Black Friday

Black Friday is the name of a Friday, which is considered due to a prolapsed on this day misfortune to be particularly memorable.

Origin of the term

This designation means that there is similar to other days of the week, is derived from a pre- Roman ancient tradition, as this ater ( " black day " ) designated an unlucky day, and was later also continued, including the names of weekdays. Especially Friday was in the Christian tradition and linked to it in superstition as a particular unlucky because had happened on a Friday, Good Friday, the Passion and Crucifixion of Christ. In English, therefore the introduction of the term Black Friday was this expression still occasionally deliberately used as a contrasting term to Good Friday, as the Good Friday is called in English in terms of the introduced with the death of Christ 's work of redemption under a positive sign in the 18th century at an early stage.

Black Fridays of Finance

The fact that historically significant accident days were referred to by contemporaries as Black Fridays, can be traced back to the 18th century and is first there is in England for the Black Friday 6 December 1745 which is at the same time is the first economic Black Friday who was called by his contemporaries as. On this day the news reached London that the Pretender, Charles Edward Stuart, who had landed with two ships in Scotland, successfully to Derby had been able to penetrate. In London, then led the fear of a French invasion and a restoration of the rule of the Stuarts to a temporary collapse of the banking system and economy.

The Anglo-Saxon custom, economically important unhappy day to be called Black Friday, then was held in conjunction with the internationalization of financial markets and of the press system since the 19th century in other countries spread. As the bankruptcy of the London Discount Bank Overend, Gurney and Co. Limited on May 11, 1866 caused a panic in the City of London and a crisis in the British financial system, the London Times described this Friday the next day as an unlucky day, the long be remembered as Black Friday will be remembered. The foreign press picked up on that name, as in France, the economist Louis Wolowski, who used it on August 15, 1866 Title of an article in the Revue des Deux Mondes, and in other writings, respectively, with reference to the London May 11, 1866.

Worldwide distribution, the term used in connection with the American financial crisis of 24 September 1869 which was triggered by gold speculation entrepreneur Jay Gould and James Fisk and Countermeasures of the Government of the United States. The American writer Frederic Stewart Isham made ​​this scandal to the subject of his 1904 published novel Black Friday, which in turn was made ​​into a film in 1916, directed by Lloyd Carleton as a silent film.

As Black Fridays of the Vienna stock market crash of May 9, 1873 were designated ( founder noise ) and the sharp fall of the Berlin Stock Exchange on 13 May 1927 at the German-speaking countries, as the stock index of the Reich Statistical Office declined by 31.9 percent.

Today is for their "black" days and their Black Friday 25 October still particularly the collapse of the New York Stock Exchange ( NYSE), 1929, which triggered the Great Depression. In contrast to the preceding and following days, October 25, 1929, however, was not a day of special losses: On Wednesday, October 23, the Dow Jones Industrial Average had fallen from 326.51 the previous day to 305.85, and the " Black Thursday " ( Black Thursday ), 24 October 1929 it fell again by 6.38 points to 299.47. In Europe one knows the day because of the time shift as "Black Friday " because it was here already after midnight. On Friday, the DJI was up by 1.75 points. His greatest losses he suffered then on Monday (from 298.97 to 260.64 ); on "Black Tuesday" ( Black Tuesday ) or " Tragic Tuesday ', he then fell further to 230.07.

Other Black Fridays

The term is also in unlucky days for individual regions, companies, sports teams and politicians and other public figures, but also in relation to purely private matters widespread. As Black Fridays also numerous days of crisis not only of the stock market and financial system, but also the political history were known.

So October 14, 1881 is regarded as Black Friday in the history of the Scottish fishing, as a total of 189 fishermen lost their lives in a storm disaster on this day the misfortune of Eyemouth. On Friday, September 8, 1978, it came on the Jaleh Square in Tehran in Iran an exchange of fire between the army and demonstrators against the government of Shah Mohammad Reza Pahlavi, at the end 64 people were killed. Since this incident this day in Iran is called Black Friday.

Because the line of the road construction company Australian Tramway Employees Association on January 18, 1912 its employees forbade the wearing of badges of the tram workers ' union, this called for a general strike on the same day. The strike committee made ​​a motion on February 2, 1912 another march in Brisbane (Queensland / Australia) to be allowed, which was rejected by the Commissioner of Police William Geoffrey Cahill perform. That refusal demonstrated some 15,000 strikers on the Market Square. Under the leadership of the Cahill partly Mounted Police used truncheons and bayonets against the trade unionists and their supporters before, including about 600 women ( including many suffragettes ) and children. The day went as so-called stick -Friday ( Baton Friday ), later known as Black Friday in history.