On this day

October 18, 1961

Revisit the news, notable people, and historical moments connected to this date.

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Headlines from October 18, 1961

Notable Births

Wynton Marsalis

1961Wynton Marsalis, American trumpet player, composer, and educator[†]

Wynton Learson Marsalis is an American trumpeter, composer, and music instructor, who is currently the artistic director of Jazz at Lincoln Center. He has been active in promoting classical and jazz music, often to young audiences. Marsalis has won nine Grammy Awards, and his oratorio Blood on the Fields was the first jazz composition to win the Pulitzer Prize for Music. Marsalis is the only musician to have won a Grammy Award in both jazz and classical categories in the same year.

Rick Moody

1961Rick Moody, American author and composer[†]

Hiram Frederick Moody III is an American novelist and short story writer best known for the 1994 novel The Ice Storm, a chronicle of the dissolution of two suburban Connecticut families over Thanksgiving weekend in 1973, which brought him widespread acclaim, became a bestseller, and was made into the film The Ice Storm. Many of his works have been praised by fellow writers and critics alike.

1961Gladstone Small, Barbadian-English cricketer[†]

Gladstone Cleophas Small is an English former cricketer, who played in 17 Test matches and 53 One Day Internationals (ODIs) for the England cricket team. He was a part of the English squads which finished as runners-up at the 1987 Cricket World Cup and as runners-up at the 1992 Cricket World Cup.

Notable Deaths

Tsuru Aoki

1961Tsuru Aoki, Japanese-American actress (born 1892)[†]

Tsuru Aoki was a Japanese stage and screen actress whose career was most prolific in the United States during the silent film era of the 1910s through the 1920s. Aoki may have been the first Asian actress to garner top billing in American motion pictures.

Historical Context for October 18, 1961

In 1961, the world population was approximately 3,064,869,675 people[†]