What Happened in May?

Jordan's Independence Day from The United Kingdom and officially becoming the Hashemite Kingdom of Transjordan, with Emir Abdullah I as its King. Transjordan officially changed its name to Jordan on June 2, 1949. More

Japan's postwar constitution goes into effect. This constitution, drafted by the Allied occupation authorities, established a democratic government, granted universal suffrage, and renounced Japan's right to make war. It also stipulated a bill of rights, abolished peerage, and limited the Emperor's power to a symbolic role. More

The U.S. Supreme Court decides in the United States v. Paramount et al. case that the studios had violated anti-trust laws, Concerns about the studios violating the Sherman Anti-Trust Act went back to 1921. More 

Jewish Agency Chairman David Ben-Gurion proclaims the State of Israel, at midnight May 14. just before the expiration of the British mandate in Palestine—precipitating the first  Arab-Israeli war. The UN General Assembly had adopted the resolution to partition Palestine on 29 November 1947 and Britain had announced the termination of its Mandate for Palestine, effective on 15 May 1948. Ben-Gurion became Israel’s first premier. More 

South Africa's National Party, led by D. F. Malan, wins the general election and implements apartheid, a system of racial segregation and discrimination. Prior to this, racial segregation and white-minority rule were already in place, but the National Party's apartheid policy intensified these measures with strict penalties for non-Whites entering designated White areas and other discriminatory laws. The election marked a turning point leading to 46 years of control by the National Party. More

The Soviets end the blockade of Berlin which had began 11-months earlier on June, 24 1948. The Soviet Union blockaded all road, rail, and water routes into West Berlin, effectively isolating it from the rest of Western Germany. The Allies response was an Airlift (Berlin Airlift) which successfully supplied West Berlin during the blockade. The Airlift continued until September of 1949 with a total of 278,228 flights delivering over 2.3 million tons of supplies More

The Federal Republic of Germany (German: Bundesrepublik Deutschland) is established with the consolidation of the western sectors, controlled by France, the United Kingdom and the United States. On 7 October 1949, the Soviet Zone became the German Democratic Republic (GDR) When West and East Germany were reunited in 1990, West Germany’s constitution and official name (Federal Republic of Germany) were adopted by the former East German state.

Police in Silkeborg, Denmark, discovers a well-preserved bog body near the village of Tollund. Initially mistaken for a recent murder victim, the body was identified as an exceptionally preserved Iron Age corpse (500 B.C. until 800 CE), now known as the Tollund Man. The man's remarkable state of preservation, including visible wrinkles, hair, and beard, led to extensive study and analysis of his remains, including his last meal. It is believed he lived in the early part of the Iron Age. More

Tibet is formally annexed by China as an autonomous region. The annexation gave rise rise to a Tibetan independence movement—led by the Dalai Lama, that continued into the early 21st century. The Dalai Lama was awarded the 1989 Nobel Peace Prize

Jacqueline Cochran makes history by becoming the first woman to break the sound barrier. She achieve this record piloting a Canadair F-86 Sabre jet aircraft. During her aviation career, from the 1930s through the 1960s, Jacqueline Cochran set more speed and altitude records than any contemporary pilot, male or female. and during World War II, she was instrumental in formation of the Women's Air Force Service Pilots (WASPs). Cochran received the Distinguished Service Medal for her leadership of the WASP and three Distinguished Flying Cross awards for other records. She was also a Colonel in the U.S. Air Force Reserve.  More

Edmund Hillary and Tenzing Norgay completed the first confirmed ascent of Mount Everest on May 29, 1953. More

The Supreme Court unanimously rules in the case of Hernandez v. Texas,  that the Fourteen amendment applies to all racial and ethnic groups facing discrimination. The defendant, Peter Hernandez, was a Mexican American agricultural worker that had come to Texas during and after World War II. Hernandez was convicted of killing a man in cold blood in Jackson County, Texas. His legal team, went through the records of jury selections in Jackson County, an area with a substantial Hispanic population, and found that not one of the roughly 6,000 jurors selected over the previous 25 years had a Hispanic last name. Hernandez received a new trial with a jury that included Mexican Americans and he was again found guilty of murder. More

The French forces are defeated at Dien Bien Phu bringing an end to French colonial efforts in Indochina. Vietnam was partitioned by the Geneva Accords of 1954 into Communist North Vietnam and non-Communist South Vietnam.  Expand +

The Supreme Court of the United States hands down its unanimous decision in Brown v. Board of Education of Topeka, Kansas, ruling that racial segregation in public educational facilities is unconstitutional. More

The Federal Republic of Germany (West Germany) gained full sovereignty after the United States, Great Britain, and France ended their military occupation, which had begun in 1945. This marked the end of Allied occupation and a significant step in West Germany's transition to a sovereign state and its integration into the Western sphere. Importantly, the announcement did not take into account the “reserved rights” of the Allies regarding decisions relating to Berlin, the question of reunification and the conclusion of peace treaties. The Soviet Union followed suit on 20 September 1955, granting the DDR “full sovereignty”. However, the freedoms granted in the treaty existed only on paper, as the Soviet Union preserved its full political, military and economic influence across the Eastern bloc. More

The Federal Republic of Germany (West Germany) Joins NATO. More

The Warsaw Treaty Organization (also known as the Warsaw Pact), a political and military alliance between the Soviet Union and several Eastern European countries. The Soviet Union formed this alliance as a counterbalance to the North Atlantic Treaty Organization (NATO), a collective security alliance concluded between the United States, Canada and Western European nations in 1949. More

Vice President Nixon’s motorcade was attacked in Caracas by angry Venezuelans during his goodwill trip through Latin America. The trip was characterized by Latin American anger over the U.S. Cold War policies. Earlier on the trip Nixon had engaged in loud and bitter debates with student groups during his travels through Peru and Uruguay.

An American U-2 spy plane flying at 60,000 feet was shot down over Sverdlovsk in central Russia. The pilot, CIA agent Francis Gary Powers, survived the crash, and was tried, convicted and sentenced to 10 years in prison. More

Leonid Ilyich Brezhnev becomes Chairman of the Presidium of the Supreme Soviet (head of state), an important step in his rise to power, eventually taking control of the Soviet Union in 1964 when he became General Secretary of the Communist Party of the Soviet Union, a position he held until his death in 1982. More