1949 in the United States
Events from the year 1949 in the United States.
Incumbents
Federal Government">Federal government of the United States">Federal Government
- President: Harry S. Truman
- Vice President: vacant, Alben W. Barkley
- Chief Justice: Fred M. Vinson
- Speaker of the House of Representatives: Joseph William Martin, Jr. , Sam Rayburn
- Senate Majority Leader: Wallace H. White, Jr. , Scott W. Lucas
- Congress: 80th, 81st
Governors
Lieutenant Governors
Events
January–March
- January 2 - Luis Muñoz Marín becomes the first democratically elected Governor of Puerto Rico.
- January 4 – RMS Caronia of the Cunard Line departs Southampton for New York City on her maiden voyage.
- January 4–February 22 - Series of winter storms in Nebraska, Wyoming, South Dakota, Utah, Colorado and Nevada - winds of up to 72 mph - tens of thousands of cattle and sheep perish.
- January 5 - President Harry S. Truman unveils his Fair Deal program.
- January 11 – Los Angeles, California receives its first recorded snowfall.
- January 17 - The first Volkswagen Beetle to arrive in the United States, a 1948 model, is brought to New York City by Dutch businessman Ben Pon. Unable to interest dealers or importers in the Volkswagen, Pon sells the sample car to pay his travel expenses. Only two 1949 models will be sold in America that year, convincing Volkswagen chairman Heinrich Nordhoff that the car has no future in the U.S.
- January 19 - The Poe Toaster first appears at the grave of Edgar Allan Poe.
- January 20 - President Harry S. Truman begins his full term.
- January 25 - The first Emmy Awards are presented at the Hollywood Athletic Club.
- February 10 - Arthur Miller's tragedy Death of a Salesman opens at the Morosco Theatre on Broadway in New York City with Lee J. Cobb in the title rôle of Willy Loman and runs for 742 performances.
- February 19 - Ezra Pound is awarded the first Bollingen Prize in poetry by the Bollingen Foundation and Yale University.
- February 22 - Grady the Cow, a 1,200-pound cow, gets stuck inside a silo on a farm in Yukon, Oklahoma and garners national media attention.
- March 2 - The B-50 Superfortress Lucky Lady II under Captain James Gallagher lands in Fort Worth, Texas, after completing the first non-stop around-the-world airplane flight.
- March 17 - The Shamrock Hotel in Houston, Texas, owned by oil tycoon Glenn McCarthy, has its grand opening.
- March 20 - The Chicago, Burlington & Quincy, Denver & Rio Grande Western and Western Pacific railroads inaugurate the California Zephyr passenger train between Chicago and Oakland, California, as the first long distance train to feature Vista Dome cars as regular equipment.
- March 26 - The first half of Giuseppe Verdi's opera Aida, conducted by legendary conductor Arturo Toscanini, and performed in concert, is telecast by NBC, live from Studio 8H at Rockefeller Center. The second half is telecast a week later. This is the only complete opera that Toscanini ever conducts on television.
- March 28 - United States Secretary of Defense James Forrestal resigns suddenly.
- March 29 - The 21st Academy Awards ceremony is held.
April–June
- April 4 - The North Atlantic Treaty is signed in Washington, D.C., creating the NATO defense alliance.
- April 7 - Rodgers and Hammerstein's South Pacific, starring Mary Martin and Ezio Pinza, opens on Broadway and goes on to become R&H's second longest-running musical. It becomes an instant classic of the musical theatre. The score's biggest hit is the song Some Enchanted Evening.
- April 13 – The 6.7 Olympia earthquake affected the Puget Sound region of western Washington with a maximum Mercalli intensity of VIII, causing eight deaths and $25 million in damage.
- April 23 - Development of the USS United States "supercarrier" is cancelled; high-ranking Navy officials resign in protest in what has been called the Revolt of the Admirals.
- May ? - A working group has been set up by United States Department of State, to codify the White Paper. This team consists of more than 80 staff members, led by Secretary of State Dean Acheson, former Columbia University Professor of Public International Law Philip C. Jessup.
- June 8 - Red Scare: Celebrities including Helen Keller, Dorothy Parker, Danny Kaye, Fredric March, John Garfield, Paul Muni and Edward G. Robinson are named in an FBI report as Communist Party members.
- June 14 - Albert II, a rhesus monkey, becomes the first primate to enter space, on Hermes project V-2 rocket Blossom IVB, but is killed on impact at return.
- June 19 - Glenn Dunaway wins the inaugural NASCAR race at Charlotte Speedway, a 3/4 mile oval in Charlotte, North Carolina, but is disqualified due to illegal springs. Jim Roper is declared the official winner.
- June 24 - The first television western, Hopalong Cassidy, airs on NBC.
- June 29 - The last U.S. troops withdraw from South Korea.
July–September
- August 5 - United States Department of State Published 《:zh:中美關係白皮書|The China White Paper, originally United States Relations with China: With Special Reference to the Period 1944-1949》。
- August 10 - The National Military Establishment is renamed the Department of Defense.
- August 16 - Office of Chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff created.
- August 28 - The last 6 surviving veterans of the American Civil War meet in Indianapolis.
- September 5 - Howard Unruh, a World War II veteran, kills 13 neighbors in Camden, New Jersey with a souvenir Luger to become America's first single-episode mass murderer.
- September 15 - The Housing Act of 1949 is enacted.
- September 29 - Iva Toguri D'Aquino is found guilty of broadcasting for Japan as "Tokyo Rose" during World War II.
October–December
- October 9 - The New York Yankees defeat the Brooklyn Dodgers, 4 games to 1, to win their 12th World Series Title.
- October 27 – An airliner flying from Paris to New York City crashes in the Azores island of São Miguel. Among the victims are violinist Ginette Neveu and boxer Marcel Cerdan.
- November - Englewood race riot in Chicago.
- November 24 - The ski resort in Squaw Valley, California officially opens.
Undated
- General Services Administration established per Federal Property and Administrative Services Act of 1949
- The first 20 mm M61 Vulcan Gatling gun prototypes are completed.
- 1949 is the first year in which no African-American is lynched in the USA.
Ongoing
- Cold War
Births
- January 2
- * Christopher Durang, playwright
- * Iris Marion Young, political scientist
- January 3 - Sylvia Likens, murder victim
- January 6 - Carolyn D. Wright, poet
- January 8 - John Podesta, lawyer and politician, 20th White House Chief of Staff
- January 10
- * George Foreman, heavyweight boxer
- * James Lapine, director and playwright
- * Linda Lovelace, pornographic film actress
- January 22 - Steve Perry, musician
- February 15 - Ken Anderson, American football player and coach
- February 17 - Dennis Green, American football player and coach
- February 19 - Danielle Bunten Berry, born Dan Bunten, software developer
- February 25 - Ric Flair, wrestler
- February 28 - Ilene Graff, actress and singer
- March 2
- * Gates McFadden, actress and choreographer
- * Eddie Money, rock guitarist and singer
- March 3
- * Gloria Hendry, African American actress
- * Jesse Jefferson, baseball player
- March 10 - Larry Wall, computer programmer
- March 12 - Rob Cohen, film director
- March 13 - Julia Migenes, soprano
- March 16
- * Erik Estrada, television actor and police officer
- * Elliott Murphy, singer-songwriter
- March 17 - Patrick Duffy, television actor
- March 28 - Michael W. Young, geneticist and chronobiologist, recipient of the Nobel Prize in Physiology or Medicine in 2017
- March 29 - Michael Brecker, jazz saxophonist
- April 1 - Gil Scott-Heron, African American poet, jazz/soul musician and author
- April 5 - Judith Resnik, astronaut
- April 9 - Stephen Hickman, illustrator
- April 11 - Dorothy Allison, novelist and campaigner
- April 20 - Jessica Lange, actress
- May 3 - Ron Wyden, U.S. Senator from Oregon from 1996
- May 4 - John Force, race car driver
- May 7 - Deborah Butterfield, sculptor
- May 9 - Billy Joel, singer-songwriter and pianist
- May 13 - Zoë Wanamaker, actress
- May 15 - George Adams, basketball player
- May 26 - Ward Cunningham, computer programmer
- June 3 - John Rothman, actor
- June 7 - Larry Hama, comic book writer, artist, actor and musician
- June 14 - Harry Turtledove, novelist
- June 20 - Lionel Richie, African American singer-songwriter
- June 22
- * Larry Junstrom, rock bassist
- * Alan Osmond, pop singer
- * Meryl Streep, actress
- * Elizabeth Warren, U.S. Senator from Massachusetts from 2013
- July 24 - Michael Richards, actor and comedian
- July 1 - Denis Johnson, writer
- July 15 - Richard Russo, novelist
- July 29 - Marilyn Quayle, wife of Dan Quayle, Second Lady of the United States
- July 31 - Mike Jackson, basketball player
- August 1 - Jim Carroll, author, poet and punk musician
- August 3 - Peter Gutmann, journalist
- August 4 - John Riggins, American football player
- August 11 - Tim Hutchinson, U.S. Senator from Arkansas from 1997 to 2003
- August 15
- * Beverly Burns, pilot
- * Mark B. Rosenberg, political scientist and academic
- August 17 - Norm Coleman, U.S. Senator from Minnesota from 2003 to 2009
- August 31
- * Richard Gere, film actor
- * H. David Politzer, physicist, recipient of the Nobel Prize in Physics in 2004
- September 1 - Leslie Feinberg, transgender activist
- September 7
- * Gloria Gaynor, African American singer
- * Lee McGeorge Durrell, zoologist
- September 10 - Bill O'Reilly, conservative political commentator
- September 13 - John W. Henry, foreign exchange advisor and Boston Red Sox owner
- September 15 - Joe Barton, politician
- September 16 - Ed Begley, Jr. actor and environmentalist
- September 23 - Bruce Springsteen, singer-songwriter
- September 26 - Jane Smiley, novelist
- October 8
- * Jerry Bittle, cartoonist
- * Ashawna Hailey, computer scientist and philanthropist
- * Mark Hopkinson, mass murderer and proxy killer
- * Sigourney Weaver, film actress
- October 24
- * Chester Marcol, American football player
- * John Markoff, journalist and author
- * Stan White, American football player and sportscaster
- October 25 - Ross Bagdasarian, Jr., film producer, record producer, singer and voice artist
- November 2 - Lois McMaster Bujold, author of speculative fiction
- November 12 - Jack Reed, U.S. Senator from Rhode Island from 1997
- November 14 - James Young, hard rock singer-songwriter and guitarist
- November 29
- * Jerry Lawler, wrestler
- * Garry Shandling, comedian
- December 4 - Jeff Bridges, film actor
- December 9 - Tom Kite, golfer
- December 13
- * Randy Owen, country lead vocalist, rhythm guitar player
- * Tom Verlaine, rock singer/guitarist
- December 14 - Bill Buckner, baseball player
- December 15 - Don Johnson, television actor
- December 16 - Billy Gibbons, rock guitarist
- December 20 - Cecil Cooper, baseball player and manager
- December 22 - Oscar Gamble, baseball player
- December 25
- * Sissy Spacek, film actress
- * Joe Louis Walker, African American electric blues musician
- December 28 - Barbara De Fina, film producer
Deaths
- January 6 - Victor Fleming, film director
- January 11 - Nelson Doubleday, publisher
- January 14 - Harry Stack Sullivan, psychiatrist
- February 1 - Herbert Stothart, composer
- February 17 - Ellery Harding Clark, field athlete
- March 7
- * Sol Bloom, politician and impresario
- * Bradbury Robinson, footballer who threw the first forward pass in American football history in 1906
- March 17 - Felix Bressart, German American actor
- March 20 - Irving Fazola, jazz clarinetist
- March 25 - Jack Kapp, president of the U.S. branch of Decca Records
- April 15 - Wallace Beery, film actor
- April 22 - Charles Middleton, actor
- May 22 - James Forrestal, U.S. Secretary of Navy and Defense
- May 27 - Robert Ripley, creator of Ripley's Believe It or Not!
- June 14 - Russell Doubleday, author and publisher
- June 25 - Buck Freeman, baseball player
- July 7 - Bunk Johnson, African American jazz trumpeter
- July 18 - Alice Corbin Henderson, poet
- July 24 - Virginia M. Alexander, African American physician and community activist
- July 26 - Linda Arvidson, silent film actress
- August 9
- * Gustavus M. Blech, German American physician and surgeon
- * Harry Davenport, actor
- August 16 - Margaret Mitchell, novelist
- August 18 - Paul Mares, dixieland jazz cornet player
- September 10 - Wiley Rutledge, U.S. Supreme Court Justice
- September 12 - Harry Burleigh, African American baritone and classical composer
- September 18 - Frank Morgan, character actor
- September 19 - Will Cuppy, humorist
- September 20 - Richard Dix, film actor
- September 22 - Sam Wood, film director
- September 27 - David Adler, architect
- October 1 - Buddy Clark, singer
- October 14 - Fritz Leiber, actor
- October 15 - Elmer Clifton, film actor and director
- October 23 - Almanzo Wilder, writer, husband of Laura Ingalls Wilder
- October 31 - Edward Stettinius, Jr., U.S. Secretary of State
- November 3 - Solomon R. Guggenheim, philanthropist
- November 25 - Bill Robinson, African American dancer
- December 6
- * Lead Belly, African American blues musician
- * Mary Margaret O'Reilly, Assistant Director of the United States Mint
- December 7 - Rex Beach, adventure novelist and Olympic water polo player
- December 25 - Leon Schlesinger, film producer
- December 28
- * Hervey Allen, novelist
- * Ivie Anderson, African American jazz singer