1949

Updated August 5, 2020 | Infoplease Staff
World | US | Sports | Entertainment | Deaths | Year in Science

World Statistics

Population: 2.554 billion (!not right!)

population by decade

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World Events

  • NATO establshed when North Atlantic Treaty is signed by 12 nations (April 4).
  • German Federal Republic (West Germany) established (Sept. 21).
  • Truman discloses Soviet Union has set off atomic explosion (Sept. 23).
    Background: The Cold War
  • Communist People's Republic of China formally proclaimed by Chairman Mao Zedong (Oct. 1).
  • South Africa institutionalizes apartheid.

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US Statistics

Population: 149,188,130

Life expectancy: 68.0 years

Homicide Rate (per 1,000): 5.4

President: Harry S Truman

Vice President: Alben W. Barkley

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US Events

  • President Truman proposes Point Four Program to help world's less developed areas (Jan. 20).
  • President Truman proposes Point Four Program to help world's less developed areas (Jan. 20).
  • President Truman proposes Point Four Program to help world's less developed areas (Jan. 20).

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Economics

US GDP (1998 dollars): $267.8 billion

Federal spending: $38.84 billion

Federal debt: $252.6 billion

Dow Jones High/Low: 200/161

Consumer Price Index: 23.8

Unemployment: 3.8%

Cost of a first-class stamp: $0.03

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Sports

Super Bowl
Green Bay d. Cincinnatti (35-1)

World Series
NY Yankees d. Brooklyn Dodgers (4-1)

NBA Championship
Minneapolis Lakers d. Washington Capitols (4-2)

NHL Championship
Toronto d. Detroit (4-0)

Wimbledon
Women: Louise Brough d. M. duPont(10-8 16 10-8)
Men: Ted Schroeder d. J. Drobny (36 60 63 46 64)

Kentucky Derby Champion
Ponder

NCAA Basketball Championship
Kentucky d. Oklahoma A&M (46-36)
The year in college basketball

NCAA Football Champions:
Notre Dame (10-0-0)
The year in college football



Entertainment Awards

Puliter Prizes
Fiction: Guard of Honor, James Gould Cozzens Music: Louisiana Story music, Virgil Thomson Drama: Death of a Salesman, Arthur Miller

Academy Award, Best Picture: All the King's Men
1949 Oscars

Nobel Prizes
Literature: William Faulkner (US)
Peace: Lord John Boyd Orr (Scotland)

1949 Emmy Awards

1949 Tony Awards

Miss America: Jacque Mercer (AZ)

Entertainment

Books
George Orwell, 1984; Eudora Welty, Golden Apples; Paul Bowles, The Sheltering Sky; Shirley Jackson, The Lottery; Eleanor Roosevelt, This I Remember; Reinhold Niebuhr, Faith and History; Norman Vincent Peale, A Guide to Confident Living

Movies
All the King's Men, Twelve O'Clock High, Sands of Iwo Jima, She Wore a Yellow Ribbon, The Third Man

Music
"Some Enchanted Evening"; "Ghost Riders in the Sky"; "Rudolph, the Red-Nosed Reindeer"; "Diamonds Are a Girl's Best Friend"; Kiss Me Kate soundtrack; Samuel Barber, Piano Sonata; Ernest Bloch, Scherzo Fantasque; Vaughn Monroe, Vaughn Monroe Sings

Theater
Death of a Salesman, South Pacific, Gentlemen Prefer Blondes

Events

  • Cable television brings better reception to rural areas where the conventional television signal is weak. These Are My Children, a live, 15-minute show, premieres on NBC. It is the first continuing daytime drama.

Nobel Prizes

Chemistry: William Francis Giauque (US), for research in thermodynamics, especially effects of low temperature

Physics: Hideki Yukawa (Japan), for mathematical prediction, in 1935, of the meson

Physiology & medicine: Walter Rudolf Hess (Switzerland), for research on brain control of body; and Antonio Caetano de Abreu Freire Egas Moniz (Portugal), for development of brain operation

Year in Science

  • First round-the-world nonstop flight. Capt. James Gallagher and USAF crew of 13 flew a Boeing B-50A Superfortress around the world nonstop from Ft. Worth, returning to same point: 23,452 mi. in 94 hr., 1 min., with four aerial refuelings enroute (Feb. 27–March 2).
  • First round-the-world nonstop flight. Capt. James Gallagher and USAF crew of 13 flew a Boeing B-50A Superfortress around the world nonstop from Ft. Worth, returning to same point: 23,452 mi. in 94 hr., 1 min., with four aerial refuelings enroute (Feb. 27–March 2).




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