January 24, 2008

160 years ago
1848

Americana
James W. Marshall discovered gold on the property of Johann A. Sutter near Coloma, California.

80 years ago
1928

Aviation
French aviators Dieudonne Costes and Joseph Lebrix, continuing their transatlantic flight, went from Baranquilla, Colombia to Colon, Panama.

70 years ago
1938

Died on this date
Rosamond Pinchot, 33. U.S. socialite and actress. Miss Pinchot was from an influential political family. She appeared in several Broadway plays, and made her only film appearance in The Three Musketeers (1935). Miss Pinchot committed suicide by carbon monoxide poisoning two days before the tenth anniversary of her marriage to "Big Bill" Gaston, from whom she'd been separated for several years.

60 years ago
1948

Hit parade
#1 single in the U.S.A. (Billboard) (Best Seller): Ballerina--Vaughn Monroe and his Orchestra (7th week at #1)

U.S.A. Top 10 (Cash Box)
1 Ballerina--Vaughn Monroe and his Orchestra (5th week at #1)
--Buddy Clark
--Bing Crosby with the Rhythmaires
2 Civilization (Bongo, Bongo, Bongo)--Danny Kaye and the Andrews Sisters
--Louis Prima and his Orchestra
--Jack Smith and the Clark Sisters
--Ray McKinley and his Orchestra
--Woody Herman and his Orchestra
3 Serenade of the Bells--Sammy Kaye and his "Swing and Sway" Orchestra
--Jo Stafford
--Kay Kyser and his Orchestra
4 Too Fat Polka (I Don’t Want Her) (You Can Have Her) (She’s Too Fat for Me)--Arthur Godfrey
5 How Soon (Will I Be Seeing You)--Vaughn Monroe and his Orchestra
--Bing Crosby and Carmen Cavallaro
--Jack Owens
--Dinah Shore
6 Golden Earrings--Peggy Lee
7 I'll Dance at Your Wedding--Ray Noble and his Orchestra with Buddy Clark
--Peggy Lee
8 Near You--Francis Craig and his Orchestra
--Larry Green and his Orchestra
--The Andrews Sisters
--Alvino Rey and his Orchestra
--Elliot Lawrence and his Orchestra
9 You Do--Vaughn Monroe and his Orchestra
--Bing Crosby and Carmen Cavallaro
--Margaret Whiting
--Dinah Shore
--Vic Damone
10 Pass That Peace Pipe--Margaret Whiting
--Beryl Davis

Singles entering the chart were Beg Your Pardon, with versions by Francis Craig and his Orchestra, and Frankie Carle and his Orchestra (#16); Loaded Pistols, Loaded Dice by Phil Harris and his Orchestra (#20); (The Treasure Of) Sierra Madre, with versions by Ray Noble and his Orchestra with Buddy Clark; and Dick Haymes (#23); Pianissimo, with versions by Perry Como, and Buddy Clark (#30); Mickey by Ted Weems and his Orchestra (#33); I Hate to Lose You (I’m So Used to You Now) by Sammy Kaye and his “Swing And Sway” Orchestra (#38); and Dardanella by Les Brown and his Orchestra (#39). (The Treasure Of) Sierra Madre was inspired by the movie.

On the radio
Escape, on CBS (West Coast)
Tonight's episode: Papa Benjamin

This was an adaptation of the short story Dark Melody of Madness (1935) by Cornell Woolrich, writing as William Irish.

Died on this date
George Alan Powell, 69. U.K. broadcasting executive. Mr. Powell was a former chairman of the British Broadcasting Corporation.

Arthur Liebehenschel, 46. German SS officer. SS Obersturmbannführer (Lieutenant Colonel) Liebehenschel joined the Nazi Party in 1932 and the SS in 1934, serving in the Death's Head Units. He was Lagerkommandant at the Auschwitz and Majdanek concentration camps in German-occupied Poland from 1943-1945. SS Obersturmbannführer Liebehenschel made some minor improvements for the prisoners, but was arrested by the U.S. Army and extradited to Poland, where he was convicted in 1947 of crimes against humanity and executed by hanging.

Maria Mandl, 36. Austro-Hungarian born war criminal. SS-Oberaufseherin Mandl was in charge of all female camps and subcamps at Auschwitz, and was believed to have been directly complicit in the deaths of over 500,000 female prisoners. A Polish court convicted her in 1947, and she was hanged at Kraków, two weeks after her 36th birthday.

Politics and government
China's Nationalist government concluded parliamentary elections, which returned 200 Kuomintang representatives from districts earlier promised to the minority Young China and Social Democratic Parties.

Moscow sources reported the dismissal of Eugen Varga, the U.S.S.R.'s leading economist, from the Soviet Academy of Sciences for advocating Soviet cooperation with the United States and western Europe.

Labour
The American Federation of Labor International Ladies Garment Workers Union executive board, meeting in Miami, denounced former U.S. Vice President Henry Wallace's third-party U.S. presidential campaign as "Communist-inspired."

United Air Lines signed a contract with the AFL Air Line Pilots Association, giving a top pay of $1,266 per month to senior pilots.

50 years ago
1958

Hit parade
#1 single in the U.K.: Jailhouse Rock--Elvis Presley

30 years ago
1978

On television tonight
Family, on ABC
Tonight's episode: See Saw

Died on this date
Herta Oberheuser, 66. German physician. Dr. Oberheuser specialized in dermatology after obtaining her medical degree in Bonn in 1937. She served as doctor for the League of German Girls before working at Ravensbrück women's concentration camp during World War II, where she performed atrocities on the prsioners. Dr. Oberheuser was the only female defendant in the Nuremberg "Doctors' trial" (1946-1947), where she was convicted of crimes against humanity and sentenced to 20 years in prison. She was released after five years, and was a family doctor in Stocksee, West Germany before losing her job and her medical license after being recognized in 1958 by a Ravensbruck survivor. Dr. Oberheuser never practiced medicine again.

Space
The Soviet nuclear-powered spy satellite Cosmos 954 broke up over the Northwest Territories, spreading Communist radiation over an area of several hundred square miles.

Hockey
NHL
All-Star Game @ War Memorial Auditorium, Buffalo
Prince of Wales Conference 3 Clarence S. Campbell Conference 2 (OT)

Gilbert Perreault scored 3:55 into overtime to give the Prince of Wales Conference a 3-2 win over the Clarence Campbell Conference. Campbell Conference goalie Billy Smith was chosen the game's Most Valuable Player. It's hard to believe today that there was a time when the NHL All-Star game could be such a low-scoring affair.

Football
NFL
Quarterback Joe Namath announced his retirement as a professional football player. After 13 seasons with the New York Jets, Broadway Joe had joined the Los Angeles Rams in 1977, but a hard hit in the fifth game of the season had sidelined him for the rest of the year. Mr. Namath's best season was 1968, when he led the Jets to the American Football League championship, and followed it with a 16-7 win over the NFL champion Baltimore Colts to become the first AFL team to win the Super Bowl.

CFL
The Hamilton Tiger-Cats hired Tom Dimitroff as head coach to succeed Bob Shaw, who had stepped down in order to be the team's full-time general manager. Mr. Dimitroff had been an assistant under George Brancato with the Ottawa Rough Riders from 1974-1977, earning a Grey Cup ring in 1976.

25 years ago
1983

Died on this date
George Cukor, 83. U.S. movie director. He won the Academy Award for Best Director for My Fair Lady in 1964. Cukor's other movies include The Women; Born Yesterday; Camille; Let's Make Love. He was known as a "woman's director," and was particularly known for his successful working relationship with Katharine Hepburn, with whom he made 10 movies (including Holiday; The Philadelphia Story; and Adam's Rib).

10 years ago
1998

Hit parade
#1 single in the U.S.A. (Billboard): Truly, Madly, Deeply--Savage Garden