1932
1932 (
MCMXXXII) was a
leap year starting on Friday (the link will take you to a full 1932 calendar).
January-February
*
January 3 - British arrest and intern
Mohandas Gandhi and
Vallabhbhai Patel*
January 8 - In Britain the
Archbishop of Canterbury forbids church remarriage of divorcees
*
January 12 -
Hattie W. Caraway becomes the first woman elected to the
United States Senate*
January 14 -
Maurice Ravel's
Concerto in G (Ravel) debuts with piano soloist
Marguerite Long and Ravel conducting the Lamoureux Orchestra
*
January 15 -
Pierre Laval forms a new government in France
*
January 15 - About 6 million unemployed in
Germany*
January 26 - British submarine M-2 sinks with all 50 hands
*
January 28 -
Japan occupies
Shanghai*
January 29 - Minority government of
Karl Mureschi in
Austria ends the governmental crisis
*
January 31 - Japanese warships arrive in
Nanking*
February 2 - General convention of
disarmament begins in
Geneva*
February 2 -
League of Nations again recommends negotiations between the
Republic of China and
Japan*
February 4 -
1932 Winter Olympics open in
Lake Placid, New York.
Japan occupies
Harbin,
China*
February 11 -
Pope Pius XI meets
Benito Mussolini in the
Vatican City*
February 15 -
Clara, Lu & Em, generally regarded as the first daytime network
soap opera, debuts in its morning time slot over the
Blue Network of
NBC Radio, having originally been a late evening program.
*
February 18 -
Japan declares
Manzhouguo (Japanese name for
Manchuria) formally independent from
China*
February 27 -
Adolf Hitler gains German
citizenship prior to elections
*
February 27 -
Mäntsälä Rebellion in
FinlandMarch-April
*
March 1 -
Charles Augustus Lindbergh III, the infant son of
Anne Morrow Lindbergh and
Charles Lindbergh is kidnapped.
*
March 9 -
Eamon de Valera is elected
President of the Executive Council. It is the first change of government in the
Irish Free State in 10 years.
*
March 18 - Peace negotiations between
China and
Japan begin.
*
March 19 -
Sydney Harbour Bridge opens.
*
March 20 -
Graf Zeppelin begins a regular route to South America.
*
March 25 -
Tarzan the Ape Man opens, with Olympic gold medal swimmer
Johnny Weissmuller in the title role. Weismuller starred in a total of 12
Tarzan films.
*
April 5 - Prohibition is lifted in
Finland at 10 in the morning (local time), resulting in a new
mnemonic "543210".
*
April 6 - U.S. president
Herbert Hoover supports armament limitations.
*
April 6 - Trial against fraudulent art dealer
Otto Wacker begins in Berlin.
*
April 10 -
Paul von Hindenburg is elected president of Germany.
*
April 17 -
Haile Selassie announces an anti-
slavery law in
Abyssinia.
*
April 19 - German art dealer
Otto Wacker is sentenced to 19 months in prison for selling
fraudulent paintings he attributed to
Vincent van Gogh.
May-June
*
May 2 - Comedian
Jack Benny's radio show airs for the first time.
*
May 6 -
Paul Gorguloff assassinates French president
Paul Doumer in Paris - Doumer dies the next day.
*
May 10 -
Albert Lebrun becomes the new
president of France*
May 12 - Ten weeks after his abduction, the infant son of
Charles Lindbergh is found dead in
Hopewell, New Jersey just a few miles from the Lindbergh's home.
*
May 13 - The
Premier of New South Wales,
Jack Lang, is dismissed by the State Governor, Sir Phillip Game
*
May 15 - Japanese troops leave
Shanghai;
May 15 Incident, the assassination of Japanese prime minister
Tsuyoshi Inukai, occurs.
*
May 16 - Massive riots between Hindus and Muslims in
Bombay - thousands dead and injured.
*
May 20-21 -
Amelia Earhart flies from USA to
Londonderry,
Northern Ireland in 14 hours 54 minutes
*
May 30 - German
chancellor Heinrich Brüning resigns. President Hindenburg takes
Franz von Papen to form a new government.
* June - 15,000
World War I veterans march in
Washington, DC*
June 4 -
Military coup in
Chile*
June 6 - The
Revenue Act of 1932 is enacted, creating the first
gas tax in the
United States at 1 cent per US gallon (0.26 ¢/L) sold.
*
June 14 - Bans against SS and SA overturned in Germany
*
June 20 -
Benelux customs union negotiated
*
June 24 - After a relatively bloodless military rebellion,
Siam becomes a
constitutional monarchyJuly-October
*
July 1 - ABC (
Australian Broadcasting Commission) established
*
July 5 -
Antonio de Oliveira Salazar becomes the
fascist prime minister of
Portugal (for the next 36 years)
*
July 7 - French submarine Sromethee sinks off
Cherbourg - 66 dead
*
July 12 -
Hedley Verity establishes a new
first-class record by taking all ten wickets for only ten runs against Nottinghamshire on a pitch affected by a storm.
*
July 17 -
Bloody Sunday of Altona in Germany - armed
communists attack a
national socialist demonstration - 18 dead. Many other political street fights follow.
*
July 28 - US President
Herbert Hoover orders the
United States Army to forcibly evict the "
Bonus Army" of
World War I veterans gathered in
Washington, DC. US troops dispersed the last of the "Bonus Army" the next day.
*
July 30 -
1932 Summer Olympics open in
Los Angeles.
*
August 2 - First
positron is discovered by
Carl D. Anderson.
*
August 6 - First
Venice Film Festival*
August 10 - A 5.1
kg chondrite type
meteorite broke into at least seven fragments and struck earth near the town of
Archie in
Cass County, Missouri.
*
August 18 -
Auguste Piccard reaches altitude of 16.500 meters with an air balloon
*
August 30 -
Hermann Göring elected as a chairman of German senate
*
August 31 - Total
solar eclipse visible from northern Canada through NE Vermont, New Hampshire, SW Maine, and the Capes of Massachusetts
*
September 9 - The Generalitat reinstaurated,
Catalonia regains political autonomy inside the
2nd Spanish Republic from
September 25*
September 11 - Canadian operations end on the
Great Gorge and International Railway.
*
September 18 - Actress
Peg Entwhistle commits
suicide jumping from the letter H of the (then)
Hollywoodland sign
*
September 20 -
Mohandas Gandhi begins an
hunger strike in
Poona prison
*
September 28 - According to Prussian statistics, 115 people have been killed in political riots during the year
*
October 15 - Tata Airlines (later to become
Air India) makes its first flight
*
October 19 - Wedding of
Prince Gustav Adolf of Sweden and
Princess Sibylla of Saxe-Coburg-Gotha*
October 20 - Hasty Market gets hijacked
November-December
*
November 1 -
San Francisco Opera House opened
*
November 7 -
Buck Rogers in the 25th Century airs on
radio for the first time.
*
November 8 -
U.S. presidential election, 1932:
Franklin D. Roosevelt defeats
Herbert Hoover in a landslide victory.
*
November 9 - Riots between conservative and socialist supporters in
Switzerland - 12 dead, 60 injured
*
November 11 -
Tornado and huge waves kills about thousand in
Santa Crus del Sure in
Cuba*
November 19 - Second wife of
Josef Stalin is found dead in her home
*
November 21 - German president Hindenburg begins negotiations with Adolf Hitler about the formation of a new government
*
November 24 - In
Washington, DC, the
FBI Scientific Crime Detection Laboratory (better known as the FBI Crime Lab) officially opens.
*
November 30 - the
Cipher Bureau broke the German
Enigma cipher
*
December 3 - Hindenburg names
Kurt von Schleicher as a German chancellor
*
December 12 - Japan and Soviet Union reform their diplomatic connections
*
December 25 -
Earthquake in the
Kansu Province in
China - 70,000 dead
Unknown dates
*
Saudi Arabia is declared a unified nation with
Ibn Saud as a king.
* Female suffrage in
Brazil*
Norway annexes northern
Greenland.
*
Chaco war between
Bolivia and
Paraguay* In the next five years, Dr.
Morris Bolber and associates successfully murder and collect the insurance money for more than 30 victims.
* Mars candy bar
*
Zippo lighters
*
Zero-length springs invented, revolutionizing
seismometers and
gravimeters
* The
Kennedy-Thorndike experiment shows that measured time as well as length are affected by motion, in accordance with the theory of
special relativity.
*
Chadwick discovers the
neutron.
* Geneticist
J. B. S. Haldane publishes
The Causes of Evolution and thereby unifies the findings of Mendelian
genetics with those of
evolutionary science.
* , an international scientific collaboration.
*
Kreuger & Toll of the "Match King"
Ivar Kreuger collapses - he commits suicide.
*
Republican Citizens Committee Against National Prohibition established for
repeal of prohibition in U.S.
*
Prontosil, the first oral antibiotic, is discovered by
Gerhard Domagk, but no publication occurs until
1935.
January
*
January 3 -
Dabney Coleman, American actor
*
January 3 -
Neil Levang, American musician
*
January 3 -
Coo Coo Marlin, American race car driver (d.
2005)
*
January 5 -
Johnny Adams, American musician (d.
1998)
*
January 5 -
Umberto Eco, Italian scholar and author
*
January 6 -
Stuart A. Rice, American chemist
*
January 13 -
Joseph Cardinal Zen, Catholic Bishop of Hong Kong
*
January 16 -
Dian Fossey, American zoologist (d.
1985)
*
January 18 -
Robert Anton Wilson, American author
*
January 22 -
Piper Laurie, American actress
*
January 26 -
Coxsone Dodd, Jamaican record producer (d.
2004)
*
January 29 -
Tommy Taylor, English footballer (d.
1958)
* January 29 -
George Allen, English footballer
*
January 30 -
Knock Yokoyama, Japanese comedian and politician
February
*
February 1 -
John Nott, British polictian
*
February 3 -
Peggy Ann Garner, American actress (d.
1984)
*
February 6 -
François Truffaut, French film director (d.
1984)
*
February 7 -
Gay Talese, American author
*
February 8 -
John Williams, American composer and conductor
*
February 9 -
Gerhard Richter, German painter
*
February 11 -
Jerome Lowenthal, American pianist
*
February 12 -
Julian Lincoln Simon, American economist and author (d.
1998)
*
February 14 -
Alexander Kluge, German author and film director
*
February 16 -
Harry Goz, American actor (d.
2003)
*
February 18 -
Miloš Forman, Czech film director
*
February 22 -
Edward Kennedy, American politician
*
February 23 -
Majel Barrett, American actress
*
February 24 -
Michel Legrand, French composer
*
February 25 -
Faron Young American singer (d.
1996)
*
February 26 -
Johnny Cash, American singer (d.
2003)
*
February 27 -
Elizabeth Taylor, English-born actress
*
February 28 -
Don Francks, Canadian actor
March
*
March 4 -
Miriam Makeba, South African singer
*
March 12 -
Andrew Young, U.S. Ambassador to the United Nations
*
March 16 -
Don Blasingame,
Major League Baseball player and Japanese baseball manager (d.
2005)
*
March 18 -
John Updike, American author
*
March 21 -
Walter Gilbert, American chemist,
Nobel Prize laureate
*
March 25 -
Gene Shalit, American film critic
*
March 30 -
Ted Morgan, French-born author, biographer, and journalist
April
*
April 1 -
Gordon Jump, American television actor (d.
2003)
*
April 1 -
Debbie Reynolds, American actress
*
April 2 -
Michael Vernon, Australian consumer activist (d.
1993)
*
April 4 -
Anthony Perkins, American actor (d.
1992)
*
April 4 -
Andrei Tarkovsky, Russian film director (d.
1986)
*
April 8 -
Baginda Almutawakkil Alallah Sultan Iskandar Al-Haj ibni Almarhum Sultan Ismail, King of Malaysia
*
April 9 -
Carl Perkins, American musician (d.
1998)
*
April 11 -
Joel Grey, American actor
*
April 12 -
Lakshman Kadirgamar, Sri Lankan politician (assassinated) (d.
2005)
*
April 12 -
Tiny Tim, American musician (d.
1996)
*
April 21 -
Elaine May, American movie director
*
April 23 -
Halston, American fashion designer (d.
1990)
*
April 26 -
Michael Smith, English-born chemist,
Nobel Prize laureate (d.
2000)
*
April 27 -
Casey Kasem, American disc jockey and voice actor
*
April 27 -
Gian-Carlo Rota, Italian-born mathematician and philosopher (d.
1999)
May
*
May 8 -
Phyllida Law, Scottish actress
*
May 8 -
Sonny Liston, American boxer (d.
1970)
*
May 19 -
Alma Cogan, English singer (d.
1966)
*
May 25 -
John Gregory Dunne, American writer (d.
2003)
*May 25 -
Roger Bowen, American actor (d.
1996)
June
*
June 4 -
John Drew Barrymore, American actor (d.
2004)
*
June 4 -
Maurice Shadbolt, New Zealand writer (d.
2004)
*
June 9 -
Jack Imel, American singer
*
June 12 -
Rona Jaffe, American novelist (d.
2005)
*
June 15 -
Mario Cuomo, American politician
*
June 18 -
Dudley R. Herschbach, American chemist,
Nobel Prize laureate
*
June 18 -
Geoffrey Hill, English poet
*
June 25 -
Peter Blake, English artist
*
June 27 -
Anna Moffo, American soprano (d.
2006)
*
June 28 -
Pat Morita, American actor (d.
2005)
*
June 29 -
Brian Hutton, Baron Hutton, British Law Lord
July
*
July 2 -
Dave Thomas, American fast-food entrepreneur (d.
2002)
*
July 9 -
Donald Rumsfeld, U.S. Secretary of Defense
*
July 12 -
Otis Davis, American runner
*
July 21 -
Ernie Warlick, American football player
*
July 29 -
Nancy Landon Kassebaum Baker, U.S. Senator
August
*
August 1 -
Meena Kumari, Indian actress (d.
1972)
*
August 2 -
Lamar Hunt, American sportsman
*
August 2 -
Peter O'Toole, Irish-born actor
*
August 6 -
Howard Hodgkin, British painter and print-maker
*
August 7 -
Dr. Maurice Rabb, Jr., African American ophthalmologist
*
August 8 -
Mel Tillis, American singer
*
August 11 -
Fernando Arrabal, Moroccan-born writer
*
August 17 -
V. S. Naipaul, West Indian-born writer,
Nobel Prize laureate
*
August 18 -
William R. Bennett, Premier of British Columbia
September
*
September 4 -
Dinsdale Landen, British actor (d.
2003)
*
September 7 -
Paul Getty, American-born philanthropist (d.
2003)
*
September 8 -
Patsy Cline, American singer (d.
1963)
*
September 11 -
Peter Anderson, English footballer
*
September 18 -
Nikolai Rukavishnikov, cosmonaut (d.
2002)
*
September 22 -
Algirdas Brazauskas,
President of Lithuania*
September 25 -
Glenn Gould, Canadian pianist (d.
1982)
*
September 25 -
Charles Stanley, American televangelist
*
September 26 -
Richard Herd, American actor
*
September 26 -
Dr. Manmohan Singh,
Prime Minister of India*
September 27 -
Oliver E. Williamson , American economist
*
September 30 -
Shintaro Ishihara, Japanese author and politician
October
*
October 10 -
Harry Smith, English footballer
*
October 12 -
Dick Gregory, American comedian and activist
*
October 18 -
Vytautas Landsbergis, Lithuanian politician
*
October 19 -
Robert Reed, American actor (d.
1992)
*
October 20 -
Rosey Brown, American football player (d.
2004)
*
October 20 -
William Christopher, American actor
*
October 24 -
Pierre-Gilles de Gennes, French physicist,
Nobel Prize laureate
*
October 24 -
Robert Mundell, Canadian economist,
Nobel Prize laureate
*
October 25 -
Harry Gregg, Irish footballer and football manager
*
October 27 -
Sylvia Plath, American poet and author (d.
1963)
*
October 28 -
Suzy Parker, American actress (d.
2003)
November
*
November 3 -
Albert Reynolds,
President of Ireland*
November 4 -
Thomas Klestil,
President of Austria (d.
2004)
*
November 4 -
Noam Pitlik, American actor and director (d.
1999)
*
November 10 -
Roy Scheider, American film actor
*
November 12 -
Jerry Douglas, American actor
*
November 13 -
Richard Mulligan, American actor (d.
2000)
*
November 15 -
Petula Clark, British singer, actress, and songwriter
*
November 20 -
Richard Dawson, British-born comedian and game show host
*
November 22 -
Robert Vaughn, American actor
*
November 29 -
Jacques Chirac,
President of France*
November 29 -
Diane Ladd, American actress
December
*
December 2 -
Manuel Puig, Argentinian writer (d.
1990)
*
December 5 -
Sheldon Lee Glashow, American physicist
*
December 5 -
Little Richard, American singer
*
December 6 -
Don King, American boxing promoter
*
December 7 -
Ellen Burstyn, American actress
*
December 9 -
Bill Hartack, American jockey
*
December 24 -
Earl Dodge, American temperance movement leader
*
December 28 -
Dhirubhai Ambani, Indian businessman (d.
2002)
*
December 28 -
Dorsey Burnette, American singer (d.
1979)
*
December 28 -
Roy Hattersley, British politician
Unknown dates
*
Basil Blackshaw, Irish artist
*
Mohammed Hamri, Moroccan artist (d.
2000)
*
Mehmood, Indian actor (d.
2004)
*
Irene Jai Narayan, Fiji politician
*
Blaze Starr, American dancer
*
Eileen Lemass, Irish politician
*
January 8 -
Eurosia Fabris, Italian Catholic
Blessed (b.
1866)
*
January 21 -
Giles Lytton Strachey British writer and biographer (b.
1880)
*
January 24 - Sir
Alfred Yarrow, English shipbuilder and philanthropist (b.
1842)
*
February 10 -
Edgar Wallace, English novelist and screenwriter (b.
1875)
*
February 16 -
Ferdinand Buisson, French pacifist, recipient of the
Nobel Peace Prize (b.
1841)
*
March 1 -
Frank Teschemacher, American musician (b.
1906)
*
March 6 -
John Philip Sousa, American band leader, conductor, and composer (b.
1854)
*
March 7 -
Aristide Briand, French statesman, recipient of the
Nobel Peace Prize (b.
1862)
*
March 14 -
George Eastman, American inventor (b.
1854)
*
March 31 -
Eben Byers, American steel tycoon and socialite (radiation poisoning) (b.
1880)
*
April 4 -
Wilhelm Ostwald, German chemist,
Nobel Prize laureate (b.
1853)
*
April 20 -
Giuseppe Peano, Italian mathematician (b.
1858)
*
April 26 -
Hart Crane, American poet (b.
1899)
*
April 26 -
William Lockwood, English cricketer (b.
1868)
*
May 3 -
Charles Fort, American researcher of the unusual (b.
1874)
*
May 7 -
Paul Doumer,
President of France (assassinated) (b.
1857)
*
May 15 -
Tsuyoshi Inukai,
Prime Minister of Japan (assassinated) (b.
1855)
*
May 17 -
Frederick C. Billard, Commandant of the United States Coast Guard (b.
1873)
*
May 22 -
Lady Gregory, Irish writer and folklorist (b.
1852)
*
June 21 -
Major Taylor, American cyclist (b.
1878)
*
July 6 -
Kenneth Grahame, English author (b.
1859)
*
July 23 -
Alberto Santos-Dumont, Brazilian aviation pioneer (b.
1873)
*
September 16 -
Ronald Ross, English physician, recipient of the
Nobel Prize in Physiology or Medicine (b.
1857)
*
September 20 -
Wovoka, Paiute visionary
*
September 23 -
Jules Chéret, French poster designer (b.
1836)
*
December 19 -
Yoon Bong-Gil, Korean resister against Japanese occupation of Korea (executed) (b.
1908)
Unknown date
*
Lucy Bacon, American painter (b.
1857)
*
Physics -
Werner Karl Heisenberg*
Chemistry -
Irving Langmuir*
Physiology or Medicine - Sir
Charles Scott Sherrington,
Edgar Douglas Adrian*
Literature -
John Galsworthy*
Peace - not awarded
