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Daily Times Nigeria Wednesday, March 4, 2015
Today in History
Cartoon from our Archives
s Compiled by ‘Tunji Okegbola
1941
1941 Britain launches Operation Claymore The British navy raided a German position off the coast of Norway and inside the Arctic Circle—the Lofoten Islands. The raid, code name Operation Claymore, proved highly destructive of its target—an armed German trawler—but ultimately a failure in achieving its objective, the capture of an Enigma decoding machine. The Brits severely damaged the trawler, called the Krebs, and killed 14 German sailors, took another 25 prisoner, and
Daily Times March 4, 1961 1936 Scottish racing legend Jim Clark born On this day in 1936, Jim Clark, who later dominate Formula One (F1) racing in the mid1960s and win two F1 world championships, was born in Scotland. Clark grew up on a farm and as a teenager began competing in local car races. Initially, Clark’s family was less-than-enthusiastic about his involvement in racing and Clark himself was shy and disliked being in the spotlight when he won. However, according to his biography at Formula1.com: “Goaded on by his friends, the reluctant racer began to take it more seriously, demonstrating an outstanding natural talent that amazed everyone, and certainly surprised the man himself.” In 1960, the Scotsman began his F1 racing career, competing for the British-based Team Lotus. (The team, which was established in the early 1950s, was dominant on the F1 circuit in the 1960s and 1970s, collecting seven F1 constructors’ championships and six drivers’ titles before it was disbanded in the mid-1990s.) Clark had some harrowing experiences early on. While competing in just his second Grand Prix, at Spa in Belgium, he narrowly missed hitting the body of a fellow competitor, who had been killed in a crash, on the track. Several laps later, Clark’s
teammate and friend Alan Stacey lost control of his car after being smacked in the face by a bird and died. The following year, at the Italian Grand Prix in Monza, Clark was involved in a collision with German driver Wolfgang von Trips of the Ferrari team. The accident, which was not considered Clark’s fault, killed the German driver and more than a dozen onlookers. Starting in 1962, things improved for Clark and for the next four seasons, he typically only ever lost a race due to mechanical problems. An oil leak prevented Clark from collecting the championship title in 1962; however, in 1963 he won seven out of 10 Grand Prix races and took home the championship. Another oil leak caused him to miss out on the championship crown in 1964, but the following year he won six out of 10 races and claimed his second world championship. Also in 1965, he gained fame in America when he won that year’s Indianapolis 500 after leading the race for 190 out of 200 laps. Clark collected his 25th Grand Prix victory in South Africa in 1968, passing the iconic Argentine driver Juan-Manuel Fangio’s (1911–1995) record of 24 Grand Prix wins. However, later that year, on April 7, 1968, Clark’s life was cut short at a Formula 2 race at Hockenheim in West Germany, when his car experienced
a tire failure and crashed. The 32-year-old Scotsman died with a record of 25 wins in 72 starts and 33 pole positions 1933 FDR inaugurated On March 4, 1933, at the height of the Great Depression, Franklin Delano Roosevelt was inaugurated as the 32nd president of the United States. In his famous inaugural address, delivered outside the east wing of the U.S. Capitol, Roosevelt outlined his “New Deal”--an expansion of the federal government as an instrument of employment opportunity and welfare--and told Americans that “the only thing we have to fear is fear itself.” Although it was a rainy day in Washington, and gusts of rain blew over Roosevelt as he spoke, he delivered a speech that radiated optimism and competence, and a broad majority of Americans united behind their new president and his radical economic proposals to lead the nation out of the Great Depression. Born into an upper-class family in Hyde Park, New York, in 1882, Roosevelt was the fifth cousin of Theodore Roosevelt, who served as the 26th U.S. president from 1901 to 1909. In 1905, Franklin Roosevelt, who was at the time a student at Columbia University Law School, married Anna Eleanor Roosevelt, the niece of Theodore Roosevelt.
1944
1944 The head of Murder, Inc. is executed Louis “Lepke” Buchalter, the head of Murder, Inc., was executed at Sing Prison in New York. Lepke was the leader of the country’s largest crime syndicate throughout the 1930s and was making nearly $50 million a year from his various enterprises. His downfall came when several members of his notorious killing squad turned into witnesses for the government. Lepke began his criminal career robbing pushcarts as a teenager. When he met Jacob “Gurrah” Shapiro while trying to rob the same pushcart, the two quickly became a formidable team. With Shapiro’s brute strength, the two established an extortion business, forcing pushcart owners to pay for protection. Lepke and Shapiro then joined Jacob “Little Augie” Orgen’s Lower East Side gang and turned their attention to bigger game. One by one, Lepke and the gang terrorized the local garment workers unions. They took over control of the unions and forced kickback payments from both the members and the employers. Soon, they had taken over the entire New York garment industry. In the 1920s, they added liquor bootlegging
Britain launches Operation Claymore destroyed the Germans’ local stockpile of oil. While the attack boosted British public morale temporarily, the Enigma machine still eluded the British military. The commander of the Krebs, Lieutenant Hans Kupfinger, threw it overboard before he was killed in the raid, but the Brits were able to recover documents that gave clues to the Enigma’s workings. British intelligence was able to piece together enough of the German coding system to track German naval activity for about five weeks.
The head of Murder, Inc. is executed and gambling and later began importing heroin and other narcotics. Lepke assembled a large team of hired killers to enforce his control. At one time, this team may have included as many as 250 hit men. Lepke also began to coordinate operations with the other big crime kingpins around the nation. With Lucky Luciano, Meyer Lansky and Dutch Schultz, Lepke virtually controlled organized crime throughout the country. In 1935, Schultz wanted to kill New York District Attorney Thomas Dewey, but Lepke, fearing that it would bring even more intense scrutiny and pressure from law enforcement, had Schultz killed instead. In order to generate more income and keep his hit men occupied, Lepke started Murder, Inc. in 1933. Murder, Inc. was authorized to kill anyone (approved by the syndicate) for a profit. With his hit squad protecting him from rivals and paid-off judges and officers keeping him out of jail, Lepke was America’s premier criminal until he was betrayed by his own men. Reportedly, he was able to order final hits on his betrayers from jail before his execution.