Sir Robert Menzies

Posted in 1960

Credit squeeze: With the fall in wool prices, drought, inflation and rising prices, Treasurer Holt belatedly imposes a credit squeeze, raises loan interest rates and heavily increases sales tax on motor vehicles.

"Government imposed credit squeeze induced late in 1960 caused an even greater outcry than had the horror budget of 1952. These difficulties were crucial in shaping opinion in the lead-up to a general election in December 1961 which almost toppled Menzies' government."
A W Martin, Robert Menzies A Life Vol 2 1944-1978, 1999 p 430.

Australian Events

Posted in 1960

Sir MacFarlane Burnet shares the Nobel Prize for Medicine, for work on acquired immunological tolerance.
National Service training ends.
Social service benefits are paid to Aborigines.
Dawn Fraser and Herb Elliott win gold medals at the Rome Olympic Games.
Australia designs the world's first plastic spectacle lenses.

World Events

Posted in 1960

South Africa: Police open fire on black African demonstrators protesting against Pass Laws which require them to carry identity cards at all times - 63 are killed and more than 360 injured in Sharpeville and Langa townships. The massacre draws the world's attention to the brutalities of apartheid.
Development of the laser.
International agreement to reserve Antarctica for scientific research.
US property in Cuba is seized and Cuba becomes aligned with Communist powers.
John F Kennedy is the youngest man ever elected as President of the USA.
An earthquake collapses the Moroccan city of Agadir, followed seconds later by a tidal wave and then fires as the waters recede. More than 1,000 people are killed and 40,000 left homeless.