Video: FDR signs law creating WACs (at 5:24)
(Friday, May 15, 1942. during World War II) — President Franklin D. Roosevelt today signed a measure creating the Women’s Army Auxiliary Corps, whose members came to be known as WACs.
Also today: wartime gasoline rationing went into effect in 17 Eastern states, limiting sales to three gallons a week for non-essential vehicles.
Video: May 8, 1942 (at 3:06)
(Friday, May 8, 1942, part of the Pacific War of World War II) — The Battle of Coral Sea, a major naval battle between the Imperial Japanese Navy and Allied naval and air forces from the United States and Australia, ended today with the loss of the carrier USS Lexington and the Japanese carrier Shoho. Continue reading Japanese repulsed as Battle of the Coral Sea ends 70 years ago today (1942)
Video: Leningrad trams resume operations (at 6:53)
(Wednesday, April 15, 1942, on the Eastern Front of World War II) — The Leningrad tram system resumed operation today, the 248th day of the Siege of Leningrad, after several months of being down for lack of power.
Image: Japanese tanks and infantry advance through Bataan jungle
(Friday, April 3, 1942, during the Pacific theater of World War II) — Japanese forces today began their final assault on Bataan against American and Filipino troops who surrendered six days later; the capitulation was followed by the notorious Bataan Death March.
Video: MacArthur 'I shall return' speech re-enacted (at 4:00)
(Friday, March 20, 1942, during World War II) — General Douglas MacArthur, at Terowie, South Australia, made his famous speech regarding the fall of the Philippines, in which he says: “I came out of Bataan and I shall return.”
Video: MacArthur in Australia (at 10:39)
(Tuesday, March 17, 1942, during World War II) — General Douglas MacArthur today became Supreme Commander of the United Nations forces in the Southwestern Pacific.
This dramatic shift of command and promotion for the dashing officer who has held the Japanese at bay on the Island of Luzon for three months and ten days was announced by the War Department simultaneously with his arrival in Australia.
(Saturday, February 28, 1942, during World War II) — The heavy cruiser USS Houston and the Australian light cruiser HMAS Perth came under attack today by Japanese forces during Battle of Sunda Strait in the Netherlands East Indies. Both were sunk shortly after midnight. The Houston lost 693 men while the Perth lost 353.
(Monday, January 24, 1972) — Japanese Sgt. Shoichi Yokoi was found today hiding in a Guam jungle, where he had been since the end of World War II.
Video: Rommel counterattacks (at 0:42)
(Wednesday, January 21, 1942) — In a dramatic and surprising move, German Colonel-General Erwin Rommel turned his Afrika Korps around and began an offensive in Libya today during the Battle of Gazala, an important battle of the Second World War Western Desert Campaign.
Three Axis columns, with powerful air cover, began advancing eastward along the coastal road. The British were ordered to pull back to Agedabia.
Video: Benghazi reoccupied (at 0:04)
(Wednesday, December 24, 1941) — Benghazi was reoccupied by the British today after the Germans were found to have abandoned the Cyrenaican city of eastern Libya during the North African Campaign of World War II.
