Timeline 1939
Return to home
1939 Jan 1, In
Palo Alto, Ca., the Hewlett-Packard partnership was formed and a coin
toss determined the order of the company name.
(SFC, 3/3/99, p.A11)
1939 Jan 2, Jim Bakker,
televangelist (PTL Club), was born.
(MC, 1/2/02)
1939 Jan 3, Bobby Hull ‘The Golden
Jet’: Hockey Hall of Famer, was born: Chicago Blackhawks left wing:
Hart Memorial Trophy, NHL’s MVP award [1965, 1966]; Lady Byng Trophy
for good sportsmanship [1965]; 1st pro hockey player to score more than
50 goals in one season [54: 1965].
(440 Int'l. 1/3/99)
1939 Jan 3, Tennis legend Don
Budge played a pro tennis match, his first in Madison Square Garden,
NY, before 6,000 spectators. Budge was touring the country as the top
U.S. tennis player, having won the grand slam of tennis (Australian,
French and U.S. Opens and Wimbledon) the year before.
(440 Int'l. 1/3/99)
1939 Jan 4, Hermann Goering
appointed Reinhard Heydrich as head of Jewish Emigration.
(MC, 1/4/02)
1939 Jan 6, Alfred Lion recorded
his first Blue Note session with boogie-woogie and blues pianists
Albert Ammons and Meade Lux Lewis. He had just founded the jazz label
in New York. He was later joined by his Berlin friend and photographer
Francis Wolff.
(WSJ, 10/3/97, p.A8)(WSJ, 1/15/98, p.W10)
1939 Jan 7, Tom Mooney
(1882-1942), California imprisoned labor leader, was pardoned by newly
elected Democratic Governor Culbert Olson (1876-1962). Mooney had been
convicted and imprisoned for over 22 years for the SF Preparedness Day
Bombing of 1916.
(http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Thomas_Mooney)(www.atheists.org/Atheism/roots/olson/)
1939 Jan 13, Jacob Ruppert, CEO of
the NY Yankees (1915-39), died.
(MC, 1/13/02)
1939 Jan 15, In the 1st NFL pro
bowl the NY Giants beat the All Stars 13-10 in Wrigley Field.
(MC, 1/15/02)
1939 Jan 16, The comic strip
"Superman" debuted.
(MC, 1/16/02)
1939 Jan 16, Franklin D. Roosevelt
asked for an extension of the Social Security Act to more women and
children.
(HN, 1/16/99)
1939 Jan 16, Albert Fish, mass
murderer, was executed.
(MC, 1/16/02)
1939 Jan 17, The Reich issued an
order forbidding Jews to practice as dentists, veterinarians and
chemists.
(HN, 1/17/99)
1939 Jan 19, Ernest Hausen of
Wisconsin set a chicken-plucking record of 4.4 sec.
(MC, 1/19/02)
1939 Jan 20, Hitler proclaimed to
German parliament his intention to exterminate all European Jews.
(MC, 1/20/02)
1939 Jan 21, Wolfman Jack, DJ
(Midnight Special), was born in Brooklyn, NY as Bob Smith.
(MC, 1/21/02)
1939 Jan 21, Picasso painted two
pictures, both titled "Reclining Woman with Book." In one Marie-Theresa
Walter is pictured in a smooth S-curve, in the other Dora Maar (born as
Theodora Markovitch d.1997 at 89) is broken into jagged forms. Maar was
a painter and photographer and struggled to develop her own ambitions,
but failed and spent much of her life as a recluse.
(WSJ, 4/26/96, p.A-13)(SFC, 7/26/97, p.A24)
1939 Jan 22, A Nazi order erased
the old officer caste, tying the army directly to the Party.
(HN, 1/22/99)
1939 Jan 24, Some 28-30,000 were
killed by magnitude 8.3 earthquake in Chillan, Chile.
(MC, 1/24/02)(AP, 6/22/02)
1939 Jan 25, The cyclotron of
Nebraska-born nuclear physicist John R. (Ray) Dunning (31) produced
nuclear fission for the first time in America in Room 128 of Columbia
University's Pupin Physics Laboratory. Eugene T. Booth was a member of
the experimental team which conducted the first nuclear fission
experiment in the US; the other members of the team were Herbert L.
Anderson, John R. Dunning, Enrico Fermi, G. Norris Glasoe, and Francis
G. Slack.
(www.enotes.com/peoples-chronology/year-1939/science)
1939 Jan 26, Franco conquered
Barcelona.
(MC, 1/26/02)
1939 Jan 27, President Franklin D.
Roosevelt approved the sale of U.S. war planes to France.
(HN, 1/27/99)
1939 Jan 29, Germaine Greer,
feminist, author (Female Eunuch), was born in Melbourne, Australia.
(MC, 1/29/02)
1939 Jan 30, Felix Frankfurter
(1882-1965), Harvard law professor, was sworn in as the 80th US Supreme
Court Justice (1939-62). He retired in 1962. "There is no inevitability
in history except as men make it."
(AP, 2/27/98)(HNQ,
3/16/99)(www.oyez.org/oyez/resource/legal_entity/78/)
1939 Feb 1, Benny Goodman and his
Orchestra recorded "And the Angels Sing", on Victor Records, on this
day. The vocalist on that number, who went on to find considerable fame
at Capitol Records, was Martha Tilton.
(440 Int'l, 2/1/1999)
1939 Feb 1, Contralto Marian
Anderson was denied a performance at Constitution Hall by the Daughters
of the American Revolution, who owned the place. She performed instead
on Easter Sunday at the Lincoln Memorial at the invitation of the Dept.
Of the Interior.
(WSJ, 2/28/97, p.A14)(WSJ, 7/24/98, p.W11)
1939 Feb 2, Hungary broke
relations with the Soviet Union.
(HN, 2/2/99)
1939 Feb 6, Spanish government
fled to France.
(MC, 2/6/02)
1939 Feb 10, Pope Pius XI died in
Rome. He was born in Desio, Italy, as Ambrogio Damiano Achille Ratti.
(www.nndb.com/people/327/000088063/)
1939 Feb 10, Japan occupied the
Chinese island of Hainan located off the coast of French Indochina
(modern day Vietnam).
(HN, 2/10/97)
1939 Feb 11, The Negrin government
returned to Madrid, Spain.
(HN, 2/11/97)
1939 Feb 11, Franz Schmidt (64),
Austrian composer, died.
(MC, 2/11/02)
1939 Feb 14, The Reich launched
the battleship Bismarck.
(HN, 2/14/98)
1939 Feb 15, Lillian Hellman's
"Little Foxes," premiered in NYC.
(MC, 2/15/02)
1939 Feb 18, The Golden Gate
International Exposition opened on Treasure Island in the SF Bay.
(HN, 2/18/98)(SFC, 2/18/99, p.D10)
1939 Feb 24, Hungary signed an
anti-Communist pact with Italy, Germany and Japan.
(HN, 2/24/98)
1939 Feb 27, The US Supreme Court,
in Leser v. Garnett, unanimously upheld the 19th Amendment to the
Constitution that guaranteed the right of women to vote.
(HN, 2/27/98)(AP, 2/27/08)
1939 Feb 27, Nadezjda K. Krupskaja
(70), Russian revolutionary, wife of Lenin, died.
(MC, 2/27/02)
1939 Feb 28, Tommy Tune, dancer,
choreographer (Boyfriend), was born in Wichita Falls, Tx.
(MC, 2/28/02)
1939 Feb 28, Great Britain
recognized the Franco regime in Spain.
(MC, 2/28/02)
1939 Feb, In Washington DC Cissy
Patterson combined the afternoon Times and the morning Herald
newspapers.
(SFEM, 3/2/97, p.22)
1939 Mar 2, The Massachusetts
legislature voted to ratify the Bill of Rights, 147 years after the
first 10 amendments to the U.S. Constitution had gone into effect.
(AP, 3/2/98)
1939 Mar 2, Roman Catholic
Cardinal Eugenio Pacelli was elected Pope; he took the name Pius XII.
(WSJ, 4/25/97, p.A18)(WSJ, 5/8/97, p.A23)(AP, 3/2/98)
1939 Mar 2, Howard Carter,
archeologist, died in London at age 62. He led the discovery of the
Tomb of Tutankhamen in 1922.
(ON, 5/00, p.8)
1939 Mar 3, The new Goldfish
swallowing craze began to sweep college campuses getting a start at the
Ivy League’s Harvard University.
(HC, Internet, 3/3/98)
1939 Mar 3, Eleanor Roosevelt
christened Pan Am's new Boeing built Yankee Clipper.
(SFEM, 2/13/00, p.38)
1939 Mar 3, In Bombay, Ghandi
began a fast to protest the state's autocratic rule.
(HN, 3/3/99)
1939 Mar 4, Laurence Steinhardt
was named as the U.S. ambassador to the USSR
(HN, 3/4/98)
1939 Mar 6, Jose Miaja took over
the Madrid government after a military coup and vowed to seek "peace
with honor."
(HN, 3/6/98)
1939 Mar 7, Guy Lombardo and Royal
Canadians made the 1st recording of "Auld Lang Syne."
(MC, 3/7/02)
1939 Mar 8, Robert Tear, tenor
(Welsh Nat’l Opera 1970), was born in Barry, Wales.
(MC, 3/8/02)
1939 Mar 9, Czech President Emil
Hacha ousted pro-German Joseph Tiso as the Premier of Slovakia in order
to preserve Czech unity.
(HN, 3/9/98)
1939 Mar 12, Pope Pius XII was
formally crowned in ceremonies at the Vatican.
(HN, 3/12/98)(AP, 3/12/98)
1939 Mar 14, Nash Kelvinator and
IBM were removed from the DJIA. AT&T was again added to the DJIA
along with United Aircraft.
(WSJ, 4/2/04, p.C4)
1939 Mar 14, The republic of
Czechoslovakia was dissolved, opening the way for Nazi occupation of
Czech areas and the separation of Slovakia.
(AP, 3/14/08)
1939 Mar 15, Germany occupied
Bohemia and Moravia, Czechoslovakia. Slovakia became independent
(Voruta #27-28, Jul 1996, p.2)(WSJ, 12/12/96,
p.A13)(HN, 3/15/98)(MC, 3/15/02)
1939 Mar 15, The Republic of
Carpatho-Ukraine, led by Avhustyn Voloshyn (d.1945), declared
independence amid the Nazi dismemberment of Czechoslovakia.
Independence ending that same evening by an invasion from Hungary. In
1946 the area became part of the Ukrainian Soviet Socialist Republic,
as the Zakarpattia Oblast ('Transcarpathian Oblast'). After the
break-up of the Soviet Union, it became part of independent Ukraine as
Zakarpattia Oblast.
(Econ, 3/14/09,
p.57)(http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Carpatho-Ukraine)
1939 Mar 16, Germany occupied the
rest Czechoslovakia.
(HN, 3/16/99)
1939 Mar 18, The U.S. raised the
duties on German imports by 25 percent.
(HN, 3/18/98)
1939 Mar 18, Georgia finally
ratified the Bill of Rights, 150 years after the birth of the federal
government. Connecticut and Massachusetts, the only other states to
hold out, also accepted the Bill of Rights in this year.
(HN, 3/18/98)
1939 Mar 20, Franklin D. Roosevelt
named William O. Douglas to the Supreme Court. He replaced Louis D.
Brandeis (1856-1941), appointed in 1916, who retired.
(HN,
3/20/98)(http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Louis_Brandeis)
1939 Mar 21, Singer Kate Smith
recorded "God Bless America" for Victor Records. She introduced the
song on her radio program in 1938.
(HN, 3/21/98)(SFC, 12/28/99, p.C5)
1939 Mar 21, In Egypt King Farouk
arrived at Tanis for the opening of the coffin of the 21st Dynasty King
Psusennes I, recently discovered by French archeologist Pierre Montet.
It turned out that this coffin actually belonged to Sheshonq II of the
22nd Dynasty.
(Arch, 5/05, p.21)
1939 Mar 21, Nazi Germany demanded
Gdansk (Danzig) from Poland.
(MC, 3/21/02)
1939 Mar 21, Ghandi called on the
world to disarm, thinking that Hitler would follow.
(HN, 3/21/98)
1939 Mar 22, Germany marched into
Klaipeda (Memel), Lithuania. The Lithuanian warship Prezidentas Smetona
was left without a harbor. The ship soon settled at Latvia’s port of
Liepaja. In December Ltn. P. Labanauskas was named captain. In 1940
Soviet occupiers called for the ship to raise the Soviet flag, but
Captain Labanauskas sailed the ship out of Soviet territory. The ship
was later handed over to the Soviet Baltic fleet. On Jan 11, 1945, it
hit a mine and sank off the coast of
Finland.
(Voruta #27-28, Jul 1996,
p.2)(http://tinyurl.com/cs545k)
1939 Mar 25, Billboard Magazine
introduced the hillbilly (country) music chart.
(MC, 3/25/02)
1939 Mar 28, Philip Barry's
"Philadelphia Story," premiered in NYC.
(MC, 3/28/02)
1939 Mar 28, Clark Gable (d.1960)
and Carol Lombard (d.1942) stayed at the Arizona Oatman Hotel for their
honeymoon. [see Mar 29]
(SSFC, 6/17/01, p.T8)
1939 Mar 28, The Spanish Civil War
ended as Madrid fell to Francisco Franco. He emerged victorious and
became head of Fascist Spain ending the Spanish Civil War. France
executed more than 100,000 people who had opposed him. In 1982 Dan
Richardson wrote "Comintern Army," a historical work on the Spanish
Civil War. "The Historical Dictionary of the Spanish Civil War" was
published in 1982. In 1991 Burnett Bolloten wrote "The Spanish Civil
War." In 2006 Antony Beevor authored “The Battle for Spain: The Spanish
Civil War 1936-1936.” This was an update of his 1982 account.
(SFC, 11/12/96, p.A12)(AP, 3/28/97)(HN,
3/28/98)(WSJ, 11/19/96, p.A22)(Econ, 6/24/06, p.97)
1939 Mar 29, Clark Gable (38)
married Carole Lombard (29) in Arizona while filming "Gone With the
Wind." [see Mar 28]
(SFEM, 1/25/98, p.47)
1939 Mar 31, Britain and France
agreed to support Poland if Germany threatened to invade. Seven French
islands were annexed by Japan.
(HN, 3/31/98)
1939 Mar, Mussolini of Italy
delivered an ultimatum to Albania.
(www, Albania, 1998)
1939 Mar, In Slovakia Germany set
up a puppet regime. The Jewish community was estimated to number 70,000
at the start of the war. Fewer than 10,000 survived the war.
(SFC, 6/28/97, p.A11)
1939 Apr 1, The United States
recognized the Franco government in Spain following the end of the
Spanish civil war. A Spanish official later said that without American
petroleum and American trucks and American credit we could never have
won the civil war.
(AP, 4/1/98)(Econ, 6/24/06, p.97)
1939 Apr 2, Marvin P. Gaye Jr,
singer (Sexual Healing), was born in Wash, DC.
(MC, 4/2/02)
1939 Apr 5, Membership in Hitler
Youth became obligatory.
(MC, 4/5/02)
1939 Apr 6, Great Britain and
Poland signed a military pact.
(MC, 4/6/02)
1939 Apr 7, Francis Ford Coppola,
director (Godfather, Apocalypse Now), was born in Detroit.
(MC, 4/7/02)
1939 Apr 7, Italy invaded Albania,
which offered only token resistance. Less than a week later, Italy
annexed Albania. [see Apr 8]
(AP, 4/7/99)
1939 Apr 8, Italy, under Fascist
dictatorship led by Benito Mussolini seized the country of Albania. The
Albanian parliament voted to unite Albania with Italy; King Zog fled to
Greece. Under Mussolini’s totalitarian rule Italy embarked on expansion
and military conquest. Ethiopia fell victim, conquered by Italy in
1936. Italy’s foreign policy cooperation with Germany began in 1936 and
both joined forces to intervene in the Spanish Civil War on the side of
Francisco Franco’s rebel forces. Italy’s military alliance with Germany
was struck in 1939. [see Apr 7]
(HN, 4/8/98)(www, Albania, 1998)
1939 Apr 9, On Easter Sunday
Marion Anderson, at the invitation of Secretary of the Interior Harold
L. Ickes, sang a triumphant outdoor concert at the Lincoln Memorial
before a crowd of 75,000 and a radio audience of millions. In early
1939, the Daughters of the American Revolution denied the
internationally famed contralto the opportunity to sing at Constitution
Hall in Washington, D.C., because of her race. First Lady Eleanor
Roosevelt was so dismayed by the injustice that she resigned her own
D.A.R. membership in protest.
(AP, 4/9/97)(WSJ, 7/24/98, p.W11) (HNPD, 4/9/99)
1939 Apr 11, SS Van Dine (50),
[William Huntingdon Wright], detective writer, died.
(MC, 4/11/02)
1939 Apr 12, Alan Ayckbourn,
playwright, was born in London.
(MC, 4/12/02)
1939 Apr 13, Seamus Heaney, Irish
poet, Nobel laureate, was born.
(HN, 4/13/01)
1939 Apr 13, Paul Sorvino, actor,
was born.
(MC, 4/13/02)
1939 Apr 13, W. Saroyan's "My
Heart's in the Highlands," premiered in NYC.
(MC, 4/13/02)
1939 Apr 14, The John Steinbeck
novel "The Grapes of Wrath" was first published.
(SFEC, 11/3/96, DB p.71)(AP, 4/14/97)
1939 Apr 14, The motion picture
"Wuthering Heights," starring Merle Oberon and Laurence Olivier,
premiered in New York.
(AP, 4/14/99)
1939 Apr 16, Toni Matt on Mt.
Washington in New Hampshire’s White Mountains raced down the headwall
on wooden skis in a record 6 min. and 29.4 sec.
(WSJ, 4/17/97, p.A1,10)
1939 Apr 16, Stalin requested a
British, French and Russian anti-Nazi pact.
(MC, 4/16/02)
1939 Apr 17, S.N. Behrman's "No
Time for Comedy," premiered in NYC.
(MC, 4/17/02)
1939 Apr 18, Franz von Papen
became German ambassador in Turkey.
(MC, 4/18/02)
1939 Apr 19, Connecticut finally
approved Bill of Rights.
(HN, 4/19/97)
1939 Apr 20, The Kehlsteinhous,
aka the Eagle’s Nest, a mountaintop teahouse located in the Kehlstein
mountains near Berchtesgaden, was given to Adolf Hitler as a 50th
birthday present.
(SSFC, 8/6/06, p.G4)
1939 Apr 28, Hitler claimed the
German-Polish non-attack treaty to be still in effect.
(MC, 4/28/02)
1939 Apr 29, Whitestone Bridge,
connecting Bronx and Queens, opened.
(MC, 4/29/02)
1939 Apr 30, The New York World’s
Fair, billed as a look at "the world of tomorrow," officially opened.
NY Mayor Fiorello LaGuardia mandated that the city's nude dancers cover
up during the fair. The cover-up evolved into the G-string and later
the thong. The General Motors exhibit was titled Futurama. Philo T.
Farnsworth premiered his television at the fair. AT&T presented its
first Picture Phone at the World's Fair. Salvador Dali created a
pavilion that was called “Dream of Venus” and described as the “funny
house of tomorrow.” In 2000 Miles Beller authored "Dream of Venus (Or
Living Pictures): A Novel of the 1939 New York world’s Fair." National
Presto Industries introduced the home pressure cooker at the fair.
(AP, 4/30/97)(WSJ, 6/7/99, p.A8)(SFEC, 4/16/00, BR
p.7)(NYTBR, 2/2/03, p.20) (www.imdb.com/title/tt0149460/trivia)(WSJ,
12/27/08, p.A7)
1939 Apr, In Czechoslovakia Alois
Elias, an army general, became prime minister more than a month after
the occupation of his country by Nazi Germany began. He maintained ties
with the exiled Czechoslovak government in London and supported
underground resistance at home throughout his term. He was sentenced to
death in October 1941 for high treason and espionage and was executed
on June 19, 1942.
(AP, 5/7/06)
1939 May 1, Judy Collins, singer
(Send in the Clowns, Clouds), was born in Seattle, Wash.
(MC, 5/1/02)
1939 May 1, Batman comics hit the
street. Bob Kane (d.1998 at 83) created Batman for DC Comics. The
cartoon hero was based on Zorro, da Vinci’s sketch of a flying man, and
a silent mystery movie titled "The Bat."
(SFC, 11/6/98, p.D5)(SFC, 12/14/00, p.C9)(WSJ,
10/25/02, p.A1)(MC, 5/1/02)
1939 May 2, Baseball player Henry
Louis Gehrig, "the Iron Horse," asked to be taken out of the NY Yankees
starting lineup in a game where the Yanks beat Tigers 22-2. He had
played 2,130 consecutive games. A few weeks later he was diagnosed with
amyotrophic lateral schlerosis, a fatal neuromuscular disease.
(SFEC, 3/30/97, Par. p.2)(SFEC, 3/30/97, BR.
p.10)(MC, 5/2/02)
1939 May 4, Amos Oz, Israeli
novelist (The Black Box, The Third State), was born.
(HN, 5/4/01)
1939 May 6, 1st performance of
Honegger and Claudel's "Jeanne d'Arc at the Stake."
(MC, 5/6/02)
1939 May 7, Germany and Italy
announced a military and political alliance known as the Rome-Berlin
Axis.
(AP, 5/7/97)
1939 May 12, Ronald Ziegler, press
secretary to Pres. Nixon, was born.
(MC, 5/12/02)
1939 May 13, Harvey Keitel, actor
(Taxi Driver, Pulp Fiction, Reservoir Dogs), was born.
(MC, 5/13/02)
1939 May 13, The SS St Louis
departed Hamburg with some 937 passengers including over 900 Jewish
refugees. They sought refuge in Cuba, but only 22 were allowed to
disembark there. No country in the Americas would take them. It
returned to Germany where a number of the Jews were later murdered.
[see May 27, June 4 and June 16]
(http://thomas.loc.gov/cgi-bin/query/z?c107:H.+Con.+Res.+185:)(WSJ,
11/3/98, p.A20)
1939 May 15, US Supreme Court
Justice James McReynolds in the US vs. Miller case said that the 2nd
Amendment did not bar restrictions on the ownership of sawed-off
shotguns, because the regulations did not have a "reasonable
relationship" to militias. A District Court had held that section
eleven of the National firearms Act violates the Second Amendment. It
accordingly sustained the demurrer and quashed the indictment. The
Supreme Court rejected the decision of the lower court.
(USAT, 12/23/98,
p.10A)(www.hoboes.com/Politics/Firearms/miller/)
1939 May 16, US food stamps were
1st issued.
(MC, 5/16/02)
1939 May 19, Churchill signed
British-Russian anti-Nazi pact.
(DTnet, 5/19/97)
1939 May 20, Regular
trans-Atlantic air mail service began as a Pan American Airways plane,
the Yankee Clipper, took off from Port Washington, N.Y., bound for
Marseilles, France.
(AP,
5/20/97)(www.airliner.net/pan-am-clipper-flying-boat/transatlantic-airline-service/)
1939 May 22, The foreign ministers
of Germany and Italy, Joachim von Ribbentrop and Galeazzo Ciano, signed
a "Pact of Steel" committing Germany and Italy to a military alliance
forming the Axis powers.
(HN, 5/22/99)(AP, 5/22/07)
1939 May 23, The US submarine
Squalus sank off the coast of New Hampshire. A diving bell designed by
Charles "Swede" Momsen (d.1967) brought 33 survivors (26 perished)
safely to the surface. In 1999 Peter Maas authored "The Terrible
Hours," an account of the sinking and rescue. This was the first
successful undersea rescue operation to retrieve a sunken submarine crew
(SFEC, 9/26/99, Par p.4,5)(WSJ, 8/17/00, p.A22)(HNQ,
5/29/01)
1939 May 23, British parliament
planned to make Palestine independent by 1949.
(MC, 5/23/02)
1939 May 23, Hitler proclaimed he
wants to move into Poland.
(MC, 5/23/02)
1939 May 23, Dmitri Shostakovitch
was appointed professor at conservatory of Leningrad.
(MC, 5/23/02)
1939 May 25, Dixie [Virginia]
Carter, actress (Designing Women, Edge of Night), was born in
McLemoresville, TN.
(SC, 5/25/02)
1939 May 25, Ian McKellen, actor
(Keep, Plenty, Scarlet Pimpernel), was born in England.
(SC, 5/25/02)
1939 May 25, Joseph Duveen
(b.1869), Dutch-Jewish art collector, died in London. In 2004 Meryle
Secrest authored “Duveen: A Life in Art.”
(Econ, 11/20/04,
p.86)(www.britannica.com/eb/article?tocId=9031630)
1939 May 26, Charles H. Mayo (74),
US surgeon, co-founder (Mayo Clinic), died.
(MC, 5/26/02)
1939 May 27, The ship St. Louis
sailed into Havana Bay with 937 Jewish passengers fleeing the Nazis.
The ship was turned away and headed for the Florida coast. The 1976
film "Voyage of the Damned" was based on this. [see June 4]
(SFC, 10/4/99, p.D1)
1939 May 27, Joseph Roth,
Austrian-born Jewish writer, died in Paris. His books included
“Radetzkymarsch” (The Radetzky March) (1932), a novel of the Habsburg
empire from 1859-1916 and “The Auto-da-Fe of the Mind.”
(www.kirjasto.sci.fi/jroth.htm)
1939 May 29, Nanette Newman,
writer, actress (Endless Game, Of Human Bondage), was born.
(SC, 5/29/02)
1939 May 29, Joseph Grinnell,
founding director of the Museum of Vertebrate Zoology at UC Berkeley,
died.
(SSFC, 11/27/05,
p.E1)(www.esa.org/history/officers.php)
1939 May 31, Terry Waite, Anglican
Church envoy, Lebanese hostage, was born.
(MC, 5/31/02)
1939 May, John Hench (d.2004)
joined Disney as a sketch artist on "Fantasia." He was the official
portrait painter of Mickey Mouse.
(SFC, 2/7/04, p.A21)
1939 May, The Ravensbruck
concentration camp opened in northern Germany. It was primarily set up
for women. Between 1939 and 1945, over 130,000 female prisoners passed
through the Ravensbrück camp system; only 40,000 survived.
(http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ravensbr%C3%BCck)
1939 Jun 1, The Douglas DC-4 made
its first passenger flight from Chicago to New York.
(HN, 6/1/98)
1939 Jun 1, Submarine Thetis:
sank in Liverpool Bay, England; 99 perished.
(DTnet, 6/1/97)
1939 Jun 4, During what became
known as the "Voyage of the Damned," the SS St. Louis, carrying 907
Jewish refugees from Germany, was turned away from the Florida coast.
Also denied permission to dock in Canada and Cuba, the ship eventually
returned to Europe. The passengers were divided among England, France,
Belgium and Holland and a number of the refugees later died in Nazi
concentration camps. By 2003 efforts to track their fates identified
935 out of the 937 passengers. Some 260 ended in Nazi killing centers.
(AP, 6/4/99)(SFC, 10/4/99, p.D3)(SSFC, 12/7/03, Par
p.5)(Econ, 6/24/06, p.44)
1939 Jun 5, Margaret Drabble,
English novelist (The Millstone, The Realms of Gold), was born.
(HN, 6/5/01)
1939 Jun 6, Marian Wright Edelman,
first African-American woman to be admitted to the Mississippi Bar, was
born. She was the founder of the Children's Defense Fund.
(HN, 6/6/00)
1939 Jun 7, King George VI and his
wife, Queen Elizabeth, arrived at Niagara Falls, N.Y., from Canada on
the first visit to the United States by a reigning British monarch.
(AP, 6/7/97)
1939 Jun 8, Herb Adderley, Hall of
Famer and defensive back for the Green Bay Packers.
(HN, 6/8/99)
1939 Jun 11, King & Queen of
England tasted their 1st "hot dogs" at FDR's party.
(SC, 6/11/02)
1939 Jun 12, The National Baseball
Hall of Fame and Museum was dedicated in Cooperstown, N.Y., on the
100th anniversary of the day Abner Doubleday supposedly invented the
sport.
(AP, 6/12/97)
1939 Jun 16-1939 Jun 20, Jewish
refugees, whose quest for freedom in the Americas was denied, began to
disembark the SS St. Louis back in Europe. Holland took 181, France
received 224, 228 went to Great Britain, and 214 went to Belgium. [see
May 13 and June 4]
(www.iearn.org/hgp/aeti/aeti-1999/ushmm-and-st-louis2.htm)
1939 Jun 17, Eugene Weldman became
the last person guillotined in France.
(MC, 6/17/02)
1939 Jun 21, Baseball legend Lou
Gehrig was forced to quit baseball because of amyotrophic lateral
sclerosis.
(HN, 6/21/98)
1939 Jun 28, Pan American Airways
began regular trans-Atlantic passenger air service as the "Dixie
Clipper" left Port Washington, N.Y., for Portugal.
(AP, 6/28/99)(NPub, 2002, p.13)
1939 Jun 28, Richard Meinertzhagen
(1877-1967, a British army colonel, met with Adolf Hitler to plead on
behalf of the Jews in Germany. He later claimed to have smuggled a
pistol into the chancellery but lost his nerve and failed to shoot
Hitler. In 2007 Brian Garfield authored “The Meinertzhagen Mystery.”
(WSJ, 2/10/07, p.P9)
1939 Jun 30, Frank Sinatra made
his first appearance with the Harry James' band.
(MC, 6/30/02)
1939 Jul 2, John Sununu, US
Secretary of State (1989-91), was born.
(SC, 7/2/02)
1939 Jul 3, Ernst Heinkel
demonstrated an 800-kph rocket plane to Hitler.
(MC, 7/3/02)
1939 Jul 4, Baseball's "Iron
Horse," Lou Gehrig (1904-1941), said farewell to 61,808 fans honoring
him with a special day at New York City's Yankee Stadium. He was
suffering from A.L.S. (amyotrophic lateral sclerosis), a
neurodegenerative disorder that destroys the body's neuromuscular
system. Many now call it Lou Gehrig's disease. He did less than two
years later at the age of 37.
(SFEC, 3/30/97, Par. p.2)(AP, 7/4/97)(IB, Internet,
12/7/98)
1939 Jul 6, Nazis closed the last
Jewish enterprises.
(MC, 7/6/02)
1939 Jul 8, Henry Havelock Ellis
(80), English sexologist (Man & Woman), died.
(MC, 7/8/02)
1939 Jul 11, Yanks hosted the 7th
All Star Game. McCarthy started 6 Yanks, AL won 3-1.
(PGA, 12/9/98)
1939 Jul 13, Frank Sinatra
recorded his first song, "From the Bottom of my Heart," with the Harry
James Band.
(HN, 7/13/01)
1939 Jul 13, Howard Long was
hanged at the New Hampshire State Prison for the sex-killing of
10-year-old Mark Neville Jensen of Alton.
(http://venus.soci.niu.edu/~archives/ABOLISH/aug97/0184.html)
1939 Jul 17, Spencer Davis,
vocalist (Spencer Davis Group-Gimme Some Lovin), was born in Wales.
(MC, 7/17/02)
1939 Jul 18, Edwin H. Armstrong
(1890-1954), US radio engineer, started the 1st FM (frequency
modulation) radio station in Alpine, NJ.
(SSFC, 10/24/04, Par p.5)
1939 Jul 20, Judy Chicago, artist,
was born.
(HN, 7/20/01)
1939 Jul 20, Joseph Mendes da
Costa, sculptor, died.
(MC, 7/20/02)
1939 Jul 21, Ambroise Vollard
(b.1866), French art patron, author and publisher, died in a car crash.
He wrote biographies on Cézanne, Degas, and Renoir.
(http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ambroise_Vollard)
1939 Jul 23, Nicholas Gage,
journalist and author (Eleni), was born.
(HN, 7/23/02)
1939 Jul 26, The London Times
reported the discovery of a buried ship and other artifacts at Sutton
Hoo. Archeologist later suspected that it was an empty grave and
memorial for a 7th century Anglo-Saxon chief.
(ON, 4/03, p.10)
1939 Jul 27, Michael Longley,
Irish poet, was born.
(HN, 7/27/01)
1939 Jul, The sci-fi story "Black
Destroyer" by A.E. van Vogt (1912-2000) appeared in Astounding Science
Fiction magazine
(SFC, 2/5/00, p.A19)
1939 Aug 2, US Congress passed the
Hatch Act. Its main provision is to prohibit federal employees from
engaging in partisan political activity. Named after Senator Carl Hatch
of New Mexico, the law was officially known as An Act to Prevent
Pernicious Political Activities.
(SFC, 3/12/08,
p.E2)(www.multieducator.com/Documents/hatchact.html)
1939 Aug 2, Albert Einstein signed
a letter to President Roosevelt urging creation of an atomic weapons
research program.
(HFA, ‘96, p.36)(AP, 8/2/97)
1939 Aug 11, Moses Annenberg,
owner of the Philadelphia Enquirer, was indicted by a federal jury in
Chicago for evading some $3.2 million in income taxes.
(SFC, 10/2/02, p.A2)
1939 Aug 11, Sergei Rachmaninov
had his last appearance in Europe.
(MC, 8/11/02)
1939 Aug 12, George Hamilton,
actor (Love at 1st Bite, Where the Boys Are), was born in Memphis, Ten.
(SC, 8/12/02)
1939 Aug 13, Saul Steinberg,
American artist (The Art of Living, New Yorker Magazine), was born in
Romania.
(MC, 8/13/02)
1939 Aug 15, The MGM musical "The
Wizard of Oz" premiered at Grauman’s Chinese Theater in Hollywood.
(AP, 8/15/97)
1939 Aug 17, Luther Allison,
guitarist (Bad News is Coming), was born in Arkansas.
(SC, 8/17/02)
1939 Aug 17, The film "Wizard of
Oz" opened at Loew's Capitol Theater in NYC.
(SC, 8/17/02)
1939 Aug 19, Vyacheslav Molotov
outlined the Soviet requirements to the German Ambassador, Friedrich
von Schulenburg. He insisted that trade agreements be signed and that a
special protocol be made defining the German and Soviet spheres of
interest.
(DrEE, 10/26/96, p.4)
1939 Aug 20, Russian offensive
under Gen. Zhukov against Jap invasion in Mongolia.
(MC, 8/20/02)
1939 Aug 20, Soviet and German
trade agreements were signed.
(DrEE, 10/26/96, p.4)
1939 Aug 21, Clarence Williams
III, actor (Mod Squad, 52 Pick Up, Purple Rain), was born in NYC.
(SC, 8/21/02)
1939 Aug 23, Zane Grey (b.1872),
American novelist, died. He best known for his popular adventure novels
and stories that presented an idealized image of the rugged Old West.
He authored over 90 books, some published posthumously and/or based on
serials originally published in magazines. Grey was one of the first
millionaire authors.
(http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Zane_Grey)
1939 Aug 23, Sidney Coe Howard
(b.1891), US playwright and short story writer, died. He adapted “Gone
With the Wind” into the 1939 film. "Half of knowing what you want is
knowing what you have to give up to get it."
(SFEC, 2/6/00, Z1 p.2)(SFC, 1/27/05, p.E1)
1939 Aug 23, German Foreign
Minister Joachim von Ribbentrop and Soviet Commissar for Foreign
Affairs Vyacheslav M. Molotov signed a Treaty of Non-Aggression, the
Molotov-Ribbentrop Pact freeing Hitler to invade Poland and Stalin to
invade Finland. Secret protocols, made public years later, were added
that assigned Finland, Estonia, Latvia and Bessarabia to be within the
Soviet sphere of influence. Poland was partitioned along the rivers
Narev, Vistula and San. Germany retained Lithuania enlarged by the
inclusion of Vilnius. Just days after the signing, Germany invaded
Poland, and by the end of September, both powers had claimed sections
of Poland.
(WP, 6/29/96, p.A16)(AP, 8/23/97) (HNPD,
8/22/98)(HN, 8/23/98)
1939 Aug 25, Britain and France
signed a treaty with Poland promising military assistance should the
Germans invade.
(ON, 11/05, p.3)
1939 Aug 26, The first televised
major league baseball games were shown on experimental station W2XBS, a
double-header between the Cincinnati Reds and the Brooklyn Dodgers at
Ebbets Field. The Reds won first, 5-2; the Dodgers, second, 6-1.
(AP, 8/26/98)
1939 Aug 27, Nazi Germany demanded
Danzig and Polish corridor.
(MC, 8/27/01)
1939 Aug 27, The world's first
jet-propelled plane, the Heinkel He-178, made its first flight at
Marienehe, north Germany. Hans von Ohain’s aircraft became the first
jet-powered airplane to fly. It remained airborne for 7 minutes. Erich
Warsitz made the 1st jet-propelled flight.
(SFC, 8/10/96, p.A20)(Reuters, 8/28/01)(MC, 8/27/01)
1939 Aug 29, William
Friedkin, director (Exorcist, Cruising, French Connection), was born in
Chicago.
(MC, 8/29/01)
1939 Aug 29, Chaim Weizmann
informed England that Palestine Jews would fight in WW II.
(MC, 8/29/01)
1939 Aug 30, Isoroku Yamamoto was
appointed supreme commander of the Japanese fleet.
(MC, 8/30/01)
1939 Aug 31, Japanese invasion
army was driven out of Mongolia.
(MC, 8/31/01)
1939 Aug 31, There was a staged
"Polish" assault on radio station in Gleiwitz by Nazis dressed as Poles
to "provoke" war, an excuse for Germany to invade Poland the next day
to start World War II.
(MC, 8/31/01)
1939 Sep 1, Lily Tomlin,
comedienne, actress (9 to 5, Laugh-in, All of Me), was born in Detroit.
(SC, 9/1/02)
1939 Sep, 1, At 4:40 a.m., World
War II began. The Germans attacked Poland with their strategy of
Blitzkrieg, or lightning war. The war started at dawn with salvos from
the cruiser Schleswig-Holstein at the Polish garrison in Gdansk. In
1989 Donald Cameron Watt authored “How War Came.”
(WSJ, 4/26/95, p.A-16)(AP, 9/1/97)(WSJ, 1/14/07,
p.P8)
1939 Sep 1, US Sen. William Borah
of Idaho said 'Lord, if only I could have talked to Hitler, all of this
might have been avoided.' We have an obligation to call this what it is
— the false comfort of appeasement, which has been repeatedly
discredited by history." In 2008 Pres. Bush quoted these words in a
speech to the Israeli Knesset.
(AP, 5/17/08)
1939 Sep 1, Physical Review
published the 1st paper to deal with "black holes."
(MC, 9/1/02)
1939 Sep 1, Hitler ordered the
extermination of mentally ill.
(MC, 9/1/02)
1939 Sep 1, Switzerland proclaimed
neutrality.
(MC, 9/1/02)
1939 Sep 2, Ireland’s Taoiseach de
Valera told the lower house of parliament that neutrality was the best
policy for the country. The Irish constitution was amended to allow the
Government to take emergency powers, and then the Emergency Powers Act
1939 was passed that included censorship of the press and mail
correspondence. In 2007 Clair Wills authored “The neutral Island: A
cultural History of Ireland during the Second World War.”
(http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_Emergency)
1939 Sep 3, British envoy Sir
Neville Henderson delivered Britain’s final ultimatum to the Reich’s
Foreign Ministry.
(DrEE, 10/26/96, p.4)
1939 Sep 3, Britain and France
declared war on Germany, two days after the Nazi invasion of Poland.
After Germany ignored Great Britain's ultimatum to stop the invasion of
Poland, Great Britain declares war on Germany, marking the beginning of
World War II in Europe. France follows 6 hours later quickly joined by
Australia, NZ, South Africa & Canada.
(AP, 9/3/97)(HN, 9/3/98)(MC, 9/3/01)
1939 Sep 3-May 10, 1940, This
period is know as the Sitzkreig (the Sitting War) or "Phony War." There
was very little action on the Western Front.
(DrEE, 10/26/96, p.4)
1939 Sep 4, German troops stormed
into Danzig (Gdansk).
(MC, 9/4/01)
1939 Sep 4, The Polish ghetto of
Mir was exterminated.
(MC, 9/4/01)
1939 Sep 5, The United States
under FDR proclaimed its neutrality in World War II.
(AP, 9/5/97)
1939 Sep 6, Arthur Rackham,
English artist and illustrator (Grimm's Fairy Tales), died at 71.
(MC, 9/6/01)
1939 Sep 6, The 1st WW II German
air attack on Great Britain took place.
(MC, 9/6/01)
1939 Sep 6, The Union of South
Africa declared war on Germany.
(AP, 9/6/07)
1939 Sep 7, In response to the
German invasion of Poland a week earlier, France invaded its neighbor
Germany. In Operation Saar, French forces marched into the Cadenbronn
and Wendt Forest near Saarrucken. The French met little or no
opposition as they drove five miles into Germany. The sluggish advance
was hindered by low troop morale and lack of support. The Soviet
Union’s invasion of Poland from the east on September 17 prompted the
French withdrawal to the Maginot Line in anticipation of a German
counterattack. The only French offensive of WWII lasted 14 days.
(HNQ, 7/9/99)
1939 Sep 8, President Franklin D.
Roosevelt declared a "limited national emergency" in response to the
outbreak of war in Europe.
(AP, 9/8/99)
1939 Sep 8, Gen. Von Reichenau's
panzer division reached the suburbs of Warsaw.
(MC, 9/8/01)
1939 Sep 9, Nazi army reached
Warsaw.
(MC, 9/9/01)
1939 Sep 10, Canada declared war
on Nazi Germany.
(AP, 9/10/97)
1939 Sep 11, British submarine
Triton torpedoed British submarine Oxley.
(MC, 9/11/01)
1939 Sep 12, In response to the
invasion of Poland, the French Army advanced into Germany and on this
day made their furthest penetration-five miles.
(HN, 9/12/00)
1939 Sep 13, Joyce Arleen Auger,
US soprano (Songs of the Auvergne), was born.
(MC, 9/13/01)
1939 Sep 13, Igor Sikorsky
invented the 1st helicopter. [see Sep 14]
(MC, 9/13/01)
1939 Sep 14, British fleet sank
the German U-39 U-boat.
(http://www.naval-history.net/WW2CampaignsUboats.htm)
1939 Sep 14, In the 1930s Igor
Sikorsky (d.1972) turned his attention again to helicopter design and
on this day flew the VS-300 on its first test flight. Sikorsky,
scientist, engineer, pilot and businessman, was a pioneer in aircraft
design who is best known for his successful development of the
helicopter. He was fascinated with flight even as a child in Russia,
and a 1908 meeting with the Wright brothers determined the course of
his life in aviation. After two early helicopter designs failed,
Sikorsky turned his attention to fixed-wing aircraft. By 1913 he had
developed the Il’ya Muromets, four-engine passenger aircraft that were
converted to bombers for use in WWI. The Bolshevik Revolution forced
Sikorsky and his family to emigrate to America in 1919 where he
established the Sikorsky Aero Engineering Corporation in New York. Over
the next 20 years, Sikorsky’s company built passenger planes and flying
boats, including the S-40 American Clipper that was used to open new
air routes across the Pacific.
(HNPD, 10/27/98)
1939 Sep 15, The Polish submarine
Orzel arrived in Tallinn, Estonia, after escaping the German invasion
of Poland.
(HN, 9/15/99)
1939 Sep 17, The Harry James
Orchestra and Frank Sinatra recorded "All or Nothing at All" for
Columbia Records.
(AP, 9/17/99)
1939 Sep 17, David H Souter, 107th
Supreme Court Justice (1990- ), was born in Weir, NH.
(MC, 9/17/01)
1939 Sep 17, The German U-29 sank
the British aircraft carrier Courageous, 519 died.
(http://www.naval-history.net/WW2CampaignsUboats.htm)
1939 Sep 17, The Soviet Union
attacked Poland, more than two weeks after Nazi Germany launched its
assault. They took 217,000 Poles prisoner and occupied eastern Poland
within a week with losses of 737 dead and 2,000 wounded. The Polish
submarine Orzel escaped from internment and went on to fight the
Germans against long odds.
(AP, 9/17/97)(DrEE, 10/26/96, p.4)(HN, 9/17/98)(MC,
9/17/01)
1939 Sep 19, The British
Expeditionary Force reached France.
(MC, 9/19/01)
1939 Sep 19, Lord Haw-Haw became
the radio host of Reichsrundfunk Berlin.
(MC, 9/19/01)
1939 Sep 19, Wehrmacht (German
regular army) murdered 100 Jews in Lukov, Poland.
(MC, 9/19/01)
1939 Sep 20, After sinking
trawlers off the northern Hebrides, German U-27 was located and sunk by
destroyers "Fortune" and "Forester."
(www.naval-history.net/WW2CampaignsUboats.htm)
1939 Sep 21, Reinhard Heydrich met
in Berlin to discuss final solution of Jews.
(MC, 9/21/01)
1939 Sep 22, Junko Tabei, Japan,
the 1st woman to climb Mount Everest, was born.
(MC, 9/22/01)
1939 Sep 23, Sigmund Freud
(b.1856), founder of psychoanalysis, died in London. He had escaped
from Vienna in 1938. His work “Moses and Monotheism” was published this
year. In 1986 Frederick Crews, a skeptic on Freud's work, published
"Skeptical Engagements." Crews also published "The memory wars: Freud's
Legacy in dispute" and "Unauthorized Freud: Doubters Confront a
Legend." Freud's last days were dramatized in 1999 by Terry Johnson in
the play "Hysteria."
(SFEM, 1/10/99, p.4)(AP, 9/23/99)(WSJ, 12/23/99,
p.A16)
1939 Sep 25, German Luftwaffe
struck Warsaw with fire bombs.
(MC, 9/25/01)
1939 Sep 25, Andorra and Germany
finally signed an official treaty ending WW I. The 1919 Versailles
Peace Treaty failed to include Andorra.
(MC, 9/25/01)
1939 Sep 27, Germany occupied
Warsaw. Poland surrendered after 19 days of resistance to invading
forces from Nazi Germany and the Soviet Union. Poland had endured a
brutal 3 day bombing campaign by the German Luftwaffe.
(AP, 9/27/97)(HN, 9/27/98)
1939 Sep 28, The Boundary and
Friendship Treaty between the USSR and Germany was supplemented by
secret protocols to amend the secret protocols of Aug 23. Among other
things Lithuania was reassigned to the Soviet sphere of influence.
Poland’s partition line was moved eastwards from the Vistula line to
the line of the Bug. Germany kept a small part of south-west Lithuania,
the Uznemune region. A separate Soviet mutual defense pact was signed
with Estonia that allowed 25,000 Soviet troops to be stationed there.
(DrEE, 9/28/96, p.3)(DrEE, 10/26/96, p.4)(DrEE,
10/26/96, p.4)(AP, 9/28/97)
1939 Sep 29, Germany and the
Soviet Union reached an agreement on the division of Poland. [see Sep
28]
(HN, 9/29/98)
1939 Sep 30, The first college
football game to be televised was shown on experimental station W2XBS
in New York as Fordham University defeated Waynesburg College, 34-7 in
Triboro Stadium on Randalls Island.
(AP, 9/30/98)(SFEC, 6/13/99, p.C18)
1939 Sep 30, The French Army was
called back into France from it's invasion of Germany. The attack, code
named Operation Saar, only penetrated five miles.
(HN, 9/30/99)
1939 Sep 30, Germany and Russia
agreed to partition Poland. [see Sep 28,29]
(MC, 9/30/01)
1939 Sep, 41 U-boats were sunk
this month.
(MC, 9/30/01)
1939 Sep, The Pepsi jingle:
Pepsi-Cola hits the spot. / Two full glasses, that‘s a lot. / Twice as
much for a nickel too. / Pepsi-Cola is the drink for you! (Nickel
nickel nickel nickel, trickle trickle trickle trickle) made its debut.
The jingle, created by the Lord & Thomas agency, was based on the
old English tune "John Peel." Most soft drinks were sold in 6-ounce
units, but starting in 1934, 12-ounce Pepsi bottles appeared in stores.
Pepsi was constantly trying to gain on Coca-Cola and quickly
capitalized on the jingle. It debuted in multiple 15-second slots while
radio listeners were updated about Hitler‘s invasion of Poland. Soon
people across the country were humming it. When the United States
entered World War II, the jingle went out into the world with the
troops via radio. It was even altered to sell war bonds (Uncle Sam is
calling you/to fight this war and see it through/ By buying bonds and
stamps today/ you can help protect the U.S.A). After about a decade,
the jingle was eventually phased out, as the "twice as much for a
nickel" line seemed too thrift-minded for postwar prosperity.
(HNQ, 10/27/00)
1939 Sep, Paul Hermann Muller, a
Geigy pesticide researcher in Switzerland, first synthesized DDT. He
combined chloral hydrate with chlorobenzene and a catalyst to make
dichlorodiphenyltrichloroethane. The discovery was reported 2 years
later.
(SFC, 9/1/96, z1 p.2)(ON, 11/01, p.6)
1939 Fall, The Univ. of Michigan
played the Univ. of Chicago at Stagg Field in Chicago and won by a
score of 85-0. Football under UC Pres. Robert Hutchins (29) was very
much discouraged. The day after the game Hutchins banned football and
turned the stadium over to scientists and the first atomic pile was
later created there.
(LSA, Spg/97, p.25)
1939 Oct 1, Churchill called the
Soviets a "riddle wrapped in a mystery inside an enigma."
(MC, 10/1/01)
1939 Oct 2, The Benny Goodman
Sextet recorded "Flying Home."
(AP, 10/2/99)
1939 Oct 4, Pamela Churchill
Harriman married Randolph Churchill, son of Winston. She was later
appointed by Pres. Clinton as ambassador to France. In 1996 Sally
Bedell Smith wrote her biography: "Reflected Glory: The Life of Pamela
Churchill Harriman."
(SFC, 10/23/96, p.E6)(SFC, 2/6/97, p.A14)
1939 Oct 4, Last Polish troops
surrendered to German Wehrmacht.
(MC, 10/4/01)
1939 Oct 5, The Soviets signed a
mutual defense pact with Latvia that allowed 30,000 troops to be
stationed there.
(DrEE, 10/26/96, p.4)
1939 Oct 5, Soviet Foreign
Minister Molotov invited the Finnish Foreign Minister, Elias Erkko, to
come to Moscow for political discussions. The Finns delayed the meeting
until Oct 12. Field Marshall Gustaf Mannerheim prepared Finland for war.
(DrEE, 10/26/96, p.4)
1939 Oct 6, In an address to the
Reichstag, Adolf Hitler denied having any intention of war against
France and Britain.
(AP, 10/6/97)
1939 Oct 6, Hitler announced plans
to resolve "The Jewish problem."
(MC, 10/6/01)
1939 Oct 7, Harvey (William)
Cushing, US neurologist, died at 70.
(MC, 10/7/01)
1939 Oct 8, Germany annexed
Western Poland.
(MC, 10/8/01)
1939 Oct 9, Finland called for
full scale mobilization for war.
(DrEE, 10/26/96, p.4)
1939 Oct 10, Lithuania signed a
treaty that allowed a soviet garrison of 20,000 troops to be stationed
in the country in return for Vilnius and other regions with a
population of 600,000.
(DrEE, 10/12/96, p.3)(DrEE, 10/26/96, p.4)
1939 Oct 11, Albert Einstein wrote
his famous letter to FDR about the potential of the atomic bomb.
Einstein, a long time pacifist, was concerned that the Nazis would get
the bomb first. In the letter, Einstein argued the scientific
feasibility of atomic weapons, and urged the need for development of a
US atomic program. The physicists Leo Szilard, Eugene Wigner, and
Edward Teller, who were profoundly disturbed by the lack of American
atomic action, had enlisted the aid of the Nobel prize-winner Einstein
in the summer of 1939, hoping that a letter from such a renowned
scientist would persuade Roosevelt into action.
(MC, 10/11/01)
1939 Oct 12-Nov 8, Finnish special
envoy, Juho Paasikivi, began negotiations in Moscow. The Finns refused
to allow the establishment of Soviet military bases.
(DrEE, 10/26/96, p.4)
1939 Oct 14, Ralph Lauren, fashion
designer (Chaps), was born.
(MC, 10/14/01)
1939 Oct 14, The German U-47,
commanded by Kapitan Gunther Prien, sank the British battleship HMS
Royal Oak at Scapa Flow, Scotland, and 833 people were killed. This
prompted Churchill to order the creation of concrete barriers at the
eastern entrance of Scapa Flow.
(SFEM, 10/10/99,
p.49)(http://www.undiscoveredscotland.co.uk/hoy/scapa/)
1939 Oct 15, New York Municipal
Airport, later re-named LaGuardia Airport, was dedicated.
(AP, 10/15/97)
1939 Oct 16, The comedy "The Man
Who Came to Dinner," by George S. Kaufman and Moss Hart, opened on
Broadway.
(AP, 10/16/99)(WSJ, 8/2/00, p.A20)
1939 Oct 17, Frank Capra's
comedy-drama "Mr. Smith Goes to Washington" premiered in the nation's
capital.
(AP, 10/17/99)
1939 Oct 18, Mike Ditka, coach and
tight end (Bears, Cowboys, NFL rookie year 1961), was born.
(MC, 10/18/01)
1939 Oct 18, R. Rodger's &
Lorenz Hart's "Too Many Girls," premiered in NYC.
(MC, 10/18/01)
1939 Oct 18, Lee Harvey Oswald,
the assassin of President John F. Kennedy, was born.
(HN, 10/18/00)
1939 Oct 18, President Franklin D.
Roosevelt banned war submarines from U.S. ports and waters.
(HN, 10/18/98)
1939 Oct 19, Benita Valente,
soprano (Pamina-Die Zauberflote), was born in Delano Calif.
(MC, 10/19/01)
1939 Oct 19, Reichsmarshal Hermann
Goering began plundering art treasures throughout Nazi occupied areas.
(MC, 10/19/01)
1939 Oct 21, As war heated up with
Germany, the British war cabinet held its first meeting in the
underground war room in London.
(HN, 10/21/99)
1939 Oct 23, Zane Grey (67), US
western writer (Spirit of the Border), died. He authored 89 books,
mostly Westerns. He books on fishing included: "Tales of fishes" and
"An American Angler in Australia."
(SFEC, 9/24/00, p.T10)(MC, 10/23/01)(WSJ, 1/8/02,
p.A16)
1939 Oct 24, Benny Goodman and his
orchestra recorded their signature theme, "Let’s Dance," for Columbia
Records in New York.
(AP, 10/24/00)
1939 Oct 24, Nylon stockings were
sold publicly for the first time, in Wilmington, Del.
(AP, 10/24/97)
1939 Oct 24, Nazis required Jews
to wear star of David.
(MC, 10/24/01)
1939 Oct 25, George Kaufman and
Moss Hart's "Man Who Came to Dinner," premiered in NYC.
(MC, 10/25/01)
1939 Oct 25, The drama "The Time
of Your Life," by William Saroyan, opened in New York.
(AP, 10/25/97)
1939 Oct 26, Polish Jews were
forced into obligatory work service.
(MC, 10/26/01)
1939 Oct 27, John Cleese,
actor-writer, was born. He is best known for comedy productions "Monty
Python" and "Fawlty Towers."
(HN, 10/27/00)
1939 Oct 28, Anti-German
demonstrations and strikes took place in Czechoslovakia.
(MC, 10/28/01)
1939 Oct 28, A Spitfire shot down
a German Heinkel-111 over Scotland.
(MC, 10/28/01)
1939 Oct 30, German U boat failed
in an attack of English battleship Nelson with Winston Churchill,
Dudley Pound and Charles Forbes aboard.
(MC, 10/30/01)
1939 Oct 30, USSR and Germany
agreed on partitioning Poland. Hitler deported Jews.
(MC, 10/30/01)
1939 Oct 31, 27 U boats were sunk
this month (135,000 ton).
(MC, 10/31/01)
1939 Oct 31, Otto Rank,
[Rosenfeld], Austria psychoanalyst (Trauma of Geburt), died.
(MC, 10/31/01)
1939 Oct, The Federal Hourly
Minimum Wage was set at $0.30 an hour.
(http://usgovinfo.about.com/library/blminwage.htm)
1939 Nov 1, The 1st animal, a
rabbit, conceived by artificial insemination was displayed.
(MC, 11/1/01)
1939 Nov 1, 1st jet plane, a
Heinkel He 178, was demonstrated to German Air Ministry.
(MC, 11/1/01)
1939 Nov 3, Terrence McNally,
playwright (Bad Habits, Master Class), was born in St. Petersburg, Fla.
(MC, 11/3/01)
1939 Nov 4, The United States
modified its neutrality stance in World War II, allowing "cash and
carry" purchases of arms by belligerents, a policy favoring Britain and
France.
(AP, 11/4/99)
1939 Nov 4, The 1st air
conditioned automobile, the Packard, was exhibited, Chicago, Ill.
(MC, 11/4/01)
1939 Nov 8, The H. Lindsay and R.
Crouse play "Life With Father," based on the book by Clarence Day,
opened on Broadway.
(AP, 11/8/99)(MC, 11/8/01)
1939 Nov 8, There was a failed
assassination attempt on Hitler in Burgerbraukeller, Munich.
(MC, 11/8/01)
1939 Nov 9, "Ninotchka," with
Greta Garbo premiered.
(MC, 11/9/01)
1939 Nov 9, Nobel for physics was
awarded to Ernest O. Lawrence for his work on the cyclotron.
(MC, 11/9/01)
1939 Nov 9, In the Venlo-incident,
German Abwehr killed 2 English agents.
(MC, 11/9/01)
1939 Nov 10, Bob Marshall, founder
of the Wilderness Society, first recreation chief of the US Forest
Service, died at the age of 38.
(NG, May 1985, M. Edwards, p.667)
1939 Nov 10-Mar 13,1940, Finland
began to wage a defensive war against the Soviet Union for 104 days.
(DrEE, 10/26/96, p.4)
1939 Nov 12, Lucia Popp, soprano
(Die Zauberflote), was born in Uhorsk Ves, Czechoslovakia.
(MC, 11/12/01)
1939 Nov 12, Jews in Lodz Poland
were ordered to wear yellow star of David.
(MC, 11/12/01)
1939 Nov 14, Wendy (Walter)
Carlos, composer (Switched on Bach), was born in Pawtucket, RI.
(MC, 11/14/01)
1939 Nov 15, President Roosevelt
laid the cornerstone of the Jefferson Memorial in Washington, D.C.
(AP, 11/15/97)
1939 Nov 15, Nazis began their
mass murder of Warsaw Jews.
(MC, 11/15/01)
1939 Nov 16, Al Capone was freed
from Alcatraz.
(MC, 11/16/01)
1939 Nov 16, German U-boat
torpedoed the tanker Sliedrecht near Ireland.
(MC, 11/16/01)
1939 Nov 17, Jerome Kern's and
Oscar Hammerstein's "Very Warm for May," premiered in NYC.
(MC, 11/17/01)
1939 Nov 17, German U-boat
torpedoed a passenger ship.
(MC, 11/17/01)
1939 Nov 18, Margaret Atwood,
Canadian writer, was born. Her books included "The Edible Woman" and
"The Handmaid's Tale."
(HN, 11/18/00)
1939 Nov 18, The Irish Republican
Army exploded three bombs in Picadilly Circus.
(HN, 11/18/98)
1939 Nov 18, The Netherland KNSM
passenger ship Simon Bolivar hit a German mine and 86 died.
(MC, 11/18/01)
1939 Nov 23, Thanksgiving.
Franklin D. Roosevelt had proclaimed Thanksgiving Day a week
earlier--on the fourth, not the last, Thursday of November--in an
effort to encourage more holiday shopping.
(HN, 11/26/98)
1939 Nov 23, Hans Frank, the Nazi
Gov. of Poland, required Jews to wear a blue star.
(MC, 11/23/01)
1939 Nov 24, In Czechoslovakia,
the Gestapo executed 120 students who were accused of anti-Nazi
plotting.
(HN, 11/24/98)
1939 Nov 25, Shelagh Delaney,
playwright whose work included "A Taste of Honey," was born.
(HN, 11/25/00)
1939 Nov 25, Nazis reported four
British ships sunk in the North Sea, but London denied the report.
(HN, 11/25/98)
1939 Nov 26, Tina Turner, U.S. pop
singer, was born.
(AP, 11/26/02)
1939 Nov 26, Soviets charged
Finland with an artillery attack on border leading to 105-day Winter
War.
(HN, 11/26/98)(AP, 11/26/02)
1939 Nov 27, The play "Key Largo,"
by Maxwell Anderson, opened at the Ethel Barrymore Theater in New York.
James Gregory made his Broadway debut.
(AP, 11/27/97)(SFC, 9/19/02, p.A24)
1939 Nov 28, Nazi Gov-Gen of
Poland, Hans Frank organized Judenrat.
(MC, 11/28/01)
1939 Nov 28, USSR scraped its
non-aggression pact with Finland.
(HN, 11/28/98)
1939 Nov 28, James A. Naismith
(78), creator of basketball, died.
(MC, 11/28/01)
1939 Nov 29, Soviet planes bombed
an airfield at Helsinki, Finland.
(HN, 11/29/98)
1939 Nov 30, The Russo-Finnish war
began when Stalin attacked Finland with 4 armies, 540,000 men, 2485
tanks, and 2000 guns. Finnish troops were led by Field Marshall Gustaf
Mannerheim. Over the next two weeks, a greatly outnumbered Finnish army
resisted the invasion of nearly fifty Red Army divisions--over one
million men. The Finnish used forest combat to inflict heavy damage on
the Russian invaders. The British and French came to the Finnish
defense in mid-December but by March, the "Peace of Moscow" treaty was
signed, and Finland ceded 16,000-square miles of land to the Soviet
Union, including the city of Vyborg and the Karelian Isthmus.
(DrEE, 10/26/96, p.4)(AP, 11/30/99)(MC, 12/30/01)
1939 Nov 30, Bela Kun (53),
[Balazs Kolozsvary], Hungarian revolutionary, died.
(MC, 11/30/01)
1939 Nov, In Birmingham, England,
John Randall invented the cavity magnetron. It was a microwave
transmitter 1000 times more powerful than any other at the time.
(Wired, 2/98, p.134)
1939 Dec 1, Reichsfuhrer-SS
Heinrich Himmler ordered the deportation of Polish Jews.
(MC, 12/1/01)
1939 Dec 2, New York's La Guardia
Airport began operations as an airliner from Chicago landed at one
minute after midnight. The North Beach Airport opened in Queens, NYC,
with 2 levels for passenger circulation. It was later renamed LaGuardia.
(Hem., 5/97, p.70)(AP, 12/2/98)
1939 Dec 2, British Imperial
Airways and British Airways merged to form BOAC.
(MC, 12/2/01)
1939 Dec 6, The Cole Porter
musical comedy "Du Barry Was a Lady" opened on Broadway.
(AP, 12/6/99)
1939 Dec 6, Britain agreed to send
arms to Finland.
(HN, 12/6/98)
1939 Dec 7, Lou Gehrig, 36, was
elected to Baseball's Hall of Fame.
(MC, 12/7/01)
1939 Dec 8, James Galway, flutist
(18k gold flute, Royal Phil), was born in Belfast, Ireland.
(MC, 12/8/01)
1939 Dec 11, Tom McGuane, novelist
and screenwriter, was born. His work includes "The Sporting Club" and
"Bushwacked Piano."
(HN, 12/11/00)
1939 Dec 11, New anti Jewish
measurements in Poland were proclaimed.
(MC, 12/11/01)
1939 Dec 12, Douglas Fairbanks
(56), actor (Zorro, 3 Musketeers, Robin Hood), died.
(MC, 12/12/01)
1939 Dec 13, In the Battle at La
Plata 3 British cruisers fought the German "pocket battleship," Graf
Spee, which took refuge in Montevideo, Uruguay. The following day, the
badly damaged ship left port, deliberately ran aground in the bay,
where the officers led the crew in scuttling and exploding the Graf
Spee. Two days later, the commander of the German warship committed
suicide in his Buenos Aires hotel room. Today, at low tide, water
commuters between Buenos Aires and Montevideo can see part of the
superstructure breaking the surface.
(MC, 12/13/01)
1939 Dec 14, The Soviet Union was
dropped from the League of Nations. [see Nov 30 attack on Finland]
(AP, 12/14/97)(HN, 12/14/98)
1939 Dec 15, The motion picture
"Gone With the Wind" had its world premiere in Atlanta. [WSJ later
claimed Dec 19 as the opening date in NYC]
(AP, 12/15/97)(WSJ, 3/18/98, p.B1)
1939 Dec 16, National Women’s
Party urged immediate congressional action on equal rights.
(HN, 12/16/98)
1939 Dec 17, In the Battle of
River Plate near Montevideo, Uruguay, the British trapped the German
pocket battleship Graf Spee. German Captain Langsdorf sank his ship
believing that resistance was hopeless.
(AP, 12/17/97)(HN, 12/17/98)
1939 Dec 18, The Graf Spee was
scuttled. A ferocious sea battle off the coast of South America between
the German battleship Admiral Graf Spee and the British ships Exeter,
Ajax, and Achilles, preceded the scuttling. The German captain Hans
Langsdorf, later killed himself. On the 13th, heavily the armed German
ship held off the three vessels for three hours, sustaining some
damage, and then fled into the harbor of Montevideo, Uruguay. Over the
next few days the British tricked the Germans into believing that a
large British fleet had them trapped.
(MC, 12/18/01)
1939 Dec 20, Dianne Arndt, artist,
photographer, was born.
(MC, 12/20/01)
1939 Dec 20, Hans Langsdorff,
German captain of the Graf Spee, committed suicide.
(MC, 12/20/01)
1939 Dec 21, Heinrich Himmler and
Reinhard Heydrich named Adolf Eichmann leader of "Referat IV B," the
group in charge of transport of Jews for Final Solution.
(MC, 12/21/01)
1939 Dec 22, Ma Rainey (53),
"Mother of the Blues", US blues singer and composer, died.
(MC, 12/22/01)
1939 Dec 22, 125 died in train
wreck at Magdeburg, Germany.
(MC, 12/22/01)
1939 Dec 22, 99 died in 2nd train
wreck at Friedrichshafen, Germany.
(MC, 12/22/01)
1939 Dec 23, The first Canadian
troops arrived in Britain.
(HN, 12/23/98)
1939 Dec 23, Anthony H.G. Fokker
(49), Dutch airplane builder (Spider), died in America.
(www.obituariestoday.com)
1939 Dec 24, John Hammond produced
a 2nd Carnegie Hall Jazz concert that was a panorama of black heritage.
Selections from the 1938 & 1939 concerts were issued in 1959, 1987
and a CD set in 1999.
(WSJ, 11/5/99, p.W11)
1939 Dec 25, Finnish troops
entered Soviet territory.
(HN, 12/25/98)
1939 Dec 26-27, In Turkey a series
of vicious earthquakes in Erzincan province, magnitude 7.9, took some
33,000 lives in Turkey.
(HN, 12/27/98)(MC, 12/27/01)(SFEC, 8/22/99,
p.A17)(AP, 6/22/02)
1939 Dec 31, The DJIA closed the
decade at 150.24.
(WSJ, 4/8/04, p.C4)
1939 Henry Moore (1898-1985)
created his sculpture "Three Points."
(WSJ, 5/1/01, p.A24)
1939 In France Pierre Bonnard
painted "The Garden."
(WSJ, 6/24/98, p.A16)
1939 Edward Hopper painted his
"New York Movie."
(WSJ, 6/28/95, p.A-16)
1939 Sargent Johnson (1888-1967),
African-American artist in SF, made his glazed ceramic "Hippopotamus."
(SFEC, 4/12/98, DB p.43)
1939 Picasso painted "The Yellow
Sweater." It later became the trademark of the Berggruen collection. He
also painted "Night Fishing at Antibes."
(WSJ, 9/13/96, p.A8)(SFC, 10/10/98, p.E8)
1939 Ben Shahn painted his "Myself
Among the Churchgoers."
(WSJ, 12/1/98, p.A20)
1939 Chaim Soutine painted "Return
From School After the Storm."
(WSJ, 5/14/98, p.A20)
1939 Hale Woodruff painted a mural
on the 1839 Amistad mutiny.
(SFEM, 3/8/98, p.8)
1939 The Salon des Realites
Nouvelles was held in France and featured abstract painters.
(Calg. Glen., 1996)
1939 Eric Ambler wrote his spy
thriller "A Coffin for Dimitrios."
(SFC, 10/24/98, p.A22)
1939 Isaiah Berlin (1909-1997)
wrote a book on Karl Marx.
(SFC,11/6/97, p.C14)
1939 E.H. Carr, British scholar,
authored “The Twenty Years’ Crises: 1919-1939.” It became a seminal
work on the realism that instructed US and British Cold War statesmen.
(WSJ, 12/29/07, p.W8)
1939 Raymond Chandler introduced
detective Philip Marlowe in his mystery fiction "The Big Sleep."
(SFC, 7/9/97, p.D5)(WSJ, 8/26/06, p.P14)
1939 Peter Drucker (1909-2005),
Austria-born management visionary, authored his 1st book “The End of
Economic Man.”
(Econ, 11/19/05, p.72)
1939 W.E.B. Du Bois published his
work: "Black Folk, Then and Now: An Essay in the History and Sociology
of the Negro Race."
(Civilization, July-Aug, 1995, p. 36)
1939 Caryl Haskins (d.2001 at 93),
ant expert, authored "Of Ants and Men."
(SFC, 10/26/01, p.D7)
1939 Earnest A. Hooton, Harvard
Prof., authored "Apes, Men and Morons."
(WSJ, 1/31/00, p.A19)
1939 Edward MacCurdy published a
compilation of "Leonardo de Vinci’s notebooks."
(NH, 5/97, p.19)
1939 Dennis Pulestin (d.2001 at
95) authored "Blue Water Vagabond," an account of his adventures in
China as the Sino-Japanese War was beginning. Pulestin later helped
design the DUKW amphibian lander in 1942 and the Environmental Defense
Fund in 1967.
(SSFC, 6/17/01, p.A27)
1939 John Steinbeck wrote his
short story "Johnny Bear."
1939 Monroe Boston Strause, the
Pie King, wrote his book "Pie Marches On."
(SFC,1/22/97, zz-1 p.2)
1939 Nathanael West (1902-1940)
wrote his last novel "The Day of the Locust." It was made into a film
in 1975.
(WSJ, 8/11/97, p.A12)(SFEC,12/21/97, DB p.58)
1939 Ernest Vincent Wright wrote
his novel "Gadsby" as a lipogram. The 50,000 words had no letter e.
(SFEC, 10/22/00, Z1 p.2)
1939 Noel Coward wrote his play
"Present Laughter."
(WSJ, 11/21/96, p.B12)
1939 Lillian Hellman wrote her
melodrama "The Little Foxes." It was about a "wicked Alabama family in
1900."
(WSJ, 4/30/97, p.A12)
1939 Paul Osborne wrote his
bittersweet comedy "Morning’s at Seven."
(WSJ, 4/24/02, p.D9)
1939 Christopher Isherwood wrote
"Goodbye to Berlin." It included a story about a singer called Sally
Bowles that became the basis for the 1951 play "I Am a Camera," the
1955 film "I Am a Camera," the 1966 musical play "Caberet" and the 1972
musical film "Cabaret." His Berlin books also included "The Last of Mr.
Norris," and "I Am a Camera." In 1998 Norman Page published "Auden and
Isherwood: The Berlin Years."
(WSJ, 3/23/98, p.A20)(SFEC, 9/27/98, BR p.8)
1939 James Joyce had his book
"Finnegan's Wake" published by Viking.
(TMC, 1994, p.1939)(SFC, 12/9/99, p.B1)
1939 Olive Schreiner wrote her
novel: "The Story of an African Farm."
(SFEC, 11/3/96, BR p.5)
1939 The 1999 novel "The Summer of
'39" by Miranda Seymour was based on a visit by poet Laura Riding and
Robert Graves to Kit and Schuyler Jackson.
(SFEC, 10/3/99, BR p.5)
1939 Charles Edward Smith authored
“Jazzmen.”
(WSJ, 5/17/06, p.D14)
1939 Dalton Trumbo (1905-1976), US
writer, authored “Johnny Got His Gun.” It was made into a film in 1971.
{Writer}
(www.spartacus.schoolnet.co.uk/USAtrumbo.htm)
1939 Ernest V. Wright wrote the
novel "Gadsby." It was a 50,000 word work with no letter "e."
(SFC, 12/21/96, p.E4)
1939 The Philip Barry play "The
Philadelphia Story" was staged in new York.
(WSJ, 12/6/95, p.A-18)
1939 Philip Barry wrote his play
"The Philadelphia Story."
(SFEC, 5/30/99, DB p.37)
1939 Berthold Brecht wrote his
play "Mother Courage and Her Children." It was set during the Thirty
Years War (1618-1648) between the German Catholics and Swedish
Lutherans.
(WSJ, 1/24/97, p.A13)(WSJ, 10/23/01, p.A24)
1939 Lillian Hellman wrote her
play "The Little Foxes."
(SFEC, 5/30/99, DB p.37)
1939 Eugene O'Neill wrote his play
"The Iceman Cometh."
(SFEC, 5/30/99, DB p.37)
1939 The Kenyon Review was founded
to advance the ideas of the New Critics who favored a close reading of
literary texts over the previous biographical or social-context
readings.
(WSJ, 10/30/03, p.W9)
1939 The Cole Porter musical "Du
Barry Was a Lady" was produced.
(WSJ, 2/23/96, p.A-10)
1939 George Bernard Shaw wrote his
play "In Good King Charles’s Golden Days." It depicted an imaginary
visit in 1680 by Charles II to Isaac Newton.
(WSJ, 8/29/97, p.A9)
1939 "Meet the People" was staged
in Hollywood and New York.
(SFC, 12/2/96, p.D2)
1939 Hector Berlioz (1803-1869),
composed "Romeo and Juliet," and conducted its first performance.
(T&L, 10/80, p. 58)(SFC, 10/5/96, p.E1)
1939 The Carter Family left
Virginia and went to Texas to pioneer border radio broadcasts.
(SSFC, 8/4/02, p.M3)
1939 Billie Holiday 1st sang
"Strange Fruit," a ballad about lynching in the south, at Manhattan’s
Café Society. The song had been written by Abel Meeropol, a
Jewish schoolteacher. In 2001 David Margolick authored "Strange Fruit:
Biography of a Song."
(SFC, 3/8/02, p.D18)
1939 Prokofiev arranged the
"Alexander Nevsky Cantata" from music he wrote for Sergei Eisenstein’s
film.
(WSJ, 7/8/96,p.A9)
1939 Arnold Schoenberg finished
his "Chamber Symphony No. 2" in LA.
(SFC, 3/5/99, p.C5)
1939 Trumpeter Legh Knowles
(d.1997) joined the Glenn Miller Band. He went on to record 123 records
with the band including tunes such as: "In the Mood," "Moonlight
Serenade," and "Tuxedo Junction."
(SFEC, 8/17/97, p.D8)
1939 Ruth Lowe, pianist and band
leader, wrote the song "I’ll Never Smile Again" in memory of her late
husband.
(SFC, 9/1/96, z1 p.2)
1939 Robert M. Crawford, Princeton
voice teacher, wrote "The Army Air Corps Song" (aka "off we go into the
wild blue yonder") for a Liberty Magazine contest and won a $1,000
first prize.
(SFC, 4/12/97, p.E3)
1939 Jimmie Davis made a hit with
"You Are My Sunshine." He became governor of Louisiana in 1944 and
again in 1960.
(SFC, 11/6/00, p.A23)
1939 The song "Rudolph the
Red-Nosed Reindeer" began life as a poem handed to shoppers at the
Montgomery Ward department store chain. It was recorded in 1949 by Gene
Autrey after Perry Como turned it down.
(SFC, 12/24/99, p.C8)
c1939 Alfred Lion founded the Blue
Note jazz label in New York. He was later joined by his Berlin friend
and photographer Francis Wolff.
(WSJ, 10/3/97, p.A8)
1938 In Hawaii the $1.4 million
Shangri La estate of tobacco heiress Doris Duke (d.1993) was completed
on 4.9 acres east of Diamond Head. Duke collected Islamic art and in
2002 the estate was opened for limited public tours and research.
(SSFC, 11/10/02, p.C9)
1939 George Whittel Jr.
(1881-1969), heir to a SF family wealthy from the gold rush, completed
his Thunderbird Lodge at Lake Tahoe. He had acquired some 30,000 acres
along the Nevada shore since 1936. It was begun in 1937 and designed
Nevada architect Frederick De Longchamps. He deeded most of the land to
the US Forest Service.
(SSFC, 4/6/03, p.C8)(SFC, 7/21/07,
p.F1)(www.thunderbirdlodge.org/theman.html)
1939 Frank Lloyd Wright designed
the Johnson Wax Administration Building.
(SFEM, 4/19/98, p.23)
1939 The San Francisco to Oakland
Bay Bridge was completed.
(SFC, 5/19/96,Mag, p.11)
1939 Treasure Island on San
Francisco Bay was created with 29.5 million cubic yards of sand and
gravel. The 403-acre island was built to host the Golden Gate Int’l.
Exposition.
(SFC, 5/7/97, p.A15)(SFC, 5/9/97, p.E2)
1939 In SF a new bathhouse and
public space was built at Aquatic Park as part of a WPA project. The
Streamline Moderne design resembled a ship in its dock. It included a
mural by Hilaire Hiler depicting the underwater world of Atlantis. In
1951 it was converted into the SF Maritime Museum. Renovation of the
structure was completed in 2008.
(SFC, 6/21/06, p.B3)(SFC, 10/3/08, p.B7)
1939 Reinhold Niebuhr presented
his Gifford Lectures at the Univ. of St. Andrews in Scotland. The
purpose of religion for him shifted from salvation to economic and
scientific progress on earth.
(WSJ, 12/24/01, p.A9)
1939 In San Francisco the Top of
the Mark Nightclub opened at the top of Mark Hopkins Hotel.
(SFEM, 11/24/96, p.13)
1939 Willis & Geiger outfitted
the "Flying Tigers" volunteer group fighting in China.
(NH, 9/96, p.17)
1939 The Guggenheim Museum began
as the Museum of Non-Objective Painting and initially occupied a
building on East 54th St. in New York City.
(WSJ, 2/14/96, p.A-12)
1939 Harry Max Foster (1906-1996)
founded Foster Farms with a $1000 down payment on a re-possessed
80-acre farm near Empire, Ca.
(SFC, 9/26/96, p.C2)
1939 Jim Rex founded the Ranger
Joe Breakfast Food Co. in Philadelphia. It was sold in the 1940s to
Philadelphia businessman Moses Berger and sold again in 1954 to Nabisco
and renamed "Wheat and Rice Honeys."
(SFC,11/19/97, Z1 p.7)
1939 Latrobe Brewing of Latrobe,
Pa., began making Rolling Rock, a pale lager. It was later acquired by
InBev SA. In 2006 Rolling Rock was acquired by Anheuser-Busch, which
moved operations to Newark NJ. In 2008 Anheuser-Busch was acquired by
InBev SA.
(www.nytimes.com/2006/08/08/nyregion/08brew.html?fta=y)(WSJ,
4/13/09, p.B1)
1939 In Jackson, Miss., the weekly
Advocate newspaper, a news source for black residents, was founded.
(SFC, 1/27/98, p.A4)
1939 The United Jewish Appeal was
founded. William Rosenwald (1903-1996) was one three signatories to the
agreement for founding the organization. His father, Julius, was a
chairman and builder of Sears, Roebuck & Co.
(SFC, 11/2/96, p.A21)
1939 Arthur Davis Shores became
the first black attorney licensed in Alabama.
(SFEC, 3/1/98, Z1 p.4)
1939 Jules Lederer married Esther
Friedman. Lederer later founded Budget Rent A Car and Friedman began an
advice column as Ann Landers.
(SFC, 1/25/99, p.A20)
1939 David McConnell renamed his
California Perfume Company, founded in 1886, to Avon in tribute to
Shakespeare.
(WSJ, 1/11/99, p.R25)(WSJ, 9/18/00, p.B1)
1939 Edward Teller and Leo
Szilard, newly immigrated Hungarian physicists, drove to Princeton, New
Jersey, to visit Albert Einstein to persuade him to help develop the
atomic bomb. They feared that Germany would acquire one first.
(SFEM, 8/28/98, p.14)
1939 At Angels Camp in California
Zip the frog jumped a record setting 15 ft 10 inches.
(SFC, 4/28/96, p.T-3)
1939 Thomas C. Rice (1914-1996)
graduated from USF. He went on to become a professional wrestler known
as "The Masked Marvel."
(SFC, 8/28/96, C2)
1939 This year’s NY Yankee
baseball season was covered by Richard J. Tofel in his 2002 book ""The
Legend in the Making." The season culminated with a 4th consecutive
World Series championship.
(WSJ, 3/14/02, p.A16)
1939 Ernest O. Lawrence
(1901-1958) of UC Berkeley won the Nobel Prize in Physics for his
invention of the cyclotron.
(SFC, 10/10/96, p.A1)(LHS, 2/12/1998)
1939 Government Aid to Dependent
Children began to serve primarily divorced, deserted and unwed mothers,
and widows became eligible for Social Security.
(SFEC, 1/5/97, Z1 p.5)
1939 Augie Hiebert went to Alaska
to help build the first radio station in Fairbanks.
(WSJ, 9/22/07, p.A8)
1939 Tom Pendergast, boss of
Kansas City’s political machine, went to prison for failing to report a
large part of $620,000 in bribe and business income.
(SFC, 12/2/96, p.A10)
1939 Edwin Sutherland, sociology
prof. at Indiana Univ., coined the term white-collar crime.
(WSJ, 10/15/03, p.B1)
1939 Paul Dorfman and Jack Ruby
ran the Waste Handlers Union in Chicago.
(SFC, 11/18/96, p.B7)
1939 Dorothy Schiff (1903-1989)
bought the New York Post at the urging of her husband, George Backer.
He resigned in 1942 and she took over the paper.
(WSJ, 4/7/07,
p.P10)(http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Dorothy_Schiff)
1939 Philo T. Farnsworth sold his
television patents to RCA Victor for $1 million.
(SFC, 9/7/02, p.D4)
1939 IBM was ejected as a
component of the Dow Jones Industrial Average in favor of AT&T.
(WSJ, 5/28/96, p. R-42)
1939 Ford debuted the Lincoln
Continental created under the design team led by Bob Gregorie (d.2002
at 94).
(SFC, 12/3/02, p.A21)
1939 GM’s Buick introduced
electrical, directional indicator signals.
(WSJ, 6/19/96, Adv. Supl)
1939 Oldsmobile was the first car
to offer an automatic transmission. [see 1937]
(WSJ, 6/19/96, Adv. Supl)
1939 Packard introduced the first
auto air-conditioning system.
(F, 10/7/96, p.69)
1939 The Del Orleans, a
passenger-cargo liner, was completed and plied the waters between north
and south America. The US Navy acquired it in 1941 and turned it into a
troop transport named Crescent City. From 1970-1995 it served as a
training ship for the California Maritime Academy. In 1995 Oakland
artist Slobodan Dan Paich had it towed to Oakland and rechristened as
the Artship. The project failed to get funding and in 2004 it was sold
for scrap.
(SFC, 6/14/04, p.B5)(SFC, 9/16/05, p.B5)
1939 The first fluorescent lights
and FM radio receivers came out.
(SFC, 9/1/96, z1 p.2)
1939 Little Lulu dolls began to be
made by the Knocker-Bocker Toy Co. and were offered as premiums to
subscribers of the Saturday Evening Post.
(SFC, 2/4/98, Z1 p.6)
1939 William Gruber and Harold
Graves produced the 1st View-Master in Portland. 2 cameras were used to
create stereo images. They were introduced at the New York World’s Fair
and became an overnight sensation. In 2009 Fisher-Price eliminated
almost all of its View Master titles, except for a handful of
children’s titles.
(SFC, 8/31/00, p.C8)(Econ, 3/14/09, p.34)
1939 Financier William R. Lovett
bought the Piggly Wiggly business and later moved the headquarters to
Jacksonville, Fla.
(WSJ, 11/16/98, p.A12)
1939 Sir John Templeton purchased
shares in 104 almost worthless NY stockbrokers in anticipation of a
strong recovery due to impending war. Within 3 years he turned a profit
on 100 of the 104 purchases.
(Econ, 12/18/04, p.110)
1939 The Toastolator Co., a
subsidiary of Crocker-Wheeler, began making the conveyer belt
Toast-o-Lator toasters. Production continued to 1952.
(SFC, 5/14/08, p.G6)
1939 Earl Tupper (d.1983), a
Massachusetts tree surgeon and inventor, founded Tupperware. In 1942 he
introduced a polyethylene container with a fitted cap. The containers
took off in 1951 when he hired Brownie Wise (d.1992), a secretary from
Detroit, who developed a sales network based on patio parties. Tupper
forced Wise out in 1958 and sold the company to Rexall Drugs. [see 1938]
(WSJ, 2/18/04, p.A9)
1939 Bra makers first started
using cup sizes.
(SFC, 9/1/96, Z1 p.2)
1939 Erno Laszlo (1891-1973),
Hungary immigrant, opened the Laszlo Institute on Fifth Ave in NYC. In
1927 he had opened the Laszlo Institute for Scientific Cosmetology in
Budapest.
(Econ, 11/29/03, p.18)
1939 Scientist Walter Elsasser
proposed that the Earth‘s core might contain a large deposit of
uranium. The idea was later supported by scientist J. Marvin Herndon
and in 2004 researchers planned tests for the hypothesis.
(SFC, 11/29/04, p.A4)
1939 Godfrey Thompson, a British
researcher, proposed that intelligence (as measured in IQ tests)
involved the interworking of multiple mental "bonds" in the brain.
(SFC, 7/21/00, p.B3)
1939 The California state Division
of Fish and Game, concerned about dead fish in the north, launched a
study and found a creek downstream from Iron Mountain getting 2,876
pounds of copper a day. The state told mine operators to reduce metals
and acid drainage.
(SFEC,11/2/97, p.A13)
1939 Harvey Cushing, Yale
professor known as the godfather of neurosurgery, died and left a
collection of some 600 brains known as the Cushing Tumor Registry.
(WSJ, 2/15/96, p.A-1)
1939 Heinrich Hoffman (b.1875),
Paris glass artist, died.
(SFC, 4/12/06, p.G4)
1939 William Butler Yeats,
Irish-born poet, died in Southern France at age 73. He was taken home
to Ireland in 1949. In 1999 Brenda Maddux published "Yeats's Ghosts:
The Secret Life of W.B. Yeats."
(SFEC, 8/8/99, p.T6)
1939 In Afghanistan the state-run
Karkar coal mine began production in Baghlan province.
(Econ, 11/25/06, p.64)
1939 Australia set up a wheat
board for growers to market their crops collectively and get better
prices. The AWB was privatized in 1999 and later quoted on the stock
market.
(Econ, 7/30/05, p.59)
1939 The first Catholic church in
the Gulf was opened in Bahrain's capital, Manama.
(AP, 3/14/08)
c1939 Belgium feared a Nazi
invasion and shipped $2.5 billion of gold to France, which in turn
shipped it to the port city of Dakar, its West African colony now known
as Senegal. The Nazis discovered the shipment after their occupation of
France and had the gold transferred to their account in Switzerland.
(WSJ, 4/28/97, p.A17)
1939 In China Mao Zedong (Mao
Tse-tung), in response to the Nazi-Soviet pact, mounted a close
collaboration with Japanese intelligence to undermine Chiang Kai-shek,
head of the KMT.
(Econ, 5/28/05, p.83)
1939 In Colombia the Museo de Oro
(Museum of Gold) opened in Bogota.
(SSFC, 3/4/07, p.G4)
1939 Nicholas Winton saved 669
Czechoslovak children by organizing train transport from Prague to
London at the outbreak of World War II. In 2007 the Czech Rep. awarded
Sir Nicholas Winton (98) the Cross of Merit of the 1st class for saving
the children.
(AP, 10/9/07)
1939 German scientists split the
uranium atom with a slight loss of total mass that is converted into
energy.
(V.D.-H.K.p.326)
1939 By this time Heinrich
Himmler’s Ahnenerbe, an organization dedicated to studying the Aryan
roots for purposes of propaganda, included 137 scholars and scientists
plus 82 members of support staff. In 2006 Heather Pringle authored “The
Master Plan,” an account of the Ahnenerbe.
(WSJ, 2/9/06, p.D8)
1939 In Iraq ruler Ghazi I died
mysteriously. The official explanation was that he drove his car into a
lamppost.
(NW, 9/8/03, p.32)
1939 Italy passed a law for the
Protection of Artistic Patrimony. It required that art over 50 years
old be offered to the government for acquisition before export.
(AM, May/Jun 97 p.64)
1939 In Mexico the National Action
Party (PAN) was founded in the state of Chihuahua.
(WSJ, 7/1/98, p.A1)
1939 Siam became Thailand. [see
1949]
(Hem., 3/97, p.27)
1939 In South Africa Solomon
Linda’s Original Evening Birds made recordings that included the piece
"Mbube" (The Lion). In 1951 the Zulu song was recorded by Pete Seeger
with "Uyimbube" (You’re the lion) mistranslated to "Wimoweh." The song
became a big hit in 1961 recorded by the Tokens as "The Lion Sleeps
Tonight." Linda died in poverty.
(NH, 6/97, p.66)(SFC, 7/9/01, p.A10)
1939 Dan West, a relief worker
from Indiana, concluded during the Spanish Civil War that there must be
a better way to help the needy than simply handing out free milk. In
1944, the first shipment of 17 heifers left York, Pennsylvania, for
Puerto Rico, going to families whose malnourished children had never
even tasted milk.
(SSFC, 11/26/06, p.E3)(www.heifer.org)
1939 In Erzincan, Turkey, an
earthquake killed 30,000 people.
(SFEC, 8/22/99, p.A17)
1939 In the USSR Yuli Khariton and
Yakow Zeldovich made the first Soviet calculations for nuclear fission.
(SFC, 12/20/96, p.B6)
1939 The USSR census of this year
classified the results and reported 170 million to Stalin. Census
officials responsible for the 1937 census had been shot for their count
of 162 million.
(Econ, 12/22/07, p.99)
1939 A Communist uprising took
place and failed in French Indochina (Vietnam).
(SFC, 5/3/00, p.A24)
1930s Late, A handful of Spanish
artists, including Eugenio Granell and Jose Vela Zanetti, immigrated to
Santo Domingo of the Dominican Republic and introduced the modern art
idiom.
(WSJ, 6/18/96, p.A14)
1939-1940 The Golden Gate Int’l. Exposition was held
on Treasure Island in the San Francisco Bay. It featured the Tower of
the Sun, the height of a 40-story building, and the immense statue of
Pacifica.
(SFC, 5/7/97, p.A15)
1939-1944 In the United States, the percentage of
total national output that was in military production rose from 2
percent in 1939 to 40 percent in 1944. The dramatic shift from civilian
to military production was driven by American involvement in World War
II.
(HNQ, 3/17/99)
1939-1945 Norman Davies covered this period in his
2006 book “Europe at War 1939-1945: No Simple Victory.” His central
theme was the Western alliance with Stalin and its consequences.
(Econ, 11/11/06, p.94)
1939-1945 During WW II Elizabeth W. Schickele
(1908-1996) and a team of researchers in the US Army Quartermasters
Corp. originated the concept of the wind-chill factor.
(SFC, 9/7/96, p.A19)
1939-1945 During WW II the US set up spider farms to
produce silk for optical and gun sight cross-hairs. 405,399 Americans
were killed in the war.
(SFEC, 9/15/96, Z1 p.5)(SFEM, 11/10/96, p.12)(SFEC,
9/28/97, Z1 p.2)
1939-1945 US Intelligence revealed in 1997 that
during WW II the Swiss National Bank sent 280 truckloads of Nazi gold
to Spain and Portugal.
(USAT, 1/13/97, p.3A)
c1939-1945 Some 119,000 people died at the Mauthausen
Concentration Camp in Austria.
(SFC, 2/25/00, p.A16)
1939-1945 Winston Churchill authorized bribes of some
$100 million to Spanish military leaders to keep Spain out of the war.
(SFC, 8/5/97, p.A10)
1939-1945 Johnnie Johnson (d.2001 at 85), British
fighter pilot and leading Allied air ace in Europe, shot down 38 German
planes. In 1956 he authored the autobiography "Wing Leader." Richard
Bong of the US Army Air Forces shot down 40 Japanese planes.
(SFC, 2/2/01, p.D7)
1939-1945 Heinrich Mohn and his associates used the
war to transform Bertelsmann from a German provincial publisher of
religious texts into the largest supplier of war literature to Hitler’s
army.
(WSJ, 12/23/02, p.A6)
1939-1945 In Germany during WW II some 5-15,000
homosexual men were sent to prison camps and marked for special
treatment with a pink triangle on their uniforms. The majority died in
the camps.
(SFEC, 6/29/97, p.A18)
1939-1945 During WW II the Germans and Ukrainians
used Transdniestria as a killing field to purge Europe of some 150,000
Jews.
(SSFC, 2/12/06, p.E2)
1939-1945 The German U-boat casualty rate during the
war was 80% of the 28,000 men who served.
(HC, 1/29/98)
1939-1945 The Hungarian Gendarmerie carried out
orders to round up Jews for Nazi death camps where some 550,000
perished.
(SFC, 2/25/00, p.A16)
1939-1945 A 1997 report said that Sweden received
some 38 tons of gold from the Nazis in payment for exports.
(SFC,1/22/97, p.A9)
1939-1945 Switzerland took in nearly 30,000 Jews
fleeing Nazi terror and turned away at least 24,500. Refugees were
forced to work in labor camps.
(SFC, 1/15/98, p.A12)(SFC, 12/11/99, p.C1)
1939-1953 In 2007 Geoffrey Roberts authored “Stalin’s
Wars: From World War to Cold War, 1939-1953.”
(Econ, 1/6/07, p.68)
1939-1960 Ernest Hemingway (d.1961), American writer,
lived in Cuba.
(SSFC, 6/5/05, p.F8)
1939-1962 A drinking club called "The Inklings"
gathered every Tuesday at "The Eagle and Child" public house in Oxford,
England. Members included CS Lewis, Charles Williams, JRR Tolkien and
others.
(SSFC, 1/26/03, p.B12)
1939-1971 California maintained a Senate Fact-Finding
Subcommittee on Un-American Activities. Files on some 20,000
Californians were declared still closed to the public in 1998.
(SFC, 4/14/98, p.A20)
1935-1976 In Sweden an involuntary sterilization
program was conducted over this period during which some 60,000 people
were deemed genetically inferior and involuntarily sterilized. In 1999
a commission recommended that victims be paid $21,000 each.
(SFC, 8/26/97, p.C3)(SFC, 1/27/99, p.C10)
1939-1996 John Register, California realist painter.
His work included: "Waiting Room" (1982), "Desert Restaurant" (1986),
and "Mojave Bus Station" (1978).
(SFC, 1/21/99, p.D1)
Go to 1940