TheRose Bowl football game, at the time the only postseason bowl game in the U.S., was played before 40,000 spectators between theWashington Huskies (who had an 8-1-0 record and were selected by the Rose Bowl Committee despite having lost to the unbeatenCalifornia Golden Bears) and theNavy Midshipmen (a 5-1-2 team whom the Huskies had been allowed to pick as their opponent). The teams played to a 14–14 tie after Washington tied the game with a fourth quarter touchdown.[1]
During a New Year's Day party at the home of millionaire oil broker Courtland S. Dines, the chauffeur of actressMabel Normand shot and wounded Dines in the abdomen with a pistol belonging to Normand. When police arrived they found Normand and fellow actressEdna Purviance in the kitchen frantically insisting they didn't know how Dines came to be shot. Alcohol was found on the premises (illegal at the time underProhibition), and the whole episode caused a scandal which caused some exhibitors to pull Purviance's filmA Woman of Paris from theaters.[2][3]
Primary railway stations in Paris closed as the water level of theSeine rose due to flooding.[6]
The Bulgarian government gave former KingFerdinand, who had been living in exile since 1918, permission to return toSofia. TheKingdom of Yugoslavia immediately sent an ultimatum objecting to the move.[7]
Clara Abbott, 66, American business executive and the first woman to serve on the board of directors of a major U.S. corporation. She was on the board ofAbbott Laboratories from 1900 to 1908 and again from 1911 until her death.[8]
Germany issued an emergency decree known as theEmminger Reform, best known for abolishing thejury system in court proceedings and replacing it with a mixed system of judges.
Factories and mines in theRuhr region shut down as laborers refused to work ten hours a day.[17]
In the U.S., 19-year-oldCelia Cooney began a string of armed robberies, starting with the Thomas Ralston Grocery inBrooklyn, where she walked out with $680 and left in a car driven by her husband Ed Cooney. Dubbed "The Bobbed Hair Bandit" by the New York press, Celia continued working with Ed until both were arrested on April 20.[18][19][20]
Turkish PresidentMustafa Kemal Atatürk survived a bomb attack, but his wifeLatife Uşşaki was injured.[6] The assailant visited Atatürk's home and asked to see him, then threw a bomb when he appeared.[21]
The French government gave the Catholic Church the right to reoccupy its former property under the "diocesan associations" system.[22]
TheFédération Internationale de Hockey (FIH) was founded inParis by representatives offield hockey of Austria, Belgium, Czechoslovakia, France, Hungary, Spain, and Switzerland, with Paul Léautey as its first president.[23] A century later, the FIH would govern the rules of field hockey and oversee 140 national associations.
Mexican rebels captured the oil port city ofTampico.[24]
The Soviet newspaperPravda reported thatLeon Trotsky was ill, a statement which the rank and file took to mean as a sign of his imminent removal.[25]
United KingdomLabour Party leaderRamsay MacDonald gave a speech at a packedRoyal Albert Hall where he announced that Labour would accept office as soon as it was invited to do so, though it would be taking over a "bankrupt estate". MacDonald pledged to run the country along sound economic lines, make efforts through theLeague of Nations to retain peace in Europe, and end the "pompous folly" of refusing torecognize the Soviet Union.[26]
Born:Ron Moody, English stage and film actor known for his portrayal ofFagin in the 1968 film musicalOliver! and the 1983 Broadway revival; actor, inTottenham,Middlesex (d. 2015)
Mary Kaye (stage name for Malia Ka'aihue), American guitarist and performer, inHawaii (d. 2007)
Died:Franz Josef Heinz, 39, German separatist former leader of the "Autonomous Palatinate" in association with theRhenish Republic, was assassinated inSpeyer by 20 members of the German nationalist paramilitary group, theViking League. The attack on the dining room of the Wittelsbacher Hof also killed a hotel guest and an employee, while two of the assassins died in a shootout.[29]
All 43 crew of the British submarineHMS L24 were killed when the sub sank after a collision with the battleshipHMS Resolution in a training exercise in the English Channel.[30][31]
In theoccupied Rhineland, France imposed a curfew and closed the borders between the occupied section and the rest of Germany, permitting no traffic in or out except for railroad business and food supplies and a curfew was imposed. The move came amid fears of a new separatist coup attempt after the murder ofFranz Josef Heinz the previous day.[33] Relations between Britain and France became strained when FrenchPrime MinisterRaymond Poincaré refused to allow British officials into the occupied Rhineland to conduct their own investigation of the separatist movement there.[33]
Born:
Earl Bakken, American inventor who created (in 1957) the first wearable artificial pacemaker, developed by his company Meditronic; inColumbia Heights, Minnesota (d. 2018)
Marilyn Cotlow, American opera singer known for starring in the original Broadway production of Gian Carlo Menotti's 1947,The Telephone; inMinneapolis (d. 2024).
Died:Peter MacQueen, 60, U.S. war correspondent, church pastor and adventurer, died one day before his 61st birthday.[34]
Mexican mountaineer irregulars loyal to PresidentObregón recapturedOaxaca City from the rebels.[36]
France rejected a British-backed proposal to arrange aLeague of Nations committee to investigate separatism in the Rhineland Palatinate. Prime MinisterPoincaré insisted it was strictly the business of the countries directly involved in administrating the region.[37]
Bengali activistGopinath Saha shot a man he thought wasCalcutta police commissionerCharles Tegart, but learned that he had killed a different Englishman, Ernest Day, instead. Saha was sentenced to death for the crime and hanged on March 1.[38]
The second stage ofEgypt's first election for parliament took place as 38,000 electors (who had been selected in September 27) cast their votes for candidates for the 215 members of the Chamber of Deputies and 147 members of the Egyptian Senate. TheWafd Party, led by exiled nationalistSaad Zaghloul, won 188 of the 215 seats available in the Chamber, with only 27 seats for the independent candidates, prompting the resignation of Prime Minister Ibrahim Pasha.[40]
A long meeting between British ambassadorCrewe and Prime MinisterPoincaré over the Rhineland separatism issue was said to be unproductive.[41]
The American Communist newspaperThe Worker changed its name toDaily Worker.[42]
TheChicago Daily Tribune announced a nationwide contest to name the new general interest magazine the paper's owners were planning to launch in the spring. The winner would receive a $20,000 cash prize. The entry eventually chosen would beLiberty.[43]
Britain began an independent investigation into the Rhineland separatist movement, against the wishes of France.[41]
Born:
Guy Williams (stage name for Armando Catalano), American TV actor known as the star ofZorro 1957-1959 and ofLost in Space (1965-1968); in New York City (d. 1989)
Luther Emmett Holt, 68, American pediatrician, author of the best selling booksThe Care and Feeding of Children andDiseases of Infancy and Childhood
Howard R. Hughes Sr., 54, American inventor who founded theHughes Tool Company and became wealthy as the developer of the two-cone rotary Sharp-Hughes Rock Bit for drilling of oil wells, died of a heart attack.
The French Cabinet drafted a plan to stabilize thefranc, which had lost more than three-quarters of its pre-war value. The plan called for many tax hikes and a reduction in civil servants.[48]
SMSBerlin became the first German Navy warship since the 1918 end of World War One to embark on an overseas voyage, departingKiel on a two-month tour of the islands of the North Atlantic Ocean, before returning on March 18.[49]
Argentine engineerRaúl Pateras Pescara broke his own record forhelicopter flight when he kept his model 2F aloft in the air for 8 minutes and 13.8 seconds atIssy-les-Moulineaux near Paris. It flew in a straight line almost three-quarters of a mile[50] at an altitude of about fifteen feet.[51]
At around 7:00 in the evening, the American dirigibleShenandoah broke free of its mooring mast inLakehurst, New Jersey during a raging gale and began drifting with 22 men aboard.[54] The airship was brought back under control and lowered into the hangar around 3:20 the next morning.[54]
Born:Katy Jurado, Mexican film actress who was one of the first Latin American actresses to become popular in U.S. film, and 1952 Golden Globe Award winner forHigh Noon; inGuadalajara (d. 2002)
The most popular song of 1924, "California, Here I Come", was recorded byAl Jolson and the Isham Jones Orchestra at the Brunswick Records studio in Chicago.[56]
Conflicting accounts arose as to the whereabouts ofLeon Trotsky amid rumors he had been arrested.[57] He was in fact traveling to theBlack Sea to convalesce from illness.[25]
A Soviet party conference ended with the passing of a resolution blaming Trotsky for divisions within theCommunist Party.Joseph Stalin attacked Trotsky in a withering speech accusing him of sowing dissent.[25][58]
A preliminary hearing into the New Year's Day shooting of Courtland Dines began in Los Angeles.[3]Edna Purviance testified that she was not present in the room when the shooting occurred.[59]
U.S. Secretary of the NavyEdwin Denby testified before the House Naval Affairs Committee in support of an expedition to the Arctic by the airshipUSS Shenandoah, to claim any undiscovered land. "This area is certain to be of high strategic value if we look forward to warfare and commerce in the future", he said.[61]
The short story "The Most Dangerous Game" byRichard Connell appeared in the popular weekly magazineCollier's.[62] The tale of a big game hunter who becomes the human prey of another hunter, the story was made into a film in 1932, and the plot of the "hunter becoming the hunted" would beadapted numerous times in film, radio and television. Connell's work has been described as "the most popular short story ever written in English."[62]
Mexican rebels capturedVillahermosa, capital of the Mexican state ofTabasco.[63] GovernorTomás Garrido Canabal was able to escape and the rebels installed Manuel Antonio Romero as the new Governor of Tabasco.
Vladimir Lenin, the semi-retired founder and leader of the Soviet Union and thede facto leader of the USSR as First Secretary of the Soviet Communist Party,died at his estate inGorki at 18:50 hrs Moscow time following a stroke.[25][65] Top Soviet leaders were convening at the Eleventh All-Russia Congress of Soviets at theBolshoi Theatre when news of Lenin's death was communicated by telephone, and an eyewitness reported never seeing so many men in tears.[25]
At midnight, 60,000 rail workers went on strike in the United Kingdom to protest a recent reduction in wages ordered by the National Wage Board. British newspapers with nationwide distribution arranged fleets of trucks to maintain their circulations during the work stoppage.[69]
Mabel Normand and Courtland S. Dines testified in the New Year's Day shooting case when the court convened in the hospital where they were staying (Normand was there with an inflamed appendix). Both of them claimed to be unable to remember much about the incident.[70][71][72]
Madhu Dandavate, Indian physicist and modernized the railroad system of India while serving as Minister of Railways (1977 to 1979) and later became India's Minister of Finance; inAhmednagar,Bombay Province (now in Maharashtra state), British India (d. 2005)
Benny Hill (stage name for Alfred Hawthorne Hill), English comedian and TV actor known for his risque syndicated program, winner of twoEmmy Awards for outstanding variety; inSouthampton (d. 1992)
Died:Vladimir Lenin, 53, Russian Communist and leader of the Soviet Union since 1918
A complete autopsy was conducted on Vladimir Lenin's body. Acerebral hemorrhage was given as the cause of death.[25][65] The brain was subsequently removed for study, as part of a directive that had been issued by Lenin, and a detailed, two-year study would begin at the Brain Research Institute in Moscow on January 24, under the direction of a German neurologist, Dr.Oskar Vogt.[75]
U.S. PresidentCalvin Coolidge announced that he would appoint special counsel from both parties to prosecute any criminal wrongdoing in theTeapot Dome scandal.[84]
The Soviet Union announced that the city ofPetrograd (which had been Saint Petersburg until World War One) had been renamedLeningrad.[85] In 1991, voters in Russia would elect to return the city to its original name ofSaint Petersburg.[86]
An explosion killed 36 miners at the Lancashire No. 18 Mine in Shanktown, Pennsylvania, located inIndiana County.[87]
In the French West African colony ofSenegal,Mahecor Joof was crowned as the lastKing of Sine (Maad a Sinig) at a ceremony inDiakhao, and would be permitted limited authority to reign until his death on August 3, 1969.[90]
Supported by theMexican Air Force (Fuerza Aérea Mexicana), Mexican federal troops won a hard-fought battle forEsperanza in the state ofPuebla. The battle was one of the turning points of theDelahuertista Rebellion, the attempt by former PresidentAdolfo de la Huerta to overthrow PresidentÁlvaro Obregón.Ralph O'Neill, a Mexican-born American with dual citizenship and a veteran pilot for the U.S. in World War One, led a counterattack against the insurgents withstrafing runs by the FAM's De Havilland DH-4B combat aircraft, which had been purchased when De la Huerta had been president.[92][93]
Japanese Prime MinisterKiyoura Keigo dissolved theNational Diet and called for new elections. A brawl broke out during the morning session over accusations that the government had failed to protect a train that prominent opposition leaders were riding on when it was pelted with rocks and timbers.[98]
Former U.S. PresidentWoodrow Wilson was reported to be seriously ill with a digestive disorder.[99]
Twenty-four days after the death of his wife, Prussian state executioner Paul Spaethe dressed in formal evening wear, lit 45 candles – one for each person he had beheaded – and committed suicide with a revolver.[6][100][101]
^"Annual East-West Football Battle Ends In 14-14 Tie", by Walter Eckersall,Detroit Free Press, January 2, 1924, p.16
^Baxter, John (2010).Von Sternberg. University Press of Kentucky. pp. 55–56.ISBN978-0-8131-2601-2.
^abMilton, Joyce (1998).Tramp: The Life of Charlie Chaplin. Da Capo Press. pp. 221–223.ISBN0-306-80831-5.
^"What it Means to Be a Book Publisher at 29: What Simon and Schuster Have Found Out in Their Pursuit of Best Sellers"], by Beatrice Barmby,McClure's magazine (October 1927) p.62
^Cornyn, John (January 2, 1924). "Mexico Rebels Trap 2,000 Men, Battle 2 Days".Chicago Daily Tribune. p. 1.
^abcdeMercer, Derrik (1989).Chronicle of the 20th Century. London: Chronicle Communications Ltd. p. 314.ISBN978-0-582-03919-3.
^Fendrick, Raymond (January 2, 1924). "Ultimatum to Bulgars Sent by Jugo-Slavs".Chicago Daily Tribune. p. 1.
^Holston, Kim R. (2013).Movie Roadshows: A History and Filmography of Reserved-Seat Limited Showings, 1911–1973. Jefferson, North Carolina: McFarland & Company, Inc. p. 35.ISBN978-0-7864-6062-5.
^"Balkan Clash Near on Former King Ferdinand".Chicago Daily Tribune. January 5, 1924. p. 1.
^Wilhelm Kreutz and Karl Scherer,Die Pfalz unter französischer Besetzung ("The Palatinate under French occupation")(Bezirksverband Pfalz, 1999) p.72
^Steele, John (January 11, 1924). "Locate Wreck of Submarine".Chicago Daily Tribune. p. 1.
^"British Give Up Hope of Saving Any on Submarine".Chicago Daily Tribune. January 13, 1924. p. 16.
^Bernard F. Dick,Columbia Pictures: Portrait of a Studio (University Press of Kentucky, 1992)
^abClayton, John (January 11, 1924). "Allies Resume Check on German Military Moves".Chicago Daily Tribune. p. 4.
^"Peter MacQueen Dies at Boothbay Harbor,"Boston Globe, January 11, 1924
^Cornyn, John (January 12, 1924). "Obregon Troops Open Battle for Rebel Tuxpam".Chicago Daily Tribune. p. 7.
^Cornyn, John (January 13, 1924). "Loyal Mountaineers Drive Mexican Rebels from Town".Chicago Daily Tribune. p. 16.
^Clayton, John (January 13, 1924). "Allied Officers Hunting German Arms Face Mob".Chicago Daily Tribune. p. 16.
^Sengupta, Nitish K. (2011).Land of Two Rivers: A History of Bengal from the Mahabharata to Mujib. London: Penguin Books. p. 342.ISBN978-0-14-341678-4.
^Steele, John (January 16, 1924). "King's Ermine Rubs Tweeds of Socialism".Chicago Daily Tribune. p. 1.
^Wales, Henry (January 16, 1924). "France Boosts Taxes to Stem Finance Crash".Chicago Daily Tribune. p. 1.
^Hans H. Hildebrand, et al.,Die Deutschen Kriegsschiffe, Biographien: Ein Spiegel der Marinegeschichte von 1815 bis zur Gegenwart (The German Warships, Biographies: A Reflection of Naval History from 1815 to the Present) (Mundus Verlag, 1993) pp.56-59
^Louis Diène Faye,Mort et Naissance le monde Sereer ("Death and Birth in the Sereer world") (Les Nouvelles Éditions Africaines, 1983. (ISBN 2-7236-0868-9). p.59
^"$100,000 Voted for Coolidge to Strain Oil Dregs".Chicago Daily Tribune. January 29, 1924. p. 4.
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