Dr. Theodore Helmreich (1910 - 2001)

Refresh this page to see various historical events that occurred during Theodore's lifetime.

In 1910, in the year that Dr. Theodore Helmreich was born, the Mexican revolution began. Dictator Porfirio Díaz had ruled for 35 years and was nationally unpopular. When elections were held in 1910 and a rigged election kept Diaz in office. The uprising began - and lasted for another 10 years.

In 1930, Theodore was 20 years old when as head of the Motion Picture Producers and Distributors of America, William Hays established a code of decency that outlined what was acceptable in films. The public - and government - had felt that films in the '20's had become increasingly risque and that the behavior of its stars was becoming scandalous. Laws were being passed. In response, the heads of the movie studios adopted a voluntary "code", hoping to head off legislation. The first part of the code prohibited "lowering the moral standards of those who see it", called for depictions of the "correct standards of life", and forbade a picture from showing any sort of ridicule towards a law or "creating sympathy for its violation". The second part dealt with particular behavior in film such as homosexuality, the use of specific curse words, and miscegenation.

In 1949, when he was 39 years old, on January 25th, the first Emmy Awards (for television) were handed out in Los Angeles. Shirley Dinsdale won for the Most Outstanding Television Personality and Pantomime Quiz Time earned an Emmy for the Most Popular Television Program.

In 1964, Theodore was 54 years old when in June, three young civil rights workers - Andrew Goodman and Mickey Schwerner from New York City, and James Chaney from Meridian, Mississippi - were kidnapped and murdered in Mississippi. Working with "Freedom Summer", they were registering African-Americans to vote in the Southern states. Their bodies were found two months later. Although it was discovered that the White Knights of the Ku Klux Klan, the Neshoba County Sheriff's Office and the Philadelphia, Mississippi Police Department were involved, only 7 men were convicted and served less than six years.

In 1999, by the time he was 89 years old, the fear that Y2K (year 2000) would cause the failure of computers worldwide when clocks didn't properly update to January 1st, 2000 became near panic. While some computer systems and software did have problems, the panic was unfounded and computer life went on.