This Year in History:
1932
Discover what happened in this year with HISTORY’s summaries of major events, anniversaries, famous births and notable deaths.
Hattie Ophelia Wyatt Caraway, a Democrat from Arkansas, becomes the first woman to be elected to the U.S. Senate. Caraway, born near Bakerville, Tennessee, had been appointed to the Senate…
On March 1, 1932, in a crime that captured the attention of the entire nation, Charles Lindbergh Jr., the 20‑month‑old son of aviation hero Charles Lindbergh and Anne Morrow Lindbergh, is kidnapped…
The Supreme Court hands down its decision in the case of Powell v. Alabama. The case arose out of the infamous Scottsboro case. Nine young Black men were arrested and…
Loretta Lynn, a singer who greatly expanded the opportunities for women in the male‑dominated world of country‑western music, is born in Butcher Hollow, Kentucky on April 14, 1932. Unlike some country‑western…
The body of aviation hero Charles Lindbergh’s baby is found on May 12, 1932, more than two months after he was kidnapped from his family’s Hopewell, New Jersey, mansion. Lindbergh,…
Five years to the day that American aviator Charles Lindbergh became the first pilot to accomplish a solo, nonstop flight across the Atlantic Ocean, female aviator Amelia Earhart becomes the…
During the Great Depression, President Herbert Hoover orders the U.S. Army under General Douglas MacArthur to evict by force the Bonus Marchers from the nation’s capital. Two months before, the…
On September 16, 1932, in his cell at Yerwada Jail in Pune, Mohandas Karamchand Gandhi begins a hunger strike in protest of the British government’s decision to separate India’s electoral system by…
With the admission of Iraq into the League of Nations, Britain terminates its mandate over the Arab nation, making Iraq independent after 17 years of British rule and centuries of…
On October 27, 1932, poet Sylvia Plath is born in Boston. Her father, a German immigrant, was a professor of biology and a leading expert on bumblebees. An autocrat at…
The crime lab that is now referred to as the FBI Scientific Crime Detection Laboratory officially opens in Washington, D.C., on November 24, 1932. The lab was initially operated out…
On December 18, 1932, the Chicago Bears defeat the Portsmouth (Ohio) Spartans, 9‑0, in the NFL’s first playoff game—and first game played indoors. The victory gives the Bears the championship…
At the height of the Great Depression, thousands turn out for the opening of Radio City Music Hall, a magnificent Art Deco theater in New York City. Radio City Music…
