Historical Events
- Jan 12 Mahatma Gandhi begins his final fast
- Jan 30 Mahatma Gandhi assassinated by Hindu extremist Nathuram Godse
- Mar 8 US Supreme Court rules in McCollum v. Board of Education that religious instruction in public schools is unconstitutional
- Apr 3 US President Harry Truman signs Marshall Plan ($5B aid to 16 European countries)
- Apr 7 World Health Organization formed by the United Nations
- Apr 16 Organization for European Economic Cooperation (EEC) forms in Paris
- May 14 Israel declares independence from British administration
- May 26 South Africa elects a nationalist government under D. F. Malan with an apartheid policy
- Jun 21 Lord Mountbatten resigns as Governor General of India (formerly the last Viceroy)
- Jul 8 500th anniversary of the Russian Orthodox Church celebrated in Moscow
- Oct 6 Earthquake in Ashgabat kills 100,000 in the Turkmen Soviet Socialist Republic
- Oct 6 Paleoanthropologist Mary Leakey finds the first partial fossil skull of Proconsul africanus, an ancestor of apes and humans on Rusinga Island, Kenya
- Oct 21 UN rejects Russian proposal to destroy atomic weapons
- Nov 15 Mackenzie King retires after 22 years as Prime Minister of Canada
- More Historical Events
1948 in Film & TV
- Jul 30 Professional wrestling premieres on prime-time network TV (DuMont)
- Aug 10 ABC enters network TV at 7 PM (WJZ, NY)
- Sep 29 "Hamlet" directed by and starring Laurence Olivier's opens at Park Avenue Cinema (Best Picture 1949)
1948 in Music
- Mar 27 Just 11 days after being released from prison, Billie Holiday plays in front of a sold-out crowd at Carnegie Hall
1948 in Sport
- May 16 First chess world championship since WWII; Russian player Mikhail Botvinnik wins a 5-player tournament to begin 20-year Russian domination
- Aug 6 Dutch super athlete Fanny Blankers-Koen wins London Olympics 200m in 24.4s to become the first women to claim 3 individual track & field gold at a Games, having already won the 100m and 80m hurdles
Did You Know?
Alice Cooper
Robert Allen Litchfield
Robert Plant
Phil Hartman
Kate Jackson
Ozzy OsbourneFamous People in 1948
Harry Truman
Jane Wyman
Laurence OlivierWorld Leaders in 1948
Clement Attlee
Joseph Stalin
Famous Weddings
- Feb 16 American baseball player and manager Leo Durocher (41) weds actress Laraine Day (27) in Santa Monica, California; divorce in 1960
- Mar 5 Actor Eli Wallach marries actress Anne Jackson
- Mar 28 Musician Nat King Cole (29) weds jazz singer Maria Hawkins (25) at Abyssinian Baptist Church in Harlem, New York
Famous Divorces
- Mar 22 Musician Nat King Cole (29) divorces dancer Nadine Robinson after 11 years of marriage
More Weddings & Divorces
Orville Wright
Mahatma Gandhi
Manuel Roxas
Witold Pilecki
Babe Ruth
Hideki Tojo1948 in Pictures
Israeli Declaration of Independence
David Ben-Gurion, who became Israel's first prime minister shortly after, declares independence beneath a picture of Theodor HerzlMay 14Ship that Changed the Face of Britain
Britain was on its knees after the Second World War, its economy and infrastructure in tatters. For help the Mother Country turned to the Commonwealth.May 27The Berlin Candy Bombers
Children in Berlin await US aircraft dropping candy over the city during the Berlin Airlift in 1948June 24
