1953

Events

• January 14 - Josip Broz Tito is named President of Yugoslavia.
• January 20 - Richard Nixon begins his service as Vice President of the United States, serving under Dwight D. Eisenhower.
• February 3 - The Batepá Massacre takes place.
• April 19 - Marcos Pérez Jiménez is formally elected President of Venezuela, after serving in a provisional capacity since December 1952.
• March 26 - Lari Massacre: 97 unarmed Kikuyu are massacred by Mau Mau insurgents. Most of the victims are women, children and elderly relatives of loyalists.
• June 13 - Gustavo Rojas Pinilla leads a successful coup, overthrowing Laureano Gómez Castro and declaring himself President of Colombia.
• June 16 to 17 - An uprising in East Germany is violently suppressed by the Socialist Unity Party of Germany, aided by the Soviet Union, resulting in the deaths of 55 to 125 people.
• July 4 - Imre Nagy is elected Prime Minister of Hungary.
• July 19 - Adib Shishakli is elected President of Syria after four years of military rule.
• July 26 - Fidel Castro and Che Guevara launch the Cuban Revolution.
• July 27 - The Korean War ends in a stalemate.
• August 15 to 19 - Operation Ajax: Mohammad Mosaddegh is overthrown as Prime Minister of Iran, returning centralized power to Shah Mohammad Reza Pahlavi.
• September 14 - Nikita Khrushchev is named First Secretary of the Communist Party of the Soviet Union. He soon begins the process of "De-Stalinization".
• September 28 - Bobby Greenlease, Jr. is abducted from Notre Dame de Sion Catholic school in Kansas City, Missouri and subsequently murdered by Carl Hall and Bonnie Heady, in an attempt to hold him for ransom.
• October 14 - The Qibya Massacre takes place when Israeli troops under Ariel Sharon attack the village of Qibya in the West Bank, killing at least 69 people.
• October 29 - Frank Costello is released from prison, following his arrest for contempt of court during the Kefauver Committee the previous year.
• December - The Church of Scientology is founded by L. Ron Hubbard.
• Unknown - Hizb ut-Tahrir is founded.

Births

Villain births

• January 1 - Afonso Dhlakama
• January 14 - Janusz Waluś
• January 15 - Robert Alton Harris
• January 16 - Robert Jay Mathews
• January 20 - Jeffrey Epstein
• March 3 - Jean de Dieu Kamuhanda
• March 12 - Ron Jeremy
• April 9 - Stephen Paddock
• April 29 - Midhat Mursi
• May 10 - Earl Bradley
• May 27 - Gheorghe Dincă
• June 1 - David Berkowitz
• June 13 - Veselin Šljivančanin
• June 15 - Xi Jinping
• July 15 - Alvin Neelley
• July 23 - Najib Razak
• July 28 - Don Black
• August 21 - David Alan Gore
• September 21 - Andrea Ghira
• October 14 - Bobby Joe Long
• October 18 - Brian David Mitchell
• November 7 - Carl Eugene Watts
• November 29 - Rosemary West
• Unknown - Jean-Paul Akayesu
• Unknown - Jean-Baptiste Gatete
• Unknown - John Bingham
• Unknown - Callixte Nzabonimana
• Unknown - Larry Green

Victim births

• January 27 - Blaine Hodges
• March 28 - Melchior Ndadaye
• May 23 - Agathe Uwilingiyimana
• July 8 - Michelle Abdill

Deaths

Villain deaths

• March 5 - Joseph Stalin
• March 14 - Klement Gottwald
• June 19 - Julius and Ethel Rosenberg
• July 15 - John Christie
• September 5 - Richard Walther Darré
• September 27 - Hans Fritzsche
• December 18 - Carl Hall and Bonnie Heady
• December 23 - Lavrentiy Beria

Victim deaths

• September 28 - Bobby Greenlease, Jr.