May 1950

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May 6, 1950: Tolund man discovered 22 centuries after his death (Nationalmuseet photo)
May 15, 1950: China's Mao Zedong....
May 9, 1950: Future Wal-Mart mogul opens his first store
... gives North Korea's Kim Il-sung go-ahead for invasion

The following events occurred in May 1950:

May 1, 1950 (Monday)
  • At a May Day rally in South Africa to protest apartheid, police fired into a crowd of black demonstrators at Johannesburg, killing 19 people and injuring 38.[1]
  • The town of Mosinee, Wisconsin, was the site of a mock Communist takeover, staged by the local American Legion outpost to illustrate what life under Soviet conquest might be like. Benjamin Gitlow, who had twice been the vice-presidential candidate for the Communist Party USA (in 1924 and 1928), before renouncing Communism, played the role of General Secretary of the Communist Party of the "United Soviet States of America", while another former Communist, Joseph Zack Kornfeder, assisted as the new Commissar of the town, renamed "Moskva" in the exercise. A Soviet flag flew in front of the American Legion outpost.[2] Mayor Ralph E. Kronenwetter, who had participated in the mock coup by allowing himself to be "arrested", suffered a cerebral hemorrhage that evening, and died six days later at the age of 49, while another participant, Reverend William L. Bennett, died the day after Kronenwetter.[3]
  • Operations began for the United Nations Relief and Works Agency for Palestine Refugees in the Near East (UNRWA).[4]
  • Springbok Radio was launched as the first commercial radio station in South Africa, broadcasting programming in both English and Afrikaans.[5]
  • The Charlemagne Prize was first awarded for work done in the service of European unification. The first recipient was Richard von Coudenhove-Kalergi, the founder of the Pan-European Movement.
  • Died: Lothrop Stoddard, 66, American eugenicist

May 2, 1950 (Tuesday)

May 3, 1950 (Wednesday)
  • Alpha Beta Alpha, the first fraternity for undergraduate students of library science (open to men and women alike) was established.[7]
  • Died: Theodor Duesterberg, 74, German politician who ran for President in 1932

May 4, 1950 (Thursday)
  • The Soviet Union announced that it had completed repatriation of all German prisoners of war who had been captured during World War II, and that the last group of 17,538 Germans concluded the return of 1,939,063 German POWs. West German chancellor Konrad Adenauer, pointing out that the TASS news agency had reported in 1945 that there were 3.5 million German POWs held in the USSR, demanded to know what had happened to more than 1.5 million still missing.[8] and the U.S. State Department described the Soviet claim as "fantastic and absurd", and that an estimated 200,000 German POWs were still prisoners in Soviet labor camps.[9]
  • In Centerville, Texas, seven schoolchildren, all African-American, were killed when their school bus collided with a truck.[10]
  • The science fiction short story fixup The Martian Chronicles by Ray Bradbury was published.

May 5, 1950 (Friday)

May 6, 1950 (Saturday)
  • The well-preserved body of the Tollund Man, who had died in the 4th Century BC was discovered by Viggo Højgaard, his wife Grethe, and his brother Emil, in a bog near the city of Silkeborg in Denmark.[13] Radiocarbon dating concluded that the average calculated date of the man's death was 2,260 to 2,220 years before present (310 BC to 270 BC) with a calibrated range of 375 BC to 210 BC).[14]
  • Elizabeth Taylor, 18-year-old movie starlet, went through the first of eight weddings, with a ceremony at the Church of the Good Shepherd in Beverly Hills, California. The groom was 23-year-old Conrad Hilton Jr., heir to the $125,000,000 hotel empire.[15]
  • Collier's magazine published Ray Bradbury's classic science fiction story, "There Will Come Soft Rains", describing the aftermath of a nuclear holocaust with the setting of a computer-controlled house that continued to operate after the death of its occupants. In the story, the setting was the fictional city of Allendale, California, on the then-future date of April 28, 1985. When the story was reprinted as a chapter in Bradbury's book The Martian Chronicles, the future date would be revised to August 4, 2026.[16]
  • Serbian Muslim peasants in the Yugoslavian town of Cazin, led by Milan Bozic and Mile Devrnja, revolted against the Communist government in frustration over the collective farm system, required delivery of harvests to the government, and excessive taxes. The rebellion was suppressed with the arrest of 714 people, of whom 17 were sentenced to death, including Bozic and Devrnja.[17]
  • Middleground won the Kentucky Derby.
  • Warrington defeated Widnes 19-0 in rugby's Challenge Cup Final in front of 94,249 at Wembley Stadium.
  • Died: Agnes Smedley, 58, American journalist

May 7, 1950 (Sunday)

May 8, 1950 (Monday)
  • U.S. Secretary of State Dean Acheson announced an agreement with France and the State of Vietnam to provide ten million dollars of military assistance,[18] the first of what would become three billion dollars of American money spent to fight Communism in Indochina over the next 25 years.[19]

May 9, 1950 (Tuesday)
Schuman
  • France's Foreign Minister Robert Schuman presented his proposal for France and West Germany to work together on the production of coal and steel, "under a common High Authority in an organization open to the other countries of Europe". Italy, Belgium, the Netherlands and Luxembourg would join France and West Germany in creating the European Coal and Steel Community (ECSC) on April 18, 1951. The "Schuman Declaration", is considered to be the beginning of the creation of what is now the European Union and May 9 is celebrated annually as "Europe Day".[20]
Hubbard

May 10, 1950 (Wednesday)
  • The National Science Foundation was founded as a U.S. government agency with a stated mission "to promote the progress of science; to advance the national health, prosperity, and welfare; and to secure the national defense."
Turing's Pilot

May 11, 1950 (Thursday)
  • The McMinnville UFO photographs, among the most famous photos purported of an unidentified flying object were taken by Paul Trent, a farmer near McMinnville, Oregon, after his wife spotted a flying disc. Trent developed the pictures, showed them to a local banker who placed them on display, and a reporter for the McMinnville Telephone Register ran the story after inquiring, and the photos would appear later in LIFE Magazine.[26] "Skeptics found nothing to disparage the Trents' integrity," it would be written 48 years later, "and no financial motive for having faked UFO pictures." [27]
  • Dongshan Island was captured by 10,000 Communist Chinese troops from the Nationalist Chinese.[28]
  • A coal mine gas explosion in a deep mine, near Mons in Belgium, killed at least 41 miners, all of whom had been working 1,650 feet underground.[29]

May 12, 1950 (Friday)
CPUSA Gen. Sec'y Dennis

May 13, 1950 (Saturday)
Nino Farina

May 14, 1950 (Sunday)
  • The "first genuinely free elections" [36] in the history of Turkey took place, with the Democrat Party of Adnan Menderes capturing 396 of the 487 seats in the General Assembly, and bringing an end to the rule of Ismet Inonu and the Republican People's Party, who had only 68 seats.[37]
  • Joseph Stalin replied to Mao Zedong, confirming that he had given Kim Il-sung the okay to "unify" Korea, but added, "If Chinese comrades do not agree, then we have to resolve this question." [34]
  • Died: Johnstown, 14, American racehorse, winner of 1939 Kentucky Derby and Belmont Stakes

May 15, 1950 (Monday)
  • In what one historian describes as "arguably the most important date in PRC diplomatic history" [34] as well as "a terrible blunder", Mao Zedong approved Kim Il-sung's plan for North Korea to invade South Korea, starting the Korean War.
  • General Józef Kuropieska, of the People's Army of Poland, was arrested on fabricated charges of spying for the West, starting a purge of officers by the Defense Minister, Marshal Konstantin Rokossovsky. The "Trial of the Generals" would take place in 1951, with 40 indicted officers being sentenced to death.[38]
  • Born: Renate Stecher, East German track athlete, gold medalist in 1972 and 1976, in Dreiheide

May 16, 1950 (Tuesday)
  • The Soviet Union announced that it was cutting the remaining reparations, owed to it from East Germany, by half. Of ten billion dollars demanded, the East Germans' payments since 1945 were to amount to $3,658,000,000 by year's end. The remaining $6,342,000,000 was reduced to $3,171,000,000 to be paid by the end of 1965. The announcement came after worldwide protests of the Soviet declaration that it had no more German prisoners of war to return.[39]
  • Born: Bruce Coville, American children's author, in Syracuse, New York

May 17, 1950 (Wednesday)

Scholastic Books; in Colorado Springs, Colorado

May 18, 1950 (Thursday)

May 19, 1950 (Friday)
  • Thirty-six people were killed and over 350 injured in South Amboy, New Jersey when a train carrying munitions exploded at 7:26 pm. Thirty-one were employees of the James Healing Company, an explosives-handling firm.[43][44]
  • An attempt, in the U.S. Senate, to break a Southern Democratic filibuster against the Fair Employment Practices Act failed to gather the necessary 64 votes (two-thirds of the entire membership of 98 Senators), though the margin was 52–32 in favor of cloture.[45]
  • Born: Patrick Caddell, American political consultant and pollster, in Rock Hill, South Carolina
  • Died: Wattie Holm, 48, former St. Louis Cardinals baseball player, in a murder-suicide

May 20, 1950 (Saturday)
  • Armed Forces Day was observed for the first time in the United States, following the proclamation by President Truman. The day has been observed annually, since then, on the third Saturday of May.[46] Retired Lt.Col. Oliver North would comment later that "the day has pretty much been ignored" because it's "just at the wrong time of year... sandwiched between Easter and Memorial Day".[47]

May 21, 1950 (Sunday)
  • The first group of Iraqi Jews arrived in Tel Aviv, marking the beginning of Operation Ezra and Nehemiah. Over the following year, until the halt of the exodus from Iraq on July 18, 1951, more than 100,000 of the refugees would resettle in Israel.[48]
  • Cuzco, in Peru was rocked by an earthquake that killed 129 people, injured 300, and destroyed ninety percent of the structures in the one-time capital of the Inca Empire.[49]

May 22, 1950 (Monday)

May 23, 1950 (Tuesday)

May 24, 1950 (Wednesday)
  • The U.S. Maritime Administration was created as an agency of the U.S. Department of Commerce).
  • Ingrid Bergman and Roberto Rossellini were married by proxy in Juarez, Mexico, where four attorneys appeared on their behalf, while the couple remained in Rome.[54]
  • A Lansa Airways airplane crashed into the side of the 8,000 foot Galeras volcano in Colombia, five miles west of the village of Pasto. Only one of the 29 people on board survived, a little girl who was seriously injured.[55]
  • France restored the official recognition of Mother's Day, with provision that the Fête des Mères would take place annually on the last Sunday in May. Article II of the legislation provided that if Pentecost fell on that Sunday (which last happened in 2009), Mother's Day would be observed on the first Sunday of June.
  • Born: Thomas DeSimone, American mobster and the inspiration for the character "Tommy DeVito" in the film Goodfellas (disappeared 1979)
  • Died: Archibald Wavell, 1st Earl Wavell, 67, Viceroy of India 1943–1947

May 25, 1950 (Thursday)
  • Thirty-three people were killed in Chicago when a streetcar collided with a gasoline truck on State Street, between 62nd and 63rd Streets.[56] As with other Chicago disasters (the October 30, 1972 Illinois Central collision and the May 25, 1979 DC-10 crash), there is no historical marker acknowledging the event.[57]
  • The Tripartite Declaration was issued by the United States, the United Kingdom and France, with the parties agreeing not to sell arms to Middle Eastern nations without the unanimous agreement of all three nations.[58]
  • The Brooklyn-Battery Tunnel was formally opened to traffic.
  • The World Fellowship of Buddhists was founded in Colombo, Sri Lanka[4]

May 26, 1950 (Friday)
  • The Kefauver Committee hearings into U.S. organized crime began.[59]

May 27, 1950 (Saturday)
  • The Journal of the American Medical Association published its first articles showing a link between cigarette smoking and an increased risk of lung cancer. "Tobacco Smoking as a Possible Etiological Factor in Bronchogenic Carcinoma: A Study of Six Hundred and Eighty-Four Proved Cases" was by Ernest L. Wynder and Dr. Evarts A. Graham, while "Cancer and Tobacco Smoking: A Preliminary Report" was authored by Drs. Morton L. Levin, Hyman Goldstein and Paul R. Gerhardt.[60]
  • Gasoline rationing came to an end in the United Kingdom after nearly eleven years, one day after British Fuel Minister Philip Noel-Baker declared that the Standard Oil Company of New Jersey (now Exxon) would supply more fuel if rationing ceased. The limitations on sales had begun after September 3, 1939, the day of Britain's entry into World War II.[61]
  • King Frederik IX of Denmark signed legislation that adopted the recommendations of the Grønlandskommissionen (Greenland Commission) for changing the status of Denmark's colony in Greenland, including an end to the control of half of the island exercised by KGH (Kongelige Grønlandske Handel), the Royal Greenland Trading Department. In 1953, Greenland would be elevated from the status of colony to an autonomous province.[62]
  • The Society of Women Engineers was founded by 50 female engineers at the Cooper Union in New York.[63]
  • Born: Dee Dee Bridgewater, American jazz singer as Denise Eileen Garrett in Memphis, Tennessee

May 28, 1950 (Sunday)
  • The TV show Zoo Parade, the first television program about wildlife exploration, debuted on NBC and was hosted by Marlin Perkins, the director of Chicago's Lincoln Park Zoo.[64]
  • Saint Joan of Valois (1464–1505) was canonized as a saint in the Roman Catholic Church.[65]
  • Yugoslavia closed its embassy in Albania as relations between the two nations deteriorated, and would cease all diplomatic relations on October 11.[66]
  • Died: Marc Sangnier, 77, French Roman Catholic philosopher

May 29, 1950 (Monday)

May 30, 1950 (Tuesday)

May 31, 1950 (Wednesday)
  • Israel's army transported 120 illegal immigrants to the border with Jordan at the Wadi Araba desert and ordered them to make their way back to their Jordanian homes. Sir Alec Kirkbride, the British ambassador to Jordan, would write later that 36 of the group did not survive the trip and died of thirst in the desert.[70]
  • Born: Gregory Harrison, American actor, in Avalon, California

References
  1. Philip S. Foner, May Day: A Short History of the International Workers' Holiday, 1886–1986 (International Publishers Company, 1986) p142
  2. "Mosinee in Hands of 'Reds' After a Make Believe Coup", Milwaukee Journal, May 1, 1950
  3. "Mayor, Pastor Die at Mosinee", Milwaukee Journal, May 8, 1950, p3; "D-Day in Mosinee" Archived 2014-10-16 at the Wayback Machine, by Carl Weinberg, OAH Magazine of History (October 2010)
  4. Edmund Jan Osmanczyk and Anthony Mango, Encyclopedia of the United Nations and International Agreements, Volume 4 (Taylor & Francis, 2003)
  5. Pieter J. Fourie, Media Studies Volume 1: Institutions, Theories and Issues (Juta and Company Ltd, 2001) pp9-10
  6. Edward L. Davis, Encyclopedia of Contemporary Chinese Culture (Taylor & Francis, 2012) p100
  7. Allen Kent, Harold Lancour, Encyclopedia of Library and Information Science, Volume 5 (CRC Press, 1971) p208
  8. "1,500,000 PWs Held Missing In Red Camps", Miami Daily News, May 5, 1950, p1
  9. "Reds' PW Claim Called Absurd By State Dept.", Miami Daily News, May 6, 1950, p1
  10. "7 Die In Bus Crash", Miami Daily News, May 4, 1950, p1
  11. "9-Tiered Crown Makes Phumiphon King of Siam", Miami Daily News, May 5, 1950, p2
  12. Kenneth W. Estes, Handbook for Marine NCOs, 4th Ed. (Naval Institute Press, 1996) p158
  13. "Tolund Man: A Body Appears" Archived 2013-12-09 at the Wayback Machine, www.TolundMan.dk; P.V. Glob, The Bog People: Iron Age Man Preserved (New York Review of Books, 2004)
  14. "Dating bog bodies by means of 14 C-AMS" Archived 2011-09-17 at the Wayback Machine, Journal of Archaeological Science 31 (2004) pp482-483
  15. "'Liz' Taylor Wedding Tops In Glamor", , Miami Sunday News, May 7, 1950, p1
  16. Alexander C.T. Geppert, Imagining Outer Space: European Astroculture in the Twentieth Century (Palgrave Macmillan, 2012) pp100-101
  17. Ivo Banac, With Stalin Against Tito: Cominformist Splits in Yugoslav Communism (Cornell University Press, 1988) pp236-237
  18. James E. Westheider, The Vietnam War (Greenwood Publishing Group, 2007) p5
  19. L. Fletcher Prouty, JFK: The CIA, Vietnam, and the Plot to Assassinate John F. Kennedy (Carol Publishing Group, 1996, reprinted by Skyhorse Publishing, 2009) p49
  20. John Gillingham, Coal, Steel, and the Rebirth of Europe, 1945–1955: The Germans and French from Ruhr Conflict to Economic Community (Cambridge University Press, 2004) p228
  21. "The Creation of 'Religious' Scientology", by Stephen A. Kent, Religious Studies and Theology (December 1999) pp97-126
  22. Sally Lee, Sam Walton: Business Genius of Wal-Mart (Enslow Publishers, 2007) p31
  23. "ACE/Pilot ACE", in Milestones in Computer Science and Information Technology, Edwin D. Reilly, ed. (Greenwood Publishing Group, 2003) p5
  24. "Lavaud, Frank", in Michael R. Hall, Historical Dictionary of Haiti (Scarecrow Press, 2012) p156
  25. Ide Anak Agung Gde Agung, From the Formation of the State of East Indonesia Towards the Establishment of the United States of Indonesia (Yayasan Obor Indonesia, 1996) p774
  26. "Farmer Trent's Flying Saucer", LIFE Magazine, June 26, 1950, p40
  27. "Six Unexplainable Encounters", by Jim Wilson, Popular Science (July 1998) p64
  28. Bruce A. Elleman, High Seas Buffer: The Taiwan Patrol Force, 1950–1979 (Government Printing Office, 2012) p61
  29. "41 Belgians Killed in Mine Blast", Miami Daily News, May 11, 1950, p1
  30. "Dennis on His Way to Jail", , Miami Daily News, May 12, 1950, p1
  31. Peter Hodgkinson and William A. Schabas, Capital Punishment: Strategies for Abolition (Cambridge University Press, 2004) p274
  32. Xavier Chimits, et al., Grand Prix Racers: Portraits of Speed (MBI Publishing, 2008) p154
  33. Odd Arne Westad, Decisive Encounters: The Chinese Civil War, 1946–1950 (Stanford University Press, 2003) pp319-320
  34. Thomas J. Christensen, Worse Than a Monolith: Alliance Politics and Problems of Coercive Diplomacy in Asia (Princeton University Press, 2011) p59
  35. "Stevie Wonder", Icons of R & B and Soul: An Encyclopedia of the Artists Who Revolutionized Rhythm, Bob Gulla, ed. (Greenwood Publishing Group, 2008) p311
  36. Andrew Mango, Atatürk: The Biography of the founder of Modern Turkey (Penguin, 2002) p36
  37. John M. VanderLippe, The Politics of Turkish Democracy: İsmet İnönü and the Formation of the Multi-party System, 1938–1950 (SUNY Press, 2005) p204
  38. Andrew A. Michta, Red Eagle: The Army in Polish Politics, 1944–1988 (Hoover Press, 1990) p47
  39. "Russia Slashes Germans' Debt", Miami Daily News, May 16, 1950, p1
  40. "Allies Ease Ban On Ruhr Control", Miami Daily News, May 17, 1950, p1
  41. James Shapiro, Oberammergau: The Troubling Story of the World's Most Famous Passion Play (Random House Digital, 2001) p183
  42. Rudolph M. Bell and Cristina Mazzoni, The Voices of Gemma Galgani: The Life and Afterlife of a Modern Saint (University of Chicago Press, 2003) p289
  43. "29 Feared Dead In Munitions Blast", Miami Daily News, May 20, 1950, p1; "Live TNT Mines Menace South Amboy Blast Area", Miami Sunday News, May 21, 1950, p1
  44. Randall Gabrielan, Explosion at Morgan: The World War I Middlesex Munitions Disaster (The History Press, 2012) pp138-139
  45. Keith M. Finley, Delaying the Dream: Southern Senators and the Fight Against Civil Rights, 1938–1965 (LSU Press, 2010) pp132-133
  46. "Armed Forces Day 2010: Honor US Military and Veterans on Saturday, May 15", by Cheryl Phillips, San Francisco Examiner, May 15, 2010
  47. "Honoring Heroes", by Oliver North, military.com
  48. Devorah Hakohen, Immigrants in Turmoil: The Great Wave of Immigration to Israel and Its Absorption, 1948–1955 (Syracuse University Press, 2003) p81
  49. Sasha Rudenstine, The Causes and Behavioral Consequences of Disasters: Models Informed by the Global Experience 1950–2005 (Springer, 2012) pp51-53
  50. "Bayar, Celal", in Historical Dictionary of Turkey, Metin Heper and Nur Bilge Criss, eds. (Scarecrow Press, 2009) p36
  51. "BIG SPY ROUNDUP LAUNCHED BY FBI", Miami Daily News, May 24, 1950, p1
  52. "Atomic Secrets", in Conspiracy Theories in American History: An Encyclopedia, Peter Knight, ed. (ABC-CLIO, 2003) p99
  53. Samuel S. Hill, et al., Encyclopedia Of Religion In The South (Mercer University Press, 2005) p99
  54. "Ingrid Weds Roberto In Mexico Proxy Rites", Miami Daily News, May 25, 1950, p1
  55. "28 Are Killed As Plane Hits Andes Volcano", Miami Daily News, May 25, 1950, p1
  56. "KIN TRY TO IDENTIFY TROLLEY DEAD", , Miami Daily News, May 26, 1950, p1
  57. Kenneth E. Foote, Shadowed Ground: America's Landscapes of Violence and Tragedy (University of Texas Press, 2003) p158
  58. Erik Goldstein and Richard Langhorne, Guide to International Relations and Diplomacy (Continuum International, 2004) p314; Major International Treaties of the Twentieth Century, J. A. S. Grenville and Bernard Wasserstein, eds. (Taylor & Francis, 2001) p719
  59. "Kefauver Committee", in Historical Dictionary of the 1950s, by James S. Olson (Greenwood Publishing, 2000) p151
  60. Merrill Goozner, The $800 Million Pill: The Truth Behind the Cost of New Drugs (University of California Press, 2004) p175; JAMANetwork.com
  61. "Britain Ends Gas Rationing On Since '39", Miami Daily News, May 26, 1950, p1
  62. Erik Beukel, et al., Phasing Out the Colonial Status of Greenland, 1945–54: A Historical Study (Museum Tusculanum Press, Aug 19, 2010) p152
  63. Sybil E. Hatch, Changing Our World: True Stories of Women Engineers (ASCE Publications, 2006) p viii
  64. Jim Sterba, Nature Wars: The Incredible Story of How Wildlife Comebacks Turned Backyards Into Battlegrounds (Random House Digital, 2012) pp192-193
  65. Ferdinand Holböck, Married Saints and Blesseds: Through the Centuries (Ignatius Press, 2002) p314
  66. "Serbia, Relations With", in Historical Dictionary of Albania, Robert Elsie, ed. (Scarecrow Press, 2010) p408
  67. "The Mounties Use Northwest Passage and Panama Canal", LIFE Magazine, June 19, 1950, pp122-128
  68. Choong Soon Kim, A Korean Nationalist Entrepreneur: A Life History of Kim Sŏngsu, 1891–1955 (SUNY Press, 1998) p145
  69. "Parsons, Midget Racer, Wins Abbreviated '500'", Miami Daily News, May 31, 1950, p2-B
  70. Nur Masalha, Catastrophe Remembered: Palestine, Israel and the Internal Refugees (Zed Books, 2005) p28
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