1919 - Definition and Overview

Events

January

• January 1 - Edsel Ford succeeds his father as head of the Ford Motor Company
• January 5 - Spartacist uprising - Socialist demonstrations in Berlin turn into attempted communist revolution
• January 9 - Spartacus revolutionary council folds – Friedrich Ebert orders Freikorps into action
• January 10-12 - Freikorps attack Spartacus supporters around Berlin
• January 11 - Romania annexes Transylvania.
• January 13 - Worker’s councils in Berlin end the general strike - Spartacus week is over
• January 15 - The Boston Molasses Disaster: Wave of molasses sweeps through Boston, killing 21 and injuring 150
• January 15 - Ignacy Jan Paderewski becomes Premier of Poland
• January 16 - The 18th Amendment, authorizing Prohibition, goes into effect in the United States
• January 18 - World War I: A peace conference opens in Versailles, France.
• January 18 - Bentley Motors is founded
• January 21 - the First Dáil Éireann meets in the Mansion House in Dublin. It is from this meeting that the Irish state dates its existence.
• January 25 - The League of Nations is founded

February-April

• February 1 - The first Miss America is crowned (New York City).
• February 3 – Soviet troops occupy the Ukraine
• February 11 - Friedrich Ebert (SPD), is elected President of Germany.
• February 14 - Polish-Soviet War begins
• February 25 - Oregon places a 1 cent per gallon tax on gasoline, becoming the first U.S. state to levy a gasoline tax.
• February 26 - An act of the United States Congress establishes most of the Grand Canyon as a United States National Park (see Grand Canyon National Park).
• March 1 - March 1st Movement against Japanese colonial rule in Korea.
• March 2 - The first Communist International meets in Moscow
• March 15 - The American Legion forms in Paris
• March 21 - The Chinese High School was established in Singapore by Mr. Tan Kah Kee
• March 23 - In Milan, Italy, Benito Mussolini founds his Fascist political movement.
• March 31 – General strike begins in the Ruhr
• April 6-7 – Communist People’s Republic of Munich founded
• April 13 - At the Amritsar Massacre, British and Gurkha troops massacre 379 Indians.
• April 14 – Emperor of Austria moves to exile in Switzerland
• April 25 – Bauhaus movement founded
• April 25 - ANZAC day is celebrated for the first time in Australia.

May-June

• May 1 – Large left-wing demonstration in France leads to a violent confrontation with the police
• May 1 - In Cleveland, police and army confront the May Day parade and drive into crowd – 2 dead, one hundred injured
• May 3 – People's Republic of Munich is crushed
• May 4 - May Fourth Movement opposes foreign colonizers in China
• May 15 - Winnipeg launches general strike for better wages and working conditions.
• May 16 - US Navy Naval Curtiss aircraft NC-4 commanded by Albert Cushing Read departs Trepassey, Newfoundland, for Lisbon via the Azores on the first transatlantic flight
• May 17 - Committee of One Thousand forms to oppose Winnipeg General Strike
• May 25 – Volcano Kloet erupts in Java – 16.000 dead
• May 29 - Einstein's theory of general relativity confirmed by Arthur Eddington's observation of a total eclipse of the Sun.
• June 4 - Women's rights: The United States Congress approves the 19th Amendment to the United States Constitution, which would guarantee suffrage to women, and sends it to the U.S. states for ratification.
• June 14 - John Alcock and Arthur Brown depart St. John's, Newfoundland on the first nonstop transatlantic flight (they landed at Clifden, County Galway, Ireland the next day). [1] (http://www.aviation-history.com/airmen/alcock.htm)
• June 21 - Royal Canadian Mounted Police fire a volley into a crowd of unemployed war veterans, killing two, during Winnipeg General Strike.
• June 21 - Admiral Ludvig von Reuter scuttles the German fleet in Scapa Flow, Orkney. The nine sailors killed were the last casualties of the First World War.
• June 28 - The Treaty of Versailles is signed, ending World War I with Germany.

July-November

• July 6 - The British dirigible R-34 lands in New York, completing the first crossing of the Atlantic by an airship.
• July 31 - Strike of policemen in London and Liverpool for recognition of the National Union of Police and Prison Officers. Over 2,000 strikers are dismissed.
• August 11 - In Germany, the Weimar Constitution is passed into law.
• August 19 - Afghanistan gains independence from the United Kingdom.
• 16 August-26 August - First Silesian Uprising, the Poles in Upper Silesia rise against the Germans
• August 31 - American Communist Party is established
• September 10 - Treaty of Saint-Germain is signed , ending World War I with Austria.
• September 27 - Last British troops leave Archangel, Russia and leave fighting to the Russians
• October 1 - Elaine Race Riot breaks out in Arkansas
• October 2 - US President Woodrow Wilson suffers a massive stroke, leaving him partially paralyzed.
• October 9 - Black Sox scandal: The Cincinnati Reds "win" the World Series.
• October 9 - Boston police strike
• October 13 - Convention relating to the Regulation of Aerial Navigation signed.
• October 28 - Prohibition begins: The United States Congress passes the Volstead Act over President Woodrow Wilson's veto.
• November - At end of month health officials declare the global Spanish Flu Pandemic over
• November 10 - The first national convention of the American Legion is held in Minneapolis, Minnesota (convention ended on November 12).
• November 27 - The Treaty of Neuilly is signed between Allies and Bulgaria.
• November 28 - The American-born Lady Astor is elected to the British House of Commons, becoming the first female MP to take a seat on December 1.

December

• December 12 – Gabriele D'Annunzio with his entourage marches into Fiume and convinces the Italian troops to join him
• December 30 - Lincoln's Inn, in London admits its first female bar student.
• The Paris Peace Conference

unknown dates

• The Åland Islands vote for a return to Swedish rule in a referendum.
• Les Champs Magnetiques, the first automatic book, is written by Andre Breton and Philippe Soupault.
• XWA (now CFCF), in Montreal, Quebec, is the first public radio station in North America to go on the air.
• Various strikes in USA: Strike of US railroad workers; Longshoreman’s strike; The Great Steel Strike; General strike in Seattle, Washington.
• First Palestine national congress meets in Jerusalem, rejects the Balfour Declaration and demands independence for Palestine
• Female suffrage in Germany and Luxemburg
• Henri Desire Landru captured
• Marcel Tolkowsky's Diamond Design is published.

Births

January-April

• January 1 - J. D. Salinger, novelist
• January 13 - Army Archerd, Hollywood journalist
• January 13 - Robert Stack, actor (d. 2003)
• January 14 - Andy Rooney, television journalist
• January 23 - Hans Haas, zoologist and underwater scientist
• January 23 - Ernie Kovacs, comedian (d. 1962)
• January 25 - Edwin Newman, journalist, writer
• January 27 - Ross Bagdasarian, musician, actor (d. 1972)
• January 31 - Jackie Robinson, baseball player (d. 1972)
• February 5 - Andreas Papandreou, Greek politician (d. 1996)
• February 5 - Red Buttons, actor
• February 11 - Gretchen Fraser, slalom skier.
• February 11 - Eddie Robinson, football coach.
• February 12 - Forrest Tucker, actor (d. 1986)
• February 13 - Tennessee Ernie Ford, musician (d. 1991)
• February 27 - Enrique A. Collantes Zafra is born.
• March 2 - Jennifer Jones, actress
• March 11 - Mercer Ellington, musician, composer (d. 1996)
• March 15 - Lawrence Tierney, actor (d. 2002)
• March 17 - Nat King Cole, singer (d. 1965)
• March 24 - Lawrence Ferlinghetti, author and publisher
• March 30 - McGeorge Bundy, National Security Advisor (d. 1996)
• April 8 - Ian Douglas Smith, leader of white-ruled Rhodesia 1965-1979

May-December

• May 3 - Pete Seeger, singer and musician
• May 7 - Eva Peron, wife of Argentina's President Juan Peron (d. 1952)
• May 8 - Lex Barker, actor (d. 1973)
• May 16 - Liberace, pianist (d. 1987)
• May 16 - Gisela Uhlen, actress
• May 18 - Dame Margot Fonteyn, ballet dancer (d. 1991)
• May 20 - George Gobel, comedian (d. 1991)
• May 23 - Betty Garrett, actress, dancer
• June 4 - Robert Merrill, baritone (d. 2004)
• June 5 - Richard Scarry, children's author (d. 1994)
• June 21 - Gérard Pelletier, French journalist, politician and diplomat (d. 1997)
• June 26 - Richard Neustadt, political historian (d. 2003)
• July 6 - Ernst Haefliger, Swiss tenor
• July 7 - Jon Pertwee, actor (d. 1996)
• July 15 - Iris Murdoch, novelist (d. 1999)
• July 20 - Edmund Hillary, mountaineer
• September 11 - Ota Sik, Czech economist and politician (d. 2004)
• September 21 - Fazlur Rahman, scholar (d. 1988)
• September 27 - James H. Wilkinson, mathematician (d. 1986)
• October 1 - member of the Romanian Academy, president of the Jewish Communities Federation of Romania
• October 11 - Art Blakey, jazz drummer (d. 1990)
• October 18 - Pierre Elliott Trudeau, Canadian prime minister (d. 2000)
• October 22 - Doris Lessing, British writer
• October 26 - Mohammad Reza Pahlavi, Shah of Iran (d. 1980)
• November 10 - Mikhail Kalashnikov - inventor, designer of the Ak-47
• November 14 - Lisa Otto, German soprano
• November 18 - Andrée Borrel, WW II heroine executed by the Nazis (d. 1944)
• November - Keith Miller, Australian sportsman (d. 2004)
• December 31 - Tommy Byrne, Major League Baseball player

Deaths

• January 6 - Theodore Roosevelt, 26th President of the United States (b. 1858)
• January 15 - Rosa Luxemburg and Karl Liebknecht
• January 18- His Royal Highness Prince John, son of George V and Queen Mary (b. 1905)
• February 17 - Wilfrid Laurier, seventh Prime Minister of Canada (b. 1841)
• April 4 - Sir William Crookes, English chemist and physicist (b. 1832)
• April 15 - Jane Delano, founder, American Red Cross Nursing Service (b. 1862)
• May 6 - L. Frank Baum, American writer (b. 1856)
• August 9 - Ruggiero Leoncavallo, Italian composer (b. 1857)
• October 7 - Alfred Deakin, second Prime Minister of Australia (b. 1856)
• October 18 - Viscount William Astor, American financier and statesman (b. 1848)
• December 3 - Pierre-Auguste Renoir, French painter (b. 1841)

Nobel Prizes

• Physics - Johannes Stark
• Chemistry - not awarded
• Medicine - Jules Bordet
• Literature - Carl Friedrich Georg Spitteler
• Peace - Thomas Woodrow Wilson