1932

1932 (MCMXXXII) was a leap year starting on Friday of the Gregorian calendar, the 1932nd year of the Common Era (CE) and Anno Domini (AD) designations, the 932nd year of the 2nd millennium, the 32nd year of the 20th century, and the 3rd year of the 1930s decade.

From top to bottom, left to right: the Chaco War erupts between Bolivia and Paraguay over control of the Gran Chaco, becoming one of South America’s deadliest conflicts of the 20th century; the Siamese revolution of 1932 peacefully ends centuries of absolute monarchy in Siam and establishes a constitutional government; the 1932 Summer Olympics are held in Los Angeles, showcasing athletic achievement amid the hardships of the Great Depression; the January 28 incident in Shanghai sees Japanese forces clash with Chinese troops, heightening tensions in East Asia and foreshadowing broader conflict; the Colombia–Peru War breaks out over disputed Amazonian territory, leading to months of fighting before a negotiated settlement; and the May 15 incident in Japan results in the assassination of Prime Minister Inukai Tsuyoshi by young naval officers, signaling a shift toward militarism in Japanese politics.

Quick facts

1932 in various calendars
Gregorian calendar	1932 MCMXXXII
Ab urbe condita	2685
Armenian calendar	1381 ԹՎ ՌՅՁԱ
Assyrian calendar	6682
Baháʼí calendar	88–89
Balinese saka calendar	1853–1854
Bengali calendar	1338–1339
Berber calendar	2882
British Regnal year	22 Geo. 5 – 23 Geo. 5
Buddhist calendar	2476
Burmese calendar	1294
Byzantine calendar	7440–7441
Chinese calendar	辛未年 (Metal Goat) 4629 or 4422 — to — 壬申年 (Water Monkey) 4630 or 4423
Coptic calendar	1648–1649
Discordian calendar	3098
Ethiopian calendar	1924–1925
Hebrew calendar	5692–5693
Hindu calendars
- Vikram Samvat	1988–1989
- Shaka Samvat	1853–1854
- Kali Yuga	5032–5033
Holocene calendar	11932
Igbo calendar	932–933
Iranian calendar	1310–1311
Islamic calendar	1350–1351
Japanese calendar	Shōwa 7 (昭和７年)
Javanese calendar	1862–1863
Juche calendar	21
Julian calendar	Gregorian minus 13 days
Korean calendar	4265
Minguo calendar	ROC 21 民國21年
Nanakshahi calendar	464
Thai solar calendar	2474–2475
Tibetan calendar	ལྕགས་མོ་ལུག་ལོ་ (female Iron-Sheep) 2058 or 1677 or 905 — to — ཆུ་ཕོ་སྤྲེ་ལོ་ (male Water-Monkey) 2059 or 1678 or 906

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Events

January

January 4 – The British authorities in India arrest and intern Mahatma Gandhi and Vallabhbhai Patel.^[1]
January 9 – Sakuradamon Incident: Korean nationalist Lee Bong-chang fails in his effort to assassinate Emperor Hirohito of Japan. The Kuomintang's official newspaper runs an editorial expressing regret that the attempt failed, which is used by the Japanese as a pretext to attack Shanghai later in the month.
January 12 – Hattie W. Caraway of Arkansas becomes the first woman to be elected to the United States Senate, succeeding her late husband, Thaddeus Caraway, in a special election,
January 22 – The 1932 Salvadoran peasant uprising begins; it is suppressed by the government of Maximiliano Hernández Martínez.
January 24 – Marshal Pietro Badoglio declares the end of Libyan resistance.
January 26 – British submarine aircraft carrier HMS M2 sinks with the loss of all 60 onboard on exercise in Lyme Bay in the English Channel.
January 28 – January 28 incident: Conflict between Japan and China in Shanghai.
January 31 – Japanese warships arrive in Nanking.

February

February 2
- A general World Disarmament Conference begins in Geneva. The principal issue at the conference is the demand made by Germany for Gleichberechtigung ("equality of status" i.e. abolishing Part V of the Treaty of Versailles, which had disarmed Germany) and the French demand for sécurité ("security" i.e. maintaining Part V).
- The League of Nations again recommends negotiations between the Republic of China and Japan.
- The Reconstruction Finance Corporation begins operations in Washington, D.C.
February 4
- The 1932 Winter Olympics open in Lake Placid, New York.^[2]
- Japan occupies Harbin, China.
February 9 – League of Blood Incident: Junnosuke Inoue, prominent Japanese businessman, banker and former governor of the Bank of Japan is assassinated by the right-wing extremist group the League of Blood.
February 11 – Pope Pius XI meets Benito Mussolini in Vatican City.
February 15 – Clara, Lu & Em, generally regarded as the first daytime network soap opera, debuts in its morning time slot over the Blue Network of NBC Radio in the United States, having originally been a late evening program.
February 18 – Japan declares Manchukuo (Japanese name for Manchuria) formally independent from China.
February 25 – Adolf Hitler obtains German citizenship by naturalization, opening the opportunity for him to run in the 1932 German presidential election.^[3]
February 27 – The Mäntsälä rebellion occurs in Finland.

March

March 1
- Lindbergh kidnapping: Charles Lindbergh Jr., the infant son of Charles and Anne Morrow Lindbergh, is kidnapped from the family home near Hopewell, New Jersey. On May 12 he is found dead just a few miles away.
- Japan installs Puyi as puppet emperor of Manchukuo.
March 2 – The Mäntsälä rebellion ends in failure; Finnish democracy prevails. The Lapua Movement is condemned by conservative Finnish president Pehr Evind Svinhufvud in a radio speech.
March 5 – Dan Takuma, prominent Japanese businessman and director of the Mitsui Zaibatsu conglomerate is assassinated by the radical right-wing League of Blood group.
March 9 – Éamon de Valera is elected President of the Executive Council of the Irish Free State, the first change of government in the country since its foundation 10 years previously.
March 11 - Booming Ben, the last known heath hen died in captivity
March 14 – George Eastman, founder of Kodak, commits suicide in Rochester, New York.
March 18 – Peace negotiations between China and Japan begin.
March 19 – The Sydney Harbour Bridge opens in Australia.^[4]
March 20 – The Graf Zeppelin airship begins a regular route between Germany and South America.
March 21–22 – 1932 Deep South tornado outbreak: A series of deadly tornadoes in the United States kills more than 220 people in Alabama, 34 in Georgia and 17 in Tennessee.
March 22 – Tarzan the Ape Man premieres in New Yord City, first of the classic film series starring Johnny Weissmuller and Maureen O'Sullivan.

April

April 5
- 10,000 disgruntled Newfoundlanders march on their legislature to show discontent with their current political situation; this is a flash point in the demise of the Dominion of Newfoundland.
- The first Alko stores are opened in Finland at 10 in the morning (local time) following the end of Prohibition in that country, resulting in a new mnemonic "543210".
April 6
- U.S. president Herbert Hoover supports armament limitations at the World Disarmament Conference.
- The trial of fraudulent art dealer Otto Wacker begins in Berlin.
April 11 – 1932 German presidential election: Paul von Hindenburg is re-elected as Reichspräsident, defeating Hitler.
April 13 – German Chancellor Heinrich Brüning bans the SA and the SS as threats to public order, arguing that they are chiefly responsible for the wave of political violence afflicting Germany.^[5]
April 14 – John Cockcroft and Ernest Walton, at the Cavendish Laboratory in the University of Cambridge (England), focus a proton beam on lithium and split its nucleus ("splitting the atom").^[6]^[7]
April 17 – Haile Selassie announces an anti-slavery law in Abyssinia.
April 19 – German art dealer Otto Wacker is sentenced to 19 months in prison for selling fraudulent paintings he attributed to Vincent van Gogh.
April 25
- Gladys Elinor Watkins consecrates the carillon of the National War Memorial in New Zealand.^[8]
- The bodies of Hudhayfah ibn al-Yaman and Jabir ibn Abd Allah, two of the companions of Islamic prophet Muhammad, are moved from their graves in Salmaan Paak following a dream of King Faisal I of Iraq that they are affected by water.
April 29 – Korean pro-independence paramilitary Yun Bong-gil detonates a bomb at a gathering of Japanese government and military officials in Shanghai's Hongkou Park, killing General Yoshinori Shirakawa and injuring Mamoru Shigemitsu and Vice Admiral Kichisaburō Nomura.

May

May 6
- Paul Gorguloff shoots French president Paul Doumer in Paris; Doumer dies the next day.
- The politically powerful General Kurt von Schleicher meets secretly with Adolf Hitler.^[9] Schleicher tells Hitler that he is scheming to bring down the Brüning government in Germany and asks for Nazi support of the new "presidential government" Schleicher is planning to form.^[9] Schleicher and Hitler negotiate a "gentlemen's agreement" where in exchange for lifting the ban on the SA and SS and having the Reichstag dissolved for early elections this summer, the Nazis will support Schleicher's new chancellor.
May 10
- There are violent scenes in the German Reichstag building in Berlin as Hermann Göring and other Nazi MRDs attack the Defense Minister General Wilhelm Groener for his lack of belief in a supposed Social Democratic putsch.^[9] After the debate, General Schleicher tells Groener that he has lost the confidence of the Army and must resign at once.^[9]
- Albert Lebrun becomes the new president of France.
- James Chadwick, working at the Cavendish Laboratory in the University of Cambridge, reports the existence of the neutron.^[10]
May 12 – General Wilhelm Groener resigns as German Defense Minister.^[9] Schleicher takes control of the Defense Ministry.
May 13 – The Premier of New South Wales, Jack Lang, is dismissed by the State Governor, Sir Philip Game.
May 15 – May 15 Incident, an attempted military coup in which Japanese prime minister Tsuyoshi Inukai is assassinated by naval officers. Japanese troops leave Shanghai.
May 16 – Massive riots between Hindus and Muslims in Bombay leave thousands dead and injured.
May 20–21 – Amelia Earhart flies from the United States to County Londonderry, Northern Ireland in 14 hours 54 minutes.
May 20 – Federación Obrera de la Industria de la Carne initiates a major strike in the Argentinian meat-packing industry.
May 25 – Goofy makes his appearance in the Disney animated short Mickey's Revue.
May 26 – Judgement in Donoghue v Stevenson handed down in the House of Lords of the United Kingdom, creating the modern concept of a duty of care in British law.
May 30 – German chancellor Heinrich Brüning is dismissed by President von Hindenburg. President Hindenburg asks Franz von Papen to form a new government, known as the "Government of the President's Friends", which is openly dedicated to the destruction of democracy and the Weimar Republic. The downfall of Brüning is largely the work of Schleicher, who has been scheming against him since the beginning of May.^[5] Schleicher takes the position of Defense Minister in his friend Papen's government.

June

c. June – The Republican Citizens Committee Against National Prohibition is established for the repeal of Prohibition in the United States.
June 4
- A military coup occurs in Chile.
- The Papen government in Germany dissolves the Reichstag for elections on July 31 in the full expectation that the Nazis will win the largest number of seats.^[11]
June 14 – The Papen government lifts the ban against the SS and SA in Germany.
June 16– Lausanne conference opens to discuss reparations, which Germany had not paid since the Hoover Moratorium of June 1931.
June 20 – The Benelux customs union is negotiated.
June 24 – After a relatively bloodless military rebellion, Siam becomes a constitutional monarchy.
June 25 – India plays its first Test cricket match with England at Lord's.

July

July 5 – António de Oliveira Salazar becomes the fascist prime minister of Portugal (for the next 36 years).
July 7 – French submarine Prométhée sinks with the loss of 62 of 69 onboard on trial out of Cherbourg in the English Channel.
July 8 – The Dow Jones Industrial Average in the United States reaches its lowest level of the Great Depression, bottoming out at 41.22.
July 9
- The Constitutionalist Revolution starts in Brazil with the uprising of the state of São Paulo.
- Lausanne conference ends, agreeing to cancel World War I reparations against Germany.
July 12
- Norway annexes northern Greenland.
- Hedley Verity establishes a new first-class cricket record by taking all ten wickets for only ten runs against Nottinghamshire on a pitch affected by a storm.
July 17 – Altona Bloody Sunday: In Altona, Germany, a bloody clash with heavy police involvement occurs when Nazi marchers enter a working class area with many communist supporters; 18 are killed.^[12]
July 20 – The Preußenschlag in Germany. The political coup gives Franz von Papen control of Prussia, the most powerful state in Germany, and is a major blow to German democracy.^[13]
July 21 – The British Empire Economic Conference opens in Ottawa, Canada.
July 30
- The 1932 Summer Olympics open in Los Angeles.
- Walt Disney's Flowers and Trees, the first animated cartoon to be presented in full Technicolor, premieres in Los Angeles. It releases in theaters, along with the film version of Eugene O'Neill's Strange Interlude (starring Norma Shearer and Clark Gable); Flowers and Trees goes on to win the first Academy Award for Best Animated Short.
July 31 – July 1932 German federal election sees the Nazis become the largest party in the Reichstag, winning 37% of the vote.

August

August – A farmers' revolt begins in the Midwestern United States.
August 1
- The second International Polar Year, an international scientific collaboration, begins.
- Forrest Mars produces the first Mars bar in his Slough factory in the UK.^[14]
August 2 – The first positron is discovered by Carl D. Anderson.
August 5 – Hitler meets with Schleicher and reneges on the "gentlemen's agreement", demanding that he be appointed Chancellor.^[15] Schleicher agrees to support Hitler as Chancellor provided that he can remain minister of defense.^[16] Schleicher sets up a meeting between Hindenburg and Hitler on August 13 to discuss Hitler's possible appointment as Chancellor.
August 6
- The first Venice Film Festival is held.
- In Germany, the world's first Autobahn is opened by Konrad Adenauer (Bundesautobahn 555).
- Carl Gustaf Ekman resigns as Prime Minister of Sweden and is replaced by his Minister of Finance Felix Hamrin.
August 9 – In Germany:
- The Papen government, which likes to take a tough "law and order" stance, passes via Article 48 a law prescribing the death penalty for a variety of offenses and with the court system simplified so that the courts can hand down as many death sentences as possible.^[17]
- Potempa Murder of 1932: In the eastern town of Potempa, five Nazi "Brownshirts" break into the house of Konrad Pietrzuch, a Communist miner, and proceed to castrate and beat him to death in front of his mother.^[18]
August 10 – A 5.1 kg chondrite-type meteorite breaks into fragments and strikes earth near the town of Archie, Missouri, United States.
August 11 – To celebrate Constitution Day in Germany, Chancellor Franz von Papen and his interior minister Baron Wilhelm von Gayl present proposed amendments to the Weimar constitution for a "New State" to deal with the problems besetting Germany.^[19]
August 13 – Hitler meets President von Hindenburg and asks to be appointed as Chancellor.^[20] Hindenburg refuses under the grounds that Hitler is not qualified to be Chancellor and asks him instead to serve as Vice-Chancellor in Papen's government.^[19] Hitler announces his "all or nothing" strategy in which he will oppose any government not headed by himself and will accept no office other than Chancellor.
August 18 – Auguste Piccard reaches an altitude of 16,197 m (53,140 ft) with a hot air balloon.
August 18–19 – Scottish aviator Jim Mollison becomes the first pilot to make an East-to-West solo transatlantic flight, from Portmarnock, County Dublin, Ireland to RCAF Station Pennfield Ridge, New Brunswick, Canada, in his de Havilland Puss Moth high-wing monoplane The Heart's Content.
August 20 – The Ottawa conference ends with the adoption of Imperial Preference tariff, turning the British Empire into one economic zone with a series of tariffs meant to exclude non-empire states from competing within the markets of Britain; the Dominions; and the rest of the empire.
August 22 – Potempa murder: The five SA men involved in the torture and murder of Konrad Pietrzuch are quickly convicted and sentenced to death under the new law introduced by the Papen government.^[17] The Potempa case becomes a cause célèbre in Germany, where some maintain the death sentences are appropriate given the brutality of the torture and murder, whilst Nazis demonstrate for amnesty for the "Potempa five" on the grounds they are patriotic heroes, justified in killing the Communist Pietrzuch, and should not be executed. Hitler sends a telegram congratulating the five^[17] and they are released from jail in 1933 after he becomes Chancellor of Germany.^[21]
August 23 – The Panama Civil Aviation Authority is established.
August 30 – Hermann Göring is elected as Speaker of the German Reichstag.
August 31 – A total solar eclipse is visible from northern Canada through northeastern Vermont, New Hampshire, southwestern Maine and the Capes of Massachusetts.

September

September 2 – Despite the court's sentence of death against the "Potempa five", Chancellor von Papen in his capacity as Reich Commissioner of Prussia refuses to have them executed under the grounds that they were not aware of the emergency law at the time they committed the murder, but in reality because he is still hoping for Nazi support for his government.^[17]
September 9
- The Cortes Generales (Parliament) of the Second Spanish Republic approves the Statute of Autonomy of Catalonia which grants full autonomy for Catalonia for the first time in modern history.
- Beginning of the Chaco War between Paraguay and Bolivia because of delimitation problems and others.
September 10 – The IND Eighth Avenue Line, at this time the world's longest subway line (31 miles (50 km)), begins operation in Manhattan.^[22]
September 11
- Canadian operations end on the International Railway (New York–Ontario).
- A bronze statue of Youssef Bey Karam^[23] is erected in his memory outside the Cathedral of Saint Georges, Ehden in Lebanon.
September 12 – The very unpopular Papen government in Germany is defeated on a massive motion of no-confidence in the Reichstag. With the exceptions of the German People's Party and the German National People's Party, every party in the Reichstag votes for the no-confidence motion. Papen has Hindenburg dissolve the Reichstag for new elections in November.
September 17
- A speech by Laureano Gómez leads to the escalation of the Leticia Incident between Colombia and Peru.
- Start of the Han–Liu War over Shandong.
September 20 – Mahatma Gandhi begins a hunger strike in Poona prison, India.^[24]
September 22 – Soviet famine of 1932–33 begins; millions starve to death as a result of forced collectivization and as part of the government's effort to break rural resistance to its policies. The Soviet regime denies the famine and allows the deaths.
September 23 – The Kingdom of Hejaz and Nejd is proclaimed the Kingdom of Saudi Arabia, concluding the country's unification under the rule of King Abdulaziz.
September 24 – After his party's victory in the election to the Swedish Riksdag's second chamber, Social Democrat Per Albin Hansson becomes the new prime minister of Sweden, after Felix Hamrin.
September 27 – Ryutin Affair at its height in the Soviet Union. The Politburo meets and condemns the so-called "Ryutin Platform" and agrees to expel those associated with it from the Communist Party, but refuses Stalin's request to execute those associated with the Platform.
September 28 – The court of Helsinki sentences Vilho Kallio, Ville Saari and Ida Maria Viden to prison for the Tattarisuo mutilation case.^[25]

October

October – Hergé's Tintin in America (Tintin en Amérique) concludes serial publication and is issued in book format (in black and white) in Belgium.
October 1 – Gyula Gömbös becomes Prime Minister of Hungary, the first time a member of the radical right has become the country's head of government.
October 3 – Iraq becomes an independent kingdom under Faisal, ending the British mandate.
October 15 – Tata Airlines (later to become Air India) makes its first flight.
October 19 – Prince Gustav Adolf of Sweden marries Princess Sibylla of Saxe-Coburg and Gotha.
October 25 – George Lansbury becomes the leader of the opposition British Labour Party.^[26]

November

The Cipher Bureau (Poland) breaks the German Enigma cipher and overcomes the ever-growing structural and operating complexities of the evolving Enigma with plugboard, the main German cipher device during World War II.

November 1 – The Kennedy–Thorndike experiment is published, showing that measured time as well as length is affected by motion, in accordance with the theory of special relativity.
November 2 – The Emu War, a nuisance wildlife management military operation, begins in Australia.
November 3 – Strike by transport workers in Berlin. The Nazis and the Communists both co-operate in support of the strike. The Nazi-Communist co-operation damages the Nazis at the upcoming election with many right-wing voters switching back to the German National People's Party.
November 6 – November 1932 German federal election: The Nazis remain the largest party in the Reichstag but their share of the seats drops from 37% to 32%.
November 7 – Buck Rogers in the 25th Century debuts on American radio. It is the first science fiction program on radio.
November 8 – 1932 United States presidential election: Democratic governor of New York Franklin D. Roosevelt defeats incumbent Republican president Herbert Hoover in a landslide victory, having promised a New Deal and repeal of Prohibition.
November 9
- A hurricane and huge waves kill about 2,500 in Santa Cruz del Sur in the worst natural disaster in Cuban history.
- Geneva massacre: Military of Switzerland fire on a socialist anti-fascist demonstration in Geneva leaving 13 dead and 60 injured.
November 21 – German president Hindenburg begins negotiations with Adolf Hitler about the formation of a new government.
November 27 – The Second Eastern Women's Congress opens in Tehran, Iran.^[27]
November 30 – The Polish Cipher Bureau breaks the German Enigma cipher.

December

December 1 – Germany returns to the World Disarmament Conference after the other powers agree to accept gleichberechtigung ^{[clarification needed]} "in principle". Henceforward, it is clear that Germany will be allowed to rearm beyond the limits imposed by the Treaty of Versailles.
December 3 – Hindenburg names Kurt von Schleicher as German chancellor after he ousts Papen. Papen is deeply angry about how his former friend Schleicher has brought him down and decides that he will do anything to get back into power.
December 4 – Chancellor Schleicher meets with Gregor Strasser and offers to appoint him Vice-Chancellor and Reich Commissioner for Prussia out of the hope that if faced with a split in the NSDAP, Hitler will support his government.^[28]
December 5 – At a secret meeting of the Nazi leaders, Strasser urges Hitler to drop his "all or nothing" strategy and accept Schleicher's offer to have the Nazis serve in his cabinet.^[29] Hitler gives a dramatic speech saying that Schleicher's offer is not acceptable and he will stick to his "all or nothing" strategy whatever the consequences might be and wins the Nazi leadership over to his viewpoint.^[29]
December 8 – Gregor Strasser resigns as the chief of the NSDAP's organizational department in protest against Hitler's "all or nothing" strategy.^[30]
December 10 – The Emu War in Australia ends in failure.
December 12 – Japan and the Soviet Union reform their diplomatic connections.^{[clarification needed]}
December 19 – BBC World Service begins broadcasting as the BBC Empire Service using a shortwave radio facility at its Daventry transmitting station in England.
December 24 – 1932 Moweaqua Coal Mine disaster
December 25
- The 7.6 M_s  Changma earthquake shakes the Gansu Province in China with a maximum Mercalli intensity of X (Extreme). Two-hundred and seventy-five people are killed.
- IG Farben files a patent application in Germany for the medical application of the first sulfonamide oral antibiotic, which will be marketed as Prontosil, following Gerhard Domagk's laboratory demonstration of its properties as an antibiotic.^[31]
- King George V delivers the first Royal Christmas Message^[32] on the new BBC Empire Service radio from Sandringham House; the text has been written by Rudyard Kipling.
December 27 – The Radio City Music Hall is opened in New York City.
December 28 – The Cologne banker Kurt von Schröder, who is a close friend of Papen and a NSDAP member, meets with Adolf Hitler to tell him that Papen wants to set up a meeting to discuss how they can work together. Papen wants Nazi support to return to the Chancellorship while Hitler wants Papen to convince Hindenburg to appoint him Chancellor. Hitler agrees to meet Papen on January 3, 1933.

Date unknown

Zero-length springs are invented, revolutionizing seismometers and gravimeters.
British geneticist J. B. S. Haldane publishes The Causes of Evolution, unifying the findings of Mendelian genetics with those of evolutionary science.
The heath hen becomes extinct in North America.
Walter B. Pitkin publishes Life Begins at Forty in the United States.
SPAR, the global retail brand, is founded in Zegwaart, Netherlands.^[33]
Unemployment in the United States – ca. 33% – 14 million. A similar level of unemployment affects Germany. Many people in depressed countries do not receive unemployment benefit due to governments not being able to afford benefit payments.^[34]

Births

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Births
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