Year 1939 (MCMXXXIX) was a common year starting on Sunday (link will display the full calendar) of the Gregorian calendar.

Events of 1939

January

• January 1 - The Hewlett-Packard Company is founded.
• January 1 - Texas A&M University wins its first football national championship.
• January 2 - Frank Finley Merriam, 28th Governor of California, is succeeded by Culbert Levy Olson.
• January 5 - Amelia Earhart is officially declared dead after her disappearance.
• January 6 - Naturwissenschaften publishes evidence that nuclear fission has been achieved by Otto Hahn.
• January 13 - Black Friday: 71 people die across Victoria in one of Australia's worst ever bushfires.
• January 23 - -Dutch War Scare-: Admiral Wilhelm Canaris of the Abwehr leaks misinformation to the effect that Germany plans to invade the Netherlands in February, with the aim of using Dutch air-fields to launch a strategic bombing offensive against Britain. The -Dutch War Scare- leads to a major change in British policies towards Europe.
• January 24 - An earthquake kills 30,000 in Chile, and razes about 50,000 sq mi (130,000 km²).
• January 26 - Spanish Civil War: Spanish Nationalist troops, aided by Italy, take Barcelona.
• January 26 - In Paris, French Foreign Minister Georges Bonnet, in response to rumours (which are true) that he is seeking to end the French alliance system in Eastern Europe, gives a speech highlighting his government's commitment to the cordon sanitaire.
• January 27 - Adolf Hitler orders Plan Z, a 5-year naval expansion programme intended to provide for a huge German fleet capable of crushing the Royal Navy by 1944. The Kriegsmarine is given the first priority on the allotment of German economic resources. (the first and only time the Kriegsmarine is given first priority in the history of the Third Reich).
• January 30 - Hitler gives a speech before the Reichstag calling for an "export battle" to increase German foreign exchange holdings. The same speech also sees Hitler's „prophecy“ where he warns that if "Jewish financers" start a war against Germany, the "...result will be the annihilation of the Jewish race in Europe".

February

February 21: Golden Gate International Exposition opens.

• February 2 - Hungary joins the Anti-Comintern Pact.
• February 6
  • British Prime Minister Neville Chamberlain states in the House of Commons that any German attack on France will be automatically considered an attack on Britain.
  • In a response to Georges Bonnet's speech of January 26th, German Foreign Minister Joachim von Ribbentrop, referring to Bonnet-s alleged statement of December 6, 1938 accepting Eastern Europe as being in Germany-s exclusive sphere of influence, protests that all French security commitments in that region are -now off limits-.
• February 10 - Spanish Nationalists complete their offensive in Catalonia.
• February 21 - The Golden Gate International Exposition opens in San Francisco, California.
• February 27
  • The United Kingdom and France recognize Franco's government.
  • Borley Rectory in England burns.
  • Sit-down strikes are outlawed by the Supreme Court of the United States.
• February 28 - The first issue of the Serbian weekly magazine Politikin Zabavnik is published.

March

• March - The 1936-1939 Arab revolt in Palestine ends.
• March 1 - A Japanese Imperial Army ammunition dump explosion on the outskirts of Osaka kills 94.
• March 2 - Pope Pius XII (Cardinal Pacelli) succeeds Pope Pius XI as the 260th pope.
• March 3
  • In Bombay, Mohandas Gandhi begins to fast in protest of the autocratic rule in India.
  • Students at Harvard University demonstrate the new tradition of swallowing goldfish to reporters.
• March 13 - Hitler advises Jozef Tiso to declare Slovakia's independence in order to prevent its partition by Hungary and Poland.
• March 14 - The Slovak provincial assembly proclaims independence; priest Jozef Tiso becomes the president of the independent Slovak government.
• March 15 - German troops occupy the remaining part of Bohemia and Moravia; Czechoslovakia ceases to exist. The Ruthenian region of Czechoslovakia declares independence as Carpatho-Ukraine.
• March 16
  • Princess Fawzia of Egypt marries Shah Mohammad Reza Pahlavi of Iran.
  • Hungary invades Carpatho-Ukraine; final resistance ends on March 18.
• March 17 - British Prime Minister Neville Chamberlain gives a speech in Birmingham, stating that Britain will oppose any effort at world domination on the part of Germany.
• March 18 - -Romanian War Scare-: Virgil Tilea, the Romanian Minister in London, spreads false rumours that Romania is on the verge of a German attack.
• March 20 - At an emergency meeting in London to deal with the Romanian crisis, French Foreign Minister Georges Bonnet suggests to Lord Halifax that the ideal state for saving Romania from a German attack is Poland.
• March 22 - After an ultimatum of March 20, Nazi Germany takes Memelland from Lithuania.
• March 23 - The Slovak-Hungarian War begins.
• March 25 - The second cartoon to feature Happy Rabbit, Prest-O Change-O, is released.
• March 26 - The Philadelphia Story, a comedy by Philip Barry starring Katharine Hepburn, debuts at the Shubert Theater in New York City.
• March 28
  • Dictator Francisco Franco assumes power in Madrid.
  • American adventurer Richard Halliburton delivers a last message from a Chinese junk, before he disappears on a voyage across the Pacific Ocean.
• March 31 - Neville Chamberlain gives a speech in the House of Commons offering the British "guarantee" of the independence of Poland.

April

• April 1 - The Spanish Civil War comes to an end when the last of the Republican forces surrender.
• April 3 - Adolf Hitler orders the German military to start planning for Fall Weiss, the codename for the invasion of Poland.
• April 4
  • Faisal II becomes King of Iraq.
  • The Slovak-Hungarian War ends with Slovakia ceding eastern territories to Hungary.
• April 7 - Italy invades Albania; King Zog flees.
• April 9 - African-American singer Marian Anderson performs before 75,000 people at the Lincoln Memorial in Washington, D.C., after having been denied the use both of Constitution Hall by the Daughters of the American Revolution, and of a public high school by the federally-controlled District of Columbia.
• April 11 - Hungary leaves the League of Nations.
• April 13 - Britain offers a "guarantee" to Romania and Greece.
• April 14
  • John Steinbeck's novel The Grapes of Wrath is first published.
  • At a meeting in Paris, French Foreign Minister Georges Bonnet meets with Soviet Ambassador Jakob Suritz, and suggests that a -peace front- comprising France, the Soviet Union, Great Britain, Poland and Romania would deter Germany from war.
• April 18 - The Soviet Union proposes a "peace front" to resist aggression.
• April 20 - Billie Holiday records "Strange Fruit", the first anti-lynching song.
• April 27 - Ely Racecourse in Cardiff closes.
• April 28 - In a speech before the Reichstag, Adolf Hitler renounces the Anglo-German Naval Agreement and the German-Polish Non-Aggression Pact.
• April 30 - The 1939 New York World's Fair opens.

May

• May 2 - Batman, created by Bob Kane (and, unofficially, Bill Finger) makes his first appearance in a comic book.
• May 2 - Major League Baseball's Lou Gehrig, the legendary Yankee first baseman known as "The Iron Horse", ends his 2,130 consecutive games played streak after contracting amyotrophic lateral sclerosis. The record stands for 56 years before Cal Ripken, Jr. plays 2,131 consecutive games.
• May 3
  • Vyacheslav Molotov succeeds Maxim Litvinov as Soviet Foreign Commissar.
  • The All India Forward Bloc is formed by Netaji Subhash Chandra Bose.
• May 6 - Carl Friedrich Goerdeler tells the British government that the German and Soviet governments are secretly beginning a rapprochement with the aim of dividing Eastern Europe between them. Goerdeler also informs the British of German economic problems which he states threaten the survival of the Nazi regime, and advises that if a firm stand is made for Poland, then Hitler will be deterred from war.
• May 7 - Spain leaves the League of Nations.
• May 17-
  • King George VI and Queen Elizabeth arrive in Quebec City to begin the first-ever tour of Canada by Canada's monarch.
  • The British government issues the White Paper of 1939, sharply restricting Jewish immigration to the Palestine Mandate.
  • Sweden, Norway, and Finland refuse Germany's offer of non-aggression pacts.
• May 20 - Pan-American Airways begins trans-Atlantic mail service with the inaugural flight of its Yankee Clipper from Port Washington, New York.
• May 22 - Germany and Italy sign the Pact of Steel.
• May 29 - Northamptonshire gains (over Leicestershire at Northampton) their first victory for 99 matches, easily a record in the County Championship. Their last Championship victory was as far back as 14 May 1935 over Somerset at Taunton.

June

June 24: Siam is renamed "Thailand"

• June 3 - The Soviet government offers its definition of what constitutes "aggression", upon which the projected Anglo-Soviet-French alliance will come into effect. The French Foreign Minister Georges Bonnet accepts the Soviet definition of aggression at once. The British reject the Soviet definition, especially the concept of "indirect aggression", which they feel is too loose a definition and phrased in such a manner as to imply the Soviet right of inference in the internal affairs of nations of Eastern Europe.
• June 4 - The S.S. St. Louis, a ship carrying a cargo of 907 Jewish refugees, is denied permission to land in Florida after already having been turned away from Cuba. Forced to return to Europe, most of its passengers later die in Nazi death camps during the Holocaust.
• June 12 - The National Baseball Hall of Fame and Museum is officially dedicated in Cooperstown, New York.
• June 14 - Tientsin Incident: The Japanese blockade the British concession in Tianjin, China, beginning a crisis which almost causes an Anglo-Japanese war in the summer of 1939.
• June 17 - In the last public guillotining in France, murderer Eugen Weidmann is decapitated by the guillotine.
• June 23 - Talks are completed in Ankara between French Ambassador René Massigli and Turkish Foreign Minister “ükrü Saraco-lu, resolving the Hatay dispute in Turkey's favor. Turkey annexes Hatay.
• June 24 - The government of Siam changes its name to Thailand, which means 'Free Land'.^[1]

July

• July 2 - The 1st World Science Fiction Convention opens in New York City.
• July 4
  • Lou Gehrig gives his last public speech, following his diagnosis of amyotrophic lateral sclerosis (ALS). In it, he states, "Today, I consider myself the luckiest man on the face of the earth."
  • The Neuengamme concentration camp becomes autonomous.
• July 6 - The last remaining Jewish enterprises in Germany are closed by the Nazis.

August

• August 2 - Albert Einstein writes President Franklin Roosevelt about developing the atomic bomb using uranium. This leads to the creation of the Manhattan Project.
• August 15 - MGM's classic musical film version of The Wizard of Oz, starring Judy Garland, Ray Bolger, Jack Haley and Bert Lahr, premieres at Grauman's Chinese Theatre in Hollywood. Winner of 3 Academy Awards, it does not do quite as well as hoped on first release, but years later, after 2 theatrical re-releases, grows to legendary status with its annual showings on TV.
• August 20 - Armored forces under the command of Soviet General Georgi Zhukov deliver a decisive defeat to Japanese Imperial Army forces in the Japanese-Soviet border war in Inner Mongolia. Although largely unnoticed in the West, this event enhances Soviet military prestige in the East, leading to the Japanese-Soviet non-aggression pact of 1941, and increases German motivation to conclude a non-aggression pact with the Russians before invading Poland.
• August 23 - Molotov-Ribbentrop Pact: Hitler and Stalin agree to divide Europe between themselves (Finland, Estonia, Latvia and eastern Poland to the USSR; Lithuania and western Poland to Germany).
• August 25 -
  • Adolf Hitler postpones Fall Weiss for 5 days, due to a message from Benito Mussolini that he will not honor the Pact of Steel if Germany attacks Poland in 1939, and to the failure of Chamberlain's government to fall because of the German-Soviet Non-Aggression Pact.
  • An IRA bomb explodes in the centre of Coventry, England, killing 5 people.
• August 26 - The Kriegsmarine orders all German-flagged merchant ships to head to German ports immediately in anticipation of the invasion of Poland.
• August 27 - A Heinkel 178, the first turbojet-powered aircraft, flies for the first time with Captain Erich Warsitz in command.
• August 30 - Poland begins a mobilization against Nazi Germany.

September

Wielu“ destroyed by Luftwaffe bombing the 1st of September 1939

• September - 10 million unemployed in the USA.
• September 1 - World War II: Nazi Germany invades Poland, beginning World War II in Europe.
• September 1 - The German navy fires on Danzig.
• September 1 - Norway, Finland, Sweden, and Switzerland declare their neutrality.
• September 2 - Following the invasion of Poland, Danzig (now Gda“sk, Poland) is annexed to Nazi Germany.
• September 2 - Spain and Ireland declare their neutrality.
• September 3 - World War II: The United Kingdom, France, New Zealand and Australia declare war on Germany.
• September 4 - World War II: Nepal declares war on Germany.
• September 5 - World War II: The United States declares its neutrality in the war.
• September 6 - World War II: South Africa declares war on Germany.
• September 10 - World War II: Canada declares war on Germany.
• September 16 - A ceasefire ends the undeclared Border War between The Soviet Union (and Mongolian allies) and Japan.
• September 17 - The Soviet Union invades Poland and then occupies eastern Polish territories.
• September 21 - Radio station WJSV in Washington, D.C. records an entire broadcast day for preservation in the National Archives.
• September 27 - World War II: Warsaw surrenders to Germany; Modlin surrenders a day later; the last Polish large operational unit surrenders near Kock 8 days later.

October

• October 8 - World War II: Germany annexes Western Poland.
• October 11 - Manhattan Project: U.S. President Franklin D. Roosevelt is presented a letter signed by Albert Einstein, urging the United States to rapidly develop the atomic bomb.
• October 12 - Jüri Uluots becomes prime minister of Estonia.
• October 14 - The German U-Boat U-47 sinks the British battleship HMS Royal Oak.
• October 15 - The New York Municipal Airport (later renamed La Guardia Airport) is dedicated.
• October 24 - Nylon stockings go on sale for the first time anywhere in Wilmington, Delaware.
• October 25 - The Time of Your Life, a drama by William Saroyan, debuts in New York City.

November

November 6: Hedda Hopper

• November 4 - World War II: U.S. President Franklin D. Roosevelt orders the United States Customs Service to implement the Neutrality Act of 1939, allowing cash-and-carry purchases of weapons to non-belligerent nations.
• November 6
  • Hedda Hopper's Hollywood debuts on radio with Hollywood gossip columnist Hedda Hopper as host (the show runs until 1951, making Hopper a powerful figure in the Hollywood elite).
  • World War II - Sonderaktion Krakau: Germans take action against scientists from the University of Kraków and other Kraków universities at the beginning of World War II.
• November 8
  • Venlo Incident: Two British agents of SIS are captured by the Germans.
  • In Munich, Adolf Hitler narrowly escapes an assassination attempt by Georg Elser while celebrating the 16th anniversary of the Beer Hall Putsch.
• November 15 - In Washington, D.C., U.S. President Franklin D. Roosevelt lays the cornerstone of the Jefferson Memorial.
• November 16 - Al Capone is released from Alcatraz.
• November 17 - To punish protests against the Nazi occupation of the Czech homeland, the Nazis murder 9 Czech graduate students, send over 1200 to concentration camps, and close all Czech universities.
• November 30 - Winter War: Soviet forces attack Finland and reach the Mannerheim Line, starting the war.
• November 30 - Sweden declares non-belligerency in the Winter War.

December

December 15: Gone with the Wind premieres.

• December 2 - La Guardia Airport opens for business in New York City.
• December 12 - World War II HMS Duchess sinks after a collision with HMS Barham off the coast of Scotland with the loss of 124 men.
• December 13 - World War II - Battle of the River Plate: The German pocket battleship, Admiral Graf Spee is trapped by cruisers HMS Ajax, HMNZS Achilles, and HMS Exeter after a running battle off the coast of Uruguay. Admiral Graf Spee is scuttled by its crew off Montevideo harbor on December 17.
• December 14 - The League of Nations expels the USSR for attacking Finland.
• December 15 - The film version of Gone with the Wind, starring Vivien Leigh, Clark Gable, Olivia de Havilland and Leslie Howard, premieres at Loew's Grand Theatre in Atlanta, Georgia.
• December 26 - Miners strike in Borinage, Belgium.
• December 27 - The 1939 Erzincan earthquake in Eastern Anatolia, Turkey, kills 30,000.
• December 31 - The Hunchback of Notre Dame, the first sound film version of the Victor Hugo classic, is released by RKO. It stars Charles Laughton as Quasimodo the hunchback, and Maureen O'Hara as Esmerelda the gypsy.

Undated

• CBS Television begins transmission.
• Kirlian photography is invented by Semyon Kirlian.
• A logging crew sets off a second forest fire in the Tillamook Burn, which destroys 190,000 acres (769 km²).
• Sandia View Academy, a private Adventist school, is founded in Corrales, New Mexico,
• General Motors introduces the Hydra-Matic drive, the first mass-produced, fully automatic transmission, as an option in 1940 model year Oldsmobile automobiles.

Ongoing

• Spanish Civil War (1936-1939)
• Sino-Japanese War (1937-1945)
• The Great Depression (1929-The Late 1930s, early 1940s)
• World War II (1939-1945)

Births

January-February

• January 3
  • Bobby Hull, Canadian hockey player
  • Ruben Reyes, Filipino Supreme Court jurist
• January 6 - Valeri Lobanovsky, Ukrainian footballer and manager (d. 2002)
• January 6 - Murray Rose, Australian swimmer
• January 9 - Jimmy Boyd, American singer, musician and actor
• January 9 - Malcolm Bricklin, American automotive pioneer
• January 10
  • Sal Mineo, American actor (d. 1976)
  • Bill Toomey, American athlete
• January 11 - Ann Heggtveit, Canadian skier
• January 12 - William Lee Golden, American country and gospel singer, member of the Oak Ridge Boys
• January 17 - Maury Povich, American talk show host
• January 17 - Archbishop Christodoulos of Greece
• January 18 - James Gritz, U.S. Presidential candidate
• January 19 - Phil Everly, American rock 'n' roll musician (Everly Brothers)
• January 20 - Chandra Wickramasinghe, British astronomer and poet
• January 22 - Ray Stevens, American musician (The Streak)
• January 29 - Germaine Greer, Australian feminist writer
• February 1 - Paul Gillmor, American politician (d. 2007)
• February 6 - Mike Farrell, American actor (M*A*S*H)
• February 10
  • Adrienne Clarkson, 26th Governor General of Canada
  • Peter Purves, British actor and television presenter
• February 12 - Ray Manzarek, American keyboardist (The Doors)
• February 13 - Beate Klarsfeld, German-born Nazi hunter
• February 16 - Adolfo Azcuna, Filipino Supreme Court jurist
• February 20 - Frank Arundel, English footballer
• February 21 - Gert Neuhaus, German artist
• February 27 - David Mitton, British producer, director, model maker, and author (d. 2008)
• February 28 - Daniel C. Tsui, Chinese-born physicist, Nobel Prize laureate
• February 28 - Tommy Tune, American dancer, choreographer, and actor

March-April

• March 1 - Leo Brouwer, Cuban composer and guitarist
• March 4
  • Jack Fisher, former American Major League baseball pitcher
  • Paula Prentiss, American actress
  • Carlos Vereza, Brazilian actor
• March 8 - Robert Tear, Welsh tenor
• March 12 - Johnny Callison, American baseball player (d. 2006)
• March 13 - Neil Sedaka, American singer (Breaking Up Is Hard To Do)
• March 14 - Raymond J. Barry, American actor
• March 17 - Jim Gary, American sculptor (d. 2006)
• March 20 - Brian Mulroney, 18th Prime Minister of Canada
• March 31
  • Zviad Gamsakhurdia, President of Georgia (d. 1993)
  • Volker Schlöndorff, German film director
• April 2 - Marvin Gaye, African-American singer (What's Goin' On) (d. 1984)
• April 4 - Hugh Masakela, South African musician
• April 7
  • Francis Ford Coppola, American film director (The Godfather)
  • David Frost, English television personality
• April 13 - Seamus Heaney, Irish writer, Nobel Prize laureate
• April 13 - Paul Sorvino, American actor
• April 16 - Dusty Springfield, English singer (d. 1999)
• April 20 - Elspeth Ballantyne, Australian actress
• April 22 - Jason Miller, American playwright and actor (d. 2001)
• April 23 - Lee Majors, American actor (The Six Million Dollar Man)
• April 25 - Ted Kooser, U.S. Poet Laureate
• April 27 - Erik Pevernagie, Belgian painter

May-June

• May 1 - Judy Collins, American singer and songwriter (Both Sides Now)
• May 7
  • Sidney Altman, Canadian-born chemist, Nobel Prize laureate
  • Ruud Lubbers, Prime Minister of the Netherlands
  • Jimmy Ruffin, American singer
  • Marco St. John, American actor
• May 9
  • Ralph Boston, American athlete
  • Pierre Desproges, French humorist (d. 1988)
• May 11 - Dante Tinga, Filipino Supreme Court jurist
• May 12 - Ron Ziegler, White House Press Secretary (d. 2003)
• May 13 - Harvey Keitel, American actor
• May 19
  • Livio Berruti, Italian athlete
  • Sonny Fortune, American jazz musician
  • James Fox, English actor
  • Dick Scobee, American astronaut (d. 1986)
• May 21 - Heinz Holliger, Swiss oboist and composer
• May 23 - Reinhard Hauff, German film director
• May 25 - Dixie Carter, American actress
• May 26 - Brent Musburger, American sports announcer (CBS Sports)
• May 29 - Al Unser, American race car driver
• May 30 - Michael J. Pollard, American actor
• June 1 - Cleavon Little, African-American actor (Blazing Saddles) (d. 1992)
• June 3 - Ian Hunter (singer), English singer (Mott the Hoople)
• June 6
  • Louis Andriessen, Dutch composer
  • Lawrence Stephen, Nauruan politician
• June 9
  • Ileana Cotruba-, Romanian soprano
  • Dick Vitale, American basketball broadcaster
• June 11 - Jackie Stewart, Scottish race car driver
• June 15 - Brian Jacques, British writer
• June 16
  • Billy Crash Craddock, American country singer (Rub It In)
  • Richard Spendlove, British radio and television presenter and scriptwriter

July-August

• July 5 - Booker Edgerson, American football player
• July 14 - George E. Slusser, American scholar and writer
• July 15 - Aníbal Cavaco Silva, President of Portugal and former Prime Minister
• July 17
  • Milva, Italian singer and actress
  • Ali Khamenei, Supreme Leader of Iran
• July 21 - John Negroponte, U.S. Director of National Intelligence
• July 23 - Raine Karp, Estonian architect
• July 26
  • John Howard, 25th Prime Minister of Australia
  • Bob Lilly, American football player
• July 27 - Michael Longley, Irish poet
• August 2 - John Snow, 73rd United States Secretary of the Treasury
• August 5 - Princess Irene of the Netherlands
• August 12 - George Hamilton, American actor
• August 12 - Skip Caray, American baseball broadcaster (d. 2008)
• August 17 - Luther Allison, American musician (d. 1997)
• August 19 - Ginger Baker, English drummer (Cream)
• August 22 - Carl Yastrzemski, American baseball player
• August 25 - Robert Jager, American composer and theorist
• August 29 - Joel Schumacher, American film producer and director
• August 30 - John Peel, English disk jockey (d. 2004)
• August 31 - Cleveland Eaton, American jazz musician

September-October

• September 5 - Clay Regazzoni, Swiss Formula 1 Driver (d. 2006)
• September 5 - George Lazenby, Australian actor (On Her Majesty's Secret Service)
• September 6 - Brigid Berlin, American actress and artist
• September 6 - David Allan Coe, American musician
• September 8 - Carsten Keller, German field hockey player
• September 8 - Susumu Tonegawa, Japanese biologist, recipient of the Nobel Prize in Physiology or Medicine
• September 8 - Guitar Shorty, American blues guitarist
• September 9 - Ron McDole, American football player
• September 13 - Richard Kiel, American actor
• September 16 - Breyten Breytenbach, South African writer and painter
• September 17 - Shelby Flint, American singer
• September 18 - Frankie Avalon, American musician (Venus)
• September 18 - Fred Willard, American comedian
• September 23 - Janusz Gajos, Polish actor
• September 26 - Ricky Tomlinson, British actor
• September 29 - Larry Linville, American actor (M*A*S*H) (d. 2000)
• September 30 - Len Cariou, Canadian actor and singer