Wednesday, July 17, 1946. African Americans were allowed to vote in Georgia's primary election for the first time.

 African Americans were allowed to vote in Georgia's primary election for the first time.

At the time Georgia used an odd primary system similar to the archaic electoral college, which needs to be abolished.  In this instance, "county units" determined the candidates, so while James V. Carmichael received more votes than former Governor Eugene Talmadge, with the help of the African American vote, Talmadge received the nomination.

The county unit system was abolished in 1964.

U.S. trademark protection was reestablished for Austrians.

Chetnik general Dragoljub "Draža" Mihailović was executed by the Communist Yugoslavian government. 

The Second World War was extremely complicated in Yugoslavia, and unlike the movie treatment you'll occasionally see regarding them, the loyalties of various partisan bands in the country were varied and changed.  The Chetniks started as a royalist anti German movement and actually fought alongside the Communist partisans in the early part of World War Two, but by the end, they were collaborating with the Germans.

The Rocky Mountain News ran an article about a 16 year old girl who was, well, a creepy fan of a trombonist and made up a lurid tale of how he was involved with her, in the hopes that it'd destroy his marriage and he'd marry her.  The headline referred to her as a "Bobby Soxer", the oldest use of that term, which I'd associated with the 1950s, that I've ever seen, although apparently that's just a misimpression on my part.  The Wikipedia article on the demographic subset composed of teenage girls has several photos from 1946.

"Bobby Soxer", January 1946.

Apparently the origin of the term for short sox worn by young women dates back to 1943 and appeared in Life as early as 1944.

Months ago colored bobby sox folded at the top were decreed, not by anyone or any group but, as usual, by a sudden mysterious and universal acceptance of the new idea. Now no teen-ager dares wear anything but pure white socks without a fold. [

Life magazine, Dec. 11, 1944.

The term was particularly associated, apparently, with the fans of Frank Sinatra and oddly enough the Rocky Mountain News used it in that context on the same day as Life did in the quote immediately above. The News used it as late as 1972 in the context of an all girls softball league.

I probably shouldn't have been surprised, as I'm aware of, but have not seen, the film The Bachelor and the Bobby Soxer, which is a well known film featuring Cary Grant and an 18 year old Shirley Temple.  It was released in 1947.

Last edition:

Tuesday, July 16, 1946. New agencies. Sentencing the perpetrators of the Malmedy Massacre.

Labels: 1940s, 1946, 1948, 1950s, 1951, Bureau of Land Management, General Land Office, German SS, Korea, Malmedy Massacre, Occupation of Korea, Social Security Administration, South Korea, The Cold War, US Grazing Service

Monday, July 8, 1946. Germans ordered to go home.

The Soviet military government of Austria began deporting Germans who had moved to the country after 1938.  54,000 would be repatriated to a Germany.

The News reported about a Hughes' accident.

Last edition:

Sunday, July 7, 1946. Mother Cabrini canonized.

Labels: 1940s, 1946, Catholic, Christianity, Immigration, Italy, Jimmy Carter, Personalities, Protestant, religion, United States

Wednesday, February 4, 1976. The 1976 Winter Olympics opened in Innsbruck.

The 1976 Winter Olympics opened in Innsbruck.

Last edition:

Monday,. February 2, 1976. Moynihan resigns.

Labels: 1970s, 1976, Government, Personalities, United Nations

Wednesday, January 2, 1946. Nuptials with the enemy.

Mexican troops fired on demonstrators in León, Mexico, killing at least 40.

The U.S. Army lifted a ban on U.S. servicemen marrying enemy nationals, save for Germans.  The lift, therefore, applied to Austrians and Italians, as well as perhaps Hungarians and Romanians.

On Corregidor twenty Japanese soldiers, who had just learned of Japan's surrender from a newspaper, surrendered themselves to a solitary Army soldier.

Last edition:

Tuesday, January 1, 1946. The first baby boomers.

Labels: 1940s, 1946, Baby Boom Generation, It was because of World War Two

Sunday, November 25, 1945. Taxing war profits.

MacArthur ordered the Japanese government to submit a plan to tax away all war profits.

The Austrian People's Party won the Austrian election.  The Christian Democratic party still exists.

Zionist terrorists attacked coast guard stations near Tel Aviv.

Last edition:

Thursday, November 22, 1945. Thanksgiving Day.

Labels: 1940s, 1945, Cartoons, entertainment, Home Front, It was because of World War Two, J.R. Williams, Japan, Joseph Stalin, Rationing, Strike Wave of 1945-1945, Thanksgiving, The written word

The Third Man - Lime's Introduction

Tuesday, July 31, 1945. Little Boy assembled.

Little Boy was assembled on Tinian.

Pierre Laval was delivered to Linz Austria from Spain, where he was then turned over to the French.

Ethnic Germans were murdered in  Ústí nad Labem, Czechoslovakia.

Field Marshal Alexander appointed Governor General of Canada.

The Takao is sunk by British frogmen with limpet mines at Singapore.

The US gives Japan a specific warning about eight cities being slated for destruction if Japan does not surrender.

Pro Nazi Lutheran minister and theologian Ludwig Müller committed suicide.

Gen. Artemio Ricarte y García, early pro independence Philippine general and collaborator with the Japanese, died of dysentery at age 78.

Last edition:

Wednesday, July 30, 1945. Eisenhower questions the bomb.

Labels: 1940s, 1945, Battle of the Visayas, Chester Nimitz, Douglas MacArthur, Dwight Eisenhower, George C. Marshall, Imperial Japanese Army, New Guinea, Weapons, World War Two

Tuesday, May 15, 1945. Germans fully surrendered, Chinese Army in retreat.

Army Group Center, now completely disintegrated, quit all resistance with troops surrender to the Western Allies where they cold, and to the Soviets if they could not.

Axis forces surrendered at Slovenski Gradek.

A new Austrian republic was declared.

Fighting was fierce again on Okinawa.

Burmese nationalist Aung San lead his forces into support of the Allies.

Japan abrogated its treaties with the other Axis countries.

 The Battle of the Malacca Strait began between the Royal Navy and the Imperial Japanese Navy.

Chinese lines were broken by the Japanese, and the Chinese Army was in full retreat.

"MGs of the heavy weapons companies of 1st Bn., 100th RCT, fire on hill #2 in the Mangima Valley Area, Mindanao, P.I. 15 May, 1945. Photographer: O'Neill."

Last edition:

Monday, May 14, 1945. Lingering actions.

Labels: 1940s, 1945, Battle of Poljana, Collaborators, German Flensburg Government, German Kriegsmarine, German Wehrmacht, Heroes, Mormon, Okinawa, The Holocaust, World War Two, Yugoslav Partisans, Yugoslavia

Friday, May 4, 1945. The war ends in northwest Europe.

British Field Marshal Sir Bernard Montgomery accepted the unconditional surrender of the German forces in the Netherlands, northwest Germany including all islands, Denmark and all naval ships in those areas. 

The US Seventh United States Army captured Innsbruck, Salzburg and Berchtesgaden.

German forces in northeast Germany, Czechoslovakia and Austria begin rearguard actions in an attempt to reach Anglo American lines.

The Red Army too the Oranienburg concentration camp.

Konrad Barde, 47, German Generalmajor committed suicide.

Fedor von Bock, 64, German field marshal was killed by a strafing British aircraft while traveling by car.

Yugoslav partisans entered Fiume.

Last edition:

Thursday, May 3, 1945. Dönitz sends a surrender delegation.

Labels: 1940s, 1945, Bernard Law Montgomery, boats and ships, British Army, Burma, Karl Dönitz, Philippines, Portugal, United Nations, World War Two

Wednesday, May 2, 1945. Berlin taken.

The Red Army took Berlin.

Yevgeny Khaldei took the staged Raising a Flag over the Reichstag photograph, showing Soviet troops raising the flag of the Soviet Union atop the Reichstag.  The unretouched variant is shown above, i which one soldier is wearing two watches, which was later edited out of the photo as at least one of them was no doubt picked up somewhere.

The Nisei 552nd Field Artillery Bn liberated a Dachau death march.

The Germans surrendered in Italy and Southern Austria. Among those going into Allied captivity is Dr. Wernher von Braun.

Admiral Dönitz's formed the Flensburg Government.

Eamon de Valera paid a visit to Dr Eduard Hempel, the German minister in Ireland, to offer his condolences on the death of Hitler.  Nobody has ever been able to grasp this.

Erich Bärenfänger, 30, German Generalmajor, Martin Bormann, 44, German Nazi official; Wilhelm Burgdorf, 50, German general; Walther Hewel, 41, German diplomat; Hans Krebs, 47, German general; and Franz Schädle, 38, German commander of Hitler's personal bodyguard, killed themselves.

Peter Högl, 47, German SS-Obersturmbannführer, Ewald Lindloff, 36, Waffen-SS officerMartin Strahammer, 54, German Generalmajor; and Joachim von Siegroth, 48, German Generalmajor were killed in action.

The British landed on Rangoon.

Last edition:

Tuesday, May 1, 1945. German radio reports Hitler dead.

Labels: 1940s, 1945, Adolf Hitler, Battle of Tarakan, Borneo, Germany, Joseph Goebbels, Karl Dönitz, Operation Oboe, Radio, Rape and the Red Army, The Battle of Halbe, World War Two

Friday, April 27, 1945. Mussolini captured by Partisans, Second Austrian Republic comes into being.

Benito Mussolini and his mistress Clara Petacci were captured by partisans while attempting to cross into Switzerland.

The Red Army took Potsdam, Prenzlau, Angemunde and Tempelhof airfield.

US troops liberated Kaufering concentration camp.

The Western Allies rejected Himmler's peace offer for the Germans to lay down their arms in the west and sent a reminder that the German surrender was to be unconditional.

One of the interesting things here is that its not entirely clearly that the Western Allies understood the offer the way it was made.  Theoretically, it might have been possible to accept the offer as a largescale troop surrender which, while it would have ended fighting in the west, it would not have ended the war against Germany.

The U.S. Fifth Army reached Genoa, Italy, which was mostly already liberated by Italian partisans.

SS architect Hans Schleif committed suicide at age 43.  Schleif had been involved in removing cultural material from Poland, but he oddly never really seemed to be fully on board with the worst elements of Nazism.  His death was probably needless, but he probably would have served time after the war.

Former Austrian chancellor Karl Renner set up a provisional government composed of Social Democrats, Christian Socialists, and Communists and proclaimed the reestablishment of Austria as a democratic republic.  This became the Second Austrian Republic, which remains today.

US and Philippine forces commenced the Battle of Davao.  US forces took Baguio.

U.S. troops firing a pack howitzer in the Philippines, April 27, 1945.

Thursday, April 26, 1945. Petain arrested.

Labels: 1940s, 1945, Battle of Berlin, Berlin Germany, Dachau, German SS, Italian partisans, Italy, Operation Exodus, Philippe Pétain, Prisoners of War, Rationing, Red Army, Vichy France, War Crimes, World War Two

Thursday, April 19, 1945. Broadcasting from Belsen.

Army machine gunners on Okinawa, April 19, 1945.  Not the visible rear sight on the M1917 machine gun and the high angle the gun is being used at.

The Battle of the Seelow Heights ended in Soviet/Polish victory.

The US 1st Army took Leipzig.

Robert Cappa, the famous photographer, took a series of photos in an event that occurred in this battle, in which a tank crewman who was manning a machinegun in a building was killed by a German sniper.  The bloody scene and the soldier's lifeless body is the recalled photograph.  A nearly as dramatic photo of another crewman stepping over him to man the gun is not as well recalled.

Richard Dimbleby broadcast the conditions of Belsen on the BBC.

The Battle of Odžak began in Croatia between Yugoslav Partisans and the Axis aligned Croatian Armed Forces.  The last battle to be fought in the Second World War in Europe, it would continue until May 25.

Pyinmana, the base of the Japanese aligned Burma Defence Army, fell to the 5th Indian Division.

Japanese Gen. Sōsaku Suzuki, age 53, was killed in action in the Philippines.

Nazi Party member Fritz Wächtler,  age 54, was executed by the Nazis for desertion over the surrender of Bayreuth. The charge was unjust and due to rivalry on the part of other Nazis.  

It's amazing to think of this sort of infighting when it should have been obvious they'd all be facing trials by the victors soon.

The U-251, U-548 and U-879 were sunk.

Johnny Kelley won the Boston Marathon.

Last edition:

Wednesday, April 18, 1945. The death of Ernie Pyle.Labels: 1940s, 1945, Adolf Hitler, Army, Canadian Army, Heroes, Mussolini, Okinawa, The Holocaust, The Press, The written word, Waffen SS, World War Two

Tuesday, April 3, 1945. The Germans began the evacuation of Buchenwald.

The Germans began the evacuation of Buchenwald.

Soviet forces take Wiener Neustadt

Elements of the US 40th Division landed on Masbate to assist Filipino guerillas.

"Pfc. Thomas Powell, North Platte, Nebr., 5th Cav., guards the main street of San Pablo, Luzon, P.I, with his machine gun, and covers himself completely with his poncho in the tropical rain. 3 April, 1945.  Photographer: T/4 Wendinger.  Photo Source: U.S. National Archives. Digitized by Signal Corps Archive."

Kamikazes were active off of Okinawa.

"Men of an antitank company keep on the alert for enemy action atop a hill in Okinawa.

Left to right, Pfc. George Harrington, Brooklyn N.Y., Cpl Joe Irvin, Elgin, Ill., and Pfc Leland Beleme, Merced, Cal. 3 April 1945."

Last edition:

Monday, April 2, 1945. Easy advances on Okinawa.

Labels: 1940s, 1945, Army, Austria, Austria (Vienna), boats and ships, British Army, Hungary, Italy, Okinawa, Operation Iceberg, Philippines, Polish Air Force, Red Army, Slovakia, Vienna Offensive, World War Two

Monday, April 2, 1945. Easy advances on Okinawa.

Operation Roast ended in a British victory in Italy.

The British 2nd Army took Munster.

The Red Army launched the Vienna Offensive.  They also took Magykanizsa and Kremnica.

The US 10th Army made easy advances on Okinawa.

U.S. artillerymen, Okinawa, April 2, 1945.

Part of the US 163d Regiment landed on Tawitawi, in the Sulu Archipelago.

The U-321 was sunk by a Vickers Wellington of No. 304 Polish Bomber Squadron southwest of Ireland.

Last edition:

Sunday, April 1, 1945. Operation Iceberg.

Labels: 1940s, 1945, Army, Battle of Kassel, British Army, Communications, Eastern Front, Hitler Youth, Italy, Okinawa, Operation Iceberg, Red Army, television, United States Marine Corps, World War Two

Easter Sunday, April 1, 1725. Bach's Easter Oratorio.

Bach’s Easter Oratorio, the companion piece to his Passions was first performed in an Easter service in Leipzig, April 1, 1725.  The composer conducted.

Last edition:

Monday, March 26, 1725. Monday of Holy Week for 1725.