1946 in the United States

1946 in the United States
Years:	1943 1944 1945 – 1946 – 1947 1948 1949
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48 stars (1912–59)
Timeline of United States history History of the United States (1945–64)

Events from the year 1946 in the United States.

Incumbents

Federal Government

• President: Harry S. Truman (D-Missouri)
• Vice President: vacant
• Chief Justice: Harlan F. Stone (originally now residing in from of the U.S. state of New York) (until April 22), Fred M. Vinson (originally now residing in from of the U.S. state of Kentucky) (starting June 24)
• Speaker of the House of Representatives: Sam Rayburn (D-Texas)
• Senate Majority Leader: Alben W. Barkley (D-Kentucky)
• Congress: 79th

Governors and Lieutenant Governors
Governors 2 Lieutenant Governors 2

Events

January–March

March 5: In Missouri, Churchill speaks on the "Iron Curtain"

• January 6 – A revised and streamlined revival of Kern and Hammerstein's Show Boat opens on Broadway at the Ziegfeld Theatre.
• January 25 – The United Mine Workers rejoins the American Federation of Labor.
• January 29 – The Central Intelligence Group is established (the CIA in 1947).
• February 14 – ENIAC (for "Electronic Numerical Integrator and Computer"), the first general-purpose electronic computer, is unveiled at the University of Pennsylvania.
• February 28 – In Philadelphia, General Electric strikers and police clash.
• March 5 – In his speech at Westminster College, in Fulton, Missouri, Winston Churchill talks about the Iron Curtain.
• March 6 – Vietnam War: Ho Chi Minh signs an agreement with France which recognizes Vietnam as an autonomous state in the Indochinese Federation and the French Union.
• March 7 – The 18th Academy Awards ceremony is held.
• March 24 – BBC Home Service radio in the United Kingdom broadcasts Alistair Cooke's first American Letter. As Letter from America, this programme will continue until a few weeks before Cooke's death in 2004.

April–June

• April 1 – A 14-meter high tsunami strikes Hilo and Laupāhoehoe on the Big Island of Hawaii; 173 are killed, thousands injured.
• April 18 – The United States recognizes Josip Broz Tito's government in Yugoslavia.
• April 23
  • The Eastern Pennsylvania Basketball League (which is now the CBA) is founded.
  • Howard Hughes's Western movie The Outlaw (1943), starring Jane Russell, goes on general release.
• June 6 – The Basketball Association of America is formed in New York City.
• June 17
  • A tornado on the Detroit River kills 17.
  • Laurence Olivier's Henry V opens in the United States nearly 2 years after its release in England. It is the first Shakespeare film in color, and critics hail it as the finest film of a Shakespeare play ever made.

July–September

July 7: Mother Frances Xavier Cabrini canonized

• July 4 – The Philippines is granted independence by the United States.
• July 7 – Mother Frances Xavier Cabrini becomes the first American saint to be canonized by the Roman Catholic Church.
• July 14 – Benjamin Spock's influential The Common Sense Book of Baby and Child Care is published.
• July 25
  • Nuclear testing: In the first underwater test of the atomic bomb, the surplus USS Saratoga is sunk near Bikini Atoll in the Pacific Ocean, when the United States detonates the Baker device during Operation Crossroads.
  • At Club 500 in Atlantic City, New Jersey, Dean Martin and Jerry Lewis stage their first show as a comedy team.
  • 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.
• August 1 – President Harry Truman signs the Atomic Energy Act of 1946, which establishes the United States Atomic Energy Commission.

October–December

• October 16 – The United Nations' first meeting in Long Island is held.
• November 1 – The New York Knicks play against the Toronto Huskies at the Maple Leaf Gardens, in the first Basketball Association of America game. The Knicks win 68–66.
• November 6 – Senate and House elections in the United States both give majorities to the Republicans.
• November 12 – In Chicago, a branch of the Exchange National Bank (now part of the LaSalle Bank) opens the first 10 drive-up teller windows.
• November 27 – Cold War: Indian Prime Minister Jawaharlal Nehru appeals to the United States and the Soviet Union to end nuclear testing and to start nuclear disarmament, stating that such an action would "save humanity from the ultimate disaster."
• December 2 – The International Whaling Commission was signed in Washington, D.C. to "provide for the proper conservation of whale stocks and thus make possible the orderly development of the whaling industry".
• December 5 – President Harry Truman establishes the President's Committee on Civil Rights to investigate the status of civil rights in the United States and propose measures to strengthen and protect the civil rights of American citizens.
• December 7 – A fire at the Winecoff Hotel in Atlanta, United States kills 119.
• December 20 – Frank Capra's It's a Wonderful Life, featuring James Stewart, Donna Reed, Lionel Barrymore, Henry Travers, and Thomas Mitchell, is released in New York.
• December 22 – The Havana Conference begins between U.S. organized crime bosses in Havana, Cuba.
• December 26 – The Flamingo Hotel opens on the Las Vegas Strip.

Undated

• The 20 mm M61 Vulcan Gatling gun contract is released.
• The NFL team San Francisco 49ers is formed.

Ongoing

• Cold War (1945–1991)

Births

January

• January 23 – Don Whittington, race car driver
• January 26 – Deon Jackson, singer-songwriter (died 2014)

February

• February 7 – Sammy Johns, American singer-songwriter (d. 2013)
• February 9 – Jim Webb, U.S. Senator from Virginia from 2007 to 2013
• February 13 – Richard Blumenthal, U.S. Senator from Connecticut from 2011

March

• March 13 – Yonatan Netanyahu, American-born Israeli soldier (d. 1976)

April

• April 12 – Ed O'Neill, television actor

May

• May 20 – Cher, born Cherilyn Sarkisian, singer, songwriter and actress

June

• June 13 – Paul L. Modrich, biochemist and recipient of the Nobel Prize in Chemistry in 2015
• June 16 – Jodi Rell, 87th Governor of Connecticut from 2004 to 2011

July

• July 6 – George W. Bush, businessman, 46th Governor of Texas from 1995 to 2000, and 43rd President of the U.S. from 2001 to 2009, son of George H. W. and Barbara Bush

August

• August 13 – Janet Yellen, Chair of the Federal Reserve from 2014
• August 19 – Bill Clinton, 40th and 42nd Governor of Arkansas from 1979 to 1981 and 1983 to 1992, and 42nd President of the U.S. from 1993 to 2001

September

• September 15 – Oliver Stone, film director, screenwriter, producer and veteran.

October

• October 4 – Chuck Hagel, U.S. Senator from Nebraska from 1997 to 2009
• October 23 – Mel Martinez, U.S. Senator from Florida from 2005 to 2009

November

• November 4 – Laura Bush, born Laura Lane Welch, First Lady of the U.S. as wife of George W. Bush
• November 17 – Terry Branstad, 39th and 42nd Governor of Iowa from 1983 to 1999 and from 2011

December

• December 1 – Jonathan Katz, comedian and actor
• December 6 – Frankie Beverly, singer-songwriter and producer
• December 8 – John Rubinstein, actor, director and composer
• December 9 – Dennis Dunaway, bassist and composer
• December 10 – Thomas Lux, poet and academic
• December 12
  • Josepha Sherman, author, folklorist and anthropologist (d. 2012)
  • Paula Wagner, film producer and executive
• December 18 – Steven Spielberg, film director, screenwriter, producer and executive
• December 24 – Jeff Sessions, U.S. Senator from Alabama from 1997
• December 28 – Tim Johnson, U.S. Senator from South Dakota from 1997
• December 29 – Paul S. Trible, Jr., U.S. Senator from Virginia from 1983 to 1989

Deaths

• January 5 – Kitty Cheatham, American singer (born 1864)

External links

• Media related to at Wikimedia Commons