1954

Years: 1951 1952 1953 - 1954 - 1955 1956 1957
Decades: 1920s 1930s 1940s - 1950s - 1960s 1970s 1980s
Centuries: 19th century - 20th century - 21st century

1954 was a common year starting on Friday (link will take you to calendar).

Events

February 3 - Queen Elizabeth II is the first reigning monarch to visit Australia
February 10 - President Dwight Eisenhower warns against United States intervention in Vietnam
February 23 - The first mass vaccination of children against polio begins in Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania
February 25 - Lt. Col. Gamal Abdel Nasser is made premier of Egypt.

March 1 - Nuclear testing: Officials announce that an American hydrogen bomb test had been conducted on Bikini Atoll in the Pacific Ocean.
March 8 - PR Newswire founded in New York by Herb Muschel.
March 19 - Joey Giardello knocks out Willie Tory in round seven at Madison Square Garden in the first televised prize boxing fight shown in color.
March 22 - The London gold market reopens (it was closed in 1939).
March 23 - Vietminh capture the main airstrip of Dien Bien Phu - French forces are partially isolated
March 29 - C-47 with Genevieve de Galard on board is incapacitated on Dien Bien Phu runway
March 30 - Canada's first subway opens in Toronto.

April 1 - President Dwight D. Eisenhower authorizes the creation of the United States Air Force Academy in Colorado
April 3 Vladimir Petrov defects from the soviet union and asks to seek asylum in Australia
April 7 - Dwight D. Eisenhower gives his "domino theory" speech during a news conference
April 14 – Aneurin Bevan resigns from the Labour shadow cabinet
April 22 - Senator Joseph McCarthy begins hearings investigating the United States Army for being "soft" on Communism.

May 1 - Taku (city in Japan) founded
May 6 - Roger Bannister runs the first four minute mile
May 7 - Construction started on Michigan's Mackinac Bridge.
May 7 - Vietnam War: The Battle of Dien Bien Phu ends in a French defeat (the battle began on March 13).
May 14 - Boeing 707 released after about two years of development.
May 17 - US Supreme Court hands down its decision in Brown v. Board of Education of Topeka, Kansas 347 US 483 1954
[May 17]- Petrov Royal Commision begains it's inqury
May 20 - Chiang Kai-shek is reelected president of the Republic of China by the National Assembly.
May 20 - Radio Free Europe/Radio Liberty launches Belarusian language programming (see also Piotra Sych).
May 29 - Menzies Government Re-elected for 4th Term

June 9 - McCarthyism: Joseph Welch, special counsel for the United States Army, lashes out at Senator Joseph McCarthy during hearings on whether Communism has infiltrated the Army
June 14- Flag day, the words "under god" added to the pledge of allegiance
June 15 - UEFA (the Union des Associations Européennes de Football) is formed in Basle, Switzerland.
June 18 - Pierre Mendes-France becomes prime minister of France
June 19 - The last regular-service streetcar operated by Twin City Rapid Transit runs in Minneapolis.
June 27 - Guatemalan President Jacobo Arbenz Guzmán steps down in a CIA-sponsored military coup–Operation PBSUCCESS–triggering a bloody civil war that would continue for more than 35 years.
June 27 - The world's first atomic power station opened at Obnisnsk , near Moscow.

July 3 - End of rationing of meat ends all the food rationing in Britain
July 7 - In Memphis, Tennessee, WHBQ becomes the first radio station to air an Elvis Presley record
July 21 - First Indochina War: The Geneva Conference partitions Vietnam into North Vietnam and South Vietnam
July 28 - Foundation of the Situationist International.
July 31 - First ascent of K2, by an Italian expedition.

August - First flight of a B-52 Stratofortress.
August 6 - Emilie Dionne, one of the Dionne Quintuplets, dies of asphyxiation following a epileptic seizure at Sainte Agathe, Quebec.
August 16 - Volume 1, Issue 1 of Sports Illustrated is published
August 24 - President of Brazil, Getulio Vargas, commits suicide; he's been accused of conspiracy to murder an air force officer.

September 3 - The last new episode of the Lone Ranger is aired on radio after 2,956 episodes over a period of 21 years
September 8 - The Southeast Asia Treaty Organization (SEATO) is established in Bangkok, Thailand
September 9 - An earthquake centered on the city of Oleansville in Algeria - 1500 dead and thousands homeless
September 11 - First Miss America Pageant broadcast on television
September 14 - USSR tests nuclear weapon
September 30 - USS Nautilus, 1st atomic-powered vessel (submarine), commissioned by the US Navy

November - The main immigration port-of-entry in New York Harbor at Ellis Island closes.
November 3 - The first in the Godzilla series of films is released in Japan.
November 10 - US President Dwight D. Eisenhower dedicates the USMC War Memorial (Iwo Jima memorial) in Arlington National Cemetery
November 30 - In Sylacauga, Alabama, a 4 kg sulfide meteorite crashes through a roof and hits Ann Hodges in her living room after bouncing off her radio, giving her a bad bruise (this is the first known modern case of a human being hit by a space rock).

December 2 - Red Scare: The United States Senate votes 67 to 22 to condemn Joseph McCarthy for "conduct that tends to bring the Senate into dishonor and disrepute."
December 24 - Laos becomes independent.

Battle of Dien Bien Phu between French and Viet Minh forces in Indochina
Boy Scouts of America desegregates on the basis of race
Stop signs are changed from black-on-yellow to white-on-red
Gerbils (Meriones Unguiculatus), brought to the United States by Dr. Victor Schwentker.