-
Excavation work on the Empire State Building begins with construction of the building itself starting on St. Patrick's Day, March 17. The project would use 3,400 workers and cost $24.7 million.
-
The Star-Spangled Banner, by Francis Scott Key, is approved by President Hoover and Congress as the national anthem.
-
The infant son of Charles Lindbergh and Anne Morrow Lindbergh, Charles Augustus Lindbergh, Jr., is kidnaped. He is found dead on May 12 not far from his home in Hopewell, New Jersey. Three years later, on February 13, 1935, Bruno Hauptmann was found guilty of the crime.
-
President Franklin D. Roosevelt is inaugurated for the first time. His speech with its hallmark phrase, "We have nothing to fear, but fear itself," begins to rally the public and Congress to deal with great depression issues.
-
The Master's golf tournament is held for the first time at Augusta National Golf Club, founded by the legendary amateur golfer Bobby Jones, in Augusta, Georgia. The 1934 winner was Horton Smith, of the United States, at four under par.
-
Franklin D. Roosevelt issues a presidential proclamation designating the Fort Jefferson National Monument, now Dry Tortugas National Park, off the Florida Keys. The waters and islands of this area contain the largest all-masonry fort in the Western hemisphere.
-
The Summer Olympics Games open in Berlin, Germany under the watchful eye of German leader Adolph Hitler, whose policies of Arian supremacy had already begun to take shape. The star of the games was Jesse Owens, a black American, who won four gold at the Berlin 1936 Games.
-
The Golden Gate Bridge opens to pedestrian traffic and one day later, after a ceremonial press of a button from Washington, D.C. by President Roosevelt, receives its first vehicles. It created a vital link between San Francisco and Marin County.
-
The final reunion of the Blue and the Gray is held. It commemorated the 75th anniversary of the Battle of Gettysburg in Gettysburg, Pennsylvania.
-
The Baseball Hall of Fame opens in Cooperstown, New York, home of one of baseball's founders, Abner Doubleday. The first class of inductees included Ty Cobb, Babe Ruth, Honus Wagner, Christy Mathewson, and Walter Johnson.
