount OD-ACX of Middle East Airlines was damaged beyond repair as a result of an accident at El Arish, Egypt.
  • James Baldwin's Blues for Mister Charlie opened on Broadway.
  • Died: Bharathidasan, 72, Tamil poet and activist

    • April 22, 1964 (Wednesday)

  • The 1964 New York World's Fair opened to celebrate the 300th anniversary of New Amsterdam being taken over by British forces under the Duke of York (later King James II) and being renamed New York in 1664. The fair would run until October 18, 1964, then make a second run from April 21 to October 17, 1965. Since less than ten years had passed since the Seattle World's Fair in 1962, the New York exposition was not internationally approved, but many nations would have pavilions with exotic crafts, art and food.
  • British businessman Greville Wynne, imprisoned in Moscow since 1963 for spying, was exchanged for Soviet spy Gordon Lonsdale.

    • April 23, 1964 (Thursday)

  • The 1964 Titlehelders Championship for women golf tournament opened at Augusta Country Club in the United States. It would last for four days and would be won by Marilynn Smith.

    • April 24, 1964 (Friday)

  • The Swedish warship Vasa, which sank in 1628, was raised from the waters of Stockholm harbor after nearly 336 years.
  • Died: Gerhard Domagk, 68 German pathologist and bacteriologist, winner of the Nobel Prize in Physiology or Medicine

    • April 25, 1964 (Saturday)

  • Thieves stole the head of the Little Mermaid statue in Copenhagen in Denmark. Henrik Bruun would confess to the crime in 1997.

    • April 26, 1964 (Sunday)

  • Tanganyika and Zanzibar merged to form Tanzania.

    • April 27, 1964 (Monday)

  • Abdullah Kassim Hanga relinquished the post of Prime Minister of Zanzibar, which had been abolished by the incoming Revolutionary Government of Zanzibar.
  • Died: Dimitri Alexandrovich Obolensky, 82, Russian nobleman and historian.

    • April 28, 1964 (Tuesday)

  • Born: Lady Helen Marina Lucy Windsor, British royal, only daughter of the Duke and Duchess of Kent, at Coppins, Buckinghamshire

    • April 29, 1964 (Wednesday)

  • The 17th Cannes Film Festival opened.

    • April 30, 1964 (Thursday)

  • Jerome "Jerry" Wurf defeated Arnold Zander to become president of the American Federation of State, County and Municipal Employees (AFSCME).
  • Born: Barrington Levy, Jamaican reggae musician, in Clarendon
  • Died: Howard Buffett, 60, American businessman and politician, father of Warren Buffett

    • References

    April 1964 Wikipedia
    (Text) CC BY-SA