Year 1956 (MCMLVI) was a leap year starting on Sunday (link will display full calendar) of the Gregorian calendar.

Events of 1956

January

• January 1 - The Anglo-Egyptian Condominium ends in Sudan.
• January 8 - Operation Auca: Five U.S. missionaries are killed by the Huaorani of Ecuador shortly after making contact with them.
• January 16 - Egyptian leader Gamal Abdal Nasser vows to reconquer Palestine.
• January 25-26 - Finnish troops re-occupy Porkkala after Soviet troops vacate its military base. Civilians can return February 4.
• January 26 - The 1956 Winter Olympic Games open in Cortina d'Ampezzo, Italy.

A 1956 Chevrolet

February

• February 11 - British spies Guy Burgess and Donald Maclean resurface in the Soviet Union after being missing for 5 years.
• February 14 - 20th Congress of the Communist Party of the Soviet Union starts.
• February 16 - The film version of Rodgers and Hammerstein's Carousel, starring Gordon MacRae and Shirley Jones, is released.
• February 22 - Elvis Presley enters the United States music charts for the first time, with Heartbreak Hotel.
• February 23 - Norma Jean Mortenson legally changes her name to Marilyn Monroe.
• February 25 - Nikita Khrushchev attacks the veneration of Joseph Stalin as a "cult of personality."
• February 26 - 20th Congress of the Communist Party of the Soviet Union ends.

March

• March 1 - The International Air Transport Association finalizes a draft of the Radiotelephony spelling alphabet for the International Civil Aviation Organization.
• March 2 - Morocco declares its independence from France.
• March 9 - The British deport Archbishop Makarios from Cyprus to the Seychelles.
• March 11 - Laurence Olivier's film, Richard III, adapted from Shakespeare's play, premieres in the U.S. in theatres and on NBC Television, on the same day as an afternoon matinee. It is one of the first such experiments of its kind. Olivier is later nominated for an Oscar for his performance.
• March 12 - 96 U.S. Congressmen sign the Southern Manifesto, a protest against the 1954 U.S. Supreme Court ruling (Brown vs. Board of Education) desegregating public education.
• March 12 - The Dow Jones Industrial Average closes above 500 for the first time rising 2.40 points, or 0.48%, to 500.24.
• March 13 - Elvis Presley releases his first Gold Album titled Elvis Presley.
• March 15 - The Broadway musical My Fair Lady opens in New York City.
• March 19 - At age 48, Dutch boxer Bep van Klaveren contests his last match in Rotterdam.
• March 20 - Tunisia gains independence from France.
• March 21 - The 28th Academy Awards ceremony is held.
• March 23 - Pakistan becomes the first Islamic republic, and a national holiday is observed in the country including the former East Pakistan state.

April

• April 7 - Spain relinquishes its protectorate in Morocco.
• April 9 - Habib Bourgiba is elected prime minister of Tunisia. ^{Confirmation needed}
• April 14 - Videotape is first demonstrated at the 1956 NARTB (now NAB) convention in Chicago by Ampex. It is the demonstration of the first practical and commercially successful videotape format known as 2" Quadruplex.
• April 17 - Queen Elizabeth II inaugurates Chew Valley Lake.
• April 18 - Maria Desylla-Kapodistria is elected mayor of Corfu and becomes the first female mayor in Greece.
• April 19 - British diver Lionel Crabb dives into the Portsmouth harbor to investigate a visiting Soviet cruiser and vanishes.
• April 19 - Actress Grace Kelly marries Rainier III, Prince of Monaco.
• April 21 - Former U.S. First Daughter Margaret Truman marries Clifton Daniel.

May

• May 2 - The United Methodist Church in America decides at its General Conference to grant women full ordained clergy status. It also calls for an end to racial segregation in the denomination.
• May 8 - Austria and Israel form diplomatic relations. ^{Confirmation needed}
• May 8 - The constitutional union between Indonesia and the Netherlands is dissolved.
• May 8 - John Osborne's Look Back in Anger opens at the Royal Court Theatre, changing the scope of theatrical and other forms of drama in England.
• May 9 - Manaslu, 8th highest mountain in the world, is first ascended.
• May 18 - Lhotse (main), the 4th highest mountain, is first ascended.
• May 23 - French minister Pierre Mendès-France resigns due to his government's policy on Algeria.
• May 24 - The first Eurovision Song Contest is broadcast from Lugano, Switzerland. The winning song is Refrain by Lys Assia (music by Géo Voumard, text by Émile Gardaz).
• May 25 - India announces the institution of diplomatic relations with Spain (still under Franco's rule)

June

• June 1 - Vyacheslav Molotov resigns as foreign minister of the Soviet Union; he later becomes ambassador in Mongolia.
• June 3 - British Rail renames 'Third Class' passenger facilities as 'Second Class' (Second Class facilities had been abolished in 1875, leaving just First Class and Third Class).
• June 6 - In Singapore, chief minister David Marshall resigns after the breakdown of talks about internal self government in London.
• June 8 - General Electric/Telechron introduces model 7H241 "The Snooz Alarm", first snooze alarm clock ever. ^{Confirmation needed}
• June 10 - 1956 Summer Olympics: Equestrian events open in Stockholm, Sweden (all other events are held in November in Melbourne, Australia).
• June 14 - President Dwight D. Eisenhower authorizes the phrase "under God" to be added to the Pledge of Allegiance.
• June 14 - The Flag of the United States Army is formally dedicated.^{[citation needed]}
• June 15 - Eindhoven University of Technology is founded in Eindhoven, The Netherlands.
• June 18 - The last foreign troops leave Egypt.
• June 23 - Gamal Abdel Nasser becomes the 2nd president of Egypt.
• June 28 - MP Sydney Silverman's bill for the abolition of the death penalty passes the British House of Commons.
• June 28 - Labour riots in Pozna-, Poland, are crushed with heavy loss of life. Soviet troops fire at a crowd that protests high prices, killing 53.
• June 28 - The film version of Rodgers and Hammerstein's The King and I, starring Deborah Kerr and Yul Brynner, is released only a few months after the film version of R&H's Carousel.
• June 29 - Actress Marilyn Monroe marries playwright Arthur Miller.
• June 29 - President Dwight D. Eisenhower signs the Federal-Aid Highway Act, creating the Interstate Highway System
• June 30 - A TWA Lockheed Constellation and United Airlines Douglas DC-7 collide in mid-air over the Grand Canyon in Arizona and crash. All 128 people aboard the 2 aircraft are killed in the disaster. The accident leads to tighter air traffic control in the United States.

July

• July 2 A lab experiment at Sylvania Electric Products results in an explosion.
• July 8 - The mountain Gasherbrum II is first ascended.
• July 10 - The British House of Lords defeats the abolition of the death penalty.
• July 24 - At New York City's Copacabana Club, Dean Martin and Jerry Lewis perform their last comedy show together (their act started on July 25, 1946).
• July 25 - 72 kilometers (45 miles) south of Nantucket Island, the Italian ocean liner SS Andrea Doria sinks after colliding with the Swedish ship SS Stockholm in heavy fog, killing 51.
• July 26 - Egyptian leader Gamal Nasser nationalizes the Suez Canal sparking international condemnation.
• July 30 - A Joint Resolution of the U.S. Congress is signed by President Dwight D. Eisenhower, authorizing "In God We Trust" as the U.S. national motto.
• July 31 - Cricket: Jim Laker sets an extraordinary record at Old Trafford in the fourth Test of taking 19 wickets in a first class match (the previous best was 17).

August

• The exhibition This Is Tomorrow opens at Whitechapel Art Gallery in London.
• August 6 - After going bankrupt in 1955, the American broadcaster DuMont Television Network has its final broadcast, a boxing match from St. Nicholas Arena.
• August 8 - 262 miners die in fire in a coal mine in Marcinelle, Belgium.
• August 11 - Jackson Pollock dies after crashing his car, aged 44.
• August 17 - West Germany bans the Communist Party of Germany.

September

• September 9 - Elvis Presley appears on The Ed Sullivan Show for the first time.
• September 13 - The Hard Disk Drive is invented by an IBM team led by Reynold B. Johnson.
• September 16 - Television broadcasting commences in Australia.
• September 21 - Nicaraguan dictator Anastasio Somoza García is assassinated.
• September 25 - The submarine Transatlantic telephone cable opens.

October

• October 8 - Baseball pitcher Don Larsen of the New York Yankees throws the only perfect game in World Series history in Game 5 of the 1956 World Series against the Brooklyn Dodgers. Yogi Berra caught the game. Dale Mitchell was the final out. The New York Yankees won the series. Larsen was named series MVP.
• October 10 - Finland joins UNESCO.
• October 14 - Dr. B. R. Ambedkar, Indian Untouchable leader, converts to Buddhism along with 385,000 followers (see Neo-Buddhism).
• October 15 - The RAF retires its last Lancaster bomber.
• October 15 - Fidel Castro and Che Guevara depart from Tuxpan, Veracruz, Mexico, enroute to Santiago de Cuba aboard the yacht Granma with 82 men.
• October 17 - The Game of the Century: 13-year-old Bobby Fischer beats GM Donald Byrne in the NY Rosenwald chess tournament.
• October 23 - The Hungarian revolution breaks out against the pro-Soviet government. Hungary attempts to leave the Warsaw Pact.
• October 26 - Red Army troops invade Hungary.
• October 29 - The Huntley-Brinkley Report debuts on NBC-TV.
• October 29 - Suez Crisis: Israel invades the Sinai Peninsula and push Egyptian forces back toward the Suez Canal.
• October 29 - Tangier Protocol: The international city Tangier is reintegrated into Morocco.
• October 29 - The first hard disk drive (5MB) is born at IBM.
• October 31 - Suez Crisis: The United Kingdom and France begin bombing Egypt to force the reopening of the Suez Canal.

November

• November 1 - The States Reorganisation Act of India reforms the boundaries and names of Indian states.
• November 3 - MGM's screen classic, The Wizard of Oz, is shown on television for the first time by CBS, as the final installment of their Ford Star Jubilee.
• November 4 - 1956 Hungarian Revolution: More Soviet troops invade Hungary to crush a revolt that started on October 23. Thousands are killed, more are wounded and nearly a quarter million leave the country.
• November 6 - U.S. presidential election, 1956: Republican incumbent Dwight D. Eisenhower defeats Democrat challenger Adlai E. Stevenson in a rematch of their contest 4 years earlier.
• November 6 - Enoch A. Holtwick is defeated as presidential candidate of theProhibition Party.
• November 7 - Suez Crisis: The United Nations General Assembly adopts a resolution calling for the