1960 - Massachusetts Sen. John F. Kennedy defeated Vice President Richard Nixon in a squeaker to become President

1961- Commander Alan B. Shepherd Jr. rode the first U.S. suborbital spacecraft

1962 - Lt. Col. John Glenn became the first American to orbit the Earth - and - the U.S. and Soviet Union stood on the brink of nuclear war after a missile buildup in Cuba

1963 - President Kennedy assassinated in Dallas, Tex.

1964 - Congress passed the Tonkin Gulf Resolution, authorizing presidential action in Vietnam

1965 - Malcolm X murdered

1966 - Over 385,000 U.S. military personnel in Vietnam, and full-scale bombing of Hanoi underway

1967 - Israel defeats combined forces of Egypt, Jordan and Syria in Six Day War

1968 - Dr. Martin Luther King Jr. assassinated in Memphis

1969 - U.S. astronaut Neil Armstrong becomes the first human to walk on the moon

1970 - The Apollo 13 space mission was launched from Cape Kennedy

1970

yes...I came back

1973

The year I was born

1973 - Cease-fire declared in Vietnam but fighting continues.

{73, also my b-day}

1974 - Hank Aaron hits 715th home run, beating Babe Ruth's record.

1975 - Fascist rule ends in Spain with death of Francisco Franco; democracy restored.

{MT - hauling butt to y2k}

1976 - One Flew Over the Cuckoos Nest wins top five Academy Awards - first time for a single movie since 1934.

1977 - The U.S. space shuttle 'Enterprise' makes first manned flight.

(as we learned in a previous post in this thread, Enterprise was also the name of the first nuclear carrier)

1978 - First test-tube baby born in England.

1979 - Margaret Thatcher elected Prime Minister of Great Britain.

1980 - Ronald Reagan becomes president, Republicans gain control of Senate.

1981 - The first U.S. space shuttle, "Columbia," makes inaugural flight.

1982 - England drives invading Argentines from Falkland Islands.

1983 - Two-year drought causes massive famine in Ethiopia.

1984 - AIDS virus is discovered.

1985 - Mikhail Gorbachev becomes General Secretary of the U.S.S.R.

1986 - Phillipine President Ferdinand Marcos flees in the wake of election rigging allegations.

1987 - Bill Gates becomes the computer industry's first billionaire.

1988 - An earthquake in Armenia kills 80,000.

1989 - The Exxon Valdez spills eleven million gallons of oil in Alaska.

1990 - Nelson Mandela freed from South African prison.

{and I'm done, the laptop battery is about dead :)... to the cheers of others wanting to post here :D)

1991 - Channel Tunnel – The ‘Chunnel’ completed linking England and France by road and rail under the English Channel.

{I'll keep going until it dies on me :p)

1992 - The "World Wide Web" started up for home use.

1993 - Coup against Russian leader Boris Yeltsin fails in Moscow.

1994 - Long-time CIA officer Aldrich Ames and his wife were charged with espionage

1995 - Palestinians granted limited self-rule in accord with Israel at White House.

1996 - TWA Flight 800, bound from New York to Paris, exploded and crashed into the Atlantic Ocean shortly after take off, killing all 230 aboard

1997 - Princess Diana killed in automobile accident in Paris.

1998 - John Glenn, first US astronaut to orbit the earth, returns to space aboard the shuttle Discovery. His 1962 solo flight lasted five hours, the 1998 trip lasted nine days.

1999 - Peace agreement reached in Northern Ireland, ending over eighty years of terrorism and civil war