1938

Template:Year nav Template:C20YearInTopic Year 1938 (MCMXXXVIII) was a common year starting on Saturday (link will take you to calendar).

Events

January

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January 3

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January 16: Benny Goodman in NYC.

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January 20: King Farouk

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January 27: Niagra Bridge collapses in ice.

January 1 – new Constitution of Estonia enters into force.

January 3 - The March of Dimes is established by Franklin Delano Roosevelt.

January 5 - H.R.H. Prince Juan Carlos of Spain is born.
January 11 - Frances Moulton is named the first female president of a U.S. national bank.
January 16 - Benny Goodman and his orchestra become the first jazz musicians to headline a concert at Carnegie Hall in New York City.
January 20 - Wedding of King Farouk I of Egypt and Queen Farida Zulficar in Cairo.
January 22 - Thornton Wilder's play Our Town is performed for the first time in Princeton, New Jersey. It premieres in New York City on February 4.
January 27 - The Niagara Bridge at Niagara Falls, New York collapses due to an ice jam.
January 28 - The first ski tow in America begins operation in Vermont.
January 31 - Crown princess Beatrix is born in Netherlands.

February

February 4 - Adolf Hitler creates the Oberkommando der Wehrmacht (High Command of the Armed Forces), giving him direct control of the German military, and sacks political and military leaders considered unsympathetic to his philosophy or policies.
February 6 - Black Sunday at Bondi Beach, Sydney, Australia: 300 swimmers dragged out to sea in three freak waves; 80 lifesavers save all but 5.
February 10 - Carol II of Romania takes dictatorial powers.
February 12 - Chancellor Kurt von Schuschnigg of Austria meets Adolf Hitler at Berchtesgaden and, under threat of invasion, is forced to yield to German demands for greater Nazi participation in the Austrian government.
February 14 - The British naval base at Singapore begins operations.
February 20 - Anthony Eden resigns as foreign minister of Great Britain, and is succeeded by Lord Halifax.
February 24 - A nylon bristle toothbrush becomes the first commercial product to be made with nylon yarn.

March

March 3 - Oil is discovered in Saudi Arabia.
March 12 - Anschluss: German troops occupy Austria; annexation declared the following day.
March 15 - Soviet Union announces officially that Nikholai Bukharin has been executed.
March 18 - Mexico nationalizes all foreign-owned oil properties within its borders.
March 18 - United States Don Richard Pendergrass is born in Tahoka, Texas.

April

April 10 - Edouard Daladier becomes prime minister of France
April 24 – Konstantin Päts becomes president of Estonia
April 25 - U.S. Supreme Court delivers opinion in Erie Railroad Co. v. Tompkins and overturns a century of federal common law.
April 28 - The towns of Dana, Enfield, Greenwich, and Prescott in Massachusetts are disincorporated to make way for the Quabbin Reservoir.

May

May 5 - Vatican recognizes Franco's government in Spain
May 9 - Kaarel Eenpalu becomes prime minister of Estonia
May 17 - Information Please debuts on NBC Radio.
May 20 - Czechoslovakia orders a partial mobilization of its armed forces along the German border.
May 25 - Bombing of Alicante, Spain, in the Spanish Civil War, with 313 dead.

June

June 11 - Fire destroys 212 buildings in Ludes, Latvia
June 12-18 - Roma and Sinti in Germany and Austria are rounded up, beaten up and jailed
June 14 - Action Comics issues the first Superman comic.
June 19 - Italy beat Hungary 4-2 to win the 1938 World Cup
June 22 - Heavyweight boxing champion Joe Louis knocks out Max Schmeling in the first round of their rematch at Yankee Stadium in New York City.
June 23 - The Civil Aeronautics Act is signed into law, forming the Civil Aeronautics Authority in the United States.
June 23 - Marineland opens near St. Augustine, Florida.
June 25 - Dr. Douglas Hyde is elected the first President of Ireland.
June 28 - A 450 metric ton meteorite struck the earth in an empty field near Chicora, Pennsylvania

July

July 3 - Steam locomotive "Mallard" sets the world speed record for steam by reaching 126 mph.
July 3 - The last reunion of the Blue and Gray commemorates the 75th anniversary of the Battle of Gettysburg in Gettysburg, Pennsylvania.
July 14 - Howard Hughes sets a new record by completing a 91 hour airplane flight around the world.
July 18 - Wrong Way Corrigan takes off from New York, ostensibly heading for California. He lands in Ireland instead.
July - Building of the concentration camp Mauthausen

August

August 18 - The Thousand Islands Bridge, connecting the United States with Canada, is dedicated by US President Franklin D. Roosevelt.

September

September - European crisis over German demand for annexation of Sudeten borderland of Czechoslovakia.
September 21 - A large hurricane (the New England Hurricane of 1938) strikes Long Island and southern New England, killing over 300 along the Rhode Island shoreline and 600 altogether.
September 29 - Munich agreement of German, Italian, British and French leaders agrees to German demands regarding annexation of Sudetenland.
September 29 - Republic of Hatay declared in Syria

October

October - Detective Comics #20 issues the first Crimson Avenger comic.
October 1 - German troops march into Sudetenland
October 2 - Tiberias massacre: Arabs murder 20 Jews.
October 5 - Edvard Beneš, president of Czechoslovakia, resigns.
October 10 - The Blue Water Bridge opens, connecting Port Huron, Michigan and Sarnia, Ontario
October 16 - Winston Churchill, in a broadcast address to the United States, condemns the Munich Agreement as a defeat and calls upon America and western Europe to prepare for armed resistance against Hitler.
October 17 - Jan Syrovy's government begins in Czechoslovakia
October 24 - Minimum wage established by law in the United States
October 27 - Du Pont announced a name for its new synthetic yarn: "nylon".
October 30 - Orson Welles's radio adaptation of The War of the Worlds is broadcast, causing mass panic in various parts of the United States.
October 31 - Great Depression: In an effort to try restore investor confidence, the New York Stock Exchange unveils a fifteen-point program aimed to upgrade protection for the investing public.

November

November 1 - Horse Racing: Seabiscuit defeats War Admiral by four lengths in their famous match race at Pimlico Race Course in Baltimore, Maryland.
November 9 - Holocaust: Kristallnacht begins - In Germany, the "night of broken glass" begins as Nazi troops and sympathizers loot and burn Jewish businesses (the all night affair saw 7,500 Jewish businesses destroyed, 267 synagogues burned, 91 Jews killed, and at least 25,000 Jewish men arrested).
November 10 - On the eve of Armistice Day, Kate Smith sings Irving Berlin's God Bless America for the first time on her weekly radio show.
November 13- The people of New York City held a fruit tasting contest held by managers.
November 18 - Trade union members elect John L. Lewis as the first president of the Congress of Industrial Organizations.
November 30 - Czech parliament elects Emil Hácha as the new president of Czechoslovakia.

December

December 16 - MGM releases its successful film version of Charles Dickens's A Christmas Carol. The film was originally intended to star Lionel Barrymore as Ebenezer Scrooge, but Barrymore is replaced because of his arthritis by Reginald Owen. The film is shown on television often in the 1960's, but its popularity is eventually eclipsed by Scrooge (1951 film), starring Alastair Sim in the role. In the late 1980's, Turner Entertainment acquires the film, and begins to show it on TV annually once again.
December 23 - Coelacanth, a fish thought to have been extinct, caught off the coast of South Africa near Chalumna River

Unknown dates

Italian mathematician Ettore Majorana disappears
In West Java, Daeng Soetigna tuned traditional angklung to play also diatonic scale.
The Neuengamme concentration camp near Hamburg.
Adolf Hitler is Time magazine's "Man of the Year" (as most influential during the course of the year, he was the best man of the year)
Enoch A. Holtwick began long political career.
Walther P38 Was Introduced.
László Bíró patents the ballpoint pen.
The first cartoon to feature a prototypical Bugs Bunny, Porky's Hare Hunt, is released.

Ongoing events

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

Births

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January-February

January 1 - Robert Jankel, British coachbuilder (d. 2005)
January 1 - Frank Langella, American actor
January 2 - Hans Herbjørnsrud, Norwegian author
January 2 - Ian Brady, British serial killer
January 5 - King Juan Carlos I of Spain
January 7 - Roland Topor, French illustrator (d. 1997)
January 8 - Bob Eubanks, American game show host
January 10 - Donald Knuth, American mathematician and computer scientist
January 10 - Willie McCovey, baseball player
January 11 - Fischer Black, American economist (d. 1995)
January 14 - Jack Jones, American singer and actor
January 18 - Curt Flood, baseball player (d. 1997)
January 20 - Derek Dougan, Northern Irish footballer
January 23 - Georg Baselitz, German painter and sculptor
January 25 - Etta James, American singer
January 25 - Vladimir Vysotsky, Russian singer-songwriter, poet, actor (d. 1980)
January 31 - Queen Beatrix of the Netherlands

February 1 - Sherman Hemsley, American comedian and actor
February 2 - Max Alvis, baseball player
February 8 - Prentice Gautt, American football player
February 11 - Bevan Congdon, New Zealand cricketer
February 11 - Simone de Oliveira, Portuguese actress and singer
February 11 - Manuel Noriega, Panamanian general and dictator
February 12 - Judy Blume, American author
February 13 - Oliver Reed, English actor (d. 1999)
February 14 - Lee Chamberlin, African-American film and television actress
February 18 - Istvan Szabo, Hungarian director
February 24 - Phil Knight, American sportswear entrepreneur
February 25 - Herb Elliott, Australian runner

March-April

March 4 - Don Perkins, American football player
March 4 - Angus MacLise, American percussionist, composer, mystic, shaman, poet, occultist, calligrapher and original drummer for the Velvet Underground (d. 1979)
March 7 - David Baltimore, American biologist, recipient of the Nobel Prize in Physiology or Medicine
March 7 - Janet Guthrie, American race car driver
March 13 - Erma Franklin, American singer (d. 2002)
March 17 - Rudolf Nureyev, Russian-born dancer and choreographer (d. 1993)
March 17 - Keith Michael Patrick O'Brien, Northern Irish clergyman
March 18 - Charley Pride, American baseball player and musician
March 23 - Maynard Jackson, mayor of Atlanta, Georgia (d. 2003)
March 25 - Hoyt Axton, American musician and actor (d. 1999)
March 26 - Anthony James Leggett, American physicist, Nobel Prize laureate

April 1 - John Quade, American actor
April 2 - John Larsson, the 17th General of The Salvation Army
April 3 - Jeff Barry, American record producer and songwriter
April 4 - A. Bartlett Giamatti, American president of Yale University and baseball commissioner (d. 1989)
April 7 - Freddie Hubbard, Jazz Trumpeter
April 8 - Kofi Annan, Ghanaian Secretary General of the United Nations, recipient of the Nobel Peace Prize
April 10 - Don Meredith, American football player and broadcaster
April 11 - Kurt Moll, German bass
April 12 - Roger Caron, Canadian author
April 15 - Claudia Cardinale, Tunisian-born, Italian actress
April 17 - Kerry Thornley, American counterculture figure, writer, co-founder of Discordianism
April 26 - Duane Eddy, American musician
April 29 - Larry Niven, American author

May-June

May 2 - Paramount Chief Moshoeshoe II of Lesotho (d. 1996)
May 17 - Jason Bernard, American actor (d. 1996)
May 22 - Richard Benjamin, American actor
May 26 - William Bolcom, American composer
May 26 - Teresa Stratas, Canadian soprano
May 31 - Johnny PayCheck, American singer (d. 2003)
May 31 - Peter Yarrow, American singer

June 5 - Karin Balzer, German athlete
June 7 - Goose Gonsoulin, American football player
June 12 - Tom Oliver, Australian actor
June 15 - Billy Williams, baseball player
June 19 - Wahoo McDaniel, American football player and professional wrestler (d. 2002)
June 19 - Ian Smith, Australian actor
June 28 - Moy Yat, Chinese martial artist