Born in the 1930s
People born in the 1930s are 86 to 96 years old in 2026 and belong to Silent Generation. The world population went from about 2.07 billion in 1930 to 2.27 billion in 1939, and the U.S. population from 119.6 million to 128.2 million.
| Born | Age in 2026 | President | Top song | Top movie | Best Picture | Top names (boy / girl) | Min. wage | Gas | Median new home |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| 1939 | 86 or 87 | Roosevelt | – | – | Gone with the Wind | Robert / Mary | $0.30 | – | – |
| 1938 | 87 or 88 | Roosevelt | – | – | You Can't Take It with You | Robert / Mary | $0.25 | – | – |
| 1937 | 88 or 89 | Roosevelt | – | – | The Life of Emile Zola | Robert / Mary | – | – | – |
| 1936 | 89 or 90 | Roosevelt | – | – | The Great Ziegfeld | Robert / Mary | – | – | – |
| 1935 | 90 or 91 | Roosevelt | – | – | Mutiny on the Bounty | Robert / Mary | – | – | – |
| 1934 | 91 or 92 | Roosevelt | – | – | It Happened One Night | Robert / Mary | – | – | – |
| 1933 | 92 or 93 | Hoover / Roosevelt | – | – | – | Robert / Mary | – | – | – |
| 1932 | 93 or 94 | Hoover | – | – | – | Robert / Mary | – | – | – |
| 1931 | 94 or 95 | Hoover | – | – | – | Robert / Mary | – | – | – |
| 1930 | 95 or 96 | Hoover | – | – | – | Robert / Mary | – | – | – |
Most popular names of the 1930s
Combined counts of Social Security card applicants born 1930 to 1939.
| Rank | Boys | Girls |
|---|---|---|
| 1 | Robert (590,799) | Mary (572,997) |
| 2 | James (547,478) | Betty (300,408) |
| 3 | John (487,946) | Barbara (296,419) |
| 4 | William (416,728) | Shirley (229,378) |
| 5 | Richard (330,501) | Patricia (220,579) |
| 6 | Charles (303,215) | Dorothy (210,414) |
| 7 | Donald (283,716) | Joan (173,439) |
| 8 | George (192,290) | Margaret (157,371) |
Events that defined the 1930s
- February 18, 1930. While studying photographs taken in January, Clyde Tombaugh discovers Pluto.
- May 27, 1930. The 1,046 feet (319 m) Chrysler Building in New York City, the tallest man-made structure at the time, opens to the public.
- May 7, 1931. The stand-off between criminal Francis Crowley and 300 members of the New York Police Department takes place in his fifth-floor apartment on West 91st Street, New York City.
- March 2, 1933. The film King Kong premieres in Radio City Music Hall and RKO Roxy in New York City.
- August 31, 1933. The Integral Nationalist Group wins the 1933 Andorran parliamentary election, the first election in Andorra held with universal male suffrage.
- September 3, 1933. Yevgeniy Abalakov is the first man to reach the highest point in the Soviet Union, Communism Peak (now called Ismoil Somoni Peak and situated in Tajikistan) (7495 m).
- March 24, 1934. The Tydings–McDuffie Act is passed by the United States Congress, allowing the Philippines to become a self-governing commonwealth.
- April 28, 1937. South African medical researcher Max Theiler develops the yellow fever vaccine at the Rockefeller Foundation in New York City.
- February 14, 1939. World War II: German battleship Bismarck is launched.
- May 22, 1939. World War II: Germany and Italy sign the Pact of Steel.
- August 23, 1939. World War II: Nazi Germany and the Soviet Union sign the Molotov–Ribbentrop Pact. In a secret protocol to the pact, Poland, Finland, Estonia, Latvia, Lithuania, and Romania are divided into German and Soviet "spheres of…
- September 1, 1939. World War II: Germany and Slovakia invade Poland, beginning the European phase of World War II.
Famous people born in the 1930s
- Neil Armstrong, American pilot, engineer, and astronaut, first man to walk on the Moon (died 2012) (1930)
- Mikhail Gorbachev, Russian lawyer and politician, the 8th and final leader of the Soviet Union, Nobel Prize laureate (died 2022) (1931)
- Boris Yeltsin, Russian politician, 1st President of Russia (died 2007) (1931)
- Jacques Chirac, French soldier and politician, 22nd President of France (died 2019) (1932)
- Yuri Gagarin, Russian colonel, pilot, and cosmonaut, first human in space (died 1968) (1934)
- Brigitte Bardot, French actress and animal rights activist (died 2025) (1934)
- Elvis Presley, American singer, guitarist, and actor (died 1977) (1935)
- Tenzin Gyatso, 14th Dalai Lama (1935)
- Woody Allen, American actor, director, and screenwriter (1935)
- Pope Francis, Argentinian Pope of the Catholic Church (died 2025) (1936)
- Silvio Berlusconi, Italian businessman and politician, Prime Minister of Italy (died 2023) (1936)
- Saddam Hussein, Iraqi general and politician, 5th President of Iraq (died 2006) (1937)
- Kofi Annan, Ghanaian economist and diplomat, 7th Secretary-General of the United Nations (died 2018) (1938)
- Ali Khamenei, Supreme Leader of Iran (died 2026) (1939)