June 1954

1954 January February March April May June July August September October November December

The following events occurred in June 1954:

June 7, 1954 (Monday)

• Early computer scientist Alan Turing commits suicide.

June 9, 1954 (Wednesday)

• 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, saying, "Have you, at long last, no decency?"

June 14, 1954 (Monday)

• The words "under God" are added to the United States Pledge of Allegiance.

June 15, 1954 (Tuesday)

• The UEFA (Union of European Football Associations) is formed in Basel, Switzerland.

June 16, 1954 (Wednesday)

• start of the 1954 FIFA World Cup held in Switzerland

June 17, 1954 (Thursday)

• A CIA-engineered military coup occurs in Guatemala. Democratically elected President of Guatemala Jacobo Árbenz was ousted and the military dictatorship of Carlos Castillo Armas took power.

June 18, 1954 (Friday)

• Pierre Mendès France becomes prime minister of France.

June 22, 1954 (Tuesday)

• Sarah Mae Flemming is expelled from a bus in South Carolina for sitting in a white-only section.
• Parker–Hulme murder case: 16-year old Pauline Parker and her friend 15-year-old Juliet Hulme bludgeon Parker's mother to death using a brick at Victoria Park in New Zealand.

June 27, 1954 (Sunday)

• Guatemalan President Jacobo Árbenz steps down in a CIA-sponsored military coup, triggering a bloody civil war that continues for more than 35 years.
• Obninsk Nuclear Power Plant, the world's first atomic power station opens at Obninsk, near Moscow.