The month of April has been home to many historical events over the years. Here’s a look at some that helped to shape the world in April 1925.
King Yeta III of Barotseland and the Lozi people in what is now Zambia abolishes the corvée on April 1 in the British colony of Northern Rhodesia. The corvée is a system of forced labor that is considered the last vestige of slavery in the colony.
On April 2, Harry Pierpont is arrested in Detroit for a string of bank robberies across Indiana and Michigan. Pierpont escapes from prison eight years later and ultimately joins John Dillinger in committing numerous additional bank robberies.
Henry Ford begins running a private air freight service between Detroit and Chicago on April 2.
On April 4, Field Marshal Paul von Hindenburg agrees to run in the second round of the German presidential election in place of Karl Jarres, who had won the first round. Jarres withdrew his name prior to the second round, paving the way for Hindenburg’s candidacy and ultimate victory.
Several men working for criminal Al Capone severely assault investigative reporter Robert St. John on April 6. St. John had previously authored several pieces exposing Capone’s criminal empire in Cicero, Illinois.
Adolf Hitler formally renounces his Austrian citizenship on April 7. Hitler would remain stateless and ineligible for public office until being granted German citizenship in early 1932.
In conjunction with the British Colonial Office, the Australian government announces a plan on April 8 to encourage nearly half a million British citizens to relocate to Australia. The government offers low-interest loans and skills training to entice people to move.
A demonstration against Lord Balfour in Damascus ends with two people dead and 11 wounded on April 9. The protests were a response to Balfour’s promotion of Jewish interests in Palestine. Balfour would depart Damascus in haste a day after the demonstration.
F. Scott Fitzgerald’s novel The Great Gatsby is published on April 10.
Police in Denver, Colorado, carry out a raid on Good Friday on April 10. More than 200 people, including bootleggers and gamblers, are arrested. The raid was ordered by Denver Mayor Benjamin F. Stapleton, a member of the Ku Klux Klan. The KKK had benefitted from many of the institutions targeted during the raid, which prompted the organization to strip Stapleton of his membership months later.
The James Simpson-Roosevelt Asiatic Expedition departs New York City on April 11. The expedition aimed to collect wildlife species from mountainous regions in Asia, and would ultimately return with thousands of specimens.
Women are granted the right to vote in the Dominion of Newfoundland on April 13.
Anarchists open fire on the vehicle of Tsar Boris III of Bulgaria on April 14. Though King Boris is grazed by a bullet and two of his companions are killed, the assassination attempt fails.
The Caterpillar Tractor Company is founded upon the merger of Holt Manufacturing Company and the C.L. Best Tractor Company on April 15.
After consuming an excessive amount of hot dogs and soda, Babe Ruth undergoes surgery on April 17. Ruth had collapsed on a team train 10 days earlier and is treated for what doctors characterized as an intestinal abscess.
The Communist Party of Korea is founded in Japanese-ruled Korea on April 17.
The use of a sign shaped like a shield is standardized as the way to identify federally funded highways in the United States on April 20.
The entire crew of the Japanese cargo ship S.S. Raifuku Maru perishes when the ship sinks in a storm on April 21. The ship was transporting wheat from the U.S. to Germany but rescue efforts failed due to stormy conditions.
Franz Kafka’s novel, Der Prozess (later translated in English as The Trial), is published posthumously on April 26. Kafka, a relative unknown at the time of the book’s publication, died of tuberculosis roughly nine months earlier.
France begins air raids on Morocco as part of the Rif War on April 27. The raids would continue intermittently for the next nine years.
