The picture on TIME's cover is always the picture of a human being, never the picture of a battle fleet, a squadron of bombers or gulls wheeling in high air--always, instead, the picture of people, of people's faces.

And the news in TIME is always told as the living story of human beings--never as the impersonal record of manners, methods, machines.

This preoccupation, this absorption with people has sired every policy of TIME's reporting of the news of the world, makes TIME write not of State and Government, but of men and women voting, arguing, lobbying... makes TIME show War as soldiers and generalissimos and the wounded... fills TIME's columns with vivid personal detail... turns TIME's very vocabulary on the lathe of "human interest." (January 31, 1938)

Click on the LIFE cover for a look at the inside contents.

January 1: Germany: Jewish doctors lose insurance under Nuremburg Laws. January 2: China: Chain Kai-shek gives up premiership to H.H. Kung. January 10: Washington: House narrowly defeats measure asking right for Congress to declare war. January 10: China: Tsing-tao occupied by Japanese army. January 12: Hungary, Austria recognize Franco government in Spain. January 12: Vatican: Pope praises Mussolini, rebukes Hitler. January 16: 48 U.S. Publishers reject invitation to International Congress in Germany. January 28: FDR asks Congress for increased military spending. January 30: 60 in U.S. Congress send sympathy note to Loyalist Party at Barcelona. January 31: British steamer Endymion sunk by torpedo in Mediterranean; 11 dead.

February 1: Britain sends 8 Warships to Mediterranean to seek "pirate" submarines. February 4: Germany: Hitler promotes himself to military chief. February 12: Germany: Schuschnigg meets Hitler, agrees to amnesty for Austrian Nazis. February 12: Japan refuses to reveal naval data requested by U.S. and Great Britain. February 15: Vienna: Nazis get key posts in Austrian cabinet. February 20: Berlin: Hitler demans self-determination for Germans in Austria, Czechoslovakia. February 22: Hungary: Nazi chief and 72 aides seized for alleged coup plot. February 23: 12 Chinese fighters drop bombs on Japan. February 24: Vienna: Schuschnigg pledges to defend Austria's independence, offers protection to German minority in Austria.

March 4: Prague: Premier Milan Hodza warns Reich Czechoslovakia will defend itself. March 8: Berlin: Herbert Hoover tells Hitler his doctrine would be intolerable in U.S. March 9: Vienna: Kurt Schuschnigg defies Nazis, calls for plebiscite on independence. March 11: Vienna: With Hitler massing troops on border, Schuschnigg resigns, succeeded by Nazi leader Arthur Seyss-Inquart. March 12: German troops enter Austria. March 17: Spain: Rebel air raid kills 1,000 in Barcelona. March 24: U.S. asks powers to help refugees flee from Nazis. March 26: Vienna: Hermann Goering warns Jews to leave Austria. March 31: New York: Hoover wanrs U.S. of Fascist trend, yet opposes alliance with Europe.

April 2: London recognizes German seizure of Austria; 34,000 arrests reported in Vienna. April 3: Spain: Nationalists seize Lerida, one of Catalonia's four capitals. April 6: U.S. recognizes German conquest of Austria. April 10: Germans and Austrians approve Anschluss, Hitler's referendum on the union of Germany and Austria. More than 99% of the voters in the two countries reportedly approved the Anschluss. April 14: China: Japan suffers major defeat, losing 40,000 soldiers near Taierchwang. April 16: Rome: Anglo-Italian pact signed; Italy to quit Spain after war, U.K. to recognize Italian sovereignty in Ethiopia. April 19: Franco, dividing loyalists, declares Spanish Civil War won.

May 2: London: Commons ratifies Anglo-Italian pact; Chamberlain extols Mussolini. May 5: New York: Six leaders of Nazi summer camp arrested. May 6: Rome: Hitler attends review of Italy's land forces. May 14: Rome: Mussolini says Fascists will fight together if democracies make war. May 17: U.S. Congress passes Naval Expansion Act, financing plan to build two-ocean Navy. May 21: Czechs place 400,000 troops on the German border. May 26: Washington: House forms committee to purge "un-Americanism" (HUAC). May 29: Brawl erupts at Goodyear Strike; 100 hurt. May 30: Prague: All Czechs between 6-60 ordered to train for defense work.

June 3: Berlin: Reich votes to confiscate "degenerate" art. June 4: Vienna: Sigmund Freud leaves Austria for refuge in London. June 9: Britain contracts for purchase of 400 planes in U.S. June 17: Washington demands Reich pay Austria's debt. June 20: Washington: U.S. jury indicts 18 as Reich spies. June 22: Berlin: Reich insistutes mandatory national service to combat labor shortage. June 28: China: 10,000 Chinese killed in one-week battle below Hankow.

July 1: Rome:Italy places curbs on books written by Jews. July 5: FDR calls South most depressed region in U.S. July 6: U.S. hosts first international parley on Jewish refugees in Europe. July 10: Spain: Journalists allowed to see 80 American prisoners help in rebel camp. July 11: Soviet and Japanese forces clash along Manchuko-Korean border. July 22: Berlin: Reich issues special identity cards for Jews.

August 2: U.S.S.R.: Six Soviet divisions, thirty tanks sent into border battle with Japan. August 3: Italy: Schooling, intermarriage forbidden to Jews. August 12: Europe alarmed as Hitler calls up one million reserves. August 15: German army begins war maneuvers. August 18: Tokyo: Japan summons one million recruits. August 22: Germany: Hungarian chief Miklos Horthy views naval parace on official visit. August 24: China: Japanese shoot down U.S.-Chinese airliner, machine gun 19 trying to flee. August 27: London warns Hitler attack on Czechs may mean world war.

September 1: Italy expels all Jews entering since 1919. September 4: Oregon: Communist leader Earl Browder asks followers to support FDR. September 8: Czechoslovakia: Sudeten Germans hold mass demonstrations for union with Reich. September 18: France, Britain give in to Hitler, will ask Czechs to surrender German areas. September 21: Spanish Loyalists announce immediate withdrawal of foreign fighters. September 25: FDR appeals to Hitler to negotiate with Czech president Benes, as 20,000 demonstrate solidarity with Czechs in Madison Square Garden. September 26: France, Britain call partial mobilization.

October 1: Czechoslovakia: Hitler and Army march into Sudetenland. October 3: Czechoslovakia: Hitler and army march into Sudetenland. October 8: Spain: Rebels to send 10,000 Italian volunteers home. October 10: Moscow: Soviet fliers denounce Limbergh as "hired liar" for the Nazis. October 20: Communist party outlawed in Czechoslovakia. October 21: China: Japanese troops occupy Canton, finding buildings razed. October 28: Germany deporting Jews to Poland; thousands seized.

November 1: Britain concedes Reich dominates Central Europe. November 1: Hitlers firm stand on Czechoslovakia reported to have been guided by an astologer. November 7: Paris: Reich embassy aide Ernst von Rath shot to avenge treatment of Jews. November 12: Mexico agrees to compensate U.S. for land seizures. November 14: Washington: U.S. recalls envoys in Berlin. November 18: Berlin: Reich recalls ambassador in Washington. November 21: Britain offers German Jews land in Africa. November 26: Poland renews non-aggression pact with U.S.S.R. to protect against German invasion.

December 1: British plan national register, stating what each citizen will do in case of war. December 2: Washington: Hoffman, Voss, Glaser receive jail terms as German spies. December 6: Paris: Germany, France sign treaty of friendship. December 9: N.Y.: 4,000 cheer as Anthony Eden calls on democracies to face fascist challenge. December 15: Washington sends fourth note to Berlin demanding amnesty for U.S. Jews. December 16: Spain: Franco restores citizenship to ex-King Alfonso XIII. December 17: Italy disavows 1935 pact with France December 28: France orders doubling of forces in Somaliland; two wartime ships sent.