1954 CE

The Battle of Dien Bien Phu ends in a decisive Vietnamese victory; Jonas Salk announces the polio vaccine; the 1954 FIFA World Cup sees West Germany win its first title; the Geneva Conference ends the First Indochina War, dissolves French Indochina, and divides Vietnam at the 17th parallel; the Algerian War begins with the Toussaint Rouge attacks; the 1954 Guatemalan coup d'état ousts President Jacobo Árbenz; Hurricane Hazel devastates the Caribbean, the U.S., and Canada; the 1954 Blons avalanches kill dozens in Austria; and Castle Romeo is detonated in the Pacific.

In the 1950s, the 20th century.

Geopolitics & Diplomacy

  • January 17 – In Yugoslavia, Milovan Đilas, one of the leading members of the League of Communists of Yugoslavia, is relieved of his duties.source
  • January 25 – The foreign ministers of the United States, Britain, France and the Soviet Union meet at the Berlin Conference.source
  • 26 January – Moshe Sharett presents his cabinet for a Knesset "Vote of Confidence". The 5th Government is approved that day and the members were sworn in.Israelsource
  • February 19 – 1954 transfer of Crimea: The Soviet Politburo of the Soviet Union orders the transfer of the Crimean Oblast from the Russian SFSR to the Ukrainian SSR.source
  • 22 February – Rendel Commission's recommendations were unveiled to the public. It proposed changes to the constitution, which took effect on 8 February 1955.Singaporesource
  • February 25 – Lt. Col. Gamal Abdel Nasser becomes premier of Egypt.source
  • 2 April – Pakistan forms an alliance with Turkey which, although not including military cooperation, opens the way to the Middle-East alliance due to its allowance of the entry of other nations.Pakistansource
  • April 11 – In a general election in Belgium, the dominant Christian Social Party wins 95 of the 212 seats in the Chamber of Representatives, and 49 of the 106 seats in the Senate. The government led by Jean Van Houtte loses their majority in parliament. The two other main parties, the Socialist and Liberal Party, subsequently form a rare "purple" government, with Achille Van Acker as Prime Minister.source
  • April 22 – The 1951 United Nations Convention Relating to the Status of Refugees comes into force, defining the status of refugees and setting out the basis for granting right of asylum.source
  • May 15 – The Latin Union (Unión Latina) is created by the Convention of Madrid. Its member countries use the five Romance languages: Italian, French, Spanish, Portuguese, and Romanian. It suspended operations in 2012.source
  • May 17 – Brown v. Board of Education (347 US 483 1954): The Supreme Court of the United States rules unanimously that segregated schools are unconstitutional.source
  • May 17 – Adnan Menderes of the Democrat Party forms the new (21st) government of Turkey.source
  • May 20 – Chiang Kai-shek is re-elected as the president of the Republic of China, by the National Assembly.source
  • 20 May – Elections are held to the Chamber of Deputies. The Christian Social People's Party gains 5 seats, while the Luxembourg Socialist Workers' Party and Democratic Party lose two each.Luxembourgsource
  • May 29 – 1954 Australian federal election: Robert Menzies' Liberal/Country Coalition Government is re-elected with a decreased majority, defeating the Labor Party led by H.V. Evatt. The election has come shortly after the Petrov Affair, arguably helping the Government survive what was initially predicted to be a defeat.source
  • June 18 – Pierre Mendès France becomes prime minister of France.source
  • July 21 – The Southeast Asia Collective Defense Treaty is signed in Manila, creating the South East Asian Treaty Organization (SEATO).Philippinessource
  • September 6 – The Southeast Asia Treaty Organization (SEATO) treaty is signed in Manila, Philippines.source
  • September 18 – Finnish president J. K. Paasikivi is the first Western head of state to be awarded the highest honor of the Soviet Union, the Order of Lenin.source
  • September 24 – The Cochabamba–Santa Cruz highway connecting western and eastern Bolivia is inaugurated.source
  • September 25 – Footscray Football Club wins their first Australian Football League Grand Final.source
  • October 23 – Paris Agreement sets up the Western European Union to implement the Treaty of Brussels (1948), providing for mutual self-defence and other collaboration between Belgium, France, West Germany, Italy, Luxembourg, the Netherlands and the United Kingdom. Germany is granted admission to the NATO which becomes effective in 1955.source
  • November 5 – Japan and Burma sign a peace treaty in Rangoon, to end their long-extinct state of war.source
  • November 14 – Egyptian president Muhammad Naguib is deposed, and Gamal Abdel Nasser replaces him.source
  • November 21 – People's Action Party, an eventual dominative political party in Singapore, was established.source
  • 2 December – Sino-American Mutual Defense Treaty.Taiwansource
  • 9 December - The Pogradec Agreement is signed by Dušan Mugoša and Mehmet Shehu, officially marking an end to the Albanian–Yugoslav border conflict.Albaniasource
  • December 15 – The Netherlands Antilles is created out of the Dutch Caribbean nations. It is dissolved between 1986 and 2010.source
  • December 24 – Laos gains full independence from France.source
  • In South Vietnam, the Viet Minh is reorganised into the Viet Cong.source
  • After the death of Joseph Stalin, the Soviet Union starts releasing political prisoners and deportees from its Gulag prison camps.source

Conflict & Security

  • 12 January – Vuelta a Colombia 1954:The 4th Vuelta a Colombia begins in Bogotá.Colombiasource
  • March 1 – U.S. Capitol shooting incident: Four Puerto Rican nationalists open fire in the United States House of Representatives chamber and wound 5; they are apprehended by security guards.source
  • March 13 – Việt Minh forces under General Võ Nguyên Giáp began a massive artillery bombardment on the French military, beginning the Battle of Dien Bien Phu, the climactic battle of the First Indochina War.source
  • 17 March – Ma'ale Akrabim massacre: Armed Palestinian Arab militants ambush and board an Israeli civilian passenger bus traveling from Eilat to Tel Aviv. Eleven Israelis on the bus are killed by the militants. Four passengers survived, two of whom are wounded by the militants.Israelsource
  • March 19 – Joey Giardello knocks out Willie Tory at Madison Square Garden in the first televised boxing prize fight to be shown in colour.source
  • March 23 – In Vietnam, the Viet Minh capture the main airstrip of Dien Bien Phu. The remaining French Army units there are partially isolated.source
  • March 25 – The Soviet Union recognises the sovereignty of East Germany. Soviet troops remain in the country.source
  • April 3 – Petrov Affair: Diplomat Vladimir Petrov defects from the Soviet Union and asks for political asylum in Australia.source
  • April 14 – Aneurin Bevan resigns from the British Labour Party's Shadow Cabinet in protest over his party's failure to oppose the rearmament of West Germany.source
  • April 22 – Senator Joseph McCarthy begins hearings investigating the United States Army for being "soft" on Communism.source
  • April 28 – U.S. Secretary of State John Foster Dulles accuses Communist China of sending combat troops to Indo-China to train Viet Minh guerrillas.source
  • 1 May–9 May – The Asian Games take place in Manila.Philippinessource
  • May 4 – General Alfredo Stroessner deposes Federico Chaves in a coup d'état in Paraguay; from August 15 he will hold the office of President until 1989.source
  • May 7 – First Indochina War: The Battle of Dien Bien Phu ends in a French defeat (the battle began on March 13).source
  • May 11 – U.S. Secretary of State John Foster Dulles declares that Indochina is important but not essential to the security of Southeast Asia, thus ending any prospect of American intervention on the side of France.source
  • 13 May – The National Service riots took place in Singapore after a peaceful demonstration turned violent.Singaporesource
  • May 14 – The Hague Convention for the Protection of Cultural Property in the Event of Armed Conflict is adopted in The Hague, Netherlands.source
  • May 16 – Beginning of the Kengir uprising in the Gulag.source
  • 16 May-26 June – Kengir uprisingSoviet Unionsource
  • June 9 – McCarthyism: Joseph N. Welch, special counsel for the United States Army, lashes out at Senator Joseph McCarthy, during hearings on whether Communism has infiltrated the Army, saying, "Have you, at long last, no decency?" The exchange results in the decline of McCarthy's popularity.source
  • June 17 – A CIA-engineered military coup occurs in Guatemala.source
  • 23 June – The Republic of China Navy captures the tanker Tuapse from the Soviet Union.Taiwansource
  • June 27 – Guatemalan President Jacobo Árbenz steps down in a CIA-sponsored military coup, triggering a bloody civil war that continues for more than 35 years.source
  • July 17 – First Indochina War: Viet Minh troops successfully ambush the armoured French column 'G.M. 42' in the Battle of Chu Dreh Pass in the Central Highlands. It is the last battle of the war.source
  • July 21 – First Indochina War: The Geneva Conference sends French forces to the south, and Vietnamese forces to the north, of a demarcation line. The agreement leads to the establishment of the North Vietnam regime and the state of South Vietnam.source
  • August 1 – The First Indochina War ends with the Vietnam People's Army in North Vietnam, the Vietnamese National Army in South Vietnam, the Kingdom of Cambodia in Cambodia, and the Kingdom of Laos in Laos, emerging victorious against the French Army.source
  • August 1 - The First Indochina War ends with the Vietnam People's Army in North Vietnam, the Vietnamese National Army in South Vietnam, the Royal Cambodian Armed Forces in Cambodia, and the Royal Lao Army in Laos, emerging victorious against the French Army.Cambodiasource
  • October 31 – Algerian War of Independence: The Algerian National Liberation Front begins a revolt against French rule.source
  • November 1 – The FLN attacks representative and public buildings of the French colonial power.source
  • November 1 – The movement towards Algerian independence from France starts with the founding of the National Liberation Front.Algeriasource
  • November 10 – U.S. President Dwight D. Eisenhower dedicates the USMC War Memorial (Iwo Jima Memorial), at the Arlington National Cemetery.source
  • December 2 – Red Scare: The United States Senate votes 67–22 to censure Wisconsin Senator Joseph McCarthy, for "conduct that tends to bring the Senate into dishonor and disrepute."source

Exploration & Expansion

  • April 10 – The modern form of value-added tax is first implemented by Maurice Lauré, joint director of the French tax authority, in France's Ivory Coast colony.source
  • April 26 – An international conference on Korea and Indo-China opens in Geneva.source
  • July 31 – 1954 Italian expedition to K2: Italian mountaineers Lino Lacedelli and Achille Compagnoni become the first to reach the summit of the second highest mountain in the world, in the Karakoram range.source
  • 5 September – Per Knut Aaland, cross country skierNorwaysource
  • October 10 – The much-travelled statue of Paul Kruger is unveiled in Church Square, Pretoria by Dr. D.F. Malan.South Africasource
  • Shirley Bliss wins the Miss Australia QuestAustraliasource
  • René Magritte, L'Empire des lumièresBelgiumsource
  • The Museo Regional de la Ceramica, Tlaquepaque is established in Tlaquepaque, Jalisco.Mexicosource
  • The national men's team undertook a 10-match tour of Australia, which included 3 internationals. They played one warm-up match prior to the tour.New Zealandsource
  • American photographer Paul Strand works in the Outer Hebrides.Scotlandsource
  • Refik Restaurant is established by Refik Arslan.Turkeysource

Religion & Belief

  • 25 January – David Grossman, Israeli author.Israelsource
  • 22 March – Jayendra Saraswathi becomes the 70th Shankaracharya of Kanchi.Indiasource
  • May 1 – The Unification Church is founded in South Korea.source
  • June 14 – The words "under God" are added to the United States Pledge of Allegiance.source
  • 15 August – The old Salt Cathedral of Zipaquirá is inaugurated.Colombiasource
  • 21 September - Clarin is founded, edited in Santiago and directed by Darío Sainte Marie.Chilesource
  • 29 September – the Governor-General of Pakistan, Ghulam Mohammad declared a state of emergency, dissolved the Constituent Assembly and appointed a new Council of Ministers on the grounds that the existing one no longer represented the people of Pakistan.Pakistansource
  • Ásmundur Guðmundsson became the ninth Bishop of Iceland, following the death of Sigurgeir Sigurðsson the previous year.Icelandsource
  • Auckland Trotting Cup – CaduceusNew Zealandsource
  • Establishment of CA Macedo de CavaleirosPortugalsource

Economy & Finance

  • 27 January – Village Institutes were closedTurkeysource
  • 26 February – Yuli Tamir, Israeli academic and former politician.Israelsource
  • May 22 – The common Nordic Labour Market act is signed.source
  • June 23 – The Trust Bank of South Africa is founded by Jan S. Marais.South Africasource
  • July 1 – The Common Nordic Labor Market Act comes into effect.source
  • 21 August – The Singapore Labour Front (LF) was founded.Singaporesource
  • August 24: The military do not accept Vargas' agreement and demand for his resignation. At the Catete Palace, President of Brazil Getúlio Vargas commits suicide by shooting himself in the heart. Vice President Café Filho becomes the 18th President of Brazil.Brazilsource
  • 18 September – TARS is renamed TAROM (Transporturi Aeriene Române, Romanian Air Transport) to recognise the full ownership of the airline by the Romanian state.Romaniasource
  • November 23 – The Dow Jones Industrial Average rises 3.27 points, or 0.86 percent, closing at an all-time high of 382.74. More significantly, this is the first time the Dow has surpassed its peak level, reached just before the Wall Street Crash of 1929.source
  • The Confederación Revolucionaria de Trabajadores is founded.Mexicosource
  • Increase since 31 December 1953: 43,700 (2.11%).New Zealandsource

Technology & Infrastructure

  • January 3 – The Italian broadcaster RAI officially begins transmitting.source
  • January 7 – Georgetown–IBM experiment: The first public demonstration of a machine translation system is held in New York, at the head office of IBM.source
  • 17 January - 1953 Albanian Cup: team Dinamo Tirana wins the finals, beating Partizani with a 2-0.Albaniasource
  • January 20 – The US-based National Negro Network is established, with 46 member radio stations.source
  • March 28 – Puerto Rico's first television station, WKAQ-TV, commences broadcasting.source
  • March 30 – The first operational subway line in Canada opens in Toronto.source
  • 1 May – The first test of television in Colombia is conducted, transmitting signals between Bogotá and Manizales.Colombiasource
  • May 14 – The Boeing 367-80, prototype for the later Boeing 707 jetliner, is rolled out in the United States, after about 2 years of development.source
  • May 29 – Creation and first meeting of the Bilderberg Group.source
  • 26 June – The world's first civilian nuclear power station, Obninsk Nuclear Power Plant, is commissioned.Soviet Unionsource
  • June 27 – The world's first atomic power station opens at Obninsk, near Moscow.source
  • July 15 – The Boeing 367-80 (or Dash 80), prototype of the Boeing 707 series, makes its maiden flight.source
  • July 29 – The construction of Yad Vashem started in Jerusalem. It is an official memorial center to commemorate the victims of the persecution of the Jews by the Nazis and their accomplices in Europe.source
  • August 23 – A United States Air Force Lockheed C-130 Hercules makes its first flight at Burbank, California, manufactured by Lockheed Martin.source
  • September 11 – The Miss America Pageant is broadcast on television for the first time.source
  • September 27 – The Tonight Show first airs on live television on NBC in the United States being the first late night talk show.source
  • 28 September – The Israeli government's attempt for the Israeli ship "Bat Galim" to traverse the Suez Canal fails after the ship is arrested by the Egyptian authorities. This attempt is made after Egypt prevented other Israeli ships and foreign cargo ships headed towards Israeli ports, of passing through the Suez Canal, in violation with the terms of the Convention of Constantinople.Israelsource
  • September 30 – The USS Nautilus, the first nuclear-powered submarine in the world, is commissioned into the United States Navy.source
  • October 18 – Texas Instruments announces the development of the first commercial transistor radio. The Regency TR-1 goes on sale the following month.source
  • 27 October – Singapore Polytechnic was founded as the first polytechnic in Singapore.Singaporesource
  • November 2 – The radio program Hancock's Half Hour, a pioneer in situation comedy, is first broadcast on BBC Radio (a television version will follow in 1956).source
  • November 2 – The dock workers' strike in the UK comes to an end.source
  • December 1 – The first Hyatt Hotel, The Hyatt House Los Angeles, opens on the grounds of Los Angeles International Airport. It is the first hotel in the world built on an airport property.source
  • December 4 – The first Burger King opens in Miami, Florida.source
  • The first electric drip brew coffeemaker is patented in Germany and named the Wigomat after its inventor Gottlob Widmann.source
  • The TV dinner is introduced, by American entrepreneur Gerry Thomas.source
  • New Zealand engineer Sir William Hamilton develops the first pump-jet engine (the "Hamilton Jet") capable of propelling a jetboat.source
  • Russian Cultural Center (Estonia) in Tallinn was opened.Estoniasource
  • 1954 Jordanian general election.Jordansource
  • Roselawn Cemetery opens in Belfast.Northern Irelandsource

Science & Discovery

  • January 21 – The first nuclear-powered submarine, the USS Nautilus, is launched in Groton, Connecticut, by First Lady of the United States Mamie Eisenhower.source
  • Mimi Coertse starts tutorship under Maria Hittorff and Josef Witt.South Africasource
  • 17 February – Miki Berkovich, former Israeli basketball player.Israelsource
  • 20 February: Yvette Williams breaks the world long jump record by jumping 20 ft at Gisborne.New Zealandsource
  • March 9 – American journalists Edward R. Murrow and Fred W. Friendly produce a 30-minute See It Now documentary, entitled A Report on Senator Joseph McCarthy.source
  • April 7 – Dwight D. Eisenhower gives his "domino theory" speech, during a news conference.source
  • April 12 – Bill Haley & His Comets record "Rock Around the Clock" in their first session for American Decca in New York City; it is released on May 20 as a B-side, but only in 1955 becomes a #1 hit, helping to initiate the rock and roll craze.source
  • April 14 – A Soviet spy ring in Australia is unveiled.source
  • 17 April – Article 4 of Decree nr. 189 establishes ensigns for auxiliary and Coast Guard vessels as well as serving ships of the Romanian Navy.Romaniasource
  • April 26 – Akira Kurosawa's Seven Samurai is released in Japan.source
  • July 1 – The United States officially begins using the international unit of the nautical mile, equal to 6,076.11549 ft. or 1,852 meters.source
  • 17 August – Ocean liner SS Southern Cross is launched by Harland and Wolff in Belfast.Northern Irelandsource
  • September 14 – The Soviet Union carries out the Totskoye nuclear exercise.source
  • 14 September – The Totskoye nuclear exercise is held.Soviet Unionsource
  • October 18 – The comic strip Hi and Lois, by Mort Walker and Dik Browne, is launched in the United States.source
  • November 3 - Godzilla released in Japan.Japansource
  • Date unknown - Wittig reaction discovered.Germanysource

Health & Medicine

  • 12 January – Jan-Olav Ingvaldsen, politician (died 2021).Norwaysource
  • 12 February – British Medical Committee report suggests the existence of a link between smoking and lung cancer.United Kingdomsource
  • February 23 – The first mass vaccination of children against polio begins in Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania, United States.source
  • February 23 – The first mass vaccination of children against polio begins in Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania.United Statessource
  • 31 May – Arne Larsen Økland, retired footballerNorwaysource
  • June 22 – Sarah Mae Flemming is expelled from a bus in South Carolina, for sitting in a white-only section.source
  • July 4 – Food rationing in Great Britain ends, with the lifting of restrictions on sale and purchase of meat, 14 years after it began early in World War II, and nearly a decade after the war's end.source
  • 4 July – Fourteen years of rationing in the UK during and following World War II comes to an end, when meat officially comes off ration.Scotlandsource
  • December 23 – J. Hartwell Harrison and Joseph Murray perform the world's first successful kidney transplantation, in Boston, Massachusetts.source
  • December 23 – The first successful kidney transplant is performed by Joseph E. Murray, MD in Boston from one identical twin to his brother. Murray will later share the 1990 Nobel Prize in Physiology or Medicine for his "[discovery] concerning organ and cell transplantation in the treatment of human disease".United Statessource
  • Gerbils (Meriones unguiculatus) are brought to the United States by Dr. Victor Schwentker.source
  • Estimated population as of 31 December: 2,118,400.New Zealandsource
  • Donald Houston co-stars in Doctor in the House.Walessource

Crime & Justice

  • January 15 – Mau Mau leader Waruhiu Itote is captured in Kenya.source
  • 17 March - The young Argentine dancer Nélida Lobato performs at the theatre Bim-Bam-Bum in Santiago.Chilesource
  • March 28 – The trial of A. L. Zissu and 12 other Zionist leaders ends with harsh sentences in Communist Romania.source
  • 31 March – Jewish writer A. L. Zissu is sentenced to life imprisonment for "conspiring against the social order".Romaniasource
  • 6 April – Flags and Emblems (Display) Act (Northern Ireland) is introduced, making it illegal to interfere with the display of a Union Flag and giving the Royal Ulster Constabulary the right to remove any other flag or emblem if it is thought that it might lead to a breach of peace.Northern Irelandsource
  • June 22 – Parker–Hulme murder case: Pauline Parker, 16 and her friend Juliet Hulme, 15, bludgeon Parker's mother to death using a brick, at Victoria Park in New Zealand.source
  • 27 June – Armed Palestinian Arab militants, who infiltrated to Israel from Jordan, kill an elderly Israeli farmer on the outskirts of Ra'anana.Israelsource
  • 27 June - Taça de Portugal FinalPortugalsource
  • July 15 – Juan Fangio, Argentine driver for German Grand Prix team Mercedes-Benz, makes a new fastest lap of the Silverstone Circuit in England, with an average speed of 100.35 mph, the previous record being 100.16 mph.source
  • 17 November - 1954 Albanian Cup: team Dinamo Tirana wins the finals, beating Partizani with a 2-1.Albaniasource
  • December 3 – A German court dismisses charges against Werner Naumann, head of the Neo-Nazi Naumann Circle.source
  • The case of Lothar Malskat, who had admitted that he had painted the supposedly antique frescoes in Marienkirche himself, goes to trial.source
  • 1954 Campeonato Profesional (April–October)Colombiasource
  • The United States defeat Mexico in the Americas Zone final of the Davis Cup.Mexicosource

Disasters & Accidents

  • March 29 – A C-47 transport with French nurse Geneviève de Galard on board is wrecked on the runway at Dien Bien Phu.source
  • April 8 – A Royal Canadian Air Force Canadair Harvard collides with a Trans-Canada Air Lines Canadair North Star over Moose Jaw, Saskatchewan, killing 37 people.source
  • 22 May – A Douglas DC-3 crashes near Paraparaumu Airport after its wing hits a house. Three people died.New Zealandsource
  • May 26 – A fire on board the U.S. Navy aircraft carrier USS Bennington, off Narragansett Bay, Massachusetts, kills 103 sailors.source
  • 29-30 August – Minister of Education Léo Collard sacks 110 school teachers with teaching qualifications from Catholic institutionsBelgiumsource
  • September 2 – A timber train carrying more than 100 passengers derailed and multiple wagons fall off a bridge near Fabrica, Negros Occidental. At least 82 people were killed.Philippinessource
  • 3 September – 50,000 workers in Chile strike, leading the government to threaten measures against the strikers.Chilesource
  • September 26 – Japanese ferry Tōya Maru sinks during a typhoon in the Tsugaru Strait. More than 1,100 people are killed, 7 other ships are wrecked, and at least nine others seriously damaged.source
  • October 8 - A sightseeing boat Uchigo Maru capsized due to overcrowding in Lake Sagami, Kanagawa Prefecture, 22 junior high school students perished, according to Japanese government confirmed report.Japansource
  • November 12 – The main immigration port-of-entry in New York Harbor at Ellis Island closes permanently.source
  • 26 November – Fire in the historical Grand Bazaar in IstanbulTurkeysource
  • November 30 – In Sylacauga, Alabama, a four-kilogram piece of the Hodges Meteorite crashes through the roof of a house and badly bruises a napping woman, in the first documented case of an object from outer space hitting a person.source
  • On 31 October, the first Vickers Viscount aircraft delivered to Australia crashed at Mangalore Airport while on a training flight only days after its arrival in Australia, killing 3 of the 7 people on board.Australiasource
  • List of Mexican films of 1954.Mexicosource

Climate & Environment

  • January 12 – Avalanches in Austria kill more than 200.source
  • 3 February – Records are set during a massive snowstorm when 115.9 L/m2 snow falls on Grivița, a layer of snow 175 m thick is found in Călărași and a high windspeed of 126 km/h is reported in Bucharest.Romaniasource
  • March 1 – U.S. officials announce that a hydrogen bomb test (Castle Bravo) has been conducted, on Bikini Atoll in the Pacific Ocean. The explosion produces a yield of 15 megatons TNT instead of the predicted 5 MT; the Japanese fishing vessel Daigo Fukuryū Maru is caught up inside the fallout zone, some 80 miles from the explosion with several of her crew members suffering from radiation sickness as a consequence.source
  • 1 March - Adelaide and large parts of southern South Australia are shaken by a 5.6 magnitude earthquake, resulting in the injuries of 16 people, and a damage bill of £17 million (2017: $578 million).Australiasource
  • April 11 – This day is denoted as the most boring day in the 20th century by True Knowledge, an answer engine developed by William Tunstall-Pedoe. No significant newsworthy events, births, or deaths are known to have happened on this day.source
  • June 24/26: Hurricane Alice (June 1954)Mexicosource
  • Great Iran Flood kills about 10,000 people.Iransource
  • September 9 – The 6.7 Mw Chlef earthquake shakes northern Algeria, with a maximum Mercalli intensity of XI (Extreme). The shock destroys Orléansville, leaving 1,243–1,409 dead, and 5,000 injured.source
  • September 9 – The 6.7 Mw Chlef earthquake shakes northern Algeria with a maximum Mercalli intensity of XI (Extreme). The shock destroyed Orléansville, left 1,243–1,409 dead, and 5,000 injured.Algeriasource
  • September 26 – A massive fire in Iwanai, Hokkaido, a result of Typhoon Marie, leaves 38 people dead, 551 people injured according to Japan Fire and Disaster Management Agency official confirmed report.:ja:岩内大火Japansource
  • October 11 – Hurricane Hazel crosses over Haiti, killing 1,000.source
  • October 15 – Hurricane Hazel makes U.S. landfall; it is the only recorded Category 4 hurricane to strike as far north as North Carolinasource
  • October 15 – Hurricane Hazel hits Toronto killing 81.Canadasource
  • October 25 – Landslides caused by heavy rains hit Salerno, Italy, killing about 300.source
  • Gígjökull glacier advances 328 m since the Mount Hekla eruption 7 years prior.Icelandsource

Culture & Society

  • 6 February – 300 Straits Times printing employees when on strike, resulting in The Sunday Times not being published the following day.Singaporesource
  • February 16 – After honeymooning with Joe DiMaggio in Japan, actress Marilyn Monroe performs ten USO shows in four days for American soldiers, airmen, Marines and sailors in Korea.South Koreasource
  • March 25 – The 26th Academy Awards Ceremony is held.source
  • April 1 – The U.S. Congress and President Dwight D. Eisenhower authorize the founding of the United States Air Force Academy in Colorado.source
  • April 1 – South Point School in India is founded, and becomes the largest school in the world by 1992.source
  • April 4 – Legendary symphony conductor Arturo Toscanini experiences a lapse of memory during a concert broadcast live from Carnegie Hall in New York City. At this concert's end, his retirement is announced, and he never conducts in public again.source
  • May 6 – Roger Bannister runs the first sub-four minute mile, in Oxford, England.source
  • May 8 – The Asian Football Confederation (AFC) is formed in Manila, Philippines.source
  • 16 May – The Hipódromo de Techo is founded in Bogotá.Colombiasource
  • May 17 – The Royal Commission on the Petrov Affair in Australia begins its inquiry.source
  • 18 May – Selig Brodetsky, Russian-born Israeli mathematician, politician and president of the Hebrew University of Jerusalem (born 1888)Israelsource
  • May 29 – Diane Leather becomes the first woman to run a sub-five minute mile, in Birmingham, England.source
  • June 6 – The grand opening of the sculpture of Yuriy Dolgorukiy takes place in Moscow (this statue is one of the main monuments of Moscow).source
  • 6 June – Moscow's statue of Yuriy Dolgorukiy, originally conceived in 1947 in recognition of the 800th anniversary of the city's foundation, is finally unveiled.Soviet Unionsource
  • June 15 – The UEFA (Union of European Football Associations) is formed in Basel, Switzerland.source
  • July 4 – "Miracle of Bern": West Germany beats Hungary 3–2 to win the 1954 FIFA World Cup.source
  • July 10 – Peter Thomson becomes the first Australian to win the British Open Golf Championship.source
  • July 19 – Release of Elvis Presley's first single, a cover of "That's All Right", by Sun Records (recorded July 5 in Memphis, Tennessee).source
  • July 24 – Blesilda Ocampo is placed Top 15 of Miss Universe 1954 at Long Beach, California, USA. She is the first Filipina finalist.Philippinessource
  • July 29 – The Fellowship of the Ring, the first of three volumes in J.R.R. Tolkien's epic fantasy novel, The Lord of the Rings, is published in London.source
  • August 16 – The first issue of Sports Illustrated magazine is published in the United States.source
  • September 8 – SEATO is established in Bangkok, Thailand.source
  • September 14 – English composer Benjamin Britten's chamber opera version of The Turn of the Screw receives its world premiere, at the Teatro La Fenice in Venice, Italy.source
  • September 17 – William Golding's allegorical dystopian novel Lord of the Flies is published in London.source
  • September 20 – The first Moomins comic strip is published in the London newspaper The Evening News.source
  • November 3 – The first Godzilla film premieres in Tokyo.source
  • November 13 – Great Britain defeats France, to capture the first ever Rugby League World Cup in Paris in front of around 30,000 spectatorssource
  • November 22 – Berman v. Parker (348 U.S. 26): The U.S. Supreme Court upholds the federal slum clearance and urban renewal programs.source
  • December 3 – Väinö Linna's war novel The Unknown Soldier (Tuntematon sotilas) is published.source
  • 1954 Albanian National Championship: FK Partizani Tirana is awarded as the champion of the season.Albaniasource
  • The 1954 World Fencing Championships are held in Luxembourg City.Luxembourgsource

Births

Deaths

  • January 10 – BOAC Flight 781, a de Havilland Comet jet plane, disintegrates in mid-air due to metal fatigue, and crashes in the Mediterranean near Elba; all 35 people on board are killed.source
  • 4 February - Capitalist district commissioner Pilo Peristeri is executed by firing squad after there were allegations circulating about him being an "American-paid conspirator".Albaniasource
  • March 27 – The Castle Romeo nuclear test explosion is executed at Bikini Atoll, in the Marshall Islands.source
  • April 3 – Aristides de Sousa Mendes, Portuguese diplomat and humanitarian (born 1885)source
  • May 14 – Heinz Guderian, German World War II general (born 1888)source
  • June 7 – English cryptanalyst, mathematician and computer scientist Alan Turing, age 41, commits suicide by cyanide poisoning.source
  • June 7 – Alan Turing, British mathematician, cryptanalyst, and pioneer computer scientist (born 1912)source
  • 11 June – León Droz Blanco, a military officer and dissident of the Marcos Pérez Jiménez dictatorship, is assassinated in Barranquilla, where he was in exile from his native Venezuela.Colombiasource
  • July 13 – Frida Kahlo, Mexican painter (born 1907)source
  • 31 July – Antoinette, Crown Princess of BavariaLuxembourgsource
  • August 6 – Emilie Dionne, one of the Dionne quintuplets, dies of asphyxiation following an epileptic seizure. She is the first of the Canadian five to perish; three live into the 21st century.source
  • August 24 – Getúlio Vargas, 14th and 17th President of Brazil (born 1882)source
  • September 5 - KLM flight 633, a Lockheed L-1049C Super Constellation named “Triton”, attempted to ditch into the river Shannon immediately after takeoff from Shannon Airport, Ireland. 28 of the 56 passengers and crew were killedsource
  • October 9 – Robert H. Jackson, United States Supreme Court associate justice and chief prosecutor at the Nuremberg Trials (born 1892)source
  • November 3 – Henri Matisse, French painter (born 1869)source
  • November 28 – Enrico Fermi, Italian physicist, Nobel Prize laureate (born 1901)source
  • November 30 – Wilhelm Furtwängler, German conductor (born 1886)source
  • 9 December – Charles Paglar, Eurasian community leader and Progressive Party Legislative Councillor for Changi Constituency (born 1894).Singaporesource