November 21, 1962: The Sino-Indian War Ends

November 21, 1962: The Sino-Indian War ends, preventing a conflict between the 2 most populous nations on Earth from expanding into a wider war, possibly even World War III.

During the 1959 Tibetan uprising in southwestern China, India had granted political asylum to Tenzin Gyatso, who, as the 14th Dalai Lama, was the spiritual head of Tibetan Buddhism, and the head of state of Tibet. Previous Chinese leaders had given Tibet varying measures of autonomy. But, since Mao Zedong founded it in 1949, the People's Republic of China has recognized Tibet as part of their country, and the Dalai Lama fled.

Since the '59 uprising, there were violent border skirmishes between China and India. Throughout 1962, there had been diplomatic attempts to reach a settlement, but they failed. On October 20, China invaded India at Ladakh.

Most of the fighting was in the mountains, with neither country using its navy (understandable) or its air force (considerably less understandable, as one or the other using it might have made a difference).

President John F. Kennedy, already dealing with the Cuban Missile Crisis (which the world at large did not know about until October 22), was never going to aid China, because he viewed it as an ally of the Soviet Union. But, surprising the world, the Soviets supported India, selling them MiG fighter jets. Now knowing, for the first time -- perhaps a failure of the CIA and MI6 -- that there was a Sino-Soviet split, the U.S. and Britain announced their neutrality in the conflict.

As JFK and Soviet Premier Nikita Khrushchev settled their conflict peacefully, the one between China and India turned into a stalemate. On November 20, China declared a ceasefire, and withdrew behind their border. Prime Minister Jawaharlal Nehru of India took this as a victory, and left things at that, refusing to punish China with an invasion of their territory.

China claimed to have lost 722 men, and killed 5,000 Indian troops. India claimed to have lost 1,383 men, and killed around the same number of Chinese troops. Despite various tensions, the 2 countries have never fought each other again.

As of November 21, 2022, the 14th Dalai Lama is 87 years old, and still promoting peace and his faith around the world. In 1989, he was awarded the Nobel Peace Prize.

*

November 21, 1962 was a Wednesday. Gospel singer Steven Curtis Chapman was born.

Baseball season was over. Football was in midweek. There were 4 games played in the NBA:

* The New York Knicks beat the Chicago Zephyrs, 137-108 at the Chicago Coliseum. Terry Dischinger scored 37 in defeat for the Zephyrs, who became the Baltimore Bullets the next season, and are now the Washington Wizards.

* The Boston Celtics beat the St. Louis Hawks, 115-106 at the Boston Garden.

* The Syracuse Nationals beat the Detroit Pistons, 122-120 at Cobo Hall (now Huntington Place) in Detroit. The Nats became the Philadelphia 76ers the next season.

* And the Cincinnati Royals beat the San Francisco Warriors, 143-139 at the Cow Palace in the San Francisco suburb of Daly City, California. For the Royals, Oscar Robertson scored 40, and Jack Twyman scored 31. For the Warriors, Wilt Chamberlain scored 61 and had 22 rebounds, while Guy Rodgers scored 26.

October 19, 1935: Mao Zedong's Long March

October 19, 1935: Mao Zedong's troops unite, ending their "Long March." It had lasted over a year.

The Long March was a military retreat during the Chinese Civil War, undertaken by the Communist Red Army, in order to evade continuous pursuit by advancing Nationalist forces. Several different Red Army forces took different routes from different Chinese Communist Party (CCP) strongholds being encircled by the Kuotmintang (KMT) National Revolutionary Army, with their concurrent retreats taking place over more than a year, traveling thousands of miles through western and central China, in order to convene at the new Communist base of operations in Yan'an, located in the northwestern province of Shaanxi.

The most famous of these marches was undertaken by the First Red Army, under Mao himself: Departing from their headquarters in the southern province of Jiangxi on October 16, 1934, the First Army marched over 5,600 miles in a large clockwise arc through the western frontiers of the country, ultimately meeting with Communist forces in Yan'an on October 19, 1935.

The circuitous route required the First Army to pass through some of the most difficult terrain in the country while avoiding destruction by the Nationalists: At first, the NRA under Chiang Kai-Shek, and later by local cliques of Nationalist-aligned warlords. Ultimately, fewer than 8,000 people traveling with the First Red Army would survive the march, out of a force of more than 65,000 that had set out the year prior. It was an attrition rate more devastating than Napoleon Bonaparte's retreat from Moscow in 1812. Over the following year, the Second and Fourth Red Armies would continue to navigate and face resistance, with the meeting of the three armies in Yan'an only taking place on October 22, 1936.

Upon arrival, the leadership that Mao, 40 years old when the March began, had demonstrated during the retreat, with the troops seeing that he had shared their suffering, afforded him immense prestige and support among many within the otherwise-shattered Communist Party.

The March would achieve mythical status in China and throughout the world as one of the most famous events of the war, for its immense hardship and implausible perseverance in the face of what appeared to be near-certain annihilation. It ultimately marked the beginning of Mao's long ascent to primacy within the CCP, and would be featured heavily in his public image, through the founding of the People's Republic in 1949.

*

October 19, 1935 was a Saturday. Baseball season had ended 12 days earlier, when the Detroit Tigers beat the Chicago Cubs in the World Series. The NBA had not been founded yet. The NHL season didn't start for another 19 days. But there were college football games, including these:

* Minnesota beat Tulane, 20-0 at Memorial Stadium in Minneapolis. Minnesota went 8-0, and won the Big Ten Conference title. They did not however, go to a bowl game. Then again, bowl games were still a new thing: The Orange and Sugar Bowls were in only their 2nd season, and the Cotton Bowl did not debut until the following season.

* Louisiana State University beat Arkansas, 13-7 at State Fair Stadium (now Independence Stadium) in Shreveport, Louisiana. LSU went on to win the Southeastern Conference title.

* Nebraska and Kansas State played to a tie, 0-0 at Memorial Stadium in Manhattan, Kansas. Not to be confused with many other Memorial Stadiums, including Nebraska's own, KSU's version would be replaced in 1968 by what's now known as Bill Snyder Family Stadium, although it is still used. In spite of this tie, Nebraska went on to win the Big Six Conference title.

* UCLA beat Stanford, 7-6 at Stanford Stadium in the San Francisco suburb of Palo Alto, California. This was the only game Stanford lost that season, as they won the Pacific Coast Conference title.

* Southern Methodist University beat Rice University, 10-0 at Ownby Stadium in Dallas.

* Texas Christian University beat Texas A&M, 19-14 at Amon G. Carter Stadium in Fort Worth, Texas. TCU lost to their Dallas arch-rivals, Southern Methodist University, thus losing the Southwest Conference title to SMU. But TCU were invited to play LSU in the Sugar Bowl, and won. In contrast, SMU were invited to play Stanford in the Rose Bowl, and lost.

* The Catholic University of America beat the University of Detroit, 13-7 at Titan Stadium in Detroit.

* The University of Mississippi beat the University of Florida, 27-6 at Hemingway Stadium (now Vaught-Hemingway Stadium) in Oxford, Mississippi. "Ole Miss" were invited to play in the Orange Bowl, but lost to Catholic University.

* Army beat Harvard, 13-0 at Michie Stadium in West Point, New York.

* Navy lost to Yale, 7-6 at the Yale Bowl in New Haven, Connecticut.

* At a time when all of Philadelphia's later-named "Big Five" schools had football programs, Villanova beat La Salle, 20-0 at Villanova Stadium in Villanova, Pennsylvania.

* Rivalry: Washington beat Washington State, 21-0 at Rogers Field in Pullman, Washington.

* Rivalry: Princeton beat Rutgers, 29-6 at Palmer Stadium in Princeton.

And in English soccer, North London team Arsenal went to Hampshire, and lost to Portsmouth, 2-1 at Fratton Park.

October 1, 1949: Red China

October 1, 1949: The People's Republic of China, a Communist state, is declared by Mao Zedong. This brings the 37-year-old Republic of China, and the 22-year-old Chinese Civil War between each side's respective forces, to an end.

As American conservatives said, 600 million people were suddenly hurled into slavery. But then, as with Cuba 9 years later, "Nationalist China," led by Chiang Kai-shek and now limited to the island of Formosa (which was renamed Taiwan), was not a particularly free country. Certainly, it was not a wealthy one.

Those conservatives supported Chiang because of his stand against Communism. In particular, Henry Luce, co-founder and now sole operator of Time magazine, who had been born to American missionaries in China and retained affection for the country, admired Chiang, and his wife, Soong Mei-ling, known throughout the world as "Madame Chiang."

She rallied support for his regime, even as he got more and more corrupt: The leading American General assisting Nationalist China, "Vinegar Joe" Stilwell, called him "Peanut" and "Generalissimo Cash My Check." Luce called the Chiangs Time's "Man and Wife of the Year for 1937." It was the 1st time he'd given the distinction to more than one person.

Still, when American conservatives asked, "Who lost China?" they expected the American people to answer, "The Democrats." Or, perhaps specifically, President Harry S Truman. Or his Secretary of State, Dean Acheson. Or his former Secretary of State, now Secretary of Defense, George C. Marshall. Or General Stilwell. Or Harry Dexter White, a State Department official involved with China, suspected of being a Communist spy, hounded into suicide in 1948.

The truth was this: China was lost by Chiang Kai-shek, even more than it was won by Mao Zedong. Chiang ruled Taiwan until his death in 1975; Mao, the People's Republic, until his death the following year. With his son from his 1st marriage, Chiang Ching-kuo, taking over as dictator of Taiwan, Madame Chiang lost her influence on the island, and moved to New York, living their until her death in 2003, at the age of 105. The younger Chiang ended martial law on Taiwan in 1987, and died the next year.

Today, "Red China" is home to 1.4 billion people, more than any country on Earth, although India may surpass it in the next 20 years. After its "reopening" in the 1970s, it became a sports power, and moved toward becoming an economic power as well. It remains totalitarian in practice, but mostly in official name is it still Communist.

American conservatives still consider China to be a threat. They are not: They know that any overt attack on America would be national suicide, economically as well as militarily. They're not stupid.

*

October 1, 1949 was a Saturday. This was the day of the plane crash that killed singer Buddy Clark. I have a separate entry for that event.

There would be National Football League and All-America Football Conference games the next day. The National Basketball Association and the National Hockey League were preparing to start new seasons in the coming weeks.

And the Major League Baseball season was reaching its climax: The next day would be the last day of the regular season, and it would turn out to be the only time in the single-division era, 1901 to 1968, that both League's Pennants remained unclinched at the final day began.

* The New York Yankees beat the Boston Red Sox, 5-4 at the original Yankee Stadium. It was Joe DiMaggio Day, since the Red Sox included Joe's brother Dom, and the rest of their family could participate as well.

Joe told the crowd of 69,551, "I'd like to thank the Good Lord for making me a Yankee." The Good Lord only knows what George Weiss, then the Yankees' general manager and the farm director who had approved Joe's signing in 1934, thought about that.

The Yankees trailed the Red Sox by 1 game going into these last 2 games, and had to win both of them in order to win the American League Pennant. Allie Reynolds did not have his best stuff, and the Sox took a 4-0 lead in the 3rd inning. Joe Page, one of the earliest great relief pitchers, had to pitch more than 6 innings. The Yankees came back, knocking Mel Parnell out in the 5th inning, and tied it up. In the bottom of the 8th, left fielder Johnny Lindell hit a home run off Joe Dobson, and the Yankees won. 

The next day, Vic Raschi held the Sox off long enough to gain a 5-3 win and the Pennant, the 1st under manager Casey Stengel.

* The Brooklyn Dodgers lost to the Philadelphia Phillies, 6-4 at Shibe Park in Philadelphia. Del Ennis, Andy Seminick and Willie "Puddin' Head" Jones hit home runs for the Fightin' Phils, 

* The Chicago Cubs beat the St. Louis Cardinals, 3-1 at Wrigley Field in Chicago. What that meant was, on the last day, a Dodger win or a Cardinal loss would give the Dodgers the National League Pennant. The next day, the Dodgers won, 9-7, on 10th inning RBI singles by Duke Snider and Luis Olmo -- bookending an intentional walk to Jackie Robinson -- so it didn't matter that the Cardinals also won their finale, 13-5.

* The New York Giants lost to the Boston Braves, 3-0 at Braves Field in Boston. Vern Bickford -- one of the pitchers the Braves relied on when they couldn't start Warren Spahn or Johnny Sain and knew it would do no good to pray for rain -- allowed 8 hits 6 walks, but still pitched a shutout.

* The Philadelphia Athletics beat the Washington Senators, 7-4 at Griffith Stadium in Washington.

* The Cleveland Indians beat the Detroit Tigers, 4-0 at Briggs (later Tiger) Stadium in Detroit. Mike Garcia allowed 7 hits and 4 walks, but still pitched a shutout.

* And the St. Louis Browns beat the Chicago White Sox, 8-6 at Sportsman's Park in St. Louis.

As I said, it was a Saturday. Notable college football games played that day included Number 1 Michigan winning at Stanford 27-7, Notre Dame winning by the same score against Washington, and Oklahoma beating Texas A&M 33-13.

As for New Jersey's teams, Rutgers lost to Temple, 14-7 at Temple Stadium in Philadelphia; and Princeton lost to Navy, 28-7 at Municipal Stadium in Baltimore, which was later converted into Memorial Stadium, home of the Orioles and Colts.

New York City still had something of a college football following. NYU went to Lewisburg, Pennsylvania and lost 14-0 to Bucknell. City College played at home at Lewisohn Stadium, and lost 20-14 to Colby College of Maine. (CCNY only played 1 more season before dropping its football program.) And Fordham didn't open its season for another week.

This was also the day that the George R. White Memorial Stadium opened in Boston. White Stadium would be the longtime home of high school football in the city. It opened with these games:

* Boston Technical High School beat Boston College High School, 12-6.

* Dorchester High School beat Boston Trade High School for Boys, 18-0.

* The English High School beat Roxbury Memorial High School, 12-6.

* And the Boston Latin School beat Boston High School of Commerce, 33-6.

The Boston Latin School is America's oldest high school, having opened in 1635, and while the term "magnet school" wasn't coined until 1968, it has always been one. Commerce closed in 1960. Roxbury Memorial closed the same year. Boston Tech moved into its building, and in 1994 was renamed The John D. O'Bryant School of Mathematics and Science, for a longtime black educator in the city who had recently died. Boston Trade, also in Roxbury, closed in 1970. BC High is actually across the city from the BC campus, on the Boston campus of the University of Massachusetts, across from the John F. Kennedy Presidential Library and Museum. Dorchester High closed in 2003.

And, in English soccer, Arsenal beat East Midlands team Derby County, 2-1, at the Arsenal Stadium, a.k.a. Highbury, in North London. 

September 11, 1969: The Sino-Soviet Border Conflict Is Settled

The Soviet Union in purple, China in gold.

With neighboring Mongolia in stripes,

North Korea in red, and Japan in orange.

September 11, 1969: This may well have been the most consequential September 11 in human history, more so even than in 2001. Because there was a Sino-Soviet Border Conflict, and it was getting bad.

On August 13, 1969, President Richard Nixon received a President’s Daily Briefing. In it, the CIA described the conflict, also known as the Ussuri River Conflict, as having "explosive potential," and that "the potential for a war between them clearly exists," including a Soviet attack on Chinese nuclear facilities; while China "appears to view the USSR as its most immediate enemy."

In other words, at this point, each is the other's biggest enemy at the moment, not America or any other Western democracy in either case. For the moment, there seemed little Nixon could do except keep an eye on things.

On September 11, returning from the funeral of North Vietnamese dictator Ho Chi Minh in Hanoi, Soviet Premier Alexei Kosygin lands in Beijing, and meets with his Chinese counterpart, Zhou Enlai. They manage to straighten things out. In the conflict, the Chinese lost about 100 men; the Soviets, about 300.

But, knowing that the Sino-Soviet split was that bad, Nixon realized that he could "triangulate" them off each other. In 1971 and 1972, he set up meetings with the leaders of both countries, and visited first Beijing in February 1972, meeting Zhou and Mao Zedong; then Moscow, meeting Kosygin and Leonid Brezhnev. He got agreements from both sides: The SALT and Anti-Ballistic Missile Treaties with the Soviet Union, and an "opening" with China that included their assistance in the peace talks between their ally, North Vietnam, and America's ally, South Vietnam.

*

September 11, 1969 was a Thursday. These games were played in Major League Baseball:

* The New York Yankees lost to the Washington Senators, 7-3 at Robert F. Kennedy Stadium in Washington. Jim Hannan outpitched Stan Bahnsen. Mike Epstein and Brant Alyea hit home runs for the Senators, while Joe Pepitone and Bobby Murcer hit them for the Yankees. Rookie catcher Thurman Munson went 3-for-4.

* The New York Mets beat the Montreal Expos, 4-0 at Shea Stadium. Gary Gentry pitched a 6-hit shutout. The Mets were 2 days past "The Black Cat Game," 13 days short of their 1st-ever 1st-place clinch, 25 days short of their 1st Pennant, and 35 days short of completing their "Miracle."

* The Philadelphia Phillies beat the Chicago Cubs, 4-3 at Connie Mack Stadium in Philadelphia. Dick Allen, getting booed every day by the home fans, hit a home run. Ernie Banks and Willie Smith homered for the "September Swooning" Cubs. On October 7, Allen would be traded for Curt Flood, and, for once, he wouldn't be the most controversial player involved in an action.

* The Baltimore Orioles beat the Boston Red Sox, 4-2 at Memorial Stadium in Baltimore. Dave McNally outpitched Lee Stange. Frank Robinson went 1-for-4. Brooks Robinson went 0-for-4. Rico Petrocelli hit a home run for the Red Sox, while Carl Yastrzemski went 0-for-3 with a walk.

* The Atlanta Braves beat the San Francisco Giants, 5-3 at Atlanta Stadium (later renamed Atlanta-Fulton County Stadium). Willie McCovey hit 2 home runs. Willie Mays went 0-for-3 with a walk. For the Braves, Hank Aaron hit his 551st career home run.

* The Pittsburgh Pirates beat the St. Louis Cardinals, 3-2 at Forbes Field in Pittsburgh. Bob Veale outpitched Steve Carlton. Roberto Clemente went 1-for-3 with a walk. Willie Stargell went 1-for-4 with an RBI.

* The Cleveland Indians beat the Detroit Tigers, 5-2 at Cleveland Municipal Stadium. Luis Tiant outpitched Denny McLain. Al Kaline did not play for the Tigers.

* The Cincinnati Reds beat the San Diego Padres, 6-4 at Crosley Field in Cincinnati. Pete Rose went 3-for-4 with 3 RBIs. Johnny Bench went 1-for-4.

* The Chicago White Sox beat the Minnesota Twins, 4-0 at Comiskey Park in Chicago. Joe Horlen pitched a 3-hit shutout. Harmon Killebrew went 0-for-3.

* The Los Angeles Dodgers beat the Houston Astros, 1-0 at the Astrodome in Houston. Claude Osteen pitched a 4-hit shutout, outpitching Don Wilson.

* The Kansas City Royals beat the California Angeles, 3-0 at Anaheim Stadium (now Angel Stadium of Anaheim). Wally Bunker allowed only 1 hit, a single to Jay Johnstone in the 7th.

* And the Oakland Athletics beat the Seattle Pilots, 6-3 at the Oakland Coliseum. Sal Bando and Bob Johnson homered for the A's. Reggie Jackson did not play.

September 9, 1976: The Death of Mao Zedong

September 9, 1976: Mao Zedong, Chairman of the Communist Party of China, and that nation's dictator since the successful completion of his revolution in 1949, dies in the national capital of Beijing.

Mao had fought Generalissimo Chiang Kai-shek for control of China, and was losing the civil war, when the Japanese invaded, beginning the Pacific phase of World War II. He redirected his troops to help beat the Japanese. Then he switched back to fighting Chiang, and he won. Then he split with the Soviet Union, and challenged them for the leadership of the Communist world.

But no one beats Father Time. In his memoir In the Arena, former President Richard Nixon wrote of what Mao was like during their momentous visit in 1972, and 4 years later, after Nixon had been forced to resign the Presidency, and Mao was dying (using the earlier English version of his name):

When I saw Mao Tse-tung in 1972, he had already suffered a stroke, but he was still mentally alert and obviously the man in charge. When I saw him again in four years, he had suffered another, more serious stroke, and the onset of Parkinson's disease had stiffened his movements. His shambling stride had become an eighty-two-year-old man's slow shuffle.

His mind was still quick and incisive, but his speech was just grunts and groans. His expressions show that he understood what I said, but when he tried to answer, the words would just not come out. If he thought the translator had not understood him, he would impatiently grab a notepad and write out his comments.

It was clear that he was no longer capable of leading the most populous nation in the world. But no one had the power or the courage to tell him to retire until the grim reaper called him to meet Marx a few months later.

On May 27, 1976, Mao met with Prime Minister Zulfikar Ali Bhutto of Pakistan, father of later Prime Minister Benazir Bhutto. The photographs taken showed just how ill he looked. Mao decided to end his public audiences.

It is now widely believed that it wasn't Parkinson's disease that was affecting Mao's movements, as was thought by the West at the time, but amyotrophic lateral sclerosis, a.k.a. Lou Gehrig's disease. He suffered 2 heart attacks in 1976, before suffering an even more severe one on September 2, and yet another on September 5. He fell into a coma on September 7, and his life support machines were turned off at midnight local time, September 9. His death was announced at 4:00 PM local time that day.

Aside from the Soviet Union, who downplayed the event, the other Communist nations were effusive in their praise, especially North Korea and the newly-united Vietnam. Yugoslavia, then Communist but opposed to the Soviets, issued a statement from President Josip Broz Tito: "Without him, modern China would be unimaginable."

As for the world's democracies, some were more respectful than others. Speaking for America, President Gerald Ford said, "When I visited Beijing in December 1975, I had the privilege of meeting Chairman Mao. Our conversation has promoted the development of U.S.-China relations along the lines envisioned by our two countries. Please let me declare now as I did then, that the United States is determined to complete the normalization of our relationship on the basis of the Shanghai Communiqué. This will be an appropriate channel to praise his vision and will benefit the people of both countries."

Britain's Queen Elizabeth II and Prime Minister James Callaghan issued a joint statement: "His influence far exceeds China's borders, and he will undoubtedly be remembered as a world-famous great politician." French President Valéry Giscard d'Estaing said, "France will not forget that it was Chairman Mao Zedong and General de Gaulle who deeply admired him that led to the mutual development of our two countries."

Pretty much the only openly hostile reaction was, understandably, from the Republic of China, a.k.a. Taiwan, who had faced the death of Chiang Kai-shek only the year before. They cited "the anti-humanity and anti-human rights falsification regime," which had included the disastrous Great Leap Forward in the 1950s and the dastardly Cultural Revolution of the 1960s.

It took 2 years for the post-Mao power struggle to be settled, and Deng Xiaoping won out. He did what Mao was not really able to do: Modernize the country. To do so, he had to abandon most of the principles of Communism, and embrace free-market reforms: Within 10 years, China was still authoritarian, but was Communist in name only.

It remains so today, as the huge portrait of Mao still looks out from the wall of the Great Hall of the People in Beijing, over Tiananmen Square to the east. Mao's Mausoleum and the Monument to the People's Heroes, patterned after Vladimir Lenin's in Moscow, is to the south of the Square, and the National Museum of China is east of the Square.

*

September 9, 1976 was a Thursday. These games were played in Major League Baseball:

* The New York Yankees beat the Milwaukee Brewers, 4-2 at Yankee Stadium. Thurman Munson and Chris Chambliss hit home runs, in support of Ken Holtzman, who went the distance for the win. Hank Aaron, in his last full month as a major league player, had an RBI double for the Brewers. It was his 3,769th career hit (he would get 2 more), his 623rd double (he would get 1 more), and his record 2,296th RBI (he would get 1 more). He had not hit a home run since July 20, and would not hit another, finishing with a record 755.

* The Boston Red Sox beat the Detroit Tigers, 5-0 at Fenway Park in Boston. Rick Wise pitched a 2-hit shutout. Jim Rice hit a home run, and Carl Yastrzemski went 2-for-4 with an RBI.

* The Philadelphia Phillies beat the Chicago Cubs, 4-2 at Veterans Stadium in Philadelphia. Mike Schmidt went 0-for-2, but did draw 2 walks. Jim Lonborg went the distance for the win.

* The Cleveland Indians beat the Baltimore Orioles, 4-3 at Memorial Stadium in Baltimore. Frank Robinson, the former Orioles star, now managing the Indians and in his last full month as an active player, did not put himself into the game. Buddy Bell and George Hendrick homered. Brooks Robinson, in his last full season, did not play. Reggie Jackson, in his only season as an Oriole, went 1-for-4. Ken Singleton homered.

* The St. Louis Cardinals beat the Montreal Expos, 6-1 at Busch Memorial Stadium in St. Louis. Lou Brock went 2-for-4 with a stolen base.

* The Kansas City Royals beat the California Angels, 6-5 at Royals (now Kauffman) Stadium in Kansas City. George Brett singled home the winning run in the bottom of the 10th inning.

* The Minnesota Twins beat the Texas Rangers, 6-0 at Arlington Stadium in the Dallas suburb of Arlington, Texas. Rod Carew appeared as a pinch-hitter in the 7th inning, and, characteristically for him, got a hit. Uncharacteristically for him, it was a grand slam home run. Dave Goltz pitched a 3-hit shutout.

* The Cincinnati Reds beat the Houston Astros, 4-3 at the Astrodome in Houston. Bob Bailey singled home the winning run in the top of the 11th inning. Pete Rose went 3-for-6, and Johnn Bench went 3-for-5 with an RBI.

* The San Diego Padres beat the Atlanta Braves, 4-3 at San Diego Stadium (later Jack Murphy Stadium and Qualcomm Stadium). Dave Winfield did not play in this game.

* The San Francisco Giants beat their arch-rivals, the Los Angeles Dodgers, 4-2 at Dodger Stadium in Los Angeles.

* And the Oakland Athletics beat the Chicago White Sox, 2-1 at the Oakland Coliseum.

* And the New York Mets and the Pittsburgh Pirates were not scheduled.

August 8, 1975: The Banqiao Dam Disaster

August 8, 1975: The Banqiao Dam breaks during Typhoon Nina. It is the worst dam disaster in history -- no pun intended.

The dam began operation in 1952, Banqiao, in Henan Province, China, about 563 miles southwest of the national capital of Beijing. Cracks began appearing immediately, due to engineering errors. The dam's designer, Chen Xing, was critical of the national government's dam-building procedures. Since the national government was run by Mao Zedong, this was very risky. Twice, he was exiled and eventually returned.

Typhoon Nina broke the Banqiao Dam, and 60 other dams. Estimates of the deaths range from 170,000 to 240,000. If it was 170,000 people that died, that's about 93 times as many as died in Hurricane Katrina, and 77 times as many as died in the Johnstown Flood. Another 11 million were left homeless. The reason we don't know for sure is the same reason we don't know how many died at Tienanmen Square in 1989: The Chinese government covered it up.

Mao died the next year. His eventual successor, Deng Xiaoping, listened to Chen, and restored him. It still took until 1986 to start reconstruction, and 1993 for the dam to restart operation. Chen lived until 2009.

*

August 8, 1975 was a Friday. These Major League Baseball games were played:

* The New York Yankees beat the California Angels, 4-3 at Anaheim Stadium (now Angel Stadium of Anaheim). Ed Herrmann hit a home run. Larry Gura outpitched Nolan Ryan, who didn't get out of the 3rd inning. But the Yankees' new manager, Billy Martin, had no confidence in Gura, and had him traded the next year, to the Kansas City Royals. He helped them reach the postseason in 4 of the next 5 years. Having gone 12-9 for the Yankees, he went 111-78.

* The New York Mets lost to the Los Angeles Dodgers, 4-3 at Shea Stadium. The Mets led 3-2 after 7 innings, but the Dodgers scored 2 in the 8th. Steve Garvey and Jimmy Wynn hit home runs.

* The Philadelphia Phillies beat the San Francisco Giants, 5-4 at Veterans Stadium in Philadelphia. Dick Allen singled Garry Maddox home in the bottom of the 9th. Greg Luzinski hit a home run, and Mike Schmidt went 2-for-4.

* A doubleheader was split at Atlanta-Fulton County Stadium. The Atlanta Braves wo the opener, 1-0. Carl Morton pitched a 5-hit shutout. The Chicago Cubs won the nightcap, 3-1.

* The Cleveland Indians beat the Kansas City Royals, 4-3 at Cleveland Municipal Stadium. Indians player-manager Frank Robinson did not put himself into the game. Oscar Gamble went 2-for-3 with a home run, a walk and 3 RBIs. George Brett went 1-for-4. Harmon Killebrew, running out the string with the Royals, pinch-hit, and did not reach base.

* The Montreal Expos beat the Cincinnati Reds, 8-7 at Riverfront Stadium in Cincinnati. Pete Rose went 1-for-4 with a walk and 2 RBIs. Johnny Bench went 2-for-4 with 2 RBIs.

* The Minnesota Twins beat the Detroit Tigers, 3-1 at Tiger Stadium in Detroit. Uncharacteristically, Rod Carew went 0-for-5. That dropped his batting down to a mere .370.

* The Baltimore Orioles beat the Chicago White Sox, 7-4 at Comiskey Park in Chicago. Brooks Robinson went 0-for-3 with a walk.

* The Texas Rangers beat the Milwaukee Brewers, 6-4 at Milwaukee County Stadium. Hank Aaron, running out the string with the Brewers, went 1-for-4. Robin Yount did not play.

* The St. Louis Cardinals beat the San Diego Padres, 10-6 at Busch Memorial Stadium in St. Louis.

* The Houston Astros beat the Pittsburgh Pirates, 5-3 at the Astrodome in Houston.

* And the Oakland Athletics beat the Boston Red Sox, 3-2 at the Oakland Coliseum. Reggie Jackson and Gene Tenace hit home runs. Carl Yastrzemski did not play. This turned out to be a preview of the American League Championship Series, but the Red Sox turned the tables and won.

May 16, 1966: Mao's Cultural Revolution

May 16, 1966: Mao Zedong, founder of the People's Republic of China and Chairman of its Communist Party, strikes back against his internal enemies.

In 1958, he launched a plan to transform the country into a modern industrialized state, a plan he called "the Great Leap Forward." He thought that establishing "people's communes" in the countryside, focused mostly on producing steel, would be a good way to go about it.

Taking people who only knew farming and getting them to leave their fields to become steelworkers had worked in America, earlier in the 20th Century. But that was by those men's own choices, because they believed that packing everything up and leaving the South to go North, or West, and learn the necessary skills, however hard it might be, was a better life than living in segregation and rural poverty -- a poverty so bad, it made white men as well as black ones leave.

In contrast, Mao was forcing his decision on people who didn't ask for it, and were completely unprepared for it, and over 30 million people starved to death. Li Jingquan, the Party boss in Sichuan, told Mao that 10.6 million people had died in his province alone by 1961.

In terms of numbers, the Great Leap Forward may have been the greatest blunder in human history. But there's a big difference between a blunder and a crime.

Mao abandoned the program after getting the numbers. Thereafter, moderates in China reversed many of the Great Leap Forward policies, and even began cutting Mao out of economic decision-making. Having an ego as big as his country, Mao didn't like this. In 1964, he saw that the Soviet Union had removed Nikita Khrushchev from power, and figured the same thing could happen to him, and he needed to do something about it. So he determined who had questionable loyalty, and secured his position by removing them from powerful positions, replacing them with sycophants.

Then, on May 16, 1966, there was a "notification": Mao declared the beginning of what he called the "Cultural Revolution." He said the moderate approaches that followed the catastrophe of the Great Leap Forward were bad, and that the Communist Party of China had to re-impose Maoism.

He called on his cult followers to rise up in violent class struggle, proclaiming, "To rebel is justified." On January 5, 1964, he published Quotations from Chairman Mao Tse-Tung (that's how his name was usually written in English during his lifetime). By 1966, he had over 1 billion copies of this "Little Red Book" made up, so that it could fit in the pocket of every person in China. (The country didn't have a billion people yet, but it would become the 1st country to reach that figure.) Among the better-known of these quotations:

* "War is a continuation of politics."

* "Politics is war without bloodshed, while war is politics with bloodshed."

* "In waking a tiger, use a long stick."

* "Despise the enemy strategically, but take him seriously tactically."

* "Political power grows out of the barrel of a gun."

* "All reactionaries are paper tigers."

Countless people were persecuted, massacres were abundant, and millions more died. And, because intelligent people are more likely to question the leader, intellectuals were maligned, and schools were closed. In an intentionally cruel reversal of his Great Leap Forward, Mao forcefully transported 17 million young, urban intellectuals to the countryside to be made to work as farmers, as punishment for their less-than-fully-loyal thinking.

All of this proved every bit as ineffective, if not as fatal. By 1971, knowing that the Cultural Revolution was failing, and that his health was also beginning to fail, Mao was willing to meet with the President of the United States, Richard Nixon. Mao died in 1976, and the power struggle thereafter was won by Deng Xiaoping. Because he was willing to experiment with free-market reforms, he was able to do what Mao was not: Turn China into a modern industrial nation -- though still a brutal totalitarian regime.

*

May 16, 1966 was a Monday. Singer Janet Jackson was born. The youngest of the 9 singing siblings from Gary, Indiana, she not only became the 2nd-most successful, but was able to establish her own "brand," separate from Michael, although they did occasionally work together. Pro Football Hall-of-Famer Thurman Thomas was also born that day.

It was also the release day for two legendary rock and roll albums: Pet Sounds by The Beach Boys, and Blonde On Blonde by Bob Dylan. I have a separate entry for that dual event.

As Monday is often a travel day in baseball, football was out of season, and this was before the NBA and Stanley Cup Playoffs extended that far into the calendar year, only 1 major sporting event was played that day.

The Minnesota Twins beat the Washington Senators, 2-1 at Metropolitan Stadium in the Minneapolis suburb of Bloomington, Minnesota. Camilo Pascual went the distance for the win for the defending American League Champions. Harmon Killebrew went 1-for-3 with a walk. The Senators' only run came on a home run by Jim King.

The current Senators franchise had been founded in 1961, to take the place of the old Senators franchise, who had moved to Minnesota. The "New Senators" also moved, after the 1971 season, to become the Texas Rangers.

February 21, 1972: President Richard Nixon visits China

February 21, 1972, approximately 9:00 AM local time (8:00 PM February 20 on the U.S. East Coast): Air Force One touches down in Shanghai, beginning the visit of President Richard Nixon, and First Lady Pat Nixon, to the People's Republic of China.

This would have seemed impossible until very recently. Nixon had made his political name as one of the foremost anti-Communists in the U.S. Congress, and had remained a dedicated Cold Warrior. Nominated for Vice President by the Republican Party in 1952, he pointed to the Communist Revolution in China in 1949, on the watch of President Harry S Truman, a Democrat, and was one of many Republicans who asked the key question: "Who lost China?"

President Chiang Kai-shek, the country's corrupt dictator, lost China. Not Truman, or any official working for him. (The Republicans tended to rotate the blame among those officials.) Things had gotten to the point where the Communists, led by Mao Zedong (his name usually written as "Mao Tse-tung" in those days), seemed to the people of China like the better option.

In 1960, after years of threatening the offshore island of Taiwan, to which Chiang and his Nationalists had fled, 2 much smaller islands, Quemoy and Matsu, were threated by mainland China, or "Red China." Those islands became a key part of that year's Presidential debates between Vice President Nixon, now nominated for President, and the Democratic nominee, Senator John F. Kennedy.

President Kennedy and, after his assassination, President Lyndon B. Johnson were accused by Republicans of being "soft on Communism," including Red China, including not going harder in the Vietnam War for fear of angering the much larger nation. In 1964, on LBJ's watch, China "joined the club": They successfully tested a nuclear weapon.

Nixon tried again in 1968, and was elected President. On July 15, 1971, he stunned the world by announcing that an agreement had been reached for him to visit China the following year. The world's most famous anti-Communist visiting the world's largest Communist nation? He may have been the only President, or potential President, with the credibility to do it.

Nixon was met by Chinese officials upon touching down in Shanghai, and then made the final leg of the flight to the capital, formerly known in the West as Peiping, then known as Peking, now Beijing. He was met by Premier Zhou Enlai (whose name was then usually written in the West as Chou En-Lai).

That afternoon, Nixon met with Chairman Mao. Knowing that Mao had led a successful revolution, and was a student of history, Nixon asked him about an event that began 183 years earlier: "What do you think of the French Revolution?" Mao, taking the long view as many Asian leaders tend to do, said, "It is too soon to tell."

That night, Zhou hosted Mr. and Mrs. Nixon at a banquet in the Great Hall of the People in Beijing. Nixon and Zhou met each day of the tour, and visited the Great Wall on February 24. On the 27th, Nixon and Zhou released the Shanghai Communiqué, announcing their intention to work toward the normalization of their relations, without affirming the status of Taiwan. The archconservative wing of the Republican Party never forgave Nixon for this. The Nixons returned to America the next day.

Soviet Premier Leonid Brezhnev took notice of Nixon's outreach to China, and, not wanting China to surpass his country as America's foreign policy priority, invited him to Moscow for a summit. On May 26, Nixon and Brezhnev signed the Strategic Arms Limitation Talks Agreement, what became known as SALT I, including the Anti-Ballistic Missile (ABM) Treaty that lasted for 30 years.

By "triangulating" the Soviets and the Red Chinese against each other, Nixon achieved more to bring the Cold War to a victory for the West in 3 months than any other President did in 4 or even 8 years. Harry Truman, Dwight Eisenhower, John F. Kennedy, Gerald Ford, Jimmy Carter and Ronald Reagan did what they had to do to stand up to the Soviets; and Eisenhower, Kennedy and Reagan each took steps toward "thawing the Cold War."

But Nixon, with the aid of National Security Adviser Henry Kissinger -- whom he trusted more than, and eventually appointed to replace, Secretary of State William P. Rogers -- showed the kind of deft operation that made all further Cold War gains considerably easier to achieve.

As this was going on, the Democratic candidates to replace Nixon were campaigning in the New Hampshire Primary, and looked weak and indecisive by comparison. Nixon essentially won the election in China.

Unfortunately, he didn't see it that way, and took the actions that led to the Watergate break-in in June. Had he been as smart at running his re-election campaign as he was at running his foreign policy, he would have been able to serve out his 2nd term. Instead, he had to resign about halfway through it, because he made himself a crook.

In the years to come, "Nixon goes to China" became a phrase meaning, "This person is the only person who could do this action." It was used when Ronald Reagan, also an intense anti-Communist, signed a treaty with the Soviet Union, reducing each country's nuclear stockpile. It was used when Bill Clinton, a very liberal Democratic President, signed a welfare reform bill. And it was used in Britain, when Tony Blair, the 1st Labour Party leader to become Prime Minister in a generation, fused traditional Labourite ideas with those of the Conservative Party to form a "Third Way."

*

February 21, 1972 was a Monday. Baseball and football were out of season. And no NHL games were played that day. Only 1 game was played in the NBA: The Baltimore Bullets beat the Philadelphia 76ers, 102-101 at the Baltimore Civic Center (now the CFG Bank Arena). Archie Clark scored 30 points for the Bullets, the team now known as the Washington Wizards.

There were 2 games played in the American Basketball Association. The New York Nets beat the Dallas Chaparrals, 104-95 at the brand-new Nassau Coliseum. And the Utah Stars beat the Pittsburgh Condors, 149-140 at the Salt Palace in Salt Lake City.

Zelmo Beaty scored 63 points for the Stars. That was a new ABA record, but it didn't last long: Larry Miller scored 67 for the Carolina Cougars against the Memphis Pros on March 18. At the time, that was a record, in any league, for a guard. Beaty also had 15 rebounds.

The Condors folded at the end of the season. The Chaps became the San Antonio Spurs in 1973. They, the Nets, the Denver Nuggets and the Indiana Pacers were brought into the NBA in 1976. The Stars moved to become the Spirits of St. Louis in 1974, and were not part of the 1976 mini-merger.

January 11, 1958: The Great Leap Forward

Time co-founder Henry Luce, still alive at this point,

was born in China to Christian missionaries,

and was among the leaders of America's "China Lobby,"

determined to free the mainland from Communism.

January 11, 1958: Mao Zedong, founder of the People’s Republic of China and Chairman of its Communist Party, speaks at a Party conference in Nanjing. He launches a plan to transform the country into a modern industrialized state, a plan he calls "the Great Leap Forward." He thought that establishing "people's communes" in the countryside, focused mostly on producing steel, would be a good way to go about it.

He was basing this on the Five-Year Plans that Joseph Stalin had instituted in the Soviet Union, starting in 1928. He had forgotten that the 1928 plan resulted in a terrible famine that killed millions of people, especially in Ukraine.

Taking people who only knew farming and getting them to leave their fields to become steelworkers had worked in America, earlier in the 20th Century. But that was by those men's own choices, because, whether they were black or white, they believed that packing everything up and leaving the South to go North and learn the necessary skills, however hard it might be, was a better life than living in segregation and rural poverty.

And 1958 China was not 1910 America. Mao was forcing his decision on people who were completely unprepared for it, and over 30 million people starved to death. Anti-Communists in America have suggested that the death toll might be as high as 55 million. Li Jingquan, the Party boss in Sichuan, told Mao that 10.6 million people had died in his province alone by 1961.

In terms of numbers, the Great Leap Forward may have been the greatest blunder in human history. But there's a big difference between a blunder and a crime.

Mao abandoned the program after getting the numbers. Thereafter, moderates in China reversed many of the Great Leap Forward policies, and even began cutting Mao out of economic decision-making. Having an ego as big as his country, Mao didn't like this. In 1964, he saw that the Soviet Union removed Nikita Khrushchev from power, and figured the same thing could happen to him, and he needed to do something about it. So he determined who had questionable loyalty, and secured his position by removing them from powerful positions, replacing them with sycophants.

Then, on May 16, 1966, there was a "notification": Mao declared the beginning of what he called the "Cultural Revolution." He said the moderate approaches that followed the catastrophe of the Great Leap Forward were bad, and that the Communist Party of China had to re-impose Maoism. That also turned out to be a disaster, based less on Mao's desire to improve his country than on his own hurt feelings. This became the crime.

*

January 11, 1958 was a Saturday. Baseball and football were out of season. There were 3 games played in the NBA:

* The Cincinnati Royals beat the Syracuse Nationals, 105-100 at the Cincinnati Gardens.

* The Detroit Pistons beat the Minneapolis Lakers, 129-102 at the Olympia Stadium in Detroit.

* And the St. Louis Hawks beat the Boston Celtics, 102-98 at the Kiel Auditorium in St. Louis. This was a rematch of the previous season's NBA Finals, won by the Celtics; and a preview of this season's Finals, which would be won by the Hawks. They would face each other again in the Finals in 1960 and 1961, with the Celtics winning both times. Although the franchise now known as the Atlanta Hawks has existed since 1946, those are the only times it has ever reached the NBA Finals.

And the NHL's entire "Original Six" were in action:

* The New York Rangers lost to the Montreal Canadiens, 9-3 at the Montreal Forum. Marcel Bonin scored 3 goals, while Bernie "Boom-Boom" Geoffrion and Don Marshall each had 2. Maurice "the Rocket" Richard did not play.

* The Boston Bruins and the Toronto Maple Leafs played to a tie, 2-2 at Maple Leaf Gardens in Toronto.

* And the Detroit Red Wings beat the Chicago Black Hawks, 4-1 at the Olympia Stadium in Detroit. Yes, even in 1958, it was possible for an arena to host a basketball game and a hockey game on the same day.