Year 1951 (MCMLI) was a common year starting on Monday.

Events of 1951

January

• January 9 - The new United Nations headquarters officially opens in New York City.

January 9: United Nations headquarters opened.

• January 15 - Ilse Koch, The "Witch of Buchenwald," wife of the commandant of the Buchenwald concentration camp, is sentenced to life imprisonment in a court in West Germany.
• January 17 - Korean War: Chinese and North Korean forces capture Seoul.
• January 20 - Avalanches in the Alps kill 240 and bury 45,000 for a time in Switzerland, Austria and Italy.
• January 27 - Nuclear testing at the Nevada Test Site begins with a 1-kiloton bomb dropped on Frenchman Flats, northwest of Las Vegas, Nevada.

February

• February 1 - The United Nations General Assembly declares that China is the aggressor in the Korean War.
• February 4-8 - Surgeons remove an ovarian cyst from Gertrude Levandowski in a 96-hour long operation in Chicago. She loses almost half of her weight and emerges weighing 140 kg.
• February 6 - A Pennsylvania Railroad passenger train derails near Woodbridge Township, New Jersey, killing 85 people and injuring over 500, in one of the worst rail disasters in American history.
• February 12 - Muhammad Reza Shah marries Soraya Esfandiary Bakhtiari.
• February 19- Jean Lee becomes the last woman hung in Australia, when Lee and her 2 pimps are hung for the murder and torture of a 73-year-old bookmaker.
• February 27 - The Twenty-second Amendment to the United States Constitution, limiting Presidents to two terms, is ratified.
• February 28 - Linus Pauling, Robert Corey, and Herman Branson publish the findings of the --helix and the --sheet.

March

March 29: Rosenbergs.

• March 6 - The trial of Ethel and Julius Rosenberg begins.
• March 7 - Korean War - Operation Ripper: In Korea, United Nations troops led by General Matthew Ridgeway begin an assault against the Chinese "volunteers".
• March 12 - The comic strip Dennis the Menace appears in newspapers across the U.S. for the first time.
• March 14 - Korean War: For the second time, United Nations troops recapture Seoul.
• March 14 - West Germany joins UNESCO.
• March 29 - Second Red Scare: Ethel and Julius Rosenberg are convicted of conspiracy to commit espionage. On April 5 they are sentenced to receive the death penalty.
• March 29 - Rodgers and Hammerstein's The King and I opens on Broadway and runs for 3 years. It is the first Rodgers and Hammerstein show specifically written for an actress (Gertrude Lawrence). Lawrence is stricken with cancer during the run of the show and dies halfway through its run. The show makes a star of Yul Brynner.
• March 29 - The 23rd Academy Awards ceremony is held.
• March 31 - Remington Rand delivers the first UNIVAC I computer to the United States Census Bureau.

March 31: UNIVAC I.

April

• April 1 - Female suffrage begins in Greece.
• April 11 - U.S. President Harry S. Truman relieves General Douglas MacArthur of his Far Eastern commands.
• April 11 - After its removal from Westminster Abbey on Christmas Day, 1950, the Stone of Scone resurfaces on the altar of Arbroath Abbey.
• April 18 - The Treaty of Paris (1951) is adopted, establishing the European Coal and Steel Community.
• April 21 - The National Olympic Committee of the Soviet Union is formed. The USSR first participates in the Olympic Games at Helsinki, Finland, in 1952.
• April 24 - In Yokohama, Japan a fire on a train kills more than 100.
• April 28 - Robert Menzies' Liberal Party government in Australia is re-elected for a second term.

May

• May 1 - The Opera house of Geneva, Switzerland is almost destroyed in a fire.
• May 3 - HM King George VI opens London's Royal Festival Hall as a patron.
• May 3 - The Festival of Britain opens.
• May 3 - The U.S. Senate Committee on Armed Services and U.S. Senate Committee on Foreign Relations begins its closed door hearings into the dismissal of General Douglas MacArthur by U.S. President Harry S. Truman.
• May 9 - Operation Greenhouse: The first thermonuclear weapon is tested on Enewetok Atoll in the Marshall Islands, by the United States.
• May 14 - The first volunteer-run passenger trains run on Talyllyn Railway, Wales.
• May 15 - A military coup occurs in Bolivia.
• May 21 - The Ninth Street Show, otherwise known as the 9th Street Art Exhibition, a gathering of a number of notable artists, marks the stepping-out of the post war New York avant-garde, collectively known as the New York School.
• May 23 - Tibetans are forced to sign the Seventeen Point Agreement for the Peaceful Liberation of Tibet with the People's Republic of China.
• May 25 - The first atomic bomb "boosted" by the inclusion of thermonuclear materials, is tested in the "Item" test on Enewetok Atoll in the Marshall Islands by the U.S.

June

• June 14 - UNIVAC I is dedicated by the U.S. Census Bureau.^[1]
• June 15 - July 1- In New Mexico, Arizona, California, Oregon, Washington, and British Columbia, thousands of hectares of forests are destroyed in fires.
• June 18 - Battle Ground, Washington is incorporated.

July

• July 1 - Judy Garland opens the first of 14 concerts in Dublin, Ireland at the Theatre Royal.
• July 5 - William Shockley, John Bardeen, and Walter Brattain announce the invention of the junction transistor.
• July 10 - Korean War: Armistice negotiations begin at Kaesong.
• July 13 - The Great Flood of 1951 reaches its highest point in Northeast Kansas, culminating in the greatest flood damage to date in the Midwestern United States.
• July 13 - MGM's Technicolor film version of Show Boat, starring Kathryn Grayson, Ava Gardner, and Howard Keel, premieres at Radio City Music Hall. The 1951 film introduces bass-baritone William Warfield (singing Ol' Man River) and makes him nationally famous overnight.
• July 14 - In Joplin, Missouri, the George Washington Carver National Monument becomes the first United States National Monument to honor an African American.
• July 16 - King Léopold III of Belgium abdicates in favour of his son Baudouin.
• July 17 - Baudouin takes the oath as king of Belgium, after his father abdicates the day before.
• July 17 - Western New England College in Springfield, Massachusetts is chartered.
• July 20 - King Abdullah I of Jordan is assassinated by a Palestinian while attending Friday prayers in Jerusalem.
• July 30 - David Lean's Oliver Twist is finally shown in the United States, after 10 minutes of supposedly anti-Semitic references and closeups of Alec Guinness as Fagin are cut. The film is a critical success, but a financial flop in the United States, and receives few bookings in U.S. theatres, mostly due to the anti-Semitic charges leveled against it. The film is not shown uncut in the U.S. until 1970.

August

• August 11 - René Pleven becomes Prime Minister of France.
• August 12 - The Catcher in the Rye is first published.

September

• September 1 - The United States, Australia and New Zealand all sign a mutual defense pact, called the ANZUS Treaty.
• September 3 - The American soap opera Search for Tomorrow debuts on CBS. After over 30 years, the show switches to NBC on March 26, 1982. Search for Tomorrow airs its final episode on NBC on December 26, 1986.
• September 8 - Treaty of San Francisco: In San Francisco, California, 48 nations sign a peace treaty with Japan to formally end the Pacific War.
• September 9 - Chinese communist forces move into Lhasa, the capital of Tibet.
• September 10 - The United Kingdom begins an economic boycott of Iran.
• September 18 - The film A Streetcar Named Desire premieres, becoming a critical and box-office smash.
• September 20 - NATO accepts Greece and Turkey as members.
• September 26-28 - A blue sun is seen over Europe: the effect is due to ash coming from the Canadian forest fires 4 months previously.

October

• October 3 - "Shot Heard 'Round the World": One of the greatest moments in Major League Baseball history occurs when the New York Giants' Bobby Thomson hits a game winning home run in the bottom of the 9th inning off of Brooklyn Dodgers pitcher Ralph Branca, to win the National League pennant after being down 14 games.
• October 4 - The Gene Kelly film An American in Paris premieres in New York.
• October 4 - Shoppers World (one the first shopping malls in the U.S.) opens in Framingham, Massachusetts.
• October 7 - Malayan Emergency: Communist insurgents kill British commander Sir Henry Gurney.
• October 15 - First oral contraceptive is invented by Luis E. Miramontes.
• October 15 - I Love Lucy debuts on CBS.
• October 16 - Judy Garland begins her legendary concerts in New York's Palace Theatre.
• October 16 - Prime Minister Liaquat Ali Khan of Pakistan is assassinated.
• October 17 - CBS' Eye logo premieres on air.
• October 20 - The Johnny Bright Incident occurs in Stillwater, Oklahoma.
• October 21 - A Storm in southern Italy kills over 100.
• October 24 - U.S. President Harry Truman declares an official end to war with Germany.
• October 26 - Winston Churchill is re-elected Prime Minister of the United Kingdom; his foreign minister is Anthony Eden.
• October 27 - Farouk of Egypt declares himself king of Sudan, with no support.
• October 31 - Scrooge, starring Alastair Sim, opens in England.

November

• November 1 - The first military exercises for nuclear war, with infantry troops included, are held in the Nevada desert.
• November 10 - Direct dial coast-to-coast telephone service begins in the United States.
• November 11 - Juan Peron is re-elected president of Argentina.
• November 12 - The National Ballet of Canada performs for the first time in Eaton Auditorium.
• November 20 - The Po River floods in northern Italy.
• November 24 - The Broadway play Gigi opens, starring little known actress Audrey Hepburn as the lead character.
• November 28 - Scrooge, starring Alastair Sim, opens in the United States under the title of Charles Dickens's original novel, A Christmas Carol.

December

• December 3 - The Lebanese University is founded in Lebanon.
• December 6 - A state of emergency is declared in Egypt due to increasing riots.
• December 13 - A water storage tank collapses in Tucumcari, New Mexico, resulting in 4 deaths, and 200 buildings destroyed.
• December 16 - Salar Jung Museum is opened to the public by Prime Minister of India Jawaharlal Nehru.
• December 20 - EBR-1, the world's first (experimental) nuclear power plant, opens.
• December 20 - A chartered C46 Curtis Commando crash lands in Cobourg, Ontario Canada; all on board survived.
• December 23 - The film The African Queen, starring Humphrey Bogart and Katharine Hepburn, premieres in Hollywood.
• December 24 - Libya becomes independent from Italy.
• December 24 - Gian-Carlo Menotti's 45-minute opera Amahl and the Night Visitors premieres live on NBC, becoming the first opera written especially for television.

Undated

• A fourth, and final, forest fire starts in the Tillamook Burn; but unlike earlier fires this one only burns 32,700 acres, and within an area already affected by the earlier fires.
• The most complete recording of Gershwin's opera Porgy and Bess made until then, a 3-LP Columbia Masterworks Records 129-minute album in mono, is released to great critical acclaim. There is truly complete recording of Porgy and Bess until 1976.
• A research team publishes the Interlingua-English Dictionary.
• IBM (United Kingdom) is formed.
• The 1951 New Zealand waterfront dispute lasts for 151 days.
• In Munich, Germany, a collection of mementos and personal papers belonging to Adolf Hitler are turned over to Bayerische Landesbank for authentication and eventual sale. Among the documents are his appointment as Chancellor signed by President Paul von Hindenburg, his Austrian passport, as well as an assortment of swastika insignia pins and medals. An initial offer of $200,000.00 is made for the collection.^[2]
• Stockholm, Sweden - An 18-year-old sailor is fined for kissing in public. The court calls his actions -obnoxious behavior repulsive to the public morals.-^[3]

Ongoing

• Marshall Plan
• First Indochina War

Births

January-February

• January 1 - Álvaro Magalhães, Portuguese writer
• January 1 - Ashfaq Hussain, Urdu poet
• January 2 - Valdir Peres, Brazilian footballer
• January 5 - Steve Arnold, English footballer
• January 6 - Kim Wilson, American singer and harmonica player
• January 8 - Kenny Anthony, Prime Minister of Saint Lucia
• January 8 - John McTiernan, American director, producer, and writer
• January 12 - Kirstie Alley, American actress
• January 12 - Rush Limbaugh, American conservative radio personality
• January 20 - Ian Hill, English rock bassist (Judas Priest)
• January 25 - Steve Prefontaine, American runner (d. 1975)
• January 30 - Phil Collins, English rock musician and producer (Genesis)
• January 31 - Harry Wayne Casey, American musician, songwriter, and producer
• January 13 - Phil Manzanera, British rock musician
• February 1 - Albert Salvadó, Andorran writer
• February 3 - Eugenijus Riabovas, Lithuanian football manager
• February 14 - Kevin Keegan, English footballer and football manager
• February 15 - Melissa Manchester, American pop singer (Midnight Blue)
• February 15 - Jane Seymour, English actress
• February 16 - Mike Flanagan, baseball pitcher
• February 19 - Shaykh-ul-Islam Dr Muhammad Tahir-ul-Qadri, Pakistani Islamic Sufi scholar and leader
• February 20 - Gordon Brown, Prime Minister of the United Kingdom
• February 20 - Edward Albert, American actor (d. 2006)
• February 23 - Patricia Richardson, known as Jill Taylor on the sitcom "Home Improvement"
• February 25 - Don Quarrie, Jamaican sprinter
• February 27 - Steve Harley, British rock musician (Cockney Rebel)

March-April

• March 1 - Mike Read, British television presenter and radio disc jockey
• March 4 - Edelgard Bulmahn, German politician
• March 4 - Kenny Dalglish, Scottish footballer and football manager
• March 4 - Mike Quarry, American light heavyweight boxer (d. 2006)
• March 4 - Chris Rea, British singer and musician
• March 4 - Linda Yamamoto, Japanese pop star
• March 6 - Gerrie Knetemann, Dutch cyclist (d. 2004)
• March 8 - Karen Kain, Canadian ballerina
• March 12 - Susan Musgrave Canadian poet and children's writer
• March 13 - Fred Berry, American actor (d. 2003)
• March 14 - Jerry Greenfield, American co-founder of Ben & Jerry's Ice Cream
• March 17 - Scott Gorham, American rock guitarist (Thin Lizzy)
• March 17 - Kurt Russell, American actor (The Computer Wore Tennis Shoes)
• March 18 - Ben Cohen, American co-founder of Ben & Jerry's Ice Cream
• March 24 - Tommy Hilfiger, American fashion designer
• March 26 - Carl Wieman, American physicist, Nobel Prize laureate
• April 5 - Joe Bowen, Canadian hockey broadcaster
• April 5 - Dean Kamen, American inventor and entrepreneur
• April 5 - Frank Moulaert, Flemish scholar
• April 5 - Guy Vanderhaeghe, Canadian author
• April 6 - Bert Blyleven, Dutch Major League Baseball player
• April 7 - Janis Ian, American singer and songwriter (Society's Child)
• April 10 - David Helvarg, American journalist and activist
• April 10 - Steven Seagal, American martial artist and actor(Under Siege)
• April 11 - Doris McGowen Beck Angleton, American socialite and murder victim (d. 1997)
• April 13 - Peabo Bryson, African-American singer
• April 13 - Peter Davison, British actor
• April 13 - Max Weinberg, American drummer
• April 14 - Julian Lloyd Webber, English cellist
• April 16 - Ioan Mihai Cochinescu, Romanian writer
• April 16 - Pierre Toutain-Dorbec, French photographer
• April 16 - Björgvin Halldórsson, Icelandic singer
• April 16 - Mordechai Ben David, Jewish singer
• April 17 - Olivia Hussey, Argentine-born actress
• April 19 - Jóannes Eidesgaard, Prime Minister of the Faroe Islands
• April 20 - Luther Vandross, African-American soul musician (d. 2005)
• April 20 - Louise Jameson, British actress
• April 21 - Tony Danza, American actor and comedian (Taxi)
• April 27 - Ace Frehley, American rock guitarist (Kiss)
• April 29 - Dale Earnhardt, American race car driver (d. 2001)

May-June

• May 3 - Tuula Palaste-Eerola, Finnish architect and politician
• May 4 - Mick Mars, American musician
• May 9 - Christopher Dewdney, Canadian poet
• May 9 - Joy Harjo, Native American poet
• May 13 - Sharon Sayles Belton, Mayor of Minneapolis, Minnesota
• May 13 - Jumbo Tsuruta, Japanese professional wrestler (d. 2000)
• May 15 - Jonathan Richman, American musician
• May 15 - Frank Wilczek, American physicist, Nobel Prize laureate
• May 19 - Joey Ramone, American rock musician (The Ramones) (d. 2001)
• May 19 - Dick Slater, American professional wrestler
• May 23 - Anatoly Karpov, Russian chess player
• May 26 - Madeleine Taylor-Quinn, Irish politician
• May 26 - Sally Ride, American astronaut
• May 30 - Stephen Tobolowsky, American actor
• June 2 - Larry Robinson, Canadian hockey player
• June 5 - Suze Orman, American financial advisor, writer, and television personality
• June 8 - Bonnie Tyler, Welsh singer (It's A Heartache)
• June 12 - Andranik Margaryan, 14th Prime Minister of Armenia (d. 2007)
• June 12 - Brad Delp, American rock vocalist (Boston) (d. 2007)
• June 13 - Stellan Skarsgård, Swedish actor
• June 13 - Richard Thomas, American actor (The Waltons)
• June 14 - Paul Boateng, British politician
• June 16 - Roberto Duran, Panamanian boxer
• June 20 - Tress MacNeille, American voice actress
• June 20 - Paul Muldoon, Irish poet
• June 21 - Nils Lofgren, American musician
• June 24 - David Rodigan, British radio DJ/actor
• June 27 - Mary McAleese, 8th President of Ireland
• June 28 - Lalla Ward, British actress
• June 28 - Lloyd Maines, American musician and record producer
• June 29 - Keno Don Rosa, American comic book author
• June 30 - Stanley Clarke, American bassist

July-August

• July 1 - Terrence Mann, American actor and dancer
• July 1 - Anne Feeney, American folk singer
• July 3 - Richard Hadlee, New Zealand cricketer
• July 5 - Rich "Goose" Gossage, American baseball player
• July 8 - Anjelica Huston, American actress
• July 10 - Cheryl Wheeler, American singer and songwriter
• July 14 - Erich Hallhuber, German actor (d. 2003)
• July 16 - Stewart Copeland, American drummer
• July 16 - Jean-Luc Mongrain, Canadian news anchor and journalist
• July 18 - Elio Di Rupo, Belgian politician
• July 21 - Robin Williams, American actor (Mork and Mindy)
• July 23 - Edie McClurg, American actress
• July 23 - Michael McConnohie, American actor
• July 24 - Chris Smith, British politician
• July 25 - Yuriy Kovalchuk, Russian oligarch
• July 28 - Garrett Hongo, Japanese-American poet
• July 28 - Doug Collins, American basketball player, coach and analyst
• August 3 - Marcel Dionne, Canadian hockey player
• August 6 - Daryl Somers, Australian television personality
• August 8 - Mamoru Oshii, Japanese film director
• August 8 - Randy Shilts, American journalist and author (d. 1994)
• August 12 - Willie Horton, African-American criminal
• August 13 - Dan Fogelberg, American singer, songwriter, and multi-instrumentalist (Longer) (d. 2007)
• August 16 - Richard Hunt, American puppeteer (d. 1992)
• August 19 - John Deacon, English rock bassist (Queen)
• August 20 - Greg Bear, American author
• August 21 - Eric Goles, Chilean mathematician and computer scientist
• August 22 - Chandra Prakash Mainali, Nepalese politician
• August 23 - Mark Hudson, American musician
• August 23 - Akhmad Kadyrov, President of Chechnya
• August 23 - Queen Noor of Jordan
• August 24 - Orson Scott Card, American writer
• August 25 - Rob Halford, English rock singer (Judas Priest)
• August 26 - Edward Witten, American mathematician and Fields medalist
• August 27 - Mack Brown, University of Texas football coach
• August 28 - Wayne Osmond, American pop singer

September-October

• September 5 - Michael Keaton, American actor (Batman)
• September 7 - Chrissie Hynde, American rock singer (The Pretenders)
• September 7 - Bert Jones, American football player
• September 12 - Joe Pantoliano, American actor
• September 12 - Bertie Ahern, former Taoiseach of Ireland
• September 13 - Linda Wong, Asian-American porn star (d. 1987)
• September 18 - Darryl Stingley, American football player for the NFL New England Patriots (d. 2007)
• September 21 - Aslan Maskhadov, President of Chechnya
• September 22 - David Coverdale, English singer
• September 25 - Mark Hamill, American actor (Star Wars)
• September 26 - Stuart Tosh, Scottish musician
• September 27 - Paul Craig, English professor of law
• September 29 - Michelle Bachelet, President of Chile
• September 29 - Andrés Caicedo, Colombian writer (d. 1977)
• September 29 - Maureen Caird, Australian hurdler
• September 30 - Barry Marshall, Australian physician, recipient of the Nobel Prize for Physiology or Medicine
• October 2 - Sting, British rock musician (The Police)
• October 3 - Bernard Cooper, American writer
• October 3 - Dave Winfield, baseball player
• October 3 - Keb Mo', American musician
• October 4 - Bakhytzhan Kanapyanov, Kazakh poet
• October 5 - Bob Geldof, Irish musician (The Boomtown Rats)
• October 6 - Manfred Winkelhock, German race car driver
• October 7 - John Mellencamp, American musician and songwriter
• October 10 - Epeli Ganilau, Fiji soldier and statesman
• October 11 - Jean-Jacques Goldman, French singer and songwriter
• October 18 - Mike Antonovich, American ice hockey player and executive
• October 18 -