1959

align="center" colspan=2 | Years:
1956 1957 1958 - 1959 - 1960 1961 1962

align="center" colspan=2 | Decades:
1920s 1930s 1940s - 1950s - 1960s 1970s 1980s

align="center" | Centuries:
19th century - 20th century - 21st century

1959 was a common year starting on Thursday (link will take you to calendar).

Events

January-February

January 1 - Cultivars of plants named after this date must be named in a modern language, not in Latin.
January 1 - Cuba: Fulgencio Batista flees Havana when forces of Fidel Castro advance
January 2 - CBS Radio cuts four soap operas: Backstage Wife Our Gal Sunday, Road of Life, and This is Nora Drake.
January 2 - Castro's troops enter Havana
January 3 - Alaska is admitted as the 49th U.S. state.
January 4 - In Lopoldville 42 people are killed during clashes between the police and participants of a meeting of the Abako party.
January 7 - The United States recognizes the new Cuban government of Fidel Castro
January 22 - Knox Mine Disaster - water breaches River Slope mine in Port Griffith, Pennsylvania - 12 miners dead
February 1 - A referendum in Switzerland turns down female suffrage
February 6 - At Cape Canaveral, Florida, the first successful test firing of a Titan intercontinental ballistic missile is accomplished
February 16 - Fidel Castro becomes Premier of Cuba
February 18 - Jesus Sosa Blanco, murderer of 108 people, executed in Cuba
February 18 - Women in Nepal vote for the first time
February 19 - The United Kingdom grants Cyprus its independence
February 22 - Lee Petty wins the first Daytona 500

March-May

March 1 - USS Tuscaloosa, USS New Orleans, USS Tennessee and USS West Virginia struck from the Naval Vessel Register
March 1 Archbishop Makarios returns to Cyprus from exile
March 1 - Japanese cities Uji, Kyoto and Muroto, Kochi are founded
March 8 - Last television appearance of The Marx Brothers, in The Incredible Jewel Robbery
March 9 - The Barbie doll debuts
March 17 - Tenzin Gyatso, the 14th Dalai Lama, flees Tibet and travels to India
March 18 - American President Dwight D. Eisenhower signs bill allowing for Hawaiian statehood
April 25 - The St. Lawrence Seaway linking the North American Great Lakes and the Atlantic Ocean officially opens to shipping
May - First Ten Tors event held in Dartmoor
May 27 - Sweet Green Grass Books D.A. Johnson writer illustrator

June-September

June 3 - Singapore becomes a self governing crown colony of Great Britain with Lee Kuan Yew as Prime Minister
June 5 - A new government of the State of Singapore is sworn in by Sir William Goode. Two former Ministers were re-elected to the Legislative Assembly.
June 8 - The first (and only) delivery of Missile Mail
June 9 - The USS George Washington is launched as the first submarine to carry ballistic missiles
June 23 - Sean Lemass becomes the third Taoiseach of Ireland.
June 23 - Convicted Manhattan Project spy Klaus Fuchs is released after only nine years in prison and allowed to emigrate to Dresden, East Germany (where he resumed a scientific career).
July 2 - Royal wedding in Belgium: Prince Albert marries the Italian princess Paola Ruffo di Calabria.
July 4 - With the admission of Alaska as the 49th U.S. state earlier in the year, the 49-star flag of the United States debuts in Philadelphia, Pennsylvania
July 7 - 14:28 UT Venus occulted the star Regulus. The rare event which will next occur on October 1, 2044 was used for determining the diameter of Venus and the structure of Venus' atmosphere.
July 24 - At the opening of the American National Exhibition in Moscow, US vice-president Richard Nixon and Nikita Khrushchev have a "kitchen debate".
August 7 - Explorer program: The United States launches Explorer 6 from the Atlantic Missile Range in Cape Canaveral, Florida
August 15 - Cyprus gains independence
August 16 - Explorer VI sends back the first picture of Earth from space
August 21 - Hawaii is admitted as the 50th U.S. state.
September 13 - Luna 2 crashes onto the Moon as the first man-made object
September 15 - Russian probe Luna 2 sends back first photos of the far side of Earth's Moon
September 25 - Ceylon's prime minister SWRD Bandaranaike assassinated

October-December

October 21 - Mau Mau leader Dedan Kimathi is arrested in Nyeri, Kenya
October 21 - In New York City, the Solomon R. Guggenheim Museum opens to the public. It was designed by Frank Lloyd Wright.
October 31 - Riots in the Belgian Congo
November 1 - Ice Hockey: After being struck in the face with a hockey puck, Montreal Canadiens goalie, Jacques Plante offered to return to play on the condition that he can wear his protective face mask. It was the first time such equipment was used in a regular NHL game.
November 2 - Quiz show scandals: "Twenty-One" game show contestant Charles Van Doren admits to a Congressional committee that he had been given questions and answers in advance
November 15 - The Clutter Family murdered at their farm outside Holcomb, Kansas
November 19 - Ford Motor Company announces the discontinuation of the unpopular Edsel
December 1 - Cold War: Antarctic Treaty signed - 12 countries, including the United States and the Soviet Union, sign a landmark treaty, which sets aside Antarctica as a scientific preserve and bans military activity on that continent (this was the first arms control agreement established during the Cold War)

unknown date

The neutrino is first experimentally detected, by Cowan and Reines.
TAT-2 cable goes into operation.
Workers World Party is founded by Sam Marcy.

Year in topic

1959 in film

Ben-Hur
The Diary of Anne Frank
Anatomy of a Murder
Alfred Hitchcock's North by Northwest, starring Cary Grant and Eva Marie Saint

1959 in literature

Starship Troopers by Robert Heinlein:
The Tin Drum by Gnter Grass:

1959 in music

February 3 - News of the early-morning plane crash that killed Buddy Holly, Richie Valens and The Big Bopper becomes widely known. This date becomes known as "The Day The Music Died".
An expressway is built through the Bronx in New York City; this causes the mass exodus of middle-class residents, making the Bronx into a progressively poorer ghetto over the years and is often cited as a major cause of the rise of hip hop in the 1970s.
First ever Benidorm Song Festival.

1959 in rail transport
1959 in science
1959 in sports
1959 in television

Fall – Scandals involving rigged network quiz shows create havoc within the television industry.
Rod Serling's The Twilight Zone debuts
Bonanza debuts, starring Lorne Greene.