WHAT ALL HAPPENED MAY TO AUGUST 1961
Find out what all happened May to August 1961

First use in Vietnam War of the Agent Orange by the U.S. Army. (10. August 1961)

American civil rights movement: The "Freedom Riders" begin a bus trip through the South. (4. May 1961)

President Jânio Quadros of Brazil resigns after just seven months in power. (25. August 1961)

An earthquake rocks New South Wales. (22. May 1961)

Kuwait declares independence from the United Kingdom. (19. June 1961)

American civil rights movement: The Freedom Riders bus is fire-bombed near Anniston, Alabama, and the civil rights protesters are beaten by an angry mob. (14. May 1961)

Jim Gentile of the Baltimore Orioles becomes the first player in baseball history to hit grand slams in consecutive innings. (9. May 1961)

Border guard Conrad Schumann flees from East Germany while on duty guarding the construction of the Berlin Wall. (15. August 1961)

The New Democratic Party of Canada is founded by the merger of the Cooperative Commonwealth Federation and the Canadian Labour Congress. (3. August 1961)

American civil rights movement: Alabama Governor John Malcolm Patterson declares martial law in an attempt to restore order after race riots break out. (21. May 1961)

Park Chung-hee leads a coup d'état to overthrow the Second Republic of South Korea. (16. May 1961)

Mercury program: Mercury-Redstone 4 Mission – Gus Grissom piloting Liberty Bell 7 becomes the second American to go into space (in a suborbital mission). (21. July 1961)

East Germany closes the border between the eastern and western sectors of Berlin to thwart its inhabitants' attempts to escape to the West. (13. August 1961)

Rudolf Nureyev defects from the Soviet Union. (16. June 1961)

The biggest fire in Singapore history. The Bukit Ho Swee Fire (25. May 1961)

Ida Siekmann died attempting to cross the Berlin Wall. (22. August 1961)

French military forces break the Tunisian siege of Bizerte. (20. July 1961)

The Mercury program: Mercury-Redstone 3 – Alan Shepard becomes the first American to travel into outer space, on a sub-orbital flight. (5. May 1961)

Turkish voters approve the Turkish Constitution of 1961 in a referendum. (9. July 1961)

The former Portuguese territories in India of Dadra and Nagar Haveli are merged to create the Union Territory Dadra and Nagar Haveli. (11. August 1961)