This page contains a timeline of major events related to the Lost Generation between 1940 and 1949, with U.S. and world events to provide context.
Previous: 1930-1939 Next: 1950-1959
1940
April 1 – The Hamlet, William Faulkner’s twelfth novel, is published
June 22 – France surrenders to Germany
December 21 – F. Scott Fitzgerald dies of a heart attack in Hollywood, California
1941
January 13 – James Joyce dies in Zurich, Switzerland
January 20 – FDR sworn in for a second term
March 8 – Sherwood Anderson dies in Colon, Panama
March 28 – Virginia Woolf dies near Rodmell, Sussex, England
June 22 – Germany invades the Soviet Union
December 7 – Japanese forces attack Pearl Harbor
December 8 – U.S. declares war on Japan
December 11 – Germany and Italy declare war on the U.S.
1942
May 12 – Go Down, Moses, William Faulkner’s thirteenth novel, is published
1943
August 13 – Harold Edmund Stearns dies
1944
February 25 –James Boyd dies in Princeton, New Jersey
April 4 – John Peale Bishop dies in Hyannis, Massachusetts
June 6 – D-Day, Allied forces invade Normandy
August 25 – Allied troops liberate Paris
1945
January 20 – FDR sworn in for a fourth term
April 12 – FDR dies, Harry Truman sworn in as the 33rd U.S. President
June 26 – United Nations established
August 6 – U.S. drops first atomic bomb on Hiroshima
August 9 – U.S. drops second atomic bomb on Nagasaki
September 2 – Japan surrenders to the U.S.
1946
July 27 – Gertrude Stein dies in Neuilly-sur-Seine, France
1947
June 17 – Maxwell Perkins dies in Stamford, Connecticut
1948
March 10 – Zelda Fitzgerald dies in Asheville, North Carolina
September 27 – Intruder in the Dust, William Faulkner’s fourteenth novel, is published
1949
January 20 – Harry Truman sworn in for a second term
April 4 – NATO established
See also: 1870s-80s, 1890s, 1900s, 1910s, 1920s, 1930s, 1950s, 1960s, 1970s, 1980s, 1990s
