1949

1949 in various calendars
Gregorian calendar	1949; MCMXLIX
Ab urbe condita	2702
Armenian calendar	1398; ԹՎ ՌՅՂԸ
Assyrian calendar	6699
Bahá'í calendar	105–106
Balinese saka calendar	1870–1871
Bengali calendar	1356
Berber calendar	2899
British Regnal year	13 Geo. 6 – 14 Geo. 6
Buddhist calendar	2493
Burmese calendar	1311
Byzantine calendar	7457–7458
Chinese calendar	戊子年 (Earth Rat); 4645 or 4585; — to —; 己丑年 (Earth Ox); 4646 or 4586
Coptic calendar	1665–1666
Discordian calendar	3115
Ethiopian calendar	1941–1942
Hebrew calendar	5709–5710
Hindu calendars
- Vikram Samvat	2005–2006
- Shaka Samvat	1870–1871
- Kali Yuga	5049–5050
Holocene calendar	11949
Igbo calendar	949–950
Iranian calendar	1327–1328
Islamic calendar	1368–1369
Japanese calendar	Shōwa 24; (昭和２４年)
Javanese calendar	1880–1881
Juche calendar	38
Julian calendar	Gregorian minus 13 days
Korean calendar	4282
Minguo calendar	ROC 38; 民國38年
Nanakshahi calendar	481
Thai solar calendar	2492
Tibetan calendar	阳土鼠年; (male Earth-Rat); 2075 or 1694 or 922; — to —; 阴土牛年; (female Earth-Ox); 2076 or 1695 or 923

Millennium:	2nd millennium
Centuries:	19th century ; 20th century ; 21st century ;
Decades:	1920s ; 1930s ; 1940s ; 1950s ; 1960s ;
Years:	1946 ; 1947 ; 1948 ; 1949 ; 1950 ; 1951 ; 1952 ;

Last updated February 15, 2019

1949 ( MCMXLIX ) was a common year starting on Saturday of the Gregorian calendar , the 1949th year of the Common Era (CE) and Anno Domini (AD) designations, the 949th year of the 2nd millennium , the 49th year of the 20th century , and the 10th and last year of the 1940s decade.

Roman numerals Numbers in the Roman numeral system

The numeric system represented by Roman numerals originated in ancient Rome and remained the usual way of writing numbers throughout Europe well into the Late Middle Ages. Numbers in this system are represented by combinations of letters from the Latin alphabet. Roman numerals, as used today, employ seven symbols, each with a fixed integer value, as follows:

A common year is a calendar year with 365 days, as distinguished from a leap year, which has 366. More generally, a common year is one without intercalation. The Gregorian calendar,, employs both common years and leap years to keep the calendar aligned with the tropical year, which does not contain an exact number of days.

A common year starting on Saturday is any non-leap year that begins on Saturday, 1 January, and ends on Saturday, 31 December. Its dominical letter hence is B. The most recent year of such kind was 2011 and the next one will be 2022 in the Gregorian calendar or, likewise, 2017 and 2023 in the obsolete Julian calendar, see below for more. Any common year that starts on Wednesday, Friday or Saturday has only one Friday the 13th; The only Friday the 13th in this common year occurs in May. Leap years starting on Friday share this characteristic.

Events

January

Harry S. Truman as Full Terms 33rd President of the United States HarryTruman.jpg — Harry S. Truman as Full Terms 33rd President of the United States

January 1 – UN sponsored ceasefire brings an end to the Indo-Pakistani War of 1947. The war results in a stalemate and the division of Kashmir, which is still continuing as of 2018.
January 2 – Luis Muñoz Marín becomes the first democratically elected Governor of Puerto Rico.
January 4 – February 22 – Series of winter storms in Nebraska, Wyoming, South Dakota, Utah, Colorado and Nevada – winds of up to 72 mph – tens of thousands of cattle and sheep perish.
January 4 – RMS Caronia of the Cunard Line departs Southampton for New York on her maiden voyage.
January 5 – U.S. President Harry S. Truman unveils his Fair Deal program.
January 9 – January 12 – The Los Angeles area is hit with a massive snow storm.
January 11 – The first "networked" television broadcasts took place as KDKA-TV in Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania goes on the air connecting the east coast and mid-west programming.
January 16 – Şemsettin Günaltay forms the new government of Turkey. It was 18th government, last single party government of Republican People's Party.

January 1 is the first day of the year in the Gregorian Calendar. There are 364 days remaining until the end of the year. This day is known as New Year's Day since the day marks the beginning of the year. It is also the first day of the first quarter of the year and the first half of the year.

Kashmir is the northernmost geographical region of the Indian subcontinent. Until the mid-19th century, the term "Kashmir" denoted only the Kashmir Valley between the Great Himalayas and the Pir Panjal Range. Today, it denotes a larger area that includes the Indian-administered territory of Jammu and Kashmir, the Pakistani-administered territories of Azad Kashmir and Gilgit-Baltistan, and Chinese-administered territories of Aksai Chin and the Trans-Karakoram Tract.

January 2 is the second day of the year in the Gregorian calendar. There are 363 days remaining until the end of the year.

January 17 – The first VW Type 1 to arrive in the United States, a 1948 model, is brought to New York by Dutch businessman Ben Pon. Unable to interest dealers or importers in the Volkswagen, Pon sells the sample car to pay his travel expenses. Only two 1949 models were sold in America that year, convincing Volkswagen chairman Heinrich Nordhoff the car had no future in the U.S. (The Type 1 went on to become an automotive phenomenon.)
January 19 – The Poe Toaster first appears at the grave of Edgar Allan Poe.
January 20 – Harry S. Truman is sworn in for a full term as President of the United States.
January 25
- Council for Mutual Economic Assistance (CMEA or COMECON) established by Soviet Union and other communist nations.
- The first Emmy Awards are presented at the Hollywood Athletic Club.
- In the first Israeli elections, David Ben-Gurion becomes Prime Minister.
The Soviet Union,, officially the Union of Soviet Socialist Republics (USSR), was a socialist state in Eurasia that existed from 30 December 1922 to 26 December 1991. Nominally a union of multiple national Soviet republics, its government and economy were highly centralized. The country was a one-party state, governed by the Communist Party with Moscow as its capital in its largest republic, the Russian Soviet Federative Socialist Republic. Other major urban centres were Leningrad, Kiev, Minsk, Alma-Ata, and Novosibirsk.
An Emmy Award, or simply Emmy, is an American award that recognizes excellence in the television industry, and is the equivalent of an Academy Award, the Tony Award, and the Grammy Award.
David Ben-Gurion was the primary national founder of the State of Israel and the first Prime Minister of Israel.
January 26 – Australian citizenship comes into being and the Constitution of India is prepared.
January 31 – Forces from the Communist Party of China enter Beijing.

January 17 is the 17th day of the year in the Gregorian calendar. There are 348 days remaining until the end of the year.

The Volkswagen Beetle—officially the Volkswagen Type 1, informally in German the Käfer, in parts of the English-speaking world the Bug, and known by many other nicknames in other languages—is a two-door, rear-engine economy car, intended for four occupants, that was manufactured and marketed by German automaker Volkswagen (VW) from 1938 until 2003.

Heinz Heinrich Nordhoff was a German engineer who led the Volkswagen company as it was rebuilt after World War II.

February

February 1
- Rationing of clothes ends in Britain.
- Belgian astronomer Jean Meeus asserts that the orbits of all the planets of the Solar System are within the same 90° arc of the Solar System on this date. The next time it is thought this will occur is on May 6, 2492.
May 6 is the 126th day of the year in the Gregorian calendar. There are 239 days remaining until the end of the year.
February 10 – Arthur Miller's tragedy Death of a Salesman opens at the Morosco Theatre in New York City and runs for 742 performances.
February 11 – London Mozart Players perform their first concert at the Wigmore Hall, London.
February 13 – António Óscar Carmona is re-elected president of Portugal for lack of an opposing candidate.
February 17 – Chaim Weizmann begins his term as the first President of Israel.
February 19 – Ezra Pound is awarded the first Bollingen Prize in poetry by the Bollingen Foundation and Yale University.
February 22
- Cincinnati Gardens opens in Cincinnati.
- Grady the Cow, a 1,200-pound cow, gets stuck inside a silo on a farm in Yukon, Oklahoma and garners national media attention in the United States.
February 28 – Margaret Roberts, the future Margaret Thatcher, is adopted as the Conservative candidate for Dartford. She will go on to fight two elections in the constituency unsuccessfully in 1950 and 1951.
February 26 – Revolutionary Communist Party of India stages attacks at Dum Dum.

February 1 is the 32nd day of the year in the Gregorian calendar. There are 333 days remaining until the end of the year.

Jean Meeus is a Belgian meteorologist and amateur astronomer specializing in celestial mechanics, spherical astronomy, and mathematical astronomy.

Solar System planetary system of the Sun

The Solar System is the gravitationally bound planetary system of the Sun and the objects that orbit it, either directly or indirectly. Of the objects that orbit the Sun directly, the largest are the eight planets, with the remainder being smaller objects, such as the five dwarf planets and small Solar System bodies. Of the objects that orbit the Sun indirectly—the moons—two are larger than the smallest planet, Mercury.

March

March 1
- World heavyweight boxing champion Joe Louis retires.
- Indonesia seizes Yogyakarta from the Dutch.
March 2 – The B-50 Superfortress Lucky Lady II under Captain James Gallagher lands in Fort Worth, Texas, after completing the first non-stop around-the-world airplane flight (it was refueled in flight 4 times).
March 17 – The Shamrock Hotel in Houston, Texas, owned by oil tycoon Glenn McCarthy, has its grand opening.
March 20 – The Chicago, Burlington and Quincy, Denver and Rio Grande Western and Western Pacific railroads inaugurate the California Zephyr passenger train between Chicago and Oakland, California, as the first long distance train to feature Vista Dome cars as regular equipment.
March 21 – WTVJ signs on the air in Miami, Florida as the first station in the state.
March 24 – The 21st Academy Awards ceremony is held. The movie Hamlet wins the Academy Award for Best Picture.
March 25 – Operation Priboi: An extensive deportation campaign begins in Estonia, Latvia and Lithuania. The Soviet authorities deport more than 92,000 people from the Baltic states to remote areas of the Soviet Union.
March 26 – The first half of Giuseppe Verdi's opera Aida , conducted by legendary conductor Arturo Toscanini, and performed in concert (i.e. no scenery or costumes), is telecast by NBC, live from Studio 8H at Rockefeller Center. The second half is telecast a week later. This is the only complete opera that Toscanini ever conducts on television.
March 28
- United States Secretary of Defense James Forrestal resigns suddenly.
- English astronomer Fred Hoyle coins the term Big Bang during a BBC Third Programme radio broadcast.^[1]^[2]^[3]
March 30 – Icelandic anti-NATO riot took place, prompted by the decision of the Icelandic parliament to join the newly formed NATO.
March 31 – The former British colony of Newfoundland joins Canada as its 10th province.

April

April 4 – The North Atlantic Treaty is signed in Washington, D.C., creating the NATO defense alliance.
April 7 – Rodgers and Hammerstein's South Pacific , starring Mary Martin and Ezio Pinza, opens on Broadway and goes on to become R&H's second longest-running musical. It becomes an instant classic of the musical theatre. The score's biggest hit is the song "Some Enchanted Evening".
April 8 – Kathy Fiscus, 3½ years old, dies from falling down an abandoned well in San Marino, California.
April 14 – The day the N'Ko alphabet is held to have been completed by Solomana Kante.
April 18 – The Republic of Ireland formally becomes a republic and leaves the British Commonwealth.
April 20 – The Royal Navy frigate HMS Amethyst goes up the Yangtze river to evacuate British Commonwealth refugees escaping the advance of Mao's Communist forces. Under heavy fire, she grounds off Rose Island. After an abortive rescue attempt on April 26, she anchors 10 miles upstream. Negotiations with the Communists to let the ship leave drag on for weeks, during which time the ship's cat Simon raises the crew's morale.
April 23 – Chinese Communist troops take Nanjing.
April 26 – Transjordan changes name to the Kingdom of Jordan.
April 28
- The 1949 Commonwealth Prime Ministers' Conference issues the London Declaration, enabling India (and, thereafter, any other nation) to remain in the Commonwealth despite becoming a republic, creating the position of 'Head of the Commonwealth' (held by the ruling British monarch), and renaming the organisation from 'British Commonwealth' to 'Commonwealth of Nations'.
- Former First Lady of the Philippines Aurora Quezon, 61, is assassinated while en route to dedicate a hospital in memory of her late husband; her daughter and 10 others are also killed.

May

May 1 – Nereid, a moon of Neptune, is discovered by Gerard Kuiper.
May 4 – Superga air disaster: The Fiat G.212 airliner of Avio Linee Italiane carrying the entire Torino F.C. football team, crashes into the back wall of the Basilica of Superga, killing all 31 on board.
May 5 – The Council of Europe is founded by the signing of the Treaty of London.
May 6 – EDSAC, the first practicable stored-program computer, runs its first program at Cambridge University.^[4]
May 9 – Rainier III of Monaco becomes Prince of Monaco, upon the death of his maternal grandfather Louis II.
May 11
- Israel is admitted to the United Nations as its 59th member.
- Siam officially changes its French name to "Thaïlande" (English name to "Thailand"), having officially changed its Thai name to "Prated Thai" since 1939.
May 12 – Cold War: The Soviet Union lifts the Berlin Blockade.
May 16 – The Tokyo Stock Exchange resumes operations after a four-year shutdown.
May 20
- The AFSA (predecessor of the NSA) is established.
- The Kuomintang regime declares Taiwan under martial law, which lasts until 1987.
May 22 – After two months in Bethesda Naval Hospital, James Forrestal commits suicide, under circumstances that seem suspicious to many.
May 23 – The Federal Republic of Germany is established.
May 31 – First trial of Alger Hiss for perjury begins in New York City with Whittaker Chambers as principal witness for the prosecution, but will end in a jury deadlock (8 for, 4 against)

June

June 5 – Thailand elects Orapin Chaiyakan, the first Thai female member of Thailand's Parliament.
June 6 – With the passage of the Bodh Gaya Temple Act by the Indian government, Mahabodhi Temple is restored to partial Buddhist control.
June 7 – 25 – Dock workers strike in the United Kingdom.
June 8
- Second Red Scare in the United States: Celebrities including Helen Keller, Dorothy Parker, Danny Kaye, Fredric March, John Garfield, Paul Muni and Edward G. Robinson are named in a Federal Bureau of Investigation report as Communist Party members.
- George Orwell's dystopian novel Nineteen Eighty-Four is published in London.
June 14 – Albert II, a rhesus monkey, becomes the first primate to enter space, on U.S. Hermes project V-2 rocket Blossom IVB, but is killed on impact at return.
June 19 – Glenn Dunaway wins the inaugural NASCAR race at Charlotte Speedway, a 3/4 mile oval in Charlotte, North Carolina, but is disqualified due to illegal springs. Jim Roper is declared the official winner.
June 24 – The first television western, Hopalong Cassidy , airs on NBC in the United States.
June 29 – Apartheid: The South African Citizenship Act suspends the granting of citizenship to Commonwealth of Nations immigrants after 5 years and imposes a ban on mixed marriages.

July

July 1 – The Institute of Chartered Accountants of India is established.
July 11 – Pamir is the last commercial sailing ship to round Cape Horn under sail alone.
July 15 – In an explosion at Prüm in Germany, the town was badly damaged and 12 people died. The explosion crater was one of the largest ever recorded.
July 19 – The Kingdom of Laos is officially formed but is not independent from the French Army.
July 20 – Israel and Syria sign a truce to end their 19-month war.
July 24 (St John's Day) – Eruption of the Cumbre Vieja volcano on La Palma begins.
July 27
- The de Havilland Comet, the world's first jet-powered airliner, makes its first flight, in England.
- Rhodesia beats the New Zealand national rugby union team (the All Blacks) 10-8 in an exhibition match in Bulawayo, the only non-Test nation ever to achieve this feat.
July 30 – Birth of legal aid in England and Wales.
July 31 – Captain Kerans of HMS Amethyst decides to make a break after nightfall, under heavy fire from the Chinese People's Liberation Army on both sides of the Yangtze river, and successfully rejoins the fleet at Woosung the next day.

August

August 3 – The Basketball Association of America and the National Basketball League finalize the merger that would create the National Basketball Association.
August 5 – The 6.8 M_L Ambato earthquake kills more than 5,000 and destroys a number of villages in Ecuador.
August 8 – Bhutan signs a Treaty of Friendship with the newly-independent India, agreeing non-interference in internal affairs but allowing India to "guide" its foreign policy (similar to the previous arrangements with the British administration in India).
August 10 – Avro Canada C102 Jetliner makes its first flight: it is the first jet airliner to fly in North America.
August 12 – The Fourth Geneva Convention is agreed to.
August 14
- The Salvatore Giuliano Gang explodes mines under a police barracks outside Palermo, Sicily.
- A military coup in Syria ousts the president.
August 21
- The Vatican announces that bones uncovered in its subterranean catacombs could be those of the apostle Peter; 19 years later, Pope Paul VI announces confirmation that the bones belong to this first Pope.^[5]
- Deportivo Saprissa enters Costa Rican soccer's first division.
August 22 – The 1949 Queen Charlotte Islands earthquake is Canada's largest earthquake since the 1700 Cascadia earthquake.
August 24 – North Atlantic Treaty Organization established.
August 29
- The Council of Europe meets for the first time.
- The Soviet Union tests its first atomic bomb, RDS-1 ("Joe 1"). Its design imitates the American plutonium bomb that was dropped on Nagasaki, Japan, in 1945.
August 31
- The retreat of the Greek Democratic Army in Albania after its defeat at Mount Grammos marks the end of the Greek Civil War.
- Six of the last sixteen surviving veterans of the Union Army in the American Civil War meet in Indianapolis.

September

September 2 – Film noir The Third Man , with screenplay by Graham Greene and set in Allied-occupied Vienna, is released in the United Kingdom; it wins the 1949 Grand Prix at the Cannes Film Festival.
September 6
- Howard Unruh, a World War II veteran, kills thirteen neighbors in Camden, New Jersey with a souvenir Parabellum P.08 pistol to become America's first single-episode mass murderer.
- Allied military authorities relinquish control of former Nazi Germany assets back to Germany.

September 7 – The Federal Republic of Germany is officially founded. Konrad Adenauer is the first federal chancellor.
September 9
- Albert Guay affair: A dynamite bomb destroys Canadian Pacific Airlines Douglas DC-3 in Quebec.
- Notorious World War II veteran Edwin Alonzo Boyd commits his first career bank robbery in Toronto.
September 13 – The Soviet Union vetoes United Nations membership for Ceylon, Finland, Iceland, Italy, Jordan and Portugal.
September 17 – The Canadian steamship SS Noronic burns in Toronto Harbour with the loss of over 118 lives.
September 19 – The United Kingdom government devalues the pound sterling from $4.03 to $2.80, leading to many other currencies being devalued.
September 23 – U.S. President Harry S. Truman announces that the Soviet Union has tested the atomic bomb.
September 24 – László Rajk, ex-foreign minister of Hungary, is sentenced to death.
September 26 – Samuel Putnam publishes his new translation of Don Quixote , the first in contemporary English. It is instantly acclaimed and, in 2008, is still in print.
September 29
- The First Plenary Session of the Chinese People's Political Consultative Conference approves a design for the Flag of the People's Republic of China.
- Iva Toguri D'Aquino is found guilty of broadcasting for Japan as "Tokyo Rose" during World War II.

October

October 1 – The People's Republic of China is officially proclaimed.
October 2 – The Soviet Union recognizes the People's Republic of China.
October 3 – Albanian Subversion: First Anglo-American attempt to infiltrate guerillas into Albania; the operation is fatally flawed by being under the control of double agent Kim Philby.
October 7 – The German Democratic Republic (East Germany) is officially established.
October 13 – Severe flooding hits Guatemala.
October 14 – Foley Square trial of Eugene Dennis and ten other leaders of the Communist Party USA ends in New York City (the longest trial in U.S. history to this date); all defendants are found guilty and all but one sentenced to five years of prison.
October 16 – Greek Civil War ends with a communist surrender.
October 17 – Chinese communist troops take Guangzhou.
October 24 – The cornerstone of the Headquarters of the United Nations on Manhattan is laid.
October 27
- Chinese communist troops fail to take Quemoy in the Battle of Kuningtou; their advance towards Taiwan is halted.
- 1949 Air France Lockheed Constellation crash: An Air France flight from Paris to New York crashes in the Azores on São Miguel Island, killing all aboard. Among the victims are violinist Ginette Neveu and French boxer Marcel Cerdan.

November

Dec. 16: Sukarno, first President of Indonesia Soekarno.jpg — Dec. 16: Sukarno, first President of Indonesia

November 7 – Oil is discovered beneath the Caspian Sea off the coast of the Azerbaijan Soviet Socialist Republic.
November 12 – The Volkswagen Type 2 panel van is unveiled in Germany.
November 15 – Nathuram Godse and Narayan Apte are executed for assassinating Mahatma Gandhi.
November 17 – Second trial of Alger Hiss for perjury begins in New York, again with Whittaker Chambers as principal witness.
November 24 – The ski resort in Squaw Valley, Placer County, California officially opens.
November 26 – The Indian Constituent Assembly adopts India's constitution.^[6]
November 28 – Winston Churchill makes a landmark speech in support of the idea of a European Union at Kingsway Hall, London.^[7]

December

December 8
- The government of the Republic of China finishes its evacuation to Taiwan and declares Taipei its temporary capital city.
- United Nations Relief and Works Agency for Palestine Refugees in the Near East (UNRWA) established as a United Nations agency.
December 10 – Australian federal election, 1949: The Liberal/Country Coalition led by Robert Menzies defeats the Labor Government led by Prime Minister Ben Chifley. Menzies was sworn in on December 19; his second stint as Prime Minister, he would hold the office for over 16 years until his retirement in 1966. Labor would not win office again until 1972 under Gough Whitlam.
December 13 – The Knesset votes to move the capital of Israel to Jerusalem.
December 14 – Traicho Kostov, ex-vice prime minister of Bulgaria, is sentenced to death.
December 15 – A typhoon strikes a fishing fleet off Korea, killing several thousand.
December 16 – Sukarno is elected president of the Republic of Indonesia.
December 17 – Burma recognises the People's Republic of China.
December 18 – In the American National Football League, the Philadelphia Eagles defeat the Los Angeles Rams 14-0 to win the championship.
December 27 – Queen Juliana of the Netherlands grants Indonesia sovereignty.
December 29 – KC2XAK of Bridgeport, Connecticut becomes the first Ultra high frequency (UHF) television station to operate a daily schedule.
December 30 – India recognizes the People's Republic of China.

Date unknown

Currywurst Currywurst-1.jpg — Currywurst

Joseph Stalin launches a savage attack on Soviet Jews, accusing them of being pro-Western and antisocialist.
The Malta Labour Party is founded.
The first 20 mm M61 Vulcan Gatling gun prototypes are completed.
This is the first year in which no African-American is reported lynched in the United States.^[8]
Fernand Braudel's La Méditerranée et le Monde Méditerranéen à l'Epoque de Philippe II is published.
The Currywurst is invented in Berlin.
D. R. Kaprekar discovers the convergence property of the number 6174.