1961 History, Trivia and Fun Facts

• Politics: The Twenty-third Amendment to the US Constitution extends the right to vote in presidential elections to citizens residing in the District of Columbia by granting the District electors in the Electoral College, as if it were a state.
• The Top Song was Tossin' and Turnin' by Bobby Lewis
• The Big Movies included 101 Dalmations, West Side Story and The Parent Trap
• Price of 14 oz of Tang in 1961: 51 cents
  RCA Color TV: $495.00
• The World Population was ~ 3,090,000,000
• Stratego (board game) became avaialable in the US
• Cordless Tools and Industrial Robots were introduced in 1961.
• And... Betty and Barney Hill claimed to be abducted and examined by aliens in Lancaster, New Hampshire. It was the first such story in modern times.

Washington DC. residents were officially allowed to vote on Presidential Elections, thanks to the 23rd amendment.

8-year-old Michelle Rochon wrote to President Kennedy concerned about the safety of Santa Claus amid Soviet nuclear testing at the North Pole. Kennedy wrote back that he had spoken to Santa and that he was fine.

1961's Hurricane Debby was the only hurricane to make landfall in Ireland.

Morely cigarettes are a fake brand of cigarettes used across mass media since April 5, 1961, first used on an episode of The Naked City.

The first Six Flags amusement park opened near Dallas Texas. Named "Six Flags Over Dallas," it was named after the six different flags Texas has over the past few hundred years.

HAL9000 the computer in 2001: A Space Odyssey sings 'Daisy, Daisy' (Daisy Bell) when he gets turned off beacuse it was the first song ever to be sang by a computer (in 1961 by IBM7094)

Human rights organization Amnesty International was founded in London.

Amnesty International was founded in 1961 after Peter Benenson read in the newspaper that 2 Portuguese students were sentenced to 7 years of prison for doing a toast to freedom.

The newest B-52 bomber in use by the USAF was built in 1961 and it's expected to be in service up until 2040.

When Preservation Hall was founded in 1961, New Orleans was segregated, and a venue could lose its liquor license for allowing black and white musicians to play together, or allowing integrated audiences. So they offered no food, drinks, or dancing, and thus evaded laws against race-mixing.

Jackie Gleason once was an actual pool shark. He made all his own trick shots in The Hustler.

The 2015 film Experimenter is based on the true story of famed social psychologist Stanley Milgram, who in 1961 conducted a series of radical behavior experiments that tested the willingness of ordinary humans to obey an authority figure while administering electric shocks to strangers.

In 1961, one giga FLOPS would have theoretically cost $8.3 trillion USD (adjusted to inflation) whereas today one giga FLOPS cost about 8 cents.

The concept of "famous for being famous" was invented by the historian and social theorist Daniel J. Boorstin. The celebrity, he wrote, is a person "known for his well-knownness." The line was in his book, The Image: A Guide to Pseudo-events in America.

Black and Decker introduced the first cordless power drill, powered by nickle-cadmium.

The Rolling Stones would never have been formed if Keith Richards and Mick Jagger hadn't accidentally met at a train station in 1961. Richards struck up a conversation with Jagger about the blues records that he was carrying. The connection was instant and the rest is history.

Pampers disposable diapers were available for the first time.

Guitar distortion in Marty Robbins 1961 song Don't Worry was due to an electrical fault in the guitarist's amp. Other musicians sought to recreate this "fuzz" sound leading to the first purpose-designed commercial distortion circuit being released in 1962.

Le Bateau, an original Matisse painting hung in New York's Museum of Modern Art (MOMA) for 47 days in 1961 before a visitor pointed out they'd hung it upside down.

Jimmy Dean who performed the song Big Bad John in 1961 is also the founder of the Jimmy Dean Sausage Company.

William Castle directed 1961's Homicidal - designed with a 45 second 'fright break' near the climax of the film where scared patrons could walk out and receive a refund from a cardboard booth called 'Coward's Corner'

Laura Bullion, the female outlaw member of Butch Cassidy and the Sundance Kid's gang, the Wild Bunch, lived until 1961.

Mothra Godzilla's frenemy) actually first appeared in a 1961 novel called The Luminous Fairies and Mothra. Mothra's film debut, 1961's Mothra, was an adaptation of this novel.

Clarence Earl Gideon, after being arrested in 1961 for stealing $5 in change and a few bottles of beer, appealed to the US Supreme Court, which established the right to an appointed attorney.

Ibuprofen was introduced to the public, and that became available as an over-the-counter drug in 1984.

Dan Rather was responsible for the first-ever display of a meteorological surveillance radar on television. It may have helped convince an estimated 350,000 people to evacuate their homes from the path of Hurricane Carla.

Hurricane Esther was formed in 1961 and was the first hurricane ever to be discovered by a satellite even before meteorologists knew it existed.

Until 1961 all YMCAS required swimmers to swim naked and the rule only changed because parents petitioned a school board to allow boys to wear swim trunks to swim practice.