Elephants in the Alps - Don't Know Much About Geography - page 103

1920 Ireland is divided between predominantly Protestant Northern Ireland and the mostly Catholic
Irish Free State. (Ireland became a Republic in 1949, severing all ties with England, but Northern
Ireland remained a part of the United Kingdom.)
1922 The Union of Soviet Socialist Republics (USSR) is proclaimed. Lenin dies in 1924 and is suc-
ceeded by Joseph Stalin (1879-1953).
1922 The modern Republic of Turkey is formed out of the old Ottoman Empire. In 1930, the name
Constantinople is changed to Istanbul.
1922 Iraq, formerly called Mesopotamia, is recognized as a kingdom.
1925 In South Africa, surgeon and amateur anthropologist Raymond Dart is given the skull of the
“Taung child.” Concluding it is neither human nor ape, Dart names the species Australopithecus
africanus , or “southern ape from Africa.” But the scientific community doesn't accept Dart's notion
until 1950. Recent dating techniques found A. africanus to be 2.5 million years old, much older than
Dart himself had thought.
1925 The German oceanographic ship Meteor , using recently invented sonar ( so und na vigation
r anging) discovers the Mid-Atlantic Ridge, the mountain range that lies under the Atlantic Ocean.
1925 The world's first motel, the Milestone Motel, opens in Monterey, California.
1926 American aviator and explorer Richard E. Byrd (1888-1957), later a naval rear admiral, be-
comes the first person to fly over the North Pole.
1927 American aviator Charles Lindbergh (1902-74) makes the first solo nonstop transatlantic
crossing in The Spirit of St. Louis , completing the trip from New York to Paris in thirty-three and a
half hours.
1929 The kingdom of Serbs, Croats, and Slovenes, carved out of the former Ottoman and Austro-
Hungarian empires, is transformed into the state of Yugoslavia.
1931 A Spanish Republic is declared after the overthrow of the monarchy.
1933 In the United States, Franklin D. Roosevelt (1882-1945) is inaugurated for the first of four
terms as president, while in Germany, Adolf Hitler (1889-1945) is granted dictatorial powers.
1935 The Nazis repudiate the Versailles Treaty.
1935 The name Persia is changed to Iran.
1936 The Germans occupy the Rhineland.
1937 American flier Amelia Earhart and her navigator are lost over the Pacific as they attempt to
complete a flight around the world.