January 9: ON THIS DAY in 1948, Jerusalem invaded

January 9, 2019 Brooklyn Daily Eagle

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ON THIS DAY IN 1948, the Eagle reported, “Jerusalem, Jan. 9 (U.P.) – Arab expeditionary forces, perhaps 2,000 strong, invaded Palestine from the Levant in a number of border crossings today and stormed scattered Jewish towns in the face of strong resistance by British Army and Jewish defense units. Reports from the northeastern tip of Palestine said some 800 Arabs swarmed across from Syria at 8 a.m. today and laid siege to the settlements of Dan and Kefar Szold. British soldiers from border posts and Hagana groups converged on the area and engaged the Arabs in fighting on a scale not made clear immediately. The British were reported firing into the ranks of the Arabs with light artillery. An official announcement said British troops ‘succeeded in bringing the situation under control’ after ‘a large number of Arabs attacked.’”

IT WAS ALSO REPORTED, “United Press – Mysterious objects seen floating in the sky over Kentucky, Tennessee and Ohio revived speculation about ‘flying saucers’ today. The latest report on the phenomena was at Wilmington, Ohio, where personnel at the Clinton County Air Base reported a flaming ball of red fire which was seen for 35 minutes until it disappeared over the horizon. National Guard headquarters in Kentucky blamed the death of a pilot on a mysterious gleaming object which he was chasing. They said pilot Thomas F. Mantell, flying without oxygen equipment, apparently flew too high, became unconscious and lost control of his plane. He crashed near Franklin, Ky. A bright, bulb-shaped object also was reported seen at Clarksville, Nashville and Columbia, Tenn., and at several points in southern Kentucky yesterday. The ball of fire at Wilmington was seen by Staff Sgt. Gale F. Walter and Corp. James Hudson in the patrol tower at the air base. They watched it for 35 minutes. They described it as a flaming red cone trailing a gaseous green mist.”

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ON THIS DAY IN 1843, the Brooklyn Daily Eagle reported, “Amusing typographical blunders will now and then occur in spite of the best proof readers. The Belknap (New Hampshire) Gazette speaks of General McNeil as the ‘gallant bottle-scarred solider.’ The writer probably intended to say ‘battle-scarred.’”

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ON THIS DAY IN 1910, the Eagle reported, “London, December 31 – Television, the art of seeing by wire, has apparently been changed from a scientific dream into an accomplished fact. According to a dispatch just received from Berlin, Ernst Ruhmer, a young German electrical engineer, has finally succeeded in perfecting the first working model of a television apparatus. The apparatus is now in the custody of the Belgian government, which is reported to be so favorable impressed that it is seriously considering the construction of an elaborate plant as the most wonderful contribution to the Brussels Exhibition planned for 1910 … ‘Seeing by wire,’ Ruhmer is quoted in the Berlin dispatch as saying, ‘has now become merely a question of money. The process has been perfected, but its application is necessarily extremely costly.”

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ON THIS DAY IN 1930, the Eagle reported, “Manhattan is right up to the minute – very. Manhattanites recognize new things right off the reel – and patronize them generously. Nothing can be put over in Manhattan unless it is the newest thing. In fact, it must be a little newer than that. Only advance showings really get a hand in Manhattan. All that is true – if you let Manhattan tell the story. Last night Manhattanites, 4,500 of them, staged a riot at the Museum of Natural History to see a moving picture shown by the Amateur Astronomers Association illustrating the Einstein relativity theory. That is the way Manhattan greets something new. Very new and interesting; one really must see it. A little bit of truth involved in this matter is the fact that the film shown last night was shown more than five years ago before the astronomy section of the Brooklyn Institute of Arts and Sciences.”