December 1927


The following events occurred in December 1927:

December 1, 1927 (Thursday)

  • Chinese actress Soong Mei-ling married General Chiang Kai-shek, and became known as Madame Chiang Kai-shek. After General Chiang became China's leader the following year, she was the First Lady for the next 48 years, until her husband's death in 1975. An Episcopal Christian wedding was conducted, in English, at Miss Soong's home, followed by a Chinese civil ceremony at the Majestic Hotel in Shanghai. Miss Soong's sister was the widow of China's first President, Sun Yat-sen.

December 2, 1927 (Friday)

December 3, 1927 (Saturday)

December 4, 1927 (Sunday)

  • Duke Ellington and his orchestra opened at the Cotton Club in Harlem. Ellington proved so popular that he was featured at the Cotton Club for five years. In 1929, the CBS Radio Network began broadcasting a live show from the club, taking the 28-year-old jazz musician on his way to worldwide fame.

December 5, 1927 (Monday)

December 6, 1927 (Tuesday)

  • On the day that they were scheduled to testify at a murder trial in Williamson, West Virginia, six witnesses were killed when the lodging they were staying in caught fire. Flames blocked both stairways leading from the upper floor, and all of the victims were found in a room where they had fled to escape the smoke.
  • Colonel Juan Aberle and Major Alfaro Noguera attempted to stage a coup in El Salvador. They took control of the central police barracks in San Salvador, but the badly planned putsch was quickly suppressed.
  • Born: Patsy Takemoto Mink, who in 1964 became the first female Asian-American to be elected to Congress; in Paia, Hawaii

December 7, 1927 (Wednesday)

  • The 250 foot long Canadian freighter SS Kamloops, with a crew of 22, sank in Lake Superior during a winter storm. Bodies of some victims were recovered in the spring, but the ship would remain missing for almost 50 years until August 21, 1977, its discovery by two scuba divers near Isle Royale.
  • Born: Helen Watts, Welsh contralto, in Milford Haven

December 8, 1927 (Thursday)

December 9, 1927 (Friday)

  • The Washington Herald, owned by William Randolph Hearst, published a front-page story alleging that Mexico's President Plutarco Calles had proposed bribing four United States Senators to advance Mexico's interests. Days later, Hearst provided documentation revealing the names of the four Senators: William Borah, J. Thomas Heflin, Robert M. La Follette, Jr. and George W. Norris, who all denied any payment from Mexico, while the Mexican government questioned the authenticity of the documents possessed by the Herald.
  • Born: Pierre Henry, French electronic music composer, in Paris
  • Died: Dr. Paul Jeserich, 73, celebrated as "The German Sherlock Holmes" because of his skills as a forensic detective.

December 10, 1927 (Saturday)

  • The WSM Barn Dance, the popular NBC Radio Network show, announced its change of name and would create a brand that is now part of its show that is still running a century after its 1925 premiere. That weekend's broadcast happened minutes after the presentation of the Grand Opera on NBC's Music Appreciation Hour, and before introducing the first act at the WSM studio in Nashville, WSM director George D. Hay told audiences that "For the past hour, we have been listening to music largely from grand opera, but from now on, we will present 'The Grand Ole Opry'."
  • The U.S. House of Representatives voted to confer the Medal of Honor upon Colonel Charles Lindbergh.

December 11, 1927 (Sunday)

  • At 4:00 am, the Chinese city of Canton was seized in an uprising of 20,000 Communists, who announced that the formation of the "Canton Soviet". The Red Guards and their sympathizers seized control of police stations and the city prison, murdering police and guards, seizing control of the arsenal, and releasing prisoners. The Nationalist Army retook the city two days later, and carried out an even bloodier retaliation. At least 2,000 members of the Red Guards, whose dyed scarves had left a red stain on their collars, were arrested and summarily executed, while another 4,000 civilians were murdered in the five-day-long "White Terror" carried out by the Nationalist Troops.

December 12, 1927 (Monday)

  • Oklahoma's Governor Henry S. Johnston, threatened with impeachment by the state legislature, called out the Oklahoma National Guard to prevent members of the state House of Representatives from meeting at the capitol building. The next day, house members met at the Huckins Hotel in Oklahoma City hotel and voted to impeach Governor Johnston, state Supreme Court Chief Justice Fred P. Branson, and State Board of Agriculture chairman Henry B. Cordell. An injunction was issued against the Senators to prevent them from attempting to conduct an impeachment trial. On December 28, the guardsmen barred members of the state Senate from meeting at the capitol building.
  • The National Builders Bank, located in Chicago, opened the first branch that would operate 24/7, with shifts to "render twenty-four hour service 365 days a year".
  • Tommy Loughran defeated world light heavyweight boxing champion Jimmy Slattery in a 15-round decision at New York's Madison Square Garden.
  • Born: Robert Noyce, co-inventor of the microchip and co-founder of Fairchild Semiconductor and Intel; in Burlington, Iowa

December 13, 1927 (Tuesday)

  • Charles Lindbergh made a daring non-stop flight from Washington DC, bound for Mexico City. He landed more than 24 hours later after going through bad weather. Reputedly, after getting lost, he flew in low enough to spot the word "Caballeros" at one railroad station and could not find it on his map, before learning later that it was the word for "Gentlemen" on a men's bathroom.
  • Born: James Wright, American poet, in Martins Ferry, Ohio

December 14, 1927 (Wednesday)

  • The United Kingdom and the Kingdom of Iraq signed a Treaty of Alliance and Amity.
  • The aircraft carrier USS Lexington, recently converted from a battle cruiser, was commissioned. The ship would be damaged beyond repair in 1942 during the Battle of the Coral Sea.
  • The British House of Lords approved the Archbishop of Canterbury's request for approval of a revision to the Book of Common Prayer, 241–88.

December 15, 1927 (Thursday)

  • Marion Parker, 12, was kidnapped from Mount Vernon Junior High School in Los Angeles. Her dismembered body was dumped from the kidnapper's car two days later, after her father paid a $1,500 ransom. Following the largest manhunt to that time on the West Coast, her killer, William Edward Hickman, was arrested on December 22 at the town of Echo, Oregon. He would be hanged on October 19, 1928.
  • The British House of Commons rejected the proposed revision of the Anglican Book of Common Prayer, by a vote of 247–205.
  • In fiction, Anthony "Buck" Rogers, of the American Radioactive Gas Corporation, was entombed by a rockfall in an abandoned coal mine in Pennsylvania. Kept in a state of suspended animation by the radioactive gas, he would be revived 492 years later, in the year 2419 and go on to further adventures. Buck Rogers was introduced in Philip Francis Nowlan's science fiction novella, Armageddon 2419 A.D. in the August 1928 issue of Amazing Stories.

December 16, 1927 (Friday)

December 17, 1927 (Saturday)

December 18, 1927 (Sunday)

December 19, 1927 (Monday)

  • The Dow Jones Industrial Average broke 200 points for the first time. By the end of 1928, it would reflect a 50% increase in stock prices, rising to 300, peaking at 386.10 on September 3, 1929. A month later, the stock market would crash. At its lowest point during the Great Depression, it would close at 41.22 on July 8, 1932.
  • For the first time in the history of Vatican City, there were as many non-Italians as there were Italians in the College of Cardinals, as Pope Pius XI appointed five men to fill vacancies in the 66 member College. Two were from France, and one apiece from Canada, Spain and Hungary.
  • Indian revolutionaries were executed by the British Indian government for their roles in the 1925 train robbery at Kakori. Rajendra Nath Lahiri had been executed two days earlier. All four men, members of the anti-British Hindustan Republican Association were hanged at the Gorkakhpur District Jail.

December 20, 1927 (Tuesday)

December 21, 1927 (Wednesday)

December 22, 1927 (Thursday)

  • The United States and Nicaragua signed an agreement for the 1,229-member Nicaraguan Guardia Nacional to be the sole military and police force, in return for U.S. training and sponsorship.
  • After three weeks of display to the public, mass production of the Model A automobile and its shipment to dealers began.

December 23, 1927 (Friday)

December 24, 1927 (Saturday)

  • The Standard Oil refinery in Tientsin caught fire during a battle between opposing forces in China. Over the next four days, the United States Marines, sent earlier in the year to protect American interests, successfully battled the blaze and saved the city from destruction.
  • The first All-India Music Conference was held in conjunction with a meeting of the Indian National Congress in Madras.
  • Born: Mary Higgins Clark, American suspense author, in the Bronx, New York

December 25, 1927 (Sunday)

December 26, 1927 (Monday)

December 27, 1927 (Tuesday)

December 28, 1927 (Wednesday)

  • U.S. Secretary of State Frank B. Kellogg informed the French Ambassador to the U.S., Paul Claudel, that his government proposed to extend American-French negotiations to create a multinational treaty to forever outlaw war, with the goal of having nations "renounce war as an instrument of national policy". Sixty four nations signed the Kellogg-Briand Peace Pact on August 27, 1928, pledging to never again go to war, and the Pact took effect on July 24, 1929.
  • At the age of 30, Dorothy Day, who would become founder of the Catholic Worker Movement, converted to Roman Catholicism.

December 29, 1927 (Thursday)

December 30, 1927 (Friday)

December 31, 1927 (Saturday)