1964: 50-year Milestones

Courtesy of AARP Bulletin Dec. 2013

Jan. 8: In his first State of the Union Address, with the nation’s poverty rate at about 19 percent, President Lyndon Johnson declares a “war on poverty.” His speech leads to the passage of the Economic Opportunity Act and, in time, to the creation of Medicare and Medicaid. The federal government said the poverty rate was 15 percent in 2013.

Feb. 7: “Beatlemania” erupts in the United States when 3,000 screaming fans greet the Fab Four as they arrive at New York’s Kennedy Airport for their first American tour. It’s six days after the quartet first vaults to the top of the U.S. singles chart with “I Want to Hold Your Hand,” and two days before an estimated 73 million television viewers watch their debut on The Ed Sullivan Show.

March 9: The first Mustang rolls off the assembly line at Ford Motor Company in Dearborn, Mich., and debuts the following month at the New York World’s Fair with a suggested retail price of $2,368. Ford forecasts fewer than 100,000 sales in the first year, but by the 18-month mark it has manufactured 1 million Mustangs.

April 13: Sidney Poitier becomes the first African American to win an Oscar in the category of best actor for his portrayal of itinerant handyman Homer Smith in Lilies of the Field.

May 2: In the first major student demonstration against the Vietnam War, as many as 1,000 students march through New York’s Times Square and another 700 in San Francisco. There are smaller antiwar marches in Boston, Seattle, and Madison, Wis.

June 12: Nelson Mandela, the leader of the anti-apartheid struggle in South Africa, is sentenced to life imprisonment in South Africa for sabotage and subversion. He is released in 1990.

July 2: President Johnson signs the Civil Rights Act of 1964 into law. It abolishes racial segregation in schools, in workplaces, and in public places; outlaws discrimination against racial, ethnic, national and religious minorities and against women.

Aug. 7: Congress passes the Gulf of Tonkin resolution, which paves the way for escalation of the U.S. involvement in Vietnam by President Johnson. The resolution comes after encounters in the gulf between two U.S. destroyers and North Vietnamese patrol boats.

Sept. 17: Bewitched, starring Elizabeth Montgomery, with Dick York, premieres on ABC. The popular sitcom will run until March 25, 1972.

Oct. 1: Some 3,000 students at the University of California, Berkeley, block a police car from taking away a civil rights activist who had been arrested for not showing his identification. The protest eventually explodes into the Berkeley Free Speech Movement and fuels the 1960s civil rights movement.

Nov. 3: President Johnson wins a second term with the largest popular vote in U.S. history, receiving 61 percent of the vote in a landslide victory over Republican challenger Barry Goldwater.

Dec. 18: The first Pink Panther theatrical cartoon short, “The Pink Phink,” features the Panther harassing his foil, a little man who is actually a caricature of Friz Freleng, the cartoon’s creator. It wins the 1964 Academy Award for Animated Short Film.

Accent Editor Myra Miller can be reached at myra.miller@eunicetoday.com