Historical Events
- Dec 1 2nd Heisman Trophy Award: Larry Kelley, Yale (E)
- Dec 1 Bell Labs tests coaxial cable for TV use
- Dec 1 EW Brundin & FF Lyon obtain patent on soilless culture of plants
- Dec 5 24th CFL Grey Cup: Sarnia Imperials defeats Ottawa Rough Riders, 26-20
- Dec 5 Armenian SSR, Azerbaijan SSR, Georgian SSR, Kazakh SSR & Kirghiz SSR becomes constituent republics of Soviet Union
- Dec 8 Anastasio Somoza García elected President of Nicaragua
- Dec 8 NAACP files suit to equalize salaries of black & white teachers
- Dec 9 AL OKs night baseball for St Louis
Donald Bradman
- Dec 10 Stockholm: physicist PBJ Debije receives Nobel prize for chemistry
Event of Interest
Dec 10 Britain replaces King Edward VIII stamp series with King George VI
George VI
Edward VIII
Event of Interest
Dec 10 Edward VIII signs Instrument of Abdication, giving up the British throne to marry American divoree Wallis Simpson
Wallis Simpson
Edward VIII
Nobel Prize
Dec 10 Nobel Peace Prize awarded to Carlos Saavedra Lamas for mediating end to Chaco War between Paraguay and Bolivia, 1st Latin American to win
Carlos Saavedra Lamas
- Dec 11 Edward VIII announces in a radio broadcast that he is abdicating the British throne to marry Wallis Simpson
Event of Interest
Dec 12 Chinese leader Chiang Kai-shek declares war on Japan
Chiang Kai-shek
NHL Record
Dec 13 Green Bay Packers win NFL championship with a 10–1–1 record under coach Curly Lambeau
Curly Lambeau
- Dec 15 KVL-AM in Seattle Washington changes call letters to KEEN (now KING)
- Dec 16 John Monks and Fred Finklehoff's play "Brother Rat" premieres in New York City
- Dec 17 Ventriloquist Edgar Bergen & dummy Charlie McCarthy, appear on TV
- Dec 18 Queensland cricket all out for 49 v Vic, Fleetwood-Smith 7-17
- Dec 18 Su-Lin, 1st giant panda to come to US from China, arrives in San Francisco
- Dec 21 Bradman's 2nd consecutive Test Cricket duck! Australia all out for 80
- Dec 22 1st common carrier license issued by ICC, Scranton, Pa
- Dec 23 Colombia becomes a signatory to the Buenos Aires copyright treaty
- Dec 24 1st radioactive isotope medicine administered in Berkeley, California
- Dec 25 Belgian bishops condemn fascism & communism
- Dec 25 Ron Hamence scores 104 for SA v Queensland before 4,865
- Dec 26 Israel's Philarmonic Orchestra forms
- Dec 30 United Auto Workers stage 1st sit-down strike, at Fisher Body Plant
- Dec 30 Beginning of the "feud" between comedians Fred Allen and Jack Benny on Allen's "Town Hall Tonight" show
Famous Birthdays
- Dec 2 Peter Michael Braun, composer
- Dec 4 Larry Davis, blues singer/guitarist
- Dec 5 James Lee Burke, American writer
- Dec 6 Kenneth Copeland, American televangelist
- Dec 6 David Ossman, American writer and comedian (The Firesign Theatre), born in Santa Monica, California
- Dec 7 Martha Layne Collins, Baghdad Ky, (Gov-D-Ky)
- Dec 8 David Carradine, actor (Kung Fu, Mean Streets, Kill Bill V.1 & 2), born in Hollywood, California
- Dec 8 Peter Parfitt, cricketer (fine England batsman of the 1960's)
- Dec 8 W S "Buster" Farrer, cricketer (South African Test batsman 1962-64)
- Dec 8 Brad Jurjens, Estonia, director (The Bank Job)
- Dec 11 Hans van den Broek, Dutch foreign minister (-1992)
- Dec 11 Taku Yamasaki, Japanese politician
- Dec 12 Bengt Emil Johnson, composer
- Dec 12 Iolanda Balas, Romania, high jumper (Olympic gold 1960)
- Dec 13 Karim Aga Khan, leader of the Nizari Ismailis, prince and billionaire
- Dec 13 J. C. Martin, American baseball player
- Dec 14 Robert Alan Ridley Parker, American PhD/astronaut (STS 9, STS 35), born in NYC, New York
- Dec 16 Morris Dees, founder of the Southern Poverty Law Center
- Dec 17 Tommy Steele [Thomas Hicks], English pop singer, 1st British Rock and Roll star, born in London
- Dec 17 Frank Martinus Arion, [F Efraim M], Antilles, writer (Double Play)
- Dec 17 Roland Sheldon, pitcher (NY Yankees)
- Dec 18 Malcolm Kirk, English professional wrestler (d. 1987)
- Dec 19 Marian McKnight, Miss America 1957
- Dec 22 Hector Elizondo, actor (American Gigolo, Young Doctors in Love), born in NYC, New York
- Dec 22 James Burke, British science historian and broadcaster (Connections), born in Derry, Northern Ireland
- Dec 22 Wojciech Frykowski, Polish actor (d. 1969)
- Dec 23 Bobby Ross, NFL coach (San Diego Chargers)
- Dec 23 Claude Albert Coppens, composer
- Dec 23 Frederic Forrest, ,American actor (The Rose, Lonesone Dove), born in Waxahachie, Texas
- Dec 23 James Stacy [ Maurice William Elias], American actor (Lancer), born in Los Angeles, California (d. 2016)
- Dec 25 Alexandra HEOC, English princess/daughter of Sir Angus Ogilvy
- Dec 25 Ismail Merchant, producer (Householder), born in Mumbai, India
- Dec 26 Kitty Dukakis, substance abuser/wife of Michael (Gov-Mass)
- Dec 27 Lee Salk, Russian-American child psychologist and author, born in New York, New York (d. 1992)
- Dec 27 Phil Sharpe, English cricketer (12 Tests), born in Shipley, West Yorkshire (d. 2014)
- Dec 28 Jacques Mesrine, French criminal (d. 1979)
- Dec 28 Lawrence Schiller, American journalist
Ray Nitschke
Dec 29 Ray Nitschke, American NFL linebacker (Green Bay Packers), born in Elmwood Park, Illinois (d. 1998)
Ray Nitschke
- Dec 29 Vitaly Alexeyevich Godzyatsky, composer
Mary Tyler Moore
Dec 29 Mary Tyler Moore, American actress (The Mary Tyler Moore Show, Ordinary People), born in Brooklyn, New York (d. 2017)
Mary Tyler Moore
Famous Weddings
Wedding of Interest
Dec 22 Filmmaker Billy Wilder (30) weds first wife Judith Coppicus
Billy Wilder
Wedding of Interest
Dec 24 Paleoanthropologist Mary Nicol (23) weds archaeologist Louis Leakey (33) in England
Mary Leakey
Louis Leakey
- Dec 28 British best-selling romantic author Barbara Cartland (35) marries 2nd husband Hugh McCorquodale
Wedding of Interest
Dec 28 Football player Bronko Nagurski (28) weds childhood sweetheart Eileen Kane in International Falls, Minnesota
Bronko Nagurski
Famous Deaths
- Dec 2 John Ringling, American circus owner (b. 1866)
- Dec 10 Luigi Pirandello, Italian writer (Enrico IV, Nobel 1934), dies at 69
- Dec 10 Robert Abel, cricketer (744 runs in 13 Tests for Eng 1888-1902), dies
- Dec 18 Andrija Mohorovičić, Austro-Hungarian-born Yugoslav seismologist (b. 1857)
- Dec 20 Baron De Borchgrave, Belgian ambassador, murdered in Madrid
- Dec 24 Dragutin Gorjanovic-Kramberger, Croatian paleontologist (discovery and descriptions of the Neandertal remains from the Huŝnjakova rock shelter at Krapina in northwestern Croatia), dies at 80
- Dec 25 Pierre Maurice, Swiss composer, dies at 68
- Dec 27 Hans von Seeckt, German Gen/advisor of Chiang Kai-shek, dies at 70
- Dec 31 Miguel de Unamuno Jugo, Span philosopher/poet (Cancionero), dies at 72
- Dec 31 William FA Ellison, Irish clergyman/astronomer, dies at 72