1941

For the 1979 Steven Spielberg movie, see 1941 (movie).

Millennium:	2nd millennium
Centuries:	19th century – 20th century – 21st century
Decades:	1910s  1920s  1930s  – 1940s –  1950s  1960s  1970s
Years:	1938 1939 1940 – 1941 – 1942 1943 1944

Events

• December 7 – The Japanese attack on Pearl Harbor. Following this, the U.S. enters World War II.
• January 6 – Franklin Delano Roosevelt delivers his Four Freedoms Speech in the State of the Union Address.
• January 10 – Lend-Lease is introduced into the United States Congress.
• January 19 – British troops attack Italian-held Eritrea.
• January 21 – World War II: Australian and British forces attack Tobruk, Libya.
• January 22 – World War II: British troops capture Tobruk from the Italians.
• January 23 – Charles Lindbergh testifies before the United States Congress and recommends that the United States negotiate a neutrality pact with Adolf Hitler.
• April 10 – Croatia declares itself independent of Yugoslavia.
• September 11 – Building of The Pentagon starts

Births

• January 3 – Van Dyke Parks, musician, composer
• January 5 – Miyazaki Hayao, Japanese movie maker
• January 5 – Grady Thomas, singer (P-Funk)
• January 8 – Graham Chapman, British comedian (d. 1989)
• January 9 – Joan Baez, American singer
• January 14 – Faye Dunaway, American actress
• January 14 – Milan Kučan, Slovene politician, statesman
• January 15 – Captain Beefheart, American singer (d. 2010)
• January 18 – David Ruffin, singer (died 1991)
• January 21 – Richie Havens, American musician (d. 2013)
• January 21 – Plácido Domingo, Spanish opera singer
• January 26 – Henry Jaglom, director
• January 26 – Scott Glenn, actor
• January 30 – Dick Cheney, former Vice President of the United States
• January 31 - Eugene Terre'Blanche, South African far-right politician (d. 2010)
• January 31 – Richard Gephardt, American politician
• February 5 – Kaspar Villiger, former member of the Swiss Federal Council
• February 8 – Nick Nolte, actor
• February 10 – Michael Apted, director
• February 11 – Glenn Randall Jr, stuntman
• February 11 – Jeremy Mackenzie, general
• February 13 – Sigmar Polke, German painter (d. 2010)
• February 16 - Kim Jong-il, North Korean supreme commander. (died 2011)
• February 17 – Julia McKenzie, actress
• February 17 – Gene Pitney, American singer (d. 2006)
• February 20 – Buffy Sainte-Marie, singer
• February 27 – Paddy Ashdown, British politician
• March 3 – Jutta Hoffmann, actress
• March 4 – Adrian Lyne, director
• March 6 – Willie Stargell, Baseball Hall of Famer (died 2001)
• March 14 – Wolfgang Petersen, director, Das Boot
• March 15 – Mike Love, musician ("The Beach Boys")
• March 16 – Bernardo Bertolucci, movie director
• March 18 – Wilson Pickett, American singer (d. 2006)
• March 26 – Richard Dawkins, British scientist
• March 30 – Wasim Sajjad, former President of Pakistan
• April 6 – Hans W. Geissendörfer, German movie director
• April 8 – Vivienne Westwood, English fashion designer
• April 14 – Pete Rose, American baseball player
• April 18 - Michael D. Higgins, President of Ireland
• April 23 – Paavo Lipponen, Prime Minister of Finland
• April 24 - Richard Holbrooke, American diplomat (d. 2010)
• May 13 – Ritchie Valens, singer (died 1959)
• May 13 – Senta Berger, actress
• May 15 – K.T. Oslin, country musician
• May 19 – Nora Ephron, American screenwriter (d. 2012)
• May 24 – Bob Dylan, American poet and musician
• June 5 – Martha Argerich, Argentinian pianist
• June 5 – Spalding Gray, actor, screenwriter, and monologue artist (died 2004)
• June 9 - Jon Lord, British musician (d. 2012)
• June 27 – Krzysztof Kieslowski, movie director
• July 14 – Maulana Karenga, writer and activist
• August 22 – Bill Parcells, NFL coach
• September 9 – Otis Redding, musician (died 1967)
• September 9 – Dennis Ritchie,American computer scientist (d. 2011)
• September 19 – Cass Elliott, singer (died 1974)
• September 28 - Edmund Stoiber, German politician
• October 4 – Anne Rice, horror/fantasy writer
• October 5 – Eduardo Duhalde former President of Argentina
• October 8 - Jesse Jackson, American pastor and civil rights leader
• October 13 – Paul Simon, American musician
• November 7 - Angelo Scola, Italian archbishop and cardinal
• November 29 – Bill Freehan, baseball player
• December 18- His Royal Highness Prince William of Gloucester
• December 31 - Alex Ferguson, Scottish football manager

Deaths

• January 5 – Amy Johnson, aviator
• January 8 – Lord Robert Baden-Powell, founder of Scouting
• January 10 – Joe Penner, comedian, actor
• January 13 – James Joyce, writer
• February 11 – Rudolf Hilferding, German economist, Minister of Finance
• February 28 – King Alfonso XIII of Spain
• March 6 – Gutzon Borglum, sculptor
• March 8 – Sherwood Anderson, writer
• March 15 – Alexej von Jawlensky, Russian impressionist painter
• May 24 – Bob Dylan, singer/songwriter
• March 28 – Virginia Woolf, writer
• June 2 – Lou Gehrig, baseball legend (born 1903)
• June 6 – Louis Chevrolet, automobile builder
• July 10 – Jelly Roll Morton – jazz musician & composer (b. 1890)
• July 11 – Arthur Evans, archaeologist
• July 26 – Henri Lebesgue, mathematician
• August 31 – Marina Tsvetaeva, Russian poet (suicide)
• August 7 – Rabindranath Tagore, writer
• September 13 – Elias Disney, American farmer and father of Walt Disney.
• November 18 – Chris Watson, third Prime Minister of Australia
• December 3 – Christian Sinding, composer

Nobel Prizes

• Nobel Prize in Physics – not awarded
• Chemistry – not awarded
• Medicine – not awarded
• Literature – not awarded
• Peace – not awarded

Movies released

• Citizen Kane