1949

1949 (MCMXLIX) was a common year starting on Saturday of the Gregorian calendar, the 1949th year of the Common Era (CE) and Anno Domini (AD) designations, the 949th year of the 2nd millennium, the 49th year of the 20th century, and the 10th and last year of the 1940s decade.

• January 20 – Harry S. Truman proposes Point Four program to help world's less developed areas.
• February 22 – Grady the Cow, a 1,200-pound cow gets stuck inside a silo on a farm in Yukon, Oklahoma and garners national media attention.
• April 4 – Twelve nations sign the North Atlantic Treaty establishing the North Atlantic Treaty Organisation (NATO).
• April 18 - Ireland Act 1949 comes into effect and ceased being in the British Commonwealth.
• May 11 – Siam changes its name to Thailand.
• September 21 – The German Federal Republic (West Germany) established.
• October 1 – The founding of the People's Republic of China is announced by Mao Zedong.
• October 7 – The German Democratic Republic (East Germany) is established.
• December 27 – Indonesia's independence is recognised by the Netherlands.

• January 12 – Murakami Haruki, Japanese writer
• January 12 – Ottmar Hitzfeld, German football manager
• February 5 – Kurt Beck, German politician
• February 22 – Niki Lauda, Austrian racecar driver
• February 24 – John Belushi, American actor (d. 1982)
• March 28 - Kevin Lloyd, British actor (d. 1998)
• April 7 - Wells Kelly, American singer-songwriter and musician (Orleans) (d. 1984)
• April 11 – Bernd Eichinger, German movie producer
• April 19 – Joachim Sauer, husband of German chancellor Angela Merkel
• April 20 – Jessica Lange, American actress
• May 9 – Billy Joel, American singer
• May 13 – Zoe Wanamaker, actress
• May 23 – Alan Garcia, President of Peru (d. 2019)
• May 26 – Jeremy Corbyn, English politician
• June 6 – Robert Englund, American actor
• June 18 – Jaroslaw Kaczynski, Polish politician
• June 18 – Lech Kaczynski, President of Poland (d. 2010)
• June 20 – Lionel Richie, American singer and musician
• June 22 – Meryl Streep, American actress
• July 4 – Horst Seehofer, German politician
• July 17 - Geezer Butler, English bass guitarist (Black Sabbath)
• July 22 - Alan Menken, American pianist and theatre composer
• July 26 – Thaksin Shinawatra, Thai politician
• July 26 – Roger Taylor, British musician (Queen)
• August 1 – Kurmanbek Bakiyev, former President of Kyrgyzstan
• August 15 – Ivan Boldirev, Russian ice hockey player
• August 20 - Phil Lynott, Irish bass guitarist (Thin Lizzy) (d. 1986)
• August 25 - Gene Simmons, American singer-songwriter and musician (Kiss)
• August 31 – Richard Gere, American actor
• September 9 – Susilo Bambang Yudhoyono, President of Indonesia
• September 13 - Dennis Pendrith, Canadian bass player
• September 19 – Twiggy, British model
• September 23 – Bruce Springsteen, American singer and musician
• October 3 - Lindsey Buckingham, American guitarist (Fleetwood Mac)
• October 4 - Armand Assante, American actor
• October 8 – Sigourney Weaver, American actress
• October 9 - Bob Leinbach, American singer-songwriter and musician (Orleans)
• October 13 - Rick Vito, American guitarist (Fleetwood Mac)
• October 21 – Benjamin Netanyahu, Israeli politician
• October 25 - Ross Bagdasarian, Jr., American voice actor
• November 14 - James "J.Y." Young, American guitarist (Styx)
• December 1 – Pablo Escobar, Colombian drug lord (d. 1993)
• December 12 – Marc Ravalomanana, former President of Madagascar
• December 21 – Thomas Sankara, President of Burkina Faso (d. 1987)
• December 22 – Maurice Gibb, singer (Bee Gees) (d. 2003)
• December 22 – Robin Gibb, singer (Bee Gees) (d. 2012)
• December 25 – Sissy Spacek, American actress
• December 26 – Jose Ramos Horta, President of East Timor

• January 6 – Victor Fleming, American director (b. 1883)
• January 11 – Nelson Doubleday, American publisher (b. 1889)
• January 14 – Joaquín Turina, Spanish composer (b. 1882)
• January 28 – Jean-Pierre Wimille, French race car driver (b. 1908)
• February 12 – Imam Hassan al Banna, Egyptian founder of the Muslim Brotherhood (b. 1906)
• March 30 – Friedrich Bergius, German chemist, Nobel Prize laureate (b. 1884)
• April 19 – Ulrich Salchow, Swedish figure skater (b. 1877)
• May 6 – Maurice Maeterlinck, Belgian writer, Nobel Prize laureate (b. 1862)
• May 9 – Louis II, Prince of Monaco (b. 1870)
• May 22 – James Forrestal, U.S. Secretary of Navy and Defense (suicide) (b. 1892)
• May 22 – Klaus Mann, German writer (suicide) (b. 1906)
• June 10 – Sigrid Undset, Norwegian writer, Nobel Prize laureate (b. 1882)
• June 14 – Russell Doubleday, American writer and publisher (b. 1872)
• July 9 – Fritz Bennicke Hart, English-born composer (b. 1874)
• July 12 – Douglas Hyde, first President of Ireland (b. 1860)
• July 18 – Vítězslav Novák, Czech composer (b. 1870)
• August 18 – Paul Mares, American musician (b. 1900)
• August 30 – Arthur Fielder, English cricketer (b. 1877)
• September 8 – Richard Strauss, German composer (b. 1864)
• September 13 – August Krogh, Danish zoophysiologist, recipient of the Nobel Prize in Physiology or Medicine (b. 1874)
• September 19 – Will Cuppy, American humorist (b. 1884)
• September 19 – Nikolaos Skalkottas, Greek composer (b. 1901)
• October 27 – Marcel Cerdan, French boxer (plane crash) (b. 1916)
• October 27 – Ginette Neveu, French violinist (plane crash) (b. 1919)
• December 6 – Leadbelly, American musician (b. 1885)
• December 11 – Krishna Chandra Bhattacharya, Indian philosopher (b. 1875)
• December 16 – Sidney Olcott, Canadian movie director (b. 1873)
• December 28 – Hervey Allen, American writer (b. 1889)
• December 28 – Jack Lovelock, New Zealand athlete (b. 1910)

• Adam's Rib
• Kind Hearts and Coronets
• Samson and Delilah
• The Third Man

• The Aleph – Jorge Luis Borges
• Alien Land – Willard W. Savoy
• The Angry Wife – Pearl S. Buck
• Beneath The Sky – Alfred Q. Jarrette
• Beyond Earth's Gates – C. L. Moore
• Bright Leaf – Foster Fitzsimmons
• Cannibal – John Hawkes
• Crooked House – Agatha Christie
• The Dream Merchants – Harold Robbins
• The Egyptian – Mika Waltari
• Father of the Bride – Edward Streeter
• The Golden Sequence – Martha E. Von Almedingen
• The Heat of the Day – Elixabeth Bowen
• King of the Wind – Marguerite Henry
• Let Love Come Last – Taylor Caldwell
• Love in a Cold Climate – Nancy Mitford
• Male and Female – Margaret Mead
• The Man with the Golden Arm – Nelson Algren
• Men of Maize – Miguel Angel Asturias
• The Miracles of the Red Altar Cloth – Hermann L. Hunter
• Nineteen Eighty-Four – George Orwell
• Pride's Castle – Frank Yerby
• A Rage To Live – John O'Hara
• The Second Sex – Simone de Beauvoir
• To Hell and Back – Audie Murphy
• Shane – Jack Schaefer
• The Sheltering Sky – Paul Bowles
• A Town Like Alice – Nevil Shute
• The Trial – Franz Kafka
• Trouble with Harry – Jack Story

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