March 20: ON THIS DAY IN HISTORY

March 20, 2024 Brooklyn Eagle History

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ON THIS DAY IN 1931, the Brooklyn Daily Eagle reported, “CARSON CITY, NEV. (AP) — Virtually all forms of gambling became legal in Nevada today and the path of the divorce seeker will be shortened by May 1 as the result of two bills signed yesterday by Gov. Fred B. Balzar. In championing legalized gambling, Nevada took a step toward the so-called good old days. In the divorce measure she will become the only state in the union in which a person may establish legal qualifications in six weeks to sue for a divorce.”

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ON THIS DAY IN 1939, the Eagle reported, “ST. PETERSBURG, FLA. (U.P.) — The swift swing of the season chews away granite on the highest hills and strains the strongest steel, so you get to wondering as the baseballs soar through the sunshine down here about the most durable ball player of them all, Henry Louis Gehrig. Is this going to be the season when the Iron Horse is taken off the rails and shunted to the scrap heap? It’s too early to make an accurate prediction, but the significant thing is that Manager [Joe] McCarthy of the Yankees has begun teaching Tommy Henrich, an outfielder, how to play first base. The Yankees without Gehrig? Why, it’s like Lunt without Fontaine, corned beef without cabbage and New Year’s Day without a hangover. Three years ago you would have sworn that Gehrig would go on forever, that he would be up there for endless summers, stretching his arms above his head just before stepping up to take his cut. But he hit below .300 last year for the first time since 1926 and some of the bounce has gone out of those thick legs.”

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ON THIS DAY IN 1944, the Eagle reported, “NAPLES (U.P.) — Allied military government officials prepared today to evacuate towns in the path of lava flows from an eruption of Mount Vesuvius unless the disturbance abates by nightfall. The eruptions began Saturday, sending four streams of flaming lava down the mountainsides. The mainstream, estimated at a quarter of a mile wide and seven feet deep, sizzled toward Torre Del Creco and Torre Annunziata, both near Pompeii. Forests and crops already have suffered considerable damage, but no serious damage to dwellings has been reported thus far. Italian experts regarded the eruption as the most serious since 1906 when the upper part of the crater’s cone collapsed and lava streams poured almost into Torre Annunziata and partly destroyed Boscotrecase. Thousands of doughboys and Tommies with weekend passes organized excursions in jeeps and trucks and even hiked to get a view of the fireworks.”

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ON THIS DAY IN 1946, the Eagle reported, “The Methodist Hospital of Brooklyn, 7th Ave. and 6th St., today has a new iron lung with the express hope of the Brooklyn Association for Masonic Charities, which made the donation, that ‘it will never be needed.’ Presenting the apparatus during an informal ceremony, Roy L. Smith, president of the association, which represents 77 lodges with a total membership of more than 30,000, said last night: ‘Although we hope it will never be needed, it is yours to use at your discretion. If it should help to save one life we shall feel amply repaid.’”

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ON THIS DAY IN 1949, the Eagle reported, “WASHINGTON, MARCH 19 (U.P.) — The State Department tonight warned the men in the Kremlin that it would be dangerous for them to underestimate the West’s power and determination ‘to take united action’ against attack. The department said it wanted to dispel ‘serious misconceptions … in the minds of leaders of the Soviet Union’ about the physical and moral strength of the Western democracies. And although only Congress can put the United States formally into war, the department added, this country ‘certainly can obligate itself in advance to action, including the use of armed force, as it deems necessary to meet armed attack affecting its national security.’ Its warning was set forth in blunt and unmistakable terms in a 6,500-word ‘white paper’ on the North Atlantic Treaty which the United States and seven — possibly 11 — other powers will sign here April 4. The 20-year pact, published yesterday, is the greatest defensive alliance every proposed in peacetime.”

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ON THIS DAY IN 1952, the Eagle reported, “WASHINGTON (UP) — Senator Robert A. Taft today withdrew from the New Jersey Presidential primary contest because, he said, Gov. Alfred Driscoll ‘has broken his word’ and indorsed Gen. Dwight D. Eisenhower. The New Jersey contest on April 15 offered the only remaining primary contest between two of the chief rivals for the G.O.P. Presidential nomination after last week’s New Hampshire vote in which Eisenhower defeated Taft. The Ohio Republican announced his decision to pull out of New Jersey just two days after Eisenhower’s astonishing write-in vote in the Minnesota primary, where Taft was not entered. Although Taft said he would close his State organization in New Jersey, it was uncertain whether Taft’s name could be removed from the ballot. The Taft organization planned to try.”

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ON THIS DAY IN 1963, the Eagle reported, “TRENTON (UPI) — A report of the New York-New Jersey Transportation Agency released last night shows that 92 percent of New Jerseyans who commute to midtown Manhattan get there by using some form of mass transportation. Other facts pertaining to the New Jersey strap-hanging, ticket-punching, toll-paying set: Bergen County commuters spend an average 72 minutes and $1.24 getting to work. In Essex, the figures are 76 minutes and $1.65, in Hudson, it is 55 minutes and 88 cents. Mercer, Morris, Passaic and Somerset commuters spend 87 minutes. The cost of working in New York is 93 minutes and $2.22 for commuters in Middlesex and Monmouth and 78 minutes and $1.86 in Union. Over 40 percent of suburban commuters to mid-Manhattan start their trip by car. But less than 8 percent of Hudson County residents begin the day that way. Other counties in New Jersey range from 25 percent in Bergen to 49 percent of workers from Mercer, Morris, Passaic and Somerset Counties.”

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NOTABLE PEOPLE BORN ON THIS DAY include “Barney Miller” star Hal Linden, who was born in 1931; former N.Y. Knicks coach Pat Riley, who was born in 1945; “Star Trek” actor John de Lancie, who was born in 1948; Emerson, Lake & Palmer drummer Carl Palmer, who was born in 1950; radio host Mike Francesa, who was born in 1954; Oscar-winning filmmaker Spike Lee, who was born in Brooklyn in 1957; Oscar-winning actress Holly Hunter, who was born in 1958; former N.Y. Knicks guard Jamal Crawford, who was born in 1980; and tennis player Sloan Stephens, who was born in 1993.

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Special thanks to “Chase’s Calendar of Events” and Brooklyn Public Library.

Quotable:

“When I was a boy and I would see scary things in the news, my mother would say to me, ‘Look for the helpers. You will always find people who are helping.’”

— TV host Fred Rogers, who was born on this day in 1928