3, 1933 (Sunday) The first concrete was poured for the Grand Coulee Dam on the Columbia River. Born: Paul J. Crutzen, Dutch chemist, 1995 Nobel Prize in Chemistry laureate, in Amsterdam (d. 2021) December 4, 1933 (Monday) The radio soap opera Ma Perkins began a 27-season run with 7,065 episodes, starting on the NBC Red Network. It would last until November 25, 1960. Tobacco Road, the most popular Broadway play and musical of the 1930s, premiered at the Theatre Mask in New York City with the first of 3,182 performances. Closing on May 31, 1941, Tobacco Road would hold the record for the longest-running Broadway show until surpassed by Life with Father. Died: Stefan George, 65, German poet December 5, 1933 (Tuesday) The 21st Amendment to the United States Constitution, repealing the 18th Amendment to the United States Constitution that enacted Prohibition across the U.S., was ratified by the 36th of 48 states, bringing the necessary 3/4ths majority necessary to take effect. At 3:32 pm local time, the constitutional convention in Utah, whose 21 delegates had been elected on November 7, voted for repeal. Earlier in the day, Ohio and Pennsylvania had become the 34th and 35th states, respectively, to ratify the amendment. December 6, 1933 (Wednesday) U.S. District Judge John M. Woolsey ruled that the James Joyce novel Ulysses was not obscene, ending a 12-year-long ban against importation of the book into the United States, and clearing the way for Random House to sell the controversial work. Born: Henryk Górecki, Polish composer, in Czernica (d. 2010) December 7, 1933 (Thursday) Good-bye, Mr. Chips, a book by James Hilton about an English schoolmaster, was first published as a 17,000 word novella in the Christmas issue of The British Weekly. Popular in Britain, Mr. Chips was reprinted in the United States in the Atlantic Monthly in 1934, and then as a best-selling book in both nations, a 1939 film and a 1969 musical. The Fleet Marine Force of the United States Marine Corps was established by General Order Number 241 of the Department of the Navy as an amphibious strike force. December 8, 1933 (Friday) Bernadette Soubirous, who had seen the first vision of the Virgin Mary at Lourdes on February 1, 1858, was canonized as a saint of the Roman Catholic Church. Died: Karl Jatho, 60, German airplane pioneer who claimed that he had been the first man to fly