January 1962 - January 31, 1962 (Wednesday)

January 31, 1962 (Wednesday)

• Telling reporters that "It's a tradition that the show must go on," tightrope walkers Gunther Wallenda and his father, Herman Wallenda walked the high wire at the Shrine Circus in Detroit, 24 hours after the disastrous had killed two members of the troupe, and put the three others in the hospital.
• Twenty-eight people had been killed by the fourth day of an unusually heavy fog in the San Joaquin and Sacramento valleys in central California, with the deaths of 11 people on their way to a labor camp in Mendota. Their bus was hit by a Southern Pacific freight train. Since January 28, seventeen other people had been killed on U.S. Highway 99 in accidents related to visibility of less than 100 feet. The cloud cover dissipated by February 2.
• Arthur Watts relinquished the leadership of the National Party of Western Australia.
• Born: Alexey Miller, Russian industrialist, in Leningrad
• Died: Noel Purcell, 70, Irish water polo and rugby international