October 16th, 1945 (TUESDAY)
CANADA: Quebec City: The Food and Agricultural Organisation of the United Nations is founded with a mandate to raise levels of nutrition and standards of living, to improve agricultural productivity, and to better the condition of rural populations.
Corvette HMCS Sorel sold for scrap.
Minesweepers HMCS Blairmore and Milltown paid off Sydney, Nova Scotia. and laid up Sorel, Province of Quebec.
U.S.A.: The USAAF 78th Fighter Group establishes its headquarters at Camp Kilmer, Piscataway, New Jersey.
Escort carrier USS Point Cruz commissioned.
Destroyer USS Lang decommissioned.
1946 (WEDNESDAY)
GERMANY: Of the 22 defendants before the International Military Tribunal at the first Nurnberg trial, 12 were sentenced to death by hanging. They were: Hermann Göring, von Ribbentrop, Keitel, Kaltenbrunner, Rosenberg, Frick, Frank, Streicher, Sauckel, Jodl, Seyss-Inquart, and Martin Bormann who is the only defendant tried (and convicted) in absentia. Since Gøring took poison, and Bormann (unbeknown at the time is already dead) there were just the 10 hangings in the early morning of 16 October 1946. Three others: Fritsche, von Papen and Schacht were acquitted. Rudolph Hess, Funk and Raeder were sentenced to imprisonment for life; Schirach and Speer to 20 years; von Neurath to 15 years, and Admiral Dønitz to ten years imprisonment. Robert Ley committed suicide in his cell at Nurnberg on 25 October 1945, so is not counted amongst the defendants. (Alex Gordon)
Hans Frank "The Butcher of Poland" is hanged. His last recorded words are: "I hope God shows mercy on me." Frank is not part of the ten executed as related earlier. (Russ Folsom)
UNITED STATES: With World War II quickly receding into memory, President Harry S. Truman sees fit to wean the nation from the austere economic diet that the government had devised to fight wartime inflation. In a move that pleases millions of Americans, Truman lifts price controls on meat today.