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What happened in 1961

• Mr Lumumba, Congo's first democratically elected leader (June 1960) is deposed after four months and shot dead in February '61. This inspires a demonstration outside the Belgian Embassy in central London, which ends with clashes with mounted police after fighting erupts.
• South Africa leave the Commonwealth after refusing to make preparations for majority rule.
• A Commonwealth Immigrants Bill is introduced in the House of Commons in order to begin to restrict the flow of settlers into the UK. The ensuing 'panic' meant that figures of immigrants rocketed to over 105, 000 for '60-'61. There were further bills passed during this decade, one which was marred by Powellism - anti-immigration feeling led by the Conservative MP Enoch Powell.
• V S Naipaul was born in Trinidad in 1932 of Indian heritage. He moved to England in 1950, published his first novel in '57 and in '61 wins the Somerset Maugham Award for Miguel Street - " a beguiling book about growing up in the West Indies. The sketches are written lightly, so that tragedy is understated and comedy is overstated, yet the ring of truth always prevails." He wins the Nobel prize for Literature in 2001.
• 1961 wasn't an easy year for Anne Cole Lowe an African-American fashion designer from Alabama, but she does manage to open a shop on Saks Fifth Avenue and is awarded the Couturier of the Year Plaque by New York Fashion Society. (In '68 she was included in the Who's Who of American Women.) These accolades came as a result of making dresses for families in high society including the wedding dress for Jacqueline Bouvier when she married the future President, John F. Kennedy in '53.
• Sport: Albert Johanneson makes his first appearance for Leeds United. The South Africa born left winger scores 68 goals for them in the 1960s. At a time when black players were a novelty in England, he endured racist taunting from opposing players and the crowd. He went on to be the first black player in an FA Cup Final.
• Although other black players had appeared in the English league prior to this, such as the legendary Nigerian international Steve Mokone (Coventry) and his fellow countryman, Elkaneh Onyeali (Tranmere), Johanneson was arguably the most influential black player in England during the 1960s
• Radio: Mrs. Dale's Diary (Light Programme, now Radio 4) was the first radio soap to include a regular role for a black actor with Jamaican Charles Hyatt as Dr Lionel Smithson.