20th century facts for kids

Kids Encyclopedia Facts

Millennium:	2nd millennium
Centuries:	19th century · 20th century · 21st century
Decades:	1900s 1910s 1920s 1930s 1940s 1950s 1960s 1970s 1980s 1990s
Categories:	Births – Deaths Establishments – Disestablishments

The 20th century began on 1 January 1901 and ended on 31 December 2000. It was the century that saw two world wars, the Soviet Union rise and fall, the coming of the telephone, sound recording, film and television, airplanes, atomic weapons, genetics and DNA, computers and electronics in general. Science and industrialization spread; medicine became more scientific. The human population increased more during this century than any previous one.

Significant people
Years
Images for kids
See also

Significant people

World leaders

Richard Nixon and Leonid Brezhnev aboard the USS Sequoia, June 19, 1973

Africa
- Félix Houphouët-Boigny, Côte d'Ivoire
- Kenneth Kaunda, Zambia
- Jomo Kenyatta, Kenya
- Idi Amin, Uganda
- Nelson Mandela, South Africa
- Robert Mugabe, Zimbabwe
- Gamal Abdel Nasser, Egypt
- Kwame Nkrumah, Ghana
- Julius Nyerere, Tanzania
- Colonel Muammar Gaddafi, Libya
- Cecil Rhodes, South Africa
- Haile Selassie, Ethiopia
- Léopold Sédar Senghor, Senegal
Americas
- William McKinley, USA
- Theodore Roosevelt, USA
- Franklin Delano Roosevelt, USA
- Harry S. Truman, USA
- Dwight D. Eisenhower, USA
- John F. Kennedy, USA
- Richard Nixon, USA
- Ronald Reagan, USA
- George H. W. Bush, USA
- Bill Clinton, USA
- Wilfrid Laurier, Canada
- William Lyon Mackenzie King, Canada
- Pierre Trudeau, Canada
- Ernesto 'Che' Guevara, Argentina
- Fidel Castro, Cuba
- Raúl Castro, Cuba
- Juan Perón, Argentina
- Leopoldo Galtieri, Argentina
- Salvador Allende, Chile
- Augusto Pinochet, Chile
- Emiliano Zápata, Mexico
- Pancho Villa, Mexico
- José María Velasco Ibarra, Ecuador
- León Febres Cordero, Ecuador
- Sixto Durán Ballén, Ecuador
Asia

Chittaranjan Das with Mahatma Gandhi and Anne Beasant at the Hill Cart Road near Kakjhora, Darjeeling in 1925

- Mao Zedong, People's Republic of China
- Deng Xiaoping, People's Republic of China
- Pol Pot, Cambodia
- Netaji Subhas Chandra Bose
- Mahatma Gandhi, India
- Indira Gandhi, India
- Muhammad Ali Jinnah, Pakistan
- Sheikh Mujibur Rahman, Bangladesh
- Mahathir Mohamad, Malaysia
- Jawaharlal Nehru, India
- Deshbandhu Chittaranjan Das, India
- Emperor Hirohito, Japan
- Ho Chi Minh, Vietnam
- Sun Yat-sen, Republic of China
- Chiang Kai-shek, Republic of China
- Achmad Sukarno, Indonesia
- Lee Kuan Yew, Singapore
Europe
Middle East
- Anwar Sadat, Egypt or United Arab Republic
- David Ben-Gurion, Israel
- Golda Meir, Israel
- Menachem Begin, Israel
- Hafez al-Assad, Syria
- Saddam Hussein, Iraq
- Hussein of Jordan, Jordan
Russia and Soviet Union

Scientists and physicians

Albert Einstein is often regarded as the father of modern physics.

Economics and business

Steve Jobs holding MacBook Air at Macworld 2008

Aerospace pioneers

Neil Armstrong in an early Gemini spacesuit

Military leaders

Leon Trotsky

Religious figures

Martin Luther King, Jr., an African American civil rights leader.

Grigori Rasputin
Tobey Maguire
Pope John XXIII
Pope John Paul II
Mother Theresa of Calcutta
The 14th Dalai Lama of Tibet, Tenzin Gyatso
The Rev. Martin Luther King Jr.
The Rev. Billy Graham
Mahatma Gandhi

Artists

Singers, actors, actresses and bands

The Beatles are widely considered one of the most successful, innovative, and influential rock groups in history.

Writers and Poets

George Orwell

Sports figures

Donald Bradman

People widely known for something bad

Benito Mussolini in an official portrait

Years

Note: movie years before or after the twentieth century are in italics.

1893	1894	1895	1896	1897	1898	1899	1900	1901	1902
1903	1904	1905	1906	1907	1908	1909	1910	1911	1912
1913	1914	1915	1916	1917	1918	1919	1920	1921	1922
1923	1924	1925	1926	1927	1928	1929	1930	1931	1932
1933	1934	1935	1936	1937	1938	1939	1940	1941	1942
1943	1944	1945	1946	1947	1948	1949	1950	1951	1952
1953	1954	1955	1956	1957	1958	1959	1960	1961	1962
1963	1964	1965	1966	1967	1968	1969	1970	1971	1972
1973	1974	1975	1976	1977	1978	1979	1980	1981	1982
1983	1984	1985	1986	1987	1988	1989	1990	1991	1992
1993	1994	1995	1996	1997	1998	1999	2000	2001	2002
2003	2004	2005	2006	2007	2008	2009	2010	2011	2012

Images for kids

The Blue Marble, Earth as seen from Apollo 17 in December 1972. The photograph was taken by LMP Harrison Schmitt. The second half of the 20th century saw humanity's first space exploration.
Map of the British Empire (as of 1910). At its height, it was the largest empire in history.
World powers and empires in 1914, just before the First World War. (The Austro-Hungarian flag should be shown instead of the Austrian Empire's one)
Anachronous world map showing member states of the League of Nations, the first global international body of governance created to prevent war after World War I, during its 26-year interwar period history.
The mushroom cloud of the detonation of Little Boy, the first nuclear attack in history, on 6 August of 1945 over Hiroshima, igniting the nuclear age with the international security dominating thread of mutual assured destruction in the latter half of the 20th century.
The international community grew in the second half of the century significantly due to a new wave of decolonization, particularly in Africa. Most of the newly independent states, were grouped together with many other so called developing country. Developing countries gained attention, particularly due to rapid population growth, leading to a record world population of nearly 7 billion people by the end of the century.
I and the Village, 1911, by Marc Chagall, a modern painter.
Elvis Presley in 1956, a leading figure of rock & roll and rockabilly.
Charlie Chaplin in his 1921 film The Kid, with Jackie Coogan.
Ralph Baer's Magnavox Odyssey, the first video game console, released in 1972.
The Empire State Building is an iconic building of the 1930s.
The pioneer of computer science, Alan Turing
A stamp commemorating Alexander Fleming. His discovery of penicillin had changed the world of modern medicine by introducing the age of antibiotics.
First flight of the Wright brothers' Wright Flyer on December 17, 1903, in Kitty Hawk, North Carolina; Orville piloting with Wilbur running at wingtip.
Photo of American astronaut Buzz Aldrin during the first moonwalk in 1969, taken by Neil Armstrong. The relatively young aerospace engineering industries rapidly grew in the 66 years after the Wright brothers' first flight.