Winston Churchill – Page 2 – The Intelligent Collector Magazine

Churchill’s Successor Left a Lasting Mark on Great Britain

A gelatin silver print of Winston Churchill, 1941, by photographer Yousuf Karsh sold for $11,352 at a May 2011 Heritage auction.

By Jim O’Neal

When Clement Attlee was asked if he wanted to comment on the campaign of 1945, his response was a simple “No.” During this election for Prime Minister of Great Britain, he and wife Violet traveled the countryside extensively in their modest (battered) family car, advocating for a totally new, post-war social policy. One of his more effective political slogans was “You Can Trust Mr. Attlee.” It worked surprisingly well as he led the Labour Party to an upset, landslide win over the venerable Winston Churchill.

Attlee became one of the most successful leaders in modern Britain, despite being habitually shy, laconic, self-deprecating and excessively modest. As Churchill once quipped, “Clement Attlee was a modest man who had much to be modest about.”

Churchill respected Attlee for his basic honesty and firm dedication to accountability. They had served together during World War I and Attlee was even part of the British Army during the disastrous Gallipoli Campaign, which Churchill had conceived while the First Lord of the Admiralty. The strategic premise was to knock Turkey out of the war by attacking the Dardanelles. The campaign went so badly that Churchill was demoted, resigned from the Conservative Cabinet, and ended up commanding an infantry battalion of the Royal Fusiliers.

Attlee naively believed that the plan had been sound strategically and had only failed due to poor military execution. In Attlee’s own words, “There was only one brilliant strategic idea in WWI and that was Winston’s ‘the Dardanelles.’” Historians still argue over this yet today, but it was enough to form a bond between the two future prime ministers … one a pure socialist and the other an imperialist of the first order.

During the Second World War (which was just a continuation of the first with a 20-year pause), Attlee served under Churchill in the coalition government of 1940-45 and was the first person to hold the office of Deputy Prime Minister. He somehow held the Labour Party together despite numerous divergent viewpoints and personal ambitions. The colossal egos of Herbert Morrison, Sir Stafford Cripps (reputed to have the finest mind in England), and union strongman Ernest Bevin (dedicated to absolute equality throughout the British Empire) required a rare blend of political leadership – perhaps unique to Attlee.

It is here (in my humble opinion) where we start to witness the real decline of the British Empire. Independence in India, the partition of Pakistan, independence in Burma (Myanmar), Sri Lanka, Palestine and Jordan and exiting Greece. This was followed by the inevitable nationalization of the Bank of England, along with the iron, coal and steel industries. Then, importantly, there was the creation of a comprehensive welfare state. To the United States, the phrase “British socialism” signified economic and political bankruptcy; one of the few things Democrats and Republicans could agree on.

In Attlee’s rationale, these Labour Party policies were merely measures to ensure full employment and welfare based on managed capitalism; “accomplishments” that remained in place until his death in 1962 and beyond. Fortunately, a research chemist-turned-barrister was elected to Parliament in 1959, and 20 years later became the first woman to hold the office of Prime Minister. She was the longest-serving British Prime Minister in the 20th century. Her name was Margaret “The Iron Lady” Thatcher.

The small island that had once ruled the seas and oceans of the world – along with much of its land – was about to enter an era known now as “Thatcherism.” Many, including me, appreciate strong, enlightened leadership grounded in economic and political freedom. She fit the model perfectly.

Intelligent Collector blogger JIM O’NEAL is an avid collector and history buff. He is president and CEO of Frito-Lay International [retired] and earlier served as chair and CEO of PepsiCo Restaurants International [KFC Pizza Hut and Taco Bell].

Webster Considered the ‘Father of American Scholarship and Education’

A first edition of Noah Webster’s *An American Dictionary of the English Language*, with a four-page manuscript in Webster’s hand concerning word origins, sold for $34,655 at a February 2010 Heritage auction.

By Jim O’Neal

Noah Webster published his American Dictionary of the English Language in 1828 when he was 70 years old. It was printed in two quarto volumes with 70,000 word entries. (A quarto was typically 9 x 12 inches or roughly the size of modern magazines.) About 12,000 of the words had never appeared in a published dictionary and Webster tried to harmonize the spelling of a word with its common pronunciation.

Another unique feature was the inclusion of words used in America that were not in British dictionaries. Perhaps that is why George Bernard Shaw – the Irish playwright who won the Nobel Prize in 1925 – is said to have coined the phrase “The United States and Great Britain are two countries separated by a common language.” (There are several variations of this, including one by Winston Churchill.)

Webster (1758-1843) also collaborated with Alexander Hamilton and other prominent Federalists, which made him a rich target for Jeffersonian-Republicans who peppered him with insults: a prostitute wretch, incurable lunatic, spiteful viper, pusillanimous traitor, to list just a few. He founded the first daily newspaper in New York, The American Minerva, and a semi-weekly publication later known as the New York Spectator. He was a prolific writer and earned the imposing sobriquet as the “Father of American Scholarship and Education.”

I have gradually abandoned the use of printed dictionaries, but a copy of the old reliable Merriam-Webster still occupies a handy spot in the bookcase. One who didn’t was Emily Dickinson, who used Webster as a reference “obsessively.” Scholars studying her immense body of work routinely turn to Webster for clarification. She was such an eccentric recluse that only a dozen of her 1,800 poems were published while she was alive. The hodgepodge of short lines, unconventional punctuation and slant rhymes make her work difficult to appreciate. But the lady could write and may be the finest American poet of the 19th century.

Webster’s name is still synonymous with “dictionary” despite becoming generic and hyphenated long ago. He died in 1843 after playing a critical role in the Copyright Act of 1831.

As War Loomed, Hospitals Lacked Drugs to Treat Wounds, Infections

This 1939 original newspaper political cartoon by Joe Parrish (1905-1989), depicting Adolf Hitler and Benito Mussolini about to plunge into war, went to auction in November 2014.

By Jim O’Neal

In September 1938, British Prime Minister Neville Chamberlain returned from Munich and infamously declared he had an assurance for “Peace for our time.” The phrase was an optimistic borrowing from a versicle in the Anglican service of evensong: “Give peace in our time, O Lord, because there is none other that fighteth for us, but only Thou, O God.”

Chamberlain was wrong on several levels since Germany (Adolf Hitler) had no intention of granting peace to Britain and its European neighbors. Secondly, Britain had a true leader-fighter in Winston Churchill, who had warned the British Parliament in 1935 of “Germany arming at breakneck speed, England lost in a pacifist dream, France corrupt and torn by dissension, America remote and indifferent.” A year later, this was no longer a rhetorical flourish, but a dangerous fact as Britain would soon be at war.

From the largest cities to the smallest villages, citizens prepared their civil defenses: air-raid shelters designated, blackout curtains for homes sewn, gas masks delivered, and fire marshals named. Trading cards in cigarette packs showing film stars and athletes were replaced with a series of 48 “Air-Raid Precautions.” Plans were made to evacuate hundreds of thousands of people from large cities to remote rural areas.

Major hospitals were organized into emergency medical facilities. A blood transfusion system was set-up, with widespread training under the Red Cross First Aid course. Prominently missing in all this was the critical supply of penicillin … for one simple reason: It did not exist. Neither did any other vital drug to treat wounds and other infectious diseases common to war casualties.

History credits the discovery of penicillin many years earlier (1928) to Sir Alexander Fleming at St. Mary’s Hospital in London after a serendipitous encounter with a mold growing in an untended Petri dish. However, he was such a poor communicator and orator that his work was largely ignored. Plus, he found the substance “too frustrating and difficult to work with” and abandoned it.

Fortunately, a small group at Oxford recognized the substance’s potential as a “miracle drug,” although they did not have the resources to manufacture commercial quantities until grants from the Rockefeller Foundation spurred the installation of small production sites.

Even more astonishing was that the first major application occurred in November 1942 when a fire at Boston’s Cocoanut Grove nightclub killed 492 people. Several hundred people survived life-threatening burns after treatment with a penicillin variant. The fire started after a club employee changed a light bulb in a darkened area, lighting a match to see what he was doing. With Freon in short supply due to the war, a highly flammable gas (methyl chloride) was being used as a substitute. Boom … the fire engulfed the entire building.

Of course, tens of millions of people were subsequently saved on many battlefields and in hospitals and emergency rooms all over the world. The worry now is that that through overuse, bacteria have developed resistance strategies, leading to new “super bugs.” Survival of the fittest seems to be an immutable law of nature.

Remember to eat your spinach and wash your hands!

Intelligent Collector blogger JIM O’NEAL is an avid collector and history buff. He is president and CEO of Frito-Lay International [retired] and earlier served as chairman and CEO of PepsiCo Restaurants International [KFC Pizza Hut and Taco Bell].

Our Wishes, Passions Cannot Alter the State of Facts

“The Big Three” – Churchill, FDR and Stalin – at the Yalta Conference, Feb. 4, 1945.

By Jim O’Neal

In February 1945, with the war in Europe winding down, the time had come for President Franklin Roosevelt, British Prime Minister Winston Churchill and Soviet Premier Joseph Stalin to decide the continent’s postwar fate. They agreed to meet at the Black Sea port of Yalta to discuss the plan.

Each man arrived on Feb. 4, along with an entourage of diplomats, military officers, soldiers and personal aides. Among those attending for Great Britain were Alexander Cadogan, under-secretary for foreign affairs, and Anthony Eden, Britain’s foreign secretary. Stalin was accompanied by his minister of foreign affairs, Vyacheslav Molotov, and the Soviet ambassador to the United States. Roosevelt brought Secretary of State Edward Stettinius and Averell Harriman, U.S. ambassador to the Soviet Union.

Roosevelt, recently elected to a fourth term, also brought along daughter Anna as his personal assistant, instead of wife Eleanor.

Aside from agreeing to the unconditional surrender of Germany, their agendas could not have been more different. While Stalin was firmly committed to expanding the USSR, Roosevelt and Churchill focused on the war in the Pacific. They hoped Stalin would declare war on Japan once Germany surrendered. Unbeknownst to Churchill, Roosevelt secretly secured the Soviet dictator’s cooperation by agreeing to grant the Soviets a sphere of influence in Manchuria once Japan capitulated.

The Allied leaders also discussed dividing Germany into zones of occupation. Each of the three nations, as well as France, would control one zone. Churchill and Roosevelt also agreed that all future governments in Eastern Europe would be “friendly” to the Soviet Union. Stalin agreed to allow free elections in each of the liberated Eastern European countries.

There was also a great deal of debate over Poland, but it was all a series of empty, almost laughable promises from Stalin in return for consenting to help with the establishment of the United Nations, which Roosevelt desperately wanted to create. He sincerely believed this new organization would step in when future conflicts arose and help countries settle their disputes peacefully.

The initial reaction to the Yalta agreements was one of celebration, especially in the United States. It appeared that the Western Allies and the Soviets would continue their wartime cooperation into the postwar period. Some historians continue to debate the impact of the conference. However, the facts are crystal clear. By spring, hopes of any continued cooperation had evaporated. After Yalta, Stalin quickly reneged on his promises concerning Eastern Europe, especially the agreement to allow free elections in countries liberated from Nazi control.

The USSR created an Iron Curtain and installed governments dominated by the Soviet Union. The one-time pseudo Allies found themselves on a more treacherous and dangerous path to another more ideologically driven one – the aptly named Cold War. Was FDR too tired and sick? He died two months after Yalta on April 12, 1945, at age 63. Was Churchill out of the loop or drinking heavily (or both)?

Seventy-plus years later, we are still consumed with Russian aggression in Crimea, Ukraine, Syria and the Baltics.

“Facts are stubborn things, and whatever may be our wishes, our inclinations, or the dictates of our passion, they cannot alter the state of facts and evidence,” said lawyer and future president John Adams in 1770, while defending British soldiers in the Boston Massacre trial.

Concerns Over Harry Truman Vanished as New President Exerted His Leadership

1945-white-house-press-release — A 1945 White House press release signed by Harry S. Truman as president announcing the bombing of Hiroshima realized $77,675 at an October 2010 Heritage auction.

By Jim O’Neal

In February 1945, Franklin Delano Roosevelt traveled to Yalta in southeastern Russia to discuss plans for peace with Winston Churchill and Joseph Stalin. He reported to Congress that plans had been arranged for an organization meeting of the United Nations on April 25, 1945. He said, “There, we all hope, and confidently expect, to execute a definite charter of organization under which the peace of the world will be preserved and the forces of aggression permanently outlawed.”

Upon his return, he looked tired and older than his 63 years. Late in March, he went to Warm Springs, Ga., for an overdue rest. On April 12, 1945, he was working at his desk as an artist painted his portrait when he suddenly complained of “a terrible headache.” A few hours later, at 4:45 p.m., he died of a cerebral hemorrhage. The last words he had written were “The only limit to our realization of tomorrow will be our doubts of today. Let us move forward with strong and active faith.”

His successor, the first president to take office in the midst of a war, Harry S. Truman, said he felt “like the moon, the stars and all the planets had fallen on me.” The nation and world wondered if he was capable of taking Roosevelt’s place. His background and even his appearance added to the nervous uncertainty. He was the first president in 50 years without a college education. He spoke the language of a Missouri dirt farmer and World War I artilleryman – both of which he had been. Instead of talking like a statesman, he looked like a bank clerk or haberdasher – both of which he had been. And worst of all, everyone knew that for more than 20 years he had been a lieutenant of Tom Pendergast, one of the most corrupt political bosses in the country.

What most people didn’t know was that he was scrupulously honest, knew his own mind and was one of the most knowledgeable students of history ever to enter the White House. Importantly, he understood the powers of the president, and knew why some men had been strong chief executives and others had been weak leaders.

When he learned about the atomic bomb, there was no soul-searching or handwringing debates. He ordered it dropped on Japan because he was sure it would save American lives and quickly end World War II. It did not bother him in the least that years later, intellectuals would question whether one man should have made such an awesome decision alone. He knew in his heart that he was right … period.

Two of his well-known sayings capture the essence of Give’m Hell Harry Truman: The Buck Stops Here (a sign on his desk) and my favorite … If you can’t stand the heat, stay the hell out of the kitchen!

Leaders get paid to make tough decisions.

Intelligent Collector blogger JIM O’NEAL is an avid collector and history buff. He is President and CEO of Frito-Lay International [retired] and earlier served as Chairman and CEO of PepsiCo Restaurants International [KFC Pizza Hut and Taco Bell].

Idea of a ‘United Nations’ Enthralled the Country … but Surprises Remained

A print of the famous “Dewey Defeats Truman” photo dated November 1948 and inscribed by Harry S. Truman sold for $10,157.50 at an April 2013 Heritage auction.

“If you can’t stand the heat, stay out of the kitchen.”

“The buck stops here!”

“Give me a one-handed economist. All my economists say, ‘On the one hand … on the other.’”

– Quotes attributed to President Harry S. Truman

By Jim O’Neal

It was during Harry S. Truman’s years that America irrevocably joined the community of nations. The phrase “United Nations” had occurred to Franklin Delano Roosevelt in the middle of the night during the bleak Christmas of 1941, while Winston Churchill was a guest at the White House. In its Jan. 10, 1942, issue, Time reported that “a new phrase, the United Nations” had slipped into the world’s vocabulary.

The year before, a Fortune survey had found that barely 13 percent of the electorate wanted to see the United States in any international organization. However, by 1944, 68 percent did and college students endorsed the proposal to send a U.S. delegation to a permanent U.N. by 50 to 1. The House, on a motion by J. William Fulbright from Arkansas to support “the creation of appropriate international machinery to establish and maintain lasting peace among the nations of the world … and participation by the U.S. therein,” resolved 360 to 20 to do so.

In the Senate, the measure also had bipartisan support.

Competition was fierce between Philadelphia, Atlantic City, Chicago, San Francisco and the Black Hills of South Dakota versus New York for the honor of providing the U.N. headquarters with a tax-free location. Only tiny Greenwich, Conn., voted not to receive it, probably more about an anti-One World sentiment.

Then there was the dramatic speech by U.S. Sen. Arthur Vandenberg making his historic pivot toward the viability of international independence that was given a standing ovation by senators of both parties. The press hailed him for delivering a speech of “unquestioned greatness” … “the most important address to come from the senate in the last 80 years” … “a courageous pledge to meet all aggression with force” … “a promise on no more Munichs.”

In the excitement, no one heard a shot fired on the other side of the world. Returning from Paris in a rage, Ho Chi Minh declared the independence of Vietnam, proclaimed himself president and took to the hills. The State Department yawned. After all, these were only natives who could be handled by a few companies of U.S. Marines and even that wouldn’t be necessary. The French Foreign Legion was on hand to suppress any issues.

Besides, we had more important work to rescue and rebuild our Allies in Europe with the new Marshall Plan. Remote places like Korea and Vietnam could wait as we established world order and focused on our domestic priorities. War was now passé and polls confirmed we would have peace for the rest of the 20th century.

As usual, the future would be laden with surprises.

Seventy-one Years Later, U.N. Still Ironing Out the Kinks

A United Nations flag flown aboard Apollo 11, from the personal collection of Buzz Aldrin, sold for $10,157.50 at an April 2013 Heritage auction.

By Jim O’Neal

After years of conflict, devastation and privation, there was a shared determination to avoid another World War. Gradually, this determination evolved into action. The seeds had been sown in August 1941 when President Franklin D. Roosevelt and British Prime Minister Winston Churchill issued the Atlantic Charter, a statement that listed their postwar goals for international security.

These goals appeared again in January 1942 when the 26 Allied nations signed the United Nations Declaration, which bound them to a common purpose of victory over the Axis powers. It also resolved to protect liberty and human rights and to respect the self-determination of all people.

In April 1945, with the end of the war in sight, representatives of 50 nations met in San Francisco to write a charter for the new organization. The charter established the mission of the United Nations: to prevent war; to affirm fundamental human rights; to facilitate international peace and security; to promote improved living standards; and to support social progress and economic advancements.

Disagreements based on national interests plagued the discussions at the April conference, but they did not prevent the formation of the United Nations. On June 25, the delegates unanimously adopted the charter and the next day they all signed the document. The United Nations was officially established on Oct. 24, 1945.

The world had entered a new period of international collaboration … “to save succeeding generations from the scourge of war … to reaffirm faith in fundamental human rights.”

Seventy-one years later, they are still trying to get some of the kinks worked out.

Winston Churchill Rallied Britain to Its Finest Hour

This Winston Churchill inscribed photograph sold for $17,925 at an April 2013 Heritage auction.

By Jim O’Neal

In June 1940, Great Britain was in mortal danger. Germany had captured all of Western Europe and had begun preparations for an invasion of Britain. It was the most serious threat to their security since the Spanish Armada in 1588. If Hitler’s panzer divisions were able to cross the channel they would overwhelm the British Army.

The new Prime Minister, Winston Churchill, knew his county faced a daunting challenge. On June 18, he stood before the House of Commons: “The Battle of France is over … the Battle of Britain is about to begin. Upon it depends our British life and the long continuity of our institutions and our empire. The whole fury and might of the enemy must very soon be turned on us.

“Hitler knows that he will have to break us on this island or lose the war … Let us therefore brace ourselves to our duty and so bear ourselves that, if the British Empire and its Commonwealth last for a thousand years, men will say … ‘This was their finest hour!’ ”

Operation Sea Lowe or “Sea Lion” was the Nazi plan to invade Great Britain. The United States had not yet entered the war, so if successful, the Fuhrer’s “Thousand Year Reich” might become a reality.

German war planners fixed the invasion date for mid-September, despite Britain’s powerful navy being a serious threat to any invasion. The plan was for the German air force, the Luftwaffe, to clear the skies and then destroy the Royal Navy. Then the invasion could begin unimpeded.

The Luftwaffe was stationed in Norway, Belgium and France. It comprised 2,670 fighters and bombers, compared to only 640 British Spitfires. The Battle of Britain – the first large-scale battle to be fought exclusively in the air – was about to begin.

An epic air battle was fought in two successive phases with heroics on both sides. However, the Germans did not realize the Royal Air Force was actually in dire straits, but then suddenly something happened that changed the entire course of the war.

German bombers accidentally dropped a load of bombs on South London, the first times civilians had ever been attacked. Enraged British forces retaliated by bombing Berlin! This shocked the Germans, who had faithfully promised their people they were entirely safe from any war.

What followed was the final phase of the Battle of Britain.

Beginning on Sept. 7, 200 German bombers – each night – assaulted London using incendiary devices to create fires and high-explosive bombs to destroy structures. On Sept. 15, two massive waves of Germans attacked England, but were somehow repulsed by furious RAF counterattacks. Then another bomber force was repulsed and caused Hitler to first postpone the invasion, and then abandon the idea entirely.

So the threat of invasion was lifted, but the bombing intensified.

On the terrible evening of Oct. 15, nearly 500 German planes dropped 386 tons of explosives and an astonishing 17,000 incendiary devices on London proper. The “blitz” continued throughout the 1940-41 winter as German planes continued to haunt the skies each night.

A major attack on May 10, 1941, turned out to be the last one as five weeks later, Hitler decided to invade Russia. Most Luftwaffe squadrons on the Atlantic were redeployed to the Eastern front.

The British had not been broken and the Battle of Britain did indeed turn out to be “Their Finest Hour.”

Gallipoli Battle Established Australian, New Zealand Forces as Ferocious Fighters

The 1981 film *Gallipoli* starred Mel Gibson and was directed by Peter Weir. This Australian daybill went to auction in September 2014.

By Jim O’Neal

Mel Gibson fans remember him for his role in Gallipoli, which won him his second AFI film award in 1981 (his first was for Mad Max). However, the actual history of the Allied invasion of the Gallipoli Peninsula in World War I (April 25, 1915-Jan. 9, 1916) is rarely mentioned.

Perhaps that is because in Great Britain it is regarded as an embarrassing military debacle. It is remembered primarily for the fact it almost cost a young Winston Churchill his career while resulting in him losing his job as the First Lord of the Admiralty. He was forced to resign in May 1916 as a consequence of the campaign’s utter failure.

For the triumphant Turks, Gallipoli was a glorious victory. It spurred the nationalist fervor that would lead to the founding of the Turkish Republic eight short years later. Gallipoli was also a personal triumph for Mustafa Kemal Ataturk, who became the founder of the modern state of Turkey in 1923.

The Gallipoli campaign was a flawed response to the closure of the Dardanelles strait by the Ottoman Empire that limited Allied shipping to Russia. Churchill endorsed a plan that included a naval attack, followed by an amphibious landing on the peninsula. However, the Turks repelled the invasion and inflicted 250,000 casualties on Allied forces. Critics claim the evacuation of Allied troops from the shambles of the battlefield was the best executed phase of the entire campaign!

One bright spot was the performance on the battlefield by the Australians and New Zealanders. The combined ANZAC forces were so impressive that their reputation as ferocious fighters was permanently established. April 25 – Anzac Day – is solemnly commemorated in both countries and people make pilgrimages to pay their respects for so much bloodshed, even in a lost cause.

RIP.

The Roaring Twenties were Outrageous, and Then … Black Tuesday

The Roaring Twenties as depicted in Everett Shinn’s 1925 Curtain Call. This oil on canvas realized $119,500 at a May 2007 Heritage auction.

By Jim O’Neal

One man poisoned himself, his wife and their two young children. Another dropped dead in his stockbroker’s office. Still another (in North Carolina) went into his garage and shot himself. Both the rich and poor were affected.

Winston Churchill woke up in a New York hotel room to a loud commotion. “Under my very window, a gentleman cast himself 15 stories and was dashed to pieces.” Irving Berlin explained it this way: “I had all the money I wanted for the rest of my life. Then suddenly I didn’t!”

It was Black Tuesday, Oct. 29, 1929.

The “Roaring Twenties” conjures up Prohibition, gangsters, flappers and bizarre fads: flagpole sitting, dance marathons, talking movies, the Marx Brothers … and the greatest fad of all … playing the stock market.

Previously a rich man’s game, by the 1920s one million Americans owned 300 million shares of stock, much of it bought on margin. And why not? There were all these new things like radios, telephones, affordable cars and, especially, the ticker tape machine allowing individuals to buy and sell stocks almost instantly.

A person would have to be crazy to stick their money in a bank when you could make a small fortune buying “on the margin.” Calvin Coolidge said: “The business of America is business” and business was booming!

New technologies for refining oil allowed companies to produce more iron, steel, gas and chemicals. Then Treasury Secretary Andrew Mellon cut corporate taxes and previously marginal companies had more money to spend. Many of them spent it buying stocks, driving the stock market even higher (and also boosting their profits).

During the summer of 1929, the stock market reached an all-time high with a record number of shares purchased. However, astute investors noticed a number of troubling warning signs. First was the ever-increasing number of shares bought on margin, a key indicator of increased leverage and a tell-tale sign of speculation versus investing. Second, only 400 of the 1,200 companies listed on the NYSE were actually increasing their revenues and profits fast enough to justify the higher stock prices. Lastly, “Stock Trusts,” pools of money by wealthy investors, could manipulate individual stocks by simply investing heavily in them.

The stock market was being rigged in plain sight, but only a few like business theorist Roger Babson was warning about an impending crash.

Throughout September and October, market volatility increased sharply and on Oct. 24, a near-crash occurred (Black Thursday) when there was a sharp, terrifying plunge. When the market opened, it went straight down and by mid-afternoon stocks had lost $11 billion. But brokers managed to stabilize it and it recovered 75 percent.

On Monday, there was another plunge as those who had survived decided to try and salvage what they had, despite many calls of reassurance. And on Tuesday, Oct. 29, the carnage really began.

The day started with thousands of people congregating on Wall Street, as if they needed to be present for some historic event. All of the major stocks began to crash.

Brokers were flooded with sell orders.

In two hours, eight million shares were sold. Then more margin calls were made and people began to literally fall into shock. By 3 p.m., after five hours of trading, the market closed. Sixteen million shares had been traded at an estimated loss of $15 billion.

Then stories of suicides began. Will Rogers wrote, “You had to stand in line to get a window to jump out of.” Then businesses began to die as well. First to go were the investment firms, followed by the companies who over-speculated on stocks, and then finally the banks.

Like a house of cards, the Roaring Twenties tumbled to an end and the country was entering the first phase of the Great Depression. It would continue for another 12 long years until we entered World War II.

Nothing like a nice little world war to get the economy humming again.