| 1845–1958 | Germany [earth sciences] | German naturalist and explorer Alexander von Humboldt lays the basis of modern geography with the publication of Kosmos/Cosmos, in which he arranges geographic knowledge in a systematic fashion. |
| c. 1931–c. 1940 | [aircraft] | Aeroplanes undergo radical changes; they become streamlined, are made almost entirely of metal, acquire controllable-pitch propellers, have air-cooled engines and retractable landing gear, and passengers and crew are protected in soundproofed and insulated cabins. |
| c. 1931–c. 1940 | [technology] | The development of facsimile machines is made possible with the discovery of a dry chemical copying process. |
| 1937 | USA [technology] | Xerography, an electrostatic copying process, is pioneered in the USA by electrical engineer Chester Carlson; it becomes commercially available in 1950. |
| 1937 | UK [technology] | British inventor Alec Reeves develops a system in which analogue sound is transformed into electrical impulses and a receiver transforms them back into an analogue signal – the basis of digital recording. |
| 1937 | USA [technology] | US radio engineer Grote Reber builds the first radio telescope. It has a parabolic reflector 9.4 m/31 ft in diameter and begins service in Wheaton, Illinois. |
| 1937 | Germany [legislation] | A German court rules that the state may remove children from homes that do not teach Nazi ideology. |
| 1937 | USA [television] | The National Broadcasting Company (NBC) makes regular experimental television broadcasts in the USA. |
| 1937 | [zoology] | Austrian zoologist Konrad Lorenz coins the term ‘imprinting’ to describe the process by which visual and auditory stimuli from animals around them cause young ducklings to associate these animals with parents of their own species. Lorenz suggests this is evolution's mechanism for locating the biologically ‘right’ object species for their upbringing. |
| 1937 | Germany [art] | Nazi authorities hold an exhibition entitled ‘Entartete Kunst’/‘Degenerate Art’ in Munich, Germany. The artists whose works are on display include Kandinsky, Picasso, Chagall, van Gogh, Beckmann, and Matisse. Nearby, the authorities endorse an exhibition of approved art, German and very traditional in style. |
| 1937 | France [plays] | The play Electre/Electra, by the French writer Jean Giraudoux, is first performed, in Paris, France. |
| 1937 | USA [poetry] | The US writer Wallace Stevens publishes his poetry collection The Man with the Blue Guitar. |
| 1937 | USA [radio] | In Richmond, Virginia, Irv Abeloff presents the first phone-in radio programme, Telephone Interviews. Radio legislation does not permit callers to appear live, and so all calls are recorded. |
| 1937 | Denmark [literature and language] | The Danish writer Isak Dinesen publishes Den Afrikanske Farm/The African Farm, which she translates into English the same year as Out of Africa. |
| 1937 | USA [materials] | Nylon, developed by W H Carothers, is patented by the US chemicals company DuPont and is commercially available the following year in the form of toothbrush bristles; nylon stockings become widely available in the USA in May 1940. |
| 1937 | [maths] | The US mathematician Georges Stibitz builds the first binary circuit that can add two binary numbers based on Boolean algebra. Consisting of batteries, lights, and wires, it is instrumental in the development of subsequent electromechanical computers. |
| 1937 | UK [media and communication] | The British Institute of Public Opinion is founded by George Gallup to introduce his polling method from the USA into Britain. |
| 1937 | France [medicine] | The French microbiologist Max Theiler develops a vaccine against yellow fever; it is the first antiviral vaccine. |
| 1937 | Austria, Switzerland [opera] | The opera Lulu by the Austrian composer Alban Berg is first performed, in Zürich, Switzerland. It was left unfinished at his death in 1935. The first complete performance, with the last act completed by the Austrian composer Friedrich Cerha, will be given in Paris, France, in 1979. |
| 1937 | Russia [orchestral music] | The Russian composer Dmitry Shostakovich completes his Symphony No. 5 in D minor, A Soviet Artist's Reply to Just Criticism. It was written in response to severe criticism of Shostakovich (inspired by the Soviet leader Joseph Stalin) that appeared in the official newspaper Pravda. |
| 1937 | Austria [painting] | The Austrian artist Oskar Kokoschka paints Portrait of a ‘Degenerate Artist’, a self-portrait. |
| 1937 | France [painting] | The French artist Pierre Bonnard paints Nude in the Bath, one of many pictures on a theme for which he becomes famous. |
| 1937 | England [fiction] | The English writer J R R Tolkien publishes his fantasy novel The Hobbit. |
| 1937 | USA [fiction] | The US writer Ernest Hemingway publishes his novel To Have and Have Not. |
| 1937 | USA [fiction] | The US writer John Steinbeck publishes his novella Of Mice and Men. |
| 1937 | Switzerland [food and drink] | The Swiss confectionery company Nestlé introduces the Milky Bar, the first chocolate bar made from white chocolate. |
| 1937 | England [food and drink] | Frank Armstrong of H W Carter & Co. in Bristol, England, develops Ribena; the name comes from the Latin for blackcurrant, Ribes nigra. |
| 1937 | USA [food and drink] | Spam, made from pork shoulder and ham, is first marketed by George A Hormel & Co. in Minnesota. It becomes the world's best-selling tinned meat. Its name is a contraction of ‘spiced ham’. |
| 1937 | England [biography] | The English writer George Orwell publishes The Road to Wigan Pier, an account of his visits to working-class areas in Lancashire, England. |
| 1937 | Germany, UK [chemistry] | German-born British biochemist Hans Adolf Krebs describes the citric acid cycle in cells, which converts sugars, fats, and proteins into carbon dioxide, water, and energy – the ‘Krebs cycle’. |
| 1937 | USA [Christianity] | The US theologian Reinhold Niebuhr publishes Beyond Tragedy: Essays on the Christian Interpretation of History. |
| 1937 | USA [cinema and film] | The film industry in the USA attracts three-quarters of all spending on leisure and entertainment. |
| 1937 | France [cinema and film] | The French director Jean Renoir's La Grande Illusion/The Great Illusion is released. A pacifist film set in a German prisoner of war camp during World War I, it will be acclaimed as a classic of world cinema. The film stars Jean Gabin, Pierre Fresnay, and Erich von Stroheim. |
| 1937 | USA [cinema and film] | Walt Disney's Snow White and the Seven Dwarfs is released in the USA. It is the first feature-length animated film. |
| 1937 | USA [cinema and film] | The animated character Bugs Bunny makes his debut in the Warner Bros production Porky's Hare Hunt, released in the USA, although it will take a few years before his looks and character become settled. |
| 1937–1939 | USA [computing] | US mathematician and physicist John V Atanasoff invents an electromechanical digital computer for solving systems of linear equations. It uses punched cards and is the first electronic calculator using electronic vacuum tubes. |
| 12 April 1937 | England [technology] | English engineer Frank Whittle tests the first prototype jet engine. A similar engine is developed in Germany at the same time. |
| 26 April 1937 | Spain [Spanish Civil War (1936–39)] | Guernica, the historic Basque capital in northern Spain, is heavily bombed by aircraft of the German Condor Legion supporting the Spanish Nationalist rebels. |
| 6 May 1937 | USA [transport disasters] | The giant German airship Hindenburg explodes in the USA as it attempts to moor at Lakehurst Naval Station, New Jersey; 36 people are killed. |
| 12 May 1937 | UK [television] | The televising of the Coronation by the British Broadcasting Corporation (BBC) is the first major outside broadcast in Britain and viewed by an estimated 50,000 people. |
| 23 May 1937 | USA [births and deaths] | John D Rockefeller, US industrialist who founded Standard Oil, and philanthropist who founded the Rockefeller Foundation, dies in Ormond Beach, Florida (97). |
| June 1937 | USA [shops and shopping] | The introduction of the shopping cart, which replaces smaller, hand-held bags and was devised by Sylvan N Goldman in Oklahoma City, Oklahoma, revolutionizes grocery shopping in the USA. |
| 1 July 1937 | UK [telephone services] | The 999 emergency telephone number for police, fire, and ambulance services is introduced in the UK. |
| 11 July 1937 | USA [births and deaths] | George Gershwin, US composer and songwriter for Broadway musicals, dies in Hollywood, California (38). |
| 20 July 1937 | Italy [births and deaths] | Guglielmo Marconi, Italian physicist and inventor of radio, dies in Rome, Italy (63). |
| 2 September 1937 | France [births and deaths] | Pierre, baron de Coubertin, French administrator who was responsible for the revival of the Olympic Games and who served as the first president of the International Olympic Committee 1896–1925, dies in Geneva, Switzerland (64). |
| 15 September 1937 | USA [legislation] | The National Housing Act (Wagner–Steagall Act) creates the US Housing Authority, to make housing for people on low incomes more affordable and to spur rural and urban construction. |
| 6 November 1937 | Italy, Germany, Japan [treaties] | Italy joins the German–Japanese Anti-Comintern Pact against international communism. |
| 9 November 1937 | Scotland [births and deaths] | Ramsay MacDonald, British politician, first Labour Party prime minister of Britain 1924, prime minister again in 1929, and in a coalition government 1931–35, dies at sea (71). |
| 10 November 1937 | Brazil [revolution] | The Brazilian president Getúlio Vargas organizes a coup that annuls the 1934 constitution and sets up the totalitarian Estado Novo (New State). |
| 11 December 1937 | Italy [League of Nations] | Italy withdraws from the League of Nations. |
