October 1964

October 1, 1964 (Thursday)

Three thousand student activists at University of California, Berkeley surround and block a police car from taking a CORE volunteer arrested for not showing his ID, when he violated a ban on outdoor activist card tables. This protest eventually explodes into the Berkeley Free Speech Movement.

The Shinkansen high-speed rail system is inaugurated in Japan, for the first sector between Tokyo and Osaka.

Born: Harry Hill, English comedian, in Woking, as Matthew Keith Hall

Died: Ernst Toch, 76, Austrian composer

October 2, 1964 (Friday)

The Kinks release their first album, The Kinks.

October 3, 1964 (Saturday)

Born: Clive Owen, English actor, in Coventry

October 4, 1964 (Sunday)

The 1964 United States Grand Prix motor race is won by Jim Clark.

The 1964 Armstrong 500 motor race is held at the Mount Panorama Circuit in New South Wales, Australia, and is won by Spencer Martin and Bill Brown.

October 5, 1964 (Monday)

Conference of Non-Aligned Nations begins in Cairo. Exclusion of Congolese mercenary Moise Tshombe results in multi-day diplomatic crisis.

Twenty-three men and thirty-one women escape to West Berlin through a narrow tunnel under the Berlin Wall.

Queen Elizabeth II of the United Kingdom and her consort The Duke of Edinburgh begin an 8-day visit to Canada.

October 6, 1964 (Tuesday)

The Soviet Union launches Kosmos 47, an unmanned test-flight of a prototype Soviet Voskhod spacecraft,

Born: Manuela Gretkowska, Polish writer and politician, in Łódź

October 7, 1964 (Wednesday)

The Southern Rhodesian government announces that, when Northern Rhodesia achieves independence as Zambia, the Southern Rhodesian government will officially become known as the Rhodesian Government and the colony will become known as Rhodesia.

October 8, 1964 (Thursday)

The Beatles record "She's a Woman" at the EMI Studios in Abbey Road. On the same day, drummer Ringo Starr passes his driving test.

October 9, 1964 (Friday)

US President Lyndon B. Johnson, campaigning for re-election, gives a speech at the Jung Hotel, New Orleans.

October 10, 1964 (Saturday)

The 1964 Summer Olympics open in Tokyo. Yoshinori Sakai, chosen to light the Olympic Flame, was born in Hiroshima on August 6, 1945, the day an atomic bomb was dropped on that city.

October 11, 1964 (Sunday)

The church of the American Lutheran Congregation, Oslo, is consecrated.

October 12, 1964 (Monday)

Leonid Brezhnev, head of the Supreme Soviet, calls premier Nikita Khrushchev to notify him of a special Presidium meeting to be held the following day, ostensibly on the subject of agriculture. Khrushchev tells his friend and Presidium colleague Anastas Mikoyan that he suspects he is to be ousted as leader.

The Soviet Union launches Voskhod 1 into Earth orbit, the first spacecraft with a multi-person crew and the first flight without space suits. The flight is cut short and lands again on October 13 after 16 orbits.

Opening of the 16th Audio Engineering Society Convention in New York, USA. It is at this conference that Dr. Robert Moog demonstrates his prototype synthesizers.

October 13, 1964 (Tuesday)

Queen Elizabeth II of the United Kingdom concludes her official tour of Canada.

October 14, 1964 (Wednesday)

American civil rights movement leader Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr. becomes the youngest recipient of the Nobel Peace Prize, which was awarded to him for leading non-violent resistance to end racial prejudice in the United States.

Nikita Khrushchev is deposed as leader of the Soviet Union, when the Presidium and the Central Committee each vote to accept Khrushchev's "voluntary" retirement from his offices; Leonid Brezhnev and Alexei Kosygin assume power.

Dutch cargo ship Doris is driven ashore in a storm at Naples, Italy. She capsizes and sinks.

Boeing B-50D-80-BO Superfortress, 48-065, converted to KB-50J, of the 421st Air Refueling Squadron, Takhli RTAFB, crashes in Thailand shortly after takeoff on a training mission while supporting Yankee missions over Laos. Corrosion found in the wreckage leads to early retirement of the KB-50 fleet and its replacement with Boeing KC-135s.

The Sikorsky CH-53 Sea Stallion makes its first flight, at the Sikorsky plant in Stratford, Connecticut, USA, several months behind schedule.

October 15, 1964 (Thursday)

The Labour Party wins the parliamentary elections in the United Kingdom, ending 13 years of Conservative Party rule. Harold Wilson replaces Alec Douglas-Home as Prime Minister.

Craig Breedlove's jet-powered car Spirit of America goes out of control in Bonneville Salt Flats in Utah and makes skid marks 9.6 km long.

The St. Louis Cardinals defeat the visiting New York Yankees, 7–5 to win the World Series in 7 games (4–3), ending a long run of 29 World Series appearances in 44 seasons for the Bronx Bombers (also known as the Yankee Dynasty).

Died: Cole Porter, 73, US composer and songwriter.

October 16, 1964 (Friday)

Harold Wilson becomes British Prime Minister after leading the Labour Party to a narrow election win over the Tory government of Sir Alec Douglas-Home, which had been in power for 13 years and had four different leaders during that time. Immediate appointments to the First Wilson ministry include Gerald Gardiner, Baron Gardiner (Lord Chancellor), James Callaghan (Chancellor of the Exchequer), and Patrick Gordon Walker (Foreign Secretary).

The People's Republic of China explodes an atomic bomb in Xinjiang.

Born: Kathryn Edwards, American reality television star

October 17, 1964 (Saturday)

Incoming UK prime minister Harold Wilson creates the new government post of Secretary of State for Wales, and appoints veteran Welsh Labour MP Jim Griffiths.

Died: Otto Wille Kuusinen, 82, Finnish-Soviet politician and writer

October 18, 1964 (Sunday)

The NY World's Fair closes for the year (it reopens April 21, 1965).

Spanish cargo ship Tulipan runs aground on the Monach Islands, Outer Hebrides, United Kingdom. Thirteen of her fourteen crew are rescued by a Royal Air Force helicopter.

Kevin Berry breaks his own world record in the men's 200m butterfly (long course) on the last day of the swimming competition at the Summer Olympics in Tokyo, Japan, with a time of 2:06.6.

October 19, 1964 (Monday)

Born: Agnès Jaoui, French actress and screenwriter, in Antony, Hauts-de-Seine

October 20, 1964 (Tuesday)

Maurice "Mad Dog" Vachon recaptures his AWA World Championship title, defeating Verne Gagne in Minneapolis, US.

Died: Herbert Hoover, 90, US politician, 31st President of the United States (1929–1933).

October 21, 1964 (Wednesday)

Ethiopian athlete Abebe Bikila becomes the first person to win the Olympic Marathon twice, only 40 days after having been operated on for appendicitis.

The film version of the hit Broadway stage musical My Fair Lady is premièred in New York City. The movie stars Audrey Hepburn in the role of Eliza Doolittle and Rex Harrison repeating his stage performance as Professor Henry Higgins, a role which will win him his only Academy Award for Best Actor. The film will win seven other Academy Awards, including Best Picture, but Audrey Hepburn will not be nominated. Critics interpret this as a rebuke to Jack L. Warner for choosing Hepburn over Julie Andrews.

October 22, 1964 (Thursday)

In Canada, a Federal Multi-Party Parliamentary Committee selects a design to become the new official Flag of Canada.

The Nobel Prize for Literature is awarded to French philosopher Jean-Paul Sartre, despite the fact he has declined it in advance.

A 5.3 Kiloton nuclear device is detonated at the Tatum Salt Dome, 21 miles (34 km) from Hattiesburg, Mississippi as part of the Vela Uniform program. This test is the Salmon phase of the Atomic Energy Commission's Project Dribble.

October 23, 1964 (Friday)

A new coat of arms of the Netherlands Antilles is introduced, including six stars, one for each island in the group. These arms remained in use until Aruba gained its independence in 1986.

Born: Camilla Henemark, Swedish singer, actress, model and political spokesperson, in Stockholm

October 24, 1964 (Saturday)

Northern Rhodesia, a former British protectorate, becomes the independent Republic of Zambia, ending 73 years of British rule.

Cambodia shoots down a US plane that has crossed the border from Vietnam.

October 25, 1964 (Sunday)

The Rolling Stones make their first appearance on The Ed Sullivan Show, and are banned from the show for some years as a result of the raucous audience reaction.

Liberian cargo ship Capetan Vanghelis runs aground on the Goodwin Sands, Kent, UK, but is refloated after six hours by a tug and the Ramsgate lifeboat.

October 26, 1964 (Monday)

Died: Eric Edgar Cooke, 33, Australian criminal. Cooke becomes the last man executed in Western Australia, after murdering 8 citizens and committed a total of 22 violent crimes in Perth, between 1959 and 1963.

October 27, 1964 (Tuesday)

In the Congo Crisis, Christophe Gbenye offers to negotiate for the safe passage of white settlers (60 Americans and 800 Belgians) from Stanleyville and other areas controlled by the Simba Rebellion.

Died: Pierre C. Cartier, 86, French jeweller

October 28, 1964 (Wednesday)

The West German ship MV Magdeburg sinks after a collision with Japanese ship MV Yamashiro Maru, off Broadness Point, Northfleet, Kent, UK. It is later raised and sold, but sinks whilst under tow in the Bay of Biscay whilst being delivered to its new owners.

October 29, 1964 (Thursday)

A collection of irreplaceable gemstones, including the 565-carat (113-gram) Star of India, is stolen from the American Museum of Natural History in New York City.

Indonesian cargo ship Tjokroaminoto sinks in Amsterdam Harbour, Netherlands, after her cargo of copra catches fire.

October 30, 1964 (Friday)

The destroyer USS Horne (CG-30) is launched by Mrs. Frederick Horne, widow of Admiral Frederick J. Horne, after whom the ship is named.

October 31, 1964 (Saturday)

Campaigning at Madison Square Garden, New York, U.S. President Lyndon Johnson pledges the creation of the Great Society.

A tornado causes the collapse of the hangar of 1° Gruppo Elicotteri (First Helicopter Group), Italian Navy, at the Naval Air Station at Maristaeli Catania, destroying five Sikorsky SH-34G Seabat: MM143899, c/n 58-599, '4-06'; MM143940, c/n 58-710, '4-07'; MM143949, c/n 58-745, '4-08'; MM80163, c/n 58-990, '21', '4-01', and MM80164, c/n 58-991, '22', '4-02'.

Jack Roland Murphy, known as "Murph the Surf", is arrested, with two accomplices, for the theft of the Star of India diamond two days earlier.

Died: Theodore Freeman, 34, US astronaut, killed when a goose smashes through the cockpit canopy of his Northrop T-38A-50-NO Talon jet trainer, 63-8188, at Ellington AFB, Texas. Flying shards of Plexiglas enter the jet engine intake, causing the engine to flameout. Freeman ejects but is too close to the ground for his parachute to open properly. He is posthumously awarded the Purple Heart.