Directory

1939 CE

The Invasion of Poland by Nazi Germany on September 1 triggers World War II as Britain and France declare war; the Molotov–Ribbentrop Pact between Germany and the Soviet Union establishes a non-aggression treaty with secret plans to divide Eastern Europe; the Winter War breaks out as the Soviet Union invades Finland, leading to fierce resistance and heavy losses on both sides; the Battles of Khalkhin Gol see Soviet and Mongolian forces decisively defeat the Japanese in Manchuria, halting Japanese expansion into Siberia; the Italian invasion of Albania results in the swift occupation of the country, expanding Mussolini's influence in the Balkans; and the release of Gone with the Wind becomes a cultural milestone, later recognized as one of the most iconic and successful films in cinema history.

Geopolitics & Diplomacy

  • January 1 – Philipp Etter takes over as President of the Swiss Confederation.source
  • January 25 – Refik Saydam forms the new (11th) government of Turkey.source
  • January 26 – In Paris, French Foreign Minister Georges Bonnet, in response to rumours (which are true) that he is seeking to end the French alliance system in Eastern Europe, gives a speech highlighting his government's commitment to the cordon sanitaire.source
  • February 6 – British Prime Minister Neville Chamberlain states in the House of Commons that any German attack on France will be automatically considered an attack on Britain.source
  • February 6 – In a response to Georges Bonnet's speech of January 26, German Foreign Minister Joachim von Ribbentrop, referring to Bonnet's alleged statement of December 6, 1938, accepting Eastern Europe as being in Germany's exclusive sphere of influence, protests that all French security commitments in that region are "now off limits".source
  • March 13 – Adolf Hitler advises Jozef Tiso to declare Slovakia's independence, in order to prevent its partition by Hungary and Poland.source
  • March 14 – The Slovak provincial assembly proclaims independence; priest Jozef Tiso becomes president of the independent Slovak government.source
  • March 15 – German troops occupy the remaining part of Bohemia and Moravia; Czechoslovakia ceases to exist. The Ruthenian region of Czechoslovakia declares independence as Carpatho-Ukraine.source
  • March 17 – The nationalist governments of Spain and Portugal sign the Iberian Pact in Lisbon, pledging mutual defence of the Iberian Peninsula and neutrality in the event of a general European war.source
  • March 31 – Neville Chamberlain gives a speech in the House of Commons, offering the British "guarantee" of the independence of Poland.source
  • April 3 – Refik Saydam forms the new government in Turkey (12th government; Refik Saydam has served twice as a prime minister).source
  • April 4 – Polish Foreign Minister Colonel Józef Beck, in London, signs a treaty designed to bilateralize Neville Chamberlain's "Polish Guarantee" of March 31.source
  • April 14 – At a meeting in Paris, French Foreign Minister Georges Bonnet meets with Soviet Ambassador Jakob Suritz, and suggests that a "peace front" comprising France, the Soviet Union, Great Britain, Poland and Romania would deter Germany from war.source
  • April 18 – Robert Menzies is elected leader of the United Australia Party, and consequently becomes the 12th Prime Minister of Australia, defeating former Prime Minister Billy Hughes. However, he will not be sworn in until April 26, because of the refusal of Earle Page and his Country Party to serve under him.source
  • May 3 – Vyacheslav Molotov succeeds Maxim Litvinov, as Soviet Foreign Commissar.source
  • May 23 – The White Paper of 1939 is ratified by the British government, acting as the governing policy for Mandatory Palestine from 1939 to 1948.source
  • June 23 – Talks are completed in Ankara between French Ambassador René Massigli and Turkish Foreign Minister Şükrü Saracoğlu, resolving the Hatay dispute in Turkey's favor. Turkey annexes Hatay.source
  • August 2 – The Einstein–Szilard letter is signed by Albert Einstein, advising President of the United States Franklin D. Roosevelt of the potential use of uranium to construct an atomic bomb. It is delivered on October 11 and leads to the first meeting on October 21 of the Advisory Committee on Uranium.source
  • August 4 – Prime Minister Neville Chamberlain dismisses the Parliament of the United Kingdom until October 3.source
  • August 23 – The Molotov–Ribbentrop Pact is signed between Germany and the Soviet Union, a neutrality treaty that also agrees to division of spheres of influence (Finland, Estonia, Latvia, eastern Poland and Bessarabia (modern-day Moldova), north-east province of Romania to the Soviet Union; Lithuania and western Poland to Germany). Its annex reassigns Lithuania to the Soviet Union.source
  • September 30 – General Władysław Sikorski becomes Prime Minister of the Polish government-in-exile.source
  • Chamberlain offers the war cabinet post of First Lord of the Admiralty to Winston Churchill, who returns to government for the first time since June 4, 1929.source
  • November 4 – WWII: U.S. President Franklin D. Roosevelt orders the United States Customs Service to implement the Neutrality Act of 1939, allowing cash-and-carry purchases of weapons to non-belligerent nations.source
  • December 1 – The Soviet Union establishes the Finnish Democratic Republic puppet state in Terijoki.source

Conflict & Security

  • March 20 – At an emergency meeting in London to deal with the Romanian crisis, French Foreign Minister Georges Bonnet suggests to Lord Halifax that the ideal state for saving Romania from a German attack is Poland.source
  • March – The 1936–39 Arab revolt in Palestine ends.source
  • April 9 – African-American singer Marian Anderson performs before 75,000 people at the Lincoln Memorial in Washington, D.C., after having been denied the use both of Constitution Hall by the Daughters of the American Revolution, and of a public high school by the federally controlled District of Columbia. First Lady of the United States Eleanor Roosevelt resigns from the DAR because of their decision.source
  • April 28 – In a speech before the Reichstag, Adolf Hitler renounces the Anglo-German Naval Agreement and the German–Polish declaration of non-aggression.source
  • August 25 – 1939 Coventry bombing: An Irish Republican Army bomb explodes in the centre of Coventry, England, killing 5 people.source
  • August 26 – The Kriegsmarine orders all German-flagged merchant ships to head to German ports immediately, in anticipation of the invasion of Poland.source
  • September 15 – WWII: Diverse elements of the German Wehrmacht surround Warsaw, and demand its surrender. The Poles refuse, and the siege begins in earnest.source
  • September 16 – A ceasefire ends the Battles of Khalkhin Gol, the undeclared border war between the Soviet Union (and Mongolian allies) and Japan.source
  • September 22 – WWII: A joint victory parade is staged by the Wehrmacht and Red Army in Brest-Litovsk, at the end of the Invasion of Poland.source
  • Following the invasion of Poland, the Free City of Danzig (modern-day Gdańsk, Poland) is annexed to Nazi Germany.source
  • The Soviet Union invades Poland, and then occupies eastern Polish territories.source
  • The United Kingdom, France, New Zealand, Australia and India (by its Viceroy) declare war on Nazi Germany. Prime Minister of Canada Mackenzie King, in English, and Justice Minister Ernest Lapointe, in French, give an international radio address stating the Dominion's intention to declare war also.source
  • October 6 – WWII: The Battle of Kock ends the Polish Campaign. Polish resistance moves underground.source
  • October 8 – WWII: Germany annexes Western Poland.source
  • November 6 – WWII: Sonderaktion Krakau – Germans take action against scientists from the University of Kraków, and other Kraków universities.source
  • November 8 – WWII: In Munich, an attempt to kill Adolf Hitler is made by Georg Elser while Hitler is celebrating the 16th anniversary of the Beer Hall Putsch.source
  • November 26 – Shelling of Mainila: The Soviet Union's Red Army shells the Russian village of Mainila, then claims that the fire originated from Finland, giving a casus belli for the Winter War.source
  • November 30 – WWII: Winter War – Soviet forces attack Finland and reach the Mannerheim Line, starting the war. Sweden declares itself a non-belligerent in the Winter War.source
  • December 6 – WWII: Winter War – The Red Army's advance on the Karelian Isthmus is stopped by Finns at the Mannerheim Line during the Battle of Taipale.source
  • December 9 – WWII: The first soldier of the British Expeditionary Force is killed: Corporal Thomas Priday triggers a French land mine.source
  • December 13 – WWII – Battle of the River Plate: The German heavy cruiser Admiral Graf Spee is trapped by cruisers , HMNZS Achilles, and after a running battle off the coast of Uruguay. Graf Spee is scuttled by its crew off Montevideo Harbor, on December 17.source
  • December 14 – WWII: Winter War – The League of Nations expels the USSR for attacking Finland.source
  • December 18 – WWII: Battle of the Heligoland Bight – RAF Bomber Command, on a daylight mission to attack Kriegsmarine ships in the Heligoland Bight, is repulsed by Luftwaffe fighter aircraft.source
  • German submarine U-36 is torpedoed and sunk by British submarine HMS Salmon off Stavanger, the first enemy submarine lost to a British one during the war.source

Exploration & Expansion

  • February 18 – The Golden Gate International Exposition opens in San Francisco.source
  • March 28 – American adventurer Richard Halliburton delivers a last message from a Chinese junk, before he disappears on a voyage across the Pacific Ocean. In 1945, some wreckage identified as a rudder, and believed to belong to the junk, washes ashore in San Diego, California.source
  • July 8 – The Pan American Airways Boeing 314 flying boat Yankee Clipper inaugurates the world's first heavier-than-air North Atlantic air passenger service, between the United States (Port Washington, New York) and Britain.source
  • October 7 – WWII: British Royal Navy cruiser departs Plymouth in convoy for Halifax, Nova Scotia, carrying £2M in gold bar to be used for purchase of military materiel in North America, a predecessor of Operation Fish.source

Religion & Belief

  • March 2 – Pope Pius XII (Cardinal Pacelli) succeeds Pope Pius XI to become the 260th pope, holding office until 1958.source
  • May 18 – The Hòa Hảo religious sect is established in Vietnam, by Huỳnh Phú Sổ.source
  • September 8 – The Little Sisters of Jesus is founded in Algeria, by Little Sister Magdeleine.source
  • The Reichstag passes a statement, stating that Adolf Hitler's second-in-command Reichsmarschall Hermann Göring should be appointed as Hitler's successor as Führer, should Hitler die during the war. Rudolf Hess is to be appointed in Göring's place, should anything befall Göring.source

Economy & Finance

  • January 30 – Hitler gives a speech before the Reichstag calling for an "export battle" to increase German foreign exchange holdings. The same speech also sees "Hitler's prophecy", where he warns that if "Jewish financiers" start a war against Germany, "the result will be the annihilation of the Jewish race in Europe".source

Technology & Infrastructure

  • January 1 – With his traditional call to the New Year in Nazi Germany, Führer and Reich Chancellor Adolf Hitler addresses the members of the National Socialist German Workers' Party (NSDAP).source
  • January 1 – The Hewlett-Packard technology and scientific instruments manufacturing company is founded by Bill Hewlett and David Packard, in a garage in Palo Alto, California, considered the birthplace of Silicon Valley.source
  • January 27 – Adolf Hitler orders Plan Z, a 5-year naval expansion programme intended to provide for a huge German fleet capable of crushing the British Royal Navy by 1944. The Kriegsmarine is given the first priority on the allotment of German economic resources.source
  • April 30 – The 1939 New York World's Fair opens.source
  • May 20 – Pan American Airways begins transatlantic mail service with the inaugural flight of its Boeing 314 flying boat Yankee Clipper from Port Washington, New York, to Marseille.source
  • June 29 – The Ford 9N tractor, with the Ferguson hydraulic three-point hitch, is first demonstrated at Dearborn, Michigan.source
  • August 26 – The first televised Major League Baseball games are shown on experimental station W2XBS in the United States: a double-header between the Cincinnati Reds and the Brooklyn Dodgers at Ebbets Field.source
  • August 27 – A Heinkel He 178, the first turbojet-powered aircraft, flies for the first time, with Captain Erich Warsitz in command.source
  • The first bombing of Wilhelmshaven in World War II is carried out, by the British Royal Air Force (RAF).source
  • United States President Franklin D. Roosevelt advocates neutrality, in a nationwide radio address.source
  • November 8 – CBS television station W2XAB resumes test transmission, with an all-electronic system broadcast from the top of the Chrysler Building in New York City.source
  • Enzo Ferrari founds Auto Avio Construzioni, the company that becomes Ferrari in 1947.source

Science & Discovery

  • January 1 – The Protection of Young Persons Act, passed on April 30, 1938, the Working Hours Regulations.source
  • January 6 – Otto Hahn's discoveries in the field of nuclear fission are published in Naturwissenschaften.source
  • January 7 – French physicist Marguerite Perey identifies francium, the last chemical element first discovered in nature.source
  • January 14 – Norway claims Queen Maud Land in Antarctica.source
  • July 27 – The first recorded snow falls in Auckland, New Zealand, since records began in 1853.source
  • November 1–2 – WWII: Physicist Hans Ferdinand Mayer writes the Oslo Report on German weapons systems, and passes it to the British Secret Intelligence Service.source
  • Kirlian photography is invented by Semyon Kirlian.source

Health & Medicine

  • January 1 – Coming into effect in Nazi Germany of:source
  • January 1 – The Third Soviet Five Year Plan is launched.source
  • January 1 – The small businesses obligation to maintain adequate accounting.source
  • May 14 – Lina Medina, a 5-year-old Peruvian girl, gives birth to a baby boy, becoming the youngest confirmed mother in medical history.source
  • May 17 – The British government issues the White Paper of 1939, sharply restricting Jewish immigration to Mandatory Palestine.source
  • November 16 – Al Capone is released from Terminal Island, due to deteriorating health caused by syphilis.source

Crime & Justice

  • January 5 – Pioneering U.S. aviator Amelia Earhart is officially declared dead, eighteen months after her disappearance.source
  • May 29 – Albanian fascist leader Tefik Mborja is appointed as member of the Italian Chamber of Fasces and Corporations.source
  • June 17 – In the last public execution in France, 6-times murderer Eugen Weidmann is guillotined.source
  • November 4 – Stewart Menzies is appointed head of the British Secret Intelligence Service.source
  • November 9 – WWII: Venlo Incident: Two British agents of SIS are captured by the Germans.source
  • November 17 – WWII: To punish protests against the Nazi occupation of the Czech homeland, the Nazis storm the University of Prague and murder 9 Czech graduate students, send over 1,200 to concentration camps, and close all Czech universities, an event which will be commemorated as International Students' Day.source

Disasters & Accidents

  • March 1 – An Imperial Japanese Army ammunition dump explosion on the outskirts of Osaka kills 94.source
  • June 4 – The St. Louis, a ship carrying 907 Jewish refugees, is denied permission to land in Florida; only a few passengers have been allowed to enter Cuba. Forced to return to Europe, many of its passengers later die in Nazi death camps during The Holocaust.source
  • July 6 – The last remaining Jewish enterprises in Germany are closed by the Nazis.source
  • Ocean liner becomes the first British civilian casualty of the war, when she is torpedoed and sunk by in the eastern Atlantic. Of the 1,418 aboard, 98 passengers and 19 crew are killed.source
  • October 14 – sinks the British battleship at anchor in Scapa Flow (Scotland), with the loss of 833 crew.source
  • December 12 – WWII: sinks after a collision with off the coast of Scotland, with the loss of 124 men.source
  • December 26 – Miners strike in Borinage, Belgium.source

Climate & Environment

  • January 24 – 1939 Chillán earthquake: An earthquake in Chile kills an estimated 30,000 people and razes about 50,000 sqmi km2 of land.source
  • December 27 – The 7.8 Erzincan earthquake shakes eastern Turkey with a maximum Mercalli intensity of XII (Extreme), causing $20 million in damage, and leaving 32,700–32,968 dead.source

Culture & Society

  • March 30 – The superhero Batman debut for Detective Comics (issue #27) (cover date of May).source
  • April 25 – The Federal Security Agency (FSA) is founded in the United States, along with the Civilian Conservation Corps and Public Health Service.source
  • May 17 – King George VI and Queen Elizabeth of the United Kingdom arrive in Quebec City, to begin the first-ever tour of Canada by Canada's monarch.source
  • May 24 – The first issue of Fashizmi is published in Tirana, Albania.source
  • November 6 – Hedda Hopper's Hollywood debuts on radio in the United States with gossip columnist Hedda Hopper as host (the show runs until 1951, making Hopper a powerful figure among the Hollywood elite).source
  • November 14 – In Washington, D.C., U.S. President Franklin D. Roosevelt lays the cornerstone of the Jefferson Memorial.source
  • December 15 – The epic historical romance film Gone with the Wind, starring Vivien Leigh, Clark Gable, Olivia de Havilland and Leslie Howard, premieres at Loew's Grand Theatre in Atlanta. Based on Margaret Mitchell's best-selling novel of 1936, it is the longest American film made up to this date (at nearly four hours) and rapidly becomes the highest-grossing film up to this time.source

Births

  • January 6 – Valeriy Lobanovskyi, Ukrainian footballer, manager (d. 2002)source
  • February 3 – R. C. Sproul, American Reformed theologian, author and pastor, founder of Ligonier Ministries (d. 2017)source
  • April 13 – Seamus Heaney, Irish poet, Nobel Prize laureate (d. 2013)source
  • April 19 – Ali Khamenei, Supreme Leader of Iran (d. 2026)source
  • May 7 – Ruud Lubbers, Dutch politician, Prime Minister of the Netherlands (1982–94) (d. 2018)source
  • June 5 – Joe Clark, 16th Prime Minister of Canadasource
  • July 15 – Aníbal Cavaco Silva, 113th Prime Minister of Portugal, 19th President of Portugalsource
  • July 17 – Milva, Italian singer, stage and film actress, and television personality (d. 2021)source
  • August 9 – Romano Prodi, Italian politician, economist and 52nd Prime Minister of Italysource
  • October 7 – Harold Kroto, English organic chemist, Nobel Prize laureate (d. 2016)source
  • November 26 – Tina Turner, American born Swiss singer and actress (d. 2023)source
  • November 26 – Abdullah Ahmad Badawi, 5th Prime Minister of Malaysia (d. 2025)source
  • December 17 – Eddie Kendricks, African-American singer (The Temptations) (d. 1992)source
  • December 18 – Harold E. Varmus, American scientist, recipient of the Nobel Prize in Physiology or Medicinesource

Deaths

  • January 28 – W. B. Yeats, Irish writer, 1923 Nobel Prize laureate (b. 1865)source
  • February 27 – Nadezhda Krupskaya, Russian Marxist revolutionary, Vladimir Lenin's widow (b. 1869)source
  • March 6 – Patriarch Miron of Romania, Austro-Hungarian-born Romanian cleric, politician, priest and 38th Prime Minister of Romania (b. 1868)source
  • April 4 – Faisal II becomes King of Iraq aged three, following the death of his father, Ghazi, in an automobile incident.source
  • April 7 – Joseph Lyons, 10th Prime Minister of Australia, dies in office from a heart attack at the age of 59. He is briefly replaced by his deputy Earle Page, who serves as the 11th Prime Minister, until a UAP leadership election is held to replace Lyons.source
  • April 7 – Joseph Lyons, 10th Prime Minister of Australia, Premier of Tasmania (b. 1879)source
  • May 19 – Ahmet Ağaoğlu, Turkish politician, author and writer (b. 1869)source
  • May 24 – Witmer Stone, American ornithologist, botanist, and mammalogist (b. 1866)source
  • August 23 – Germán Busch, 36th President of Bolivia (b. 1903)source
  • September 23 – Sigmund Freud, Austrian psychoanalyst (b. 1856)source
  • November 13 – Lois Weber, American actress (b. 1881)source
  • November 28 – James Naismith, Canadian inventor of basketball (b. 1861)source
  • November 29 – Philipp Scheidemann, German politician, 11th Chancellor of Germany (b. 1865)source
  • December 12 – Douglas Fairbanks, American actor, father of Douglas Fairbanks Jr. (b. 1883)source