1932

1932 is a leap year starting on a Friday.

Events

January-February

• January 3 - British arrest and intern Mohandas Gandhi and Vallabhbhai Patel
• January 8 - In Britain the Archbishop of Canterbury forbids church remarriage of divorcees
• January 12 - Hattie W. Caraway becomes the first woman elected to the United States Senate
• January 14 - Maurice Ravel's Concerto in G (Ravel) debuts with piano soloist Marguerite Long and Ravel conducting the Lamoureux Orchestra
• January 15 - Pierre Laval forms a new government in France
• January 15 - About 6 million unemployed in Germany
• January 26 - British submarine M-2 sinks with all 50 hands
• January 28 - Japan occupies Shanghai
• January 29 - Minority government of Karl Mureschi in Austria ends the governmental crisis
• January 31 - Japanese warships arrive in Nanking
• February 2 - General convention of disarmament begins in Geneva
• February 2 - League of Nations again recommends negotiations between the Republic of China and Japan
• February 4 - Japan occupies Harbin, China
• February 11 - Pope Pius XI meets Benito Mussolini in the Vatican City
• February 18 - Japan declares Manzhouguo (Japanese name for Manchuria) formally independent from China
• February 27 - Adolf Hitler gains German citizenship prior to elections
• February 27 - Mäntsälä Rebellion in Finland

March-April

• March 1 - Charles Augustus Lindbergh III, the baby son of Anne Morrow Lindbergh and Charles Lindbergh is kidnapped
• March 9 - Eamon de Valera is elected President of the Executive Council. It is the first change of government in the Irish Free State in 10 years.
• March 18 - Peace negotiations between China and Japan begin.
• March 19 - Sydney Harbour Bridge opens
• March 20 - Graf Zeppelin begins a regular route to South America
• April 5 - Prohibition is lifted in Finland at 10 in the morning (local time), inventing a new mnemonic "543210".
• April 6 - U.S. president Herbert Hoover supports armament limitations
• April 10 - Paul von Hindenburg elected president of Germany. Adolf Hitler receives over 13 million votes.
• April 17 - Haile Selassie announces an anti-slavery law in Abyssinia
• April 19 - German art dealer Otto Wacker is sentenced for 19 months for selling fraudulent paintings of Vincent van Gogh

May-June

• May 2 - Comedian Jack Benny's radio show airs for the first time.
• May 6 - Paul Gordulof assassinates French president Paul Doumer in Paris - Doumer dies the next day.
• May 10 - Albert Lebrun becomes the new president of France
• May 12 - Ten weeks after his abduction, the infant son of Charles Lindbergh is found dead in Hopewell, New Jersey just a few miles from the Lindbergh's home.
• May 13 - The Premier of New South Wales, Jack Lang, is dismissed by the State Governor, Sir Phillip Game
• May 15 - Japanese troops leave Shanghai; May 15 incident occurs.
• May 16 - Massive riots between Hindus and Muslims in Bombay - thousands dead and injured.
• May 18 - Assassination of Japanese prime minister Tsuyoshi Inukai
• May 20-21 - Amelia Earhart flies from USA to Londonderry, Northern Ireland in 14 hours 54 minutes
• May 30 - German chancellor Heinrich Brüning resigns. President Hindenburg takes Franz von Papen to form a new government.
• June - 15,000 World War I veterans march in Washington, DC
• June 4 - Military coup in Chile
• June 6 - The Revenue Act of 1932 is enacted, creating the first gas tax in the United States (1 cent per gallon sold).
• June 14 - Bans against SS and SA overturned in Germany
• June 20 - Benelux customs union negotiated
• June 24 - After a relatively bloodless military rebellion, Siam becomes a constitutional monarchy

July-October

• July 1- ABC (Australian Broadcasting Commission) established
• July 5 - António de Oliveira Salazar becomes the fascists prime minister of Portugal (for the next 36 years)
• July 7 - French submarine Sromethee sinks off Cherbourg - 66 dead
• July 12 - Hedley Verity establishes a new first-class record by taking all ten wickets for only ten runs against Nottinghamshire on a pitch affected by a storm.
• July 17 - Bloody Sunday of Altona in Germany - armed communists attack a national socialist demonstration - 18 dead. Many other political street fights follow.
• July 28 - US President Herbert Hoover orders the United States Army to forcibly evict the "Bonus Army" of World War I veterans gathered in Washington, DC. US troops dispersed the last of the "Bonus Army" the next day.
• August 6 - First Venice Film Festival
• August 10 - A 5.1 kg chondrite type meteorite broke into at least seven fragments and struck earth near the town of Archie in Cass County, Missouri.
• August 18 - Auguste Piccard reaches altitude of 16.500 meters with an air balloon
• August 30 - Hermann Göring elected as a chairman of German senate
• August 31 - Total solar eclipse visible from northern Canada through NE Vermont, New Hampshire, SW Maine, and the Capes of Massachusetts
• September 9 - The Generalitat reinstaurated, Catalonia regains political autonomy inside the 2nd Spanish Republic from September 25
• September 20 - Mohandas Gandhi begins an hunger strike in Poona prison
• September 28 - According to Prussian statistics, 115 people have been killed in political riots during the year
• October 15 - Tata Airlines (later to become Air India) makes its first flight
• October 19 - Wedding of Prince Gustav Adolf of Sweden and Princess Sibylla of Sachse-Coburg

November-December

• November 1 - San Francisco Opera House opened
• November 7 - Buck Rogers in the 25th Century airs on radio for the first time.
• November 8 - U.S. presidential election, 1932: Franklin D. Roosevelt defeats Herbert Hoover in a landslide victory.
• November 9 - Riots between conservative and socialist supporters in Switzerland - 12 dead, 60 injured
• November 11 - Tornado and huge waves kills about thousand in Santa Crus del Sure in Cuba
• November 19 - Second wife of Josef Stalin is found dead in her home
• November 21 - German president Hindenburg begins negotiations with Adolf Hitler about the formation of a new government
• November 24 - In Washington, DC, the FBI Scientific Crime Detection Laboratory (better known as the FBI Crime Lab) officially opens.
• December 3 - Hindenburg names Kurt von Schleicher as a German chancellor
• December 12 - Japan and Soviet Union reform their diplomatic connections
• December 25 - Earthquake in the Kansu Province in China - 70,000 dead

Unknown dates

• Saudi Arabia is declared a unified nation with Ibn Saud as a king.
• Female suffrage in Brazil
• Norway annexes northern Greenland.
• Chaco war between Bolivia and Paraguay
• In the next five years, Dr. Morris Bolber and associates successfully murder and collect the insurance money for more than 30 victims.
• Mars candy bar
• Zippo lighters
• The Kennedy-Thorndike experiment shows that measured time as well as length are affected by motion, in accordance with the theory of special relativity.
• Chadwick discovers the neutron.
• Geneticist J. B. S. Haldane publishes The Causes of Evolution and thereby unifies the findings of Mendelian genetics with those of evolutionary science.
• Second Polar Year, an international scientific collaboration.

Births

January

• January 3 - Dabney Coleman, American actor
• January 4 - Carlos Saura, director
• January 5 - Johnny Adams, American musician (d. 1998)
  • Umberto Eco, Italian scholar and author
  • Raisa Gorbachev, Soviet first lady (d. 1999)
• January 6 - Stuart A. Rice, American chemist
• January 16 - Dian Fossey, American zoologist (d. 1985)
• January 18 - Robert Anton Wilson, American author
• January 22 - Piper Laurie, American actress
• January 26 - Coxsone Dodd, Jamaican record producer (d. 2004)
• January 29 - Tommy Taylor, English footballer (d. 1958)
• January 30 - Knock Yokoyama, Japanese comedian and politician

February-March

• February 3 - Peggy Ann Garner, American actress (d. 1984)
• February 6 - François Truffaut, French film director (d. 1984)
• February 7 - Gay Talese, American author
• February 8 - John Williams, American composer and conductor
• February 9 - Gerhard Richter, German painter
• February 11 - Jerome Lowenthal, pianist
• February 12 - Julian Simon, American economist and author (d. 1998)
• February 14 - Alexander Kluge, German author and film director
• February 18 - Milos Forman, Czech film director
• February 22 - Edward Kennedy, American politician
• February 23 - Majel Barrett, American actress
• February 24 - Michel Legrand, French composer
• February 25 - Faron Young American country music singer (d. 1996)
• February 26 - Johnny Cash, American country music singer (d. 2003)
• February 27 - Elizabeth Taylor, English-born actress
• March 4 - Miriam Makeba, South African singer
• March 12 - Andrew Young, American civil rights activist, politician, and ambassador to the United Nations
• March 16 - Don Blasingame, Major League Baseball player and Japanese baseball manager (d. 2005)
• March 18 - John Updike, American author
• March 30 - Ted Morgan, French-born American author, biographer, and journalist

April-July

• April 1 - Gordon Jump, American television actor (d. 2003)
  • Debbie Reynolds, American actress
• April 2 - Michael Vernon, Australian consumer activist (d.1993)
• April 4 - Anthony Perkins, American actor (d. 1992)
  • Andrei Tarkovsky, Russian movie director (d. 1986)
• April 8 - Baginda Almutawakkil Alallah Sultan Iskandar Al-Haj ibni Almarhum Sultan Ismail, Sultan of Johor and 8th Yang di-Pertuan Agong of Malaysia
• April 9 - Carl Perkins, American musician (d. 1998)
• April 12 - Tiny Tim, American musician (d. 1996)
• April 23 - Halston, American fashion designer (d. 1990)
• April 27 - Casey Kasem, American disc jockey and voice actor
  • Gian-Carlo Rota, Italian-born mathematician and philosopher (d. 1999)
• May 8 - Phyllida Law, Scottish actress
  • Sonny Liston, American boxer (d. 1970)
• May 21 - Gabriele Wohmann, author
• June 4 - John Drew Barrymore, American actor (d. 2004)
  • Maurice Shadbolt, New Zealand writer (d. 2004)
• June 12 - Rona Jaffe, American novelist
• June 18 - Geoffrey Hill, English poet
• June 25 - Peter Blake, English artist
• June 27 - Anna Moffo, American soprano
• June 28 - Pat Morita, American actor
• July 2 - Dave Thomas, American fast-food entrepreneur (d. 2002)
• July 9 - Donald Rumsfeld, U.S. Secretary of Defence
• July 12 - Otis Davis, American runner
• July 21 - Ernie Warlick, American football player
• July 29 - Nancy Landon Kassebaum Baker, U.S. Senator

August-December

• August 1 - Meena Kumari, Indian actress
• August 2 - Lamar Hunt, American sportsman
• August 2 - Peter O'Toole, Irish actor
• August 6 - Howard Hodgkin, British painter and print-maker
• August 11 - Fernando Arrabal, Moroccan-born French writer
• August 17 - V. S. Naipaul, British writer
• September 8 - Patsy Cline, American singer (d. 1963)
• August 18 - William R. Bennett, Premier of British Columbia
• September 18 - Nikolai Rukavishnikov, cosmonaut (d. 2002)
• September 25 - Glenn Gould, Canadian pianist (d. 1982)
• September 26 - Dr. Manmohan Singh, Prime Minister of India
• September 26 - Richard Herd, American actor
• September 27 - Oliver E. Williamson , American economist
• October 19 - Robert Reed, American actor (d. 1992)
• October 20 - Rosey Brown, American football playerr (d. 2004)
• October 24 - Pierre-Gilles de Gennes, French physicist, Nobel Prize laureate
• October 28 - Suzy Parker, American actress (d. 2003)
• November 3 - Albert Reynolds, Taoiseach of the Republic of Ireland
• November 4 - Noam Pitlik, American actor and director (d. 1999)
• November 15 - Petula Clark, English singer, actress, songwriter
• November 20 - Richard Dawson, English-born game show host
• November 29 - Jacques Chirac, President of France
• December 5 - Sheldon Lee Glashow, American physicist
• December 9 - Bill Hartack, American jockey
• December 24 - Earl Dodge, American presidential candidate
• December 28 - Dorsey Burnette, American singer (d. 1979)
  • Roy Hattersley, British politician

Unknown dates

• Blaze Starr, American stripper and burlesque performer
• Irene Jai Narayan, Fijian politician
• Mehmood, Indian actor (d. 2004)

Deaths

• January 21 - Giles Lytton Strachey British writer and biographer (b. 1880)
• January 24 - Sir Alfred Yarrow, English shipbuilder and philanthropist (b. 1842)
• February 10 - Edgar Wallace, English novelist and screenwriter (b. 1875)
• February 16 - Ferdinand Buisson, French recipient of the Nobel Peace Prize (b. 1841)
• March 6 - John Philip Sousa, American band leader, conductor, and composer (b. 1854)
• March 1 - Frank Teschemacher, American jazz clarinetist and alto saxophonist (b. 1906)
• March 7 - Aristide Briand, French diplomat, winner of the Nobel Peace Prize
• March 14 - George Eastman, American inventor (b. 1854)
• March 31 - Eben Byers, American steel tycoon and socialite (radiation poisoning) (b. 1880)
• April 4 - Wilhelm Ostwald, German chemist, Nobel Prize laureate (b. 1853)
• April 20 - Giuseppe Peano, Italian mathematician (b. 1858)
• April 26 - Hart Crane, American poet (b. 1899)
• April 26 - William Lockwood, English cricketer (b. 1868)
• May 3 - Charles Fort, American researcher of the unusual (b. 1874)
• May 7 - Paul Doumer, President of France (assassinated) (b. 1857)
• May 15 - Tsuyoshi Inukai, Prime Minister of Japan (assassinated) (b. 1855)
• May 17 - Fredrick C. Billard, Commandant of the United States Coast Guard (b. 1873)
• July 6 - Kenneth Grahame, English author (b. 1859)
• July 23 - Alberto Santos-Dumont, Brazilian aviation pioneer (b. 1873)
• September 20 - Wovoka, Northern Paiute visionary
• September 23 - Jules Chéret, French poster designer (b. 1836)
• November 9 - Nadezhda Alliluyeva-Stalin, second wife of Iosif Vissarionovich Stalin (b. 1901)

Nobel Prizes

• Physics - Werner Karl Heisenberg
• Chemistry - Irving Langmuir
• Medicine - Sir Charles Scott Sherrington, Edgar Douglas Adrian
• Literature -John Galsworthy
• Peace - Not awarded.