date: July 27

text: July 27 – WWII: Soviet forces liberate Lvov, Stanislav and Białystok, and the following day enter Brest, Belarus.


date: July

section: Conflict & Security

text: The largest convoy of the war embarks from Halifax Harbour, Nova Scotia, under Royal Canadian Navy protection.

source_section: Events › July


date: August 28

text: August 28 – WWII: Operation Dragoon – The Free French Army liberates the cities of Marseille and Nice.

source_section: Events › August


date: September 17

text: September 17 – WWII: Operation Market Garden: Allied airborne landings begin in the Netherlands and Germany.

source_section: Events › September


date: September

text: An approaching formation of 36 US bombers is engaged by a German fighter squadron (Jagdgeschwader) in the Battle over the Ore Mountains. After the first German attack on the bombers, US Mustangs attack the German squadron in aerial dogfights.


date: October 4

text: October 4 – WWII: Milan Nedić's collaborationist puppet government of the Axis powers, the Government of National Salvation in Nazi-occupied Serbia, is disbanded.

source_section: Events › October


date: October 6

text: October 6 – WWII: The Battle of Debrecen starts on the Eastern Front, lasting until October 29.


date: October

text: Belgrade Offensive ends when Belgrade is liberated by Yugoslav Partisans, together with the Bulgarian Army and the Red Army, and the remnants of Nedić's collaborationist Serbian puppet state, the Government of National Salvation, are abolished.


text: Nazi troops end the Warsaw Uprising. Home Army commander Tadeusz Bór-Komorowski signs the act of capitulation. This is followed by the Destruction of Warsaw.


date: November 8

text: November 8 – WWII: A German surrender of Middelburg, Zeeland, to Allied forces ends the Battle of the Scheldt after five weeks, opening the Belgian port of Antwerp to Allied shipping. The bulk of the fighting has been by Canadians, with over 6,000 casualties.

source_section: Events › November


date: November 17

text: November 17 – WWII: Partisan troops of the National Liberation Movement enter Tirana, the capital of Albania.


date: January

section: Exploration & Expansion

text: The United States 36th Infantry Division in Italy attempts to cross the Rapido River.

source_section: Events › January


date: February

text: Deportation of the Chechens and Ingush ("Operation Lentil"): Forced deportation of Chechens and Ingush people from North Caucasus to Kazakhstan and Kyrgyzstan in Central Asia by the Soviet authorities begins.

source_section: Events › February


date: March

text: Landing on Emirau: 4,000 United States Marines land on Emirau Island in the Bismarck Archipelago to develop an airbase, as part of Operation Cartwheel.

source_section: Events › March


date: June 1

text: June 1 – Two K-class blimps of the United States Navy complete the first transatlantic crossing by non-rigid airships, from the U.S. to French Morocco, with two stops.

source_section: Events › June


date: June

text: British Group Captain James Stagg correctly forecasts a brief improvement in weather conditions over the English Channel, which will permit the following day's Normandy landings to take place (having been deferred from today due to unfavourable weather).


text: The German navy's Enigma messages are decoded in England almost in real time.


text: A hunter-killer group of the United States Navy captures the , marking the first time a U.S. Navy vessel has captured an enemy vessel at sea since the War of 1812. Some significant intelligence data is acquired.


text: The first contingent of the Brazilian Expeditionary Force arrives in Italy.


date: October 12

text: October 12 – Canadian Arctic explorer Henry Larsen returns to Vancouver, becoming the first person successfully to navigate the Northwest Passage in both directions, in the Royal Canadian Mounted Police schooner . His westbound voyage is the first completed in a single season, and the first passage through the Prince of Wales Strait.


text: Last known evidence of the existence of the Asiatic lion in the wild in Khuzestan Province, Persia.

source_section: Events › Date unknown


date: March 15

section: Religion & Belief

text: March 15 – WWII: The National Council of the French Resistance approves the Resistance programme.


date: May 30

text: May 30 – Princess Charlotte Louise Juliette Louvet Grimaldi of Monaco, heir to the throne, resigns in favor of her son Prince Rainier Louis Henri Maxence Bertrand Grimaldi, who later reigns as Prince Rainier III of Monaco.

source_section: Events › May


date: August

text: The First Assembly of ASNOM (the Anti-Fascist Assembly for the People's Liberation of Macedonia) is held in the Prohor Pčinjski monastery.


date: October 16

text: October 16 – WWII: American bombing of Salzburg destroys the dome of the city's cathedral and most of a Mozart family home.


date: July 22

section: Economy & Finance

text: July 22 – The Bretton Woods Conference ends with agreements signed to set up the International Bank for Reconstruction and Development, General Agreement on Tariffs and Trade and International Monetary Fund.


date: November 22

text: November 22 – Conscription Crisis: Prime Minister of Canada William Mackenzie King agrees a one-time conscription levy in Canada for overseas service.


text: The BC Žalgiris professional basketball club is founded in Kaunas, Lithuanian Soviet Socialist Republic.


date: March 3

section: Technology & Infrastructure

text: March 3 – Italy: in one of the deadliest railway disasters in history, over 500 clandestine passengers die of carbon monoxide poisoning when a steam freight train stops in a railway tunnel near Balvano, Basilicata, Southern Italy.


date: March 27

text: March 27 – In Sweden, Ruben Rausing patents Erik Wallenberg's method of packaging milk in paper, origin of the international company Tetra Pak.


date: July 26

text: July 26 – WWII: A Messerschmitt Me 262 becomes the first jet fighter aircraft to have an operational victory.


date: August 7

text: August 7 – IBM dedicates the first program-controlled calculator, the Automatic Sequence Controlled Calculator (known best as the Harvard Mark I).


text: The Red Ball Express convoy system begins operation, supplying tons of materiel to Allied forces in France.


text: Operation Pluto: The world's first undersea oil pipeline is laid between England and France.


date: September

text: The Holocaust: Diarist Anne Frank and her family are placed on the last transport train from Westerbork to Auschwitz concentration camp, arriving 3 days later.


date: January 25

section: Science & Discovery

text: January 25 – A total solar eclipse is visible in Pacific Ocean, South America, Atlantic Ocean and Africa, the 48th solar eclipse of Solar Saros 130.


text: British Royal Air Force Flight Sergeant Nicholas Alkemade's bomber is hit over Germany, and he has to bail out without a parachute from a height of over 4,000 m 0. Tree branches interrupt his fall and he lands safely on deep snow.


date: June 20

text: June 20 – WWII: A V-2 rocket becomes the first man-made object to cross the Kármán line and reach the edge of space.


date: July 20

text: July 20 – The annular solar eclipse of July 20, 1944 is visible in Africa, Indian Ocean, Asia, Pacific Ocean and Australia, and is the 35th solar eclipse of Solar Saros 135.


text: The first V-2 rocket attack on London takes place, launched from The Hague.


date: October

text: The first V-2 rocket attack on Antwerp takes place.


date: February 26

section: Health & Medicine

text: February 26 – Sue S. Dauser becomes the first woman appointed to the substantive rank of captain, in the United States Navy Nurse Corps.


date: March

text: In Markowa, Poland, German police kill Józef and Wiktoria Ulm, their 6 children and 8 Jews they were hiding.


date: October 25

text: October 25 – 76-year-old American amateur soprano Florence Foster Jenkins gives a sell-out public recital in Carnegie Hall, New York. The audience and press are scathing: "she can sing everything except notes". 5 days later she suffers a fatal heart attack, dying at home on November 26.


date: March 4

section: Crime & Justice

text: March 4 – Louis Buchalter, the leader of 1930s crime syndicate Murder, Inc., is executed at Sing Sing prison, in Ossining, New York, along with Emanuel Weiss and Louis Capone.


date: March 11

text: March 11 - Resistance leader Joop Westerweel is arrested while returning to the Netherlands, having escorted a group of Jewish children to safety in Spain.


date: March 18

text: March 18 – WWII: The Nazis execute almost 400 prisoners, Soviet citizens and anti-fascist Romanians at Rîbnița.


text: The "Great Escape": 76 Royal Air Force prisoners of war escape by tunnel "Harry" from Stalag Luft III in Silesia this night. Only 3 men (2 Norwegians and a Dutchman) return to the UK; of those recaptured, 50 are summarily executed soon afterwards, in the Stalag Luft III murders.


date: April

text: German General Kreipe is kidnapped on Crete, Greece.

source_section: Events › April


date: June 16

text: June 16 – At age 14, African-American teenage boy George Stinney Jr. becomes the youngest person ever executed by electric chair in the United States. His conviction was vacated 70 years later, in 2014, due to him not receiving a fair trial.


date: June

text: Joel Brand is intercepted by British agents in Aleppo.


date: July 6

text: July 6 – WWII: At Camp Hood, Texas, future baseball star and 1st Lt. Jackie Robinson is arrested and later court-martialed, for refusing to move to the back of a segregated U.S. Army bus (he is eventually acquitted).


date: August 31

text: August 31 – The Mad Gasser of Mattoon apparently resumes his mysterious attacks in Mattoon, Illinois for two weeks.


date: August

text: Sant'Anna di Stazzema massacre: The Waffen-SS and Black Brigades paramilitaries murder about 560 civilians and refugees (including more than 100 children) in the Italian village of Sant'Anna di Stazzema, burn their bodies, and leave their houses semi-derelict.


text: 168 captured Allied airmen, including Phil Lamason, accused of being "terror fliers" by the Gestapo, arrive at Buchenwald concentration camp, where they form the KLB Club.


text: The Holocaust: A tip from a Dutch informer leads the Gestapo to a sealed-off area in an Amsterdam warehouse, where they find Jewish diarist Anne Frank, her family, and others in hiding. All will die in captivity, except for Otto Frank, Anne's father.


date: September 2

text: September 2 – The last execution of a Finn in Finland will take place when soldier Olavi Laiho is executed by shooting in Oulu.


date: October 7

text: October 7 – The Holocaust: Members of the Sonderkommando – a special detachment of Jewish prisoners who are forced to empty the gas chambers after a mass gassing and undertake the burning of the bodies – organises the only armed revolt that ever takes place in Auschwitz concentration camp. They succeed in destroying the gas chambers and Crematorium IV. The Waffen-SS murders more than 450 prisoners who take part in the revolt.


date: October 10

text: October 10 – The Holocaust/Porajmos: 800 Romani children are systematically murdered at the Auschwitz concentration camp.


date: October 14

text: October 14 – WWII: German Field Marshal Erwin Rommel commits forced suicide rather than face public disgrace and execution for allegedly conspiring against Adolf Hitler.


date: October 31

text: October 31 – Serial killer Dr Marcel Petiot is apprehended at a Paris Métro station after 7 months on the run.


date: December

text: The Home Guard (United Kingdom) is stood down.

source_section: Events › December


date: January 15

section: Disasters & Accidents

text: January 15 – The Soviet Union ceases production of the Mosin–Nagant 1891/30 sniper rifle.


date: January

text: Light cruiser is sunk by a Henschel Hs 293 guided missile from a German aircraft off Anzio, western Italy, with the loss of 46 men.


date: February 18

text: February 18 – WWII: British light cruiser is torpedoed and sunk by U-410 in the Mediterranean; 418 of her crew, including the captain, go down with the ship.


date: February

text: 2,765 drown when American submarine torpedoes Japanese troop transport Lima Maru.


text: 2,670 drown when British submarine torpedoes German-captured carrying Italian prisoners of war.


text: Norwegian heavy water sabotage: The Norwegian resistance sinks train ferry SF Hydro which is carrying a shipment of heavy water from the Vemork plant to Germany along Tinnsjå in Telemark.


date: March 9

text: March 9 – WWII: Soviet Army planes attack Tallinn, Estonia, killing 757 and leaving 25,000 homeless.


date: April 14

text: April 14 – Bombay Explosion: Freighter SS Fort Stikine, carrying a mixed cargo of ammunition, cotton bales and gold, explodes in harbour at Bombay (India), sinking surrounding ships and killing around 1,300 people.


date: May 31

text: May 31 – WWII: American destroyer escort sinks the sixth Japanese submarine in two weeks. This anti-submarine warfare performance remains unmatched through the 20th century.


date: July 31

text: July 31 – WWII: American submarine torpedoes Japanese troop transport Yoshino Maru; 2,495 drown.


date: July

text: Port Chicago disaster: The SS E. A. Bryan, loaded with ammunition, explodes at the Port Chicago, California, Naval Magazine, killing 320 sailors and civilian personnel.


text: In the Kara Sea, German submarine U-365 torpedoes the passenger-cargo ship Marina Raskova; 618 people die.


text: Japanese vessels attack and sink the submarine off Luzon.


date: September 22

text: September 22 – WWII: The Red Army captures Tallinn, Estonia. Prime Minister in Duties of the President of Estonia Jüri Uluots and 80,000 Estonian civilians manage to escape to Sweden and Germany. The evacuees include almost the entire population of Estonian Swedes. Soviet bombing raids on the evacuating ships sink several, with thousands on board.


date: September

text: British submarine torpedoes Japanese "hell ship" ; 5,620 drown.


text: The Laksevåg floating dry dock at Bergen (Norway) is sunk by British X-class submarine X-24.


text: Shin'yō Maru incident: Japanese cargo ship is torpedoed and sunk in the Sulu Sea by American submarine USS Paddle while carrying 750 American prisoners of war; 688 perish.


text: October 10 – WWII: 10/10 Air Raid: Allied forces inflict significant losses upon Imperial Japanese Navy ships moored in Naha Harbor, destroying much of the city of Naha, Okinawa as well.


date: October 25

text: October 25 – WWII: is sunk in the Formosa Strait by one of her own torpedoes. Medal of Honor-winning submarine ace Richard O'Kane becomes a prisoner of war.


date: November 7

text: November 7 – Election day rail accident in Puerto Rico: A passenger train derails at Aguadilla due to excessive speed on a downgrade; 16 are killed, 50 injured.


date: November 14

text: November 14 – WWII: American submarine torpedoes Japanese aircraft carrier Akitsu Maru in the East China Sea; 2,246 drown.


date: November 29

text: November 29 – WWII: American submarine sinks Japanese aircraft carrier Shinano, the largest carrier built to this date, and will remain through the twentieth century the largest ship sunk by a submarine.


date: December 15

text: December 15 – A USAAF utility aircraft carrying bandleader Major Glenn Miller disappears in heavy fog over the English Channel, while flying to Paris.


date: December 24

text: December 24 – WWII: Fifty German V-1 flying bombs, air-launched from Heinkel He 111 bombers flying over the North Sea, target Manchester in England, killing 42 and injuring more than 100 in the Oldham area.


date: January 15

section: Climate & Environment

text: January 15 – 1944 San Juan earthquake: An earthquake hits San Juan, Argentina, killing an estimated 10,000 people, in the worst natural disaster in Argentina's history.


date: March 18

text: March 18 – The last eruption of Mount Vesuvius in Italy kills 26, and causes thousands to flee their homes.


text: Hideki Tōjō resigns as Prime Minister of Japan due to numerous setbacks in the war effort and is succeeded on July 22 by Kuniaki Koiso.


date: September 14

text: September 14 – The Great Atlantic hurricane makes landfall killing 390 people from North Carolina to New England.


text: September – The Dutch famine ("Hongerwinter") begins, in the occupied northern part of the Netherlands.


date: December 7

text: December 7 – 1944 Tōnankai earthquake: An earthquake along the coast of Wakayama Prefecture in Japan causes a tsunami which kills 1223 people.


date: February 2

section: Culture & Society

text: February 2 – The first issue of Human Events is published in Washington, D.C.


date: March 2

text: March 2 – The 16th Academy Awards Ceremony is held, the first Oscar ceremony held at a large public venue, Grauman's Chinese Theatre in Hollywood. Casablanca, directed by Michael Curtiz, wins the Award for Best Picture.


date: March 19

text: March 19 – The secular oratorio A Child of Our Time by Michael Tippett is premiered at the Adelphi Theatre in London.


date: March

text: March – Austrian-born economist Friedrich Hayek publishes his book The Road to Serfdom in London.


date: April 20

text: April 20 – Members of the Slovene Home Guard swear an oath to Hitler on his birthday at Bežigrad Stadium.


date: April 25

text: April 25 – The United Negro College Fund is incorporated in the United States.


date: June 3

text: June 3 – Hans Asperger publishes his paper on Asperger syndrome.


date: July 1

text: July 1 – The United Nations Monetary and Financial Conference begins at Bretton Woods, New Hampshire, United States.


date: August 3

text: August 3 – The Education Act in the United Kingdom, promoted by Rab Butler, provides for the postwar education system, including free secondary education for children of both sexes and raising of the school leaving age to 15.


date: September 2

text: September 2 – ¡Hola! magazine is launched in Barcelona.


date: October 8

text: October 8 – The Adventures of Ozzie and Harriet radio show debuts in the United States.


date: October 30

text: October 30 – Appalachian Spring, a ballet by Martha Graham with music by Aaron Copland, debuts at the Library of Congress in Washington, D.C., with Graham in the lead role.


date: November 16

text: November 16 – The Jussi Awards, the Finnish film award ceremony, is held for the first time at Restaurant Adlon in Helsinki.


date: November 18

text: November 18 – The Popular Socialist Youth is founded in Cuba.


date: November 22

text: November 22 – Laurence Olivier's film Henry V, based on Shakespeare's play, opens in London. It is the most acclaimed and the most successful movie version of a Shakespeare play made up to this time, and the first in Technicolor. Olivier both stars and directs.


text: December 7 – The Arab Women's Congress of 1944 is hosted by the Egyptian Feminist Union in Cairo, leading to establishment of the Arab Feminist Union.


date: December 10

text: December 10 – Italian conductor Arturo Toscanini leads a concert performance of the first half of Beethoven's Fidelio (minus its spoken dialogue) on NBC Radio, starring Rose Bampton. He chooses this opera for its political message: a statement against tyranny and dictatorship. Presenting it in German, Toscanini intends it as a tribute to the German people who are being oppressed by Hitler. The second half is broadcast a week later. The performance is later released on LP and CD, the first of 7 operas that Toscanini conducts on radio.


date: December 14

text: December 14 – The film National Velvet is released in the United States, bringing a young Elizabeth Taylor to stardom.


date: December 19

text: December 19 – The daily newspaper Le Monde begins publication in Paris.


date: December 24

text: December 24 – The first complete U.S. production of Tchaikovsky's ballet The Nutcracker is presented in San Francisco, choreographed by Willam Christensen. It will become an annual tradition there, and for the next ten years, the San Francisco Ballet will be the only company in the United States performing the complete work.


date: December 26

text: December 26 – The original stage version of The Glass Menagerie by Tennessee Williams premieres in Chicago.


date: December 30

text: December 30 – Stage Door Cartoon is the first cartoon produced by Eddie Selzer.


text: The National Committee for Education on Alcoholism, predecessor of the National Council on Alcoholism and Drug Dependence, is established in the United States by Marty Mann.


text: The 1944 Summer Olympics, scheduled for London (together with the February Winter Olympics scheduled for Cortina d'Ampezzo in Italy), are suspended due to WWII.


date: January 27

section: Births

text: January 27 – Mairead Maguire, Northern Irish peace activist, recipient of the Nobel Peace Prize

source_section: Births › January


date: February 10

text: February 10 – Peter Allen, Australian-born Academy Award-winning composer and lyricist (d. 1992)

source_section: Births › February


date: March 11

text: March 11 – Graham Lyle, Grammy-winning Scottish singer-songwriter and guitarist, known for writing several international hits for Tina Turner

source_section: Births › March


date: March 17

text: March 17 – Pattie Boyd, English model and first wife of George Harrison and Eric Clapton


text: March 17 – John Sebastian, American singer-songwriter (The Lovin' Spoonful)


date: April 4

text: April 4 – Faisal bin Musaid, assassin and nephew of King Faisal of Saudi Arabia (d. 1975)

source_section: Births › April


date: June 13

text: June 13 – Ban Ki-moon, South Korean politician and 8th Secretary-General of the United Nations

source_section: Births › June


date: July 31

text: July 31 – Tommy Robson, English footballer (Northampton Town, Chelsea, Newcastle United, Peterborough United) (d. 2020)

source_section: Births › July


date: August 9

text: August 9 – Patricia McKissack, African American children's writer (d. 2017)

source_section: Births › August


date: August 24

text: August 24 – Rocky Johnson, Canadian professional wrestler and father of Dwayne Johnson (d. 2020)


date: September 12

text: September 12 – Leonard Peltier, Native American activist and convicted murderer

source_section: Births › September


date: September 13

text: September 13 – Peter Cetera, lead singer and guitarist of American rock group Chicago


date: October 15

text: October 15 – David Trimble, Northern Irish Unionist political leader; recipient of the Nobel Peace Prize 1998 (d. 2022)

source_section: Births › October


date: December 28

text: December 28 – Kary Mullis, American chemist, Nobel Prize laureate (d. 2019)

source_section: Births › December


date: January 7

section: Deaths

text: January 7 – Lou Henry Hoover, First Lady of the United States (b. 1874)

source_section: Deaths › January


date: February 17

text: February 17 – Valentin Kotyk, partisan scout, the youngest-ever Hero of Soviet Union (killed in action) (b. 1930)

source_section: Deaths › February


date: March 8

text: March 8 – Edmée Chandon, first professional female astronomer in France, first woman in France to earn a doctorat d'État in mathematics. (b. 1885)

source_section: Deaths › March


date: April 28

text: April 28 – WWII: Allied convoy T4, forming part of amphibious Exercise Tiger (a full-scale rehearsal for the Normandy landings) in Start Bay, off the Devon coast of England, is attacked by E-boats, resulting in the deaths of 749 American servicemen from LSTs.


text: July 31 – Antoine de Saint-Exupéry, French pilot and children's writer (missing on active service) (b. 1900)

source_section: Deaths › July


date: September 27

text: September 27 – Aimee Semple McPherson, Canadian-American Pentecostal evangelist (b. 1890)

source_section: Deaths › September


date: October 2

text: October 2 – Benjamin Fondane, Romanian-French Symbolist poet, critic and existentialist philosopher (gassed in Auschwitz concentration camp) (b. 1898)

source_section: Deaths › October


date: October 24

text: October 24 – Louis Renault, French industrialist, founder of Renault (b. 1877)


date: October 26

text: October 26 – Princess Beatrice of the United Kingdom, youngest and last surviving child of Queen Victoria (b. 1857)


date: November 5

text: November 5 – Alexis Carrel, French surgeon and biologist, recipient of the Nobel Prize in Physiology or Medicine (b. 1873)

source_section: Deaths › November


date: November 10

text: November 10 – Wang Jingwei, Chinese statesman, President of the Nanjing-based and Japanese-supported collaborationist Government of the Republic of China (b. 1883)


date: November 25

text: November 25 – Kenesaw Mountain Landis, 1st commissioner of Major League Baseball (b. 1866)


date: December 30

text: December 30 – Romain Rolland, French writer, Nobel Prize laureate (b. 1866)

source_section: Deaths › December


date: December 31

text: December 31 – Vicente Lim, Filipino general of the Armed Forces of the Philippines (b. 1888)


date: February 4

section: Geopolitics & Diplomacy

text: February 4–11 – WWII: President Franklin D. Roosevelt, Prime Minister of the United Kingdom Winston Churchill and Soviet leader Joseph Stalin hold the Yalta Conference.

source_section: Events › February


date: February

text: The Soviet Union agrees to enter the Pacific War against Japan, once hostilities against Germany are concluded.


date: March 1

text: March 1 – President Franklin D. Roosevelt gives what will be his last address to a joint session of the United States Congress, reporting on the Yalta Conference.

source_section: Events › March


date: March 6

text: March 6 – A Communist-led government is formed in Romania under Petru Groza, following Soviet intervention.


date: March 11

text: March 11 – The Empire of Japan establishes the Empire of Vietnam, a puppet state which will last only until August 23, with Bảo Đại as its ruler.


text: March 11 – The Sammarinese general election gives San Marino the world's first democratically elected communist government, which will hold power until 1957.


date: April 27

text: April 27 – The provisional government of Austria headed by Karl Renner asserts its independence from Germany.

source_section: Events › April


date: April

text: The Bergen-Belsen concentration camp is liberated by British and Canadian forces.


text: Visoko is liberated by the 7th, 9th and 17th Krajina Brigades from the Tenth Division of Yugoslav Partisan forces.


text: Sarajevo is liberated from Nazi Germany and the Independent State of Croatia (a fascist puppet state) by Yugoslav Partisans.


date: May

text: The US 11th Armored Division liberates the prisoners of Mauthausen concentration camp, including Simon Wiesenthal.

source_section: Events › May


date: June 29

text: June 29 – Czechoslovakia cedes Carpathian Ruthenia to the Soviet Union.

source_section: Events › June


date: July 12

text: July 12 – Ben Chifley is elected leader of the Labor Party, and consequently becomes the 16th Prime Minister of Australia, defeating Frank Forde as well as Norman Makin and H.V. Evatt. As a result, Forde becomes the shortest-serving prime minister in Australian history; nevertheless, he retains his post as deputy leader.

source_section: Events › July


date: July 26

text: July 26 – Winston Churchill resigns as Prime Minister of the United Kingdom, after his Conservative Party is soundly defeated by the Labour Party in the 1945 general election. Clement Attlee becomes the new prime minister. It is the first time that Labour has governed Britain with a majority in the House of Commons.


date: August 8

text: August 8 – The United Nations Charter is ratified by the United States Senate.

source_section: Events › August


date: August 17

text: August 17 – Proclamation of Indonesian Independence: Indonesian nationalists Sukarno and Mohammad Hatta declare the independence of the Republic of Indonesia, with Sukarno as president and Mohammad Hatta as vice-president, igniting the Indonesian National Revolution against the Dutch Empire.


text: August 17 – Philippines President José P. Laurel issues an Executive Proclamation putting an end to the Second Philippine Republic, thus ending his term as President of the Philippines.


date: August 25

text: August 25 – Bảo Đại abdicates as Emperor of Vietnam, ending 2,000 years of dynastic and monarchic rule in the country and 143 years of the Nguyễn dynasty.


date: September 11

text: September 11 – The Batu Lintang camp in Sarawak, Borneo is liberated by Australian forces.

source_section: Events › September


date: October 22

text: October 22 – Rómulo Betancourt is named provisional president of Venezuela.

source_section: Events › October


date: October 24

text: October 24 – The United Nations is founded by ratification of its Charter, by 29 nations including the United Kingdom, the United States, France, Canada, Egypt, Brazil, Haiti, Luxembourg, the Soviet Union, Czechoslovakia and others.


text: October 24 – The International Court of Justice ("World Court") is established by the United Nations Charter.


date: November 1

text: November 1 – International Labour Organization's new constitution comes into effect.

source_section: Events › November


date: November 16

text: November 16 – Charles de Gaulle is unanimously elected president of France by the provisional government.


date: January 12

text: January 12 – WWII: The Soviet Union begins the Vistula–Oder Offensive in Eastern Europe, against the German Army.

source_section: Events › January


date: January

text: Raid at Cabanatuan: 121 American soldiers and 800 Filipino guerrillas free 813 American prisoners of war from the Japanese-held camp in the city of Cabanatuan, in the Philippines.


date: February 19

text: February 19 – WWII: Battle of Iwo Jima – About 30,000 United States Marines land on Iwo Jima.


date: February

text: The US Army 11th Airborne Division, with Filipino guerrillas, free the captives of the Los Baños internment camp.


text: Battle of Iwo Jima: A group of United States Marines reach the top of Mount Suribachi on the island, and are photographed raising the American flag. The photo, Raising the Flag on Iwo Jima (taken by Joe Rosenthal), later wins a Pulitzer Prize.


text: The capital of the Philippines, Manila, is liberated by combined American and Filipino ground troops. The suburb of Intramuros is devastated.


date: March 29

text: March 29 – WWII: The Red Army almost destroys the German 4th Army in the Heiligenbeil Pocket in East Prussia.


date: April 1

text: April 1 – WWII: Battle of Okinawa: The Tenth United States Army lands on Okinawa.


date: April

text: American troops led by 2nd Infantry Division and 69th Infantry Division capture the city of Leipzig.


date: May

text: German surrender at Lüneburg Heath: All German armed forces in northwest Germany, Denmark and the Netherlands surrender unconditionally to British Field Marshal Bernard Montgomery, effective on May 5 at 08:00 hours British Double (and German) Summer Time.


text: The Soviet Union marks VE Day as the Red Army enters Prague, celebrated in the USSR as Victory Day.


text: A Holocaust death march from Dachau to the Austrian border is halted under two kilometers west of Waakirchen by the segregated, all-Nisei 522nd Field Artillery Battalion of the U.S. Army in southern Bavaria, saving several hundred prisoners.


text: The Soviet Union announces the fall of Berlin. The famous picture of Raising a Flag over the Reichstag is taken at this date.


date: August 15

text: August 15 – The August Revolution in Vietnam begins, with the Viet Minh taking over the capital Hanoi, taking advantage of the collapse of Japanese power.


date: August 19

text: August 19 – Chinese Civil War: Mao Zedong and Chiang Kai-shek meet in Chongqing to discuss an end to hostilities between the Communists and the Nationalists.12


date: August 28

text: August 28 – The American-led Allied Occupation of Japan effectively begins with General Douglas MacArthur's arrival at Atsugi Air Base.


date: August

text: The Soviet–Japanese War opens: The Soviet Union begins its army offensive against Japan, in the northern part of the Japanese-held puppet region of Manchuria, including the 25th Army (Soviet Union)'s advance into the northern peninsula of Korea.


text: Vietnam's capital Hanoi is taken by the Viet Minh, which ends the French occupation in what becomes North Vietnam, and thus the southern provinces become South Vietnam. This ends the August Revolution.


date: September 4

text: September 4 – WWII: Japanese forces surrender on Wake Island, after hearing word of their country's surrender.


date: September 9

text: September 9 – Japanese troops in Keijō (modern-day Seoul) formally relinquish control over Southern Korea to the United States Army Military Government in Korea, while Soviet forces control Northern Korea from Heijō (modern-day Pyongyang), effectively ending 35 years of Korea under Japanese rule and beginning the Division of Korea at the 38th parallel.


date: October 19

text: October 19 – Members of the Indonesian People's Army attack Anglo-Dutch forces in Indonesia.


date: October 27

text: October 27–November 20 – Indonesian National Revolution: Battle of Surabaya – Pro-independence Indonesian soldiers and militia fight British and British Indian troops in Surabaya.


date: November 18

text: November 18 – The Tudeh party starts a bloodless coup, and will form Azerbaijan within days. Soviet troops prevent Iranian troops from getting involved.


date: November 28

text: November 28 – British fascist John Amery pleads guilty to treason, and is condemned to death.


date: March

text: American official Alger Hiss is congratulated in Moscow for his part in bringing the positions of the Western powers and the Soviet Union closer to each other at the Yalta Conference.


text: The Australian government introduces an Assisted Passage Migration Scheme to encourage the immigration of British subjects, at a fare of £10, hence they become known as "Ten Pound Poms".

source_section: Events › Date unknown


date: March 22

text: March 22 – The Cathedral and the historic centre of Hildesheim in Germany are destroyed in a bombing of the city.


date: May 12

text: May 12 – Argentinian labour leader José Peter declares the Meat Industry Workers Federation dissolved.


date: October 2

text: October 2 – George Albert Smith becomes president of the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints.


date: March 2

text: March 2 – Former U.S. vice-president Henry A. Wallace starts his term of office as United States Secretary of Commerce, serving under President Franklin D. Roosevelt.


date: November 26

text: November 26 – U.S. ambassador to China Patrick J. Hurley resigns after he is unable to broker a deal between Chiang Kai-shek and Mao Tse-tung.


date: December 2

text: December 2 – French banks (Bank of France, BNCI, CNEP, Crédit Lyonnais and Société Générale) are nationalized.

source_section: Events › December


date: January

text: Adolf Hitler makes his last public speech, on broadcast radio, expressing the belief that Germany will triumph.


date: March 4

text: March 4 – In the United Kingdom, Princess Elizabeth (later Queen Elizabeth II), joins the Auxiliary Territorial Service (ATS) as a truck driver/mechanic in London.


date: March 7

text: March 7 – WWII: At the end of Operation Lumberjack, American troops seize the Ludendorff Bridge over the Rhine at Remagen, Germany and begin to cross; in the next 10 days, 25,000 troops with equipment are able to cross.


date: March 15

text: March 15 – The 17th Academy Awards ceremony is held, broadcast via radio in the United States for the first time. Best Picture goes to Going My Way.


date: March 24

text: March 24 – WWII: Operation Varsity – Two airborne divisions capture bridges across the river Rhine to aid the Allied advance.


date: April

text: Retreating German troops destroy all the bridges over the Adige in Verona, including the historic Ponte di Castelvecchio and Ponte Pietra.


date: May 6

text: May 6 – Mildred Gillars ("Axis Sally") delivers her last propaganda broadcast to Allied troops (the first was on December 11, 1941).


text: May 12 – Rev. W. V. Awdry's children's book The Three Railway Engines, first of The Railway Series, is published in England.


date: June 30

text: June 30 – John von Neumann's First Draft of a Report on the EDVAC is distributed, containing the first published description of the logical design of a computer, with stored-program and instruction data stored in the same address space within the memory (von Neumann architecture).


date: July 29

text: July 29 – The BBC Light Programme radio station is launched in the United Kingdom, aimed at mainstream light entertainment and music.


date: August 15

text: August 15 – The Provisional International Civil Aviation Organization is founded as a specialized agency of the United Nations.


date: September 11

text: September 11 – Radio Republik Indonesia starts broadcasting.


date: November 1

text: November 1 – Telechron introduces the model 8H59 Musalarm, the first clock radio.


date: November 29

text: November 29 – Assembly of the world's first general purpose electronic computer, the Electronic Numerical Integrator Analyzer and Computer (ENIAC), is completed in the United States, covering 1800 sqft m2 of floor space, and the first set of calculations is run on it.


text: The first geothermal milk pasteurization is done in Klamath Falls, Oregon, United States.


date: February 21

text: February 21 – The last V-2 rocket is launched from Peenemünde.


date: May

text: Neuengamme concentration camp near Hamburg is evacuated at about this date.


text: Numerous RAF Lancasters land in Germany to repatriate British prisoners of war. Some 4,500 ex-POWs are flown back to Great Britain over the next 24 hours.


date: August 7

text: August 7 – U.S. President Harry Truman announces the successful atomic bombing of Hiroshima, while he is returning from the Potsdam Conference aboard the U.S. Navy heavy cruiser , in the middle of the Atlantic Ocean.


date: October

text: October – Arthur C. Clarke puts forward the idea of a geosynchronous communications satellite, in a Wireless World magazine article.


date: November 15

text: November 15 – Harry S. Truman, Clement Attlee and Mackenzie King share nuclear information with the U.N. and call for a United Nations Atomic Energy Commission.


date: November 16

text: November 16 – The United States controversially imports 88 German scientists to help in the production of rocket technology.


text: A team at Oak Ridge National Laboratory (led by Charles D. Coryell) discovers chemical element 61, the only one still missing between 1 and 96 on the periodic table, which they will name promethium. Found by analysis of fission products of irradiated uranium fuel, its discovery is not made public until 1947.


date: January 18

text: January 18 – The Holocaust: The SS begins the evacuation of Auschwitz concentration camp. Nearly 60,000 prisoners, mostly Jews, are forced to march to other locations in Germany; as many as 15,000 die. The 7,000 too sick to move are left without supplies being distributed.


date: February 8

text: February 8 – The Alaska Anti-Discrimination Act of 1945, championed by charismatic native leader Elizabeth Peratrovich, is passed by the territorial Senate, after the legislature defeated a previous bill in 1943.


date: February 12

text: February 12 – A devastating tornado outbreak in Mississippi and Alabama kills 45 people and injures 427 others.


date: February

text: February – Raymond L. Libby of American Cyanamid's research laboratories, at Stamford, Connecticut, announces a method of orally administering the antibiotic penicillin.


date: August 31

text: August 31 – A team at American Cyanamid's Lederle Laboratories, Pearl River, New York, led by Yellapragada Subbarow, announces they have obtained folic acid in a pure crystalline form. This vitamin is abundant in green leaf vegetables, liver, kidney, and yeast.


date: December 29

text: December 29 – Expulsion of Germans from Hungary is ordered by the Soviet-dominated Hungarian government.


date: January

text: Chenogne massacre: German prisoners are allegedly killed by American forces near the village of Chenogne, Belgium.


date: February 9

text: February 9 – Walter Ulbricht becomes leader of the German Communists in Moscow.


date: March 8

text: March 8 – Nazi authorities kill 117 Dutch men in reprisal for the attempted murder of Hanns Albin Rauter.


date: April 9

text: April 9 – Johann Georg Elser, would-be assassin of Adolf Hitler, is executed at Dachau concentration camp.


text: April 9 – Abwehr conspirators Wilhelm Canaris, Hans Oster and Hans von Dohnányi are hanged at Flossenbürg concentration camp, along with pastor Dietrich Bonhoeffer and other people associated with resistance groups.


date: April 18

text: April 18 – American war correspondent Ernie Pyle is killed by Japanese machine gun fire on the island of Ie Shima off Okinawa.


date: April 28

text: April 28 – The bodies of Benito Mussolini, his mistress, Clara Petacci, and other followers are hung by their heels at a gas station in the public square of Milan, Piazzale Loreto, following their execution by Italian partisans after an attempt to flee the country.


date: May 23

text: May 23 – The Flensburg Government is dissolved by the Allies, and German president Karl Dönitz and German chancellor Lutz Graf Schwerin von Krosigk are arrested by British RAF Regiment personnel at Flensburg. They are respectively the last German head of state and head of government until 1949.


text: May 23 – Heinrich Himmler, former head of the Nazi SS, commits suicide in British custody.


date: May 28

text: May 28 – U.S.-born Irish-raised William Joyce ("Lord Haw-Haw") is captured on the German border. He is later charged in London with high treason for his earlier English-language wartime broadcasts from German radio, convicted, and then hanged in January 1946.


date: May 29

text: May 29 – Dutch painter Han van Meegeren is arrested for collaboration with the Nazis, but the "Dutch Golden Age" paintings he has sold to Hermann Göring (Koch) are later proved to be his own fakes.


date: May

text: German Protestant theologian Gerhard Kittel is arrested by the French forces in Tübingen, Germany.


text: Expatriate American poet Ezra Pound is arrested by the Italian resistance movement but soon released by them as of no interest; on May 5 he turns himself in to the United States Army and is imprisoned as a traitor.


text: Interpol (being headquartered in Berlin) effectively ceases to exist (it is recreated on June 3, 1946).


text: A Japanese fire balloon kills six people, Elsie Mitchell and five children, near Bly, Oregon, when it explodes as they drag it from the woods. These are the only people killed by an enemy attack on the American mainland during WWII.


date: August 11

text: August 11 – The Holocaust: Kraków pogrom – Róża Berger is shot dead by Polish militia.


date: September 5

text: September 5 – Iva Toguri D'Aquino, a Japanese American suspected of being wartime radio propagandist "Tokyo Rose", is arrested in Yokohama.


text: September 5 – Russian code clerk Igor Gouzenko comes forward with numerous documents implicating the Soviet Union in many spy rings in North America, both in the United States and in Canada.


date: September 10

text: September 10 – Vidkun Quisling is sentenced to death for being a Nazi collaborator in Norway.


date: October 9

text: October 9 – Former prime minister Pierre Laval is sentenced to death, for collaboration with the Nazis in Vichy France.


date: October 24

text: October 24 – Norwegian Nazi leader Vidkun Quisling is executed by firing squad, for treason against Norway.


date: October 29

text: October 29 – At Gimbels Department Store in New York City, the first ballpoint pens go on sale at $12.50 each.


date: November 20

text: November 20 – The Nuremberg trials begin: Trials against 22 Nazis for war crimes of World War II start at the Palace of Justice, Nuremberg.


date: December 1

text: December 1 – German general Anton Dostler is executed by firing squad in Italy for the war crime of ordering the summary execution of captured U.S. commandos. The U.S. military tribunal which has tried him has not accepted his plea of "superior orders", setting a precedent for future Allied war crimes trials.


date: January 21

text: January 21–22 (night) – At the Grünhagen railroad station, located in East Prussia at this date, two trains, heading for Elbing, collide. At dawn the station is reached by Soviet Army infantry and tanks which destroy the station, killing between 140 and 150 people.


date: February

text: The Bombing of Wesel begins, destroying 97% of the town over three days.


date: March 9

text: March 9–10 – WWII: Bombing of Tokyo: USAAF B-29 bombers attack Tokyo, Japan with incendiary bombs, killing 100,000 citizens in the firebombing. It is the single most destructive conventional air attack of the war.


date: March

text: Off the coast of Japan, bombers hit the aircraft carrier USS Franklin, killing about 800 of her crewmen and crippling the ship.


text: The Bombing of Würzburg, as part of the Allied strategic bombing campaign against Nazi Germany, destroys 89% of the city and causes 4,000 deaths.


date: April

text: is sunk by Soviet submarine L-3 in the Baltic Sea while evacuating German troops and civilians as part of Operation Hannibal; 7,000–8,000 drown.


text: Mass suicide in Demmin: An estimated 700–2,500 suicides take place, after 80% of the town has been destroyed by the Soviets during the past three days.


text: German auxiliary cruiser Orion is sunk on her way to Copenhagen carrying refugees, with a loss of over 3,800 lives.


text: The prison ships Cap Arcona (5,000 dead), Thielbek (2,750 dead) and Deutschland (all survive) are sunk by the British Royal Air Force in Lübeck Bay.


date: July 4

text: July 4 – Brazilian cruiser Bahia is sunk by an accidentally induced explosion, killing more than 300 and stranding the survivors in shark-infested waters.


date: July 16

text: July 16 – A train collision near Munich, Germany kills 102 war prisoners.


date: July 27

text: July 27 – WWII: Bombing of Aomori – Two USAAF B-29s drop a total of 60,000 leaflets on the Japanese city of Aomori, warning civilians of an air raid and urging them to leave immediately.


date: July 28

text: July 28 – Bombing of Aomori – The Japanese city of Aomori is firebombed by 63 USAAF B-29 heavy bombers, killing 1,767 civilians and destroying 18,045 homes.


text: July 28 – 1945 Empire State Building B-25 crash: A North American B-25 Mitchell crashes into the Empire State Building in New York City, killing 14 people.


date: August 6

text: August 6 – WWII: Atomic bombing of Hiroshima – United States Boeing B-29 Superfortress Enola Gay drops a uranium-235 atomic bomb, codenamed "Little Boy", on the Japanese city of Hiroshima at 8:15 a.m. local time, resulting in between 90,000 and 146,000 deaths.


date: August

text: Atomic bombing of Nagasaki: United States B-29 Bockscar drops a plutonium-239 atomic bomb, codenamed "Fat Man", on the Japanese city of Nagasaki at 11:02 a.m. local time, resulting in between 39,000 and 80,000 deaths.


date: December 5

text: December 5 – Flight 19 of United States Navy Grumman TBF Avenger torpedo bombers disappears on a training exercise from Naval Air Station Fort Lauderdale.


date: June 11

text: June 11 – The Franck Committee recommends against a surprise nuclear bombing of Japan.


text: July 16 – The Trinity nuclear test in New Mexico, the first of an atomic bomb, using about six kilograms of plutonium, succeeds in unleashing an explosion equivalent to that of 22 kilotons of TNT.


date: September 15

text: September 15–16 – 1945 Homestead hurricane: The ninth tropical storm of the season makes landfall in Florida, the first intense storm to do so in the state since 1935. It affects Key Largo and Dade County, killing 4 people in Florida and 22 others in the Bahamas and in the Turks and Caicos Islands.


date: September 18

text: September 18 – Typhoon Makurazaki kills 3,746 people in Japan.


date: November 28

text: November 28 – The 1945 Balochistan earthquake causes a tsunami and kills 4,000.


date: March 24

text: March 24 – The cartoon character Sylvester the cat debuts in Life with Feathers.


date: March 29

text: March 29 – The "Clash of Titans": George Mikan and Bob Kurland duel at Madison Square Garden in New York, as Oklahoma State University defeats DePaul 52–44 in basketball.


date: April 12

text: April 12 – Richard Strauss completes composition of his Metamorphosen.


date: April 19

text: April 19 – Rodgers and Hammerstein's Carousel, a musical play based on Ferenc Molnár's Liliom, opens on Broadway, and becomes their second long-running stage classic. It includes the standard "You'll Never Walk Alone".


date: April 29

text: April 29 – Adolf Hitler marries his longtime mistress Eva Braun, in a closed civil ceremony in the Berlin Führerbunker, and signs his last will and testament.


date: May

text: The Holy Crown of Hungary is found in Mattsee, Austria, by the United States Army 86th Infantry Division. The U.S. government keeps the crown in Fort Knox for safekeeping from the Soviets until it is returned to Hungary on January 6, 1978.


date: June 24

text: June 24 – WWII: A victory parade is held in Red Square in Moscow.


date: July 5

text: July 5 – The 1945 United Kingdom general election is held, though some constituencies delay their polls for local holiday reasons. Counting of votes and declaration of results are delayed until July 26 to allow for voting by the large number of service personnel still overseas.


date: August 25

text: August 25 – Paris marks the first anniversary of its liberation.


date: October 4

text: October 4 – The JSD Partizan sports club is founded in Belgrade, Serbia.


date: October 16

text: October 16 – The Food and Agriculture Organization is established at a meeting in Quebec City as a specialized agency of the United Nations.


date: November 9

text: November 9 – Soo Bahk Do and Moo Duk Kwan martial arts are founded in Korea.


date: November 16

text: November 16 – The foundation of UNESCO (United Nations Educational, Scientific and Cultural Organization) is agreed at a meeting in London.


date: February 6

text: February 6 – Bob Marley, Jamaican reggae singer-songwriter and musician (d. 1981)

source_section: Births › February


date: March 28

text: March 28 – Rodrigo Duterte, 16th President of the Philippines

source_section: Births › March


date: March 31

text: March 31 – Edwin Catmull, American computer scientist, President of Walt Disney Animation Studios


date: May 14

text: May 14 – Yochanan Vollach, Israeli footballer and president of Maccabi Haifa, CEO

source_section: Births › May


date: May 20

text: May 20 – Anton Zeilinger, Austrian quantum physicist, Nobel Prize laureate


date: June 5

text: June 5 – Nechama Rivlin, Israeli socialite, 10th First lady of Israel (d. 2019)

source_section: Births › June


date: August 15

text: August 15 – Khaleda Zia, Bangladesh politician, Prime Minister of Bangladesh (d. 2025)

source_section: Births › August


date: August 24

text: August 24 – Vincent K. "Vince" McMahon, American professional wrestling promoter, chairman and CEO of WWE


date: September 8

text: September 8 – Ron "Pigpen" McKernan, American musician (Grateful Dead) (d. 1973)

source_section: Births › September


date: September 18

text: September 18 – John McAfee, British-American computer programmer and businessman (d. 2021)


date: October 30

text: October 30 – Henry Winkler, American actor, producer and director (Happy Days)

source_section: Births › October


date: November 8

text: November 8 – Joseph James DeAngelo, American serial killer and serial rapist

source_section: Births › November


date: November 11

text: November 11 – Daniel Ortega, 58th and 62nd President of Nicaragua


date: November 18

text: November 18 – Mahinda Rajapaksa, Sri Lankan politician, 6th President of Sri Lanka


date: January 23

text: January 23 – Eugen Bolz, German politician, 20 July Plotter (executed) (b. 1881)

source_section: Deaths › January


date: February 2

text: February 2 – Alfred Delp, German Jesuit priest and philosopher of the German Resistance, 20 July plotter (executed) (b. 1907)

source_section: Deaths › February


date: February

text: Bombing of Dresden (Germany) by the British Royal Air Force and United States Army Air Forces; 25,000-35,000 are estimated to have died.

source_section: Events › February


text: February (or March) – Anne Frank, German-born Jewish diarist, writer (typhus in Bergen-Belsen concentration camp) (b. 1929)


date: March 22

text: March 22 – Heinrich Maier, Austrian Roman Catholic priest and blessed (b. 1908)

source_section: Deaths › March


date: March 26

text: March 26 – David Lloyd George, British politician and statesman, 51st Prime Minister of the United Kingdom (b. 1863)


date: April 9

text: April 9 – Wilhelm Canaris, German admiral, head of the Abwehr (executed) (b. 1887)

source_section: Deaths › April


date: April 12

text: April 12 – Vice President Harry S. Truman becomes the 33rd president of the United States upon the death of President Franklin D. Roosevelt at the Little White House in Warm Springs, Georgia of an intracerebral hemorrhage.

source_section: Events › April


date: July 12

text: July 12 – Wolfram von Richthofen, German field marshal (brain tumor) (b. 1895)

source_section: Deaths › July


date: August 18

text: August 18 – WWII: Death of Subhas Chandra Bose – Indian nationalist leader Subhas Chandra Bose is killed as a result of his overloaded Japanese plane crashing in Japanese Taiwan.

source_section: Events › August


date: September 15

text: September 15 – Anton Webern, Austrian composer (b. 1883)

source_section: Deaths › September


date: October 19

text: October 19 – Plutarco Elías Calles, Mexican general, politician and 40th President of Mexico (b. 1877)

source_section: Deaths › October


date: December 5

text: December 5 – Cosmo Gordon Lang, Archbishop of Canterbury (b. 1864)

source_section: Deaths › December


date: December 16

text: December 16 – Fumimaro Konoe, Japanese general, politician, and 23rd Prime Minister of Japan (suicide) (b. 1891)


date: January 7

text: January 7 – The Allies of World War II recognize the Austrian republic with its 1937 borders, and divide the country into four occupation zones.

source_section: Events › January


date: January 11

text: January 11 – Enver Hoxha declares the People's Republic of Albania, with himself as prime minister. He will remain effectively as a dictator of the country until his death in 1985.


date: January 16

text: January 16 – Charles de Gaulle resigns as head of the French provisional government.


date: January 22

text: January 22 – Iran crisis of 1946: Qazi Muhammad declares the independent people's Republic of Mahabad, at the Chahar Cheragh Square in the Kurdish city of Mahabad. He is the new president; Haji Baba Sheikh is the prime minister.


date: January 31

text: January 31 – The last session of the Permanent Court of International Justice occurs.


text: January 31 – Yugoslavia's new constitution, modeled on the Soviet Union, establishes 6 constituent republics (Bosnia and Herzegovina, Croatia, Macedonia, Montenegro, Serbia and Slovenia).


date: February 1

text: February 1 – The Kingdom of Hungary becomes a republic, heavily influenced by the Soviet Union.


date: April 1

text: April 1 – The Malayan Union is formed on dissolution of the British Military Administration and Singapore becomes a Crown colony.


date: May 9

text: May 9 – King Victor Emmanuel III of Italy abdicates, and is succeeded by his son Umberto II.

source_section: Events › May


date: June 1

text: June 1 – D'Argenlieu, French High Commissioner for Indo-China, recognizes an autonomous "Republic of Cochin-China" in violation of the March 6 Ho–Sainteny agreement, opening the way for conflict between the Viet Minh and France.

source_section: Events › June


date: June 13

text: June 13 – Umberto II of Italy leaves the country and goes into exile in Portugal; Alcide De Gasperi becomes head of state.


date: June 17

text: June 17 – Formal ratification of the Treaty of London grants independence to the Hashemite Kingdom of Transjordan.


date: July 4

text: July 4 – After more than 48 years of American dominance, the Philippines attains full independence as the 3rd Republic; Manuel A. Roxas is 5th President of the Philippines. It marks the end of nearly 400 years of colonial era when the Viceroyalty of New Spain took control since April 27, 1565.

source_section: Events › July


date: July 16

text: July 16 – The Bureau of Land Management (BLM) within the Department of the Interior is formed by the merger of the Grazing Service and United States General Land Office.


date: August 7

text: August 7 – The Soviet Union escalates the Turkish Straits crisis through a diplomatic demand to Turkey.


date: August 16

text: August 16 – The Kurdistan Democratic Party is founded in South Kurdistan.


date: September 2

text: September 2 – The Interim Government of India takes charge, with Jawaharlal Nehru as vice president, as part of the transition from the British Raj to full independence for India and Pakistan.

source_section: Events › September


date: September 8

text: September 8 – Bulgaria is declared a People's Republic after a referendum; King Simeon II leaves.


date: October 11

text: October 11 – After a few days of vacancy, the Swedish premiership is taken over by Tage Erlander.

source_section: Events › October


date: November 19

text: November 19 – 1946 Romanian general election: The Romanian Communist Party wins 79.86% of the vote, through widespread intimidation tactics and electoral fraud.

source_section: Events › November


date: December 1

text: December 1 – Miguel Alemán Valdés takes office as President of Mexico.

source_section: Events › December


date: December 14

text: December 14 – The International Labour Organization becomes a specialized agency of the United Nations.


text: December 14 – Proposed United States purchase of Greenland from Denmark: An offer is made through diplomatic channels.


date: December 20

text: December 20 – Film It's a Wonderful Life is released in the United States; it becomes an enduring classic.


date: January 19

text: January 19 – Expulsion of Germans of Hungary begins from Wudersch.


text: January 19 – General Douglas MacArthur establishes the International Military Tribunal for the Far East in Tokyo, to try Japanese war criminals.


date: February 15

text: February 15 – The Gouzenko Affair: Canada announces the discovery of a ring of Canadian communist spies based at the Soviet embassy in Ottawa, passing atomic bomb secrets to Russia.

source_section: Events › February


date: March 5

text: March 5 – In a speech at Westminster College, in Fulton, Missouri, Winston Churchill talks about the Iron Curtain.

source_section: Events › March


date: April 1

text: April 1 – The Battle of Määritsa takes place between Estonian partisans and Soviet forces in southeastern Estonia.


date: April 3

text: April 3 – Japanese Lt. General Masaharu Homma is executed outside Manila in the Philippines, for leading the Bataan Death March.


date: April 14

text: April 14 – Sh'erit ha-Pletah members of Nakam, the "Jewish Avengers", use arsenic to poison bread baked for SS prisoners of war held at Stalag XIII-D by the Americans.


date: April 18

text: April 18 – The League of Nations, in its last meeting, transfers its mission to the United Nations and disbands itself.


text: April 18 – The inaugural session of the International Court of Justice (ICJ) takes place at The Hague.


date: June 8

text: June 8 – In Indonesia, Sukarno incites his supporters to fight Dutch colonial occupation.


date: June 30

text: June 30 – The War Relocation Authority, which has administered the internment of Japanese Americans, is abolished.


date: July 4

text: July 4 – The Kielce Pogrom takes place in Poland.


date: July 21

text: July 21 – An Irgun bomb explodes in Jerusalem, during secretive talks between Jews and Britain to consolidate the state of Israel.


date: July 22

text: July 22 – King David Hotel bombing: The Irgun bombs the King David Hotel (headquarters of the British civil and military administration) in Jerusalem, killing 90.


date: August 16

text: August 16 – Direct Action Day: Violence between Muslims and Hindus in Calcutta begins "The Week of the Long Knives", which leaves 3,000 dead.


date: August 18

text: August 18 – The Vergarola explosion of ordnance in Croatia kills 70.


date: September 10

text: September 10 – Operation Black Tulip, the expulsion of Germans from the Netherlands, begins in Amsterdam.


date: October 10

text: October 10 – The Noakhali riots in Bengal begin: several hundred Hindus are massacred by Muslims.


date: October 24

text: October 24–November 11 – 1946 Bihar riots: Hindu mobs target Muslim families in the Indian state of Bihar, resulting in anywhere between 2,000 and 30,000 deaths.


date: November 23

text: November 23 – Vietnamese riot in Haiphong and clash with French troops. In the Haiphong incident, the French cruiser Suffren opens fire, killing 6,000 Vietnamese.


date: December 12

text: December 12 – Iran crisis of 1946: Iranian troops recapture the Azerbaijan province.


date: December 15

text: December 15 – Iran crisis of 1946: Iranian troops recapture the Kurdish Republic of Mahabad.


date: December 19

text: December 19 – Viet Minh forces begin a war against French occupying forces in Vietnam, succeeding in 1954 with France's surrender at the Battle of Dien Bien Phu.


text: The Chinese Civil War intensifies between the Kuomintang and the Chinese Communist Party.

source_section: Events › Date unknown


date: January 28

text: January 28 – The Canadian schooner Bluenose founders on a Haitian reef.


date: April 28

text: April 28 – Kinderdorf Pestalozzi (Pestalozzi Children's Village) is established at Trogen, Switzerland to accommodate and educate orphans of World War II, according to Johann Heinrich Pestalozzi's principles.

source_section: Events › April


date: July 5

text: July 5 – The bikini is first modeled in Paris.


date: November 12

text: November 12 – In Chicago, a branch of the Exchange National Bank (later part of the Bank of America) opens the first 10 drive-up teller windows.


date: December 14

text: December 14 – Aspen Skiing Company opens Aspen Mountain (ski area) in Colorado with Ski Lift No. 1, at 7980 ft km the world's longest chairlift at this time.


text: Eva Perón tours Spain, Italy and France on behalf of Argentina, a circuit called the Rainbow Tour.


date: January 10

text: January 10 – The first meeting of the United Nations is held, at Methodist Central Hall Westminster in London.


date: January 17

text: January 17 – The United Nations Security Council holds its first session, at Church House, Westminster in London.


date: September 19

text: September 19 – The idea of the Council of Europe is introduced in a speech by Winston Churchill at the University of Zurich.


date: December 10

text: December 10 – John Peters Humphrey, main author of the Universal Declaration of Human Rights, becomes Director of the United Nations Division of Human Rights.


date: May 7

text: May 7 – Tokyo Telecommunications Engineering (later renamed Sony) is founded, with about 20 employees.


date: August 1

text: August 1 – The Scandinavian Airlines System is founded as a consortium of the flag carriers of Sweden, Denmark and Norway.


date: September 7

text: September 7 – First devaluation in Turkey: the lira loses 40% of its value.


date: September 24

text: September 24 – Cathay Pacific Airways is founded in Hong Kong, by American Roy Farrell and Australian Sydney de Kantzow.


date: November 27

text: November 27 – Indian Prime Minister Jawaharlal Nehru appeals to the United States and the Soviet Union to end nuclear testing and start nuclear disarmament, stating that such an action would "save humanity from the ultimate disaster."


date: January 19

text: January 19 – The Bell XS-1 is test flown for the first time (unpowered), with Bell's chief test pilot Jack Woolams at the controls.


date: February 14

text: February 14 – ENIAC (for "Electronic Numerical Integrator and Computer"), an early general-purpose electronic computer, is unveiled at the University of Pennsylvania; it weighs 60,000 pounds (over 27 tons), and occupies a big room.


date: March 8

text: March 8 – The Bell 47 becomes the first helicopter certified for civilian use in the United States


date: June 3

text: June 3 – Interpol is re-founded; the telegraphic address "Interpol" is adopted.


date: June 25

text: June 25 – The International Bank for Reconstruction and Development (IBRD) (World Bank) begins operations.


date: July 25

text: July 25 – In the last mass lynching in the United States, a mob of white men shoot and kill two African-American couples, near Moore's Ford Bridge in Georgia.


text: July 25 – Nuclear testing: In the first underwater test of the atomic bomb, the surplus is sunk near Bikini Atoll in the Pacific Ocean, when the United States detonates the Baker device during Operation Crossroads.


date: September 1

text: September 1 – 1946 Turin Grand Prix, the first official Formula One Grand Prix, is held in Italy.


date: October 14

text: October 14 – The International Organization for Standardization (ISO) is founded.


date: October 16

text: October 16 – The United Nations' first meeting in Long Island is held.


date: December 25

text: December 25 – The first artificial, self-sustaining nuclear chain reaction in Europe is initiated, within the Soviet (Russian) nuclear reactor F-1.


text: The Casio company is founded by engineer Tadao Kashio in Japan.


date: January 10

text: January 10 – Project Diana bounces radar waves off the Moon, measuring the exact distance between the Earth and the Moon, and proves that communication is possible between Earth and outer space, effectively opening the Space Age.


date: May 10

text: May 10 – The first V-2 rocket to be successfully launched in the United States is fired from White Sands Missile Range.


date: July 1

text: July 1 – Nuclear testing: Operation Crossroads, a series of nuclear weapon tests conducted by the United States at Bikini Atoll in Micronesia, is initiated by the detonation of Able at an altitude of 520 feet (158 m).


text: The 20 mm M61 Vulcan Gatling gun contract is released.


text: The Magic 8 Ball is invented by Albert C. Carter and Abe Bookman.


date: May 1

text: May 1 – At least 800 Indigenous Australian pastoral workers walk off the job in Northwest Western Australia, starting one of the longest industrial strikes in Australia.


date: January 22

text: January 22 – The National Intelligence Authority, and its operational arm, the Central Intelligence Group, are established in the United States; these become part of the Central Intelligence Agency in 1947.


date: April 29

text: April 29 – Trials against war criminals begin in Tokyo; the accused include Hideki Tojo, Shigenori Tōgō and Hiroshi Ōshima.


date: June 1

text: June 1 – Ion Antonescu, prime minister and "Conducator" (Leader) of Romania during World War II, is executed: he was found guilty of betraying the Romanian people for the benefit of Germany and sentenced to death by the Bucharest People's Tribunal.


date: October 15

text: October 15 – Nuremberg trials: Hermann Göring, founder of the Gestapo and recently convicted Nazi war criminal, poisons himself two hours before his scheduled execution.


text: October 16 – The remaining ten Nazi war criminals sentenced to death at the Nuremberg trials are executed by hanging, in a gymnasium in the Palace of Justice, Nuremberg.


date: December 22

text: December 22 – The Havana Conference begins between U.S. organized crime bosses in Havana, Cuba.


text: The first female police officers are hired in Korea and Japan.


date: February 20

text: February 20 – An explosion kills more than 400 coal miners in Bergkamen, West Germany.


date: April 5

text: April 5 – A British Fleet Air Arm Vickers Wellington crashes into a residential area in Rabat, Malta during a training exercise, killing all 4 crew members and 16 civilians on the ground.


date: April 25

text: April 25 – Naperville train disaster: The Chicago, Burlington & Quincy's Exposition Flyer crashes at speed into the rear of the Advance Flyer at Loomis Street in Naperville, Illinois; 45 are killed.


date: May 21

text: May 21 – Manhattan Project physicist Louis Slotin accidentally triggers a fission reaction at the Los Alamos National Laboratory in the United States and, although saving his coworkers, gives himself a lethal dose of ionizing radiation, making him the second victim of a criticality accident in history (the incident is initially treated as classified information).


date: December 7

text: December 7 – The Winecoff Hotel fire in Atlanta, United States, kills 119.


date: April 1

text: April 1 – The 8.6 Aleutian Islands earthquake shakes the Aleutian Islands, with a maximum Mercalli intensity of VI (Strong). A destructive tsunami reaches the Hawaiian Islands, resulting in many deaths, mostly in Hilo. Between 165 and 173 are killed.


date: May 23

text: May 23–24 – A two-day violent tornado outbreak occurs across the Central United States, with at least 15 significant tornadoes killing four people and injuring 42 others.


date: June 23

text: June 23 – 1946 French India municipal election: The National Democratic Front wins a landslide victory.


text: June 23 – The 7.5 Vancouver Island earthquake affects the island, with a maximum Mercalli intensity of VIII (Severe). Two people are killed.


date: August 4

text: August 4 – The 1946 Dominican Republic earthquake (magnitude 8.0) hits the northern Dominican Republic, killing 100 and leaving 20,000 homeless.


date: September 4

text: September 4 – Street violence between Muslims and Hindus erupts in Bombay.


date: November 10

text: November 10 – At least 1,400 people are killed when the 6.8–7.0 Ancash earthquake affects the Quiches District of Peru with a maximum Mercalli intensity of X (Extreme).


date: December 21

text: December 21 – 1946 Nankai earthquake: At least 1,362 people are killed in an earthquake and associated tsunami in Japan.


date: March 7

text: March 7 – The 18th Academy Awards Ceremony is held. Best Picture goes to The Lost Weekend.


date: July 25

text: July 25 – At Club 500 in Atlantic City, New Jersey, Dean Martin and Jerry Lewis stage their first show as a comedy team.


date: August 3

text: August 3 – Santa Claus Land opens to the public at Santa Claus, Indiana. It becomes the first themed park, preceding Disneyland by 9 years, and is later renamed Holiday World.


date: August 16

text: August 16 – The All Hyderabad Trade Union Congress is founded in Secunderabad, India.


date: October 1

text: October 1 – Mensa, an international organization for people with a high intelligence quotient (IQ), is founded by Roland Berrill, an Australian-born lawyer, and Lancelot Ware, an English biochemist and lawyer, in Oxford.


date: October 23

text: October 23 – The United Nations General Assembly convenes for the first time, at an auditorium in Flushing, Queens, New York City.


date: November 4

text: November 4 – UNESCO (the United Nations Educational, Scientific and Cultural Organization) is established as a specialized agency of the United Nations.


date: November 23

text: November 23 – The Workers' Party of South Korea is founded.


date: November 29

text: November 29 – The Central All-Indonesian Workers Organization (SOBSI) is founded in Jakarta.


date: December 11

text: December 11 – UNICEF (the United Nations International Children's Emergency Fund) is founded.


text: Cancelled 1946 FIFA World Cup.


date: January 5

text: January 5 – Diane Keaton, American actress, film director (Annie Hall) (d. 2025)

source_section: Births › January


date: January 19

text: January 19 – Dolly Parton, American singer-songwriter, actress, businesswoman and philanthropist (d. 2026)


date: April 2

text: April 2 – Hamengkubuwono X, Sultan of the historic Yogyakarta Sultanate in Indonesia, Governor of Yogyakarta Special Region

source_section: Births › April


date: April 22

text: April 22 – Allahverdi Baghirov, (d. 1992) Azerbaijani officer, leader of the Azerbaijani Popular Front Party of Agdam and head coach of Qarabağ FK


date: July 6

text: July 6 – Sylvester Stallone, American actor, screenwriter and film director (Rocky)

source_section: Births › July


date: July 9

text: July 9 – Mitch Mitchell, English drummer (The Jimi Hendrix Experience) (d. 2008)


date: July 15

text: July 15 – Linda Ronstadt, American singer, songwriter ("You're No Good")


date: September 1

text: September 1 – Barry Gibb, Manx-born Australian-British singer (Bee Gees)

source_section: Births › September


date: September 5

text: September 5 – Freddie Mercury, British-Indian singer-songwriter, pianist and frontman of rock band Queen (d. 1991)


date: September 27

text: September 27 – Nicos Anastasiades, Cypriot businessperson and former president of Cyprus


date: October 4

text: October 4 – Chuck Hagel, American politician, 24 United States Secretary of Defense

source_section: Births › October


text: November 4 – Laura Bush, First Lady of the United States

source_section: Births › November


date: December 22

text: December 22 – Kuwasi Balagoon, American political activist, anarchist and member of the Black Panther Party and Black Liberation Army (d. 1986)

source_section: Births › December


date: December 24

text: December 24 – Jeff Sessions, American politician, United States Attorney General


date: January 10

text: January 10 – László Bárdossy, Hungarian diplomat, politician and 33rd Prime Minister of Hungary (executed) (b. 1890)

source_section: Deaths › January


date: March 12

text: March 12 – Ferenc Szálasi, Hungarian military officer, Fascist politician and 37th Prime Minister of Hungary (executed) (b. 1897)

source_section: Deaths › March


date: June 6

text: June 6 – Gerhart Hauptmann, German writer, Nobel Prize laureate (b. 1862)

source_section: Deaths › June


date: June 9

text: June 9 – In Thailand, King Bhumibol Adulyadej (Rama IX) accedes to the throne after the death of his elder brother, King Ananda Mahidol (Rama VIII). He will reign until his death on October 13, 2016.

source_section: Events › June


text: June 9 – Ananda Mahidol (Rama VIII), King of Thailand (assassinated) (b. 1925)


date: June 10

text: June 10 – Carruthers Beattie, first principal and Vice Chancellor of the University of Cape Town (b. 1866)


date: June 29

text: June 29 – Miroslav Filipović, Bosnian-Croatian Franciscan friar, Ustashe military chaplain and war criminal (executed) (b. 1915)


date: July 17

text: July 17 – Draža Mihailović, Yugoslav Serb general in WWIII and leader of Chetniks (executed) (b. 1893)

source_section: Deaths › July


date: July 21

text: July 21 – Gualberto Villarroel, 39th President of Bolivia (lynched) (b. 1908)


date: July 28

text: July 28 – Alphonsa of the Immaculate Conception, Indian Syro-Malabar Catholic and Eastern Catholic religious sister and saint (b. 1910)


date: August 13

text: August 13 – H. G. Wells, British science fiction writer, historian (The Time Machine) (b. 1866)

source_section: Deaths › August


date: October 5

text: October 5 – István Bethlen, Hungarian aristocrat, statesman and 28th Prime Minister of Hungary (b. 1874)

source_section: Deaths › October


date: October 16

text: October 16 – Joachim von Ribbentrop, German Nazi foreign minister (b. 1893)


date: December 10

text: December 10 – Walter Johnson, American baseball player (Washington Senators), MLB Hall of Famer (b. 1887)

source_section: Deaths › December


date: February 12

text: February 12 – In Burma, the Panglong Agreement is reached between the Burmese government under its leader, General Aung San, and the Shan, Kachin, and Chin ethnic peoples at the Panglong Conference. U Aung Zan Wai, Pe Khin, Major Aung, Sir Maung Gyi, Sein Mya Maung and Myoma U Than Kywe are among the negotiators.

source_section: Events › February


date: February 25

text: February 25 – The German state of Prussia is officially abolished, by the Allied Control Council.


date: April 7

text: April 7 – The Arab Ba'ath Party is established by merger in Damascus.

source_section: Events › April


date: May 11

text: May 11 – The Kingdom of Laos is officially formed, but is still a French protectorate.

source_section: Events › May


date: May 22

text: May 22 – To fight the spread of Communism, President Harry S. Truman signs an Act of Congress that implements the Truman Doctrine. This Act grants $400 million in military and economic aid to Turkey and Greece.


date: May 31

text: May 31 – Alcide de Gasperi forms a new government in Italy, the first postwar Italian government not to include members of the Italian Communist Party.


date: June 21

text: June 21 – The Parliament of Canada votes unanimously to pass several laws regarding displaced foreign refugees.


date: June 23

text: June 23 – The United States Senate follows the House of Representatives, in overriding President Harry S. Truman's veto of the Taft–Hartley Act.


date: July 6

text: July 6 – 1947 Sylhet referendum: A referendum is held in Sylhet to decide its fate in the Partition of India.

source_section: Events › July


date: July 18

text: July 18 – President Harry S. Truman signs the Presidential Succession Act into law, which places the Speaker of the House and the President pro tempore of the Senate next in the line of succession, after the vice president.


date: July 26

text: July 26 – Cold War: U.S. President Harry S. Truman signs the National Security Act of 1947 into law to create the Central Intelligence Agency, the Department of Defense, the Joint Chiefs of Staff, and the National Security Council.


date: August 14

text: August 14 – The Muslim majority regions formed by the Partition of India gain independence from the British Empire as the Dominion of Pakistan. While the transition is officially at midnight on this day, Pakistan celebrates its independence on August 14, compared with India on the 15th, because the Pakistan Standard Time is 30 minutes behind the standard time of India.

source_section: Events › August


text: August 14 – Muhammad Ali Jinnah becomes the first governor-general of Pakistan. Liaquat Ali Khan takes office as the first prime minister of Pakistan.


date: August 15

text: August 15 – The greater Indian subcontinent, with a mixed population of Hindu, Sikhs, Buddhists, Jains, Zoroasters, Jews, Christians, Muslims and others formed by the Partition of India, gains independence from the British Empire, as the Dominion of India. 190 years British rule (1757–1947) in India comes to an end.


text: August 15 – Jawaharlal Nehru takes office as the first prime minister of India, taking his oath from Louis Mountbatten, Viscount Mountbatten of Burma, Governor-General of India (but no longer viceroy).


date: August 31

text: August 31 – In Hungary, communists fail to gain a majority in the 1947 Hungarian parliamentary election (despite widespread fraud) and turn to direct action as part of the country's transition to Communism (1944–1949).


date: September 30

text: September 30 – Pakistan and Yemen join the United Nations.

source_section: Events › September


date: October 20

text: October 20 – A war begins in Kashmir, along the border between India and Pakistan, initiating the Indo-Pakistani War of 1947–1948. Also, Pakistan establishes diplomatic relations with the United States of America.

source_section: Events › October


date: October 24

text: October 24 – The first Azad Kashmir Government is established within Pakistan, headed by Sardar Muhammad Ibrahim Khan as its first President supported by the government of Pakistan.


date: November 25

text: November 25 – The New Zealand Parliament ratifies the Statute of Westminster, and thus becomes independent of legislative control by the Parliament of the United Kingdom.

source_section: Events › November


date: November 29

text: November 29 – The United Nations General Assembly votes for the United Nations Partition Plan for Palestine which will partition Mandatory Palestine between Arab and Jewish regions, resulting in the creation of the State of Israel.


date: December 9

text: December 9 – French labor unions call off the general strike, and re-commence negotiations with the French government.

source_section: Events › December


date: December 22

text: December 22 – The Italian Constituent Assembly votes to accept the new Constitution of Italy.


date: December 30

text: December 30 – King Michael I of Romania is forced to abdicate and the Romanian monarchy is abolished.


date: January 11

text: January 11 – The Afghan tribal revolts of 1944–1947 conclude with the Surrender at Datta Khel.

source_section: Events › January


date: February 28

text: February 28 – In Taiwan, civil disorder is put down, with large loss of civilian lives.


date: March 12

text: March 12 – The Cold War begins: The Truman Doctrine is proclaimed, to help stem the spread of Communism.

source_section: Events › March


date: March 15

text: March 15 – Hindus and Muslims clash in Punjab.


date: March 29

text: March 29 – A rebellion against French rule erupts in Madagascar.


date: April 1

text: April 1 – The 1947 Royal New Zealand Navy mutinies begin.


date: May 1

text: May 1 – Portella della Ginestra massacre: The Salvatore Giuliano gang of Sicilian separatists opens fire on a Labour Day parade at Portella della Ginestra, Sicily, killing 11 people and wounding 27.


date: June 15

text: June 15 – The Estado Novo in Portugal orders 11 military officers and 19 university professors, who are accused of revolutionary activity, to resign.


date: July 18

text: July 18 – Following wide media and UNSCOP coverage, the Exodus is captured by British troops, and refused entry into Palestine at the port of Haifa.


date: July 19

text: July 19 – Burmese nationalist Aung San, and six members of his newly formed cabinet, are assassinated during a cabinet meeting.


date: August 5

text: August 5 – The Netherlands ends Operation Product, the first of its major military Police Actions in Indonesia.


date: September 18

text: September 18 – In the United States:


date: September

text: The Department of War becomes the Department of the Army, a branch of the new Department of Defense.


date: November 9

text: November 9 – Junagadh is invaded by the Indian army.


date: November 10

text: November 10 – The arrest of four steel workers in Marseille begins a French communist riot, that also spreads to Paris.


date: November 16

text: November 16 – Great Britain begins withdrawing its troops from Palestine.


date: November 20

text: November 20 – Paul Ramadier resigns as Prime Minister of France. He is succeeded by Robert Schuman, who calls in 80,000 army reservists to quell rioting miners in France.


date: November 24

text: November 24 – McCarthyism: The United States House of Representatives votes 346–17 to approve citations of Contempt of Congress against the "Hollywood Ten", after the screenwriters and directors refuse to co-operate with the House Un-American Activities Committee concerning allegations of communist influences in the movie business. The ten men are blacklisted by the Hollywood movie studios on the following day.


date: December 4

text: December 4 – French Interior Minister Jules S. Moch takes emergency measures against his country's rioters, after six days of violent arguments in the National Assembly.


date: December 12

text: December 12 – The Iranian Royal Army takes back power in the Azerbaijan province.


date: February 5

text: February 5 – The Government of the United Kingdom announces the £25 million Tanganyika groundnut scheme, for cultivation of peanuts in the Tanganyika Territory.


date: April 18

text: April 18 – 'Mrs. Ples', an Australopithecus africanus skull, is discovered in the Sterkfontein area in Transvaal, South Africa.


date: April

text: April – The previous discovery of the 'Dead Sea Scrolls' in the Qumran Caves (above the northwest shore of the Dead Sea) by Bedouin shepherds, becomes known.


date: August 7

text: August 7 – Thor Heyerdahl's balsa wood raft, the Kon-Tiki, smashes into the reef at Raroia in the Tuamotu Islands, after a 101-day, 4,300 mile, voyage across the Eastern Pacific Ocean, demonstrating that prehistoric peoples could have traveled to the Central Pacific islands from South America.


date: September 13

text: September 13 – Indian Prime Minister Jawaharlal Nehru suggests the exchange of four million Hindus and Muslims between India and Pakistan.


text: November 20 – Wedding of Princess Elizabeth and Philip Mountbatten, Duke of Edinburgh: Princess Elizabeth (later Elizabeth II), the daughter of George VI of the United Kingdom, marries The Duke of Edinburgh at Westminster Abbey in London.


date: February 23

text: February 23 – The International Organization for Standardization (ISO) is founded.


date: April 16

text: April 16 – American financier and presidential adviser Bernard Baruch describes the post–World War II tensions between the Soviet Union and the United States as a "Cold War".


date: August 27

text: August 27 – The French government lowers the daily bread ration to 200 grams, causing riots in Verdun and Le Mans.


date: October 30

text: October 30 – The General Agreement on Tariffs and Trade (GATT), the foundation of the World Trade Organization (WTO), is established.


date: November 21

text: November 21 – The United Nations Conference on Trade and Employment begins in Havana, Cuba. This conference ends in 1948, when its members complete the Havana Charter.


date: January

text: January–February — Winter of 1946–47 in the United Kingdom: The worst snowfall in the country in the 20th century causes extensive disruption of travel. Given the low ratio of private vehicle ownership at the time, it is mainly remembered in terms of its effects on the railway network.


date: February 3

text: February 3 – P.L. Prattis becomes the first African American news correspondent allowed in the United States House of Representatives and Senate press galleries.


date: February 17

text: February 17 – Cold War: The Voice of America begins to transmit radio broadcasts into Eastern Europe and the Soviet Union


date: February 25

text: February 25 – John C. Hennessy Jr. brings the first Volkswagen Beetle to the United States. He purchased the 1946 automobile from the U.S. Army Post Exchange in Frankfurt, Germany, while serving in the U.S. Army. The Beetle is shipped from Bremerhaven, arriving in New York this day.


date: March 1

text: March 1 – The International Monetary Fund begins to operate.


date: April 4

text: April 4 – The International Civil Aviation Organization begins operations.


text: April 16 – The first public demonstration of a TV camera zoom lens, the Jerry Fairbanks Zoomar, is held at NBC studios in New York.


date: May 25

text: May 25 – Hyundai Togun, the initial name of the Hyundai Group, is founded by Chung Ju-young.


date: June 10

text: June 10 – SAAB in Sweden produces its first automobile.


date: July 6

text: July 6 – The first prototype AK-47 assault rifles are built to the design of Mikhail Kalashnikov.


date: July 27

text: July 27–28 – English endurance swimmer Tom Blower becomes the first person to swim the North Channel, from Donaghadee in Northern Ireland to Portpatrick in Scotland.


date: July 29

text: July 29 – After being shut down on November 9, 1946, for a refurbishment, the ENIAC computer in the United States is turned back on again, and remains in continuous operation until October 2, 1955.


date: August 1

text: August 1 – Indonesian airline Garuda Indonesia is established.


date: August 7

text: August 7 – The Bombay Municipal Corporation formally takes over the Bombay Electric Supply and Transport (BEST).


date: September 9

text: September 9 – A moth lodged in a relay is found to be the cause of a malfunction in the Harvard Mark II electromechanical computer, logged as the "First actual case of bug being found."


date: September

text: The National Security Act of 1947 becomes effective on this day, creating the United States Air Force, National Security Council and the Central Intelligence Agency.


date: October 1

text: October 1 – The North American F-86 Sabre jet fighter aircraft makes its first flight.


date: October 5

text: October 5 – President Harry S. Truman delivers the first televised White House address, speaking on the world food crises.


date: October 14

text: October 14 – United States Air Force test pilot Captain Chuck Yeager flies a Bell X-1 rocket plane faster than the speed of sound, the first time it has been accomplished.


date: October

text: October – First recorded use of the word computer in its modern sense, referring to an electronic digital machine.


date: November 15

text: November 15 – The International Telecommunication Union becomes a specialized agency of the United Nations.


date: November 17

text: November 17–December 23 – John Bardeen and Walter Brattain working under William Shockley at AT&T's Bell Labs in the United States demonstrate the transistor effect, a key element for the electronics revolution of the 20th century.


date: December 3

text: December 3 – The Tennessee Williams play A Streetcar Named Desire, starring Marlon Brando in his first great role, opens at the Ethel Barrymore Theatre on Broadway in New York City; Jessica Tandy also stars as Blanche Du Bois.


date: December 30

text: December 30 – The Mikoyan-Gurevich MiG-15 jet fighter aircraft (NATO reporting name Fagot) makes its first flight in the Soviet Union.


date: February 20

text: February 20 – The U.S. Army Ordnance Corps Hermes program V-2 rocket Blossom I is launched into space, carrying plant material and fruitflies, the first living things to enter space.


date: February 21

text: February 21 – Edwin Land demonstrates the first "instant camera", his Polaroid Land Camera, to a meeting of the Optical Society of America in New York City.


date: April 7

text: April 7 – The largest recorded sunspot group appears on the solar surface.


date: April 18

text: April 18 – The British Royal Navy detonates 6,800 tons of explosives, in an attempt to demolish the fortified island of Heligoland, Germany, in another of the largest man-made non-nuclear explosions in history.


date: June 24

text: June 24 – Kenneth Arnold makes the first widely reported UFO sighting near Mount Rainier, Washington. Over 800 copycat sightings are reported throughout the US in the coming following weeks.


date: June

text: June – The Doomsday Clock of the Bulletin of the Atomic Scientists is introduced.


date: July 8

text: July 8 – Roswell UFO incident: A supposedly downed extraterrestrial spacecraft is reportedly found near Roswell, New Mexico.


date: July 9

text: July 9 – 'Flying disc' photographs published in Phoenix


date: July 11

text: July 11 – The ship Exodus leaves France for Palestine, with 4,500 Jewish Holocaust survivor refugees on board.


date: November 2

text: November 2 – In Long Beach, California, United States, designer and airplane pilot Howard Hughes carries out the one and only flight of the Hughes H-4 Hercules ("Spruce Goose"), the largest fixed-wing aircraft ever built and flown. This flight only lasts 8 minutes.


date: January 13

text: January 13 – The last of hundreds of concentration camps in Francoist Spain, Miranda de Ebro, shuts down.


date: April 1

text: April 1 – Jackie Robinson, the first African American in Major League Baseball since the 1880s, signs a contract with the Brooklyn Dodgers.


date: April 15

text: April 15 – Jackie Robinson becomes the first African American to play Major League Baseball since the 1880s.


date: July 1

text: July 1 – The United States begins the National Malaria Eradication Program, successfully eradicating malaria in 1951.


date: December 21

text: December 21 – During the mass migration of Hindus and Muslims between the new states of India and Pakistan, 400,000 are slaughtered.


date: January 15

text: January 15 – Elizabeth Short, an aspiring actress nicknamed the "Black Dahlia", is found brutally murdered in a vacant lot in Los Angeles; the mysterious case is never solved.


date: March 31

text: March 31 – The leaders of the Kurdish People's Republic of Mahabad, the second Kurdish state in the history of Iran, are hanged at Chuwarchira Square in Mahabad, after the state has been overrun by the Iranian army.


date: November 16

text: November 16 – In Brussels, 15,000 people demonstrate against the relatively short prison sentences of Belgian Nazi criminals.


date: November 17

text: November 17 – The Screen Actors Guild implements an anti-Communist loyalty oath.


date: November 27

text: November 27 – In Paris, France, police occupy the editorial offices of the communist newspapers.


date: January 19

text: January 19 – Ferry sinks in the South Euboean Gulf of Greece killing 392.


date: January 26

text: January 26 – A KLM Douglas DC-3 aircraft crashes soon after taking off from Kastrup Airport, Copenhagen, killing all 22 people on board, including Prince Gustaf Adolf, second in line to the Swedish throne, and American opera singer Grace Moore.


date: February 8

text: February 8 – The Karlslust dance hall fire in Berlin, Germany, kills over 80 people.


date: February 20

text: February 20 – An explosion at the O'Connor Electro-Plating Company in Los Angeles leaves 17 dead, 100 buildings damaged, and a 22 ft m crater in the ground.


date: February 25

text: February 25 – Hachikō Line derailment: The worst-ever train accident in Japan kills 184 people.


date: March 25

text: March 25 – A coal mine explosion in Centralia, Illinois, United States; 111 miners are killed.


date: March 28

text: March 28 – A World War II Japanese booby trap explodes on Corregidor Island, killing 28 people.


date: April 16

text: April 16 – Texas City disaster: The ammonium nitrate cargo of French-registered Liberty ship explodes in Texas City, Texas in one of the largest man-made non-nuclear explosions in history, killing at least 581, including all but one member of the city fire department, injuring at least 5,000 and destroying 20 city blocks. Of the dead, remains of 113 are never found, and 62 are unidentifiable.


date: May 29

text: May 29 – A United States Army Air Forces Douglas C-54 Skymaster crashes on approach to Naval Air Station Atsugi, Japan, killing all 41 on board in the worst aviation accident in Japanese history up to this time.


text: May 29 – An Air Iceland Douglas C-47 on a domestic flight in Iceland crashes into a mountainside killing all 25 people on board.


date: May 30

text: May 30 – Eastern Air Lines Flight 605: A Douglas C-54 Skymaster crashes near Bainbridge, Maryland, killing all 53 aboard (49 passengers, 4 crew), in America's worst commercial aviation disaster to this date.


date: July 17

text: July 17 – Indian passenger ship is capsized by a cyclone at Mumbai, India, with 625 people killed.


date: August 2

text: August 2 – 1947 BSAA Avro Lancastrian Star Dust accident: A British South American Airways Avro Lancastrian airliner crashes into a mountain during a flight from Buenos Aires, Argentina to Santiago, Chile (the wreckage will not be found until 1998).


date: August 30

text: August 30 – A fire at a movie theater in Rueil, a suburb of Paris, France, kills 83 people.


date: November 18

text: November 18 – Ballantyne's fire: A fire in Ballantynes department store in Christchurch, New Zealand, kills 41 people.


date: December 3

text: December 3 – 16 are killed and about 30 injured in a train derailment in Arras, France. Authorities report that the disaster is an act of sabotage and accuse communists of being responsible in the midst of the country's ongoing labor strife.


date: February 3

text: February 3 – The lowest air temperature in North America (−63 degrees Celsius) was recorded in Snag, in the Yukon Territory.


date: February 12

text: February 12 – The fragments of a meteorite create a number of impact craters up to 36 metres wide in Sikhote-Alin, in the Soviet Union.


date: March 14

text: March 14 – The Thames flood and other widespread flooding occurs, as the exceptionally harsh British winter of 1946–1947 ends in a thaw.


date: April 9

text: April 9 – Multiple tornadoes strike Texas, Oklahoma and Kansas, killing 184 and injuring 970.


date: September 15

text: September 15–16 – Typhoon Kathleen strikes the Bōsō Peninsula and the entire Kantō region in Japan. Heavy rains cause the Arakawa and Tone Rivers to overflow and embankment collapse. The resulting floods and debris flow kill between 1,077 and 1,920 people, injuring 1,547 and leaving 853 missing.


date: September 17

text: September 17–21 – The 1947 Fort Lauderdale hurricane in southeastern Florida, and also in Alabama, Mississippi, and Louisiana causes widespread damage, and kills 50 people.


date: January 4

text: January 4 – First issue of weekly magazine Der Spiegel published in Hanover, Germany, edited by Rudolf Augstein.


date: March 1

text: March 1 – German rocket scientist Wernher von Braun marries his first cousin, 18-year-old Maria von Quirstorp.


date: March 19

text: March 19 – The 19th Academy Awards Ceremony is held. The movie The Best Years of Our Lives wins the Academy Award for Best Picture, along with several other Academy Awards.


text: April 9 – The Journey of Reconciliation in the Southern United States begins, organized by the Congress of Racial Equality.


date: April 20

text: April 20 – King Frederik IX succeeds his father, Christian X, on the throne of Denmark.


date: May 2

text: May 2 – The movie Miracle on 34th Street, a Christmastime classic, is first shown in theaters.


date: May 11

text: May 11 – The Ferrari 125 S, the first car to bear the Ferrari name, debuts.


date: June 5

text: June 5 – U.S. Secretary of State George Marshall outlines the Marshall Plan for American reconstruction and relief aid to Europe, in a speech at Harvard University.


date: June 7

text: June 7 – The Romanian Army founds the association football club CCA (Clubul Central al Armatei – The Army's Central Club), which will become the most successful Romanian football team during its time as CSA Steaua București.


date: June 11

text: June 11–15 – The first Llangollen International Musical Eisteddfod is held in Wales.