istoryworld
Events relating to america
US novelist Carson McCullers publishes a collection of stories, The Ballad of the Sad Café
John Huston directs Humphrey Bogart and Katherine Hepburn in The African Queen, based on a C.S. Forester story
The first hydrogen bomb is successfully tested by the US at Enewetak Atoll in the Marshall Islands
Argentinian driver Juan Manuel Fangio wins the first of five Grand Prix world championship titles
US boxer Rocky Marciano becomes world heavyweight champion, defeating 'Jersey Joe' Walcott
A left-wing coup brings Paz Estenssoro to power and launches a 12-year revolution in Bolivia
US author Ralph Ellison publishes his first novel, Invisible Man, a Kafkaesque account of a black immigrant's life in New York
Gene Kelly dances a famous routine with an umbrella in the film Singin' in the Rain
Ernest Hemingway publishes The Old Man and the Sea, about an epic struggle between an aged Cuban fisherman and a gigantic marlin
Grace Kelly has her first starring role in High Noon, with Gary Cooper
Eva Perón dies of cancer and achieves the status of a popular saint in Argentina
In his novel East of Eden John Steinbeck develops the biblical theme of Cain and Abel in a family saga set in California
US clergyman Norman Vincent Peale has a best-seller in The Power of Positive Thinking
US composer John Cage's 4'33" consists of precisely that number of minutes and seconds of silence
Republican Dwight D. Eisenhower wins the US presidential election with Richard Nixon as his vice-president
The Modern Jazz Quartet, led by pianist John Lewis, plays in the sophisticated style that becomes known as 'cool jazz'
Saul Bellow publishes The Adventures of Augie March, a novel about the experiences of a young Chicago Jew
Elia Kazan directs Marlon Brando in the film On the Waterfront
Fred Zinneman directs Burt Lancaster, Deborah Kerr and Frank Sinatra in From Here to Eternity
US architect Louis Kahn makes his reputation with the Yale Art Gallery in New Haven
Black American Malcolm Little, who has joined the Nation of Islam while in prison, adopts the surname X to symbolize his rejection of his slave name
US microbiologist Jonas Salk announces the discovery of an effective vaccine against polio
Alfred Charles Kinsey completes his study of human sexuality with the publication of Sexual Behaviour in the Human Female
US author James Baldwin publishes his first novel, Go Tell It on the Mountain, set in Harlem
US abstract expressionist Willem de Kooning exhibits his series Women nos I-VI, on which he has been working since 1938
