Historical Events in November 1939

Nov 1 First animal conceived by artificial insemination (rabbit) displayed
Nov 1 First jet plane, Heinkel He 178, demonstrated to German Air Ministry

Catholic Encyclical

Nov 1 Pope Pius XII publishes encyclical Sertum laetitiae

Nov 3 Clare Booth's "Margin for Error" premieres in NYC
Nov 4 First air conditioned automobile (Packard) exhibited, Chicago, Illinois
Nov 4 US allows "cash & carry" arms sales during WW II
Nov 6 WGY-TV (Schenectady, NY), 1st commercial TV station, begins service
Nov 6 WRGB TV channel 6 in Schenectady-Alby-Troy, NY (CBS) 1st broadcast
Nov 6 World War II: 'Sonderaktion Krakau' - a Nazi operation against academics, with 184 professors arrested in Krakow and deported

Assassination Attempt

Nov 8 Failed assassination attempt on Adolf Hitler in Burgerbraukeller, Munich

Nov 8 H Lindsay & R Crouse's play "Life with Father" premieres in NYC

Film Premiere

Nov 9 Romantic comedy film "Ninotchka" directed by Ernst Lubitsch and starring Greta Garbo premieres

Nov 9 Nobel Prize for physics awarded to American Ernest Lawrence for his invention of the cyclotron
Nov 9 Venlo-incident: German Abwehr kills 2 British agents

Music History

Nov 11 Kate Smith first sings Irving Berlin's "God Bless America"

Nov 12 Jews in Lodz, Poland, ordered to wear a yellow star of David
Nov 14 Oil refinery fire kills 500 & destroys Lagunillas, Venezuela
Nov 15 Anti-German demonstrations in Czechoslovakia

Historic Event

Nov 15 FDR lays cornerstone of Jefferson Memorial in Washington, D.C.

Nov 15 Nazis begin mass murder of Warsaw Jews
Nov 15 The first unemployment compensation law, under the Social Security Act, that of the District of Columbia, was approved for grants by the Social Security Board

Historic Event

Nov 16 Al Capone freed from Alcatraz jail

Nov 16 German U-boat torpedoes tanker Sliedrecht near Ireland
Nov 17 German U-boat torpedoes passenger ship

Music History

Nov 17 Jerome Kern and Oscar Hammerstein II's "Very Warm for May" premieres in NYC

Nov 17 The Rome-Rio de Janeiro air connection created
Nov 18 Dutch KNSM passenger ship Simón Bolívar hits German mine, 86 die
Nov 18 The Irish Republican Army explodes three bombs in Piccadilly Circus
Nov 19 Don Lash wins 6th straight AAU cross-country 10K championship
Nov 19 Comic superheroes Flash (as Jay Garrick) and Hawkman (Carter Hall) first appear in "Flash Comics No. 1" published by DC

Historic Siege

Nov 22 Bugsy Siegel, Whitey Krakower, Frankie Carbo and Albert Tannenbaum kill Harry "Big Greenie" Greenberg outside his apartment after Greenberg had threatened to become a police informant