RETURN TO INDEX
Top Song(s)
• Bing Crosby - White Christmas
• Jimmy Dorsey - Tangerine
• Glenn Miller - Moonlight Cocktail
• Harry James - Sleepy Lagoon
• Benny Goodman - Jersey Bounce
Top Film(s)
• Casablanca
• To Be or Not to Be
• The Magnificent Ambersons
• Cat People
• Now, Voyager
Best Selling Book(s)
• The Stranger - Albert Camus
• The Runaway Bunny - Margaret Wise Brown
• The Screwtape Letters - C.S. Lewis
• The Moving Finger - Agatha Christie
• West with the Night - Beryl Markham
Famous Deaths
• January 13 - Emil Szramek, Polish Roman Catholic priest, martyr and saint
• February 2 - Ado Birk, Estonian politician, 3rd Prime Minister of Estonia
• March 3 – Prince Amedeo, Duke of Aosta, Italian nobleman and military officer
• April 13 - Julia Danzas, Soviet and Russian Roman Catholic religious leader
• May 22 - Stjepan Filipovic, Yugoslav national hero
• June 14 – Fyodor Braun, Soviet-born German scholar
• July 90 - Pauline of the Agonizing Heart of Jesus, Brazilian Roman Catholic religious sister and saint
• August 8 – Leopold Janikowski, Polish explorer and ethnographer
• October 1 – Ants Piip, 7th Prime Minister and 1st State Elder of Estonia
• November 13 - Daniel J. Callaghan, American admiral and Medal of Honor recipient
Medical/Science/Technology
• James Stanley Hey, a British Army research officer, first detects radio waves emitted by the Sun.
• The first V-2 rocket is successfully launched from Test Stand VII at Peenemunde, Germany.
• German pathologist Max Westenhofer first puts forward an aquatic ape hypothesis.
• Eastman Kodak first market Kodacolor color negative film.
• John V. Atanasoff with Clifford Berry successfully test the Atanasoff–Berry Computer.
• Chicago Pile-1, the first nuclear reactor, goes critical under the squash court.
• Klinefelter syndrome is first described by American endocrinologist Harry Klinefelter.
• The first practical oximeter is described by Glenn Allan Millikan.
• Messerschmitt Me 262 jet aircraft prototype makes its first flight under jet power.
• The first American-built jet aircraft, the Bell P-59 Airacomet, makes its first official flight.
Political Events
• January 1 – The Declaration by United Nations is signed.
• February 2 – President Franklin D. Roosevelt signs an executive order directing the internment of Japanese Americans.
• February 7 – President Roosevelt signs an Executive Order creating the War Shipping Administration (WSA).
• February 19 – President Franklin D. Roosevelt signs executive order 9066.
• February 22 – President Roosevelt orders General Douglas MacArthur out of the Philippines.
• March 9 – Executive order 9082 reorganizes the United States Army into three major commands.
• June 13 - The United States opens its Office of War Information, a propaganda center.
• June 13 - Office of Strategic Services (OSS) is created.
• July 30 – A bill creating the United States Marine Corps Women's Reserve is signed into law.
• November 23 – A bill creating the United States Coast Guard Women's Reserve (SPARS) is signed into law.
National Events
• January 1 - Sales of new cars are banned to save steel.
• February 20 – Lieutenant Edward O'Hare becomes America's first World War II flying ace.
• February 24 – The Voice of America begins broadcasting.
• May 20 – The first African-American seamen are taken into the United States Navy.
• June 21 – Bombardment of Fort Stevens – Fort Stevens, Oregon is fired upon by a Japanese submarine.
• August 13 – Walt Disney's fifth feature film, Bambi, is released.
• September 15 – The Women's Flying Training Detachment (WFTD) is established.
• September 21 – Boeing B-29 Superfortress bomber prototype first flies, from Boeing Field, Seattle.
• October 28 – The Alaska Highway is completed.
• December 1 – Gasoline rationing begins in the United States.
Worldwide Events
• January 17 – South African forces of the British 8th Army conquer the Halfaya Pass.
• January 26 – The first American forces arrive in Europe, landing in Northern Ireland.
• March 16 – New Zealand and Australia declare war on Thailand.
• April 5 – Easter Sunday Raid – Aircraft of the Imperial Japanese Navy attack Colombo, Ceylon (Sri Lanka).
• April 23 - Exeter-born William Temple is enthroned as Archbishop of Canterbury.
• May 21 – Mexico declares war against Nazi Germany, after the sinking of the Mexican tanker.
• June 12 – On her 13th birthday, Anne Frank receives the book that she will use to keep her diary in occupied Amsterdam.
• July 13 – U-boats sink three merchant ships in the Gulf of St. Lawrence.
• October 16 - A cyclone and consequential floods in the Bay of Bengal kill 40,000 people.
• November 8 – Operation Torch – United States and United Kingdom forces land in French North Africa.