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The ruins of the ancient Indian villages around Canyon de Chelly are designated a national monument by President Herbert Hoover.
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The Star-Spangled Banner, by Francis Scott Key, is approved by President Hoover and Congress as the national anthem. The lyrics of the anthem were inspired during the bombing of Fort McHenry by British ships at the head of Baltimore harbor in September of 1814.
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Construction is completed on the Empire State Building in New York City and it opens for business. On the same day in Aniakchak Caldera, Alaska, a major eruption of Half Cone occurred, blackening the skies in southwestern Alaska for the next several weeks.
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The Reconstruction Finance Corporation is established to stimulate banking and business. Unemployment in 1932 reached twelve million workers.
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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.
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The highest continuous paved road in the United States, the Trail Ridge Road in Rocky Mountain National Park, Colorado, is opened to traffic.
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Democratic challenger Franklin D. Roosevelt defeats incumbent President Hoover in the presidential election for his first of an unprecedented four terms. The landslide victory, 472 Electoral College votes to 59 for Hoover began the era of FDR that would lead the nation through the vestiges of the Great Depression and the ravages of World War II.
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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. His subsequent Fireside Chats, that began eight days later, would continue his addresses with the American public.
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The New Deal social and economic programs are passed by the United States Congress in a special one hundred day session to address depression era economics. The gold standard was dropped on April 19 and ratified during the time of this session on June 5. Canada also drops using the gold standard.
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The Civilian Conservation Corps is authorized under the Federal Unemployment Relief Act. It would provide work for two and one-half million men during the succeeding nine years and help construct many national park and other projects across the United States.
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The Century of Progress World's Fair opens in Chicago, Illinois. Held along the banks of Lake Michigan on 427 acres, this depression era fair was a successful event, both in financial and attendance terms, taking advantage of cheap labor to keep costs low. It lasted for two seasons, drawing over 39 million visitors over its 1933 and 1934 years.
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In South Dakota, a strong dust storm strips topsoil from depression era farms. It was one in a series of such storms to plague the Midwest during 1933 and 1934.
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The 21st Amendment to the U.S. Constitution is passed, ending prohibition.
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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.
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The U.S. Securities and Exchange Commission is established with the signing of the Securities Exchange Act into law by President Franklin D. Roosevelt.
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The construction of the Natchez Trace Parkway, a scenic and historic trail between Nashville, Tennessee, and Natchez, Mississippi is approved in legislation signed by President Franklin D. Roosevelt.
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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.
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The greatest hitter in the history of baseball, Babe Ruth, retires from Major League Baseball. He is among the charter class of players inducted into the Baseball Hall of Fame, in Cooperstown, New York, in 1939.
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The Social Security Act is passed by Congress as part of the New Deal legislation and signed into law by President Franklin D. Roosevelt. It would begin payouts to retirees within two years. Workers began contributing into the system during the same year, at a rate of 2% of the first $3,000 in earnings, half paid by the employee and half paid by the employer.
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The Santa Fe Railroad inaugurates the all-Pullman Super Chief passenger train service between Chicago, Illinois and Los Angeles, California.
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The Summer Olympics Games open in Berlin, Germany under the watchful eye of German leader Adolph Hitler, whose policies of Aryan 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.
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The Summer Olympics Games open in Berlin, Germany under the watchful eye of German leader Adolph Hitler, whose policies of Aryan 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.
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William Henry Hastie is appointed to the federal bench, becoming the first African-American to become a federal judge.
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At Lakehurst, New Jersey, the German airship Hindenburg bursts into flames while mooring. The fire consumes the largest airship in the world, 804 feet long, within one minute, causing the death of thirty-six people.
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The National Minimum Wage is signed into law within the federal legislation known as the Fair Labor Standards Act. It established a minimum wage of $0.25 at the time, as well as time and one half for overtime and the prohibition of most employment for minors.
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The final reunion of the Blue and the Gray is held. It commemorated the 75th anniversary of the Battle of Gettysburg in Gettysburg, Pennsylvania.
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This world's fair, spectacularly conceived for the Flushing Meadows trash dump made famous by F. Scott Fitzgerald in Queen's, New York, is often credited with proving to the American public that prosperity and good times could lay ahead after the decade of depression. The New York fair closed on October 21, 1940 and drew 45 million paid visitors.
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The United States declares its neutrality in the European war after Germany invaded Poland, effectively beginning World War II after a year of European attempts to appease Hitler and the aims of expansionist Nazi Germany.