May 6, 1937: LZ 129 Hindenburg, a large German airship of the Zeppelin class, catches fire while trying to land at Lakehurst Naval Air Station in Manchester, Ocean County, New Jersey.
Hindenburg was named for Paul von Hindenburg, a Field Marshal in World War I, and President from 1925 until his death in 1934. Launched on March 4, 1936, it was the pride of Nazi Germany's passenger transit service.
But after flying over New York City, providing dramatic newsreel footage, including some taken from the gondola of the airship itself, it tried to land at Lakehurst, about 80 miles southwest of Midtown at 7:00 PM local time. But rain and wind caused delays, until a final attempt was made at 7:25. But it caught fire -- there wasn't an explosion -- and of the 97 people on board -- 36 passengers and 61 crewmen -- 35 died. An additional person on the ground was killed.
Newsreel cameras were going, and Herbert Morrison, of Chicago radio station WLS, was narrating for them:
It's practically standing still now. They've dropped ropes out of the nose of the ship. And, uh, they've been taken ahold of down on the field by a number of men.
It's starting to rain again. It's, the rain had, uh, slacked up a little bit. The back motors of the ship are just holding it, uh, just enough to keep it from -- It's burst into flame!
Get this, Charlie! Get this, Charlie! It's fire! And it's crashing! It's crashing! Terrible! Oh, my! Get out of the way, please! It's burning and bursting into flames and the -- and it's falling on the mooring mast and all the folks between it.
This is terrible. This is one of the worst of the worst catastrophes in the world. Oh it's [unintelligible] its flames. Crashing, oh, oh, four or five hundred feet into the sky. And it’s a terrific crash, ladies and gentlemen. There’s smoke, and there’s flames, now, and the frame is crashing to the ground, not quite to the mooring mast. Oh, the humanity!
And all the passengers screaming around here! I told you, it – I can't even talk to people, their friends are on there! Ah! It's, it, it's a, ah, I, I can't talk, ladies and gentlemen. Honest. It's just laying there, a mass of smoking wreckage. Ah! And everybody can hardly breathe and talk, and the screaming. I, I, I'm sorry. Honest: I, I can hardly breathe. I, I'm going to step inside, where I cannot see it. Charlie, that's terrible. Ah, ah, I can't. Listen, folks. I, I'm gonna have to stop for a minute, because I've lost my voice. This is the worst thing I've ever witnessed.
Transatlantic airplane flights were still a novelty, and dangerous, so transatlantic airship flights were then the preferred method of such travel for those who could afford it. But cruise ships were still safer, and probably cheaper at that point.
But after the Hindenburg, no one wanted to fly aboard something powered by incredibly flammable hydrogen. The age of airships came to a quick end, and planes capable of crossing the Atlantic Ocean more safely soon arrived. Since 1937, most airships flying in America have been the considerably smaller "blimps," with those used to advertise Goodyear tires the most familiar.
Lakehurst NAS has since been merged with nearby Fort Dix and McGuire Air Force Base to form Joint Base McGuire-Dix-Lakehurst.
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May 6, 1937 was a Thursday. While this is often a travel day for Major League Baseball, there was nearly a full slate of games on the day. Every team then in the major leagues played, except for the Boston Braves (then known as the Boston Bees) and the St. Louis Cardinals:
* The New York Yankees lost to the Detroit Tigers, 12-6 at Navin Field in Detroit. The next year, the ballpark would be expanded into its more familiar configuration, and renamed Briggs Stadium. It was renamed Tiger Stadium in 1961. Despite 3 hits from Tony Lazzeri, Tommy Bridges went the distance to get the win for Detroit, and was backed by home runs from future Hall-of-Famers Mickey Cochrane (also their manager) and Hank Greenberg.
* The New York Giants lost to the Cincinnati Reds, 4-0 at the Polo Grounds in New York. Lee Grissom pitched a 5-hit shutout.
* The Brooklyn Dodgers bear the Pittsburgh Pirates, 9-5 at Ebbets Field. Cookie Lavagetto hit a home run for Dem Bums.
* The Chicago Cubs beat the Philadelphia Phillies 1-0 in a game limited to 5 innings by rain.
* The Cleveland Indians beat the Washington Senators, 4-2 at League Park in Cleveland.
* The Philadelphia Athletics beat the Chicago White Sox, 3-1 at Comiskey Park in Chicago.
This was the off-season for the NFL, the NBA wasn't founded until 1946, and the NHL had already wrapped up its season, with the Detroit Red Wings having won the Stanley Cup on April 15 by defeating the New York Rangers 3 games to 2 in the Finals.