1960

It is also known as the "Year of Africa" because of major events—particularly the independence of seventeen African nations—that focused global attention on the continent and intensified feelings of Pan-Africanism.

Events

January

* January 9– 11 – Aswan Dam construction begins in Egypt.
* January 10 – British Prime Minister Harold Macmillan makes the "Wind of Change" speech for the first time, to little publicity, in Accra, Gold Coast (modern-day Ghana).
* January 19 – A revised version of the U.S.-Japan Security Treaty, which allows U.S. troops to be based on Japanese soil, is signed in Washington, D.C. by Prime Minister Nobusuke Kishi and President Dwight D. Eisenhower. The new treaty is opposed by the massive Anpo protests in Japan.
* January 21
** Coalbrook mining disaster: A coal mine collapses at Holly Country, South Africa, killing 435 miners.
** Avianca Flight 671 crashes and burns upon landing at Montego Bay, Jamaica killing 37, the worst air disaster in Jamaica's history and the first for Avianca.
* January 22
** Charles de Gaulle, President of France, dismisses Jacques Massu as commander-in-chief of French troops in Algeria.
** Jacques Piccard and Don Walsh descend into the Mariana Trench in the bathyscaphe '' Trieste'', reaching the depth of 10,911 meters (35,797 feet), and become the first human beings to reach the lowest spot on Earth.
* January 24 – A major insurrection occurs in Algiers against French colonial policy.

February

* February 1 – Greensboro sit-ins: In Greensboro, North Carolina, four black students from North Carolina Agricultural and Technical State University begin a sit-in at a segregated Woolworth's lunch counter. Although they are refused service, they are allowed to stay at the counter. The event triggers many similar non-violent protests throughout the Southern United States, and six months later, the original four protesters are served lunch at the same counter.

* February 3 – Prime Minister of the United Kingdom Harold Macmillan makes the Wind of Change speech to the South African Parliament in Cape Town (although he had first made the speech, to little publicity, in Accra, Gold Coast — modern-day Ghana — on January 10).
* February 5 – The first CERN particle accelerator becomes operational in Geneva, Switzerland.
* February 10 – A conference about the proposed independence of the Belgian Congo begins in Brussels, Belgium.
* February 11 – Twelve Indian soldiers die in clashes with Red Chinese troops along their small common border.
* February 13 – ''Gerboise Bleue'': France tests its first atomic bomb, in the Sahara Desert of Algeria.
* February 18 – The 1960 Winter Olympics begin at the Squaw Valley Ski Resort in Placer County, California.
* February 26 – Alitalia Flight 618: An airliner ''en route'' to New York crashes into a cemetery at Shannon, Ireland, shortly after takeoff, killing 34 of the 52 persons on board.
* February 29 – The 5.7 Agadir Earthquake shakes coastal Morocco with a maximum perceived intensity of X (''Extreme''), destroying Agadir and leaving 12,000 dead and another 12,000 injured.

March

* March 5 – Alberto Korda takes his iconic photograph of Che Guevara, ''Guerrillero Heroico'', in Havana.
* March 6
** Vietnam War: The United States announces that 3,500 American soldiers will be sent to Vietnam.
** The Canton of Geneva in Switzerland gives women the right to vote.
* March 17
** Northwest Orient Airlines Flight 710 crashes near Tell City, Indiana, killing all 63 on board.
** U.S. President Dwight D. Eisenhower approves a covert Central Intelligence Agency plan to train a paramilitary force against Cuba, which would result in the 1961 Bay of Pigs Invasion.
* March 21 – The Sharpeville massacre in South Africa results in more than 69 dead, 300 injured.
* March 22 – Arthur Leonard Schawlow and Charles Hard Townes receive the first patent for a laser, in the United States.
* March 23 – Soviet Premier Nikita Khrushchev meets French President Charles de Gaulle in Paris.
* March 29 – "Tom Pillibi" by Jacqueline Boyer (music by André Popp, text by Pierre Cour) wins the Eurovision Song Contest 1960 for France.

April

* April 1
** Abdul Rahman of Negeri Sembilan, 1st Yang di-Pertuan Agong of Malaysia, dies in office. He is replaced by Hisamuddin Alam Shah ibni Almarhum Sultan Alaeddin Sulaiman Shah, Sultan of Selangor.
** The United States launches the first weather satellite, TIROS-1.
** The 1960 United States Census begins. There are 179,323,175 U.S. residents on this day. All people from Latin America are listed as white, including blacks from the Dominican Republic, European whites from Argentina and Mexicans who resemble Native Americans.
* April 4 – At the 32nd Academy Awards Ceremony, '' Ben-Hur'' wins a record number of Oscars, including Best Picture.
* April 9 – Gunman David Pratt shoots South African Prime Minister Hendrik Verwoerd in Johannesburg, wounding him seriously.
* April 12 – Eric Peugeot, the youngest son of the founder of the Peugeot Corporation, is kidnapped in Paris. He is released on April 15, in exchange for $300,000 in ransom.
* April 19 – April Revolution: South Korean students hold a nationwide pro-democracy protest against President Syngman Rhee, eventually leading him to resign from office.
* April 21 – In Brazil, the country's capital ( Federal District) is relocated from the city of Rio de Janeiro to the new city, Brasília, in the highlands. The actual city of Rio de Janeiro becomes the State of Guanabara.
* April 27 – Togo gains independence from France, with the French-administered United Nations Trust Territory being terminated.

May

* May 1
** The U-2 incident: Several Soviet surface-to-air missiles shoot down an American Lockheed U-2 spy plane. Its pilot, Francis Gary Powers of the Central Intelligence Agency, is captured.
** In India, this day is declared as 'Maharashtra Divas', i.e., Maharashtra Day (also celebrated as 'Kaamgaar Divas', i.e., Workers Day).
* May 3 – The European Free Trade Association (EFTA) is established.
* May 4 – West German refugee minister Theodor Oberländer is dismissed because of his Nazi past.
* May 6 – United States President Dwight D. Eisenhower signs the Civil Rights Act of 1960 into law..
* May 10 – The U.S. nuclear-powered submarine , under the command of Captain Edward L. Beach Jr., completes the first underwater circumnavigation of the Earth (codenamed Operation Sandblast).
* May 11 – In Buenos Aires, four Mossad agents abduct fugitive Nazi war criminal Adolf Eichmann