WHAT ALL HAPPENED FEBRUARY TO MARCH 1960
Find out what all happened February to March 1960

The French freighter La Coubre explodes in Havana, Cuba killing 100. (4. March 1960)

U.S. President Dwight D. Eisenhower signs the National Security Council directive on the anti-Cuban covert action program that will ultimately lead to the Bay of Pigs Invasion. (17. March 1960)

Apartheid in South Africa: Massacre in Sharpeville, South Africa: Police open fire on a group of unarmed black South African demonstrators, killing 69 and wounding 180. (21. March 1960)

Queen Elizabeth II of the United Kingdom issues an Order-in-Council, stating that she and her family would be known as the House of Windsor, and that her descendants will take the name "Mountbatten-Windsor". (8. February 1960)

Cuban photographer Alberto Korda takes his iconic photograph of Marxist revolutionary Ernesto "Che" Guevara. (5. March 1960)

Arthur Leonard Schawlow and Charles Hard Townes receive the first patent for a laser (22. March 1960)

Dr. Belding Hibbard Scribner implants for the first time a shunt he invented into a patient, which allows the patient to receive hemodialysis on a regular basis. (9. March 1960)

Black college students stage the first of the Nashville sit-ins at three lunch counters in Nashville, Tennessee. (13. February 1960)

With the success of a nuclear test codenamed "Gerboise Bleue", France becomes the fourth country to possess nuclear weapons. (13. February 1960)

An earthquake in Morocco kills over 3,000 people and nearly destroys Agadir in the southern part of the country. (29. February 1960)

The U.S. Navy submarine USS Triton begins Operation Sandblast, setting sail from New London, Connecticut, to begin the first submerged circumnavigation of the globe. (16. February 1960)

British Prime Minister Harold Macmillan speaks of "a wind of change", an increasing national consciousness blowing through colonial Africa, signalling that his Government is likely to support decolonisation. (3. February 1960)

Four black students stage the first of the Greensboro sit-ins at a lunch counter in Greensboro, North Carolina. (1. February 1960)

China successfully launches the T-7, its first sounding rocket. (19. February 1960)

A New York-bound Alitalia airliner crashes into a cemetery in Shannon, Ireland, shortly after takeoff, killing 34 of the 52 persons on board. (26. February 1960)

The first eight brass star plaques are installed in the Hollywood Walk of Fame. (8. February 1960)