1928
Nearly two hundred and fifty thousand domestic slaves in the British Protectorate of Sierra Leone were freed by decree. AA Milne's House On Pooh Corner published.
The first episode of JG Crowther's Stars Of The Month - an ancient ancestor of The Sky At Night - broadcast.
Michael Barrett born in Leeds.
According to a - rather hysterical - report in the Chicago Tribune 'half of England' was under-water due to heavy rainfall and flooding. England won the second test at Cape Town by ninety seven runs. Match highlights including ninety nine in England's second innings by Herbert Sutcliffe and Tich Freeman taking seven wickets.
ZF Willis's Psychology In Everyday Life broadcast.
Charlie Chaplin's The Circus premiered.
Cecil Lewis and Michael Hogan's 'new idea in radio drama', Pursuit and a reading of Sir Edward Gosse's Father & Son by the author broadcast. The River Thames burst its banks in London shortly after midnight, killing fourteen. Westminster Abbey, the Tate Gallery and the Tower of London were among the buildings flooded.
The Italian press was banned from reporting suicides or 'sensational crimes.'
David Knight born in Niagra Falls.
Al Bowlly & The John Abriani Six's recording of 'My Blue Heaven' released.
The first episode of I Remember - Desmond MacCarthy's reminiscence of Henry James - broadcast.
The Women's Freedom League sent a message to Prime Minister Stanley Baldwin protesting that women were excluded from holding posts in diplomatic and consular services around the Empire.
The third test at Durban was drawn. This match holds the record for the highest aggregate (twelve hundred and seventy two runs) without a player scoring a century. Thirteen fifties were scored with Wally Hammond top-scoring with ninety. Sam Staples made his test debut.
Volcanic activity on the Pacific island of Krakatoa caused a new volcanic cone to emerge from below sea level. This new atoll was called Anak Krakatoa.
Michael Francis Gregson born in Poona, India.
Clyde Bruckman's Leave 'Em Laughing - starring Laurel and Hardy - premiered.
Peter James Byrne born in West Ham.
South Africa won the fourth test at Johannesburg by four wickets. The outstanding performance was Herbie Taylor's first innings century for the hosts.
Vivian Warren Chen born in Jamaica.
John Logie Baird broadcast a transatlantic television signal from London to Hartsdale, New York. South Africa won the fifth test at Durban by eight wickets to square the series two-two. In the absence of Colonel Stanyforth, England were captained by Greville Stevens. Ernest Tyldesley scored his second century of the series but England were bowled out for one hundred and eighteen in their second innings (George Bissett taking seven wickets). Eddie Dawson and Harry Elliott made their test debuts.
John Henry Ringham born in Cheltenham.
Lucien Hubbard's Rose-Marie - starring Joan Crawford, James Murray and House Peters - premiered.
Sam Taylor's My Best Girl - starring Mary Pickford, Buddy Rogers, Sunshine Hart, Lucien Littlefield and Carmelita Geraghty - premiered.
The first episodes of Professor Noel Baker's International Affairs In The Twentieth Century and Ann Spice's A Bookshelf Of Old Favourites broadcast. Douglas John Malin born in London.
Jimmie Rodgers' 'In The Jailhouse Now' recorded. Donald Harley McKillop born in Carlisle. Leon Griffiths born in Sheffield.
Sir Banister Fletcher's How To Appreciate Architecture broadcast.
Sir Arthur Conan Doyle published a nineteen-page essay, A Word Of Warning, recommending that Christianity be abandoned and replaced by a new religion based on spiritualism.
Bruce Joseph Forsyth-Johnson born in Edmonton.
Jean Shufflebottom born in Pudsey, West Yorkshire. Bernard Frederic Bemrose Kay born in Bolton.
The controversial British war film Dawn - starring Sybil Thorndike - was discussed in the House of Commons. Foreign Affairs Secretary Austen Chamberlain had not viewed the film and did not plan to, but objected to a scene depicting Edith Cavell's execution which had reportedly been embellished for dramatic effect. 'I believe that account of the execution to be wholly apocryphal and I hold it is an outrage on a noble woman's memory to turn into melodrama, for the purposes of commercial gain, so heroic a story,' Chamberlain said, though he did not propose to censor the film.
William Stanley Baker born in Ferndale, Glamorgan. Rhys Adrian Griffiths born in London.
Sidney Edmond Jocelyn Ackland born in North Kensington. Camillo Irene Sunters born in The Gorbels, Glasgow. Roy James Locke born in Marylebone.
Daphne Helen Slater born in London.
Betty Diana Coupland born in Leeds.
Glyn Griffith Owen born in Bolton.
Nwcastle United beat Aston Villa seven-five in an extraordinary First Division game at St James' Park.
The BBC Dance Orchestra, led by Jack Payne, made its first broadcast.
Miss V Brand's Something New From Something Old - Clothes For The Small Boy broadcast. Mervyn Oliver Haisman born in London. Edward F Cline and Gilbert Pratt's A Harem Knight - starring Ben Turpin and Madeline Hurlock - premiered,
Victor Jack Maddern born in Ilford.
Patrick Joseph McGoohan born in Queens, New York.
Bernard Frederic Bemrose Kay born in Bolton. Louis Frank Marks born in Golders Green.
James Arthur Lovell born in Cleveland, Ohio.
Roy James Locke born in Marylebone.
The so-called 'Flapper Vote Bill' passed its second reading in the House of Commons. The bill created over five million new women voters over the age of twenty-one.
Scotland's 'Wembley Wizards' - including the immortal forward line of Alex Jackson, Alex James, Jimmy Dunn, Hughie Gallacher and Alan Morton - thrashed England five-one in London. Jackson scored a hat-trick and James twice. Bob Kelly got England's consolation. Huddersfield Town's Tom Wilson had the misfortune to make his England debut. In the First Division, despite being without five of their usual first team due to international call-ups, top-of-the-table Huddersfield Town won three-two at Bury whilst second placed Everton won two-nil at Sunderland. Derby County beat Cardiff City seven-one (Harry Bedford scored four). Leeds United topped the Second Division with a four-il win over Blackpool (Russell Wainscoat scoring twice). Thomas Boyle of County Clare received a bronze medal for gallantry from the Royal National Lifeboat Institution for leading a rescue of three men shipwrecked on a remote island. When their boat was swept ashore on the mainland, Boyle led two others in a canvas canoe in a strong gale to bring the men home after they had been stranded for fifty hours without food. John Lee born in Launceston, Tasmania. Dilys Hamlett born in South Tidworth, Hampshire.
Tipperary Tim won the Grand National.
The Cinematograph Films Act came into law. The act introduced a requirement for British cinemas to show a quota of British films for a duration of ten years. Its supporters believed that it would promote the emergence of a vertically integrated film industry, with production, distribution and exhibition infrastructure controlled by the same companies.
Michael Dennis Bryant born in London.
JB Priestley's Easter Customs In Other Lands broadcast. Bryant Haliday born in Albany, New York.
Eric Richard Porter born in Shepherd's Bush.
Aubrey Harold Woods born in Edmonton, Middlesex.
A libel trial opened in Ontario, initiated by General Sir Arthur Currie against the publisher of the Port Hope Evening Guide. Currie claimed that an article published in the newspaper defamed him by alleging that he 'wasted Canadian lives' by ordering an assault in Mons on 11 November 1918, for no reason other than to have it be recorded that Canadians had fired the last shot of the war. The case was eventually decided in Currie's favour.
Alan Kenneth MacKenzie Clark born in Saltwood, Kent.
Blind Lemon Jefferson's 'Lectric Chair Blues'/'See That My Grave Is Kept Clean' released on Paramount Records.
Commander BT Coote's How To Keep Fit broadcast. David Arthur Whitaker born in Knebworth, Hertfordshire.
Alexis Andrew Nicholas Koerner born in Paris.
Blackburn Rovers defeated Huddersfield Town three-one in the FA Cup Final at Wembley.
On the evening of St George's Day, former Minister of Shipping Sir Leo Money was spotted in Hyde Park with Irene Savidge, a radio valve-tester from New Southgate. A police constable witnessed their exchange of what a later social historian described as 'a rather chaste kiss.' The police maintained that mutual masturbation was taking place, although Money claimed that he had merely been offering Savidge 'advice on her career.' They were both arrested and charged with indecent behaviour, but the case was later dismissed by the Marlborough Street magistrate, who awarded costs of ten pounds against the police. At the time of his arrest, Money protested that he was 'not the usual riff-raff' but 'a man of substance' and, once in custody, was permitted to telephone the Home Secretary, Sir William Joynson-Hicks.
James MacTaggart born in Glasgow.
Hubert Rees born in Abergavenny.
The London & North Eastern Railway's Flying Scotsman ran non-stop over the three hundred and ninety three miles of the East Coast Main Line from King's Cross to Edinburgh.
The first episode of Harold J Laski's Social Purpose broadcast.
The Daily Express published a story claiming to detail a plot by Prince Carol of Romania to overthrow the Romanian government and seize the throne held by his six-year-old son Michael. Carol, who was in England at the time with his mistress, Magda Lupescu, was 'requested' by British authorities to leave the country forthwith. If not sooner.
Dixie Dean finished the season with a Football League record of sixty goals for the champions Everton. Huddersfield - who had led the table for much of the season - finished runners-up and Leicester City third. Third Division South champions Millwall were the league's top scoring team with eighty seven goals in forty six games. John David Bennett born in Beckenham.
Sir Arthur Keith said in a lecture at the University of Manchester that 'no evidence had been found' to support the belief that a spirit survives after the brain ceases to function.
W2XB, an experimental television station based in Albany, New York, began broadcasting. Kolin Hager became the first television newscaster, appearing three times a week to deliver farm and weather reports. The Carter Family's recording of 'John Hardy Was A Desperate Man' released. John Forbes-Robertson born in Worthing.
Walter Hagen won the Open Championship golf tournament at Sandwich. Elisabeth Yvonne Scatcherd born in Roubaix, Nord-Pas-de-Calais.
Burt Freeman Bacharach born in Kansas City. Buster Keaton's Steamboat Bill Junior premiered.
A much-changed England beat France five-one in a friendly international in Paris. Dixie Deans scored two as did debutant George Stephenson of Derbu County whilst David Jack added a fifth, all after France had taken the lead in the opening minute. Apart from Stephenson, Ben Olney of Aston Villa, The Wednesday's Ernie Blenkinsop, Vince Matthews of Sheffield united. Burnley's John Bruton and Leicester City's Len Barry all made their debuts. In the French side was Alex Villaplane who would go on to become their first Captain at the World Cup Finals in 1930. More notoriously, he would become a leading member of the French Gestapo during the war, eventually being shot as a traitor on Boxing Day 1944 for heinous crimes against his own people. Police conduct in subjecting twenty two-year-old Irene Savidge to a five-hour interview without a female officer or legal support present and, after the case of indecent behaviour in Hyde Park with ex-government minister Sir Leo Money again her had been dismissed, was strongly debated in the House of Commons. An inquiry was subsequently established which led to changes in the way that female suspects could be questioned.
John Frederick Abineri born in London.
England beat Belgium three-one in a friendly international in Antwerp with two goals from Dixie Dean and a third by Vince Matthews. A foundation stone was laid at Stormont in Belfast to commemorate the completion of the Parliament Building for the devolved Northern Ireland Assembly.
P Bilton's 'sketch in one act' The Mists Of Morning broadcast featuring the radio debut of 'Walter Plinge' (a well-known theatrical pseudonym).
John Leonard Duncan Mackenzie born in Edinburgh.
Arthur Nigel Davenport born in Great Shelford, Cambridgeshire.
William Trevor Cox born in Mitchelstown, County Cork.
Manfred Frederick Jaeger born in Berlin.
Robert Alan Monkhouse born in Beckenham.
The first episode of Miss EC Clarke's Food Values In Cooking broadcast.
Ernesto Guevara born in Rosario, Argentina.
The Friendship landed in Burry Port, Wales after a twenty-hour flight. Amelia Earhart entered the record books as the first woman to fly across the Atlantic and quickly became a celebrity. Meanwhile, Roald Amundsen and four crewmen took off from outside Tromsø, Norway in an effort to find the missing crew of another plane, the Italia. They were never seen again
The silent film The Red Dance premiered at the Globe Theatre in New York. It was preceded by the debut of the newsreel Shaw Talks For Movietone News, in which American audiences got their first opportunity to hear the voice of George Bernard Shaw. The playwright displayed some of his signature wit as he jovially addressed his imaginary audience and performed a visual impression of Benito Mussolini. Moray Robin Philip Adrian Watson born in Sunningdale.
On Holidays Abroad, Bernard C Newman informed the listeners about the wonders of Andorra. England won their first ever test against West Indies at Lord's - the first of a three match series - by an innings and fifty eight runs. Jack Hobbs was unfit so England opened with Herbert Sutcliffe and Charlie Hallows and the three West Indian fast bowlers, Learie Constantine, Herman Griffith and George Francis caused early discomfort. But, although wickets fell regularly, runs were also scored very fast. Ernest Tyldesley made one hundred and twenty two and captain Percy Chapman fifty. Constantine finished with four for eighty two, England totalling four hundred and one. West Indies, opened with Freddie Martin and George Challenor and reached seventy without loss by lunchtime and the partnership went to eighty six before Martin was out to Maurice Tate for forty four. Five wickets then fell for ten runs and though Karl Nunes made thirty seven, Vallance Jupp and Tich Freeman took the last five wickets. Following on, the West Indies lost their first six wickets for just forty four runs. On the final morning, fifty two from Joe Small and forty four from Cyril Browne brought the second innings total to one hundred and sixty six. Freeman finished with four for thirty seven. Douglas Jardine and Harry Small made their test debuts.
David Mercer born in Wakefield.
Stanley Barstow born in Horbury, West Yorkshire.
Ian Edmund Bannen born in Airdrie.
The first episode of How To Appreciate Pictures broadcast. The Belgian financier Alfred Loewenstein left from Croydon to fly to Brussels on his private aircraft, a Fokker FVII trimotor, along with six others. While the aircraft was crossing the English Channel, Loewenstein went to the rear of the plane to use the lavatory. When he had not reappeared for some time, Loewenstein's secretary went in search and discovered that the lavatory was empty and the aircraft's rear door was open. Itws speculated that Loewenstein must have opened the wrong door and fallen death. His body was recovered fifteen days later. Patricia Russell born in Highgate
Frank Windsor Higgins born in Walsall. Minnie Higginbottom born in Dukinfield, Cheshire. Peter Cellier born in Hendon.
Moira Redmond born in Bogner Regis.
T Hayes Hunter's A South Sea Bubble - starring Ivor Novello, Benita Hume and Annette Benson - premiered.
England won the second test at Old Trafford by an innings and thirty runs. On a lifeless pitch, Cliff Roach made fifty for the tourists. The West Indies then collapsed to one hundred and thirty three for six before Cyril Browne and Tommy Scott took the total beyond two hundred. Tich Freeman took five wickets. Jack Hobbs, restored to health and Herbert Sutcliffe made one hundred and nineteen for the first England wicket. After three quick wickets, Wally Hammond put on one hundred and twenty with Douglas Jardine. A collapse followed, including Chapman retiring injured but the tail took the total to three hundred and fifty one. The second West Indies innings ended rather abjectly on the third morning. Freeman again took five wickets.
Oliver John MacGreevy born in Dublin.
The day before the opening ceremony of the Olympics in Amsterdam, some international athletes and delegates came to the Olympic Stadium to get a glimpse of the structure. Some sort of altercation broke out between a French group and a Dutch gatekeeper, who reportedly punched one of the French officials in the jaw. Really hard. The French immediately got all stroppy and discombobulated and demanded - and received - an official apology from the Dutch Olympic Committee and a promise to discharge the gatekeeper.
The opening ceremony for the Olympics was held. The French boycotted the ceremony after their delegation arrived at the stadium to find that the Dutch gatekeeper from the day before had not been sacked as the Olympic Committee had promised. Germany received the biggest ovation from the forty five thousand crowd, this being their first Olympics since 1912.
Itani Yōko born in Paris.
Eleven Thousand Britons conducted a pilgrimage to the battlefields of Northern France on the fourteenth anniversary of the British declaration of war on Germany. The anniversary was marked in Berlin with a huge anti-war demonstration organised by Communists.
Romana Barrack born in Liverpool.
Andrew Warhola born in Pittsburgh.
John King Day, aged fifteen, a prefect at Stamford Grammar School, Lincolnshire and the nephew of the headmaster, the Reverend JD Day, was summoned at Stamford for assaulting John Henry Davis, aged ten, a pupil at the school. The allegation - as reported by the Daily Mail - was that Day administered 'excessive corporal punishment' because Davis had broken one of the school rules by failing to attend as a spectator at a cricket match. The Mayor of Stamford, Alderman JH Bowman, the chairman of the Bench, made a strong appeal that the matter should be 'settled amicably.' The boy's father, Albert Davis agreed to withdraw the summons, but he maintained that he bad been justified in bringing the case.
England won the third test at The Oval by an innings and seventy three runs. The West Indians again made a good start through Cliff Roach (fifty three) and George Challenor (forty six), but no other batsman got beyond the thirties. Jack Hobbs and Herbert Sutcliffe made one hundred and fifty five for the first wicket and Hobbs and George Tyldesley then added one hundred and twenty nine before Hobbs was out for one hundred and fifty nine. Five further wickets fell in the next hour for forty nine runs, all of them to Herman Griffith, whose figures of six for one hundred and three were the best of the series for the West Indies. Maurice Tate and Harold Larwood then added sixty one in twenty five minutes and the last three wickets made one hundred and five runs. West Indies' second innings, as in the previous tests, began badly and only a stubborn forty one from Freddie Martin enabled the side to reach three figures. Maurice Leyland made his test debut.
Nicolas Jack Roeg born in London. Frederick Powell born in Camberwell. Raymond Llewelyn born in Newport, Gwent.
Murphy Grumbar born in London. ,br /> Lancashire claimed a hat-trick of cricket county championship titles, winning their final match of the season by an innings and forty nine runs against Derbyshire at Burton-on-Trent. Charlie Hallows scored two thousand five hundred runs in the season whilst the bowling of Ted McDonald and Dick Tyldesley proved too much for most opponents. Wicketkeeper George Duckworth claimed a record ninety eight dismissals. Kent finished second and Nottinghamshire third. Nottinghamshire's Harold Larwood again topped the national bowling averages with one hundred and thirty eight wickets at 14.51. Hampshire's Phil Mead was the leading championship run-scorer (two thousand eight hundred and forty three) and Kent's Tich Freeman was the top wicket-taker (two hundred and sixteen).
Helen Kane's recording of 'I Wanna Be Loved By You' released. Al Jolson recorded 'Sonny Boy'.
Karlheinz Stockhausen born in Burg-Mödrath, Germany.
Donald Marshall Gray born in Bournemouth.
Peter Miles born in London.
The Threepenny Opera by Bertolt Brecht and Kurt Weill premiered at the Theater am Schiffbauerdamm in Berlin. James Harrison Coburn III born in Laurel, Nebraska. Tommy Johnson recorded 'Canned Heat Blues' for RCA Victor Records.
Ahmet Zogu was crowned King Zog as Albania changed from a republic to a monarchy. Robert Emrys James born in Machynlleth, Powys.
Alexander Fleming accidentally discovered penicillin when he returned to his lab after a summer holiday to find that the Staphylococcus aureus bacteria which had once been in a Petri dish had apparently been killed off by a Penicillium mold.
Dorothea Phillips born in Penygraig, Rhondda.
Derek Royle born in London.
James Cruze's Excess Baggage - starring William Haines, Josephine Dunn and Neely Edwards - premiered.
Al Capone accidentally shot himself with his own pistol when getting into a car after a game of golf in Burnham, Illinois.
Brian Matthew born in Coventry.
William West Anderson born in Walla Walla, Washington State.
Buster Keaton's The Cameraman premiered. John Logie Baird's Television Development Company demonstrates their model A, B and C 'televisors' to the general public at the Radio Exhibition at Olympia. The exhibition proved hugely popular, with an estimated nine hundred people per day watching the demonstration programming.
Alfred J Goulding's The Campus Carmen - starring Daphne Pollard, Johnny Burke and Carole Lombard - premiered.
Newcastle United's five-nil defeat at Manchester United saw the four hundred and seventy second - and final - appearance of Frank Hudpeth in a career which began until 1910. Hudspeth remains second on The Magpies' all-time list of appearances behind Jimmy Lawrence (four hundred and ninety six), established in 1922.
Joseph Stalin announced the first Soviet five-year plan. The Mae West play Pleasure Man was closed down by police after one performance at the Biltmore Theatre on Broadway due to alleged 'indecency.' All sixty four members of the cast were thrown in The Joint.
The LZ 127 Graf Zeppelin sailed across the English Channel and over parts of England during test flights as it prepared to cross the Atlantic Ocean.
Walter Frederick George Williams born in Heath End, Surrey.
Joseph Brady born in Glasgow.
Mott, Hay & Anderson's Tyne Bridge was opened by King George and Queen Mary. The royal couple were the first to use the roadway, travelling in their Ascot Landau from Gateshead to Newcastle. The ceremony was attended by twenty thousand local schoolchildren - including both of this blogger's parents.
An iron lung was used for the first time, on a polio victim in Boston Children's Hospital. DW Griffiths's The Battle Of The Sexes - starring Jean Hersholt, Phyllis Haver, Belle Bennett and Sally O'Neil - premiered.
The Charfield railway disaster killed sixteen people in Gloucestershire. Ten days of official mourning were declared following the death of Dowager Empress Marie of Russia, sister of the late Queen Alexandra.
Arsenal paid Bolton Wanderers a world record transfer fee of ten thousand six hundred and forty seven pounds and ten shillings to acquire England international David Jack. This beat the previous record (paid by Aston Villa to Patrick Thistle for jimmy Gibson in April 1927) by almost four thousand pounds. Herbert Chapman negotiated the transfer with Bolton's representatives in a hotel bar, his tactic being to drink gin and tonics without any gin in them, while asking the waiter to double the alcohol served to the other side. The fee would remain a record for almost ten years.
Blind Willie McTell recorded 'Statesboro Blues' in Atlanta, Georgia.
John Colin Smith born in Burley In Wharfedale, West Yorkshire.
Chiang Kai-shek invited notorious racist and anti-semite Henry Ford and four other American industrialists to become 'honorary economic advisors' to China. Intended as a replacement for retired captain Charlie Buchan, David Jack made his Arsenal debut in a three-nil victory at Newcastle United. Elsewhere, Leciester City thrashed Portsmouth ten-nil with Arthur Chandler scoring six and Ernie Hine three.
England defeated Ireland two-one in the Home International championship at Goodison. Local hero Dixie Dean scored the winner, having earlier msised a penalty. Joe Hilme also scored for the hosts whilst Linfield's Joe Bambrick netted for the visitors. Oldham Athletic's John Hacking, Jim Barrett of West Ham United, Blackburn Rovers' Austen Campbell and Leicester City's Ernie Hine all made their international debuts. Barrett was stretchered off after he twisted his left knee whilst taking a shot aftyer only eight minutes. Reports suggested he had either twisted his knee, or sprained his ankle.The murder trial of Chinese law student, Chung Yi Miao opened. He was on honeymoon with his wife, Wai-Sheung Siu, the daughter of a wealthy merchant. He had strangled her in woods near the village of Grange in the Lake District and tried to make it appear as though she had been sexually assaulted and robbed, before returning alone to their hotel. Her rings were found in his possession by the police and it was reported that he had made the fatal mistake of remarking that it was 'terrible' she had been robbed, when the police had not informed him that she had been. The trial lasted two days before he was found extremely guilty by the jury and he was executed six weeks later.
The stage musical Animal Crackers, starring Groucho, Harpo, Chico and Zeppo Marx, opened at the Forty Fourth Street Theatre on Broadway. RKO Pictures was founded in Los Angeles. Jerome Barry Willis born in London.
During a public meeting in the Royal Albert Hall, Stanley Baldwin said that Britain had no intention of building up its navy in competition with the United States.
The first pictures ever publicly broadcast in Britain through the fultograph system were transmitted by the BBC to the Savoy Hotel in London. A picture of George V and a cartoon were successfully transmitted.
Michael J Bird born in London.
The LZ 127 Graf Zeppelin landed back in Friedrichshafen only seventy one hours and twelve minutes after leaving the United States, a new Atlantic crossing speed record for dirigibles.
Eileen Kennally born in Leeds.
The first episode of Modern Britain In The Making broadcast.
Ennio Morricone born in Rome.
Rudyard Kipling declared a copyright on his speeches, handing out advance copies of a speech he was about to make to the Royal Society of Medicine with a notice stating that all rights to the speech would revert to him on Sunday. 'I have never heard of it being done before,' said newspaper proprietor Lord Riddell. 'What Mister Kipling, apparently, is trying to do is to give a license to newspapers for the reproduction of his speech for forty-eight hours after it is delivered. What legal force the condition has, I do not know. I do not believe such a demand ever has been tested.'
Gale-force winds and heavy rain swept much of Western Europe. People were injured from falling trees, telegraph wires were brought down, rivers were flooded, buildings were damaged, the English Channel became treacherous, there were multiple shipwrecks and planes were grounded. An estimated thirty people died in Britain alone.
England beat Wales three-two in the Home International championship at Swansea's Vetch Field. Joe Hulme scored two and Leicester's Ernie Hind added a third. Cardiff's Fred Keenor and Swansea's Jack Fowler netted for the home side. Leeds United's Ernie Hall made his England debut. Hall's absence from Leeds' two-nil defeat at home to The Wednesday in the First Division saw the league debut of Jack Milburn, the eldest of a noted footballing family from Ashington, the first of four hundred and twenty three games for Leeds and Bradford City in a career that lasted until 1947. League leaders Derby County won one-nil at Manchester United with a Harry Bedford goal. Ken MacDonald scored five in Hull City's five-one defeat of Bristol City in the Second Division. Rhere were also hat-tricks for Alex Hair (in Preston North End's five-two victory over Clapton Orient and Bill Johnstone and Jimmy Cookson for opposite siders in Reading's five-three win against West Bromwich Albion.
The Walt Disney animated cartoon Steamboat Willie, introducing the character of Mickey Mouse, was premiered at Universal's Colony Theatre in New York.
Julia Arnall born in München.
Maurice Ravel's Bolero received its première in Paris at the Palais Garnier.
Stanley Michael Hawkins born in Blean, Kent.
John Marshall Bay born in Chicago.
Gerald Blake born in Hackney.
Cosmo Gordon Lang was installed as the new Archbishop of Canterbury.
England won the first Ashes test at Brisbane by a record six hundred and seventy five runs. Patsy Hendren scored one hundred and sixty nine and Harold Larwood seventy in the first innings and Phil Mead and Douglas Jardine half-centuries in the second. Larwood, Maurice Tate and Farmer Jack White twice bowled out the hosts - for one hundred and twenty two and sixty six. It was an inauspicious debut for Australia's Don Bradman who scored eighteen and one.
After several days of losses, the crashing New York Stock Exchange bottomed out with a mass selling spree.
St Elmo Boyce's Casper's Week End starring Thelma Hill and Bud Duncan - premiered.
Ronald Glasfryn Lewis born in Port Talbort.
Henry Lionel Ogus born in Montreal.
George Gershwin's An American In Paris was first performed at New York's Carnegie Hall. Josephine Griffin born in London.
Robert F McGowan's The Spanking Age - starring Joe Cobb, Jean Darling and Lyle Tayo - premiered.
Philip Kindred Dick born in Chicago.
Eddie Cantor's recording of 'Makin' Whoopee!' released.
England won the second Ashes test at Sydney by eight wickets. George Geary took five wickets as Australia were dismissed for two hundred and fifty three. England's innings of six hundred and thirty six included two hundred and fifty from Wally Hammond. Not for the first or last time, the fearsome pace of Harold Larwood made the Aussies shite in their own pants and whinge like little girls.
Captain Eric Green's Forward Play Today broadcast.
The first Festival Of Nine Lessons & Carol Service broadcast from King's College, Cambridge. Norman Rossington born in Liverpool.
A Popular British Programme - featuring The Wireless Orchestra - broadcast. Burnley's three-two victory over Liverpool featured the five hundred and sixty ninth (and final) appearance for The Clarets of goalkeeper Jerry Dawson, almost twenty one years after his debut in 1907. In the process he broke Fred Barron's appearance record for the club, established in 1911. After retiring from professional football Dawson joined the coaching staff at Turf Moor and played as a batsman in the Lancashire League for Burnley Cricket Club.
An adaptation of Dick Whittington broadcast.
Miss Jan MacDonald's A New Experiment In Welfare Work broadcast.
Captain Malcolm Campbell's My Adventures In The Sahara and extracts from Edward Gibbon's The History Of The Decline & Fall Of The Roman Empire broadcast. Mississippi John Hurt recorded 'Stack O'Lee Blues' and 'Candy Man Blues' for Okeh Records. Bernard Joseph Cribbins born in Oldham.
Pinetop Smith recorded 'Pinetop's Boogie Woogie' in Chicago.
Anatomist and anthropologist Sir Arthur Keith said that forty five to fifty was the age that humans were 'naturally meant to live to. Civilisation, acting as the world's hothouse, gradually extended this age to between sixty five and seventy five,' he explained. 'Nowadays some even desire it to be prolonged over the century mark. I think it is one of the most foolish of things for man to want such a long life.' Keith added that it was 'selfish' for older generations to 'hang on too long' and block younger generations from 'getting their chance in life' and that it would be 'in the world's best interests to restrict human life' to an age at which each human would produce at maximum ability. Ellas Otha Bates born in McComb, Mississippi.
Do You Remember?, a comedy by EA Bryan, was performed on 5NO Newcastle by members of the Clarion Dramatic Society including Norman Veitch, Marjorie Dixon, Robert Strangeways, Harry Shuttleworth and Tom Heenan.
Nearly two hundred and fifty thousand domestic slaves in the British Protectorate of Sierra Leone were freed by decree. AA Milne's House On Pooh Corner published.
The first episode of JG Crowther's Stars Of The Month - an ancient ancestor of The Sky At Night - broadcast.
Michael Barrett born in Leeds.
According to a - rather hysterical - report in the Chicago Tribune 'half of England' was under-water due to heavy rainfall and flooding. England won the second test at Cape Town by ninety seven runs. Match highlights including ninety nine in England's second innings by Herbert Sutcliffe and Tich Freeman taking seven wickets.
ZF Willis's Psychology In Everyday Life broadcast.
Charlie Chaplin's The Circus premiered.
Cecil Lewis and Michael Hogan's 'new idea in radio drama', Pursuit and a reading of Sir Edward Gosse's Father & Son by the author broadcast. The River Thames burst its banks in London shortly after midnight, killing fourteen. Westminster Abbey, the Tate Gallery and the Tower of London were among the buildings flooded.
The Italian press was banned from reporting suicides or 'sensational crimes.' David Knight born in Niagra Falls.
Al Bowlly & The John Abriani Six's recording of 'My Blue Heaven' released.
The first episode of I Remember - Desmond MacCarthy's reminiscence of Henry James - broadcast.
The Women's Freedom League sent a message to Prime Minister Stanley Baldwin protesting that women were excluded from holding posts in diplomatic and consular services around the Empire.
The third test at Durban was drawn. This match holds the record for the highest aggregate (twelve hundred and seventy two runs) without a player scoring a century. Thirteen fifties were scored with Wally Hammond top-scoring with ninety. Sam Staples made his test debut.
Volcanic activity on the Pacific island of Krakatoa caused a new volcanic cone to emerge from below sea level. This new atoll was called Anak Krakatoa.
Michael Francis Gregson born in Poona, India.
Clyde Bruckman's Leave 'Em Laughing - starring Laurel and Hardy - premiered.
Peter James Byrne born in West Ham.
South Africa won the fourth test at Johannesburg by four wickets. The outstanding performance was Herbie Taylor's first innings century for the hosts.
Vivian Warren Chen born in Jamaica.
John Logie Baird broadcast a transatlantic television signal from London to Hartsdale, New York. South Africa won the fifth test at Durban by eight wickets to square the series two-two. In the absence of Colonel Stanyforth, England were captained by Greville Stevens. Ernest Tyldesley scored his second century of the series but England were bowled out for one hundred and eighteen in their second innings (George Bissett taking seven wickets). Eddie Dawson and Harry Elliott made their test debuts.
John Henry Ringham born in Cheltenham.
Lucien Hubbard's Rose-Marie - starring Joan Crawford, James Murray and House Peters - premiered.
Sam Taylor's My Best Girl - starring Mary Pickford, Buddy Rogers, Sunshine Hart, Lucien Littlefield and Carmelita Geraghty - premiered.
The first episodes of Professor Noel Baker's International Affairs In The Twentieth Century and Ann Spice's A Bookshelf Of Old Favourites broadcast. Douglas John Malin born in London.
Jimmie Rodgers' 'In The Jailhouse Now' recorded. Donald Harley McKillop born in Carlisle. Leon Griffiths born in Sheffield.
Sir Banister Fletcher's How To Appreciate Architecture broadcast.
Sir Arthur Conan Doyle published a nineteen-page essay, A Word Of Warning, recommending that Christianity be abandoned and replaced by a new religion based on spiritualism.
Bruce Joseph Forsyth-Johnson born in Edmonton.
Jean Shufflebottom born in Pudsey, West Yorkshire. Bernard Frederic Bemrose Kay born in Bolton.
The controversial British war film Dawn - starring Sybil Thorndike - was discussed in the House of Commons. Foreign Affairs Secretary Austen Chamberlain had not viewed the film and did not plan to, but objected to a scene depicting Edith Cavell's execution which had reportedly been embellished for dramatic effect. 'I believe that account of the execution to be wholly apocryphal and I hold it is an outrage on a noble woman's memory to turn into melodrama, for the purposes of commercial gain, so heroic a story,' Chamberlain said, though he did not propose to censor the film.
William Stanley Baker born in Ferndale, Glamorgan. Rhys Adrian Griffiths born in London.
Sidney Edmond Jocelyn Ackland born in North Kensington. Camillo Irene Sunters born in The Gorbels, Glasgow. Roy James Locke born in Marylebone.
Daphne Helen Slater born in London.
Betty Diana Coupland born in Leeds.
Glyn Griffith Owen born in Bolton.
Nwcastle United beat Aston Villa seven-five in an extraordinary First Division game at St James' Park.
The BBC Dance Orchestra, led by Jack Payne, made its first broadcast.
Miss V Brand's Something New From Something Old - Clothes For The Small Boy broadcast. Mervyn Oliver Haisman born in London. Edward F Cline and Gilbert Pratt's A Harem Knight - starring Ben Turpin and Madeline Hurlock - premiered,
Victor Jack Maddern born in Ilford.
Patrick Joseph McGoohan born in Queens, New York.
Bernard Frederic Bemrose Kay born in Bolton. Louis Frank Marks born in Golders Green.
James Arthur Lovell born in Cleveland, Ohio.
Roy James Locke born in Marylebone.
The so-called 'Flapper Vote Bill' passed its second reading in the House of Commons. The bill created over five million new women voters over the age of twenty-one.
Scotland's 'Wembley Wizards' - including the immortal forward line of Alex Jackson, Alex James, Jimmy Dunn, Hughie Gallacher and Alan Morton - thrashed England five-one in London. Jackson scored a hat-trick and James twice. Bob Kelly got England's consolation. Huddersfield Town's Tom Wilson had the misfortune to make his England debut. In the First Division, despite being without five of their usual first team due to international call-ups, top-of-the-table Huddersfield Town won three-two at Bury whilst second placed Everton won two-nil at Sunderland. Derby County beat Cardiff City seven-one (Harry Bedford scored four). Leeds United topped the Second Division with a four-il win over Blackpool (Russell Wainscoat scoring twice). Thomas Boyle of County Clare received a bronze medal for gallantry from the Royal National Lifeboat Institution for leading a rescue of three men shipwrecked on a remote island. When their boat was swept ashore on the mainland, Boyle led two others in a canvas canoe in a strong gale to bring the men home after they had been stranded for fifty hours without food. John Lee born in Launceston, Tasmania. Dilys Hamlett born in South Tidworth, Hampshire.
Tipperary Tim won the Grand National.
The Cinematograph Films Act came into law. The act introduced a requirement for British cinemas to show a quota of British films for a duration of ten years. Its supporters believed that it would promote the emergence of a vertically integrated film industry, with production, distribution and exhibition infrastructure controlled by the same companies.
Michael Dennis Bryant born in London.
JB Priestley's Easter Customs In Other Lands broadcast. Bryant Haliday born in Albany, New York.
Eric Richard Porter born in Shepherd's Bush.
Aubrey Harold Woods born in Edmonton, Middlesex.
A libel trial opened in Ontario, initiated by General Sir Arthur Currie against the publisher of the Port Hope Evening Guide. Currie claimed that an article published in the newspaper defamed him by alleging that he 'wasted Canadian lives' by ordering an assault in Mons on 11 November 1918, for no reason other than to have it be recorded that Canadians had fired the last shot of the war. The case was eventually decided in Currie's favour.
Alan Kenneth MacKenzie Clark born in Saltwood, Kent.
Blind Lemon Jefferson's 'Lectric Chair Blues'/'See That My Grave Is Kept Clean' released on Paramount Records.
Commander BT Coote's How To Keep Fit broadcast. David Arthur Whitaker born in Knebworth, Hertfordshire.
Alexis Andrew Nicholas Koerner born in Paris.
Blackburn Rovers defeated Huddersfield Town three-one in the FA Cup Final at Wembley.
On the evening of St George's Day, former Minister of Shipping Sir Leo Money was spotted in Hyde Park with Irene Savidge, a radio valve-tester from New Southgate. A police constable witnessed their exchange of what a later social historian described as 'a rather chaste kiss.' The police maintained that mutual masturbation was taking place, although Money claimed that he had merely been offering Savidge 'advice on her career.' They were both arrested and charged with indecent behaviour, but the case was later dismissed by the Marlborough Street magistrate, who awarded costs of ten pounds against the police. At the time of his arrest, Money protested that he was 'not the usual riff-raff' but 'a man of substance' and, once in custody, was permitted to telephone the Home Secretary, Sir William Joynson-Hicks.
James MacTaggart born in Glasgow.
Hubert Rees born in Abergavenny.
The London & North Eastern Railway's Flying Scotsman ran non-stop over the three hundred and ninety three miles of the East Coast Main Line from King's Cross to Edinburgh.
The first episode of Harold J Laski's Social Purpose broadcast.
The Daily Express published a story claiming to detail a plot by Prince Carol of Romania to overthrow the Romanian government and seize the throne held by his six-year-old son Michael. Carol, who was in England at the time with his mistress, Magda Lupescu, was 'requested' by British authorities to leave the country forthwith. If not sooner.
Dixie Dean finished the season with a Football League record of sixty goals for the champions Everton. Huddersfield - who had led the table for much of the season - finished runners-up and Leicester City third. Third Division South champions Millwall were the league's top scoring team with eighty seven goals in forty six games. John David Bennett born in Beckenham.
Sir Arthur Keith said in a lecture at the University of Manchester that 'no evidence had been found' to support the belief that a spirit survives after the brain ceases to function.
Walter Hagen won the Open Championship golf tournament at Sandwich. Elisabeth Yvonne Scatcherd born in Roubaix, Nord-Pas-de-Calais.
Burt Freeman Bacharach born in Kansas City. Buster Keaton's Steamboat Bill Junior premiered.
A much-changed England beat France five-one in a friendly international in Paris. Dixie Deans scored two as did debutant George Stephenson of Derbu County whilst David Jack added a fifth, all after France had taken the lead in the opening minute. Apart from Stephenson, Ben Olney of Aston Villa, The Wednesday's Ernie Blenkinsop, Vince Matthews of Sheffield united. Burnley's John Bruton and Leicester City's Len Barry all made their debuts. In the French side was Alex Villaplane who would go on to become their first Captain at the World Cup Finals in 1930. More notoriously, he would become a leading member of the French Gestapo during the war, eventually being shot as a traitor on Boxing Day 1944 for heinous crimes against his own people. Police conduct in subjecting twenty two-year-old Irene Savidge to a five-hour interview without a female officer or legal support present and, after the case of indecent behaviour in Hyde Park with ex-government minister Sir Leo Money again her had been dismissed, was strongly debated in the House of Commons. An inquiry was subsequently established which led to changes in the way that female suspects could be questioned.
John Frederick Abineri born in London.
England beat Belgium three-one in a friendly international in Antwerp with two goals from Dixie Dean and a third by Vince Matthews. A foundation stone was laid at Stormont in Belfast to commemorate the completion of the Parliament Building for the devolved Northern Ireland Assembly.
P Bilton's 'sketch in one act' The Mists Of Morning broadcast featuring the radio debut of 'Walter Plinge' (a well-known theatrical pseudonym).
John Leonard Duncan Mackenzie born in Edinburgh.
Arthur Nigel Davenport born in Great Shelford, Cambridgeshire.
William Trevor Cox born in Mitchelstown, County Cork.
Manfred Frederick Jaeger born in Berlin.
Robert Alan Monkhouse born in Beckenham.
The first episode of Miss EC Clarke's Food Values In Cooking broadcast.
Ernesto Guevara born in Rosario, Argentina.
The Friendship landed in Burry Port, Wales after a twenty-hour flight. Amelia Earhart entered the record books as the first woman to fly across the Atlantic and quickly became a celebrity. Meanwhile, Roald Amundsen and four crewmen took off from outside Tromsø, Norway in an effort to find the missing crew of another plane, the Italia. They were never seen again
The silent film The Red Dance premiered at the Globe Theatre in New York. It was preceded by the debut of the newsreel Shaw Talks For Movietone News, in which American audiences got their first opportunity to hear the voice of George Bernard Shaw. The playwright displayed some of his signature wit as he jovially addressed his imaginary audience and performed a visual impression of Benito Mussolini. Moray Robin Philip Adrian Watson born in Sunningdale.
On Holidays Abroad, Bernard C Newman informed the listeners about the wonders of Andorra. England won their first ever test against West Indies at Lord's - the first of a three match series - by an innings and fifty eight runs. Jack Hobbs was unfit so England opened with Herbert Sutcliffe and Charlie Hallows and the three West Indian fast bowlers, Learie Constantine, Herman Griffith and George Francis caused early discomfort. But, although wickets fell regularly, runs were also scored very fast. Ernest Tyldesley made one hundred and twenty two and captain Percy Chapman fifty. Constantine finished with four for eighty two, England totalling four hundred and one. West Indies, opened with Freddie Martin and George Challenor and reached seventy without loss by lunchtime and the partnership went to eighty six before Martin was out to Maurice Tate for forty four. Five wickets then fell for ten runs and though Karl Nunes made thirty seven, Vallance Jupp and Tich Freeman took the last five wickets. Following on, the West Indies lost their first six wickets for just forty four runs. On the final morning, fifty two from Joe Small and forty four from Cyril Browne brought the second innings total to one hundred and sixty six. Freeman finished with four for thirty seven. Douglas Jardine and Harry Small made their test debuts.
David Mercer born in Wakefield.
Stanley Barstow born in Horbury, West Yorkshire.
Ian Edmund Bannen born in Airdrie.
The first episode of How To Appreciate Pictures broadcast. The Belgian financier Alfred Loewenstein left from Croydon to fly to Brussels on his private aircraft, a Fokker FVII trimotor, along with six others. While the aircraft was crossing the English Channel, Loewenstein went to the rear of the plane to use the lavatory. When he had not reappeared for some time, Loewenstein's secretary went in search and discovered that the lavatory was empty and the aircraft's rear door was open. Itws speculated that Loewenstein must have opened the wrong door and fallen death. His body was recovered fifteen days later. Patricia Russell born in Highgate
Frank Windsor Higgins born in Walsall. Minnie Higginbottom born in Dukinfield, Cheshire. Peter Cellier born in Hendon.
Moira Redmond born in Bogner Regis.
T Hayes Hunter's A South Sea Bubble - starring Ivor Novello, Benita Hume and Annette Benson - premiered.
England won the second test at Old Trafford by an innings and thirty runs. On a lifeless pitch, Cliff Roach made fifty for the tourists. The West Indies then collapsed to one hundred and thirty three for six before Cyril Browne and Tommy Scott took the total beyond two hundred. Tich Freeman took five wickets. Jack Hobbs, restored to health and Herbert Sutcliffe made one hundred and nineteen for the first England wicket. After three quick wickets, Wally Hammond put on one hundred and twenty with Douglas Jardine. A collapse followed, including Chapman retiring injured but the tail took the total to three hundred and fifty one. The second West Indies innings ended rather abjectly on the third morning. Freeman again took five wickets.
Oliver John MacGreevy born in Dublin.
The day before the opening ceremony of the Olympics in Amsterdam, some international athletes and delegates came to the Olympic Stadium to get a glimpse of the structure. Some sort of altercation broke out between a French group and a Dutch gatekeeper, who reportedly punched one of the French officials in the jaw. Really hard. The French immediately got all stroppy and discombobulated and demanded - and received - an official apology from the Dutch Olympic Committee and a promise to discharge the gatekeeper.
The opening ceremony for the Olympics was held. The French boycotted the ceremony after their delegation arrived at the stadium to find that the Dutch gatekeeper from the day before had not been sacked as the Olympic Committee had promised. Germany received the biggest ovation from the forty five thousand crowd, this being their first Olympics since 1912.
Itani Yōko born in Paris.
Eleven Thousand Britons conducted a pilgrimage to the battlefields of Northern France on the fourteenth anniversary of the British declaration of war on Germany. The anniversary was marked in Berlin with a huge anti-war demonstration organised by Communists.
Romana Barrack born in Liverpool.
Andrew Warhola born in Pittsburgh.
John King Day, aged fifteen, a prefect at Stamford Grammar School, Lincolnshire and the nephew of the headmaster, the Reverend JD Day, was summoned at Stamford for assaulting John Henry Davis, aged ten, a pupil at the school. The allegation - as reported by the Daily Mail - was that Day administered 'excessive corporal punishment' because Davis had broken one of the school rules by failing to attend as a spectator at a cricket match. The Mayor of Stamford, Alderman JH Bowman, the chairman of the Bench, made a strong appeal that the matter should be 'settled amicably.' The boy's father, Albert Davis agreed to withdraw the summons, but he maintained that he bad been justified in bringing the case.
Nicolas Jack Roeg born in London. Frederick Powell born in Camberwell. Raymond Llewelyn born in Newport, Gwent.
Murphy Grumbar born in London. ,br /> Lancashire claimed a hat-trick of cricket county championship titles, winning their final match of the season by an innings and forty nine runs against Derbyshire at Burton-on-Trent. Charlie Hallows scored two thousand five hundred runs in the season whilst the bowling of Ted McDonald and Dick Tyldesley proved too much for most opponents. Wicketkeeper George Duckworth claimed a record ninety eight dismissals. Kent finished second and Nottinghamshire third. Nottinghamshire's Harold Larwood again topped the national bowling averages with one hundred and thirty eight wickets at 14.51. Hampshire's Phil Mead was the leading championship run-scorer (two thousand eight hundred and forty three) and Kent's Tich Freeman was the top wicket-taker (two hundred and sixteen).
Helen Kane's recording of 'I Wanna Be Loved By You' released. Al Jolson recorded 'Sonny Boy'.
Karlheinz Stockhausen born in Burg-Mödrath, Germany.
Donald Marshall Gray born in Bournemouth.
Peter Miles born in London.
The Threepenny Opera by Bertolt Brecht and Kurt Weill premiered at the Theater am Schiffbauerdamm in Berlin. James Harrison Coburn III born in Laurel, Nebraska. Tommy Johnson recorded 'Canned Heat Blues' for RCA Victor Records.
Ahmet Zogu was crowned King Zog as Albania changed from a republic to a monarchy. Robert Emrys James born in Machynlleth, Powys.
Alexander Fleming accidentally discovered penicillin when he returned to his lab after a summer holiday to find that the Staphylococcus aureus bacteria which had once been in a Petri dish had apparently been killed off by a Penicillium mold.
Dorothea Phillips born in Penygraig, Rhondda.
Derek Royle born in London.
James Cruze's Excess Baggage - starring William Haines, Josephine Dunn and Neely Edwards - premiered.
Al Capone accidentally shot himself with his own pistol when getting into a car after a game of golf in Burnham, Illinois.
Brian Matthew born in Coventry.
William West Anderson born in Walla Walla, Washington State.
Buster Keaton's The Cameraman premiered. John Logie Baird's Television Development Company demonstrates their model A, B and C 'televisors' to the general public at the Radio Exhibition at Olympia. The exhibition proved hugely popular, with an estimated nine hundred people per day watching the demonstration programming.
Alfred J Goulding's The Campus Carmen - starring Daphne Pollard, Johnny Burke and Carole Lombard - premiered.
Newcastle United's five-nil defeat at Manchester United saw the four hundred and seventy second - and final - appearance of Frank Hudpeth in a career which began until 1910. Hudspeth remains second on The Magpies' all-time list of appearances behind Jimmy Lawrence (four hundred and ninety six), established in 1922.
Joseph Stalin announced the first Soviet five-year plan. The Mae West play Pleasure Man was closed down by police after one performance at the Biltmore Theatre on Broadway due to alleged 'indecency.' All sixty four members of the cast were thrown in The Joint.
The LZ 127 Graf Zeppelin sailed across the English Channel and over parts of England during test flights as it prepared to cross the Atlantic Ocean.
Walter Frederick George Williams born in Heath End, Surrey.
Joseph Brady born in Glasgow.
Mott, Hay & Anderson's Tyne Bridge was opened by King George and Queen Mary. The royal couple were the first to use the roadway, travelling in their Ascot Landau from Gateshead to Newcastle. The ceremony was attended by twenty thousand local schoolchildren - including both of this blogger's parents.
An iron lung was used for the first time, on a polio victim in Boston Children's Hospital. DW Griffiths's The Battle Of The Sexes - starring Jean Hersholt, Phyllis Haver, Belle Bennett and Sally O'Neil - premiered.
Arsenal paid Bolton Wanderers a world record transfer fee of ten thousand six hundred and forty seven pounds and ten shillings to acquire England international David Jack. This beat the previous record (paid by Aston Villa to Patrick Thistle for jimmy Gibson in April 1927) by almost four thousand pounds. Herbert Chapman negotiated the transfer with Bolton's representatives in a hotel bar, his tactic being to drink gin and tonics without any gin in them, while asking the waiter to double the alcohol served to the other side. The fee would remain a record for almost ten years.
Blind Willie McTell recorded 'Statesboro Blues' in Atlanta, Georgia.
John Colin Smith born in Burley In Wharfedale, West Yorkshire.
Chiang Kai-shek invited notorious racist and anti-semite Henry Ford and four other American industrialists to become 'honorary economic advisors' to China. Intended as a replacement for retired captain Charlie Buchan, David Jack made his Arsenal debut in a three-nil victory at Newcastle United. Elsewhere, Leciester City thrashed Portsmouth ten-nil with Arthur Chandler scoring six and Ernie Hine three.
England defeated Ireland two-one in the Home International championship at Goodison. Local hero Dixie Dean scored the winner, having earlier msised a penalty. Joe Hilme also scored for the hosts whilst Linfield's Joe Bambrick netted for the visitors. Oldham Athletic's John Hacking, Jim Barrett of West Ham United, Blackburn Rovers' Austen Campbell and Leicester City's Ernie Hine all made their international debuts. Barrett was stretchered off after he twisted his left knee whilst taking a shot aftyer only eight minutes. Reports suggested he had either twisted his knee, or sprained his ankle.The murder trial of Chinese law student, Chung Yi Miao opened. He was on honeymoon with his wife, Wai-Sheung Siu, the daughter of a wealthy merchant. He had strangled her in woods near the village of Grange in the Lake District and tried to make it appear as though she had been sexually assaulted and robbed, before returning alone to their hotel. Her rings were found in his possession by the police and it was reported that he had made the fatal mistake of remarking that it was 'terrible' she had been robbed, when the police had not informed him that she had been. The trial lasted two days before he was found extremely guilty by the jury and he was executed six weeks later.
The stage musical Animal Crackers, starring Groucho, Harpo, Chico and Zeppo Marx, opened at the Forty Fourth Street Theatre on Broadway. RKO Pictures was founded in Los Angeles. Jerome Barry Willis born in London.
During a public meeting in the Royal Albert Hall, Stanley Baldwin said that Britain had no intention of building up its navy in competition with the United States.
The first pictures ever publicly broadcast in Britain through the fultograph system were transmitted by the BBC to the Savoy Hotel in London. A picture of George V and a cartoon were successfully transmitted.
Michael J Bird born in London.
The LZ 127 Graf Zeppelin landed back in Friedrichshafen only seventy one hours and twelve minutes after leaving the United States, a new Atlantic crossing speed record for dirigibles.
Eileen Kennally born in Leeds.
The first episode of Modern Britain In The Making broadcast.
Ennio Morricone born in Rome.
Rudyard Kipling declared a copyright on his speeches, handing out advance copies of a speech he was about to make to the Royal Society of Medicine with a notice stating that all rights to the speech would revert to him on Sunday. 'I have never heard of it being done before,' said newspaper proprietor Lord Riddell. 'What Mister Kipling, apparently, is trying to do is to give a license to newspapers for the reproduction of his speech for forty-eight hours after it is delivered. What legal force the condition has, I do not know. I do not believe such a demand ever has been tested.'
Gale-force winds and heavy rain swept much of Western Europe. People were injured from falling trees, telegraph wires were brought down, rivers were flooded, buildings were damaged, the English Channel became treacherous, there were multiple shipwrecks and planes were grounded. An estimated thirty people died in Britain alone.
England beat Wales three-two in the Home International championship at Swansea's Vetch Field. Joe Hulme scored two and Leicester's Ernie Hind added a third. Cardiff's Fred Keenor and Swansea's Jack Fowler netted for the home side. Leeds United's Ernie Hall made his England debut. Hall's absence from Leeds' two-nil defeat at home to The Wednesday in the First Division saw the league debut of Jack Milburn, the eldest of a noted footballing family from Ashington, the first of four hundred and twenty three games for Leeds and Bradford City in a career that lasted until 1947. League leaders Derby County won one-nil at Manchester United with a Harry Bedford goal. Ken MacDonald scored five in Hull City's five-one defeat of Bristol City in the Second Division. Rhere were also hat-tricks for Alex Hair (in Preston North End's five-two victory over Clapton Orient and Bill Johnstone and Jimmy Cookson for opposite siders in Reading's five-three win against West Bromwich Albion.
The Walt Disney animated cartoon Steamboat Willie, introducing the character of Mickey Mouse, was premiered at Universal's Colony Theatre in New York.
Julia Arnall born in München.
Maurice Ravel's Bolero received its première in Paris at the Palais Garnier.
Stanley Michael Hawkins born in Blean, Kent.
John Marshall Bay born in Chicago.
Gerald Blake born in Hackney.
Cosmo Gordon Lang was installed as the new Archbishop of Canterbury.
England won the first Ashes test at Brisbane by a record six hundred and seventy five runs. Patsy Hendren scored one hundred and sixty nine and Harold Larwood seventy in the first innings and Phil Mead and Douglas Jardine half-centuries in the second. Larwood, Maurice Tate and Farmer Jack White twice bowled out the hosts - for one hundred and twenty two and sixty six. It was an inauspicious debut for Australia's Don Bradman who scored eighteen and one.
After several days of losses, the crashing New York Stock Exchange bottomed out with a mass selling spree.
St Elmo Boyce's Casper's Week End starring Thelma Hill and Bud Duncan - premiered.
Ronald Glasfryn Lewis born in Port Talbort.
Henry Lionel Ogus born in Montreal.
George Gershwin's An American In Paris was first performed at New York's Carnegie Hall. Josephine Griffin born in London.
Robert F McGowan's The Spanking Age - starring Joe Cobb, Jean Darling and Lyle Tayo - premiered.
Philip Kindred Dick born in Chicago.
Eddie Cantor's recording of 'Makin' Whoopee!' released.
England won the second Ashes test at Sydney by eight wickets. George Geary took five wickets as Australia were dismissed for two hundred and fifty three. England's innings of six hundred and thirty six included two hundred and fifty from Wally Hammond. Not for the first or last time, the fearsome pace of Harold Larwood made the Aussies shite in their own pants and whinge like little girls.
The first Festival Of Nine Lessons & Carol Service broadcast from King's College, Cambridge. Norman Rossington born in Liverpool.
A Popular British Programme - featuring The Wireless Orchestra - broadcast. Burnley's three-two victory over Liverpool featured the five hundred and sixty ninth (and final) appearance for The Clarets of goalkeeper Jerry Dawson, almost twenty one years after his debut in 1907. In the process he broke Fred Barron's appearance record for the club, established in 1911. After retiring from professional football Dawson joined the coaching staff at Turf Moor and played as a batsman in the Lancashire League for Burnley Cricket Club.
An adaptation of Dick Whittington broadcast.
Miss Jan MacDonald's A New Experiment In Welfare Work broadcast.
Captain Malcolm Campbell's My Adventures In The Sahara and extracts from Edward Gibbon's The History Of The Decline & Fall Of The Roman Empire broadcast. Mississippi John Hurt recorded 'Stack O'Lee Blues' and 'Candy Man Blues' for Okeh Records. Bernard Joseph Cribbins born in Oldham.
Pinetop Smith recorded 'Pinetop's Boogie Woogie' in Chicago.
Anatomist and anthropologist Sir Arthur Keith said that forty five to fifty was the age that humans were 'naturally meant to live to. Civilisation, acting as the world's hothouse, gradually extended this age to between sixty five and seventy five,' he explained. 'Nowadays some even desire it to be prolonged over the century mark. I think it is one of the most foolish of things for man to want such a long life.' Keith added that it was 'selfish' for older generations to 'hang on too long' and block younger generations from 'getting their chance in life' and that it would be 'in the world's best interests to restrict human life' to an age at which each human would produce at maximum ability. Ellas Otha Bates born in McComb, Mississippi.
Do You Remember?, a comedy by EA Bryan, was performed on 5NO Newcastle by members of the Clarion Dramatic Society including Norman Veitch, Marjorie Dixon, Robert Strangeways, Harry Shuttleworth and Tom Heenan.
