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Michael Scheepers

Male 1931 - 1945  (14 years)

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Timeline

1931
1934
1937
1939
1942
1945
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5
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9
10
11
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14
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   Date  Event(s)
1 1931 
  • 1931—1931:
    Statute of Westminster: British Dominions become independent sovereign states
  • 1931—1931:
    Collapse of the German banking system; 3,000 banks there close
  • 14 Apr 1931—14 Apr 1931:
    Highway Code first issued
  • 26 Apr 1931—26 Apr 1931:
    Census: Population - England and Wales; 40 Million; Scotland: 4.8 Million; N Ireland: 1.24 Million (Unfortunately, the census was destroyed by fire in WW2)
  • 21 Oct 1931—21 Oct 1931:
    National Government formed to deal with economic crisis - Britain comes off gold standard
2 1932 
  • 1932—1932:
    Great Hunger March of unemployed to London
  • 1932—1932:
    Moseley founds British Union of Fascists
  • 1932—1932:
    Cockroft and Walton accelerate particles to disintegrate an atomic nucleus
  • 1932—1932:
    Sir Thomas Beecham established the London Philharmonic Orchestra
  • 1932—1932:
    SA - Airmail service between South Africa and Britain started in January. Wireless telephone communication established with Britain in February.
  • 21 May 1932—21 May 1932:
    Amelia Earhart first solo nonstop flight across Atlantic by a female pilot
  • 3 Oct 1932—3 Oct 1932:
    Iraq gains independence from Britain
  • 3 Oct 1932—3 Oct 1932:
    'The Times' introduces 'Times New Roman' typeface
3 1933 
  • 1933—1933:
    ICI scientists discover polythene
  • 1933—1933:
    Only 6 pennies minted in Britain this year
  • 1933—1933:
    SA - South Africa House opened in London. Afrikaans Bible issued.
  • 12 Nov 1933—12 Nov 1933:
    First known photos of the 'Loch Ness Monster' taken
4 1934 
  • 1934—1934:
    Hitler becomes Fuehrer of Germany
  • 1934—1934:
    SA - Union Airways acquired by government on 01 August 1936. South African Broadcasting Corporation established.
  • 18 Jul 1934—18 Jul 1934:
    King George V opens Mersey Tunnel
  • 26 Sep 1934—26 Sep 1934:
    RMS Queen Mary launched
  • 30 Nov 1934—30 Nov 1934:
    First time a steam locomotive travels at 100 mph ('Flying Scotsman')
5 1935 
  • 1935—1935:
    London adopts a 'Green Belt' scheme
  • 1935—1935:
    Land speed record of 301.13 mph by Malcolm Campbell
  • 28 Feb 1935—28 Feb 1935:
    Nylon first produced by Gerard J. Berchet of Wallace Carothers' research group at DuPont (there is no evidence to the widely-supposed story that the name derives from New York-London)
  • 12 Mar 1935—12 Mar 1935:
    Hore-Belisha introduces pedestrian crossings and speed limits for built-up areas in Britain
  • 1 Jun 1935—1 Jun 1935:
    Voluntary driving tests introduced in UK
  • 30 Jul 1935—30 Jul 1935:
    Penguin paperbacks launched
6 1936 
  • 1936—1936:
    Jet engine first tested
  • 20 Jan 1936—20 Jan 1936:
    George V dies
  • 5 May 1936—5 May 1936:
    First flight of a Spitfire
  • 24 Jul 1936—24 Jul 1936:
    'Speaking clock' service starts in UK
  • 2 Nov 1936—2 Nov 1936:
    British Broadcasting Corporation initiates the BBC Television Service, world's first public TV transmission
  • 30 Nov 1936—30 Nov 1936:
    Crystal Palace destroyed by fire
  • 5 Dec 1936—5 Dec 1936:
    Edward VIII abdicates (announced Dec 10) - popular carol that Christmas: 'Hark the Herald Angels sing Mrs Simpson's got our King'
7 1937 
  • 1937—1937:
    '999' emergency telephone call facility starts in London
  • 1937—1937:
    Billy Butlin opens his first holiday camp
  • 12 Apr 1937—12 Apr 1937:
    Frank Whittle ground-tests the first jet engine designed to power an aircraft
  • 12 May 1937—12 May 1937:
    Coronation of King George VI
  • 28 May 1937—28 May 1937:
    Neville Chamberlain becomes Prime Minister - policy of appeasement towards Hitler
  • 3 Jun 1937—3 Jun 1937:
    Duke of Windsor marries Wallis Simpson
  • 4 Dec 1937—4 Dec 1937:
    'The Dandy' first published
8 1938 
  • 1938—1938:
    SA - Great Trek Centenary celebrations.
  • 1938—1938:
    Principle of paid holidays established in Britain
  • 1938—1938:
    HMS Rodney first ship to be equipped with radar
  • 1938—1938:
    First practical ball-point pen produced by Hungarian journalist, Lajos Biro
  • 12 Mar 1938—12 Mar 1938:
    Germany invades and annexes Austria
  • 3 Jul 1938—3 Jul 1938:
    'Mallard' reaches 126 mph (203 km/h); still world record for a steam locomotive
  • 27 Sep 1938—27 Sep 1938:
    Largest ocean liner ever built, Queen Elizabeth launched on Clydebank
  • 29 Sep 1938—29 Sep 1938:
    Chamberlain visits Hitler in Munich - promises 'peace in our time'
  • 30 Oct 1938—30 Oct 1938:
    Orson Welles broadcasts his radio play of HG Wells 'The War of the Worlds', causing panic in the USA
9 1939 
  • 1939—1939:
    Germany annexes Czechoslovakia
  • 1939—1939:
    Start of evacuation of women and children from London
  • 1939—1939:
    Coldest winter in Britain since 1894, though this could not be publicised at the time
  • 1 Sep 1939—1 Sep 1939:
    Germany invades Poland
  • 3 Sep 1939—3 Sep 1939:
    Britain and France declare war on Germany
  • 6 Sep 1939—6 Sep 1939:
    First air-raid on Britain
  • 11 Sep 1939—11 Sep 1939:
    British Expeditionary Force (BEF) sent to France
  • 14 Oct 1939—14 Oct 1939:
    HMS Royal Oak sunk in Scapa Flow with loss of 810 lives
  • 7 Dec 1939—7 Dec 1939:
    'First flight' of Canadian troops sail for Britain - 7,400 men on 5 ships
  • 17 Dec 1939—17 Dec 1939:
    'Admiral Graf Spee' scuttled outside Montevideo
10 1940 
  • 1 Apr 1940—1 Apr 1940:
    BOAC starts operations, replacing Imperial and British Airways Ltd
  • 11 May 1940—11 May 1940:
    National Government formed under Churchill
  • 13 May 1940—13 May 1940:
    Germany invades France
  • 27 May 1940—27 May 1940:
    Start of the evacuation of the British Army at Dunkirk (27 May - 4 Jun)
  • 25 Jun 1940—25 Jun 1940:
    Fall of France to Germany
  • 7 Sep 1940—7 Sep 1940:
    Germany launches bombing blitz on Britain, the first of 57 consecutive nights of bombing
  • 15 Sep 1940—15 Sep 1940:
    Battle of Britain: massive waves of German air attacks decisively repulsed by the RAF - Hitler postpones invasion of Britain
  • 14 Nov 1940—14 Nov 1940:
    Coventry heavily bombed and the Cathedral almost completely destroyed
11 1941 
  • 1941—1941:
    Britain introduces severe rationing
  • 1941—1941:
    First British jet aircraft flies, based on work of Whittle
  • 1941—1941:
    Bailey invents his portable military bridge
  • 1941—1941:
    First use of antibiotics
  • 1941—1941:
    SA - South African Forces take Mega in Southern Abyssinia. South African Forces arrive in Egypt in April.
  • 1941—1941:
    SA - Heroic stand by South African Forces at Sidi Resegh in November 1944. The black-out in Cape Town is suspended. 6th South African Armoured Division leads 8th Army offensive in Italy, South Africans were the first to enter Florence.
  • 10 May 1941—10 May 1941:
    Rudolf Hess flies to Scotland
  • 27 May 1941—27 May 1941:
    'Bismark' sunk
  • 22 Jun 1941—22 Jun 1941:
    Germany invades Russia (Operation Barbarossa)
  • 1 Jul 1941—1 Jul 1941:
    First Canadian armoured regiments arrive in Britain
  • Dec 1941—Dec 1941:
    Canadian forces given operation role in defending south coast of England
  • Dec 1941—Dec 1941:
    'Manhattan Project' of nuclear research begins in America
  • 7 Dec 1941—7 Dec 1941:
    Japan attackes US fleet at Pearl Harbour
  • 8 Dec 1941—8 Dec 1941:
    USA enters WWII
  • 24 Dec 1941—24 Dec 1941:
    Hong Kong falls to the Japanese
12 1942 
  • 1942—1942:
    Invention of world's first programmable computer by Alan Turing in co-operation with Max Neumann - used to crack German codes
  • 1942—1942:
    Gilbert Murray founds Oxfam
  • 30 May 1942—30 May 1942:
    Over 1,000 allied bombers raid Cologne
  • 4 Jun 1942—4 Jun 1942:
    Battle of Midway
  • 19 Aug 1942—19 Aug 1942:
    Abortive raid on Dieppe, largely by Canadian troops
  • 6 Sep 1942—6 Sep 1942:
    Germans defeated at Stalingrad
  • 3 Oct 1942—3 Oct 1942:
    First successful launch of V2 rocket in Germany - first man-made object to reach space
  • 23 Oct 1942—23 Oct 1942:
    Battle of El Alamein - Montgomery defeats Rommel
  • 2 Dec 1942—2 Dec 1942:
    'Manhattan Project' - a team led by Enrico Fermi initiates the first self-sustaining nuclear chain reaction
13 1943 
  • 1943—1943:
    Round-the-clock bombing of Germany begins
  • 16 May 1943—16 May 1943:
    'Dam Buster' raids on Ruhr dams by RAF
  • 24 Jul 1943—24 Jul 1943:
    Allies invade Italy - Benito Mussolini resigns as Italian Dictator, 24 July
14 1944 
  • 6 Apr 1944—6 Apr 1944:
    PAYE income tax begins
  • 4 Jun 1944—4 Jun 1944:
    Allies enter Rome
  • 6 Jun 1944—6 Jun 1944:
    D-Day invasion of Normandy
  • 12 Jun 1944—12 Jun 1944:
    First V1 flying bombs hit London
  • 8 Sep 1944—8 Sep 1944:
    First V2 rocket bombs hit London
  • 11 Sep 1944—11 Sep 1944:
    Allies enter Germany
  • 16 Dec 1944—16 Dec 1944:
    Battle of the Bulge: German counter-offensive
15 1945 
  • 1945—1945:
    SA - 34 people killed and 90 injured in explosion of the Grand Magazine in Pretoria.
  • 1945—1945:
    SA - Announcement made that as from the beginning of the war until 05 March 1945, more than 1500 South African soldiers were decorated, 2386 were mentioned in despatches and 330 were commended.
  • 1945—1945:
    SA - Hiroshima and Nagasaki nuked
  • 4 Feb 1945—4 Feb 1945:
    Yalta Conference between Churchill, Roosevelt and Stalin
  • 17 Mar 1945—1945:
    SA - South African Forces capture Monte Sole and Monte Caprara, which were barring entering into Bologna.
  • 29 Mar 1945—29 Mar 1945:
    Last V1 flying bomb attack
  • 25 Apr 1945—25 Apr 1945:
    Berlin surrounded by Russian troops
  • 30 Apr 1945—30 Apr 1945:
    Hitler commits suicide
  • 8 May 1945—8 May 1945:
    VE Day (Victory in Europe)
  • 9 May 1945—9 May 1945:
    Channel Islands liberated
  • 26 Jun 1945—26 Jun 1945:
    UN Charter signed in San Francisco
  • 16 Jul 1945—16 Jul 1945:
    First ever atomic bomb exploded in a test in New Mexico (although there were other forms of atomic device before that, such as the Pile at Stagg Field, first critical on 2nd Dec 1942)
  • 26 Jul 1945—26 Jul 1945:
    Labour win UK General Election - Churchill out of office
  • 29 Jul 1945—29 Jul 1945:
    BBC Light Programme starts
  • 6 Aug 1945—6 Aug 1945:
    Atomic bomb dropped on Hiroshima
  • 9 Aug 1945—9 Aug 1945:
    Atomic bomb dropped on Nagasaki
  • 15 Aug 1945—15 Aug 1945:
    VJ Day (Victory in Japan)
  • 2 Sep 1945—2 Sep 1945:
    Japanese surrender signed aboard USS Missouri
  • 24 Oct 1945—24 Oct 1945:
    United Nations Organisation comes into existence
  • 4 Nov 1945—4 Nov 1945:
    UNESCO founded

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