FROM WIKIPEDIA COMMONS

Mildred Elizabeth Gillars (néeSisk; November 29, 1900 – June 25, 1988) was an American broadcaster employed by Nazi Germany to disseminate Axispropaganda during World War II. Following her capture in post-war Berlin, she became the first woman to be convicted of treason against the United States. In March 1949, she was sentenced to ten to thirty years’ imprisonment. She was released in 1961. Along with Rita Zucca she was nicknamed “Axis Sally“.

WORK AS A NAZI PROPAGANDIST

In 1940, Gillars obtained work as an announcer with the Reichs-Rundfunk-Gesellschaft (RRG), German State Radio.

By 1941, the U.S. State Department was advising American nationals to leave Germany and German-controlled territories. However, Gillars chose to remain because her fiancé, Paul Karlson who was a naturalized German citizen, said he would never marry her if she returned to the United States. Shortly afterwards, Karlson was sent to aid the German war effort in the Eastern Front where he was killed in action.

Gillars’ initial broadcasts were largely apolitical. Eventually, she started a relationship with Max Otto Koischwitz, the German-American program director in the USA Zone at the RRG. In 1942, Koischwitz cast Gillars in a new show called Home Sweet Home and included her in his political broadcasts. Gillars soon acquired several names amongst her GI audience, including the “Bitch of Berlin”, “Berlin Babe”, “Olga”, and “Sally”, but the most common was “Axis Sally”. This name probably came when asked on air to describe herself, Gillars said she was “the Irish type… a real Sally.” Gillars expressed anti-Semitic sentiments during her broadcasts. During one broadcast, she said “I say damn Roosevelt and Churchill, and all of their Jews who have made this war possible.”

In 1943, an Italian-American woman, Rita Zucca, also began broadcasting to American forces from Rome using the name “Sally”. The two often were confused with each other and even thought by many to be one and the same, though Gillars was annoyed another woman was broadcasting under her name.

LATER LIFE

Having converted to Catholicism while in prison, Gillars went to live at the Our Lady of Bethlehem Convent in Columbus, Ohio and taught German, French, and music at St. Joseph Academy, Columbus.

In 1973, she returned to Ohio Wesleyan University to complete her degree, a Bachelor of Arts in speech.

Gillars died of colon cancer at Grant Medical Center in Columbus on June 25, 1988.

TODAY’S ALMANAC

Question of the Day

Why aren’t there exactly 12 hours of daylight and 12 hours of darkness on the spring and fall equinoxes?

On the equinoxes, the very center of the Sun sets just 12 hours after it rose. But the day begins when the upper edge of the Sun reaches the horizon (which happens a bit before the center rises), and it doesn’t end until the entire Sun has set. Not only that, but the Sun is actually visible when it is below the horizon, as Earth’s atmosphere refracts the Sun’s rays and bends them in an arc over the horizon. 

→ Learn more about equinoxes and solstices!

Advice of the Day

Prune any tree limbs that have been damaged by ice and snow.

Home Hint of the Day

You can clean the starch off the bottom of an iron by making a paste of baking soda and a little water, rubbing it on the iron wih a soft cloth, and wiping it off with a clean cloth.

Word of the Day

Midsummer Day

June 24. Although it occurs near the summer solstice, to the farmer this day is the midpoint of the growing season, halfway between planting and harvest and an occasion for festivity. The English church considered it a “Quarter Day,” one of the four major divisions of the liturgical year. It also marks the feast day of St. John the Baptist.

Puzzle of the Day

What flowers can be found between the nose and chin?

Tulips (two lips)

Born

• Ferdinand V (King of Aragon) – 1452
• Angel de Saavedra (poet, dramatist) – 1791
• Emily Pauline Johnson (Canadian writer, performer) – 1861
• Lillian D. Wald (social worker) – 1867
• Barry Fitzgerald (actor) – 1888
• Bix Beiderbecke (jazz musician) – 1903
• Victor Manuel Blanco (astronomer who helped build the Cerro Tololo Inter-American Observatory in Chile) – 1918
• Kenneth Burns (singer) – 1923
• James Earl Ray (convicted of assassinating Martin Luther King Jr.) – 1928
• Chuck Norris (actor) – 1940
• David Rabe (playwright) – 1940
• Lance Burton (magician) – 1960
• Prince Edward (youngest son of Queen Elizabeth II) – 1964
• Mike Timlin (baseball player) – 1966
• Jon Hamm (actor) – 1971
• Lyne Bessette (professional bicycle racer) – 1975
• Shannon Miller (gymnast; Olympic gold medalist) – 1977
• Robin Thicke (musician) – 1977
• Carrie Underwood (singer) – 1983
• Emily Osment (actress) – 1992

Died

• Harriet Tubman (American abolitionist) – 1913
• Zelda Fitzgerald (wife of F. Scott Fitzgerald) – 1948
• Konstantin Chernenko (Soviet leader) – 1985
• Lloyd Bridges (actor) – 1998
• Danny Joe Brown (musician) – 2005
• Corey Haim (actor) – 2010
• Richard Wagamese (Ojibwe writer ) – 2017
• Emilio Delgado (actor; played Luis on Sesame Street ) – 2022

Events

• Thomas Jefferson became U.S. minister to France– 1785
• Thomas Jefferson presented a paper on the megalonyx (which was later determined to be an extinct giant ground sloth)– 1797
• U.S. national paper currency first issued– 1862
• The first royal wedding took place at Windsor Castle in St. George’s chapel. Edward, Prince of Wales, married Alexandra, Princess of Denmark– 1863
• Ulysses S. Grant became the Lt. Gen. of Union army in the Civil War– 1864
• Alexander Graham Bell transmitted the first telephone message to his assistant saying, Mr. Watson, come here, I want to see you.– 1876
• Commissioner George Scott Railton and seven women officers officially began the work of the Salvation Army in the U.S.(Battery Park, N.Y.C.)– 1880
• William Knox bowled first perfect 300 game in competition– 1913
• A 6.4 earthquake killed 120 people and caused $50 million in damages, Long Beach, California– 1933
• Mildred E. Gillars, who made wartime broadcasts for the Nazis under the name Axis Sally, was convicted of treason in Washington— she served 12 years in prison– 1949
• Tennessee Williams’s play, Sweet Bird of Youth, opened on Broadway– 1959
• James Earl Ray pleaded guilty to the assassination of the Rev. Martin Luther King Jr., and was sentenced to 99 years in prison– 1969
• U.S. Army Captain Ernest L. Medina was court-martialed on murder charges in connection with the My Lai incident of March 1968 (Vietnam War)– 1970
• Uranus rings discovered– 1977
• The Vatican declared its opposition to test tube fertilization, embryo transfer, and most other forms of scientific interference in procreation– 1987
• A previously healthy 25-year old man from Virginia became the first known fatality in the U.S. linked to raccoon rabies– 2003

Weather

• 5.12 inches of rain fell in Wilmington, North Carolina– 1936
• Thirty-four degrees below zero F at International Falls, Minnesota– 1948
• In Colebrook, New Hampshire, snow was 21.5 feet deep– 1971

COURTESY www.almanac.com