Saturday, January 15, 2022

Thursday, January 15, 1942. Baseball gets the go ahead.


President Roosevelt issued his "green light" letter to professional baseball, indicating that it should go forward in spite of the war.  Unlike World War One, however, there'd be no pretextual avenue for baseball players to avoid conscription and that fact, combined with baseball players volunteering for service, would result in an enormous decrease in first rank talent from the sport for the duration of the war, making wartime baseball accordingly unique.

While Operation Drumbeat takes three more ships off the US east coast, 3,900 US troops of the 34th Division depart by ship for the United Kingdom. The U-577 surfaces so close off of New York Harbor that night that the rides at Coney Island could be seen silhouetted against the nighttime sky, blackouts not having been ordered.

German Field Marshall Ritter von Leeb is relieved of his command after demanding a free, non Hitler, hand over his troops.

The American-British-Dutch-Australian (ABDA) Command was activated with Field Marshall Sir Archibald Wavell as its commander.  Its task was to combat the Japanese expansion in South-East Asia.

The Ninth Pan American Conference opened in Rio de Janeiro.

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