1930 History Events: What Happened in 1930

By 1930, the Great Depression had reached its peak. Over 15 million people in the United States were unemployed. European colonisation of Africa and Asian countries was at an all-time peak during this time.

On March 12, 1930, Mahatma Gandhi began the salt march in India. It was his most significant act of civil disobedience against colonial government in India. After the British established a policy preventing Indians from gathering and selling salt, a fundamental element in Indian cuisine, the Indians rebelled. The Indians had to buy salt from the British to get it. Over 60,000 Indians were detained by colonialists, and Gandhi’s incarceration on May 5 did not stop civil disobedience.

The World Cup, which is now one of the most popular sporting events in the world, began after the 1932 Olympics omitted football off the schedule. On July 13, 1930, the first World Cup football matches were held in the host city of Montevideo, Uruguay. The first two games saw France overcome Mexico and the United States defeat Belgium 3-0. In Europe, the Great Depression was raging, and many European players avoided the World Cup for fear of losing their day jobs.

By 1930, the Ohio Penitentiary, which had been built in 1834, had a bad reputation. In 1849, a cholera pandemic killed 121 convicts. On April 21, 1930, a fire at the prison killed 320 inmates. The prison had a capacity of 1,500 inmates, however there were 4,300 inmates at the time of the incident. The fire was caused by a fire in the scaffolding, and waders refused to open the cells. In 1930, Ruth Wakefield of Toll House Inn introduced the chocolate chip cookie, which became a popular treat. It was the year when Pope Pius IX forbade all Roman Catholic faithful from using artificial birth control.

Continue reading to discover more about the events of 1930.

Event
(January 11, 1930) Amelia Earhart, one of the world's most famous aviators, made the first successful solo trip from Hawaii to California on this day in 1935, a distance longer than the distance between the United States and Europe. photo source: wikimedia.org
Advertisements (January 20, 1930) Buzz Aldrin, an American astronaut, was born in Montclair, New Jersey.
(February 18, 1930) On this day in 1930, Clyde W. Tombaugh, a 24-year-old American with no formal training in astronomy, discovered the dwarf planet Pluto using a 13-inch (33-cm) telescope at the Lowell Observatory in Flagstaff, Arizona.
(March 28, 1930) Built around 657 BCE as Byzantium, then renamed Constantinople in the 4th century CE after Constantine the Great made it his capital, the Turkish city of Istanbul gained its current name on this day in 1930.
(May 19, 1930) Lorraine Hansberry was born in Chicago, and her play A Raisin in the Sun (1959) was the first African American woman's drama to be presented on Broadway.
Advertisements (July 07, 1930) Henry J. Kaiser, an industrialist, begins work on the Hoover Dam.
Happy Birthday! (August 30, 1930) Warren Buffett, American businessman and philanthropist. photo source: wikimedia.org
(September 08, 1930) Richard Gurley Drew, an American inventor, designs Scotch tape. 3M launches the Scotch transparent tape onto the marketplace. photo source: wikimedia.org