The 1960s world record madness

Francisco Anjo

The first world record ever recorded was in 1954. Roger Bannister ran the first-ever mile race in under 4 minutes, clocking a record time of 3 minutes 59.4 seconds at Iffley Road in Oxford on 6 May 1954. The Guinness world record book started to go massive a decade after, with people from all parts of the world trying to break these records and create new ones.

In this post, I'm just going to mention the most relevant records of the 60s decade: for example, records that were considered a mark to human history or simply by being interesting. For more information about the records just read the books of each year and you will find more detailed information about each one of them.

The 1960s records

This decade had a crucial importance in the progress of humanity. The development made in science and other areas created the possibility for new inventions and adventures for human beings. This phenomenon of the 60s caused a change in the records of that decade as well, for example, in 1964, on 17 July, Donald Campbell (UK) sets a new land speed record in Bluebird. Despite encountering a damp track at Lake Eyre in South Australia, he achieves an average speed of 648.73 km/h. A year after that, Soviet cosmonaut Lt-Col Alexei Leonov makes the first spacewalk on 18 March; he spends a total of 12 minutes and 9 seconds outside the Voskhod 2 spacecraft while orbiting Earth.

The Guinness world record book creates the possibility of these more scientific records contrasting with more interesting and fun ones. Like in 1962, where Arlon Brando, became the first actor to break the $1 million thresholds for a movie role, earning $1.25 million for his starring role as Fletcher Christian in Mutiny on the Bounty. He later goes on to break the $3 million thresholds for his role in Superman.

Currently, there are over more than 40,000 records but how far could the human being go?