The month of January has been home to many historical events over the years. Here’s a look at some that helped to shape the world in January 1924.
•Millionaire oil broker Courtland S. Dines is shot in the abdomen at his home on Jan. 1. When police arrived on the scene, they found alcohol on the premises, causing a scandal during the Prohibition era.
•Flooding causes the water level of the Seine to rise in Paris, forcing the closure of railway stations on Jan. 2.
•The exiled King Ferdinand is granted permission to return to Sofia by the Bulgarian government on Jan. 2, prompting an immediate objection to the move by the Kingdom of Yugoslavia.
•On Jan. 3, the governor of the Mexican state of Yucatán, Felipe Carrillo Puerto, is executed by rebels fighting for General Adolfo de la Huerta. De la Huerta was attempting to overthrow the government of President Alvaro Obregón, and Carrillo and three of his brothers were among 11 people killed by the rebels.
•The automobile manufacturer Walter P. Chrysler introduces his first car, the Chrysler Six Model B-70 sedan, on Jan. 5 at the 24th Annual New York Automobile Show.
•Turkish President Mustafa Kernal Atakürk survives a bomb attack at his home on Jan. 6. A visitor to the president’s home asked to see him and then threw the bomb when Atakürk appeared.
•The British submarine HMS L24 sinks during a training exercise on Jan. 10. The sub collided with the battleship HMS Resolution, and all 43 crew members aboard perished in the accident.
•Bengali activist for Indian independence Gopinath Saha shoots and kills Englishman Ernest Day, a civilian, in Calcutta on Jan. 12. Saha believed he was shooting Calcutta police commissioner Charles Tegart, who was helping to lead the fight against the independence movement. Saha is arrested and subsequently tried and sentenced to death.
•The SMS Berlin embarks on a two-month tour of the North Atlantic Ocean on Jan. 15. It is the first German Navy warship since the end of World War One to depart on an overseas voyage.
•On Jan. 16, Argentine engineer Raúl Pateras Pescara breaks his own record for helicopter flight. Pescara kept his model 2F aloft in the air for eight minutes and 13.8 seconds at an altitude of around 15 feet near Paris.
•Ailing Russian leader Leon Trotsky is rumored to have been arrested on Jan. 18. Despite the rumors, Trotsky is ultimately revealed to have been traveling to the Black Sea in an effort to overcome his illness.
•Richard Connell’s short story “The Most Dangerous Game” appears in the weekly magazine Collier’s on Jan. 19. The story’s theme of the hunter who becomes the hunted has since been adapted for countless stories.
•Following a stroke, semi-retired leader and founder of the Soviet Union Vladimir Lenin dies on Jan. 21 at his estate in Gorki.
•On Jan. 23, Britain and the United States sign a treaty that allows American authorities to search British ships suspected of rum-running.
• Oil tycoon Edward L. Doheny testifies on Jan. 24 that he lent Senator Albert B. Fall $100,000. Doheny’s admission exacerbates the Teapot Dome Scandal that enveloped the administration of United States President Warren G. Harding.
•The first Winter Olympics open in Chamonix, France, on Jan. 25.
•Prince Regent Hirohito marries Princess Nagako in an elaborate royal wedding in Tokyo on Jan. 26. Within two years, Hirohito would become the 124th Emperor of Japan, a position he would retain, despite controversy, until his death in 1989.
•Lenin is laid to rest in a state funeral in Moscow’s Red Square on Jan. 27. Mourners brave frigid conditions, as the temperature drops to -35 F during the funeral.
•Benito Mussolini addresses 10,000 Blackshirts in the Palazzo Venezia in Rome on Jan. 28. Mussolini predicts complete victory for the Fascists as he campaigns for a general election in Italy.
•On Jan. 31, within weeks of his wife’s death, Prussian state executioner Paul Spaethe dresses in formal evening wear and lights 45 candles. Each candle signifies a person Spaethe had beheaded, and once each candle is lit, Spaethe takes his own life with a revolver.
