* 1961 – Rory Bremner, Scottish comedian

* 1961 – The Russian ( Soviet ) cosmonaut Yuri Gagarin becomes the first human to travel into outer space and perform the first manned orbital flight, in Vostok 3KA-2 ( Vostok 1 ).

* 1961 – Enedina Arellano Félix, Mexican drug trafficker

* 1961 – Lisa Gerrard, Australian singer, musician, and composer ( Dead Can Dance )

* 1961 – Charles Mann, American football player

* 1961 – Magda Szubanski, Australian actress

* 1961 – K-19, the first Soviet nuclear submarine equipped with nuclear missiles, is commissioned.

* 1961 – Isiah Thomas, American basketball player

* 1961 – Yolanda Adams, American singer, producer, and actress

* 1961 – Tom Ford, American fashion designer and director

* 1961 – Helmut Winklhofer, German footballer

* 1881 – Leo Carrillo, American actor ( d. 1961 )

* 1961 – Brad Gilbert, American tennis player

* 1961 – John Key, New Zealand politician, 38th Prime Minister of New Zealand

* 1961 – Amy Stiller, American comedian and actress

* 1961 – East Germany closes the border between the eastern and western sectors of Berlin to thwart its inhabitants ' attempts to escape to the West.

* 1961 – Sam Champion, American weatherman

* 1961 – Christos Christodoulou, Greek basketball player

* 1961 – Dawnn Lewis, American actress

* 1961 – Stuart Maconie, English journalist, author, and broadcaster

* 1961 – Neil Mallender, England cricketer

* 1961 – Tom Perrotta, American novelist

* 1961 – Sunil Shetty, Indian actor and producer

* 1961 – Cary Stayner, American serial killer

* 1886 – John Alexander Douglas McCurdy Canadian pilot and engineer ( d. 1961 )

* Ada ( film ), 1961 film by Daniel Mann

* 1961 – Daniel House, American bass player and producer ( 10 Minute Warning and Skin Yard )

* 1961 – Daniel Ribacoff, Brazilian lie detector expert

* 1961 – Daniel Johnston, American singer-songwriter and artist

In late 2006, the foundation sent out a holiday card featuring a picture of Electric Cord ( 1961 ), a painting that had been missing since 1970 after being sent out to art restorer Daniel Goldreyer by the Leo Castelli Gallery.

* Daniel C. Burbank ( b. 1961 ), American astronaut.

* Daniel Doustin ( 1961 – 1964 )

The fifty-four artists shown included Richard Lindner, Wayne Thiebaud, Roy Lichtenstein, Andy Warhol, Claes Oldenburg, James Rosenquist, Jim Dine, Robert Indiana, Tom Wesselmann, George Segal, Peter Phillips and Peter Blake ( his large The Love Wall from 1961 ) and Yves Klein, Arman, Daniel Spoerri, Christo, Mimmo Rotella.

* American choral music composer Mark Daniel Merritt ( 1961 -) lived in Noank during his childhood.

Texas governor Marion Price Daniel, Sr., was born in Dayton on October 10, 1910 ; his brother Bill Daniel, governor of the United States Territory of Guam from 1961 through 1963, was born in Dayton on November 20, 1915.

She was honored in 1961 with membership in the National Academy of Sciences, from which she had received the Daniel Giraud Elliot Medal in 1951.

While at Daniel from 1961 to 1963, Maravich participated in the school's first ever game against a team from an all-black school.

On 23 March 1961, Kenyan leaders, including Daniel arap Moi, later his longtime Vice President and successor as president, visited him at Lodwar.

* Daniel Flynn, the actor who plays Superintendent John Heaton in the long-running ITV1 police drama The Bill was born in Evesham in 1961 but whose family moved to Bromley, Kent when an infant.

Kristol was affiliated with the Congress for Cultural Freedom ; he wrote in Commentary magazine from 1947 to 1952, under the editor Elliot Cohen ( not to be confused with Elliot A. Cohen the writer of today's magazine ); co-founder ( with Stephen Spender ) of the British-based Encounter from 1953 to 1958 ; editor of The Reporter from 1959 to 1960 ; executive vice-president of the publishing house Basic Books from 1961 to 1969 ; Henry Luce Professor of Urban Values at New York University from 1969 to 1987 ; and co-founder and co-editor ( first with Daniel Bell and then Nathan Glazer ) of The Public Interest from 1965 to 2002.

Bertrand tried to become leader of the Union Nationale in 1961, but was defeated by his colleague Daniel Johnson, Sr., the MLA for the district of Bagot.

The City University of New York began offering doctoral education through its Division of Graduate Studies in 1961, and awarded its first two Ph. D. s to Daniel Robinson and Barbara Stern in 1965.

Robert Wexler ( born January 2, 1961 ) is the president of the Washington-based S. Daniel Abraham Center for Middle East Peace.

Daniel Gillespie Clowes ( born April 14, 1961 ) is an American author, screenwriter, and cartoonist of alternative comic books.

* Mark Daniel Merritt ( born 1961 ), American composer and arranger

Johnson became Vice President, and Governor Price Daniel, Sr., appointed fellow Democrat William A. Blakley of Dallas to Johnson's Senate seat, pending a special election to be held in May 1961.

Daniel Christopher Burbank ( born July 27, 1961 ) is an American astronaut and a veteran of two Space Shuttle missions.

In September 1961, Daniel Johnson, Sr. was elected as the new leader of the Union Nationale, thereby replacing interim party leader Talbot as the leader of the Opposition.