January 2 – NAACP Executive Secretary Roy Wilkins praises U.S. President John F. Kennedy's "personal role" in advancing civil rights.
January 4 – New York City introduces a subway train that operates without a crew on board.
January 26 – Ranger 3 is launched to study the Moon but later misses its target by 22,000 miles.
January 30 – Two of the high-wire "Flying Wallendas" are killed, when their famous 7-person pyramid collapses during a performance in Detroit, Michigan.
March 5–9 – Ash Wednesday Storm of 1962: One of the ten worst storms in the United States in the 20th century occurs, killing 40 people, injuring over 1,000, and causing hundreds of millions of dollars in property damage in six states.
June 3 – Air France Flight 007, Boeing 707Chateau de Sully on a charter flight carrying cultural and civic leaders of Atlanta, Georgia, overruns the runway at Orly Airport in Paris; 130 of 132 passengers are killed.
Robert M. White flies the X-15 to an altitude of 314,750 feet (59 miles, 96 km) to qualify him for USAFAstronaut Wings becoming the first "winged" astronaut and one of a few who have flown into space without a conventional spacecraft.
July 22 – Mariner program: the Mariner 1 spacecraft flies erratically several minutes after launch and has to be destroyed.
July 23 - Jackie Robinson becomes the first African-American to be inducted into the Baseball Museum And Hall Of Fame.
The infamous Columbus Day Storm strikes the U.S. Pacific Northwest with wind gusts up to 170 mph (270 km/h); 46 are killed, 11 billion board feet (26 million m3) of timber is blown down, with $230 million U.S. in damages.
October 28 – Cuban Missile Crisis: Soviet Union leader Nikita Khrushchev announces that he has ordered the removal of Soviet missile bases in Cuba. In a secret deal between Kennedy and Khrushchev, Kennedy agrees to the withdrawal of U.S. missiles from Turkey. The fact that this deal is not made public makes it look like the Soviets have backed down.
Novemberedit
November 7 – Richard M. Nixon loses the California governor's race. In his concession speech, he states that this is his "last press conference" and that "you won't have Dick Nixon to kick around any more".
December 2 – Vietnam War: after a trip to Vietnam at the request of U.S. President John F. Kennedy, U.S. Senate Majority Leader Mike Mansfield becomes the first American official to make a non-optimistic public comment on the war's progress.
December 14 – U.S. spacecraft Mariner 2 flies by Venus, becoming the first probe to successfully transmit data from another planet.
December 24 – Cuba releases the last 1,113 participants in the Bay of Pigs Invasion to the U.S., in exchange for food worth $53 million.
December 30 – An unexpected storm buries Maine under five feet of snow, forcing the Bangor Daily News to miss a publication date for the first and only time in its history.
Undatededit
American advertising man Martin K. Speckter invents the interrobang, a new English-language punctuation mark.
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^Stephen Gould, Tenor Best Known for Tackling Wagner, Dies at 61
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^Daredevil Robbie Knievel, son of Evel Knievel, dies at 60
^Former Chargers RB Lionel 'Little Train' James dies at age of 59
^James Michael Tyler, Gunther the Central Perk Barista on ‘Friends,’ Dies at 59
^Cecil Exum, the father of Dante Exum, died at the age of 60.
^Levenson, Michael; Genzlinger, Neil (March 17, 2023). "Lance Reddick, Star of 'The Wire' and 'John Wick,' Dies at 60". The New York Times. Retrieved March 17, 2023.
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^Former Louisiana federal judge Michael Juneau dies
^Cahill, Marie (May 1992). Tom Cruise. Smithmark. p. 9. ISBN 978-0-8317-8669-4.
^Jeff Innis, former Mets pitcher, dead from cancer at 59
^Welch, William F.; James, Steven T., eds. (2007). Public Officers of the Commonwealth of Massachusetts (2007–2008). Massachusetts General Court. p. 101.
^Longtime Jets O-Lineman Jim Sweeney Dies at 60; 'I Just Loved to Play the Game'
^Former Canadiens defenceman Tom Kurvers dies from lung cancer at 58
^Veteran CNN investigative journalist Drew Griffin dead at 60
^"Jodie Foster". BFI. Archived from the original on February 6, 2016. Retrieved 30 March 2022.
^"Famous birthdays for Dec. 9: Judi Dench, John Malkovich". UPI.
^Congress (U.S.), Joint Committee on Printing (6 September 2018). Official Congressional Directory 115th Congress, 2017-2018. Government Printing Office. pp. 9–. ISBN 978-0-16-094208-2.
^Robinson Jeffers; Tim Hunt (2001). The Selected Poetry of Robinson Jeffers. Stanford University Press. p. 6. ISBN 978-0-8047-4108-8.
^Sicherman, Barbara; Green, Carol Hurd (1980). Notable American Women: The Modern Period : a Biographical Dictionary. Harvard University Press. p. 7. ISBN 978-0-674-62733-8.
^Katchmer, George A. (May 20, 2015). A Biographical Dictionary of Silent Film Western Actors and Actresses. McFarland. p. 13. ISBN 978-1-4766-0905-8. Retrieved September 12, 2020.
^"Carroll McComas Dies at 76; Actress Began Career in 1907". The New York Times. November 10, 1962. p. 19. Retrieved December 20, 2021.
External linksedit
Media related to 1962 in the United States at Wikimedia Commons