1929
German President Paul von Hindenburg and Chancellor Hermann Müller told a New Year's Day reception of diplomatic representatives that the German people wanted the occupation of the Rhineland to end. Hindenburg said that the Germans were 'very bitter because a great part of their country still lacks the liberty which we claim by divine and human right,' while Müller said that strained international relations remaining over the war could only end once the 'foreign yoke' of occupation had been removed.
Jerome K Jerome's 'idle fancy', The Passing Of The Third Floor Block broadcast.
Sergio Leone born in Rome.
The Charcoal Burner's Son, 'an operetta for children', by L Du Garde Peach with music by Victor Hely-Hutchinson broadcast.
England won the third test at Melbourne by three wickets to take a three-nil lead in the series and, thus, retain the Ashes. There was a debut century for Don Bradman in Australia's second innings, one of four hundreds hit by the hosts (Jack Ryder, Al Kippax and Bill Woodfull also reached three figures) but, again, Harold Larwood, Maurice Tate, George Geary and Jack White were able, twice, to dismiss the Aussies. England, having scored four hundred and seventeen in their own first innings (Wally Hammond making his second consecutive double century) were set an imposing three hundred and thirty two to win. But, with Herbert Sutcliffe hitting one hundred and thirty five, they reached it for the loss of seven wickets.
Heinrich Himmler became Reichsführer-SS.
Saeed Jaffrey born in Malerkotla, Punjab.
The first episode of Our Boys & Girls broadcast. In Belgium, Hergé's character Tintin first appeared in the children's newspaper supplement Le Petit Vingtième.
Laurence Housman's Crime & The Criminal broadcast. Peter Wynn Barkworth born in Margate.
Martin Luther King Junior born in Atlanta.
The comic strip character Popeye first appeared in the daily King Features comic strip Thimble Theatre. Charles Philip Latham born in Essex.
Ronald Radd born in Sunderland.
Claes Oldenburg born in Stockholm.
Stephanie Bidmead born in Kidderminster.
Victor Winding born in Lambeth.
Alexander Davion born in Paris.
John Nettleton born in Lewisham.
Keith Spencer Waterhouse born in Leeds.
The Federal Reserve Board issued a warning to the American public about 'the excessive amount of the country's credit absorbed in speculative loans.' The New York Stock Exchange took a tumble on the same day, which was blamed on the Bank of England raising its discount rate by one percentage point. Norman John Frank Rodway born in Dublin.
England won the fourth Ashes test at Adelaide by twelve runs. Wally Hammond scored a century in each innings, aided by a dogged ninety eight from Douglas Jardine in the second. Despite Archie Jackson's stunning hundred on debut for the hosts, they fell just short of their fourth innings target of three hundred and forty nine. Jack White took thirteen wickets in the match, including eight in the Australians' second innings.
Katherine Florence Newman born in Liverpool.
The Jazz Age, starring Douglas Fairbanks Junior and Marceline Day, premiered.
Five gangsters (all rivals of Al Capone), plus two civilians, were shot very dead in Chicago in what became known as The Saint Valentine's Day Massacre. The atrocity was possibly carried out by members of the notorious Purple Gang dressed as police officers.
Katherine Patricia Routledge born in Birkenhead.
Leonard Cyril Deighton born in Marylebone.
The government narrowly avoided defeat on an impending vote over the amount of compensation to be paid to Irish loyalists for losses since the truce in the Irish Free State. After many Conservative members voiced their intent to vote against the government for committing an amount they considered too low, Stanley Baldwin adjourned the debate with a view to 'reconsider the matter.' Elspet Jean MacGregor Gray born in Inverness.
Foreign Affairs Secretary Austen Chamberlain was severely heckled in the House of Commons over the recent statement of Britain's US ambassador Esme Howard suggesting that Britain would ask for a naval disarmament conference. Chamberlain contradicted Howard's assertion by insisting that the government had 'no intention of issuing an invitation for a conference on this subject' and said that Howard's statement was 'merely a personal opinion.' Neil John McCallum born in Hanley, Saskatchewan.
Stanley James Carroll Beck born in Islington. Maxwell Shaw born in London.
Hughie Gallacher scored four in Scotland's seven-three victory over Ireland in the Home International championship in Belfast.
The first National Lecture - by the Poet Laureate, Robert Bridges - broadcast from Magdalen College Oxford.
Hilda Braid born in Northfleet.
Sir Arthur Conan Doyle was giving a lecture on the paranormal in Nairobi when he displayed a photograph of a supposed 'ghost' in a haunted house in Nottingham. A well-known Nairobi dentist identified himself as the 'ghost', explaining that he had posed for the photo wearing a white sheet some years ago after he and other members of a party had investigated the house for two weeks and had failed to find any ghostly activity. Doyle accepted the man's explanation, expressed regret at being hoaxed and said he would not show the photograph again.
Australia won the fifth Ashes test at Melbourne by five wickets to, at least, salvage some pride from a series in which they were thrashed four-one. England's first innings total of five hundred and nineteen included centuries for Jack Hobbs and Maurice Leyland and ninety five from Patsy Hendren. Australia replied with four hundred and ninety one, Don Bradman and Bill Woodfull hitting hundreds. Tim Wall, making his test debut, took five wickets in England's second innings leaving Australia two hundred and eighty seven for victory. A sixth wicket partnership of eighty three between Jack Ryder and Bradman saw the hosts home.
Thomas Baptiste born in British Guyana.
Gregalach won the Grand National. The Billiard Room Mystery Or Who Do You Think Did It? broadcast.
James Ackley Maxwell born in Worcester, Massachusetts.
Buster Keaton's Spite Marriage premiered.
Phyllis Pamela Green born in Kingston Upon Thames.
Lee Patterson born in Vancouver. Alexander Davion born in Paris.
Michael Hayes born in Barking.
Nigel Barnard Hawthorne born in Coventry.
Willis Edward Hall born in Leeds. Corbet Stafford Woodall born in Hampshire.
Austro-Italian relations deteriorated over a football match after Austria defeated Italy three-nil in the Central European International Cup. The Italians complained that a sideways Hungarian flag was used to represent Italy and that the Austrian band had played the wrong Italian national anthem. Italian newspapers also accused the Austrians of 'unfair play' and called for a refusal to offer the country any loans.
Keith Anderson born in Barton Upon Irwell, Lancashire.
Ronald Eyre born in Mapplewell, Yorkshire. Scotland defeated England one-nil in the Home International championship at Hampden Park. Aberdeen's Alex Chayne scored the last-minute winner, direct from a corner assisted by strong winds. Scotland finished the game with ten men after Alex Jackson dislocated his elbow. Russell Wainscoat of Leeds United made his England debut. First Division leaders The Wednesday, even without Ernie Blenkinsop who was on international duty, thrashed West Ham United six-nil (Alf Strange and Mark Hooper both scoringt twice). Liverpool won five-two at Derbu County. An open verdict was reached in Kensington at the inquest of Evelyn Greig, the estranged wife of the actor, Colin Clive. She was, herself, also an actress and was going through rather messy divorce proceedings with her husband. She died at the home of a midwife from a heart attack following an abortion, though it appeared that the midwife was unaware she had been pregnant and was merely a boarder at the midwife's house. It was assumed that Greig had bought her own drugs to induce a miscarriage. Her husband went on to achieve Hollywood movie fame as Victor Frankenstein, two years later.
William Grover-Williams won the first-ever Monaco Grand Prix driving a British Racing Green Bugatti 35B. The first air mail delivery from India to the United Kingdom was completed at Croydon Aerodrome with the arrival of fifteen thousand letters. Gerald Alexander Abrahams born in Bloomsbury.
On budget day a month ahead of a general erection, Chancellor of the Exchequer Winston Churchill announced the abolition of the three hundred and twenty five-year-old duty on tea, cutting its price by four pence a pound. JM Barrie donated the copyright fee of his Peter Pan works to the Great Ormond Street Hospital in London in perpetuity. The second National Lecture featured Arthur Eddington's Matter In Interstellar Space.
France rescinded its permission to allow English occultist and Grand Magus Aleister Crowley to live there and gave him twenty four hours to leave the country and never come back. Crowley had been living abroad after becoming unwelcome in England, being branded a traitor for writing articles supporting Germany during the war. 'The expulsion order and the slanderous articles on my character do not worry me. Magick is the sole thing in life and lifts the soul above petty annoyances,' Crowley declared from his sick bed.
Eve Pearce born in Aberdeen.
Peter Jeffrey born in Bristol.
DW Griffiths' The Battle Of The Sexes - starring Jean Hersholt, Phyllis Haver, Belle Bennett and Sally O'Neil - premiered.
The first episode of English Eloquence broadcast.
A case settled by the Divisional Court of King's Bench in London defined the limits of the authority of parents and schoolmasters. The incident that gave rise to the case was the caning of a fifteen-years-old schoolboy, Frank Douglas Wright, by his master for smoking in the street out of school hours. Ernest Wright, chairman of the Newport Urban Council and father of the boy, had obtained a ruling calling on the Newport justices to 'show just cause' why they should not refer the case for an appeal against their initial decision dismissing a summons for assault against the headmaster, WS Brooks and two assistant masters. Ronald Walker, for the justices, said that Wright and another boy had been caned for smoking. Mister Justice Avory asked if the other boy had 'taken it like a man?' Walker said that if Wright had been seen by a policeman the officer could have confiscated all cigarettes found on him. Yet his father 'had the effrontery to complain' because he permitted his son to do something which was illegal. Apparently, a girl who smoked could only have the actual cigarette she was smoking taken away to which one of the justices noted: 'That, again, shows the importance of belonging to the other sex.' Lord Hewart, in his judgement, said there was 'a plain rule of law' that any person who sent his child to school was 'presumed to give the school authorities power' to administer 'moderate and reasonable punishment.' The justices in the case had 'expressed a perfectly correct view of the law.' They found that the punishment was a 'proper' one and there were no ground for sending the case to appeal.
Bolton Wanderers defeated Portsmouth two-nil in the FA Cup Final at Wembley. Sheffield Wednesday won the first division title with a one-all draw against Burnley. Leicester City finished second and Aston Villa third. Sunderland's Dave Halliday was the First Division's top scorer with forty three goals.
The first episode of English Eloquence broadcast. One thousand Belgian, British and French war veterans dedicated a monument in Steenstrate, Belgium on the fourteenth anniversary of the first poison gas attack in that Flanders village.
The first episode of The Week In London. Laurel and Hardy made the jump to talking pictures with the premiere of Hal Roach's Unaccustomed As We Are. Stan Laurel's famous whimper of panic was heard for the first time, as was Oliver Hardy's catchphrase: 'Why don't you do something to help me?!' Audrey Kathleen Ruston born in Ixelles, Brussels.
Al Capone hosted a party to ostensibly honour gang members Albert Anselmi, John Scalise and Joseph Giunta. During the festivities Capone accused them of being traitors, then personally beat them with a club and shot them extremely dead. Their bodies were dumped on a roadside near Hammond, Indiana where they were found the next day.
John Ford's The Black Watch - starring Victor McLaglen and Myrna Loy - premiered.
England beat France four-one in a friendly international in Paris. Edgar Kail of Dulwich Hamlets and George Camsell of Middlesbrough both scored twice on their England debuts. Kail would be the last non-Football League player to represent England. Camsell's Boro team-mate Joe Peacock and Leicester City's Hugh Adcock also made their international debuts. A Croydon housekeeper was cross-examined at the inquest into the mysterious case of the mother and daughter, Violet and Vera Sidney, who had apparently both died from natural causes, within three weeks of each other, just under a year after the mother's son-in-law had died under similar circumstances. Only when the bodies were exhumed was it discovered that they had all been poisoned with arsenic. The inquest found that the housekeeper had served soup to Vera which had made her ill, but she herself was also made ill by the soup, as was the family cat. No one was ever charged with the murders. Violet's other daughter, Grace, the widow of the first victim, was strongly suspected by the police for all three deaths, but they could not gather enough evidence to support a prosecution and she died, aged eighty six, in 1973.
Parliament was dissolved to give notice of the General Erection at the end of the month.
England defeated Belgium five-one in a friendly international in Brussels. George Camsell scored four, including a penalty, taking his goals total for England to six in two games, whilst Joe Carter netted the other.
Gangsters from eight US states, including such notable figures as Lucky Luciano, Al Capone, Johnny Torrio and Bugsy Siegel, met in Atlantic City to form a National Crime Syndicate. Over the next three days they settled disputes, agreed upon territorial boundaries and strolled along the boardwalks in full view of the media like they owned the place. Which, effectively, at that point they did.
Henry James Marris-McGee born in South Kensington.
David Healy born in New York. Spain beat England four-three in a friendly international Madrid, England's first defeat against non-British opposition. Joe Carter scored twice for England and Joe Bradford added a third (from a cross by his cousion, Hugh Adcock). However, they were undone by a crack Spanish side led by Real Madrid's Gasper Rubio, who scored twice including the winner ten minutes from time. One hundred and twenty people died at the Cleveland Clinic in Ohio when an x-ray film ignited due to the close proximity of an exposed lightbulb. Poisonous gas was released and there were two explosions. One of the clinic's founders, Doctor John Phillips, was among the fatalities.
The first Academy Awards ceremony was held at the Hollywood Roosevelt Hotel. All the winners had already been announced in February and the event lasted only fifteen minutes. Wings won the first-ever Award for Outstanding Picture. An adaptation of There Are Crimes & Crimes broadcast.
Lewis Foster's Double Whoopee - starring Laurel and Hardy and featuring an early appearance by Jean Harlow - premiered.
The Cocoanut - the film debut of Groucho, Harpo, Chico and Zeppo Marx - premiered in New York.
Shane Lance Deacon born in Toronto. Thane William Howard Hardcastle Christopher Bettany born in the Kingdom of Sarawak.
Marguerite Saad born in München, Germany.
The General Erection returned a extremely well-hung parliament. Labour had a small majority of twenty seven seats and formed a minority government, supported by the Liberal Party's fifty nine seats. Arthur Edward Barrett born in London.
Mary Elizabeth Bodington born in Reading. David Henry Conville born in Kashmire, India.
Ramsay MacDonald formed a new, minority, Labour government. MacDonald made his first radio address to the British public, saying that international disarmament was 'a matter of overshadowing importance' and stressing the need for 'dialogue with foreign powers.' Leon Trotsky - exiled from the Soviet Union - asked Britain for political asylum. He got his answer on 11 July. Not unexpectedly, it was negative.
TS Eliot's The History Of English Letters - Six Types Of Tudor Prose broadcast.
Brigid Antonia Brophy born in Ealing.
Charley Patton made his first recording session in Richmond, Indiana. Among the songs cut were 'A Spoonful Blues', 'Prayer Of Death', Shake It & Break It (But Don't Let Mama Fall)' and 'I'm Going Home'.
Damaris Ann Kennedy Hayman born in Kensington. Pauline Lettice Yates born in St Helens, Lancashire.
Kansas Joe McCoy and Memphis Minnie recorded 'When The Levee Breaks' for Columbia Records. England drew the first of a five test series with South Africa at Edgbaston. Patsy Hendren top-scored with seventy in England's first innings. The tourists gained a small first innings lead despite five wickets for Harold Larwood. Herbert Stucliffe and Wally Hammond hit centuries in England's second innings but Bob Catterall and Bruce Mitchell steered South Africa to safety. Kumar Duleepsinhji and Tom Killick made their test debuts.
Thelma Pigott born in Middlesbrough.
Ronald Charles Andrew Hines born in London.
John Edward Barandon born in New York.
George and Weedon Grossmith's The Diary Of A Nobody broadcast.
David Kingshott born in Twickenham.
The first London performances of two ballets by Igor Stravinsky - Apollon Musagète and Le Baiser De La Fée - conducted by the composer at the Kingsway Hall were broadcast. June Wyndham Davies born in Cardiff.
The Deutsche Physikalische Gesellschaft awarded the first Max Planck Medals, honouring extraordinary achievements in theoretical physics. The recipients were Albert Einstein and Planck himself.
A new session of parliament opened with the first King's Speech made under a Labour government. The speech was read by Lord Sankey as George V, still recovering from a long illness, was advised by doctors not to attend in person and run the risk of further infection. By being in contact with socialists, probably. The second test at Lord's was drawn. Herbert Sutcliffe, Maurice Leyland and Maurice Tate all scored centuries. Jack O'Connor and Walter Robins made their test debuts.
Scotland Yard seized thirteen paintings of male and female nudes by DH Lawrence from a Mayfair gallery on the grounds of alleged indecency under the Vagrancy Act 1838. Helen Wills won her third straight Wimbledon title, defeating Helen Jacobs in the Women's Singles Final.
Christopher Thomas Morahan born in london.
David Kelly born in Dublin.
Judith Stott born in Oxford.
England won the third test at Headingley by five wickets. Tich Freeman took seven wickets in South Africa's first innings whilst he, Jack White and Frank Woolley all picked up three in the second. Woolley also hit eighty three and an undefeated ninety five. Ted Bowley made his test debut (scoring a vital forty six in England's run chase of the final afternoon).
John Woodvine born in South Shields.
Ada Brand Thomson born in Manchester.
Plum Warner played his five hundred and twenty first and final first class cricket match for the MCC against the Royal Navy at Lord's. In a career which began in 1895, he scored twenty nine thousand and twenty eight runs. He played fifteen test matches, captaining England in ten of them and succeeded in regaining The Ashes in 1904, winning the series against Australia three-two.
Lord Lloyd resigned as High Commissioner in Egypt at the request of the Labour government due to differences of opinion over Egyptian policy. 'Mama Don't Allow No Easy Riders Here' by Tampa Red & His Hokum Band with Frankie Half-Pint Jaxon on vocals was recorded.
The Geneva Convention, covering the treatment of prisoners of war, was signed.
Alfred Hitchcock's Blackmail premiered, one of - if not the - first British sound movie. Harry A Pollard and Arch Heath's Show Boat premiered.
England won the fourth test at Old Trafford by an innings and thirty two runs. Frank Woolley and Bob Wyatt scored centuries in England's four hundred and twenty seven for seven whilst Tich Freeman took twelve wickets in the match. Fred Barratt made his test debut.
Fats Waller's recording of 'Ain't Misbehavin' released.
Peter Alexander Diamond born in Durham.
Isaac Bluthal born in Jezierzany, Poland.
The Pedestrians Association, advocating for road safety and the rights of pedestrians, was formed in London.
Richard Michael Carpenter born in King's Lynn, Norfolk.
Blind Blake's recording of 'Diddie Wa Diddie' released.
Lucky Star - starring Janet Gaynor and Charles Farrell - premiered.
The first transmissions of John Logie Baird's experimental thirty-line television system by the BBC. The fifth test at The Oval was drawn. Herbert Sutcliffe scored a century in each innings whilst Wally Hammond also hit an undefeated hundred in the second innings. Les Ames and Nobby Clark (who picked up three wickets) made their test debuts.
Mahatma Gandhi was elected president of the Indian National Congress, but he refused to accept the post.
The musical Say It With Songs - featuring Al Jolson singing 'Little Pal' - released.
Patsy Sloots born in West Norwood.
Grand Mufti of Jerusalem Haj Amin al-Husseini warned that Palestine and Arabia could not regain peace unless Britain abandoned its policy of making Palestine a national home for Jews. He explained that the reasons for recent violence had little to do with the Wailing Wall but actually went back to the Balfour Declaration of 1917. Vittorio Giorgio Andre Spinetti born in Cwm, Ebbw Vale.
Nottinghamshire overcame their Northern rivals, Lancashire and Yorkshire, to win the cricket county championship for the first time since 1907. Gloucestershire finished fourth. Notts drew with Derbyshire at Ilkston on the last day of the season to secure the title. Dodger Whysall was their top-scorer with two thousand six hundred and twenty first-class runs. Fred Barratt, Harold Larwood, Bill Voice and Sam Staples all took over one hundred wickets. Gloucester's Alf Dipper tied with Whysall as the championship's leading run-scorer (two thousand and seventy nine). Kent's Tich Freeman was, again, the leading wicket-taker (one hundred and ninety nine).
Twenty nine goals were scored in seven First Division games, with Newcastle United beating Blackburn five-one, Birmingham winning four-two against West Ham and Derby defeating Aston Villa four-nil. In the Third Division North Darlington beat Nelson six-one. Plymouth Argyle won four-three at Torquey United, their winner a penalty scored by their goalkeeper Fred Craig. It was Craig's fifth goal for The Pilgrims, all from the penalty spot.
American business theorist Roger Babson gave a conference speech in Wellesley, Massachusetts saying, 'More people are borrowing and speculating today than ever in our history. Sooner or later, a crash is coming and it may be terrific.' A recording of James Joyce reading the 'Anna Livia Plurabelle fragment form his, as yet unpublished, Finnegans Wake was made by CK Ogden (the linguist and philosopher) in the studio of the Orthological Society in Cambridge. Ogden boasted of the two biggest recording machines in the world and wanted to do a better recording of Joyce than the Ulysses recording of five years earlier. The record, a twelve-inch double sided 78 bearing the Linguaphone label, was sold by the Orthological Institute for two guineas.
Thomas Patrick McKenna born in Mullagh, County Cavan.
AH Oriebar set a new world flying speed record of three hundred and fifty five miles per hour, using the same Supermarine S6 flown by Richard Waghorn in the Schneider Trophy race which set the previous record a mere three days earlier.
Louis Armstrong recorded 'When You're Smiling'. George Hirst played his eight hundred and twenty sixth and final first class cricket match for Yorkshire against the MCC at Scarborough. He had last appeared in a first class game in 1921. Aged fifty eight, he scored just one run before Bill Bowes bowled him; Hirst reportedly commented: 'A grand ball that, lad. I couldn't have played that one when I was good!' In a career which began in 1891 his remarkable all-round feats included thirty six thousand three hundred and fifty six runs, two thousand seven hundred and forty two wickets and six hundred and five catches. He completed the double of one thousand runs and one hundred wickets in a season fourteen times, the second most of any cricketer after his friend and team-mate Wilfred Rhodes. He played twenty four tests for England between 1897 and 1909 including the remarkable final Ashes test at The Oval in 1902. England, needing two hundred and sixty three to win, were forty eight for five at one point but an innings of one hundred and from Gilbert Jessop gave England hope. The ninth wicket fell with fifteen still needed when Rhodes joined Hirst. It has been claimed that Hirst said to Rhodes: 'We'll get 'em in singles', though neither batsman could remember those words being spoken subsequently. Nevertheless, the two Yorkshiremen held their nerve to take England to a memorable one-wicket victory.
In the Second Division match between Millwall and Bradford Park Avenue, the visitors gave a debut to future England international Albert Geldard. At fifteen years and one hundred and fifty eight days he was, then, the youngest player to appear in a football league game. The record would be equalled (by Wrexham's Ken Roberts) in 1951 but would not be beaten until 2008 by Barnsley's Reuben Noble-Lazarus.
Elizabeth Jean Williams born in Buxton. Alex Scott born in Australia.
Henry Livings born in Prestwych.
Ronald William George Barker born in Bedford. Kenneth John Rathbone Warren born in Parramatta, New South Wales.
Bernard Gallagher born in Bradford.
Ernest Hemingway's A Farewell To Arms published. Barbara Ann Murray born in London.
Alfred Barnett, nineteen and described as a musician, pleaded guilty to assaulting Rachel Elgrod with intent to rob her at the Old Bailey. Barnett called at the jeweller's shop of Elgrod's husband in Black Lion Yard and said that he wanted a ring for his fiancée. By a ruse he sent out the man who was in the shop and when Mrs Elgrod was left alone, he threw pepper at her. It missed her and he then struck her on the head with a spanner. Barnett bolted from the shop but was chased and caught. Fred Levy, defending, claimed that Barnett was 'constantly going to the films. Nearly all the modern films deal with crime,' said Levy who added that Barnett had also been reading 'the mystery tales of Edgar Allan Poe and other authors.' The Recorder said the offence to which Barnett had pleaded guilty was regarded so seriously that the law allowed a maximum punishment of penal servitude for life and a whipping. Instead, he sentenced Barnett to three months' imprisonment and ordered him to receive twelve strokes of the birch. Ronald William George Barker born in Bedford.
In Frankfurt, Fritz von Opel made the world's first flight in a rocket-propelled plane, the RAK1, for about a mile and a quarter at an average altitude of forty nine feet. Opel crashed upon landing but was unhurt. The first episode of Points Of View featured the political scientist and philosopher Goldsworthy Lowes Dickinson.
Barbara Joy Mitchell born in Northampton.
Frederick Feast born in Scarborough.
Vilma June Charlish born in London.
Magnús Sigursteinsson born in Reykjavík.
The British airship R101 embarked on its maiden voyage. Traffic in London came to a standstill as thousands stopped to watch the dirigible pass over the city. Points Of View featured a talk by George Bernard Shaw.
Jane Mary Griffiths born in Peacehaven.
Charley Patton's recording of 'Rattlesnake Blues'/'Running Wild Blues' released in the US. England beat Ireland three-nil in the Home Intenrational championship at Windsor Park. George Camsell (a later replacement for Derby's George Stephenson) scored twice with Ernie Hine adding a third from the penalty spot. Fulham's Bert Barrett and Eric Brook of Manchester City made their England debuts. Leeds United were three points clear at the top of the First Division following a one-nil victory over Birmingham City. Sheffield Wednesday were second, three-one winners over Huddersfield Town. Manchester City beat West Ham United four-three. Sunderland won the Wear-Tyne derby one-nil with a Gordon Gunson winner. Blackpool defeated Preston North End six-four in the Second Division. Wolves led the league on goal average after a three-nil defeat of Tottenham Hotspur. Three and a half million shares were sold on the New York Stock Exchange as prices fell significantly. Five days later came the Wall Street Crash as the markets went into freefall and investors began to lose their shit.
Colin Abel Jeavons born in Newport.
Points Of View featured HG Wells.
The 'Wall Street Crash' occurred signalling the start of The Great Depression. John Clifford Rose born in Hamnish Clifford, Herefordshire.
It was announced that London buses would be red, as trials with yellow-and-red buses proved unpopular. Sam Taylor's adaptation of The Taming Of The Shrew - starring Douglas Fairbanks and Mary Pickford and featuring the credit 'with additional dialogue by William Shakespeare' - premiered.
Alun Morgun Richards born in Caerphilly.
Jack Snowdon Hawkins born in London.
Cecil Philip Taylor born in Glasgow.
Lila Kaye born in Middlesbrough. Arthur Blake born in Washington.
James J Riordan, president of the County Trust Company and a friend of former presidential candidate Al Smith, took a pistol from the teller's cage at his bank, went to his home in Manhattan and committed suicide. Though he left no note, those who knew him said he had been 'distraught' after The Wall Street Crash. The news was suppressed until after the bank closed on Saturday to prevent a run by depositors. Riordan's suicide made front page news in the Sunday papers and may have contributed to the popular but exaggerated image of mass waves of investors killing themselves after the crash.
Victor Fleming's The Virginian - staring Gary Cooper and Walter Huston - premiered. Eric Norman Thompson born in Sleaford.
The première of John Grierson's documentary Drifters about North Sea herring fishermen, made for the Empire Marketing Board, effectively inaugurated the British documentary film movement. It debuted at The Film Society in London on a double-bill with the UK première of Eisenstein's The Battleship Potemkin. Stanley Morgan born in Liverpool.
Grace Patricia Kelly born in Philadelphia.
The front page of all newspapers owned by William Randolph Hearst ran An Open Letter To President Hoover written by Hearst himself, in which he proposed various methods to restore economic confidence. Hearst's primary solution was for the Federal Reserve to lower interest rates.
Trevor Gordon Martin born in Edinburgh.
The first episode of Making The Best Of Oneself - featuring Miss Barbara Cartland - broadcast.
Salvador Dalí had his first one-man Paris show. England thrashed Wales six-nil in the Home International championship at Stamford Bridge. George Camsell made ti eleven goals in four England appearances with a hat-trick, whilst Tommy Jhosnon scored twice and Hugh Adcock added the sixth. Birmingham's Henry Hibbs and Bill Marsden of Sheffield Wednesday made their international debuts. Prior to the match, Arsenal had warned the international selection committees of Scotland, Ireland and Wales, that after this season they would not release their players for any international match if the club had a league match on the same date as the international. That warning began a campaign by league clubs for stopping Saturday internationals on the ground that the withdrawal from their teams of the best players seriously affected their league status. Three people were killed when a goods train emerged out of control from the Combe Down Tunnel in Bath, accelerated down an incline, left the rails and smashed into a building in the goods yard. The three deaths were of the driver, the inspector of the yard and a stationmaster's clerk, whilst the guard broke both legs and the fireman was badly burned. Three months later, the inquest found that there were gas fumes in the tunnel and that the driver had passed out.
The oil tanker British Chemist exploded in Grangemouth port, shaking the town but causing no casualties. In the first attempted homicide ever recorded in Vatican City, a Swedish woman in St Peter's Basilica tried to shoot an archbishop who had 'disappointed' her after she approached him requesting employment. She was believed to have a mental disorder. A district court in Cambridge, Massachusetts found two men guilty of obscenity for selling the DH Lawrence novel Lady Chatterley's Lover. The owner of the bookstore and the clerk were both ordered to pay fines and serve jail sentences of four months and two weeks, respectively. The conviction triggered a public backlash against the Watch and Ward Society which had instigated the legal proceedings in the case.
William Dysart born in Glasgow.
Berry Gordy III born in Detroit.
How Wireless Came To Toytown broadcast as part of the Children's Hour strand.
David Lloyd George said in the House of Commons that war was 'inevitable' without disarmament. 'The League of Nations has been going on for ten years,' he said. 'There have been meetings and eloquent speeches delivered in favour of peace, disarmament and arbitration, but the League of Nations is in danger of failure from being run by flapdoodlers.'
John James Osborne born in Fulham.
Arthur Christopher Orme Plummer born in Toronto.
William Nicholas Stone Courtney born in Cairo.
Grace Jacqueline Hill born in Birmingham.
The occasion of Joseph Stalin's fiftieth birthday marked a major development of the state-orchestrated cult of personality around him. An enormous press campaign showered hyperbolic acclaim on 'the glorious leader' and that day's issue of Pravda was exclusively devoted to him and his doings.
Miss Nina Abbott's Christmas In Bermuda broadcast.
The West Wing of the White House was seriously damaged in an evening fire. President Hoover left a Christmas Eve reception for children in order to direct efforts to retrieve important documents. It was the most serious fire at the White House since it was burned by the British in 1814.
An adaptation of the comic opera Cox & Box broadcast.
Mrs WA Holman's Christmas in Australia broadcast.
The Foreign Office publicised a note from a Soviet ambassador promising that the USSR would 'refrain from Communist agitation in British Dominions.' One or two people even believed him. Irene Shubik born in Hampstead. Mary Elizabeth Spinks born in Gorleston-on-Sea, Norfolk.
Holt Marvell's adaptation of Rupert Of Hentzau broadcast.
The Archbishop of Canterbury made a radio broadcast from Canterbury Cathedral heard around the world calling on all British citizens to 'do their part for the country' in 1930. 'For more than a century we have taken for granted the industrial and commercial leadership of this country,' he said. 'Let the experience of the passing year suffice to show that this leadership is seriously threatened. Our great industries in coal, iron, steel and cotton textiles are anxious and ill-at-ease. Competitors have arisen to supplant us in markets in which we thought our positions assured. More than one million of our people are unemployed and the future is clouded with uncertainty.' The Archbishop said that the 'only possible remedy' was not through a political solution, but by 'each citizen realising and fulfilling his own personal responsibility.' In the Nazi newspaper Der Angriff, Joseph Goebbels published an article titled Hindenburg, Are You Still Alive?, accompanied by a cartoon depicting President Paul von Hindenburg as a Teutonic God sitting on a throne supported by a stereotypical Jewish figure, watching pitilessly as generations of Germans marched into slavery. Hindenburg subsequently sued Goebbels for libel.
Al Simpson's Evergreen Country broadcast.
Sixty nine children perished in a theatre fire in Paisley. None of the deaths were from the fire itself, which was quickly put out - they were all due to suffocation, choking from the noxious fumes of the burning celluloid or trampled in the rush to get out. David Porter Nixon born in Muswell Hill.
German President Paul von Hindenburg and Chancellor Hermann Müller told a New Year's Day reception of diplomatic representatives that the German people wanted the occupation of the Rhineland to end. Hindenburg said that the Germans were 'very bitter because a great part of their country still lacks the liberty which we claim by divine and human right,' while Müller said that strained international relations remaining over the war could only end once the 'foreign yoke' of occupation had been removed.
Jerome K Jerome's 'idle fancy', The Passing Of The Third Floor Block broadcast.
Sergio Leone born in Rome.
The Charcoal Burner's Son, 'an operetta for children', by L Du Garde Peach with music by Victor Hely-Hutchinson broadcast.
Heinrich Himmler became Reichsführer-SS.
Saeed Jaffrey born in Malerkotla, Punjab.
The first episode of Our Boys & Girls broadcast. In Belgium, Hergé's character Tintin first appeared in the children's newspaper supplement Le Petit Vingtième.
Laurence Housman's Crime & The Criminal broadcast. Peter Wynn Barkworth born in Margate.
Martin Luther King Junior born in Atlanta.
The comic strip character Popeye first appeared in the daily King Features comic strip Thimble Theatre. Charles Philip Latham born in Essex.
Ronald Radd born in Sunderland.
Claes Oldenburg born in Stockholm.
Stephanie Bidmead born in Kidderminster.
Victor Winding born in Lambeth.
Alexander Davion born in Paris.
John Nettleton born in Lewisham.
Keith Spencer Waterhouse born in Leeds.
The Federal Reserve Board issued a warning to the American public about 'the excessive amount of the country's credit absorbed in speculative loans.' The New York Stock Exchange took a tumble on the same day, which was blamed on the Bank of England raising its discount rate by one percentage point. Norman John Frank Rodway born in Dublin.
England won the fourth Ashes test at Adelaide by twelve runs. Wally Hammond scored a century in each innings, aided by a dogged ninety eight from Douglas Jardine in the second. Despite Archie Jackson's stunning hundred on debut for the hosts, they fell just short of their fourth innings target of three hundred and forty nine. Jack White took thirteen wickets in the match, including eight in the Australians' second innings.
Katherine Florence Newman born in Liverpool.
The Jazz Age, starring Douglas Fairbanks Junior and Marceline Day, premiered.
Five gangsters (all rivals of Al Capone), plus two civilians, were shot very dead in Chicago in what became known as The Saint Valentine's Day Massacre. The atrocity was possibly carried out by members of the notorious Purple Gang dressed as police officers.
Katherine Patricia Routledge born in Birkenhead.
Leonard Cyril Deighton born in Marylebone. The government narrowly avoided defeat on an impending vote over the amount of compensation to be paid to Irish loyalists for losses since the truce in the Irish Free State. After many Conservative members voiced their intent to vote against the government for committing an amount they considered too low, Stanley Baldwin adjourned the debate with a view to 'reconsider the matter.' Elspet Jean MacGregor Gray born in Inverness.
Foreign Affairs Secretary Austen Chamberlain was severely heckled in the House of Commons over the recent statement of Britain's US ambassador Esme Howard suggesting that Britain would ask for a naval disarmament conference. Chamberlain contradicted Howard's assertion by insisting that the government had 'no intention of issuing an invitation for a conference on this subject' and said that Howard's statement was 'merely a personal opinion.' Neil John McCallum born in Hanley, Saskatchewan.
Stanley James Carroll Beck born in Islington. Maxwell Shaw born in London.
Hughie Gallacher scored four in Scotland's seven-three victory over Ireland in the Home International championship in Belfast.
The first National Lecture - by the Poet Laureate, Robert Bridges - broadcast from Magdalen College Oxford.
Hilda Braid born in Northfleet.
Sir Arthur Conan Doyle was giving a lecture on the paranormal in Nairobi when he displayed a photograph of a supposed 'ghost' in a haunted house in Nottingham. A well-known Nairobi dentist identified himself as the 'ghost', explaining that he had posed for the photo wearing a white sheet some years ago after he and other members of a party had investigated the house for two weeks and had failed to find any ghostly activity. Doyle accepted the man's explanation, expressed regret at being hoaxed and said he would not show the photograph again.
Australia won the fifth Ashes test at Melbourne by five wickets to, at least, salvage some pride from a series in which they were thrashed four-one. England's first innings total of five hundred and nineteen included centuries for Jack Hobbs and Maurice Leyland and ninety five from Patsy Hendren. Australia replied with four hundred and ninety one, Don Bradman and Bill Woodfull hitting hundreds. Tim Wall, making his test debut, took five wickets in England's second innings leaving Australia two hundred and eighty seven for victory. A sixth wicket partnership of eighty three between Jack Ryder and Bradman saw the hosts home.
Thomas Baptiste born in British Guyana.
Gregalach won the Grand National. The Billiard Room Mystery Or Who Do You Think Did It? broadcast.
James Ackley Maxwell born in Worcester, Massachusetts.
Buster Keaton's Spite Marriage premiered.
Phyllis Pamela Green born in Kingston Upon Thames.
Lee Patterson born in Vancouver. Alexander Davion born in Paris.
Michael Hayes born in Barking.
Nigel Barnard Hawthorne born in Coventry.
Willis Edward Hall born in Leeds. Corbet Stafford Woodall born in Hampshire.
Austro-Italian relations deteriorated over a football match after Austria defeated Italy three-nil in the Central European International Cup. The Italians complained that a sideways Hungarian flag was used to represent Italy and that the Austrian band had played the wrong Italian national anthem. Italian newspapers also accused the Austrians of 'unfair play' and called for a refusal to offer the country any loans.
Keith Anderson born in Barton Upon Irwell, Lancashire.
Ronald Eyre born in Mapplewell, Yorkshire. Scotland defeated England one-nil in the Home International championship at Hampden Park. Aberdeen's Alex Chayne scored the last-minute winner, direct from a corner assisted by strong winds. Scotland finished the game with ten men after Alex Jackson dislocated his elbow. Russell Wainscoat of Leeds United made his England debut. First Division leaders The Wednesday, even without Ernie Blenkinsop who was on international duty, thrashed West Ham United six-nil (Alf Strange and Mark Hooper both scoringt twice). Liverpool won five-two at Derbu County. An open verdict was reached in Kensington at the inquest of Evelyn Greig, the estranged wife of the actor, Colin Clive. She was, herself, also an actress and was going through rather messy divorce proceedings with her husband. She died at the home of a midwife from a heart attack following an abortion, though it appeared that the midwife was unaware she had been pregnant and was merely a boarder at the midwife's house. It was assumed that Greig had bought her own drugs to induce a miscarriage. Her husband went on to achieve Hollywood movie fame as Victor Frankenstein, two years later.
William Grover-Williams won the first-ever Monaco Grand Prix driving a British Racing Green Bugatti 35B. The first air mail delivery from India to the United Kingdom was completed at Croydon Aerodrome with the arrival of fifteen thousand letters. Gerald Alexander Abrahams born in Bloomsbury.
On budget day a month ahead of a general erection, Chancellor of the Exchequer Winston Churchill announced the abolition of the three hundred and twenty five-year-old duty on tea, cutting its price by four pence a pound. JM Barrie donated the copyright fee of his Peter Pan works to the Great Ormond Street Hospital in London in perpetuity. The second National Lecture featured Arthur Eddington's Matter In Interstellar Space.
Eve Pearce born in Aberdeen.
Peter Jeffrey born in Bristol.
DW Griffiths' The Battle Of The Sexes - starring Jean Hersholt, Phyllis Haver, Belle Bennett and Sally O'Neil - premiered.
The first episode of English Eloquence broadcast.
A case settled by the Divisional Court of King's Bench in London defined the limits of the authority of parents and schoolmasters. The incident that gave rise to the case was the caning of a fifteen-years-old schoolboy, Frank Douglas Wright, by his master for smoking in the street out of school hours. Ernest Wright, chairman of the Newport Urban Council and father of the boy, had obtained a ruling calling on the Newport justices to 'show just cause' why they should not refer the case for an appeal against their initial decision dismissing a summons for assault against the headmaster, WS Brooks and two assistant masters. Ronald Walker, for the justices, said that Wright and another boy had been caned for smoking. Mister Justice Avory asked if the other boy had 'taken it like a man?' Walker said that if Wright had been seen by a policeman the officer could have confiscated all cigarettes found on him. Yet his father 'had the effrontery to complain' because he permitted his son to do something which was illegal. Apparently, a girl who smoked could only have the actual cigarette she was smoking taken away to which one of the justices noted: 'That, again, shows the importance of belonging to the other sex.' Lord Hewart, in his judgement, said there was 'a plain rule of law' that any person who sent his child to school was 'presumed to give the school authorities power' to administer 'moderate and reasonable punishment.' The justices in the case had 'expressed a perfectly correct view of the law.' They found that the punishment was a 'proper' one and there were no ground for sending the case to appeal.
Bolton Wanderers defeated Portsmouth two-nil in the FA Cup Final at Wembley. Sheffield Wednesday won the first division title with a one-all draw against Burnley. Leicester City finished second and Aston Villa third. Sunderland's Dave Halliday was the First Division's top scorer with forty three goals.
The first episode of English Eloquence broadcast. One thousand Belgian, British and French war veterans dedicated a monument in Steenstrate, Belgium on the fourteenth anniversary of the first poison gas attack in that Flanders village.
The first episode of The Week In London. Laurel and Hardy made the jump to talking pictures with the premiere of Hal Roach's Unaccustomed As We Are. Stan Laurel's famous whimper of panic was heard for the first time, as was Oliver Hardy's catchphrase: 'Why don't you do something to help me?!' Audrey Kathleen Ruston born in Ixelles, Brussels.
Al Capone hosted a party to ostensibly honour gang members Albert Anselmi, John Scalise and Joseph Giunta. During the festivities Capone accused them of being traitors, then personally beat them with a club and shot them extremely dead. Their bodies were dumped on a roadside near Hammond, Indiana where they were found the next day.
John Ford's The Black Watch - starring Victor McLaglen and Myrna Loy - premiered.
England beat France four-one in a friendly international in Paris. Edgar Kail of Dulwich Hamlets and George Camsell of Middlesbrough both scored twice on their England debuts. Kail would be the last non-Football League player to represent England. Camsell's Boro team-mate Joe Peacock and Leicester City's Hugh Adcock also made their international debuts. A Croydon housekeeper was cross-examined at the inquest into the mysterious case of the mother and daughter, Violet and Vera Sidney, who had apparently both died from natural causes, within three weeks of each other, just under a year after the mother's son-in-law had died under similar circumstances. Only when the bodies were exhumed was it discovered that they had all been poisoned with arsenic. The inquest found that the housekeeper had served soup to Vera which had made her ill, but she herself was also made ill by the soup, as was the family cat. No one was ever charged with the murders. Violet's other daughter, Grace, the widow of the first victim, was strongly suspected by the police for all three deaths, but they could not gather enough evidence to support a prosecution and she died, aged eighty six, in 1973.
Parliament was dissolved to give notice of the General Erection at the end of the month.
England defeated Belgium five-one in a friendly international in Brussels. George Camsell scored four, including a penalty, taking his goals total for England to six in two games, whilst Joe Carter netted the other.
Gangsters from eight US states, including such notable figures as Lucky Luciano, Al Capone, Johnny Torrio and Bugsy Siegel, met in Atlantic City to form a National Crime Syndicate. Over the next three days they settled disputes, agreed upon territorial boundaries and strolled along the boardwalks in full view of the media like they owned the place. Which, effectively, at that point they did.
Henry James Marris-McGee born in South Kensington.
David Healy born in New York. Spain beat England four-three in a friendly international Madrid, England's first defeat against non-British opposition. Joe Carter scored twice for England and Joe Bradford added a third (from a cross by his cousion, Hugh Adcock). However, they were undone by a crack Spanish side led by Real Madrid's Gasper Rubio, who scored twice including the winner ten minutes from time. One hundred and twenty people died at the Cleveland Clinic in Ohio when an x-ray film ignited due to the close proximity of an exposed lightbulb. Poisonous gas was released and there were two explosions. One of the clinic's founders, Doctor John Phillips, was among the fatalities.
Lewis Foster's Double Whoopee - starring Laurel and Hardy and featuring an early appearance by Jean Harlow - premiered.
The Cocoanut - the film debut of Groucho, Harpo, Chico and Zeppo Marx - premiered in New York.
Shane Lance Deacon born in Toronto. Thane William Howard Hardcastle Christopher Bettany born in the Kingdom of Sarawak.
Marguerite Saad born in München, Germany.
The General Erection returned a extremely well-hung parliament. Labour had a small majority of twenty seven seats and formed a minority government, supported by the Liberal Party's fifty nine seats. Arthur Edward Barrett born in London.
Mary Elizabeth Bodington born in Reading. David Henry Conville born in Kashmire, India.
Ramsay MacDonald formed a new, minority, Labour government. MacDonald made his first radio address to the British public, saying that international disarmament was 'a matter of overshadowing importance' and stressing the need for 'dialogue with foreign powers.' Leon Trotsky - exiled from the Soviet Union - asked Britain for political asylum. He got his answer on 11 July. Not unexpectedly, it was negative.
TS Eliot's The History Of English Letters - Six Types Of Tudor Prose broadcast.
Brigid Antonia Brophy born in Ealing.
Charley Patton made his first recording session in Richmond, Indiana. Among the songs cut were 'A Spoonful Blues', 'Prayer Of Death', Shake It & Break It (But Don't Let Mama Fall)' and 'I'm Going Home'.
Damaris Ann Kennedy Hayman born in Kensington. Pauline Lettice Yates born in St Helens, Lancashire.
Kansas Joe McCoy and Memphis Minnie recorded 'When The Levee Breaks' for Columbia Records. England drew the first of a five test series with South Africa at Edgbaston. Patsy Hendren top-scored with seventy in England's first innings. The tourists gained a small first innings lead despite five wickets for Harold Larwood. Herbert Stucliffe and Wally Hammond hit centuries in England's second innings but Bob Catterall and Bruce Mitchell steered South Africa to safety. Kumar Duleepsinhji and Tom Killick made their test debuts.
Thelma Pigott born in Middlesbrough.
Ronald Charles Andrew Hines born in London.
John Edward Barandon born in New York.
George and Weedon Grossmith's The Diary Of A Nobody broadcast.
David Kingshott born in Twickenham.
The first London performances of two ballets by Igor Stravinsky - Apollon Musagète and Le Baiser De La Fée - conducted by the composer at the Kingsway Hall were broadcast. June Wyndham Davies born in Cardiff.
The Deutsche Physikalische Gesellschaft awarded the first Max Planck Medals, honouring extraordinary achievements in theoretical physics. The recipients were Albert Einstein and Planck himself.
A new session of parliament opened with the first King's Speech made under a Labour government. The speech was read by Lord Sankey as George V, still recovering from a long illness, was advised by doctors not to attend in person and run the risk of further infection. By being in contact with socialists, probably. The second test at Lord's was drawn. Herbert Sutcliffe, Maurice Leyland and Maurice Tate all scored centuries. Jack O'Connor and Walter Robins made their test debuts.
Christopher Thomas Morahan born in london.
David Kelly born in Dublin.
Judith Stott born in Oxford.
England won the third test at Headingley by five wickets. Tich Freeman took seven wickets in South Africa's first innings whilst he, Jack White and Frank Woolley all picked up three in the second. Woolley also hit eighty three and an undefeated ninety five. Ted Bowley made his test debut (scoring a vital forty six in England's run chase of the final afternoon).
John Woodvine born in South Shields.
Ada Brand Thomson born in Manchester.
Plum Warner played his five hundred and twenty first and final first class cricket match for the MCC against the Royal Navy at Lord's. In a career which began in 1895, he scored twenty nine thousand and twenty eight runs. He played fifteen test matches, captaining England in ten of them and succeeded in regaining The Ashes in 1904, winning the series against Australia three-two.
Lord Lloyd resigned as High Commissioner in Egypt at the request of the Labour government due to differences of opinion over Egyptian policy. 'Mama Don't Allow No Easy Riders Here' by Tampa Red & His Hokum Band with Frankie Half-Pint Jaxon on vocals was recorded.
The Geneva Convention, covering the treatment of prisoners of war, was signed.
Alfred Hitchcock's Blackmail premiered, one of - if not the - first British sound movie. Harry A Pollard and Arch Heath's Show Boat premiered.
England won the fourth test at Old Trafford by an innings and thirty two runs. Frank Woolley and Bob Wyatt scored centuries in England's four hundred and twenty seven for seven whilst Tich Freeman took twelve wickets in the match. Fred Barratt made his test debut.
Fats Waller's recording of 'Ain't Misbehavin' released.
Peter Alexander Diamond born in Durham.
Isaac Bluthal born in Jezierzany, Poland.
The Pedestrians Association, advocating for road safety and the rights of pedestrians, was formed in London.
Richard Michael Carpenter born in King's Lynn, Norfolk.
Blind Blake's recording of 'Diddie Wa Diddie' released.
Lucky Star - starring Janet Gaynor and Charles Farrell - premiered.
The first transmissions of John Logie Baird's experimental thirty-line television system by the BBC. The fifth test at The Oval was drawn. Herbert Sutcliffe scored a century in each innings whilst Wally Hammond also hit an undefeated hundred in the second innings. Les Ames and Nobby Clark (who picked up three wickets) made their test debuts.
Mahatma Gandhi was elected president of the Indian National Congress, but he refused to accept the post.
The musical Say It With Songs - featuring Al Jolson singing 'Little Pal' - released.
Patsy Sloots born in West Norwood.
Grand Mufti of Jerusalem Haj Amin al-Husseini warned that Palestine and Arabia could not regain peace unless Britain abandoned its policy of making Palestine a national home for Jews. He explained that the reasons for recent violence had little to do with the Wailing Wall but actually went back to the Balfour Declaration of 1917. Vittorio Giorgio Andre Spinetti born in Cwm, Ebbw Vale.
Nottinghamshire overcame their Northern rivals, Lancashire and Yorkshire, to win the cricket county championship for the first time since 1907. Gloucestershire finished fourth. Notts drew with Derbyshire at Ilkston on the last day of the season to secure the title. Dodger Whysall was their top-scorer with two thousand six hundred and twenty first-class runs. Fred Barratt, Harold Larwood, Bill Voice and Sam Staples all took over one hundred wickets. Gloucester's Alf Dipper tied with Whysall as the championship's leading run-scorer (two thousand and seventy nine). Kent's Tich Freeman was, again, the leading wicket-taker (one hundred and ninety nine).
Twenty nine goals were scored in seven First Division games, with Newcastle United beating Blackburn five-one, Birmingham winning four-two against West Ham and Derby defeating Aston Villa four-nil. In the Third Division North Darlington beat Nelson six-one. Plymouth Argyle won four-three at Torquey United, their winner a penalty scored by their goalkeeper Fred Craig. It was Craig's fifth goal for The Pilgrims, all from the penalty spot.
American business theorist Roger Babson gave a conference speech in Wellesley, Massachusetts saying, 'More people are borrowing and speculating today than ever in our history. Sooner or later, a crash is coming and it may be terrific.' A recording of James Joyce reading the 'Anna Livia Plurabelle fragment form his, as yet unpublished, Finnegans Wake was made by CK Ogden (the linguist and philosopher) in the studio of the Orthological Society in Cambridge. Ogden boasted of the two biggest recording machines in the world and wanted to do a better recording of Joyce than the Ulysses recording of five years earlier. The record, a twelve-inch double sided 78 bearing the Linguaphone label, was sold by the Orthological Institute for two guineas.
Thomas Patrick McKenna born in Mullagh, County Cavan.
AH Oriebar set a new world flying speed record of three hundred and fifty five miles per hour, using the same Supermarine S6 flown by Richard Waghorn in the Schneider Trophy race which set the previous record a mere three days earlier.
In the Second Division match between Millwall and Bradford Park Avenue, the visitors gave a debut to future England international Albert Geldard. At fifteen years and one hundred and fifty eight days he was, then, the youngest player to appear in a football league game. The record would be equalled (by Wrexham's Ken Roberts) in 1951 but would not be beaten until 2008 by Barnsley's Reuben Noble-Lazarus.
Elizabeth Jean Williams born in Buxton. Alex Scott born in Australia.
Henry Livings born in Prestwych.
Ronald William George Barker born in Bedford. Kenneth John Rathbone Warren born in Parramatta, New South Wales.
Bernard Gallagher born in Bradford.
Ernest Hemingway's A Farewell To Arms published. Barbara Ann Murray born in London.
Alfred Barnett, nineteen and described as a musician, pleaded guilty to assaulting Rachel Elgrod with intent to rob her at the Old Bailey. Barnett called at the jeweller's shop of Elgrod's husband in Black Lion Yard and said that he wanted a ring for his fiancée. By a ruse he sent out the man who was in the shop and when Mrs Elgrod was left alone, he threw pepper at her. It missed her and he then struck her on the head with a spanner. Barnett bolted from the shop but was chased and caught. Fred Levy, defending, claimed that Barnett was 'constantly going to the films. Nearly all the modern films deal with crime,' said Levy who added that Barnett had also been reading 'the mystery tales of Edgar Allan Poe and other authors.' The Recorder said the offence to which Barnett had pleaded guilty was regarded so seriously that the law allowed a maximum punishment of penal servitude for life and a whipping. Instead, he sentenced Barnett to three months' imprisonment and ordered him to receive twelve strokes of the birch. Ronald William George Barker born in Bedford.
In Frankfurt, Fritz von Opel made the world's first flight in a rocket-propelled plane, the RAK1, for about a mile and a quarter at an average altitude of forty nine feet. Opel crashed upon landing but was unhurt. The first episode of Points Of View featured the political scientist and philosopher Goldsworthy Lowes Dickinson.
Barbara Joy Mitchell born in Northampton.
Frederick Feast born in Scarborough.
Vilma June Charlish born in London.
Magnús Sigursteinsson born in Reykjavík.
The British airship R101 embarked on its maiden voyage. Traffic in London came to a standstill as thousands stopped to watch the dirigible pass over the city. Points Of View featured a talk by George Bernard Shaw.
Jane Mary Griffiths born in Peacehaven.
Charley Patton's recording of 'Rattlesnake Blues'/'Running Wild Blues' released in the US. England beat Ireland three-nil in the Home Intenrational championship at Windsor Park. George Camsell (a later replacement for Derby's George Stephenson) scored twice with Ernie Hine adding a third from the penalty spot. Fulham's Bert Barrett and Eric Brook of Manchester City made their England debuts. Leeds United were three points clear at the top of the First Division following a one-nil victory over Birmingham City. Sheffield Wednesday were second, three-one winners over Huddersfield Town. Manchester City beat West Ham United four-three. Sunderland won the Wear-Tyne derby one-nil with a Gordon Gunson winner. Blackpool defeated Preston North End six-four in the Second Division. Wolves led the league on goal average after a three-nil defeat of Tottenham Hotspur. Three and a half million shares were sold on the New York Stock Exchange as prices fell significantly. Five days later came the Wall Street Crash as the markets went into freefall and investors began to lose their shit.
Colin Abel Jeavons born in Newport.
Points Of View featured HG Wells.
The 'Wall Street Crash' occurred signalling the start of The Great Depression. John Clifford Rose born in Hamnish Clifford, Herefordshire.
It was announced that London buses would be red, as trials with yellow-and-red buses proved unpopular. Sam Taylor's adaptation of The Taming Of The Shrew - starring Douglas Fairbanks and Mary Pickford and featuring the credit 'with additional dialogue by William Shakespeare' - premiered.
Alun Morgun Richards born in Caerphilly.
Jack Snowdon Hawkins born in London.
Cecil Philip Taylor born in Glasgow.
Lila Kaye born in Middlesbrough. Arthur Blake born in Washington.
James J Riordan, president of the County Trust Company and a friend of former presidential candidate Al Smith, took a pistol from the teller's cage at his bank, went to his home in Manhattan and committed suicide. Though he left no note, those who knew him said he had been 'distraught' after The Wall Street Crash. The news was suppressed until after the bank closed on Saturday to prevent a run by depositors. Riordan's suicide made front page news in the Sunday papers and may have contributed to the popular but exaggerated image of mass waves of investors killing themselves after the crash.
The première of John Grierson's documentary Drifters about North Sea herring fishermen, made for the Empire Marketing Board, effectively inaugurated the British documentary film movement. It debuted at The Film Society in London on a double-bill with the UK première of Eisenstein's The Battleship Potemkin. Stanley Morgan born in Liverpool.
Grace Patricia Kelly born in Philadelphia.
The front page of all newspapers owned by William Randolph Hearst ran An Open Letter To President Hoover written by Hearst himself, in which he proposed various methods to restore economic confidence. Hearst's primary solution was for the Federal Reserve to lower interest rates.
Trevor Gordon Martin born in Edinburgh.
The first episode of Making The Best Of Oneself - featuring Miss Barbara Cartland - broadcast.
Salvador Dalí had his first one-man Paris show. England thrashed Wales six-nil in the Home International championship at Stamford Bridge. George Camsell made ti eleven goals in four England appearances with a hat-trick, whilst Tommy Jhosnon scored twice and Hugh Adcock added the sixth. Birmingham's Henry Hibbs and Bill Marsden of Sheffield Wednesday made their international debuts. Prior to the match, Arsenal had warned the international selection committees of Scotland, Ireland and Wales, that after this season they would not release their players for any international match if the club had a league match on the same date as the international. That warning began a campaign by league clubs for stopping Saturday internationals on the ground that the withdrawal from their teams of the best players seriously affected their league status. Three people were killed when a goods train emerged out of control from the Combe Down Tunnel in Bath, accelerated down an incline, left the rails and smashed into a building in the goods yard. The three deaths were of the driver, the inspector of the yard and a stationmaster's clerk, whilst the guard broke both legs and the fireman was badly burned. Three months later, the inquest found that there were gas fumes in the tunnel and that the driver had passed out.
The oil tanker British Chemist exploded in Grangemouth port, shaking the town but causing no casualties. In the first attempted homicide ever recorded in Vatican City, a Swedish woman in St Peter's Basilica tried to shoot an archbishop who had 'disappointed' her after she approached him requesting employment. She was believed to have a mental disorder. A district court in Cambridge, Massachusetts found two men guilty of obscenity for selling the DH Lawrence novel Lady Chatterley's Lover. The owner of the bookstore and the clerk were both ordered to pay fines and serve jail sentences of four months and two weeks, respectively. The conviction triggered a public backlash against the Watch and Ward Society which had instigated the legal proceedings in the case.
William Dysart born in Glasgow.
Berry Gordy III born in Detroit.
How Wireless Came To Toytown broadcast as part of the Children's Hour strand.
David Lloyd George said in the House of Commons that war was 'inevitable' without disarmament. 'The League of Nations has been going on for ten years,' he said. 'There have been meetings and eloquent speeches delivered in favour of peace, disarmament and arbitration, but the League of Nations is in danger of failure from being run by flapdoodlers.'
John James Osborne born in Fulham.
Arthur Christopher Orme Plummer born in Toronto.
William Nicholas Stone Courtney born in Cairo.
Grace Jacqueline Hill born in Birmingham.
The occasion of Joseph Stalin's fiftieth birthday marked a major development of the state-orchestrated cult of personality around him. An enormous press campaign showered hyperbolic acclaim on 'the glorious leader' and that day's issue of Pravda was exclusively devoted to him and his doings.
Miss Nina Abbott's Christmas In Bermuda broadcast.
The West Wing of the White House was seriously damaged in an evening fire. President Hoover left a Christmas Eve reception for children in order to direct efforts to retrieve important documents. It was the most serious fire at the White House since it was burned by the British in 1814.
Mrs WA Holman's Christmas in Australia broadcast.
The Foreign Office publicised a note from a Soviet ambassador promising that the USSR would 'refrain from Communist agitation in British Dominions.' One or two people even believed him. Irene Shubik born in Hampstead. Mary Elizabeth Spinks born in Gorleston-on-Sea, Norfolk.
Holt Marvell's adaptation of Rupert Of Hentzau broadcast.
The Archbishop of Canterbury made a radio broadcast from Canterbury Cathedral heard around the world calling on all British citizens to 'do their part for the country' in 1930. 'For more than a century we have taken for granted the industrial and commercial leadership of this country,' he said. 'Let the experience of the passing year suffice to show that this leadership is seriously threatened. Our great industries in coal, iron, steel and cotton textiles are anxious and ill-at-ease. Competitors have arisen to supplant us in markets in which we thought our positions assured. More than one million of our people are unemployed and the future is clouded with uncertainty.' The Archbishop said that the 'only possible remedy' was not through a political solution, but by 'each citizen realising and fulfilling his own personal responsibility.' In the Nazi newspaper Der Angriff, Joseph Goebbels published an article titled Hindenburg, Are You Still Alive?, accompanied by a cartoon depicting President Paul von Hindenburg as a Teutonic God sitting on a throne supported by a stereotypical Jewish figure, watching pitilessly as generations of Germans marched into slavery. Hindenburg subsequently sued Goebbels for libel.
Al Simpson's Evergreen Country broadcast.
Sixty nine children perished in a theatre fire in Paisley. None of the deaths were from the fire itself, which was quickly put out - they were all due to suffocation, choking from the noxious fumes of the burning celluloid or trampled in the rush to get out. David Porter Nixon born in Muswell Hill.
