1949

Published on Tuesday, November 18th 2008. Edited by Bed Trycarrid, Falls Church, United States.

Centuries: 19th century – 20th century – 21st century

Decades: 1910s 1920s 1930s – 1940s – 1950s 1960s 1970s

Years: 1946 1947 1948 – 1949 – 1950 1951 1952

Year 1949 (MCMXLIX) was a common year starting on Saturday (link will display the full calendar) of the Gregorian calendar.

Events of 1949

January

17 January: Beetle in U.S.

2 January – Luis Muñoz Marín becomes the first democratically elected Governor of Puerto Rico.
4 January – RMS Caronia of the Cunard Line departs Southampton for New York on her maiden voyage.
4 January – 22 February – Series of winter storms in Nebraska, Wyoming, South Dakota, Utah, Colorado and Nevada – winds of up to 72 mph – tens of thousands of cattle and sheep perish.
5 January – U.S. President Harry S. Truman unveils his Fair Deal program.
11 January – Los Angeles, California receives its first recorded snowfall.
11 January – KDKA-TV, Becomes the first local, on-air television station.
17 January – The first Volkswagen Beetle to arrive in the United States, a 1948 model, is brought over to New York by Dutch businessman Ben Pon. Unable to interest dealers or importers in the Volkswagen, Pon sells the sample car to pay his travel expenses. Only two 1949 models will be sold in America that year, convincing Volkswagen chairman Heinrich Nordhoff that the car has no future in the U.S. (The VW Beetle goes on to become the greatest automobile phenomenon in American history.)
19 January – First recorded date of The Poe Toaster to appear at the grave of Edgar Allan Poe
20 January – U.S. President Harry S. Truman begins his full term.
25 January
Forces from the Communist Party of China enter Beijing.
The first Emmy Awards are presented at the Hollywood Athletic Club.
In the first Israeli election, David Ben-Gurion becomes Prime Minister.
26 January – Australian Citizenship comes into being.

February

1 February – Rationing of clothes ends in Britain.
13 February – António Óscar Carmona is re-elected president of Portugal for lack of an opposing candidate.
19 February – Ezra Pound is awarded the first Bollingen Prize in poetry by the Bollingen Foundation and Yale University.
22 February – Grady the Cow, a 1,200-pound cow gets stuck inside a silo on a farm in Yukon, Oklahoma and garners national media attention.

March

1 March
World heavyweight boxing champion Joe Louis retires
Indonesia seizes Yogyakarta from the Dutch.
2 March – The B-50 Superfortress Lucky Lady II under Captain James Gallagher lands in Fort Worth, Texas after completing the first non-stop around-the-world airplane flight. It was refueled in flight four times.
17 March – Grand opening of the Shamrock Hotel in Houston, Texas, owned by oil tycoon Glenn McCarthy.
20 March – The Chicago, Burlington & Quincy, Denver & Rio Grande Western and Western Pacific railroads inaugurate the California Zephyr passenger train between Chicago and Oakland, California as the first long distance train to feature Vista Dome cars as regular equipment.
25 March – The extensive deportation campaign was conducted in Estonia, Latvia and Lithuania. The Soviet authorities deported more than 92,000 people from Baltics to remote areas of the Soviet Union.
26 March – The first half of Giuseppe Verdi’s opera Aida, conducted by legendary conductor Arturo Toscanini, and performed in concert (i.e. no scenery or costumes), is telecast by NBC, live from Studio 8H at Rockefeller Centre. The second half will be telecast a week later. This will be the only complete opera that Toscanini will ever conduct on television.
28 March – United States Secretary of Defense James Forrestal resigns suddenly.
29 March – 21st Academy Awards ceremony
31 March – The former British colony of Newfoundland and Labrador joins Canada as its 10th province.

April

1 April
Éire leaves the British Commonwealth and becomes the Republic of Ireland.
The Tokyo Stock Exchange is founded.
4 April – The North Atlantic Treaty is signed in Washington, D.C., creating the NATO defense alliance.
7 April – Rodgers and Hammerstein’s South Pacific, starring Mary Martin and Ezio Pinza, opens on Broadway and goes on to become R&H’s second longest-running musical. It becomes an instant classic of the musical theatre. The score’s biggest hit is the song Some Enchanted Evening.
14 April – The day the N'Ko alphabet is held to have been completed by Solomana Kante.
18 April – Éire formally became the Republic of Ireland.
20 April – Royal Navy frigate HMS Amethyst (U16) goes up the Yangtze River to evacuate British Commonwealth refugees escaping the advance of the Mao’s communist forces. Under heavy fire it runs aground off Rose Island. After an aborted rescue attempt on 26 April it anchors 10 miles upstream. Negotiations with the communist forces to let the ship leave drag on for weeks
23 April – Chinese communist troops take Nanking
28 April
India issues the London Declaration, enabling it (and, thereafter, any other nation) to remain in the British Commonwealth despite becoming a republic, creating the position of ‘Head of the Commonwealth’, and renaming the organisation as the ‘Commonwealth of Nations’.
Former Philippine First Lady Aurora Quezon, 61, is assassinated while en route to dedicate a hospital in memory of her late husband; her daughter and 10 others are also killed.
29 April – The News Review reveals that neither Selhurst College nor its headmaster H. Rochester Sneath exist.

May

1 May – Nereid, a moon of Neptune, is discovered by Gerard P. Kuiper.
5 May – The Council of Europe is founded by the signing of the Treaty of London.
9 May – Rainier III of Monaco becomes Prince of Monaco, upon the death of his maternal grandfather Louis II.
11 May
Israel is admitted to the U.N. as its 59th member.
Siam officially changes its name to Thailand, a name in use since 1939.
12 May – Cold War: The Soviet Union lifts its Blockade of Berlin.
20 May
The AFSA (predecessor of the NSA) is established.
Kuomintang regime declare Taiwan is under the martial law.
22 May – After two months in Bethesda Naval Hospital, James Forrestal commits suicide, under circumstances that seem suspicious to many.
23 May – The Federal Republic of Germany is established.
EDSAC, the first stored-program computer, begins operation at Cambridge University.

June

2 June – Transjordan becomes kingdom of Jordan
6 June – With the passage of the Bodh Gaya Temple Act by the Indian government, Mahabodhi Temple is restored to partial Buddhist control.
8 June
Red Scare: Such celebrities as Helen Keller, Dorothy Parker, Danny Kaye, Fredric March, John Garfield, Paul Muni and Edward G. Robinson are named in an FBI report as Communist Party members.
George Orwell’s book Nineteen Eighty-Four is published.
19 June – Glenn Dunnaway wins the inaugural NASCAR race at Charlotte Speedway, a ¾ mile oval in Charlotte, North Carolina, but is disqualified due to illegal springs. Jim Roper is declared the official winner.
24 June – First Television Western, Hopalong Cassidy, airs on NBC.
29 June
Last US troops withdraw from South Korea
Dock strike in the UK
Beginning of Apartheid – The South African Citizenship Act suspends the granting of citizenship to British Commonwealth immigrants after five years and imposes a ban on mixed marriages

July

20 July – Israel and Syria sign a truce to end their nineteen-month war.
27 July – Initial flight of the de Havilland Comet, the first jet-powered airliner.
31 July – Captain Kerans of the HMS Amethyst decides to make a break after nightfall under heavy fire from the Chinese People’s Liberation Army both sides of the Yangtze River and successfully rejoins the fleet at Woosung the next day.

August

5 August – 6.75 Richter scale earthquake in Ecuador kills 6000 and destroys 50 towns.
8 August – Bhutan becomes independent
12 August – The Fourth Geneva Convention is agreed.
14 August * Gang of Salvatore Giuliano explodes mines under police barracks outside Palermo, Sicily
Military coup in Syria ousts the president
21 August – Deportivo Saprissa enters Costa Rica – soccer’s first division.
22 August – The Queen Charlotte earthquake, Canada’s largest earthquake since the 1700 Cascadia earthquake
28 August – Last surviving veterans of the American Civil War meet in Indianapolis – all six
29 August
First meeting of the Council of Europe
Soviet Union tests its first atomic bomb, code named “Joe 1.” Its design imitated the American plutonium bomb that was dropped on Nagasaki in 1945.

September

Mo Tu We Th Fr Sa Su

1 2 3 4

5 6 7 8 9 10 11

12 13 14 15 16 17 18

19 20 21 22 23 24 25

26 27 28 29 30

5 September – A former sharpshooter in World War II, Howard Unruh kills 13 neighbors in Camden, New Jersey with a souvenir Luger to become America’s first single-episode mass murderer.
6 September – Allied military authorities relinquish control of former Nazi Germany assets back to German control.
7 September – Federal Republic of Germany officially founded. Konrad Adenauer is the first federal chancellor.
9 September
Albert Guay affair: dynamite bomb destroys Canadian Pacific Airlines Douglas DC-3 in Quebec.
Notorious World War II veteran Edwin Alonzo Boyd commits his first career bank robbery in Toronto
13 September – Soviet Union vetoes United Nations membership of Ceylon, Finland, Iceland, Italy, Jordan and Portugal.
17 September – Canadian steamship SS Noronic burns in Toronto Harbour with the loss of over 118 lives.
19 September – The United Kingdom government devalued the pound sterling from $4.03 to $2.80. This led to many other currencies being devalued.
24 September – Laszlo Rajk, ex-foreign minister of Hungary, is sentenced to death.
29 September
First Plenary Session of the National People’s Congress approves design for the Flag of the People’s Republic of China.
Mrs. Iva Toguri D'Aquino is found guilty of broadcasting for Japan as “Tokyo Rose” during World War II.
September – Mervyn’s reveal their first logo, used until 1994.

October

1 October: People’s Republic of China founded.

1 October – Birth of the People’s Republic of China.
7 October – Democratic Republic of Germany DDR established officially
13 October – Severe flooding in Guatemala
16 October – Civil war ends in Greece – communist troops surrender
17 October – Chinese communist troops take Canton, China
27 October – Chinese communist troops fail to take Kinmen in the Battle of Kuningtou. Communist advance towards Taiwan is halted.
27 October – An airliner flying from Paris to New York crashes in the Azores island of São Miguel. Among the victims are violinist Ginette Neveu and boxer Marcel Cerdan.

November

15 December: Typhoon at Korea.

Dec. 16: Sukarno, first President of Indonesia.

15 November – Nathuram Godse and Narayan Apte executed for assassinating Mahatma Gandhi.
24 November – Opening day at the ski resort Squaw Valley California.
26 November – The Indian Constituent Assembly adopts India’s constitution.

December

8 December – The government of Republic of China finish their evacuation to Taiwan.
10 December- Robert Gordon (Bob) Menzies elected.
14 December – Traicho Kostov, ex-vice prime minister of Bulgaria, is sentenced to death.
15 December – Typhoon strikes fishing fleet off Korea – several thousand reported dead.
16 December – Sukarno elected president of Republic of Indonesia.
17 December – Burma recognizes People’s Republic of China.
27 December – Queen Juliana of the Netherlands grants Indonesia sovereignty.
30 December – India recognizes People’s Republic of China.

Undated

Pamir is the last commercial sailing ship to sail round Cape Horn.
The Malta Labour Party is founded.
The Vatican announces that bones uncovered in its subterranean catacombs could be the apostle Peter: 19 years later, Pope Paul VI announces confirmation that the bones belonged to this first saint.
The first 20mm M61 Vulcan Gatling gun prototypes are completed.
Samuel Putnam publishes his new translation of Don Quixote, the first in what we would consider modern English. It is instantly acclaimed and, in 2007, is still in print.

Ongoing

Marshall Plan
First Indochina War

Births

1949 in other calendars

Gregorian calendar 1949 MCMXLIX

Ab urbe condita 2702

Armenian calendar 1398 ԹՎ ՌՅՂԸ

Bahá'í calendar 105 – 106

Berber calendar 2899

Buddhist calendar 2493

Burmese calendar 1311

Byzantine calendar 7457 – 7458

Chinese calendar 戊子年十二月初三日 (4585/4645-12-3)

— to —

己丑年十一月十二日 (4586/4646-11-12)

Coptic calendar 1665 – 1666

Ethiopian calendar 1941 – 1942

Hebrew calendar 5709 – 5710

Hindu calendars

- Vikram Samvat 2004 – 2005

- Shaka Samvat 1871 – 1872

- Kali Yuga 5050 – 5051

Holocene calendar 11949

Iranian calendar 1327 – 1328

Islamic calendar 1368 – 1369

Japanese calendar Shōwa 24 (昭和24年)

Korean calendar 4282

Thai solar calendar 2492

January-February

2 January – Christopher Durang, American playwright
3 January – Sylvia Likens, American murder victim (d. 1965)
7 January – Steven Williams, American actor
7 January – Chavo Guerrero, American wrestler.
8 January – Wolfgang Puck, Austrian chef
10 January
George Foreman, American boxer
James Lapine, American stage director and librettist
Linda Lovelace, American actress (d. 2002)
11 January – Kalev Ots, Estonian statesman
12 January
Haruki Murakami, Japanese author
Michael W. Vannier, American radiologist
Wayne Wang, Hong Kong-born film director
13 January – Brandon Tartikoff, American television executive (d. 1997)
14 January
Nadezhda Ilyina, Soviet athlete
Lawrence Kasdan, American director and screenwriter
Mary Robison, American writer
17 January – Andy Kaufman, American comedian (d. 1984)
18 January – Philippe Starck, French designer
19 January
Robert Palmer, English musician (d. 2003)
Dennis Taylor, Irish snooker player
20 January – Göran Persson, former Prime Minister of Sweden
22 January – Steve Perry, former lead singer of Journey. From 1978 to 1998.
24 January – John Belushi, American actor (d. 1982)
28 January – Gregg Popovich, American basketball coach
30 January – Peter Agre, American biologist, recipient of the Nobel Prize in Chemistry
31 January – Johan Derksen, Dutch footballer and sports journalist
31 January – Ken Wilber, American philosopher
2 February – Brent Spiner, American actor, Duncan Bannatyne, Entrepreneur
3 February – Hennie Kuiper, Dutch cyclist
9 February – Jim Sheridan, Irish film director
10 February
Michael Weiss, jazz pianist and composer
Maxime Le Forestier, French singer
Harold Sylvester, American actor
15 February – Ken Anderson, NFL player
16 February – Lyn Paul, English female singer
17 February – Dennis Green, American football coach
18 February – Gary Ridgway, American serial killer
19 February – Dan Bunten, American computer game designer (d. 1998)
21 February – Jerry Harrison, guitarist/keyboardist for Talking Heads.
21 February – Ronnie Hellström, Swedish footballer
22 February – Niki Lauda, Austrian race car driver
25 February – Ric Flair, American professional wrestler

March-April

2 March
Gates McFadden, American actress
Eddie Money, American singer (or March 21)
JPR Williams, Welsh rugby player
3 March – Jesse Jefferson, baseball player
6 March
Shaukat Aziz, Prime Minister of Pakistan
Martin Buchan, Scottish footballer
7 March – Ghulam Nabi Azad, Indian politician
9 March – Tapani Kansa, Finnish singer
10 March – Larry Wall, American computer programmer
12 March
Bill Payne, American musician (Little Feat)
Natalia Kuchinskaya, Soviet gymnast
13 March – Julia Migenes, American soprano
14 March – Michael Stedman, British World War I Historian and Author
16 March
Erik Estrada, Puerto Rican actor
Victor Garber, Canadian actor
17 March
Patrick Duffy, American actor
Pat Rice, Irish footballer and football manager
18 March – Alex Higgins, Irish snooker player
21 March – Eddie Money, American singer
22 March – Fanny Ardant, French actress
23 March – Ric Ocasek, American musician (The Cars)
24 March – Nick Lowe, English musician
26 March – Patrick Süskind, German writer
29 March – Michael Brecker, American jazz musician (d. 2007)
30 March
Marcia Ball, American musician
Lene Lovich, American singer
Naomi Sims, American model and businesswoman
Elijah Harper, Canadian Aboriginal activist
1 April The Reserve Bank of India is established.
Gérard Mestrallet, French businessman
Sammy Nelson, Irish footballer
Gil Scott-Heron, American musician and composer
3 April – Richard Thompson, English musician and songwriter
6 April – Horst Ludwig Störmer, German-born physicist, Nobel Prize laureate
14 April – John Shea, American actor
15 April – Alla Pugacheva, Russian musical performer
16 April – Sandy Hawley, Canadian jockey
18 April – Geoff Bodine, American race car driver
21 April – Patti Lupone. American actress
24 April – Veronique Sanson, French singer and songwriter
28 April – Bruno Kirby, American actor (d. 2006)

May-June

2 May – Alan Titchmarsh, English gardener
4 May – John Force, American race car driver
9 May – Billy Joel, American musician
13 May – Zoë Wanamaker, English-American actress
18 May
Rick Wakeman, English musician and songwriter (Yes)
Bill Wallace, Canadian musician (The Guess Who)
19 May
Enrique Aguirre, gynecologist who discovered cervical cancer
Archie Manning, American football player
20 May – Dave Thomas, Canadian actor and comedian
24 May – Tomaž Pisanski, Slovenian mathematician
25 May – Prahladananda Swami, ISKCON religious leader
26 May
Philip Michael Thomas, American actor
Hank Williams Jr., American singer
29 May – Francis Rossi English guitist/singer (Status Quo)
31 May – Tom Berenger, American actor
2 June – Heather Couper, British astronomer
4 June – Mark B. Cohen, Pennsylvania legislative leader
8 June – Emanuel Ax, Polish-born pianist
11 June – Benjamin Vasserman, Estonian artist
13 June – Ann Druyan, American writer
14 June
Jimmy Lea, English musician (Slade)
Harry Turtledove, American historian and novelist
15 June – Jim Varney, American actor (d. 2000)
17 June – Andrei Fursenko, Russian politician, scientist and businessman
18 June
Chris Van Allsburg, American author and illustrator
Lech Kaczyński, President of Poland
Jarosław Kaczyński, Polish Prime Minister
Prince Lincoln Thompson, Jamaican musician (d. 1999)
21 June
John Agard, British writer
Jane Urquhart, Canadian author
22 June – Meryl Streep, American Actress
27 June – Vera Wang, American fashion designer

July-August

2 July
David Eaton, American Composer/Conductor/Producer
3 July
Jan Smithers, American actress
Johnnie Wilder, Jr., American R&B singer (Heatwave) (d. 2006)
7 July – Shelley Duvall, American actress
11 July – Ingrid Newkirk, president of People for the Ethical Treatment of Animals (PETA)
11 July – Émerson Leão, Brazilian footballer
15 July
Carl Bildt, Prime Minister of Sweden
Trevor Horn, British singer and producer
16 July – Dennis Young, American Skier
17 July – Charlie Steiner, American sportscaster
22 July – Alan Menken, American composer
26 July – Roger Taylor, English musician (Queen)
4 August – John Riggins, American football player
6 August – Alan Campbell, Northern Irish clergyman
7 August – Walid Jumblatt, leader of the Lebanese Druze
12 August – Mark Knopfler, British guitarist (Dire Straits)
15 August – Richard Deacon (sculptor)|Richard Deacon]], Welsh sculptor. *15 August – Beverly Lynn Burns, first woman in the world to captain the boeing 747.
20 August – Philip Lynott, Irish musician (Thin Lizzy) (d. 1986)
22 August – Alfred Musema, Rwandan businessperson and geocidaire
23 August
Shelley Long, American actress
Rick Springfield, Australian singer and actor
25 August
Martin Amis, English novelist
Gene Simmons, American musician (Kiss)
27 August – Jeff Cook, vocals, guitar, keyboards, bass, fiddle, banjo, and mandolin for Alabama
28 August – Svetislav Pešić, Serbian basketball player and coach
31 August
Richard Gere, American actor
H. David Politzer, American physicist, Nobel Prize laureate

September-October

1 September – P.A. Sangma, Indian politician
3 September – Patriarch Peter VII of Alexandria (d. 2004)
7 September
Lee McGeorge Durrell, American author, television presenter, and zookeeper
Gloria Gaynor, American singer
9 September
Susilo Bambang Yudhoyono, Current President of Indonesia.
Joe Theismann, American football player
13 September – John Henry, American foreign exchange advisor, Boston Red Sox owner
14 September
Fred “Sonic” Smith, American guitarist
Eikichi Yazawa, Japanese singer
15 September – Joe Barton, American politician
17 September – Cassandra Peterson, American actress
18 September
Mo Mowlam, British politician (d. 2005)
Peter Shilton, English goalkeeper
19 September – Twiggy Lawson, English model
23 September – Bruce Springsteen, American singer and songwriter
24 September – Pedro Almodóvar, Spanish filmmaker
26 September – Jane Smiley, American novelist
27 September – Mike Schmidt, baseball player
1 October – Isaac Bonewits, American author and occultist
4 October – Armand Assante, American actor
7 October – Ronnie Mund, American television personality
8 October – Sigourney Weaver, American actress
12 October – Carlos the jackal, Venezuelan-born mercenary
14 October
Katy Manning, British actress
Katha Pollitt, American writer
20 October – Valeri Borzov, Ukrainian athlete
21 October – Benjamin Netanyahu, Prime Minister of Israel
22 October
Stiv Bators, American musician (The Dead Boys) (d. 1990)
Arsene Wenger, French football (soccer) manager
26 October – Antonio Carpio, Filipino Supreme Court jurist

November-December

2 November – Simon Augustini, Albanian politician
3 November – Larry Holmes, American World Heavyweight Boxing Champion
5 November
Armin Shimerman, American actor
Jimmie Spheeris, American singer-songwriter (d. 1984)
6 November – Nigel Havers, British Actor
7 November
Aiswarya, Queen of Nepal (d. 2001)
Judi Bari, American environmental activist (d. 1997)
19 November – Ahmad Rashad, American sports host and commentator
15 November – David Rubinstein, American pianist and composer
24 November – Nicholas Richard Ainger, British politician
25 November – Kerry James O'Keeffe, Australian cricketer and commentator
26 November – Juanin Clay, American actress (d. 1995)
Shlomo Artzi, Israeli singer
28 November
Alexander Godunov, Russian-born dancer and actor (d. 1995)
Paul Shaffer, Canadian-American musician
29 November
Jerry Lawler, American professional wrestler and commentator
Stan Rogers, Canadian musician (d. 1983)
Garry Shandling, American comedian
1 December – Kurt Schmoke, Dean, Howard Law School, Mayor of Baltimore
3 December – John Akii-Bua, Ugandan hurdler (d. 1997)
4 December
Jeff Bridges, American actor
Pamela Stephenson, New Zealand-born comedienne, actress, and singer
7 December – Tom Waits, American singer, composer, and actor
8 December – Mary Gordon, American writer
11 December – Teri Garr, American actress
12 December – Rajinikanth, Indian actor
13 December
Robert Lindsay, English actor
Randy Owen, lead vocals, rhythm guitar for Alabama
Tom Verlaine, American singer/guitarist of Television
14 December – Bill Buckner, baseball player
15 December – Don Johnson, American actor
16 December – Billy Gibbons, American guitarist (ZZ Top)
17 December – Paul Rodgers, British singer (Free)
19 December – Sebastian, Danish musician
22 December
Maurice Gibb, British musician (The Bee Gees) (d. 2003)
Robin Gibb, British musician (The Bee Gees)
24 December – Randy Neugebauer, American politician
25 December
Simone Bittencourt de Oliveira, Brazilian singer
Sissy Spacek, American actress
Joe Louis Walker, American musician
26 December – José Ramos-Horta, President of East Timor, recipient of the Nobel Peace Prize
unknown date – Brian Calvin Hartnell, Zodiac killer survivor
unknown date – Suthep Po-ngam, Thai comedian, actor, film director and screenwriter.

Deaths

See also Category:1949 deaths

January-June

6 January – Victor Fleming, American director (b. 1883)
11 January – Nelson Doubleday, American publisher (b. 1889)
14 January – Joaquín Turina, Spanish composer (b. 1882)
28 January – Jean-Pierre Wimille, French race car driver (b. 1908)
12 February – Imam Hassan al Banna, Egyptian founder of the Muslim Brotherhood (b. 1906)
21 February – Tan Malaka, Indonesian nationalist activist and communist leader (b. 1894)
25 March – Jack Kapp, president of US branch of Decca Records (b. 1901)
28 March – Grigoraş Dinicu, Romanian composer (b. 1889)
30 March
Friedrich Bergius, German chemist, Nobel Prize laureate (b. 1884)
Prince Harald of Denmark (b. 1876)
18 April – Will Hay, English comedian and actor (b. 1888)
19 April – Ulrich Salchow, Swedish figure skater (b. 1877)
28 April – Aurora Quezon, First Lady of the Philippines (shot) (b. 1888)
6 May – Maurice Maeterlinck, Belgian writer, Nobel Prize laureate (b. 1862)
9 May – Louis II, Prince of Monaco (b. 1870)
22 May
James Forrestal, U.S. Secretary of Navy and Defense (suicide) (b. 1892)
Klaus Mann, German writer (suicide) (b. 1906)
27 May – Robert Ripley the creator of the famous Ripley’s Believe It or Not! dies.
10 June – Sigrid Undset, Norwegian writer, Nobel Prize laureate (b. 1882)
14 June – Russell Doubleday, American author and publisher (b. 1872)
19 June – Syed Zafarul Hasan, Prominent Indian/Pakistani Muslim philosopher (b. 1885)
25 June – Buck Freeman, baseball player (b. 1871)

July-December

9 July – Fritz Bennicke Hart, English-born composer (b. 1874)
12 July – Douglas Hyde, first President of Ireland (b. 1860)
18 July – Vítězslav Novák, Czech composer (b. 1870)
16 August – Margaret Mitchell, American writer (b. 1900)
17 August – Gregorio Perfecto, Filipino jurist & politician (b. 1891)
18 August – Paul Mares, American musician (b. 1900)
30 August – Arthur Fielder, English cricketer (b. 1877)
8 September – Richard Strauss, German composer (b. 1864)
13 September – August Krogh, Danish zoophysiologist, recipient of the Nobel Prize in Physiology or Medicine (b. 1874)
14 September – Gottfried Graf von Bismarck-Schönhausen, German Resistance figure (b. 1901)
19 September
Will Cuppy, American humorist (b. 1884)
George Shiels, Irish writer (b. 1886)
Nikolaos Skalkottas, Greek composer (b. 1901)
27 October
Marcel Cerdan, French boxer (plane crash) (b. 1916)
Ginette Neveu, French violinist (plane crash) (b. 1919)
November – Maria Josepha Sophia de Iturbide, head of Imperial House of Mexico (b. 1872)
2 November – Jerome F. Donovan, American politician (b. 1872)
5 November – Abdolhossein Hazhir, Prime Minister of Iran (b. 1899)
6 December – Leadbelly, American musician (b. 1888)
11 December – Krishna Chandra Bhattacharya, Indian philosopher (b. 1875)
16 December – Sidney Olcott, Canadian film director (b. 1873)
28 December – Hervey Allen, American author (b. 1889)
28 December – Jack Lovelock, New Zealand athlete (b. 1910)

Nobel prizes

Physics – Yukawa Hideki
Chemistry – William Francis Giauque
Medicine – Walter Rudolf Hess, Antonio Caetano De Abreu Freire Egas Moniz
Literature – William Faulkner
Peace – John Boyd Orr

Retrieved from “http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/1949”