Disney's animated film, One Hundred and One Dalmatians, is released. Its financial success pulling the studio out of another financial slump from the initial underperformance of Sleeping Beauty.
January 31 – Ham, a 37-pound (17-kg) male chimpanzee, is rocketed into space aboard Mercury-Redstone 2, in a test of the Project Mercury capsule, designed to carry United States astronauts into space.
February 1 – The United States launches its first test of the Minuteman I intercontinental ballistic missile.[1]
"I believe that this nation should commit itself to achieving the goal, before this decade is out, of landing a man on the Moon and returning him safely to the Earth."
President John F. Kennedy before a joint session of Congress, May 25, 1961
April 27 – President Kennedy delivers a revealing speech: The President and the Press: Address before the American Newspaper Publishers Association.[4]
May 25 – Apollo program: President Kennedy announces before a special joint session of Congress his goal to put a man on the Moon before the end of the decade.
July 21 – Mercury program: Gus Grissom, piloting the Mercury-Redstone 4 capsule Liberty Bell 7, becomes the second American to go into space (sub-orbital). Upon splashdown, the hatch prematurely opens, and the capsule sinks (it is recovered in 1999).
July 31 – At Fenway Park in Boston, Massachusetts, the first All-Star Game tie in major league baseball history occurs, when the game is stopped in the 9th inning due to rain (the only tie until 2002 in MLB All-Star Game history).
September 17 – The world's first retractable roof stadium, the Civic Arena, opens in Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania.
September 24 – The Walt Disney anthology television series, renamed Walt Disney's Wonderful World of Color, moves from ABC to NBC after seven years on the air, and begins telecasting its programs in color for the first time.
October 1 – Baseball player Roger Maris of the New York Yankees hits his 61st home run in the last game of the season, against the Boston Red Sox, beating the 34-year-old record held by Babe Ruth.