Selected Sixties Events for 1961 |
| Month | Day | Event | Related Resource |
| | | Catch-22, Joseph Heller's dark satire on the horror and insanity of war is published. | |
| March | 01 | The Peace Corps is founded by President John F. Kennedy. | Link |
| April | 21 | President Kennedy speaks about the failed Bay of Pigs invasion. | |
| May | 04 | Interracial groups board buses destined for the South to test the Supreme Court's 1946 decision, which declared segregated seating of interstate passengers unconstitutional. The Freedom Riders meet violent mobs in Anniston and Birmingham. | Link |
25 | President Kennedy proposes an American space effort greater than all previous efforts combined and designed to put an American space team on the moon within the decade. | Link | | June | 03 | John F. Kennedy meets Soviet leader Nikita Khrushchev in Vienna. | |
| August | 13 | The German Democratic Republic begins to construct the "Berlin Wall" (known as the "Antifascist Protection Wall" in East Germany). | Link |
| November | 20 | In Hoyt v Florida, the U.S. Supreme Court upholds a Florida statute which provides that no female will be called for jury duty unless she has registered to be placed on the jury duty list. | Link |
| December | 16 | Martin Luther King, Jr. is arrested in Albany, Georgia at a demonstration to desegregate public facilties. | Link |
