Still, the base hit is the most basic unit in baseball, and nobody in the history of the game has gotten more of them in a single season. Ichiro, the fourth-year leadoff man from Japan, who has piled up so many great performances and lesser records, now owns one of baseball's most important marks. It has been clear since Ichiro's first season in the United States in 2001, when he had 242 hits, that he was capable of challenging Sisler.
Lead Story. U.S. begins Berlin Airlift. On this day in 1948, U.S. and British pilots begin delivering food and supplies by airplane to Berlin after the city is isolated by a Soviet Union blockade. When World War II ended in 1945, defeated Germany was divided into Soviet, American, British and French zones of occupation.
U.S. troops occupying Berlin. The army of the Soviet Union conquered Berlin in April/May 1945. Two months later the Western Allied troops also entered the city. On 4 July 1945, the American Independence Day, U.S. troops officially took charge of their occupation sector in southwest Berlin. In September 1994, after almost 50 years, the Allied troops withdrew from Berlin. At the end of April 1945 the Soviet forces occupied Berlin, the capital of the German Reich. American and British troops did not enter the city until two months later on 4 July, the French forces participating initially with only a small unit.