1950 – 1960s

Events in the 1950s 85

• 1865 – 1957 Jean Sibelius Finnish national composer Finnish composer whose Finlandia, Violin Concerto and 7 symphonies made him a national hero and one of the defining voices of late Romanticism.
• 1869 – 1954 Henri Matisse Fauvism · France Henri Matisse (December 31, 1869 – November 3, 1954) was a French painter and sculptor who led the Fauvist movement. Renowned for his bold colour and fluid draughtsmanship, he is considered alongside Picasso as the most important artist of the 20th century.
• 1874 – 1951 Arnold Schoenberg 12-tone music inventor Austrian composer who invented the 12-tone technique, one of the most influential — and controversial — compositional methods of the 20th century.
• 1875 – 1955 Thomas Mann German novelist Mann wrote The Magic Mountain, exploring intellectual life, illness, and European culture.
• 1878 – 1953 Joseph Stalin Soviet dictator — industrialisation and terror Joseph Vissarionovich Stalin (December 18, 1878 – March 5, 1953) was the leader of the Soviet Union from the mid-1920s until his death in 1953. He transformed the USSR into an industrial superpower through collectivisation and Five Year Plans, but at the cost of millions of lives in the Great Purge and gulag system.
• 1878 – 1953 Stalin Soviet dictator Joseph Stalin ruled the Soviet Union from the mid-1920s until his death, overseeing rapid industrialisation and the brutal Great Purge.
• 1879 – 1955 Albert Einstein Relativity Pioneer The physicist who developed the theory of relativity, fundamentally changing our understanding of space and time.
• 1886 – 1957 Diego Rivera Muralism · Mexico Diego Rivera (December 8, 1886 – November 24, 1957) was a Mexican muralist whose monumental public works depicted Mexican history and society. He was married to Frida Kahlo. His Detroit Industry Murals are among the greatest American public artworks.
• 1891 – 1958 Ronald Colman (1891-1958) English actor with a celebrated voice, star of Lost Horizon, A Tale of Two Cities and A Double Life.
• 1891 – 1953 Sergei Prokofiev Soviet modernist composer Russian composer of Peter and the Wolf, Romeo and Juliet ballet, and five piano concertos. A titan of Soviet music who walked the line between modernism and accessibility.
• 1903 – 1950 George Orwell English novelist and essayist Orwell wrote Animal Farm and 1984, warning against totalitarianism, propaganda, and surveillance societies.
• 1903 – 1958 Big Bill Broonzy Blues singer and guitarist A founding figure of Chicago blues in the 1930s who later brought folk blues to Europe and inspired the British blues boom.
• 1903 – 1952 Curly Howard (1903-1952) American comedian, the most popular of the Three Stooges.
• 1907 – 1954 Frida Kahlo Surrealism / Folk Art · Mexico Frida Kahlo (July 6, 1907 – July 13, 1954) was a Mexican painter whose intensely autobiographical work explored identity, pain and the human body. She has become a global feminist icon. She was married to Diego Rivera.
• 1912 – 1956 Jackson Pollock Abstract Expressionism · USA Jackson Pollock (January 28, 1912 – August 11, 1956) was an American painter and pioneer of Abstract Expressionism whose drip technique revolutionised painting. He died in a car crash at 44, defining the archetype of the tortured American artist.
• 1912 – 1954 Alan Turing The man who defined the machine Alan Turing answered a question in mathematical logic in 1936 and, in the course of answering it, invented the idea of a general-purpose computer. He spent the war at Bletchley Park breaking German naval Enigma, work that is credited with shortening it by years. He then built early computers, asked whether machines could think, and turned to the mathematics of how a tiger gets its stripes. In 1952 he was prosecuted for a consensual relationship with a man, chemically castrated as an alternative to prison, and stripped of his security clearance. He died two years later at forty-one.
• 1913 – 1952 John Garfield (1913-1952) American actor, a rebel hero of 1940s film whose career was cut short by the Hollywood blacklist.
• 1915 – 1959 Billie Holiday Jazz singer Lady Day — the American jazz singer whose phrasing changed popular singing, and whose Strange Fruit became a landmark of protest music.
• 1920 – 1958 Rosalind Franklin X-ray crystallographer whose data was pivotal to discovering the structure of DNA Rosalind Elsie Franklin (1920-1958) was a British chemist and X-ray crystallographer whose diffraction images of DNA, most famously "Photo 51", provided critical evidence for the double-helix structure published by James Watson and Francis Crick in 1953. Beyond DNA, she made lasting contributions to the understanding of coal and carbon structures and to the molecular structure of viruses, including tobacco mosaic virus and poliovirus. Her data was used by Watson and Crick without her knowledge or consent, and for decades her role in the DNA discovery was underappreciated. She died of ovarian cancer at 37, four years before the 1962 Nobel Prize was awarded to Watson, Crick, and Maurice Wilkins for the work her data underpinned.
• 1923 – 1955 Robert Woodruff era Transforms Coca-Cola into a global brand Robert W. Woodruff became president of Coca-Cola in 1923 and led the company for over three decades. He introduced six-bottle cartons, vending machines and coolers, supplied Coca-Cola to every US soldier in WWII for 5 cents regardless of cost, and began international expansion.
• 1924 – 1953 Stalin in power Soviet dictator — 1924 to 1953 Stalin consolidated power gradually after Lenin's death, becoming undisputed leader by the late 1920s. His 29-year rule transformed the USSR through forced industrialisation and collectivisation, but also brought the Great Terror, the Gulag and an estimated 6-20 million deaths from political repression.
• 1945 – 1953 Truman presidency 33rd President — 1945 to 1953 Harry S. Truman assumed the presidency on April 12, 1945 after FDR's death. He authorised the atomic bombs on Japan, launched the Marshall Plan, established NATO, and recognised Israel in 1948.
• 1949 – 1950 Knickerbockers shortened to "Knicks" To avoid confusion with baseball's New York Giants, who shared the "Knickerbockers" nickname, the team officially shortens its name before the 1949-50 season.
• 1950 – 1951 First trip to the NBA Finals New York reaches its first NBA Finals, the first of three consecutive appearances (1951-53), losing to the Rochester Royals.
• 1950 – 1953 Korean War Peninsula divided The Korean War (1950–53) ended in an armistice that left the peninsula divided along the 38th parallel, a line that holds to this day.
• 1950 Schuman Declaration Schuman Declaration French foreign minister Robert Schuman proposed on 9 May 1950 that French and German coal and steel production be placed under a shared authority, making another war between them materially impossible. The plan produced the European Coal and Steel Community in 1951. It is the founding moment of European integration, marked each year as Europe Day.
• 1950 – 2025 Formula 1 World Champions Every World Drivers' Champion since 1950 A year-by-year record of every Formula One World Drivers' Champion from the inaugural 1950 season to the present day. The championship has been won by 35 different drivers from 15 countries, with Michael Schumacher and Lewis Hamilton sharing the record of seven titles each. The sport has evolved from gentleman amateurs racing on public roads to a global spectacle watched by hundreds of millions, but the title of World Champion remains the ultimate prize in motorsport.
• 1950 Republic of India proclaimed The constitution comes into force On 26 January 1950 the Constitution of India — the longest written constitution of any sovereign nation — came into force, making India a sovereign democratic republic. The date is celebrated each year as Republic Day.
• 1950 – present Peter Gabriel Singer-songwriter English musician, founding singer of Genesis, solo artist of Solsbury Hill and Sledgehammer, and champion of world music and human rights.
• 1950 – present Stevie Wonder Singer, songwriter, multi-instrumentalist American soul musician, blind since infancy, signed by Motown at eleven. His 1970s albums, from Talking Book to Songs in the Key of Life, are among the most acclaimed in pop.
• 1951 Color TV broadcast Color TV broadcast CBS broadcast the first commercial colour television programme on 25 June 1951, using a mechanical spinning-disc system incompatible with existing black-and-white sets. Almost nobody could watch it. RCA's compatible NTSC system was adopted instead in 1953 and became the American standard.
• 1951 – present Phil Collins English drummer, singer & songwriter Phil Collins (born 1951) is an English drummer, singer, songwriter and actor — drummer and later lead singer of Genesis, and one of the best-selling solo artists of the 1980s with hits including "In the Air Tonight", "Against All Odds" and "Sussudio". A double Rock and Roll Hall of Fame inductee, with Genesis (2010) and as a solo artist (2026).
• 1951 – present John Mellencamp Singer-songwriter American heartland rock singer from Indiana — Jack & Diane, Pink Houses, Small Town — and co-founder of Farm Aid.
• 1952 Elizabeth II becomes queen Elizabeth II becomes queen Elizabeth II became queen on 6 February 1952 on the death of her father George VI, while she was in Kenya at the start of a Commonwealth tour. Her coronation the following June was the first to be televised. She reigned for seventy years, longer than any other British monarch.
• 1952 Second straight Finals loss The Knicks lose the NBA Finals to the Minneapolis Lakers, their second consecutive Finals defeat.
• 1952 – present Salman Rushdie British-Indian novelist Rushdie writes magical realist fiction exploring identity, religion, and politics in global contexts.
• 1952 – present Vladimir Putin Russia's dominant leader since 2000 Vladimir Vladimirovich Putin (born October 7, 1952) has been the dominant leader of Russia since 2000. A former KGB officer, he served as President 2000-2008, Prime Minister 2008-2012, and again as President from 2012 onwards. He launched the full-scale invasion of Ukraine in February 2022.
• 1953 1953 coup overthrows Mossadegh CIA- and MI6-backed coup restores the Shah's power In 1953 the popular, nationalist prime minister Mohammad Mossadegh — who had nationalised Iran's oil — was overthrown in a coup backed by the American CIA and British MI6, restoring the Shah to full power. The episode left a lasting legacy of resentment toward Western intervention.
• 1953 DNA structure Watson & Crick James Watson and Francis Crick described the double helix structure of DNA in 1953, unlocking the secret of heredity and transforming biology.
• 1953 Everest first climbed Everest first climbed Edmund Hillary and Tenzing Norgay reached the summit of Everest on 29 May 1953, the first confirmed ascent, as part of a British expedition led by John Hunt. News reached London on the morning of Elizabeth II's coronation. The two never said which of them stepped onto the summit first.
• 1953 Third straight Finals loss A third consecutive Finals appearance ends in defeat, this time to the Minneapolis Lakers again, closing the franchise's early golden run.
• 1953 Australian Open 1953 Men: Ken Rosewall · Women: Maureen Connolly Connolly won all four Grand Slams in 1953.
• 1953 Ian Fleming publishes Casino Royale Ian Fleming publishes his first James Bond novel, Casino Royale, introducing the world to Agent 007 of the British Secret Service. Fleming based Bond partly on himself and wartime intelligence colleagues. The book sells out its first print run of 4,750 copies within a month.
• 1953 – present The Drifters American vocal group Atlantic Records vocal group with ever-changing members — Clyde McPhatter, Ben E. King, Rudy Lewis — and songs by the Brill Building writers.
• 1953 French Open 1953 Men: Ken Rosewall · Women: Maureen Connolly Connolly won all four Grand Slams in 1953.
• 1953 Wimbledon 1953 Men: Vic Seixas · Women: Maureen Connolly Connolly won all four Grand Slams in 1953 — first woman to complete the calendar Grand Slam.
• 1953 US Championships 1953 Men: Tony Trabert · Women: Maureen Connolly Connolly won all four Grand Slams in 1953.
• 1954 First nuclear submarine First nuclear submarine USS Nautilus was launched on 21 January 1954, the first vessel powered by a nuclear reactor. It could stay submerged for weeks rather than hours and in 1958 sailed under the North Pole ice cap. Nuclear propulsion turned the submarine into a genuinely undersea weapon and underpinned the sea-based deterrent.
• 1954 Rock 'n' Roll Elvis, Chuck Berry era Rock 'n' roll exploded in the mid-1950s with Elvis Presley and Chuck Berry, transforming youth culture and popular music globally.
• 1954 – present Anthony Head Actor and singer Anthony Stewart Head was an English actor and singer with a distinctive baritone voice. Primarily a musical-theatre performer, he became a household name through the Gold Blend coffee adverts and went on to international fame as Rupert Giles in Buffy the Vampire Slayer.
• 1954 – present Thomas Pynchon American novelist Pynchon is known for complex postmodern novels exploring paranoia, systems, and history.
• 1954 – present Angela Merkel German chancellor 2005–2021 Angela Merkel served as Chancellor of Germany for 16 years, becoming the most powerful woman in European politics.
• 1954 – present Elvis Costello Singer-songwriter English songwriter who emerged from punk with the Attractions — Alison, Oliver's Army, Watching the Detectives — and went on to work in almost every genre.
• 1955 Disneyland opens Disneyland opens Disneyland opened in Anaheim, California on 17 July 1955, built in a year on former orange groves. The opening day was a shambles of counterfeit tickets, melting asphalt and broken drinking fountains, remembered inside the company as Black Sunday. The park drew a million visitors within seven weeks and created the modern theme park.
• 1955 – 1970 Evidence for dark matter Most of the universe's mass is invisible Fritz Zwicky first noted evidence for missing mass in galaxy clusters (1933). Vera Rubin and Kent Ford's galaxy rotation measurements in the 1960s-70s conclusively showed that galaxies contain far more mass than can be seen — dark matter must exist. It comprises approximately 27% of the universe's total energy content and its nature remains one of the greatest unsolved problems in physics.
• 1955 – present Mikoyan-Gurevich MiG-21 The most-produced supersonic jet The most-produced supersonic jet aircraft in history, with more than 11,000 built and flown by some sixty air forces on four continents.
• 1955 – 1980 Parliament American funk band George Clinton's funk collective, twin of Funkadelic — Mothership Connection, Give Up the Funk and Flash Light.
• 1955 – 1975 Vietnam War US involvement The Vietnam War saw US forces fighting communist North Vietnam. After 58,000 American deaths, the US withdrew in 1973 and Saigon fell in 1975.
• 1955 – 2011 Steve Jobs Apple co-founder Steve Jobs co-founded Apple and pioneered personal computing and the smartphone era with the Mac, iPod, iPhone, and iPad.
• 1955 – present Bill Gates Microsoft founder Bill Gates co-founded Microsoft and helped bring personal computers to the masses, later becoming one of history's greatest philanthropists.
• 1956 Container shipping begins Container shipping begins Malcom McLean sent the converted tanker Ideal X from Newark to Houston on 26 April 1956 carrying 58 truck trailer bodies craned aboard as sealed units. Loading costs fell by well over ninety per cent. Containerisation remade ports, shipping and global manufacturing over the following two decades.
• 1956 Lapchick resigns Joe Lapchick steps down as head coach; the Knicks begin a long slide into mediocrity through the early 1960s.
• 1956 – present Bryan Cranston (born 1956) American actor, famous as Hal in Malcolm in the Middle and Walter White in Breaking Bad, with four Emmys and two Tony Awards.
• 1956 French Open 1956 Men: Lew Hoad · Women: Althea Gibson Althea Gibson won Roland Garros — one of her two Grand Slam titles that year.
• 1957 – 1958 Harris & Meehan: The Vipers Skiffle Group London jazz-skiffle scene Jet Harris and Tony Meehan, both rooted in London's jazz-skiffle scene, played together in the Vipers Skiffle Group on Parlophone Records before joining forces with Marvin and Welch.
• 1957 – 1958 Marvin & Welch: The Railroaders / Five Chesternuts Newcastle skiffle roots Hank Marvin and Bruce Welch, both inspired by American rock and roll, played together in Newcastle-based skiffle groups The Railroaders and the Five Chesternuts before moving to London.
• 1957 Wimbledon 1957 Men: Lew Hoad · Women: Althea Gibson Althea Gibson — first Black player to win a Grand Slam.
• 1957 US Championships 1957 Men: Mal Anderson · Women: Althea Gibson Althea Gibson won the US Championships.
• 1957 – present Nick Cave Australian singer-songwriter, author, screenwriter and composer Nick Cave is an Australian musician, writer and composer best known as the frontman of Nick Cave and the Bad Seeds, one of the most influential and enduring bands in alternative rock. Emerging from the confrontational post-punk of The Birthday Party in the late 1970s, Cave built a decades-long career defined by literary, often gothic songwriting that draws on religion, violence, love and grief. Beyond music he has published novels, screenplays and a memoir, and become known for direct correspondence with fans through his website The Red Hand Files. His work took a profoundly personal turn following the deaths of his sons Arthur in 2015 and Jethro in 2022, reshaping the emotional register of his later albums.
• 1957 Sputnik First Earth satellite The Soviet Union launched Sputnik 1 on October 4, 1957 — the first artificial Earth satellite — shocking the West and igniting the Space Race.
• 1957 – present Ian McEwan British novelist McEwan writes psychological fiction exploring morality, memory, and human relationships.
• 1958 Become "The Drifters" — Cliff Richard's band The four musicians came together as "The Drifters", the backing band for rising star Cliff Richard — first rehearsing at the Webb family home in Cheshunt, Hertfordshire. Cliff and Hank first met at a Soho tailor's shop where Cliff was being fitted for a stage jacket.
• 1958 – 1990 Core trio: Marvin, Welch & Bennett Through line-up changes Despite numerous changes to the bass position over the decades, Hank Marvin, Bruce Welch and (from 1961) Brian Bennett formed the stable core of The Shadows throughout their classic era — the trio most associated with the band's identity.
• 1958 – 1962 Great Leap Forward — the worst man-made famine in history Mao's industrialisation campaign kills 15–55 million Mao Zedong's Great Leap Forward (1958–62) aimed to rapidly transform China from an agrarian into a socialist industrial society through forced collectivisation and backyard steel production. The catastrophic mismanagement of agriculture, combined with officials falsifying harvest figures, caused a famine that killed between 15 and 55 million people — the deadliest famine in human history.
• 1958 – present Legacy: the first backing band to become stars The Shadows are widely credited as the first backing band in popular music history to achieve major stardom in their own right — a template followed by countless backing musicians-turned-stars in the decades since, and a permanent fixture in the story of British rock and roll.
• 1958 – present McDonnell Douglas F-4 Phantom II Twin-engined, two-seat, everywhere Big, fast and twin-engined, the Phantom II flew with the US Navy, Marine Corps and Air Force at once. 5,195 were built, and it fought from Vietnam to the Middle East.
• 1958 NASA founded NASA founded NASA began operations on 1 October 1958, created by Congress in response to Sputnik and built around the existing NACA aeronautics laboratories. It was deliberately civilian, to separate spaceflight from the missile programme. Within eleven years it had landed men on the Moon.
• 1958 – 1978 The Miracles American soul vocal group Detroit group led by Smokey Robinson, Motown's first million-sellers and among the label's finest songwriters.
• 1958 – present The O'Jays American soul vocal group Eddie Levert and Walter Williams' group, stars of Gamble and Huff's Philadelphia International — Back Stabbers, Love Train, For the Love of Money.
• 1958 – present The Shadows British instrumental rock group, London 1958 The Shadows are a British instrumental rock group formed in London in 1958, originally as Cliff Richard's backing band. With hits including "Apache", "FBI" and "Wonderful Land", they became the third most successful act in UK chart history behind only Elvis Presley and Cliff Richard himself, and were pioneers of the four-piece guitar-bass-drums rock format.
• 1958 – 2023 Benjamin Zephaniah British Poet & Writer British writer, poet and activist of Jamaican heritage who became one of the most widely recognised poets in Britain. Known for his dub poetry and energetic performance style, he brought poetry to audiences far beyond the literary establishment. He declined an OBE in 2003, citing the British Empire's legacy of slavery and colonialism. He was also a prominent vegan, martial arts practitioner and campaigner for social justice.
• 1958 – 2016 Prince Singer, songwriter, multi-instrumentalist American musician from Minneapolis who blended funk, rock, pop and soul, played almost every instrument on his records and fought the music industry for control of his work.
• 1959 Barbie doll launched Barbie doll launched Mattel launched Barbie at the New York Toy Fair on 9 March 1959, an adult-figured fashion doll in a market of baby dolls, devised by Ruth Handler after watching her daughter play with paper dolls. Buyers were sceptical and she sold 350,000 in the first year. The doll's proportions have been argued over ever since.
• 1959 – 2025 Val Kilmer -- the intense, transformative actor Val Edward Kilmer (31 December 1959 - 1 April 2025) was an American actor known for his intense, immersive performances and his willingness to disappear completely into roles. The youngest student ever admitted to the Juilliard School drama division, he became a major star through Top Gun, The Doors, Tombstone and Batman Forever before his reputation for difficult on-set behaviour and his refusal to compromise artistically led to a gradual retreat from mainstream Hollywood. Diagnosed with throat cancer in 2014, he lost the ability to speak clearly but continued working, documenting his life in a celebrated 2021 documentary. He died of pneumonia in Los Angeles at 65.
• 1959 Renamed "The Shadows" Six Bells pub, Ruislip After legal threats from the American band of the same name, "The Drifters" needed a new name. Jet Harris coined "The Shadows" during a relaxed afternoon with Hank Marvin at the Six Bells pub in Ruislip in July 1959.