Top News Stories from 1939
World Events
- Germany invades Poland; occupies Bohemia and Moravia; renounces pact with England and concludes 10-year non-aggression pact with U.S.S.R.
- Russo-Finnish War begins; Finns to lose one-tenth of territory in 1940 peace treaty.
- World War II begins.
U.S. Events
U.S. Statistics
President: Franklin D Roosevelt
Vice President: John N. Garner
Population: 130,879,718
More U.S. Statistics... - As World War II begins, Roosevelt submits $1,319-million defense budget, proclaims U.S. neutrality, and declares limited emergency.
- New YorkWorld's Fair opens. Background: exposition
- Daughters of the American Revolutionrefuses to allow Marian Anderson to perform at Constitution Hall in Washington, D.C.
- U.S. Department of Agriculture starts first food stamp program in Rochester, N.Y. Program ends in 1943.
Economics
Federal spending: $9.14 billion
Consumer Price Index: $13.9
Unemployment: 17.2%
Cost of a first-class stamp: $0.03
Sports
World Series
NY Yankees d. Cincinnati (4-0)Stanley Cup
Boston d. TorontoWimbledon
Women: Alice Marble d. K. Stammers (6-2 6-0)Men: Bobby Riggs d. E. Cooke (2-6 8-6 3-6 6-3 6-2)
Kentucky Derby Champion
JohnstownNCAA Basketball Championship
Oregon d. Ohio St.NCAA Football Champions
Texas A&M (11-0-0)Entertainment
Entertainment Awards
Pulitzer Prizes Fiction:
The Yearling, Marjorie Kinnan Rawlings
Drama: Abe Lincoln in Illinois, Robert E. Sherwood
Academy Award, Best Picture: You Can't Take It With You (Columbia)
Nobel Prize for Literature: Frans Eemil Sillanpää (Finland)
Miss America: Patricia Donnelly (MI)
More Entertainment Awards... Events
- The big-screen adaptation of Gone with the Wind premieres, and will go on to gross $192 million, making it one of the most profitable films of all time. It's also one of the longest films, clocking in at 231 minutes.
- Robert Kane introduces the Batman cartoon.
Science
Nobel Prizes in Science
Chemistry: Adolf Butenandt (Germany), for work on sexual hormones (declined the prize); and Leopold Ruzicka (Switzerland), for work with polymethylenes
Physics: Ernest Orlando Lawrence (US), for development of the cyclotron
Physiology or Medicine: Gerhard Domagk (Germany), for antibacterial effect of prontocilate
More Nobel Prizes in 1998... - Albert Einstein writes a letter to President Roosevelt regarding the possibility of using uranium to initiate a nuclear chain reaction, the fundamental process behind the atomic bomb.
- Paul Muller develops DDT.
