The following events occurred in August 1956:
August 1, 1956 (Wednesday) The UK's Foreign Secretary Selwyn Lloyd, U.S. Ambassador Robert D. Murphy and French Foreign Affairs Minister Christian Pineau meet at 10 Downing Street to discuss the Suez Crisis.
August 2, 1956 (Thursday) UK Opposition leader Hugh Gaitskell, says of the nationalisation of the Suez Canal by Egypt: "It is all very familiar. It is exactly the same that we encountered from Mussolini and Hitler in those years before the war." Died: Albert Woolson, 106, US centenarian, last surviving Union veteran of the American Civil War
August 3, 1956 (Friday) The US athlete Willie Williams breaks the world record for the Men's 100 metres, finishing in 10.1 seconds in an event at Berlin, Germany.
August 4, 1956 (Saturday) Columbia Pictures releases its 57th and last film serial, Blazing the Overland Trail, starring Lee Roberts. Ira Murchison of the US equals the 100 metres world record set the day before by his compatriot Willie Williams in Berlin.
August 5, 1956 (Sunday) The 1956 German Grand Prix is held at Nürburgring and is won by Juan Manuel Fangio. The event was attended by future King of Spain Juan Carlos, who was supporting his relative Alfonso de Portago.
August 6, 1956 (Monday) "Columbus Geneva Steel" #35, the last major diesel locomotive constructed by Baldwin-Lima-Hamilton at Eddystone, Pennsylvania, United States, is shipped to its purchaser. In the UK, a severe hailstorm in Arundel, Sussex, causes a blockage of the A27 trunk road.
August 7, 1956 (Tuesday) US baseball player Ted Williams spits at a mocking fan during a game. He would be fined $5,000 for his conduct. Maurice Bourgès-Maunoury, France's Defence Minister, obtains support from Israel for a joint attack on Suez. An explosion occurs in Cali, Colombia, caused by the explosion of seven ammunition trucks loaded with 1053 boxes of dynamite, parked in Cali overnight. The country's president, General Gustavo Rojas Pinilla, blames the opposition. Death estimates range from 1,300 to 10,000, in a city that at the time had merely 120,000 inhabitants.
August 8, 1956 (Wednesday) Fire breaks out at the Bois du Cazier mine in Marcinelle, Belgium. 262 miners are killed, workers of twelve different nationalities; more than half are Italian.
August 9, 1956 (Thursday) About 20,000 women join a protest march in Pretoria, South Africa, directed against the country's pass laws. The exhibition This Is Tomorrow, featuring the ICA Independent Group of artists and inspired by the theories of Marshall McLuhan, opens at Whitechapel Art Gallery in London. The collaborators include Richard Hamilton, John Voelcker, John McHale and Magda Cordell.
August 10, 1956 (Friday) Russian composer Igor Stravinsky obtains an audience with Giuseppe Cardinal Roncalli, who, as Archbishop of Venice, gives permission for the performance of Stravinsky's Canticum Sacrum in St Mark's Cathedral. The piece was dedicated by Stravinsky "To the City of Venice, in praise of its Patron Saint, the Blessed Mark, Apostle". He conducted the performance himself, a month later.
August 11, 1956 (Saturday) 1956 Murray River flood: Following higher than average rainfall in Western Queensland and three months of heavy rain in the Murray-Darling basin, flood waters move down the Murray and Darling and peak at Merbein in Victoria and at Morgan in South Australia. Died: Jackson Pollock, 44, US artist, killed in a car crash, along with a passenger, while driving under the influence of alcohol
August 12, 1956 (Sunday) Hurricane Betsy makes landfall in Puerto Rico, the first Atlantic hurricane to strike the island for 24 years. Extensive damage is caused in Aibonito, Comerío and Jayuya; the worst damage is in Yabucoa. Sixteen people are killed. Around 5,000 members of the banned Romanian Greek-Catholic Church protest outside Cluj-Napoca Piarists' Church to demonstrate that despite the regime's claims their church survives. Fr. Vasile Chindriș preaches a sermon criticizing the Communist leadership, and all priests involved in the protest are later arrested and imprisoned. The All-Ireland Senior Hurling Championship and All-Ireland Football Championship finals are postponed because of an outbreak of polio which has already affected 90 people in Cork.
August 13, 1956 (Monday) Lakenheath-Bentwaters incident: Air bases in eastern England, UK, belonging to Britain's RAF and the US Air Force, experience a number of suspected UFO sightings. British swimmer Brenda Fisher swims Lake Ontario in a record time of 18 hours 51 minutes.