President Johnson
Fidel Castro
Premier Khrushchev and Premier Fidel Castro
·January 1, Johnson in New Years Message to USSR said that 1964 should be a year of concrete action towards the goal of relaxed East-West tensions
January 1, A new year's editorial in the Peking People's Daily declares that China will continue to :resutely oppose the policy of war and aggression of imperialism headed by the U.S."
January 1, Cuban Premier Fidel Castro in an ABC-TV interview expresses hope for improvement in U.S.-Cuban relations. Castro asserts that President Kennedy indicated before his death a willingness to normalize relations with Cuba
January 2, Soviet Premier Khrushchev, in a message to world leaders, proposes a worldwide treaty denouncing war as a means of settling territorial disputes. Khrushchev also urges the withdrawal of US troops from Germany, Korea and Vietnam as a first step toward reunification of those countries
January 3, US State Department says it will give careful study to Soviet Premier Khrushchev's January 2nd proposal on renouncing war, but indicates disappointment at the allegedly propagandistic purposes and tone of his message
January 3, US and Soviet officials jointly announce completion of the first series of Soviet purchases of US wheat expected eventually to total more than four million metric tons, worth about $250 million
January 4, Pope Paul VI tours the Holy Land and meets with Patriarch Benedictos of Jerusalem; it is the first meeting of the heads of the Roman Catholic and Eastern Orthodox churches in five hundred years
January 6, Communist border guards close the Berlin Wall following the expiration of a Christmas pass agreement under which 1.25 million west Berliners had entered the city's Communist sector for one day visits with relatives
January 7, Talks open in Moscow on the fourth two-year renewal of the U.S.-Soviet cultural exchange program
· January 8, In his State of Union Address President Johnson unveils his $97.9 billion budget, with increased spending for education as a hallmark
· January 8, President Johnson declares "war on poverty", introduces a variety of federal welfare programs including Medicare in his State of Union address
January 13, Castro arrives in Moscow for discussion of Soviet-Cuban relations
January 14, US Agreement to provide South Vietnam with additional economic assistance is signed in Saigon
January 14, Visiting Italian President Antonia Segni addresses ajoint session of the US Congress to reaffirm Italy's commitment to a Europe linked with the US in an "indissoluble" Atlantic partnership
January 18, President Johnson informs Soviet Premier Khrushchev that the US is willing to discuss recent Soviet proposals for a world treaty outlawing territorial aggression provided that the pact be extended to cover guerrilla warfare and other forms of forcible subversion
January 18, An earthquake strikes South Taiwan killing about 400 persons
January 28, A US Airforce T-39 training plane is attacked and downed by Soviet fighters near East Germany after its pilot failed to respond to warnings that he was intruding into Communist air space. All three crewmen are believed dead.
January 31, Britain and US propose creation of 10,000-man NATO force to keep the peace between Turkish and Greek Cypriotes on Cyprus. Greece and Turkey indicate support but Cypriote President Makarios says he will oppose the plan
· February 4, The 24th Amendment to Constitution adopted, ensuring fair voting practices
February 4, Chinese government launches a sharp attack on Soviet Premier Khrushchev, accusing him of working in association with the US to achieve world domination
February 6, US delegation at the Geneva disarmament talks calls for a joint Soviet-American pledge to refrain from providing nuclear weapons or relevant technological information to nations not now possessing an atomic capability
February 7, Khrushchev in notes to Western leaders, warns that the USSR will not tolerate forcible NATO intervention in the affairs of "neutral" Cyprus
February 22, USSR and US sign a two-year cultural exchange agreement providing for increased contacts in the fields of industry, agriculture, medicine and the performing arts
· February 22, The United States and the Soviet Union sign the fourth two-year agreement on education, technological, and scientific exchanges
February 23, A six-member Communist Chinese delegation arrives in Paris to establish formal diplomatic relations with the French government
February 29, The Polish government calls for a treaty freezing the current levels of nuclear armaments on the territories of East and West Germany, Poland, and Czechoslovakia
·March, Jack Ruby is tried and convicted for the murder of Lee Harvey Oswald
March 8, US Defense Secretary McNamara arrives in Saigon on his four facet-finding mission to South Vietnam. McNamara promises a welcoming crowd that the U.S. will support Vietnamese government for "As long as it takes to defeat the Viet Cong"
March 10, Soviet air defenses shot down an unarmed US Air Force RB-66 jet reconnaissance plan shot down March 10 over East Germany is released to US medical personnel in West Berlin by Soviet authorities. The plane's other two crew members are still being held
March 24, One person in dead and dozens injured following two days of racial rioting in Jacksonville, Florida
March 26, Defense Secretary Robert S. McNamara claims that US forces will remain in Vietnam until the possibility of a Communist takeover is no longer a threat
March 26, President Johnson restores most-favored-nation status to imports from Yugoslavia and Poland. Congress had deprived such treatment form the two Communist states in 1962 under the trade Expansion Act
March 27, USSR returns the two remaining crewmen of an American RB-66 reconnaissance jet shot down over East Germany on March 10th
March 31, The Chinese Communist Party issues a formal statement calling on Communists everywhere to repudiate Khrushchev and Soviet leadership and to join China in a united struggle for world revolution
April 19, Castro denounces the U.S's regular reconnaissance flights over Cuba as a violation of the island's sovereignty and warns that ground-to-air missiles may be employed to combat future flights
April 20, US, British, and Soviet negotiators agree to reduce the production of fissionable materials for military purposes
· May, Howard Nathaniel Lee was elected mayor of Chapel Hill, North Carolina, becoming the first black mayor of a predominately white southern community
May 12, In a television address the Russian people, Premier Khrushchev discloses that the USSR has asked other Communists States to join in a "resolute rebuff" to Communist China
May 18, Civil Rights March in Washington DC
May 22 LBJ announced Great Society Program Speech at the University of Michigan
The Boston Strangler begins a killing spree which soon holds the city in the grip of terror
June 12, eight South African antiapartheid leaders, including Nelson Mandela, are sentenced to life imprisonment
June 12, USSR and East Germany sign a 20-year friendship treaty in Moscow while the pact asserts the legal existence of the East German state, it also explicitly acknowledges the USSR's 1945 Potsdam commitments regarding the four-power occupation of Germany and Berlin
June 19, Edward Kennedy's private plane crashed
June 21, Three civil rights workers murdered in Mississippi during "Freedom Summer" voting-rights drive
June 22, Escobedo v. Illinois is decided by the Supreme Court, which requires that a suspect have access to an attorney during interrogation
June 29, Juana Castro Ruz, sister of Fidel Castro, announces on Mexico City television that she has defected from Cuba and has requested political asylum in Mexico. She accuses her brother of betraying the Cuban Revolution to "Russian Imperialism"
June 30, US attorney General Robert Kennedy concludes a three-day goodwill trip to Poland
· July 2, President Johnson signs the Civil Rights Act of 1964 banning racial discrimination in public places and employment
· July 15, Arizona Senator Barry Goldwater wins the Republican presidential nomination
· July 18, Race riots break out in Harlem and other US cities · September, Investigating the Kennedy assassination, the Warren Commission determines that "Oswald acted alone" in killing the president
· August 4, US military forces launch attacks on North Vietnam in response to an alleged attack on a US destroyer off the Vietnamese coast
·August 7, Congress passes Gulf of Tonkin resolution that gives the President greater freedom to authorize combat actions in Vietnam
·August 20, Johnson signs the War on Poverty Bill
·August 26, Johnson wins the Democratic presidential nomination and selects Minnesota senator Hubert H. Humphrey as his running mate
·August 30, The Equal Opportunity Act is signed by President Johnson, providing $950 million for youth programs, community-action antipoverty measures, small-business loans, and the creation of the Job Corps.
·September 7, Daisy Girl TV add, helped LBJ defeat Goldwater
September 13, An Israeli government statement warns that it will not tolerate an Arab league attempt to block the headwaters of the Jordan River
September 23, West Germany approves a one-year agreement with East Germany to allow West Berliners to visit relatives in East Berlin during two-week periods at Christmas, Easter, Pentecost, all-saints Day and at times of family crisis
·October 5, Fifty-seven East Germans escape to West Berlin by tunnel
·October 14, Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr., is awarded the Nobel Peace Prize and donates the prize money to the civil rights movement
·October 15, Soviet Leader Khrushev falls from power, is ultimately replaced by Leonid Brezhnev
·October 15, Harold Wilson, leader of the Labour Party, becomes prime minister of Britain
· October 16, China conducts its first nuclear test explosion
· Anchorage, Alaska hit by massive earthquake
· Turkey attacks Cyprus
November 3, After completing what would have been the final year of John F. Kennedy's first term, President Johnson re-elected in a landslide over Barry Goldwater
November 11, US sources in Saigon report that a record twenty Americans died in Vietnam during October. South Vietnamese deaths for October are listed at 775
December 30, UN Security Council votes for an end to foreign intervention in the Congo
1964 march for free speech
President Johnson
Official photo
Barry Goldwater campaigning for November Presidential election in November, 1964
President Johnson signing the Medicare bill
Civil Rights March
Clergymen and Church laymen file past the US Capitol building in Washington DC on May 18
.Edward Kennedy in a hospital in Boston, a few weeks after his plane crashed
President Johnson signing the Civil Rights Bill on July 2, 1964
"Daisy Girl" Johnson's political commercial which aired on September 7, 1964
Dr. Martin Luther King Jr., was awarded the Nobel Peace Prize in October, 1964
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