January

January 1 - Soviet Union no longer demands war reparations from East Germany.

January 12 - Large-scale avalanches in Austria - over 20 dead.

January 13 - Yangtze River ran dry

January 14

The Hudson Motor Car Company merges with Nash-Kelvinator Corporation forming the American Motors Corporation.

Marilyn Monroe weds Joe DiMaggio.

January 15 - Mau Mau lleader Waruhiu Itote is captured in Kenya.

January 17 - In Yugoslavia, Milovan Djilas, Tito's second-in-command, is relieved of his duties.

January 20 - The National Negro Network is established with 40 charter member radio stations.

January 21 - The first nuclear-powered submarine, the USS Nautilus, is launched in Groton, Connecticut, by First Lady of the United States Mrs. Dwight D. Eisenhower.

January 25 - The foreign ministers of the United States, Britain, France and the Soviet Union meet at the Berlin Conference.

January 26 - Milpitas, California was incorporated as a city.

February

February 3 - Queen Elizabeth II is the first reigning monarch to visit Australia.

February 10 - After authorizing $385 million over the $400 million already budgeted for military aid to Vietnam, President Dwight Eisenhower warns against United States intervention in Vietnam.

February 18 - The first Church of Scientology is established in Los Angeles, California.

February 23 - The first mass vaccination of children against polio begins in Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania and helps to save the lives of innumerable children.

February 25 - Lt. Col. Gamal Abdel Nasser is made premier of Egypt.

March

March 1

Nuclear testing: Officials announce that an American hydrogen bomb test had been conducted on Bikini Atoll in the Pacific Ocean.

Four Puerto Ricans open fire on United States House of Representatives and wound five. Security guards apprehend them.

March 9 - Edward Murrow and Fred W. Friendly produce a 30-minute See It Now special entitled "A Report on Senator Joseph McCarthy".

March 12 - Finland and Germany officially end the state of war.

March 13 - French troops begin battle against Vietminh in Dien Bien Phu.

March 19 - Joey Giardello knocks out Willie Tory in round seven at Madison Square Garden in the first televised prize boxing fight shown in color.

March 22 - The London bullion market reopens (it was closed in 1939).

March 23 - Viet Minh capture the main airstrip of Dien Bien Phu - French forces are partially isolated.

March 25

RCA manufactures first color TV set (12" screen; price: $1,000).

Soviet Union recognizes sovereignty of East Germany but Soviet troops remain in the country.

March 28 - The television stations Telemundo - WKAQ-TV is formed in Puerto Rico.

March 29 - C-47 with Genevieve de Galard on board is incapacitated on Dien Bien Phu runway.

March 30 - Canada's first subway opens in Toronto.

April

April - The Fender Stratocaster, one of the best-known guitars of all time, is released.

April 1 - President Dwight D. Eisenhower authorizes the creation of the United States Air Force Academy in Colorado.

April 3 - Vladimir Petrov defects from the Soviet Union and asks to seek political asylum in Australia.

April 4 - Legendary conductor Arturo Toscanini experiences a lapse of memory during a concert. At concert's end, his retirement is announced, and Toscanini never conducts in public again.

April 7 - Dwight D. Eisenhower gives his "domino theory" speech during a news conference.

April 12 - Bill Haley & His Comets record "Rock Around the Clock" in New York City.

April 14 - Aneurin Bevan resigns from the UK Labour shadow cabinet.

April 16 - Vice President Richard Nixon announces that the United States may be, quote, “putting our own boys in Indochina regardless of Allied support.”

April 22 - Senator Joseph McCarthy begins hearings investigating the United States Army for being "soft" on Communism.

May

May 1 - Taku (city in Japan) is founded.

May 6 - Roger Bannister runs the first four minute mile.

May 7

Construction started on Michigan's Mackinac Bridge.

Vietnam War: The Battle of Dien Bien Phu ends in a French defeat (the battle began on March 13).

May 14 - Boeing 707 released after about two years of development.

May 17

United States Supreme Court hands down its decision in Brown v. Board of Education of Topeka, Kansas 347 US 483 1954.

Petrov Royal Commission in Australia begins its inqury.

May 18 - President Eisenhower today asked for progress reports on coming moves to public school segregation in the District of Columbia.

May 20

Chiang Kai-shek is reelected president of the Republic of China by the National Assembly.

Radio Free Europe/Radio Liberty launches Belarusian language programming (see also Piotra Sych).

May 29 - Robert Menzies Government re-elected for 4th term in Australia.

June

June 1 - Radio station Sender Freies Berlin begins broadcasting.

June 7 - Mathematician Alan Turing commits suicide.

June 9 - McCarthyism: Joseph Welch, special counsel for the United States Army, lashes out at Senator Joseph McCarthy during hearings on whether Communism has infiltrated the Army.

June 14 - On United States Flag Day, the words "under God" added to the Pledge of Allegiance.

June 15 - UEFA (the Union of European Football Associations) is formed in Basel, Switzerland.

June 17 - Military coup occurs in Guatemala.

June 18 - Pierre Mendès-France becomes prime minister of France.

June 19 - The last regular-service streetcar operated by Twin City Rapid Transit runs in Minneapolis.

June 27

Guatemalan President Jacobo Arbenz Guzmán steps down in a CIA-sponsored military coup–Operation PBSUCCESS–triggering a bloody civil war that would continue for more than 35 years.

The world's first atomic power station opened at Obninsk, near Moscow.

July

July 3 - Food rationing ends in Britain.

July 4

End of rationing of meat - the last form of food rationing in Britain.

West Germany beat Hungary 3-2 to win the 1954 FIFA World Cup.

July 5 - Andhra Pradesh High Court is established.

July 7 - In Memphis, Tennessee, WHBQ becomes the first radio station to air an Elvis Presley record.

July 15 - Maiden flight of Boeing 707.

July 21 - First Indochina War: The Geneva Conference partitions Vietnam into North Vietnam and South Vietnam.

July 28 - Foundation of the Situationist International.

July 31 - First ascent of K2, by an Italian expedition. Which is celebrated in both Pakistan and Italy as the 50th anniversary of the official day of K2 since 2004.

August

August - First flight of a B-52 Stratofortress.

August 6 - Emilie Dionne, one of the Dionne Quintuplets, dies of asphyxiation following an epileptic seizure at Sainte Agathe, Quebec.

August 16 - Volume 1, Issue 1 of ''Sports Illustrated'' is published.

August 24 - President of Brazil, Getulio Vargas, commits suicide; he's been accused of conspiracy to murder an air force officer.

September

September 3 - The last new episode of ''The Lone Ranger'' is aired on radio after 2,956 episodes over a period of 21 years

September 6 - SEATO treaty signed in Manila, Philippines KOVR went on the air.

September 8 - The Southeast Asia Treaty Organization (SEATO) is established in Bangkok, Thailand.

September 9 - An earthquake centered on the city of Oleansville in Algeria: 1500 dead and thousands homeless.

September 11 - First Miss America Pageant broadcast on television.

September 14 - USSR tests nuclear weapon.

September 24 - Edward Pilgrim commits suicide hastened by bureaucracy.

September 25 - Footscray Football Club wins their first Grand Final.

September 26 - Japanese ferry Toya Maru sinks during a typhoon in the Tsugaru Strait killing more than 1,100.

September 30 - USS Nautilus, 1st atomic-powered vessel (submarine), commissioned by the US Navy.

October

October 11

Vietnam War: The Viet Minh takes control of North Vietnam.

Hurricane Hazel crosses over Haiti, killing 1,000 people.

October 15 - Hurricane Hazel makes U.S. landfall - it is the only recorded Category 4 hurricane to strike as far north as North Carolina.

October 18 - Texas Instruments announces the worldwide first Transistor radio.

October 20 - Dock workers' strike expands in England.

October 23 - West Germany joins NATO.

October 25 - Disastrous landslides caused by heavy rains hit Salerno, Italy killing some 300 people.

October 26 - Member of Muslim Brotherhood Abdul Munim Abdul Rauf tries to kill Gamal Abdal Nasser.

October 31 - Algerian War of Independence: The Algerian National Liberation Front begins a revolt against French rule.

November

November - The main immigration port-of-entry in New York Harbor at Ellis Island closes.

November 1 - The FLN attacks Representative and public buildings of the France colonial power.

November 2 - Dock workers' strike in England ends.

November 3 - The first in the Godzilla series of films is released in Japan.

November 10 - US President Dwight D. Eisenhower dedicates the USMC War Memorial (Iwo Jima memorial) in Arlington National Cemetery.

November 13 - Don Estes invents the disrupter (a part to help combines work).

November 14

Egyptian president Mohammed Naguib is deposed - Gamal Abdel Nasser replaces him.

Leonard Bernstein makes his first appearance on television, lecturing on the first movement of Ludwig van Beethoven's ''Fifth Symphony'', the first of his many television music lectures.

November 23 - The Dow Jones Industrial Average rises 3.27 points, or 0.86%, closing at an all-time high of 382.74. More significantly, this is the first time the Dow has surpassed its 1929 peak level reached just before that year's crash.

November 30 - In Sylacauga, Alabama, a 4 kg meteorite crashes through the roof of a house and hits Ann Hodges, badly bruising her, in the first documented case of an object from outer space hitting a person.

December

December 2

Red Scare: The United States Senate votes 67 to 22 to condemn Joseph McCarthy for "conduct that tends to bring the Senate into dishonor and disrepute."

Taiwan-United States Mutual Defense Treaty. http://en.wikisource.org/wiki/Mutual_Defense_Treaty_between_the_United_States_of_America_and_the_Republic_of_China

December 24 - Laos becomes independent.

Undated

The first kidney transplants are done in Boston and also in Paris.

The Boy Scouts of America desegregates on the basis of race.

Stop signs are changed from black-on-yellow to white-on-red.

Gerbils (Meriones Unguiculatus), brought to the United States by Dr. Victor Schwentker.

Unification Church is founded.

Case of Lothar Malskat, who had admitted that he had painted the frescoes in Marienkirche himself, goes into trial.

The TV Dinner is introduced by American, Gerry Thomas.

Foundation of Université de Sherbrooke.

The first complete recordings of all three of Tchaikovsky's ballets, ''Swan Lake'', ''The Sleeping Beauty'', and ''The Nutcracker'' are released on LP by Mercury Records, with Antal Dorati conducting the Minneapolis Symphony Orchestra.