April
- April 7 – Dag Hammarskjöld is elected United Nations Secretary General.
- April 8 – Jomo Kenyatta is sentenced to seven years in prison for the alleged organization of the Mau Mau Rebellion.
- April 10 – Melbourne Knights is founded as Croatia SC in Melbourne.
- April 13
- Ian Fleming publishes his first James Bond novel, Casino Royale in the United Kingdom.
- The German football team SG Dynamo Dresden is founded.
- April 16
- President Eisenhower delivers his "Chance for Peace" speech to the National Association of Newspaper Editors.
- A four-story building in Chicago belonging to the Habar Corporation catches fire, killing 35 employees.
- April 17 – Mickey Mantle hits a 565 foot (172 m) home run at Griffith Stadium in Washington D.C. Mantle's home run is believed to be the longest home run in baseball history by many historians.
- April 25 – Francis Crick and James D. Watson publish "Molecular Structure of Nucleic Acids: A Structure for Deoxyribose Nucleic Acid", their description of the double helix structure of DNA.
Famous quotes containing the word april:
“I, Alphonso, live and learn,
Seeing Nature go astern.
Things deteriorate in kind;
Lemons run to leaves and rind;
Meagre crop of figs and limes;
Shorter days and harder times.
Flowering April cools and dies
In the insufficient skies.”
—Ralph Waldo Emerson (1803–1882)
“Thou art thy mother’s glass, and she in thee
Calls back the lovely April of her prime.”
—William Shakespeare (1564–1616)
“No April can revive thy withered flowers,
Whose blooming grace adorns thy glory now;
Swift speeding Time, feathered with flying hours,
Dissolves the beauty of the fairest brow.
Oh let not then such riches waste in vain,
But love whilst that thou mayst be loved again.”
—Samuel Daniel (1562–1619)