January 10 » The first great Texas oil gusher is discovered at Spindletop in Beaumont, Texas.
June 11 » The boundaries of the Colony of New Zealand are extended by the UK to include the Cook Islands.
August 5 » Peter O'Connor sets the first IAAF recognised long jump world record of 24ft 11.75in (7.6137m), a record that would stand for 20 years.
August 21 » Six hundred American school teachers, Thomasites, arrived in Manila on the USAT Thomas.
October 29 » In Amherst, Massachusetts, nurse Jane Toppan is arrested for murdering the Davis family of Boston with an overdose of morphine.
October 29 » Leon Czolgosz, the assassin of U.S. President William McKinley, is executed by electrocution.
Day of death March 23, 1961
The temperature on March 23, 1961 was between 6.7 °C and 11.4 °C and averaged 8.2 °C. There was 1.6 hours of sunshine (13%). The heavily clouded was. The average windspeed was 3 Bft (moderate breeze) and was prevailing from the west. Source: KNMI
February 16 » Explorer program: Explorer 9 (S-56a) is launched.
May 19 » At Silchar Railway Station, Assam, 11 Bengalis die when police open fire on protesters demanding state recognition of Bengali language in the Bengali Language Movement.
May 24 » American civil rights movement: Freedom Riders are arrested in Jackson, Mississippi, for "disturbing the peace" after disembarking from their bus.
August 1 » U.S. Defense Secretary Robert McNamara orders the creation of the Defense Intelligence Agency (DIA), the nation's first centralized military espionage organization.
October 31 » In the Soviet Union, Joseph Stalin's body is removed from the Lenin's Mausoleum, also known as the Lenin Tomb.
December 2 » In a nationally broadcast speech, Cuban leader Fidel Castro declares that he is a Marxist–Leninist and that Cuba is going to adopt Communism.
When copying data from this family tree, please include a reference to the origin: Hendrik Dreyer, "Dreyer Tree", database, Genealogy Online (https://www.genealogieonline.nl/dreyer-tree/I21230.php : accessed January 27, 2026), "Richard Gerald Dreyer (Richard Gerald Dreyer ) Steyn (1901-1961)".
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