The tennis Grand Slam has only been accomplished nine times in the same calendar year in either singles or doubles and Rod Laver did it in men singles in 1962.

Margaret Smith Court won women's singles in Australia, France and the U.S. Open.

John F. Kennedy was President of the United States.

The National Book Awards that year went to:
For Fiction: The Moviegoer by Walker Percy
For Nonfiction: The City in History: Its Origins, Its Transformations and Its Prospects by Lewis Mumford
And For Poetry: Poems, Alan Dugan

We lost:

• Ted Husing - sportscaster
• Kirsten Flagstad - Wagnerian soprano
• Charles Laughton - actor
• Fritz Kreisler - violinist and composer
• Niels Bohr - atomic physicist
• Ernie Kovacs - comedian
• Isak Dinesen (Karen Blixen) - author
• Adolf Eichmann - Nazi and mass murderer
• Eleanor Roosevelt - First Lady, reformer and humanitarian

The Academy Awards for that year went to:
Best Picture: Lawrence of Arabia
Best Actor: Gregory Peck for his role in To Kill a Mockingbird
Best Actress: Anne Bancroft for her role in The Miracle Worker

The Tony Awards for that year went to:
Best Play: A Man for All Seasons
Best Musical: How to Succeed in Business Without Really Trying
Best Actor-Play: Paul Scofield, A Man for All Seasons
Best Actress-Play: Margaret Leighton, Night of the Iguana

The Unemployment Rate in the Civilian Labor Force 1962 was 5.5%

1962 World Series had the Minnesota Twins vs San Francisco Giants - with the Giants winning.

John Glenn went into space for the first time.

The Second Vatican Council began their meetings in Rome.

The structure of DNA was discovered.

Russia and the United States almost go to Nuclear War over Cuba.

1962 - What a year!