The following events occurred in November 1961:
November 1, 1961 (Wednesday) The Hungry generation Movement was launched in Calcutta, India. The first Soviet ICBM, called the R-16 in the USSR and the SS-7 by Americans, was put on active status. A Panair do Brasil Airlines DC-7 with 85 people on board crashed, killing 48 people. The plane, arriving from Lisbon, Portugal, was coming in for a landing at Recife when it struck a hillside in the suburb of Tijipio. Women Strike for Peace held its first event, as thousands of American women, most of them housewives concerned over the contamination of strontium-90 from fallout, marched in 60 different U.S. cities to demand an end to further nuclear testing. Estimates of the number of participants ranged from 25,000 to 50,000. The U.S. Interstate Commerce Commission's federal order banning segregation at all interstate public facilities officially went into effect. NASA's launch of a Mercury-Scout 1 rocket and a Manned Space Flight Network communications package into orbit, prior to the next crewed orbital flight, Mercury 4, failed 43 seconds after liftoff. The rocket veered off course and was remotely destroyed by the Range Safety Officer. NASA's Space Task Group (STG) was redesignated the Manned Spacecraft Center, with Robert R. Gilruth as Director. STG Director Robert R. Gilruth and Chief Engineer James A. Chamberlin briefed NASA Associate Administrator Robert C. Seamans, Jr. on the Mercury Mark II proposal and awaited NASA approval.
November 2, 1961 (Thursday) The cover of Oleg Penkovsky, who had passed along top secret Soviet information to American CIA agents operating in the U.S.S.R., was blown, after four KGB agents caught a CIA case officer in the act of picking up information that had been dropped off. The CIA man was expelled; the execution of Penkovsky would be announced on May 17, 1963.
Salman bin Hamad Al Khalifa, the Emir of Bahrain since 1942, died at the age of 67. At the time, the oil-rich Arab sheikdom was a protectorate of the United Kingdom. Salman's son, Isa bin Salman Al Khalifa, became the new Emir and would lead the nation to independence in 1971, reigning as King of Bahrain until his death in 1999. Israel's Prime Minister David Ben-Gurion received approval to form a new coalition government, with the Knesset approving a vote of confidence, 63–46. The musical Kean, based on the life of 18th-century Shakespearean actor Edmund Kean, opened at the Broadway Theater in New York City. It would close on January 20 after only 92 performances. Born: k.d. lang, Canadian singer-songwriter, as Kathryn Dawn Lang, in Consort, Alberta Died: James Thurber, 66, American humorist Harriet Bosse, 83, Swedish-Norwegian actress
November 3, 1961 (Friday)