Enslaved Africans in the North American Dutch settlement New Amsterdam (New York City) are ordered to build a wall and road to protect the colonists from attacks by the Native Americans. The street is named Wall Street, and will become the world’s most powerful financial centre. Enslaved Americans remain when New York is established, and their labour is used to clear land, build stone houses, mills, bridges, a fort, the first city hall, docks for ships, the city prison, churches, the city hospital, the famous Fraunces Tavern and Trinity Church (pic) at the corner of Wall Street and Broadway.

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Enjoying a world tour in the year after his presidency ends, U.S. President Ulysses S. Grant (arrow) becomes the first person to hold the office of the U.S. presidency to visit an African country, when his ship lands in Alexandria, Egypt today. He meets with Egypt’s ruler Khedive Isma’il Pasha, sails down the Nile to the Valley of the Kings, and takes a train ride along the length of the Suez Canal. Accompanied by ships of the U.S. Navy, the tour boosts the U.S.’ standing in the world community.

The foundation is laid for St. George’s Hall on Lagos Island, to be used as the Freemasons Lodge for the British Colony and Protectorate of Southern Nigeria. Designed to showcase the permanency and stateliness of the British Empire, the front is adorned with Corinthian columns.

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The Mediterranean Sea is crossed for the first time by air as two pilots from the French Army’s Aéronautique Militaire make a round-trip crossing from France to French Algeria. They fly a Breguet 14 biplane for the trip of 1,609 km.

The first woman superhero to star in her own comic book, Sheena: Queen of the Jungle, makes her publication debut in the U.S. Like another white orphan, Tarzan, she grew up in Africa’s rainforests, where she acquired the ability to speak with wild animals. Sheena is skilled with spears, knives and bow and arrow, which she uses to save white men who routinely fall into danger at the hands of blood-thirsty African warriors, “witch-doctors,” cannibals and other racist African caricatures. Whether black or white, no man is a match for feminist icon Sheena.

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U.S. President Dwight Eisenhower launches a new American foreign policy that permits North African countries to receive economic and military aid from the U.S. if these countries are threatened by armed aggression. The policy’s goal is to reduce the region’s dependency on Egypt, which is strengthening ties with the U.S.’ Cold War rival the Soviet Union. (This aim will become irrelevant when by 1959 the relationship between Egypt and  the Soviet Union deteriorates.) France is horrified when Tunisia makes a request and is given U.S. weapons, which might be used against its old colonial master, France. Sensitive to France’s concerns, the U.S. mollifies France by assisting with its war in Vietnam. Ultimately, the U.S. fiasco with its own War in Vietnam, which it will inherit from France and which will inflame unprecedented domestic dissent, can be traced to the U.S.' desire to counter Soviet influence in North Africa.

Air Afrique begins its first jet service on its Paris-Dakar-Abidjan and Paris-Douala-Brazzaville routes, using Boeing 707 aircraft. Meanwhile, its global advertising campaign is drawing attention with dazzling posters featuring stylish graphics.

Television comes to South Africa with the first broadcast by the state South African Broadcasting Corporation, from studios in Johannesburg.

Operation Moses concludes with 8,000 Ethiopian Jews airlifted from refugee camps in Sudan to Israel. In the past two months, a team effort by the Israeli and Sudanese security forces and the U.S. has seen 40 flights carry 200 refugees per flight.

Kenya exports its first shipments of cut flowers, earning US$29 million and creating what will become a major industry. In 2022, Kenya will export nearly US$1 billion in cut flowers, and be the main supplier to the European Union, employing 150,000 Kenyans and contributing 1% of Kenya’s GDP. Kenya’s most popular exported flower is the rose.

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Kenya's urban migration has led to just 9 of the country's 47 counties holding 30% of the country's population, reports the Kenya National Bureau of Statistics. The population in Nairobi (pic) is 7,000 people per km², and Mombasa has 5,600 people per km² – and both are higher than any African city other than Cairo.