August 1922

August 1, 1922 (Tuesday)

• Britain published the Balfour Note, which declared that Britain would give up reparations claims as well as claims on other Allies to the extent that the United States would do the same with respect to Britain's debts. The Note was met with great anger by the Americans for their being made to appear as greedy and an obstacle to international recovery.
• Forty people were killed and 50 injured when two trains carrying pilgrims to Lourdes collided between Agen and Tarbes, near Auch, France. In all, almost 500 passengers were on the two trains, which were both climbing uphill to Tarbes and Lourdes. According to the investigation, "the first train was too heavily laden and unable to climb a sharp gradient" and "the driver decided to return to Agen and ran down the hill backward" without regard to the second train.
• The House of Commons voted to expel MP Horatio Bottomley, the editor of John Bull magazine and a representative of the Hackney South constituency, after Bottomley's May 23 conviction on felony charges of fraud.
• The International Committee on Intellectual Cooperation, and an advisory organization for the League of Nations to promote the sharing of research findings between nations, held its first session.
• Born: Edith Konecky, American feminist novelist; as Edith Rubin, in Brooklyn, New York City, United States

  August 2, 1922 (Wednesday)

• A devastating typhoon came ashore at Shantou in the Guangdong province on the southeast coast of China, killing at least 60,000 people.
• Born:
• *Paul Laxalt, American politician, served as Governor of Nevada from 1967 to 1971, U.S. Senator from Nevada from 1974 to 1987, and chairman of the Republican National Committee from 1983 to 1987; in Reno, Nevada, United States
• *Betsy Bloomingdale, American socialite and philanthropist; as Betty Newling, in Los Angeles, United States
• Died:
• *Alexander Graham Bell, 75, Scottish-born American inventor of the telephone; died of complications from diabetes
• *Harry Boland, 35, Irish republican politician; died after being shot two days earlier by the Irish Army
• *Lemuel P. Padgett, 66, American politician, served as the U.S. Congressman from Tennessee from 1901 until his death
• *William E. Crow, 52, American lawyer and politician, served as the U.S. Senator from Pennsylvania from October 1921 until his death

  August 3, 1922 (Thursday)

• Radio station WGY of Schenectady, New York, introduced the concept of the weekly broadcast of a drama series, as "The WGY Players" presented The Wolf, an adaptation by director Edward H. Smith of a play by Eugene Walter. The play was presented as three episodes between piano and soprano solos in a 40-minute concert program that began at 8:45 in the evening. Smith began perfecting radio drama sound effects and the WGY Players presented weekly plays in serial form, each condensed to fit the blocks of time available.
• Two days of street fighting between Socialists and Fascists began in Milan, Italy. The building housing the Socialist newspaper Avanti! was destroyed.
• The U.S. Treasury said that the Balfour Note would have no effect on the American policy towards foreign debts.
• The "lats" was introduced as the currency of Latvia, valued at one gold French franc and equivalent to 50 paper Latvian rubles. It would last until Latvia's annexation by the Soviet Union in 1940. It would be revived in 1993 until replaced by the European.
• The second annual world bicycle racing championship was held in Liverpool, England, and was won by Dave Marsh.
• Born:
• *Su Bai, Chinese archaeologist and bibliographer; in Mukden, Liaoning Province, Republic of China
• *F. James McDonald, American automotive engineer and business executive, served as the President of General Motors from 1981 to 1987; as Francis James McDonald, in Saginaw, Michigan, United States
• *Tom Kines, Canadian musician, folklorist and TV host; in Roblin, Manitoba, Canada
• *Robert Sumner, American evangelist and author; in Norwich, New York, United States
• *Mariano Lebrón Saviñón, Dominican author and co-founder of Universidad Nacional Pedro Henríquez Ureña; in Santo Domingo, Dominican Republic
• *John Eisenhower, U.S. Army officer and ambassador, son of Dwight D. Eisenhower; in Denver, United States
• Died:
• *Minna Cauer, 80, German educator, journalist and activist
• *Ture Malmgren, 71, Swedish journalist, book publisher and municipal politician; died of a heart attack
• *Ben "Sport" Donnelly, 52, American football player and coach, second-known professional player in the sport's history; died after a long illness

  August 4, 1922 (Friday)

• A contingent of 1,500 National Army of Ireland troops landed in ships at three ports of County Kerry to retake the area of Munster from the Irish Republican Army, with 450 coming ashore at Fenit on the ferry SS Lady Wicklow and others landing at Tralee and Passage West.
• At 6:25 p.m. Eastern time, the time of the burial of Alexander Graham Bell, all telephone service in the United States was suspended for one minute.
• The Aliens Decree was issued by the Bolshevik government of the Byelorussian Soviet Socialist Republic, specifying which Belarusians could be citizens of the Soviet Union. All former subjects of the Russian Empire who were at least 14 years old and permanent residents were allowed to apply for citizenship, and all children younger than 14 were granted automatic citizenship. Citizenship could be denied to those who had defied the Soviet government or who failed to apply by the end of the year.
• Born: Loro Boriçi, Albanian soccer football forward and manager of the Albania national team; as Lorenco Boriçi, in Shkodër, Principality of Albania
• Died:
• *Nikolai Belelubsky, 77, Russian civil engineer and leading bridge designer in Imperial Russia
• *Nikolai Nebogatov, 73, rear admiral in the Imperial Russian Navy who surrendered his fleet to the Japanese Imperial Navy in the 1905 Battle of Tsushima
• *General Enver Pasha, 40, Ottoman Turkish military officer, revolutionary and convicted war criminal, served as the Minister of War and leader of the "Army of Islam"; killed in battle near the village of Ab-i-Derya outside of the city of Dushanbe after coming under attack by an ethnic Armenian brigade of the Soviet Red Army. Enver had been convicted of war crimes in a court-martial in 1920 for his role in the massacre of Armenians.

  August 5, 1922 (Saturday)

• A train collision in Sulphur Springs, Missouri killed 34 people and injured 186, the worst train disaster in Missouri history. The Missouri Pacific express train 4, running from Fort Worth, Texas to St. Louis, crashed into a slower moving local train with 100 passenger, which had stopped at the Sulphur Springs station to take on water, and the local's wooden coaches were splintered. Many of the victims who survived the initial impact were scalded by steam from the No. 4 engine, while others drowned when their train cars rolled down an embankment into a creek. An inquest concluded that the express train engineer, who was killed in the accident, had been negligent in failing to observe a stop signal because he had been reading orders handed to him at an earlier stop.
• Taxi driver Arthur Partridge introduced an independent bus service, "Chocolate Express." Partridge became the first to challenge the monopoly that was held in London by the British Electric Traction and Underground Electric Railways. Within two years, other independent bus companies, referred to as "pirate operators," would follow Partridge's lead and as many as 500 independent buses would be competing the BET/UER monopoly for customers on London's streets. The independents would be outlawed by the London Traffic Act 1924, which limited bus operations to those licensed by the city.
• Albert Einstein left Germany due to threats on his life by Organisation Consul, the ultra-nationalist and antisemitic terror group that assassinated Walther Rathenau.
• The drama film Blood and Sand starring Rudolph Valentino and Lila Lee premiered in Los Angeles.
• The Battle of Kilmallock ended in an Irish Free State victory after two days of fighting, as Irish Republicans fell back toward Charleville.
• Born:
• *Ethel Winant, the first female executive in U.S. television as vice-president of CBS; as Ethel Wald, in Worcester, Massachusetts, United States
• *Sandy Kenyon, voice and character actor; as Sanford Klein, in New York City, United States
• Died: Tommy McCarthy, 59, American baseball player and inductee into the Baseball Hall of Fame, known for his innovations and for being the only Hall member who played in the Union Association

  August 6, 1922 (Sunday)

• Martial law was announced in Genoa, Milan, Parma, Ancona and Livorno to curb Fascist violence. The move came a day after Fascisti invaded and occupied the San Giorgio Palace in Genoa.
• The first specimen of the Dukes' skipper butterfly was discovered by entomologist W. C. Dukes in Alabama, and named for him in 1923 by Arthur Ward Lindsey.
• Born:
• *Doug Ford, American professional golfer, winner of the 1955 PGA Championship and 1957 Masters Tournament; as Douglas Fortunato, in West Haven, Connecticut, United States
• *General Om Prakash Malhotra, senior army officer in the Indian Army, served as the 10th Chief of Staff of the Indian Army from 1978 to 1981; in Srinagar, Princely State of Kashmir and Jammu, British India
• Died:
• *Rear Admiral Uriel Sebree, 74, U.S. Navy officer, Commander-in-Chief of the U.S. Pacific Fleet, leader of two rescue missions in the Arctic Ocean, and served as the second Governor of American Samoa from 1901 to 1902
• *Katharina Scheven, 60-61, German women's rights activist and campaigner against state-regulated prostitution