The Great McGinty The Great McGinty The Great McGinty is a 1940 political satire comedy film written and directed by Preston Sturges, starring Brian Donlevy and Akim Tamiroff and featuring William Demarest and (in her final screen appearance) Muriel Angelus. It was Sturges's first film as a director; he sold the story to Paramount Pictures for just $10 on condition he direct the film. Sturges went on to win the Academy Award for Writing Original Screenplay. In the U.K. the film was retitled Down Went McGinty. Dan McGinty (Brian Donlevy) is a bartender in a banana republic who recounts his rise and fall
1940 Preston by-election his defeat at the 1945 general election. 1940 Preston by-election The Preston by-election, 1940 was a parliamentary by-election held for the British House of Commons constituency of Preston in Lancashire on 29 September 1940. The seat had become vacant on the death of the Conservative Member of Parliament Adrian Moreing, who had held the seat since the 1931 general election. During World War II, the parties in the war-time coalition government had agreed not contest by-elections where a seat held by any of their parties fell vacant, so the Conservative candidate, Randolph Churchill (son of Prime Minister Winston Churchill), was