1945


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Events

   * January 5 - The Soviet Union recognizes the new pro-Soviet government
     of Poland
   * January 7 - British General Bernard Montgomery holds a press conference
     in which he claims credit for victory in the Battle of the Bulge
   * January 12 - World War II: The Soviets begin a very large offensive in
     Eastern Europe against the Nazis.
   * January 13 - Soviet patrol arrests Raoul Wallenberg in Hungary
   * January 16 - Adolf Hitler moves into his underground bunker, the
     so-called FŸhrerbunker
   * January 17 - World War II: Soviets occupy Warsaw
   * January 17 - Holocaust: Nazis begin to evacuate from Auschwitz
     concentration camp
   * January 27 - The Red Army arrives at Auschwitz and Birkenau in Poland
     and find the Nazi concentration camp where 1.1-1.5 million people were
     murdered.
   * January 28 - World War II: Supplies begin to reach China over the newly
     reopened Burma Road.
   * January 30 - The Wilhelm Gustloff with more 10,000 refugees from
     Gotenhafen in the Danzig Bay sunk with three torpedos from the Soviet
     submarine S-13. More 9,300 drowned in the Baltic Sea.
   * January 31 - Eddie Slovik is executed, the first American soldier since
     the Civil War to be executed for desertion
   * February 2 - World War II: President Franklin D. Roosevelt and British
     Prime Minister Winston Churchill leave to meet with Soviet leader
     Joseph Stalin at the Yalta Conference.
   * February 3 - World War II: Russia agrees to enter the Pacific Theatre
     conflict against Japan.
   * February 4 - World War II: President Franklin D. Roosevelt, Prime
     Minister of the United Kingdom Winston Churchill and Soviet leader
     Joseph Stalin begin the Yalta Conference (ends February 11)
   * February 7 - World War II: General Douglas MacArthur returns to Manila
   * February 8 - World War II: United States fire bombs Dresden, Germany is
     fire-bombed killing 35,000 citizens.
   * February 10 - World War II: The Steuben sunk by the Soviet submarine
     S-13.
   * February 13 - World War II: Soviet Union forces capture Budapest,
     Hungary from the Nazis.
   * February 13 - World War II: The British Air Force bombs Dresden,
     Germany.
   * February 14 - Chile, Ecuador, Paraguay and Peru join the United
     Nations.
   * February 16 - World War II: American forces land on Corregidor island
     in the Philippines.
   * February 16 - American forces recapture the Bataan Peninsula
   * February 19 - World War II: Battle of Iwo Jima - about 30,000 United
     States Marines landed on Iwo Jima starting the battle.
   * February 23 - World War II: Following the American victory at the
     Battle of Iwo Jima, a group of United States Marines reach the top of
     Mount Surabachi on the island and are photographed raising the American
     flag. The photo will later win a Pulitzer Prize.
   * February 23 - World War II: The capital of the Philippines, Manila, is
     liberated by American forces.
   * February 24 - Egyptian Premier Ahmed Maher Pasha is killed in
     Parliament after reading a decree.
   * March 3 - World War II: Previously neutral Finland declares war on the
     Axis powers.
   * March 6 - Communist-led government formed in Romania
   * March 7 - World War II: American troops seize the bridge over the Rhine
     River at Remagen, Germany and begin to cross.
   * March 8 - Josip Broz Tito forms a government in Yugoslavia
   * March 9 - March 10 - World War II: American B-29 bombers attack Japan
     with incendiary bombs. Tokyo is fire-bombed killing 100,000 citizens.
   * March 16 - World War II: The Battle of Iwo Jima ends but small pockets
     of Japanese resistance persist.
   * March 18 - World War II: 1,250 American bombers attack Berlin.
   * March 19 - World War II: Adolf Hitler orders that all industries,
     military installations, shops, transportation facilities and
     communications facilities in Germany be destroyed.
   * March 19 - Off the coast of Japan, bombers hit the aircraft carrier USS
     Franklin, killing 800 of her crew and crippling the ship.
   * March 21 - World War II: British troops liberate Mandalay, Burma
   * March 22 - The Arab League was formed with the adoption of a charter in
     Cairo, Egypt.
   * March 30 - World War II: Soviet Union forces invade Austria and take
     Vienna.
   * April 1 - World War II: United States troops land on Okinawa in the
     last campaign of the war.
   * April 4 - World War II: American troops liberate Ohrdruf death camp in
     Germany.
   * April 7 - World War II: The Japanese battleship Yamato is sunk 200
     miles north of Okinawa while in-route to a suicide mission.
   * April 10 - The Allied Forces liberated their first Nazi concentration
     camp, Buchenwald.
   * April 12 - United States President Franklin Delano Roosevelt
     (1933-1945) dies in office; Vice President Harry S. Truman (1945-1953)
     takes the Oath of Office.
   * April 25 - Founding negotiations of United Nations in San Francisco
   * April 25 - World War II: United States and Russian troops link up at
     the Elbe River, cutting Germany in two
   * April 28 - Italian dictator Benito Mussolini and his mistress, Clara
     Petacci, are hanged upside down by Italian partisans as they attempt to
     flee the country.
   * April 30 - Adolf Hitler and his wife of one day, Eva Braun, commit
     suicide as Soviet troops approach Berlin.
   * May 1 - Josef Goebbels and his wife commit suicide after killing their
     6 children.
   * May 2 - The Soviet Union announces the fall of Berlin. Soviet soldiers
     hoist the red flag over the Reichstag building.
   * May 3 - Sinking of the floating-jails Cap Arcona, Thielbek and
     Deutschland by the RAF in the LŸbeck Bay.
   * May 3 - Rocket scientist Wernher von Braun and 120 members of his team
     surrender to US forces. They later help start the US space program.
   * May 4 - Liberation of the concentration camp Neuengamme near Hamburg by
     the british army.
   * May 4 - Reddition of the North Germany army by Marshal Bernard
     Montgomery.
   * May 5 - Ezra Pound, poet and author, is arrested by American soldiers
     in Italy for treason.
   * May 5 - US armored unit liberates prisoners of Mauthausen concentration
     camp - including Simon Wiesenthal
   * May 5 - Canadian soldiers liberate the city of Amsterdam from Nazi
     occupation.
   * May 6 - World War II: Axis Sally delivers her last propaganda broadcast
     to Allied troops (first was on December 11, 1941).
   * May 7 - World War II: General Alfred Jodl signs unconditional surrender
     terms at Reims, France, ending Germany's participation in the war. The
     document will take effect the next day.
   * May 8 - World War II: V-E Day (Victory in Europe, as Nazi Germany
     surrenders) commemorates the end of World War II in Europe.
   * May 9 - World War II: Hermann Gšring is captured by the United States
     Army; Norway arrests Vidkun Quisling.
   * May 23 - Heinrich Himmler, the head of the Nazi Gestapo, commits
     suicide in British custody.
   * May 25 - In Atlantic, ships can finally keep their lights lit. Szilard
     begs Harry S Truman not to use the bomb.[1]
   * May 28 - William Joyce, known as "Lord Haw-Haw" is captured. He is
     later charged with high treason in London for his English-language
     wartime broadcasts on German radio. He is hanged in January of 1946.
   * June 1 - British take over Lebanon and Syria
   * June 6 - King Haakon VII of Norway returns to Norway
   * June 11 - William Lyon Mackenzie King is reelected as Canadian prime
     minister. Franck Committee recommends against a surprise nuclear
     bombing of Japan.[2]
   * June 24 - Victory parade in Red Square
   * June 26 - United Nations charter signed.
   * July 1 - World War II: Germany is divided between Allied occupation
     forces
   * July 5 - World War II: Liberation of the Philippines declared.
   * July 8 - Harry S Truman informed that Japan will talk peace if she can
     keep the Emperor.[3]
   * July 9 - A forest fire breaks out in the Tillamook Burn, the third fire
     in that area since 1933.
   * July 16 - Nuclear testing: The Trinity Test, the first test of an
     atomic bomb, using 6 kilograms of plutonium, succeeds in detonating,
     unleashing an explosion equivalent to that of 20 kilotons of TNT.
   * July 17 - World War II: Potsdam Conference - At Potsdam, the three main
     Allied leaders begin their final summit of the war. The meeting will
     end on August 2.
   * July 21 - Harry S Truman approves order for atomic bombs to be used.[4]
   * July 23 - World War II: French marshall Henri Petain, who headed the
     Vichy government during World War II goes on trial, charged with
     treason.
   * July 26 - Winston Churchill resigns as Great Britain's prime minister
     after his Conservative Party is soundly defeated by the Labour Party.
     Clement Atlee becomes the new prime minister. Potsdam Declaration
     demands Japan's unconditional surrender; Article 12 permitting Japan to
     retain the Emperor had been deleted by Truman.[5]
   * July 28 - A US bomber accidentally crashes into the Empire State
     Building, killing 14 people.
   * July 28 - Japan rejects Potsdam Declaration.[6]
   * July 29 - The BBC Light Programme radio station was launched, aimed at
     mainstream light entertainment and music.
   * July 30 - World War II: The USS Indianapolis is hit and sunk by an I-58
     Japanese submarine. Some 900 survivors jump into the sea and are adrift
     for 4 days. Nearly 600 die before help arrives. Captain Charles Butler
     MacVey III is later court-martialed.
   * July 31 - World War II: Pierre Laval, fugitive former leader of Vichy
     France, surrenders to Allied soldiers in Austria.
   * August 6 - World War II: the atomic bomb, (Little Boy is dropped on
     Hiroshima, killing 80,000 citizens immediately.
   * August 8 - World War II - The Soviet Union declares war on Japan and
     invades Manchuria with more than 1 million troops. This action prompts
     Emperor Hirohito to plead with the war council to reconsider surrender.
   * August 8 - The United Nations Charter is ratified by the United States,
     and that nation becomes the first to join the new international
     organization. Soviets declare war on Japan.[7]
   * August 9 - World War II: An atomic bomb nicknamed "Fat Man" is
     detonated over the city of Nagasaki, Japan at 11:02 AM (local time)
     with an equivalent force of 22,000 tons of TNT. An estimated
     60,000-80,000 are killed and more 60,000 injured. Soviet Union begins
     its offensive against Japan in Manchuria.
   * August 10 - US drops warning leaflets on Nagasaki.[8]
   * August 13 - Zionist World Congress approaches British government to
     talk about founding of Israel.
   * August 15 - Imperial Japan surrenders, but retains the Emperor. The
     United States called this day V-J Day (Victory in Japan). This ends the
     period of Japanese expansionism and begins the period of Occupied
     Japan.
   * August 17 - Indonesian nationalists declare independence from the
     Netherlands. Achmad Sukarno becomes president.
   * August 19 - Vietnam War: Viet Minh led by Ho Chi Minh take power in
     Hanoi, Vietnam.
   * End of August - Mao Zedong and Chiang Kai-shek meet in Chongqing to
     discuss an end to hostilities between the Communists and the
     Nationalists.
   * September 2 - World War II ends: The final official surrender of Japan
     was accepted by General Douglas MacArthur and Admiral Chester Nimitz
     from a delegation led by Mamoru Shigemitsu, aboard the battleship
     Missouri in Tokyo Bay. But in Japan August 14 is well recognized as the
     day the Pacific War ended.
   * September 2 - Ho Chi Minh promulgates the Vietnamese Declaration of
     Independence, and unity from the north to the south.
   * September 4 - World War II: Japanese forces surrender on Wake Island
     after hearing word of their nation's surrender.
   * September 5 - Iva Toguri D'Aquino, a Japanese-American suspected of
     being wartime radio propagandist "Tokyo Rose," is arrested in Yokohama.
   * September 8 - US troops occupy southern Korea, Russians occupy the
     north. This arrangement proves to be the beginning of a divided Korea.
   * September 8 - Hideki Tojo, Japanese prime minister during most of World
     War II, attempts suicide to avoid facing a war crimes tribunal.
   * September 20 - Mohandas Gandhi and Jawaharlal Nehru demand that British
     troops leave India
   * October 10 - Russian code clerk Igor Gouzenko defects to Canada. He
     helps the West gain an understanding of Soviet spy rings in North
     America.
   * October 15 - World War II: Former premier of Vichy France, Pierre
     Laval, is executed by firing squad for treason.
   * October 17 - Colonel Juan Peron stages a coup d'etat, becoming ruler of
     Argentina.
   * October 18 - The first German war crimes trial begins in Nuremberg.
   * October 21 -Women's suffrage: Women are allowed to vote in France for
     the first time.
   * October 23 - Jackie Robinson signs a contract with the Montreal Royals.
   * October 27 - Indonesian separatists riot and fight Dutch and British
     security forces
   * October 29 - Getulio Vargas, president of Brazil, resigns
   * October 29 - At Gimbels Department Store in New York City the first
     ballpoint pens go on sale (price: $12.50 each).
   * November 1 - John H. Johnson publishes the first issue of Ebony
     Magazine.
   * November 13 - Charles de Gaulle is elected president of France.
   * November 15 - Harry S Truman, Clement Atlee, and King call for a UN
     Atomic Energy Commission.[9]
   * November 29 - The Federal People's Republic of Yugoslavia is
     proclaimed. Marshal Tito is named president.
   * November - Assembly of the world's first general purpose electronic
     computer, the Electronic Numerical Integrator Analyzer and Computer
     (ENIAC), is completed. It covers 1800 feet of floor space. The first
     set of calculations is run on the computer.
   * December 20 - Gen. George S. Patton dies in a car accident at the age
     of 60.
   * December 27 - Twenty-eight nations sign an agreement creating the World
     Bank.
   * December 27 - Terror strikes against British military bases in
     Palestine.

   * Foundation of the Food and Agriculture Organization of the United
     Nations.
   * Poland has two rival governments
   * Discovery of Nag Hammadi scriptures
   * Dutch painter Hans Van Meegeren is arrested for collaboration with
     Nazis but the paintings he had sold to Hermann Gšring are found to be
     fakes.
   * Female suffrage in Guatemala and Japan

   * Denmark recognizes independent Iceland

Ongoing events

   * Sino-Japanese War (1937-1945)

Art, Culture & Fashion

   * 1945 in film
        o The Lost Weekend. Winner of Academy Awards for Best Picture; Ray
          Milland, Best Actor; Billy Wilder, Best Director, Best Screenplay
        o Mildred Pierce Winner of Academy Award for Joan Crawford, Best
          Actress.
        o Alfred Hitchcock's Spellbound, starring Ingrid Bergman and Gregory
          Peck
        o With Rossellini's Roma Citt`a aperta, Italian neorealist cinema
          begins.
        o Paramount Studios releases theatrical short cartoon titled "The
          Friendly Ghost", featuring ghost named Casper
        o Marcel CarnŽ and Jacques PrŽvert's The Children of Paradise (Les
          Enfants du Paradis) is released following the liberation of France
   * 1945 in music
        o Jazz pianist Oscar Peterson, makes his first record for Victor
        o Hit songs of 1945:
             + "On the Atchison, Topeka, and the Santa Fe" - Johnny Mercer
             + "You Belong to My Heart" - Bing Crosby and Xavier Cugat Orch
             + "Rum and Coca-Cola" - The Andrews Sisters
             + "It Might as Well be Spring" - Dick Haymes
             + "My Dreams are Getting Better All the Time" - Doris Day and
               Les Brown
        o Bebop begins to emerge as popular style of jazz to contrast music
          of the big bands. Development of bebop is attributed in large part
          to trumpeter Dizzy Gillespie and alto saxophonist Charlie Parker
   * 1945 in sports
        o Toronto Maple Leafs win Stanley Cup
        o Detroit Tigers win World Series
   * 1945 in television

Science and Technology

   * Arthur C. Clarke puts forward idea of a communications satellite in a
     Wireless World magazine article
   * At Mayo Clinic, streptomycin first used to treat tuberculosis
   * Percy Spencer accidentally discovers that microwaves can heat food.
     Invention of microwave oven follows.
   * Grand Rapids, Michigan, and Newburgh, New York become the first cities
     to add fluoride to drinking water
   * The first nuclear reactor outside of the U.S. is built in Chalk River,
     Ontario, Canada.
   * High-altitude west-to-east winds across Pacific, discovered by Japanese
     in 1942 and by Americans in 1944, are dubbed "jet stream"
   * Salvador Edward Luria and Alfred Day Hershey independently recognize
     that viruses undergo mutations
   * Herbicide 2,4-D is introduced. Later used as a component of Agent
     Orange
   * Team lead by Charles DuBois Coryell discovers element 61, the only one
     still missing between 1 and 96 on Periodic Table. New element is called
     promethium

Births

   * January 3 - Stephen Stills (Crosby, Stills, Nash and Young), singer,
     songwriter
   * January 3 - Victoria Principal, actress
   * January 10 - Rod Stewart, singer
   * January 19 - Maria Jespen, theologian
   * January 26 - Jacqueline du PrŽ, cello player (+ 1987)
   * January 27 - Nick Mason, musician of Pink Floyd
   * January 28 - Marthe Keller, actress
   * January 29 - Tom Selleck, actor
   * January 30 - Michael Dorris, author (+ 1997)
   * February 3 - Bob Griese, Football Hall of Famer
   * February 5 - Charlotte Rampling, actress
   * February 6 - Bob Marley, reggae superstar
   * February 7 - Pete Postlethwaite, actor
   * February 9 - Mia Farrow, actress
   * February 17 - Brenda Fricker, actress
   * February 24 - Barry Bostwick, actor
   * February 28 - Bubba Smith, Football Hall of Famer
   * March 7 - John Heard, actor
   * March 8 - Micky Dolenz, actor, director, musica ("The Monkees")
   * March 8 - Anselm Kiefer, painter
   * March 19 - Cem Karaca, Turkish rock musician
   * March 22 - Paul Schockemšhle, equestrian
   * March 29 - Walt Frazier, basketball player
   * March 30 - Eric Clapton, blues guitarist
   * April 4 - Daniel Cohn-Bendit, political activist
   * April 4 - Craig T. Nelson, actor "Coach" "The District"
   * April 27 - August Wilson, playwright
   * May 6 - Bob Seger, rock music singer
   * May 6 - Jimmie Dale Gilmore, musician
   * May 8 - Keith Jarrett, jazz musician
   * May 13 - Magic Dick, musician ("The J. Geils Band")
   * May 15 - Duarte Pio, Duke of Braganza presumptive heir to Portuguese
     crown
   * May 19 - Pete Townshend, guitarist, lyricist
   * May 21 - Ernst Messerschmid, physicist and astronaut
   * May 28 - John Fogerty, singer
   * May 31 - Rainer Werner Fassbinder, director
   * June 17 - Art Bell - radio talk show host
   * June 17 - Eddy Merckx, Belgian cycling champion
   * June 19 - Aung San Suu Kyi, Myanmar poet and Nobel peace laureate
   * July 7 - Michael Ancram (Michael Kerr, Earl of Ancram), British
     politician
   * July 15 - JŸrgen Mšllemann, German politician
   * August 14 - Steve Martin, actor and comedian
   * August 31 - Itzhak Perlman, violinist
   * August 31 - Van Morrison, musician
   * September 3 - Aldo Moro, Italian politician
   * September 8 - Jose Feliciano, singer
   * October 27 - Lu's In‡cio Lula da Silva, Brazilian President
   * November 3 - J. D. Souther, country rock musician
   * November 12 - Neil Young, (Crosby, Stills, Nash and Young), singer,
     songwriter

Deaths

   * January 3 - Edgar Cayce, psychic, "exhaustion"
   * January 22 - Else Lasker-Schuler, poet
   * January 31 - Eddie Slovik, American soldier
   * February 11 - Al Dubin, Swiss songwriter
   * February 11 - J. S. H. Lokerman, Dutch resistance fighter
   * March - Anne Frank, at Bergen-Belsen concentration camp, typhus
   * March 2 - Emily Carr, artist
   * March 18 - William Grover-Williams, Grand Prix motor racing driver/war
     hero
   * March 19 - Friedrich Fromm, Nazi official
   * March 26 - David Lloyd George, Prime Minister of the United Kingdom
   * April 9 - Wilhelm Canaris, head of the German Abwehr, hanged for
     treason
   * April 9 - Dietrich Bonhoeffer, theologian in Nazi Germany
   * April 12 - United States President Franklin Delano Roosevelt, massive
     stroke
   * April 18 - Ernie Pyle, American journalist, sniper fire
   * April 28 - Benito Mussolini, Italian dictator, hanged
   * April 30 - Adolf Hitler, Nazi party leader, suicide
   * May 1 - Josef Goebbels, Nazi propagandist, suicide
   * May 15 - Charles Williams, British author
   * May 23 - Heinrich Himmler, head of the Nazi Gestapo, suicide
   * July 5 - John Curtin, Australian prime minister
   * August 10 - Robert Goddard, American rocket scientist
   * August 31 - Stefan Banach, great Polish mathematician
   * September 15 - Anton Webern, Austrian composer
   * September 24 - Johannes Hans Geiger, inventor of the Geiger counter
   * September 26 - BŽla Bart--k, aged 64, Hungarian composer
   * October 13 - Milton Hershey, chocolate tycoon
   * October 15 - Pierre Laval, former Vichy French premier, firing squad
   * October 19 - N.C. Wyeth, illustrator
   * October 24 - Vidkun Quisling, Norwegian politician, famous traitor,
     executed
   * November 11 - Jerome Kern, composer
   * November 21 - Robert Benchley, The New Yorker, humorist, theatre
     critic, actor
   * December 4 -Thomas Hunt Morgan, biologist
   * December 20 - General George S. Patton, car accident
   * December 28 - Theodore Dreiser, author

Nobel Prizes

   * Physics - Wolfgang Pauli
   * Chemistry - Artturi Ilmari Virtanen
   * Medicine - Sir Alexander Fleming, Ernst Boris Chain, Sir Howard Walter
     Florey
   * Literature - Gabriela Mistral
   * Peace - Cordell Hull