1934 in the United States

Incumbents

Federal Government">Federal government of the United States">Federal Government

• President: Franklin D. Roosevelt
• Vice President: John Nance Garner
• Chief Justice: Charles Evans Hughes
• Speaker of the House of Representatives: Henry Thomas Rainey
• Senate Majority Leader: Joseph Taylor Robinson
• Congress: 73rd

  Governors

Lieutenant Governors

Events

January

• January 26 – The Apollo Theater opens in Harlem, New York City.
• January 27 - Albert Einstein visits the White House.
• January 30 - Gold Reserve Act: All gold held in the Federal Reserve to be surrendered to the Department of the Treasury; immediately following, President Roosevelt raises the statutory gold price from $20.67 per ounce to $35.

  February

• February 22 - Frank Capra's It Happened One Night, starring Clark Gable and Claudette Colbert, is released. It becomes a smash hit and the first of Capra's great screen classics. It becomes the first film to win all 5 of the major Academy Awards - Best Actor, Best Actress, Best Screenplay, Best Director, and Best Picture. Gable and Colbert receive their only Oscars for this film.

  March

• March 3 – John Dillinger escapes from jail in Crown Point, Indiana, using a wooden pistol.
• March 12 – The 6.5 Hansel Valley earthquake affects a sparsely populated area of northern Utah with a maximum Mercalli intensity of VIII, causing light damage and two deaths.
• March 13 - John Dillinger and his gang rob the First National Bank in Mason City, Iowa.
• March 24 - The Tydings–McDuffie Act comes into effect, establishing the Philippine Commonwealth which allows greater self-government of the Philippines, and scheduling full independence from the U.S. for 1944. Sugar imports are reduced and immigration is limited to 50 Filipino people per year.

  April

• April 1 - Clyde Barrow and Bonnie Parker kill 2 young highway patrolmen near Grapevine, Texas.
• April 12
• *U.S. publication of the novel Tender Is the Night by F. Scott Fitzgerald
• *The world's highest ever recorded surface wind speed of was recorded on the summit of Mount Washington.
• April 22 - John Dillinger and two others shoot their way out of an FBI ambush in northern Wisconsin.

  May

• May 9 - 1934 West Coast waterfront strike: A general strike is engaged in San Francisco.
• May 11 - Dust Bowl: A strong 2-day dust storm removes massive amounts of Great Plains topsoil in one of the worst dust storms of the Dust Bowl.
• May 15 - The United States Department of Justice offers a $25,000 reward for John Dillinger.
• May 16 - Teamsters in Minneapolis begin a strike that lasts until a settlement proposal is accepted on August 21.
• May 23
• * A team of police officers, led by Texas Ranger Frank Hamer, ambush bank robbers Bonnie Parker and Clyde Barrow near their hide-out in Black Lake, Louisiana, killing them both.
• * The "Battle of Toledo" begins during the Auto-Lite strike in Toledo, Ohio, continuing until May 27.
• May 30 – Everglades National Park is established.

  June

• June 4 – USS Ranger is commissioned.
• June 6 - New Deal: U.S. President Franklin D. Roosevelt signs the Securities Exchange Act into law, establishing the U.S. Securities and Exchange Commission.
• June 15 – Great Smoky Mountains National Park is established.
• June 18 – expands the crime of making false statements to remove the requirement of an intent to defraud and expands the coverage to "any matter within the jurisdiction" of the federal government.

  July

• July 1
• *The world-famous Brookfield Zoo opens in Brookfield, Illinois.
• *The Hays Office censorship code for motion pictures goes into full effect.
• July 5 - 1934 West Coast waterfront strike: Police in San Francisco open fire on a crowd of striking longshoremen, killing two.
• July 17 - The North Dakota Supreme Court declares Lieutenant Governor Ole H. Olson the legitimate governor and tells William Langer to resign. Langer proceeds to declare North Dakota independent. He revokes the declaration after the Supreme Court justices meet him.
• July 22 - Outside Chicago's Biograph Theatre, "Public Enemy No. 1" John Dillinger is mortally wounded by FBI agents.

  August

• August 15 - The United States occupation of Haiti ends as the last Marines depart.
• August 19 - The first All-American Soap Box Derby is held in Dayton, Ohio.
• August 25 - Anti-union vigilantes seize the town of McGuffey, Ohio, during the Hardin County onion pickers strike.

  September

• September 8 - Off the New Jersey coast, a fire aboard the passenger liner Morro Castle kills 134 people.
• September 29-October - Folk song collector John Lomax makes the first recordings of "Rock Island Line" at prison farms in Arkansas.

  October

• October 9 - The St. Louis Cardinals defeat the Detroit Tigers, 4 games to 3, to win their third World Series Title.
• October 22 - "Pretty Boy" Floyd is shot and killed by FBI agents near East Liverpool, Ohio.

  November

• November 5 - Kelayres massacre: An election-eve rally by Democrats in the coal-mining village of Kelayres, Pennsylvania is fired on as it passes the home of a leading local Republican family, resulting in 5 deaths.
• November 20-21 - Business Plot: An alleged coup to overthrow President Franklin D. Roosevelt is investigated by the McCormack–Dickstein Committee and is reported by the Philadelphia Record.
• November 21 – Cole Porter's musical Anything Goes, starring Ethel Merman, premieres in New York City.
• November 26 - Universal Pictures releases the first film version of Fannie Hurst's novel, Imitation of Life, starring Claudette Colbert and Louise Beavers. It gives Beavers, usually featured in small roles as a maid, her best screen role, and features the largest supporting role played by a black person in a Hollywood film up until then. Its storyline is extremely daring for a 1934 film - part of it revolves around a young mulatto girl rejecting her mother and trying to "pass for white". It is the first Hollywood film to seriously deal with this subject. The 1936 film version of Show Boat, also from Universal, will deal with a similar storyline.
• November 27 - A running gun battle between FBI agents and bank robber Baby Face Nelson results in the death of one FBI agent and the mortal wounding of special agent Samuel P. Cowley, who was still able to mortally wound Nelson.

  December

• December 26 - An American Airlines aircraft crashes in the Adirondack Mountains.
• December 29 - Japan renounces the Washington Naval Treaty of 1922 and the London Naval Treaty of 1930.

  Undated

• National Archives established.
• National Union for Social Justice founded.

  Ongoing

• Lochner era
• U.S. occupation of Haiti
• Dust Bowl
• New Deal

  Sport

• April 10 - Chicago Black Hawks win their First Stanley Cup by defeating the Detroit Red Wings 3 games to 1. The deciding game was played at Chicago Stadium

  Births

January

• January 1
• * George D. Behrakis, Greek-American philanthropist
• * Alan Berg, Jewish talk show host
• January 7
• * Charles Jenkins, American sprinter
• * Joseph Naso, American serial killer
• January 9 – Bart Starr, American football player and coach
• January 10 – Leonard Boswell, American politician
• January 16 – Marilyn Horne, American mezzo-soprano
• January 17 – Cedar Walton, American jazz pianist
• January 19 – Phil Rollins, American basketball player
• January 20 – Dave Hull, American former radio personality
• January 21 – Ann Wedgeworth, American actress
• January 22 – Bill Bixby, American actor and television director
• January 23
• * Lou Antonio, American actor, director
• * Carmine Caridi, American actor
• January 24 – Stanley Falkow, American microbiologist
• January 26 – Bob Uecker, American baseball player, sportscaster, comedian and actor
• January 30 – Tammy Grimes, American actress

  February

• February 1 – Bob Shane, American folk singer and guitarist
• February 5 – Hank Aaron, African-American baseball player
• February 7
• * Frank Clarke, American football player, sportscaster
• * Earl King, American musician
• February 9 – John Ziegler Jr., American lawyer, ice hockey executive
• February 11
• * Tina Louise, American actress
• * Mel Carnahan, American politician
• February 12
• * Anne Krueger, American economist
• * Bill Russell, African-American basketball player and coach
• February 13 – George Segal, American actor
• February 14 – Florence Henderson, American actress, singer and television personality
• February 15 – William Newsom, American judge
• February 16
• * Harold "Hal" Kalin, American singer
• * Herbert "Herbie" Kalin, American singer
• February 18 – Ronald F. Marryott, American admiral
• February 19 – Michael Tree, American violist
• February 20 – Bobby Unser, American race car driver
• February 21 – Rue McClanahan, American actress
• February 22
• * Sparky Anderson, American baseball manager
• * Van Williams, American actor
• February 26 – Joe Holup, American basketball player
• February 27 – Ralph Nader, American consumer activist, presidential candidate

  March

• March 1 – Joan Hackett, American actress
• March 4
• * John Duffey, American bluegrass musician
• * Anne Haney, American actress
• * Barbara McNair, African-American singer, actress
• March 5 – Bob Skoronski, American football player
• March 6
• * Milton Diamond, American sexologist and professor of anatomy and reproductive biology
• * Red Simpson, American country music singer-songwriter
• March 7
• * Gray Morrow, American comic book artist, book illustrator
• * Willard Scott, American television weather reporter
• March 9
• * Del Close, American actor, improviser, writer and teacher
• * Joyce Van Patten, American actress
• March 11 – Sam Donaldson, American reporter
• March 13 – Barry Hughart, American author and screenwriter
• March 14
• *Eugene Cernan, American astronaut
• *Paul Rader, General of The Salvation Army
• March 17 – Frederick T. Mackenzie, American sedimentary, global biogeochemist
• March 18 – Charley Pride, African-American baseball country musician
• March 20 – Willie Brown, African-American Mayor of San Francisco
• March 22 – Orrin Hatch, American politician
• March 25
• * Johnny Burnette, American rockabilly singer, songwriter and musician
• * Gloria Steinem, American feminist
• March 26 – Alan Arkin, American actor, director, and screenwriter
• March 27 – Arthur Mitchell, African-American ballet dancer and choreographer
• March 28 – Lester R. Brown, American environmentalist
• March 31
• * Richard Chamberlain, American actor
• * Shirley Jones, American singer, actress and first wife of Jack Cassidy
• * John D. Loudermilk, American singer-songwriter
• * Orion Samuelson, American television personality

  April

• April 1
• * Jim Ed Brown, American singer-songwriter and guitarist
• * Don Hastings, American actor
• * Rod Kanehl, American baseball player and manager
• April 2
• * Paul Avery, American journalist
• * Paul Cohen, American mathematician
• * Carl Kasell, American radio personality
• April 7 – David T. Kennedy, American attorney, politician
• April 13 – Nancy Kissinger, American philanthropist
• April 18
• *James Drury, American actor
• *Pedro Tenorio, Northern Mariana Islander politician
• April 20 – Robert G. Wilmers, American billionaire banker
• April 24 – Shirley MacLaine, American actress and activist
• April 25
• * Johnny McCarthy, American basketball player
• * Denny Miller, American actor
• April 29
• * Norman Edge, American jazz musician
• * Otis Rush, African-American blues guitarist and singer-songwriter

  May

• May 3 – Frankie Valli, American musician
• May 5
• * Ace Cannon, American saxophonist
• * Johnnie Taylor, American singer-songwriter
• May 6 – Richard Shelby, American politician
• May 9 – Nathan Dean, American soldier and politician
• May 10 – Gary Owens, American disc jockey, voice actor and announcer
• May 11
• * Jim Jeffords, American politician
• * Jack Twyman, American basketball player
• May 12 – John Amirante, American singer
• May 13 – Leon Wagner, American baseball player
• May 18 – Dwayne Hickman, American actor
• May 19 – Jim Lehrer, American television journalist
• May 22 – Peter Nero, American pianist
• May 23 – Robert Moog, American inventor of the synthesizer
• May 24 – William R. Ratchford, American politician
• May 27 – Harlan Ellison, American writer
• May 28
• * Chuck Missler, American author
• * Betty X, African-American educator, civil rights advocate

  June

• June 1
• * Pat Boone, American actor, pop singer
• * Peter Masterson, American actor, director, producer and writer
• * Ken McElroy, American criminal
• June 3
• * Jim Gentile, American baseball player and manager
• * Rolland D. McCune, American minister and theologian
• June 5 – Bill Moyers, American journalist
• June 6 – Roy Innis, American activist and politician
• June 7 – Wynn Stewart, American country music singer-songwriter and guitarist
• June 9 – Jackie Wilson, African-American singer
• June 13 – Marianne Means, née Hansen, American political journalist
• June 16
• * Bill Cobbs, African-American actor
• * William F. Sharpe, American economist, Nobel Prize laureate
• June 19 – Herbert Kleber, American psychiatrist
• June 22
• * Russ Snyder, American Major League Baseball player
• * Nancy R. Stocksdale, American politician
• June 23
• * Marino Casem, American football coach, athletic administrator
• * Jesse White, American athlete, educator and politician
• June 25 – Jack Hayford, American evangelist, author, and minister
• June 26
• * Dave Grusin, American composer, arranger, producer, and pianist
• * John V. Tunney, American politician
• June 27 – Ed Hobaugh, American baseball player
• June 28
• * Carl Levin, American politician
• * Bette Greene, American author
• * Michael Artin, American mathematician
• June 29
• * Bob Burrow, American basketball player
• * Susan George, American and French political, social scientist, activist and writer
• * Chuck Schaden, American television presenter
• * Duane Wilson, American baseball player
• June 30 – Harry Blackstone Jr., American magician

  July

• July 1
• * Jamie Farr, American actor
• * Sydney Pollack, American film director, and actor
• July 2 – Tom Springfield, American musician
• July 6 – LaFarr Stuart, American computer music pioneer, computer engineer
• July 8
• * Rodney Stark, American sociologist
• * Edward D. DiPrete, American politician
• July 9 – Michael Graves, American architect
• July 10 – Jerry Nelson, puppeteer with The Muppets
• July 11
• * Jim Ridlon, American football safety
• * Woody Sauldsberry, American basketball player
• * Dick Treleaven, American politician
• July 12 – Van Cliburn, American pianist
• July 13 – Phillip Crosby, American actor, singer
• July 14 – Lee Elder, American professional golfer
• July 16
• * Katherine D. Ortega, 38th Treasurer of the United States
• * George Perles, American football player and coach
• July 18 – Joan Evans, American actress
• July 19 – Bobby Bradford, American jazz trumpeter, cornetist, bandleader, and composer
• July 21 – Edolphus Towns, American politician
• July 22 – Louise Fletcher, American actress
• July 27 – Luang Por Ajahn Sumedho, American Theravada Buddhist representative in the West
• July 28 – Bud Luckey, American voice actor, Pixar animator
• July 30 – Bud Selig, American Major League Baseball commissioner

  August

• August 4 – Dallas Green, American baseball player, manager, executive
• August 5
• * Wendell Berry, American novelist, essayist, poet
• * Vern Gosdin, American country music singer
• * Cammie King, American child actor
• August 10 – James Tenney, American experimental composer
• August 13 – Betty Lou Bredemus, American actress and acting coach
• August 16
• * Donnie Dunagan, American child actor and U.S. Marine Corps major
• * Ketty Lester, American singer and actress
• August 18 – Vincent Bugliosi, American prosecutor, author
• August 19
• * David Durenberger, American politician
• * Renée Richards, American transsexual physician, tennis player
• August 22 – Norman Schwarzkopf, U.S. Army general
• August 26 – Tom Heinsohn, American basketball player, coach, and broadcaster
• August 27 – Dave Piontek, American basketball player
• August 29 – David Pryor, American politician

  September

• September 2
• * Chuck McCann, American actor
• * Grady Nutt, American humorist
• September 6 – Marshall Rosenberg, American psychologist, writer
• September 7 – Little Milton, American musician
• September 10 – Charles Kuralt, American journalist
• September 14 – Kate Millett, American sculptor and feminist activist
• September 16 – Elgin Baylor, American basketball player, executive
• September 17 – Maureen Connolly, American tennis player
• September 20
• * Jeff Morris, American actor
• * Tony Alamo, American religious cult leader, convicted criminal
• September 21 – Ron Sobieszczyk, American basketball player
• September 22 – Lute Olson, American basketball coach
• September 27
• * Beverly Armstrong, American female professional baseball player
• * Wilford Brimley, American actor

  October

• October 1 – Chuck Hiller, American baseball player
• October 2 – Earl Wilson, African-American baseball player
• October 4 – Sam Huff, American football player
• October 7
• * Amiri Baraka, African-American poet, playwright and activist
• * Willie Naulls, American basketball player
• October 15 – John Coleman, American meteorologist
• October 16 – Robert M. O'Neil, American educator
• October 18 – Chuck Swindoll, American evangelist
• October 20
• * Michael Dunn, a.k.a. Gary Neil Miller, dwarf American actor and singer
• * Charles Liebman, American-born Israeli political scientist and author on Jewish life and Israel
• October 26 – Hot Rod Hundley, American basketball player

  November

• November 3 – Bob Hopkins, American basketball player
• November 6 – Barton Myers, American/Canadian architect
• November 7 – Jackie Joseph, American actress
• November 9 – Carl Sagan, American cosmologist
• November 10 – Joanna Moore, American actress
• November 12 – Charles Manson, American cult leader and criminal
• November 13 – Garry Marshall, American film producer, director and actor
• November 17 – Jim Inhofe, American politician
• November 21 – Laurence Luckinbill, American actor
• November 27 – Gilbert Strang, American mathematician
• November 29 – Willie Morris, American writer
• November 30 – Steve Hamilton, American basketball and baseball player

  December

• December 1 – Billy Paul, African-American singer
• December 2 – Andre Rodgers, American baseball player
• December 4 – Victor French, American actor, director
• December 5 – Joan Didion, American novelist
• December 6 – Nick Bockwinkel, American professional wrestler
• December 7 – Joey Powers, American singer-songwriter
• December 9
• * Henry McNamara, American politician
• * Junior Wells, American harmonica player
• December 10 – Howard Martin Temin, American geneticist
• December 13 – Richard D. Zanuck, American producer
• December 16 – Pete Schrum, American actor
• December 19 – Al Kaline, American baseball player
• December 22 – David Pearson, American race car driver
• December 23 – Dan Swartz, American basketball player
• December 26 – Mari Hulman George, American motorsport executive
• December 29 – Ed Flanders, American actor
• December 30
• * John Norris Bahcall, American astrophysicist
• * Joseph P. Hoar, U.S. Marine commander
• * Willie Hobbs Moore, African-American engineer
• * Del Shannon, American singer
• * Russ Tamblyn, American dancer, singer and actor

  Deaths

• February 25
• * Elizabeth Gertrude Britton, botanist
• * John McGraw, baseball manager
• March 21 - Lilyan Tashman, vaudeville, Broadway and film actress
• April 27 - Joe Vila, sportswriter
• May 17 - Cass Gilbert, architect
• May 23
• * Clyde Barrow, outlaw
• * Bonnie Parker, outlaw
• May 24 - Brand Whitlock, journalist and politician
• May 31 - Lew Cody, film actor
• July 4 - Marie Curie, Nobel prize winner
• June 8 - Dorothy Dell, film actress
• June 20 - Andrew Jackson Zilker, philanthropist
• June 21 - Thorne Smith, humorist and fantasy author
• June 24 - Charles S. Thomas, U.S. Senator from Colorado from 1913 to 1921
• July 15 - Louis F. Gottschalk, composer
• July 18 - Sy Sanborn, sportswriter
• July 21 - Julian Hawthorne, journalist and novelist
• July 22 - John Dillinger, criminal
• July 26 - Winsor McCay, comic creator and animator
• August 8 - Wilbert Robinson, baseball manager
• August 10 - George W. Hill, film director
• August 13 - Mary Hunter Austin, travel writer
• August 14 - Raymond Hood, architect
• September 2
• * Russ Columbo, singer and actor
• * Alcide Nunez, jazz clarinetist
• October 6 - James Taliaferro, U.S. Senator from Florida from 1899 to 1911
• October 22 - Pretty Boy Floyd, bank robber
• November 10 - Ion Farris, politician, Speaker of the Florida House of Representatives
• November 22 - Harry Steppe, vaudeville performer
• November 27 - Baby Face Nelson, gangster
• December 10 - Theobald Smith, bacteriologist
• December 26 - Wallace Thurman, African American novelist
• December 28 - Lowell Sherman, film actor and director