1962The year saw the Cuban Missile Crisis, which is often considered the closest the world came to a nuclear confrontation during the Cold War. January 1962 January 1 – Western Samoa becomes independent from New Zealand. January 3 – The office of Pope John XXIII announces the excommunication of Fidel Castro for preaching communism and interfering with Catholic churches in Cuba. January 8 – Harmelen train disaster: 93 die in the worst Dutch rail disaster. January 9 – Cuba and the Soviet Union sign a trade pact.
1921January 1921 January 2 The Association football club Cruzeiro Esporte Clube, from Belo Horizonte, is founded as the multi-sports club Palestra Italia by Italian expatriates in Brazil. The Spanish liner Santa Isabel breaks in two and sinks off Villa Garcia, Mexico, with the loss of 244 of the 300 people on board. January 16 – The Marxist Left in Slovakia and the Transcarpathian Ukraine holds its founding congress in Ľubochňa. January 17 – The first recorded public performance of the illusion of "sawing a woman in half" is given by English stage magician P.
1915Below, the events of World War I have the "WWI" prefix. January 1915 January – British physicist Sir Joseph Larmor publishes his observations on "The Influence of Local Atmospheric Cooling on Astronomical Refraction". January 1 WWI: British Royal Navy battleship HMS Formidable is sunk off Lyme Regis, Dorset, England, by an Imperial German Navy U-boat, with the loss of 547 crew. Battle of Broken Hill: A train ambush near Broken Hill, Australia, is carried out by two men (claiming to be in support of the Ottoman Empire) who are killed, together with four civilians.
1940A calendar from 1940 according to the Gregorian calendar, factoring in the dates of Easter and related holidays, cannot be used again until the year 5280. Below, the events of World War II have the "WWII" prefix. January 1940 January 4 – WWII: Luftwaffe Colonel Hermann Göring assumes control of most war industries in Germany. January 6 – WWII: Winter War – General Semyon Timoshenko takes command of all Soviet forces. January 7 – WWII: Winter War: Battle of Raate Road – Outnumbered Finnish troops decisively defeat Soviet forces.
1932January 1932 January 4 – The British authorities in India arrest and intern Mahatma Gandhi and Vallabhbhai Patel. January 9 – Sakuradamon Incident: Korean nationalist Lee Bong-chang fails in his effort to assassinate Emperor Hirohito of Japan. The Kuomintang's official newspaper runs an editorial expressing regret that the attempt failed, which is used by the Japanese as a pretext to attack Shanghai later in the month. January 22 – The 1932 Salvadoran peasant uprising begins; it is suppressed by the government of Maximiliano Hernández Martínez.
1933January 1933 January 11 – Sir Charles Kingsford Smith makes the first commercial flight between Australia and New Zealand. January 17 – The United States Congress votes in favour of Philippines independence, against the wishes of U.S. President Herbert Hoover. January 28 – "Pakistan Declaration": Choudhry Rahmat Ali publishes (in Cambridge, UK) a pamphlet entitled Now or Never; Are We to Live or Perish Forever?, in which he calls for the creation of a Muslim state in northwest India that he calls "Pakstan"; this influences the Pakistan Movement.
1914This year saw the beginning of what became known as World War I, after Archduke Franz Ferdinand of Austria, heir to the Austrian throne was assassinated by Serbian nationalist Gavrilo Princip. It also saw the first airline to provide scheduled regular commercial passenger services with heavier-than-air aircraft, with the St. Petersburg–Tampa Airboat Line. January 1914 January 1 – The St. Petersburg–Tampa Airboat Line in the United States starts services between St.
1950January 1950 January 1 – The International Police Association (IPA) – the largest police organization in the world – is formed. January 5 – Sverdlovsk plane crash: Aeroflot Lisunov Li-2 crashes in a snowstorm. All 19 aboard are killed, including almost the entire national ice hockey team (VVS Moscow) of the Soviet Air Force – 11 players, as well as a team doctor and a masseur. January 6 – The UK recognizes the People's Republic of China; the Republic of China severs diplomatic relations with Britain in response.
1953January 1953 January 6 – The Asian Socialist Conference opens in Rangoon, Burma. January 12 – Estonian émigrés found a government-in-exile in Oslo. January 14 Marshal Josip Broz Tito is chosen President of Yugoslavia. The CIA-sponsored Robertson Panel first meets to discuss the UFO phenomenon. January 15 – Georg Dertinger, foreign minister of East Germany, is arrested for spying. January 19 – 71.1% of all television sets in the United States are tuned into I Love Lucy, to watch Lucy give birth to Little Ricky, which is more people than those who tune into Dwight Eisenhower's inauguration the next day.
1930January 1930 January 15 – The Moon moves into its nearest point to Earth, called perigee, at the same time as its fullest phase of the Lunar Cycle. This is the closest moon distance at in recent history, and the next one will be on January 1, 2257, at . January 26 – The Indian National Congress declares this date as Independence Day, or as the day for Poorna Swaraj (Complete Independence). January 28 – The first patent for a field-effect transistor is granted in the United States, to Julius Edgar Lilienfeld.
