The massive Seattle-built Boeing B-52 Stratofortress, a long-distance U.S. bomber intended initially to be equipped with turboprop engines to attain the necessary range, is instead equipped with eight powerful Pratt & Whitney turbojet engines, and enters the Strategic Air Command in 1955.

German-American physicist Hans Georg Dehmelt served in the German army during the Second World War, was captured in battle, sent to an American prisoner-of-war camp, and then returned to Germany in 1946.

After attending Breslau Technical University, the University of Göttingen, and the Institute of Hans Kopfermann, where in 1950 he earns his Ph.D., he goes to the University of Washington, Seattle, as a visiting assistant professor.

In 1955, he develops the Penning trap, which can confine electrons and ions in a small space for long periods in relative isolation.

Australian novelist Patrick White explores universal themes of suffering and success in “The Tree of Man,” published in 1955; it earns him his second Australian Literature Society Gold Medal.

Mount Everest’s first European conqueror, Sir Edmund Hilary, writes “High Adventure” in 1955.

Mount Everest’s first European conqueror, Sir Edmund Hilary, writes “High Adventure.”

Australian novelist Patrick White explores universal themes of suffering and success in “The Tree of Man,” which earns him his second Australian Literature Society Gold Medal.

Australian painter Sidney Nolan follows his early Ned Kelly paintings with a second series in 1955.

Australian playwright Ray Lawler’s “Summer of the Seventeenth Doll” opens to great acclaim in 1955.

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Prolific English composer Eugene Goossen, from 1947 conductor of the Sydney Symphony and director of the New South Wales Conservatorium, is knighted in 1955 at the age of sixty-two.

Australian playwright Ray Lawler’s “Summer of the Seventeenth Doll” opens to great acclaim.

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