The following events occurred in September 1925:
September 1, 1925 (Tuesday) The Banco de México, Mexico's central bank, was inaugurated after having been authorized on August 25. The government-owned bank, initially led by director-general Alberto Mascareñas Navarro, was empowered to regulate exchange rates, interest rates, and monetary control, and the exclusive authority to mint coins and print banknotes, a task formerly delegated to private businesses. In a ceremony at the then-Chilean city of Tarata that began at 10:00 in the morning, the South American nation of Chile formally transferred its Departamento de Tarata to Peru as part of the resolution of a boundary dispute. Nicaraguan President Carlos José Solórzano declared martial law in the country as it was unclear whether rebels would uphold their promise to vacate the mountain-top fortress of La Loma. Danish seamen went on strike over their employers' refusal to raise wages. With seamen also on strike in China and across the British Empire, a large portion of the world's commerce was disrupted. A crew commanded by U.S. Navy Commander John Rodgers and four other members, who had departed from California in seaplane PN-9 No. 1 in an attempt to make the first flight to Hawaii, disappeared, prompting a search by U.S. Navy ships that had been placed in the area. The PN-9 had run out of gas into its flight while trying to locate one of the ships. Nazi Party member Hermann Göring, who would later become Adolf Hitler's chief advisor and commander of the Luftwaffe, was hospitalized in the psychiatric ward of the Långbro Hospital in Sweden after assaulting a nurse during his addiction to morphine. He remained in recovery for months until he could be rehabilitated. España Quinta, a Spanish troop transport carrying 1,000 Spanish Legion troops was reported sunk in Alhucemas Bay by Rif shelling. The report proved to be a false alarm and the ship was reported the next day as having arrived at Melilla in Spanish Morocco. Born: Peter Mallett, Church of England priest who served as Chaplain-General to the Forces from 1974 to 1980; in Leicester, Leicestershire, England (d. 1996) Madeleine Chapsal, French novelist; in Paris, France (d. 2024) Colin Free, Australian screenwriter for television; in Sydney, Australia (d. 1996)
September 2, 1925 (Wednesday) As part of his reform of culture in Turkey, President Mustafa Kemal Atatürk issued a decree closing all politically-oriented religious lodges, including the zawiyas associated with the Muslim Sufi order and the lodges of the Suci dervishes. The dervish lodges were converted into museums. The Banka Kombëtare e Shqipnis (BKS), Albania's central bank, was inaugurated in Durrës after having been authorized on June 22. The Australian government announced new tariffs that included preferences for British goods. Ship owners told Australian seamen that they would face no reprisals for their outlaw strike if they returned to duty within 48 hours. Born: Gunnar Nilson, Swedish jazz musician; in Luleå, Sweden (d. 1989) Marcela Delpastre, French novelist who write in the Occitan language and in French; in Germont, Corrèze département, France (d. 1998)
September 3, 1925 (Thursday) The U.S. Navy dirigible USS Shenandoah broke up in a squall line near Caldwell, Ohio, killing 14 of the 43 crewmen aboard. Bautista Saavedra resigned the office of president of Bolivia after protests that followed his annulment of the results of the May 2 presidential election. Saavedra was replaced by the president of the Bolivian Senate, Felipe Segundo Guzmán, who scheduled a new election to be held on December 1. The Second International Conference on the Standardization of Medicine was held in Geneva, with the goal of standardizing drug formulae worldwide. French Army General, World War One hero and future traitor Philippe Pétain was appointed as the Commander-in-Chief of French Forces in Morocco to bring an end to the Rif War, replacing Hubert Lyautey. Born: Herbert Parsons Patterson, American banker who served as president of the Chase Manhattan Bank from 1969 to 1972; in New York City, United States (d. 1985) Shoista Mullojonova, Tajik singer; as Shushana Rubinovna Mullodzhanova, in Dushanbe, Tajik ASSR (present-day Tajikistan) (d. 2010) Claire Malroux, French poet, essayist, and translator; as Josette Andrée Malroux, in Albi, Tarn département, France (d. 2025) Died: Moisés Tuʻu Hereveri, 51-52, King of Easter Island from 1901 to 1902 (b. ) Julius Stickoffer, 79-80, Swiss-born U.S. Army soldier who was the only Medal of Honor recipient to receive the medal for heroism in the second Black Hawk War (b. )
September 4, 1925 (Friday) The government of Norway appointed Johannes Gerckens Bassøe as the first Governor of Svalbard, which had been newly acquired as Norwegian territory. Rif rebels launched an offensive toward the Spanish-held city of Tétouan. Samuil Feinberg's "Piano Sonata No. 6" premiered in Venice. Born: S. K. Ramachandra Rao, Indian author and Sanskrit scholar; as Saligrama Krishna Ramachandra Rao, in Hassan, Kingdom of Mysore, British India (present-day Karnataka state, India) (d. 2006) E.G. Franz Sauer, German ornithologist who proved the theory that birds use the stars to migrate accurately; as Edgar Gustav Franz Sauer, in Mannheim, Germany (d. 1979)
September 5, 1925 (Saturday) Two days after the Shenandoah crash, U.S. Army Colonel Billy Mitchell, the former assistant chief of the Army Air Service, issued a statement publicly accusing senior leaders in the Army and Navy of incompetence and "almost treasonable administration of the national defense." His defiant act, meant to call attention to the need for a strong air defense for the United States, would lead to his court-martial on direct order from U.S. President Calvin Coolidge. In the USSR, a joint protest against Soviet Communist Party Secretary Joseph Stalin was signed by Comintern leader Grigory Zinoviev, Lev Kamenev, Deputy Premier Finance Commissar Grigory Sokolnikov and Vladimir Lenin's widow, Nadezhda Krupskaya. Zinoviev, Kamenev and Sokolnikov would all become victims of Stalin's Great Purge and would all be executed. Canadian Prime Minister William Lyon Mackenzie King announced that the 14th Parliament was dissolved and that new elections were to be held on October 29. The ocean liner SS Sophocles barricaded its striking sailors into the ship and then pulled out of Cape Town, South Africa en route to Australia, but was forced to turn around and go back when the sailors refused to work. Born: William Conton, Sierra Leonean novelist, educator, and historian; in Bathurst, British Gambia (present-day Banjul, The Gambia) (d. 2003) Died: Mahmoud Al-Ayyash, 27, Syrian revolutionary referred to as "Abu Stita;" executed at Aleppo by a French Army firing squad along with 11 other rebels (b. 1898) Sir Lionel Woodward, 60, British colonial administrator and Chief Justice of the Federated Malay States from 1920 until his death; shot himself to death (b. 1864)
September 6, 1925 (Sunday) The silent films The Phantom of the Opera, starring Lon Chaney in the title role; Kentucky Pride directed by John Ford; The Coming of Amos directed by Cecil B. DeMille; Pretty Ladies starring ZaSu Pitts; and The White Outlaw starring Jack Hoxie were released. Dietzen, a new colony on Scoresby Sund in Greenland, was established by Denmark. Tipperary defeated Galway on a score line of 5–6 to 1–5 (51 points to 8) to win the All-Ireland Hurling Championship. Gastone Brilli-Peri won the Italian Grand Prix in his Alfa Romeo P2 at Monza and completing the race in 5 hours, 14:33. Born: Nina Lowry, British barrister who became the first woman judge of the Central Criminal Court of England and Wales in 1976; as Noreen Margaret Collins, in Hampstead, London, England (d. 2017) Freddie Oversteegen, Dutch resistance fighter during the German occupation of the Netherlands during World War II; in Schoten, Netherlands (d. 2018) Jorge Noceda Sánchez, Dominican physician surrealist painter; in Santo Domingo, Dominican Republic (d. 1987) Died: Riley Hatch, 63, American stage and silent film actor (b. 1862) Philippine E. Von Overstolz, 78, American socialite and partron of the arts (b. 1847)
September 7, 1925 (Monday) An attempt by Spanish troops during the Rif War to make an amphibious landing at Alhucemas Bay at Spanish Morocco ended in disaster. The Spanish withdrew after 361 of their troops were killed and 1,975 wounded. Italian Army General Maurizio Ferrante Gonzaga was appointed by Prime Minister Mussolini as the Commandant-General of the Fascist Party's Voluntary Militia for National Security (MSVN), more commonly known as the "Blackshirts". The Treze Futebol Clube was founded in Brazil. Amidst unrest in Shanghai, rioting occurred; several were wounded as British police fired on a crowd of over 2,000 demonstrators protesting unequal treaties. Born: Laura Ashley, Welsh fashion designer who founded the Laura Ashley PLC retail chain of fashion stores in 1954; as Laura Mountney, in Dowlais, Marthyr Tydfil, Glamorgan, Wales (d. 1985) Bhanumathi, Indian Telugu film actress, singer, novelist, music composer, and director known for Chandirani (1953); as P. Bhanumathi Ramakrishna, in Doddavaram, Madras Presidency, British India (present-day Andhra Pradesh state, India) (d. 2005) Nosratollah Vahdat, Iranian comedian, actor and director, known for The Bride (Arouse Farangi); in Isfahan, Imperial State of Persia (present-day Iran) (d. 2020) Oreste Benzi, Italian Catholic priest who founded the Pope John XXIII Community Association; in San Clemente, Emilia-Romagna, Kingdom of Italy (present-day Italy) (d. 2007) Died: René Viviani, 61, French politician, served as the Prime Minister of France from 1914 to 1915 (b. 1863) Thomas Ronayne, 75-76, New Zealand public servant involved in railway management, served as the General Manager of the New Zealand Railways Department from 1895 to 1913, and coal mine operator; accidentally killed after falling from a shuttlecar while visiting the Clydevale mine at Seddonville (b. 1849)
September 8, 1925 (Tuesday) Spanish forces carried out the first successful amphibious landing with tanks, coming ashore at Alhucemas Bay in Morocco, the day after a disastrous first attempt. After a preliminary bombardment and a feint landing near Cape Tres Forcas. It was announced that explorer Roald Amundsen had signed a deal with the Italian government to use the dirigible N-1 in another attempt to fly to the North Pole, to be undertaken in 1926. Born: Peter Sellers, English comedian and film actor known for portraying multiple characters in Dr. Strangelove (1964), and Inspector Clouseau in five of the films in the Pink Panther series; as Richard Henry Sellers, in Southsea, Portsmouth, England (d. 1980) Bat-Sheva Dagan, Polish-born Israeli psychologist, author, and Holocaust survivor; as Izabella Batszewa Rubinsztajn, in Łódź, Poland (d. 2024)
September 9, 1925 (Wednesday) In Detroit in the U.S., a white mob estimated at 5,000 people attempted to drive Dr. Ossian Sweet and his family out of the home that the black couple had purchased in an all-white neighborhood from the house on 2905 Garland Street. A white bystander, Leon Briener, who lived across the street, was killed by a gunshot fired from inside the house. Dr. Sweet was among those arrested and charged with murder, and a famous criminal case dealing with race relations in America would result. Rif rebels surrounded Tétouan. Russian composer Igor Stravinsky completed Serenade for piano in A major in Vienna. Born: Soňa Červená, Czech opera mezzo-soprano singer and actress; in Prague, Czechoslovakia (present-day Czech Republic) (d. 2023)
September 10, 1925 (Thursday)