1939

Decades: 1880s 1890s 1900s 1910s 1920s - 1930s - 1940s 1950s 1960s 1970s 1980s

Years: 1934 1935 1936 1937 1938 - 1939 - 1940 1941 1942 1943 1944

Events

• January 26 - Spanish Civil War: Troops loyal to Francisco Franco and aided by Italy take Barcelona.
• February 27 - Sit-down strikes are outlawed by the Supreme Court of the United States.
• March 2 - Pius XII becomes Pope
• March 3 - In Bombay, Mohandas Gandhi begins to fast in protest of the autocratic rule in India.
• March 15 - German troops occupy the remaining part of Bohemia and Moravia; Czechoslovakia ceases to exist.
• March 16 - Marriage of Princess Fawzia of Egypt to Shah Mohammad Reza Pahlavi of Iran
• March 22 - Germany takes Memel from Lithuania
• March 28 - Dictator Francisco Franco conquers Madrid, ending the Spanish Civil War
• April 4 - Faisal II becomes King of Iraq.
• April 7 - Italy invades Albania.
• May 22 - Germany and Italy sign the Pact of Steel.
• July 4 - The concentration camp Neuengamme becomes autonomous.
• July 6 - Holocaust: The last remaining Jewish enterprises in Germany are closed.
• August 23 - Hitler and Stalin divide eastern Europe between themselves. Finland, the Baltic states and eastern Poland to the USSR. Western Poland to Germany (Molotov-Ribbentrop Pact)
• August 27 - A Heinkel 178, the first jet-powered aircraft, flies for the last time.
• September 1 - World War II: Polish September Campaign - Nazi Germany attacks Poland, beginning the war
• September 3 - World War II: France, Australia and the United Kingdom declare war on Germany.
• September 5 - World War II: The United States declares its neutrality in the war.
• September 6 - World War II: South Africa declares war on Germany.
• September 10 - Canada declares war on Germany.
• September 17 - Soviet Union invades Poland and then occupies eastern Polish territories.
• September 27 - Warsaw surrenders to Germany; Modlin surrenders day later; last Polish large operational unit surrenders near Kock eight days later.
• October 8 - World War II: Germany annexes Western Poland.
• October 11 - Manhattan Project: US President Franklin D. Roosevelt is presented with a letter signed by Albert Einstein urging the United States to rapidly develop the atomic bomb.
• October 15 - The New York Municipal Airport (later renamed La Guardia Airport) is dedicated.
• November 4 - World War II: US President Franklin D. Roosevelt orders the United States Customs Service to implement the Neutrality Act of 1939, allowing cash-and-carry purchases of weapons by belligerents.
• November 6 - The Hedda Hopper Show debuts with Hollywood gossip Hedda Hopper as host (the show ran until 1951 and made Hopper a powerful figure in the Hollywood elite).
• November 8 - Venlo Incident: Two British agents of SIS are captured by the Germans.
• November 8 - In Munich, Adolf Hitler narrowly escapes an assassination attempt while celebrating the 16th anniversary of the Beer Hall Putsch.
• November 15 - In Washington, DC, US President Franklin D. Roosevelt lays the cornerstone of the Jefferson Memorial.
• November 30 - Winter War begins: Soviet forces invade Finland and reach the Mannerheim Line, starting the war.
• December 2 - La Guardia Airport opens for business in New York City.
• December 25 - A Christmas Carol was read before a radio audience for the first time.
• Batman created by Bob Kane.
• Nuclear fission discovered independently by Lise Meitner and Otto Hahn
• Kirlian photography invented by Semyon Kirlian
• Siam changes its name to Thailand
• A logging crew sets off a second forest fire in the Tillamook Burn, which destroys 190,000 acres

Ongoing events

• Spanish Civil War (1936-1939)
• Sino-Japanese War (1937-1945)

Year in topic

• 1939 in film
  • August 12 - The Wizard of Oz
  • December 15 - Gone With the Wind premiers in Altanta, Georgia.
  • Mr. Smith Goes to Washington starring Jimmy Stewart
  • Of Mice and Men
  • Wuthering Heights
• 1939 in literature
• 1939 in music
  • January 18 - Louis Armstrong records "Jeepers Creepers."
  • Frequency modulation (FM) is invented
• 1939 in sports
• July 4 - Lou Gehrig, recently diagnosed with Amyotrophic lateral sclerosis, tells a crowd at Yankee Stadium that he considered himself "The luckiest man on the face of the earth" as he announces his retirement from Major League Baseball.
• 1939 in television
  • April - television demonstrations are held at the World's Fair in New York and the Golden Gate International Exhibition in San Francisco
  • April 30 - Franklin Delano Roosevelt, appearing at the World's Fair, becomes the first U.S. president to give a speech that is broadcast on television
  • May 17 - The first baseball game (Princeton-Columbia) is broadcast on television, from Baker Field in New York. Bill Stern was the announcer
  • June 1 - The first heavyweight boxing match is televised, Max Baer vs Lou Nova, form Yankee Stadium.
  • August 26 - The first Major League Baseball game is telecast, a double-header between the Cincinnati Reds and the Brooklyn Dodgers at Ebbets Field, in Brooklyn.
  • September 1 - As World War II began, BBC television abruptly stopped its broadcasting in the middle of a Mickey Mouse cartoon (The BBC would resume its broadcasting at that same point after the war in 1945)
  • The DuMont company begins producing consumer television sets
  • September 30 - The first televised college football game, Fordham vs Waynesburg, at Randall's Island, New York.
  • October 22 - The first NFL game is televised. The Brooklyn Dodgers vs Philadelphia Eagles at Ebbetts Field in Brooklyn.

Births

• January 3 - Bobby Hull, hockey player
• January 10 - Bill Toomey, track and field athlete
• January 10 - Sal Mineo, actor (d. 1976)
• January 17 - Maury Povich, talk show host
• January 19 - Phil Everly, musician and singer
• January 21 - Wolfman Jack, disk jockey, actor (d. 1995)
• January 24 - Doug Kershaw, musician
• January 24 - Ray Stevens, country music musician
• January 29 - Germaine Greer, writer, feminist
• February 6 - Mike Farrell, actor
• February 10 - Roberta Flack, singer
• February 11 - Jane Hyatt Yolen, science fiction author.
• February 12 - Ray Manzarek, keyboardist
• February 23 - Peter Fonda, actor
• February 23 - Majel Barrett, actress
• February 28 - Erika Pluhar, actress and singer
• February 28 - Tommy Tune, dancer, choreographer, actor
• March 13 - Neil Sedaka, singer
• March 19 - Joe Kapp, American football star
• March 20 - Brian Mulroney, eighteenth Prime Minister of Canada
• March 26 - James Caan, actor
• March 27 - Cale Yarborough, NASCAR racer
• March 31 - Zviad Gamsakhurdia, scientist and writer, first President of the Republic of Georgia (d. 1993)
• March 31 - Volker Schlöndorff, film director
• April 2 - Marvin Gaye, singer (d. 1984)
• April 4 - Hugh Masakela, musician
• April 7 - Francis Ford Coppola, American film director
• April 7 - Sir David Frost, broadcaster, television host
• May 7 - Ruud Lubbers, politician and Prime Minister of the Netherlands
• May 7 - Jimmy Ruffin, singer
• May 9 - Ralph Boston, athlete
• May 13 - Harvey Keitel, actor
• May 18 - Hark Bohm, film director
• May 19 - Dick Scobee, astronaut (d. 1986)
• May 23 - Reinhard Hauff, film director
• May 25 - Ian McKellen, actor
• May 30 - Michael J. Pollard, actor
• June 6 - Louis Andriessen, Dutch composer
• June 11 - Jackie Stewart, Formula One racing driver
• July 26 - John Howard, Australian Prime Minister
• July 26 - Bob Lilly, NFL football player
• August 5 - Princess Irene of the Netherlands
• August 30 - John Peel, Radio 1 DJ
• September 16 - Breyten Breytenbach, South African poet, writer and painter
• September 23 - Janusz Gajos, Polish actor
• October 14 - Ralph Lauren, American fashion designer
• October 24 - F. Murray Abraham, Actor
• November 21 - Mulayam Singh Yadav, politician, India
• November 23 - Bill Bissett, Canadian anti-conventional poet
• December 18 - Michael Moorcock, English science fiction author

Deaths

• January 24 - Maximilian Bircher-Benner, Swiss physician and Muesli inventor
• January 28 - William Butler Yeats, writer
• February 10 - Pope Pius XI
• February 11 - Franz Schmidt, Austrian composer
• February 12 - S. P. L. Sørensen, Danish chemist
• March 19 - Lloyd L. Gaines, American civil rights activist
• August 2 - Harvey Spencer Lewis, Rosicrucian mysticist and Imperator of AMORC
• October 7 - Harvey Cushing, American neurosurgeon (b. 1869)
• November 12 - Norman Bethune, Canadian humanitarian
• November 28 - James Naismith, inventor of basketball
• December 3 - Princess Louise of the United Kingdom, Duchess of Argyll, fourth daughter of Queen Victoria
• December 23 - Anthony Fokker, aircraft manufacturer

Nobel Prizes

• Physics - Ernest Orlando Lawrence
• Chemistry - Adolf Friedrich Johann Butenandt, Leopold Ruzicka
• Medicine - Gerhard Domagk
• Literature - Frans Eemil Sillanpää
• Peace - not awarded

Heads of state in 1939

Referenced By