1948

1948 is a leap year starting on Thursday (link will take you to calendar).

align="center" colspan=2 | Years:
1945 1946 1947 - 1948 - 1949 1950 1951

align="center" colspan=2 | Decades:
1910s 1920s 1930s - 1940s - 1950s 1960s 1970s

align="center" | Centuries:
19th century - 20th century - 21st century

Events

January-February

January 1 - Nationalisation of UK railways to form British Railways. Arab militants lay siege to the Jewish Quarter of the Old City of Jerusalem. First day of the Italian republican constitution.
January 4 - Burma gains its independence from the United Kingdom.
January 5 - Warner Brothers shows the first color newsreel (Tournament of Roses Parade and the Rose Bowl).
January 17 - Truce between nationalist Indonesian and Dutch troops in Java
January 26 - Man masquerading as a doctor poisons 12 out of 15 bank employees of the Tokyo branch of Imperial Bank and takes the money; artist Sadimacha Hirasawa is later sentenced for the crime.
January 30 - Indian pacifist and leader Mahatma Gandhi is murdered by a Hindu extremist.
January 30 - 1948 Winter Olympics open in St. Moritz, Switzerland.
February 1 - Soviet Union begins to jam Voice of America broadcasts.
February 4 - Ceylon (later renamed Sri Lanka) becomes independent within the British Commonwealth. King George VI becomes King of Ceylon.
February 18 - Eamon de Valera, head of government since 1932, loses power to an opposition coalition. John A. Costello is appointed Taoiseach of ire (formerly called the Irish Free State) by President O'Kelly.
February 24 - The Communist Party seizes control of Czechoslovakia.

March-April

March 8 - The United States Supreme Court rules that religious instruction in public schools violated the Constitution.
March 10 - Czech foreign minister Jan Masaryk killed in ?fall? from his office window.
March 20 - First elections in Singapore
April 3 - President Harry Truman signs the Marshall Plan which authorizes $5 billion in aid for 16 countries.
April 7 - The World Health Organization is established by the United Nations.
April 9 - Jorge Elicer Gaitn's assassination provokes a violent riot in Bogot (the Bogotazo), and a further ten years of violence in all of Colombia (La violencia).
April 9 - The Deir Yassin massacre takes place in Palestine.

May

May 1 - 213 communists executed in Greece.
May 11 - Luigi Einaudi becomes president of Italy.
May 14 - Israel is declared as an independent state.
May 14 - The murder of a three-year-old girl in Blackburn, England leads to the fingerprinting of more than 40,000 men in the city in an attempt to find the murderer.
May 15 - Egypt, Transjordan, Lebanon, Syria, Iraq and Saudi Arabia attack Israel.
May 16 - Chaim Weizmann is elected as the first President of Israel.
May 18 - The First Legislative Yuan of the Republic of China officially convenes in Nanking.
May 26 - The U.S. Congress passes Public Law 557 which permanently establishes the Civil Air Patrol as the auxiliary of the United States Air Force.
May 30 - A dike along the Columbia River breaks, obliterating Vanport, Oregon within minutes. 15 people died and tens of thousands are left homeless.

June

June 3 - Palomar Observatory telescope finished in California.
June 16 - Communist guerillas kill three rubber planters in Malay.
June 17 - A Douglas DC-6 carrying United Air Lines Flight 624 crashes near Mount Carmel, Pennsylvania, killing all 43 people on board.
June 18 - State of Emergency declared in Malaysia for communist insurgency - Malayan Emergency begins.
June 21 - The Deutsche Mark becomes official currency of the Federal Republic of Germany.
June 24 - The Berlin Blockade begins.
June 28 - Cominform Resolution marks the beginning of the Informbiro period in Yugoslavia and Soviet/Yugoslav split.

July-October

July 5 - British National Health Service Act enacted.
July 15 - Attempted assassination of Palmiro Togliatti, general secretary of the Italian Communist Party, incites number of strikes all over the country.
July 15 - First London,England chapter of Alcoholics Anonymous
July 20 - Cold War: President Harry S. Truman issues the second peacetime military draft in the United States amid increasing tensions with the Soviet Union (the first peacetime draft occurred in 1940 under President Roosevelt).
July 24 - Great oil fire in the harbor of Naantali, Finland
July 26 - U.S. President signs Executive Order 9981, ending segregation in the United States Armed Forces.
July 31 - At Idlewild Field in New York, New York International Airport (later renamed John F. Kennedy International Airport) is dedicated.
August 12 - USA recognizes the government of South Korea.
August 19 - Soviet troops fire at German demonstrators that protest against the Berlin Blockade.
September 4 - Queen Wilhelmina of the Netherlands abdicates for health reasons.
September 6 - Juliana becomes Queen of the Netherlands.
September 17 - Stern Gang assassinates count Folke Bernadotte.
October 11 - Cleveland Indians defeat the Boston Braves to win the World Series, four games to two.

November-December

November 2 - U.S. presidential election, 1948: Harry S. Truman defeats Thomas E. Dewey for the US presidency.
November 12 - In Tokyo, an international war crimes tribunal sentences seven Japanese military and government officials to death, including General Hideki Tojo, for their roles in World War II.
November 15 - Louis Stephen St. Laurent becomes Canada's twelfth prime minister.
November 16 - Operation Magic Carpet to transport Jews from Yemen to Israel begins.
November 17 - Mohammad Reza Shah Pahlavi divorces Queen Fawzia of Egypt after she is unable to produce a male heir.
December 10 - United Nations General Assembly adopts Universal Declaration of Human Rights.
December 28 - Member of Muslim Brotherhood assassinates Egyptian Prime Minister Mahmud Fahmi Nokrashi.
December 30 - The play Kiss Me, Kate opens for the first of 1,077 performances.
December 31 - Israeli troops drive Egyptians from Negev.

Undated

Hell's Angels motorcycle gang forms
Empire Windrush immigrant ship arrives in Britain
Faroe Islands receive autonomy from Denmark
Civil war in Costa Rica
Civil war in Colombia

Unknown date

Porsche is founded.
Miranda, the innermost moon of Uranus, is discovered by Gerard Kuiper.
Casimir effect discovered by Dutch physicist Hendrik Casimir.
Tunnel of Vielha is opened in Val d'Aran, Spanish Pyrenees.
Fresh Kills, world's largest landfill, opens in Staten Island, New York.
The law firm of Skadden, Arps, Slate, Meagher & Flom is founded.
Brandeis University is founded.

Year in topic

1948 in film

Hamlet
The Treasure of the Sierra Madre starring Humphrey Bogart
Joan of Arc starring Ingrid Bergman and Jos Ferrer
Key Largo starring Humphrey Bogart and Lauren Bacall
Alfred Hitchcock's Rope, starring Jimmy Stewart
La terra trema by Luchino Visconti
Ladri di biciclette by Vittorio De Sica

1948 in literature
1948 in music

Columbia Records introduces the 33⅓ rpm LP (“long playing”) record.

1948 in rail transport

October 26 - The American Freedom Train, which is carrying the original versions of the United States Constitution, Declaration of Independence and Bill of Rights, makes its final public display in Havre de Grace, Maryland before the official end of tour. See also American Freedom Train - 1947-1949 station stops

1948 in sports

February 21 - The National Association for Stock Car Auto Racing (NASCAR) was incorporated by William HG France to organize and promote the sport of stock car racing.
February 28 - Bud Gartiser sets a new world record after clearing the 50-yard low hurdles in 6.8 seconds.
1948 Winter Olympic Games in St. Moritz, Switzerland
1948 Summer Olympic Games in London, United Kingdom
Baseball World Series: Cleveland Indians defeat the Boston Braves.

1948 in television

CBS begins network programming.
ABC opens its first television station in New York.
June 20 - Toast of the Town, with Ed Sullivan, premieres on CBS, with guests Dean Martin and Jerry Lewis.
June 21 - The first network telecast of political conventions from Philadelphia.
July 30 - Professional wrestling premieres in prime-time on the DuMont Network.
August 10 - Candid Camera debuts on ABC.
August 15 - The first network nightly newscast, CBS-TV News, debuts on CBS with Douglas Edwards.
September - Milton Berle becomes the first television star, with Texaco Star Theatre on NBC.
Television manufacturing begins in Canada.