On this day

July 11, 1937

Revisit the news, notable people, and historical moments connected to this date.

Notable Births

Pai Hsien-yung

1937Pai Hsien-yung, Chinese-Taiwanese author[†]

Kenneth Hsien-yung Pai is a Taiwanese writer who has been described as a "melancholy pioneer". He was born in Guilin, Guangxi at the cusp of the Second Sino-Japanese War. Pai's father was the Kuomintang (KMT) general Bai Chongxi, whom he later described as a "stern, Confucian father" with "some soft spots in his heart." Pai was diagnosed with tuberculosis at the age of seven, during which time he would have to live in a separate house from his siblings. He lived with his family in Chongqing, Shanghai, and Nanjing before moving to the British-controlled Hong Kong in 1948 as CPC forces turned the tide of the Chinese Civil War. In 1952, Pai and his family resettled in Taiwan, where the KMT had relocated the Republic of China after defeat by the Communists in 1949.

Notable Deaths

George Gershwin

1937George Gershwin, American pianist, songwriter, and composer (born 1898)[†]

George Gershwin was an American composer and pianist whose compositions spanned jazz, popular and classical music. Among his best-known works are the songs "Swanee" (1919) and "Fascinating Rhythm" (1924), the orchestral compositions Rhapsody in Blue (1924) and An American in Paris (1928), the jazz standards "Embraceable You" (1928) and "I Got Rhythm" (1930) and the opera Porgy and Bess (1935), which included the hit "Summertime". His Of Thee I Sing (1931) was the first musical to win the Pulitzer Prize for Drama.

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Headlines from July 11, 1937