The following events occurred in October 1937:
October 1, 1937 (Friday) In the British Mandate for Palestine, the British administration outlawed most Palestinian nationalist organizations in response to the assassination of Galilee district commissioner Lewis Yelland Andrews on September 26. The Arab Higher Committee, the National Bloc and the Istiqal pro-independence party were all outlawed, and members of the organizations were arrested.Tom Segev, One Palestine, Complete: Jews and Arabs Under the British Mandate, translated by Haim Watzman (New York: Henry Holt and Company, 2001) p.510 Yaqub al-Ghusayn, Husayin al-Khalidi and Ahmed Hilmi Pasha were deported to the remote Seychelles islands. U.S. Supreme Court Justice Hugo Black gave a radio address admitting that he had once been a member of the Ku Klux Klan, but had resigned and never rejoined. Black repudiated the Klan and pointed out that his voting record in the Senate demonstrated that he was "of that group of liberal senators who have consistently fought for the civil, economic and religious rights of all Americans, without regard to race or creed." The Federal Court of India began operations at Delhi in British India with Sir Maurice Gwyer as the first Chief Justice, and natives Sir Shah Muhammad Sulaiman and M. R. Jayakar as the two associate justices.Pylee, M.V. (1996). The Federal Court Of India, New Delhi: Vikas Publishing House,
October 2, 1937 (Saturday) The massacre of at least 12,000 migrants from Haiti began in the Dominican Republic and Haiti, when Dominican President Rafael Trujillo made an inflammatory speech at Dajabon accusing Haitian migrants of stealing cattle and produce from Dominican farmers. Trujillo proclaimed, "To the Dominicans who were complaining of the depradations by Haitians living among them, thefts of cattle, provisions and fruits... I have responded 'I will fix this'... 300 Haitians are now dead in Banica. This remedy will continue." The campaign is referred to as the "Parsley Massacre" because the method used by the army to determine whether a peasant was of Haitian descent was by asking the victim to pronounce "perejil", the Spanish word for parsley. Ultimately, a list was compiled 12,168 known victims who were killed by soldiers and civilians during the six days before Trujillo ordered a halt to the killing on October 8. In Spain, General Franco's Nationalists captured Covadonga. Ronald Reagan made his screen debut with the release of the film Love Is on the Air, also starring June Travis. The first of 107 recorded deaths in the U.S. from the toxic sulfanalamide elixir when 8-year-old John King, Jr. of Tulsa, Oklahoma, died in a hospital from "influenza and a kidney ailment" that had developed September 24."John King, Jr., Dies of Influenza; Rites Monday", Tulsa (OK) Daily World, October 2, 1937, p.13 Three days later, Millard Wakeford Jr., 5, died from "a streptocuss throat inspection which spread to his kidneys,"5-Year-Old Son of Sonny Wakeford Dies", Tulsa (OK) Daily World, October 5, 1937, p.11 followed two days later by a 6-year-old boy's death."Young Child Dies of Brief Illness", Tulsa (OK) Daily World, October 7, 1937, p.18 Born: Johnnie Cochran, American lawyer; in Shreveport, Louisiana (d. 2005) Roberto Herlitzka, Italian actor; in Turin. (d. 2024)
October 3, 1937 (Sunday) Samuel R. Caldwell and Moses Baca became the first Americans to be arrested under the U.S. Marihuana Stamp Tax Act of 1937, which had gone into effect two days earlier beforeS. Sandy Sanbar, Legal Medicine: Health Care Law and Medical Ethics (American College of Legal Medicine and Elsevier, 2024) Both arrests were carried out in Denver, Colorado. Caldwell, who was not a marijuana user, was caught selling three joints to a buyer, Claude Morgan, and a search of his hotel room found additional cannabis; he was sentenced to four years in federal prison for drug trafficking. Baca, picked up at his apartment at 3:15 in the morning for beating his wife after becoming drunk, was charged with the additional crime of possession after police searched his apartment and found 1/4 ounce of cannabis and sentenced to 14 months in prison. Since possession and selling of marijuana itself was not punishable as a federal crime, the arrests were made for having the cannabis without having proof of paying the new federal tax on the product. An estimated 2,000 members of the British Union of Fascists, led by Sir Oswald Mosley marched through the London district of Bermondsey to mark the fifth anniversary of the organization's founding. Anti-fascists jeered and threw eggs, bricks and other objects as 3,000 police fought to maintain order during the riot, and 111 arrests were made."London Mob Raids Fascists Meeting; 111 Arrested After Nearly All Police Are Rushed to Protect Mosley Parade and Rally", The New York Times, October 4, 1937, p.1 In the U.S., The Old Fashioned Revival Hour, a Christian evangelical radio program, premiered on the Mutual Broadcasting System, with Charles E. Fuller, beginning a 31-year run (on Mutual and then on ABC Radio) that ended in 1968 after Fuller's death.R. A. Torrey, The Holy Spirit: Who He Is and What He Does (Bridge-Logos Publishers, 2008)Roger Finke and Rodney Stark, The Churching of America, 1776—2005: Winners and Losers in Our Religious Economy (Rutgers University Press, 2005) pp.219-220 Soviet Communist Party official Iosif Vareikis, who had questioned General Secretary Joseph Stalin about the arrest and execution of Marshal Mikhail Tukhachevsky and been summoned to return to the Kremlin, was arrested when his train arrived at Moscow. Vareikis would be executed less than a year later, on July 29, 1938. As part of the Great Purge in the Soviet Union, German Communists Hans Kippenberger and Willy Leow, and Soviet Georgian artist Benito Buachidze were executed by gunshot in the Soviet Union for being members of a "counter-revolutionary" organization. Died: Richard Hertwig, 87, German zoologist E. J. Rapson, 76, British numismatist, philologist and professor of the Sanskrit language.
October 4, 1937 (Monday) In the Madras Province of British India, a passive resistance campaign was launched against the Hindu-dominated provincial government by the province's Muslim minority speakers of the Urdu language, in resistance to the August 11 proposal to make teaching of the Hindi language mandatory in all schools. Newspaper publisher Periyar (Erode Venkatappa Ramasamy) and Justice Party leader A. T. Panneerselvam convened the "Anti-Hindi " conference and agreed on a resistance campaign with peaceful protest marches, black flag demonstrations, and fasting to prevent the Hindi education order proposed by Premier Chakravarti Rajagopalachari. In the Canadian province of Alberta, the "Accurate News and Information Act" passed the provincial legislature. The Act, introduced by the government of Premier William Aberhart, setting up a committee of legislators from the Social Credit Party, who would have authority to require newspapers in the province to revise any articles deemed to be inaccurate, to reveal unidentified sources on demand, and providing for criminal penalties for failure to cooperate. The Act never took effect, because the province's lieutenant governor declined to give royal assent until the Act could be reviewed by the Supreme Court of Canada, which ultimately found the proposed law to be unconstitutional. A submarine of unknown origin fired a torpedo at the British destroyer as it patrolled the Mediterranean, the first such attack since the Nyon agreement went into effect. The torpedo missed its target and the Basilisk countered by dropping depth charges, to unknown effect. Born: Jackie Collins, English novelist with 32 best sellers; in Hampstead, London (d. 2015) Franz Vranitzky, Chancellor of Austria from 1986 to 1997; in ViennaDavid Wilsford, ed. Political Leaders of Contemporary Western Europe: a biographical dictionary (Greenwood Publishing, 1995) pp.465–473 Pahlad Ramsurrun, Mauritian author of 70 books and editor of the literary journal Indradhanush; at Amaury.
October 5, 1937 (Tuesday) In Chicago, U.S. President Franklin D. Roosevelt made the controversial "Quarantine Speech", describing war as a "contagion" and calling for an international "quarantine" of aggressor nations. In a bout in French Algeria, French boxer Maurice Holtzer defeated Phil Dolhem is a 15-round decision to win the world featherweight championship of the International Boxing Union. The handwritten "Ben-Gurion letter", which is of historical interest to researchers because of Zionist leader David Ben-Gurion's views of treatment of Palestinian Arabs, was written by Ben-Gurion to his son, Amos. Ben-Gurion, who would become the first Prime Minister of Israel in 1948, with a dispute on whether he crossed out a section saying "We must expel Arabs and take their places" or "We must not expel the Arabs".Commentary magazine Born: Barry Switzer, American college football and professional football coach, known for winning three NCAA college football championships (1974, 1975 and 1985) while at the University of Oklahoma, and the NFL's Super Bowl XXX for the Dallas Cowboys in the 1995 season; in Crossett, Arkansas Premasara Epasinghe, Sri Lankan broadcaster known for being that nation's commentator on cricket match broadcasts; in Colombo, British Ceylon Died: Frank Stephens, 88, the first Director of the San Diego Natural History Museum, died 10 days after being struck by a street car.
October 6, 1937 (Wednesday) The U.S. radio talk show Hobby Lobby, described by a columnist as "a novel form of radio entertainment","Hobbies Get a Place on Radio— Columbia Devotes a New Weekly Program to Collectors", Arizona Daily Star (Tucson AZ), October 3, 1937, Sec. 2, p. 7 hosted by comedian Dave Elman, premiered in the evening on the CBS Radio network."'Hobby Lobby' Premiere Tonight", The Tampa (FL) Daily Times, October 6, 1937, p.12 with a time slot of 7:15 to 8:15 in the east, and 9:30 to 10:00 in the central time zone. With a guest co-host each week (starting with Admiral Richard E. Byrd on the first show), Elman interviewed members of the American public who had unusual hobbies. Italy sent three new squadrons of Savoia-Marchetti SM.79 bombers to assist the Nationalists in Spain. Legislative elections were held in the Canadian province of Ontario. The Liberal Party led by Premier Mitchell Hepburn, retained its majority. Born: Emilio Isgrò, Italian artist; in Barcellona Pozzo di Gotto Renato Capecchi, Italian-born American geneticist and 2007 Nobel Prize laureate; in Verona (d. 1998). Died: Angelo Musco, 65, Italian actor.
October 7, 1937 (Thursday) A Spanish Nationalist court-martial declared death for the captured mercenary American pilot Harold Edward Dahl, but the sentence was immediately annulled by a reprieve. The U.S. magazine Woman's Day was first published."'Woman's Day,' Name Given to Magazine", The Mayfield (KY) Messenger, October 7, 1937, p.5 ("The first issue of Woman's Day appears in A&P stores on October 7. Thereafter it will be published monthly, appearing always on the first Thursday of each month.") Born: Chet Powers, American singer-songwriter; in Danbury, Connecticut (d. 1994) Died: Renate Müller, 31, German singer and actress was killed when she fell or jumped from a window. Henry Roland, 43, German-born American stunt performer, fell to his death during a performance
October 8, 1937 (Friday) The family of American greeting card executive Charles S. Ross, who had been kidnapped on September 25 by John Henry Seadlund and James Atwood Gray, paid Seadlund a ransom of $50,000 (equivalent to $1.1 million in 2025) for Ross's release. Rather than releasing Ross, Seadlund shot and killed both Ross and Gray two days later. Seadlund would be arrested three months later on federal charges of kidnapping, found guilty, and executed in the electric chair on July 14, 1938.