" The term made an impact into English pulp science fiction starting from Jack Williamson's The Cometeers ( 1936 ) and the distinction between mechanical robots and fleshy androids was popularized by Edmond Hamilton's Captain Future ( 1940 – 1944 ).

* 1940 – Homero Aridjis, Mexican writer and diplomat

* 1940 – Pedro Armendáriz Jr., Mexican actor

* 1874 – William B. Bankhead, American politician ( d. 1940 )

* 1892 – Johnny Dodds, American jazz clarinetist and saxophonist ( d. 1940 )

* 1940 – John Hagee, American pastor and televangelist

* 1940 – Herbie Hancock, American jazz musician, bandleader, and composer

* 1857 – Eugen Bleuler, Swiss psychiatrist ( d. 1940 )

* 1940 – Burt Young, American actor

* 1874 – Carl Bosch, German chemist and engineer, Nobel Prize laureate ( d. 1940 )

* 1940 – Sonny Sharrock, American guitarist ( Last Exit ) ( d. 1994 )

* 1940 – Estonia was illegally annexed by the Soviet Union.

* 1940 – Mukhu Aliyev, Russian politician

* 1940 – Louise Sorel, American actress

* 1857 – Manuel de Escandón, Mexican polo player ( d. 1940 )

* 1940 – Bill Musselman, American basketball coach ( d. 2000 )

* 1940 – Beko Ransome-Kuti, Nigerian doctor and activist ( d. 2006 )

* 1940 – Will Tura, Belgian singer-songwriter, musician, and composer

2 # 1 ( Jan., 1940 ), pp. 87 – 104 in JSTOR

* 1881 – Otto Toeplitz, German mathematician ( d. 1940 )

* 1940 – Mervyn Kitchen, English cricketer and umpire

* 1940 – Ram Loevy, Israeli screenwriter and director

* 1940 – World War II: Italian forces begin the invasion of British Somaliland.

* 1940 – Lance Alworth, American football player

* 1940 – Martin Sheen, American actor

From 1940 to 1943, the Italian Royal Navy ( Regia Marina Italiana ) established BETASOM, a submarine base at Bordeaux.

The Italian invasion of Greece in October 1940 saw mounted cavalry used effectively by the Greek defenders along the mountainous frontier with Albania.

* 1940 – World War II: Operation Compass – British and Indian troops under the command of Major-General Richard O ' Connor attack Italian forces near Sidi Barrani in Egypt.

By the late 1930s and the 1940s, Italian Fascism completely denounced capitalism as an obsolete and oppressive system, Mussolini in 1940 at the entry of Italy into World War II, said:

Health and welfare spending grew dramatically under Italian fascism, with welfare rising from 7 % of the budget in 1930 to 20 % in 1940.

* 1940 – Fabrizio De André, Italian singer-songwriter ( d. 1999 )

* 1940 – 1943 – Gibraltar harbour was attacked many times by Italian commando frogmen operating from Algeciras.

Meanwhile 150, 000 Italians settled in Libya between 1920 and 1940, greatly developing Italian Libya in all areas.

The governor Balbo ( after the creation of " Libya " in 1934, with the unification of Tripolitania, Cyrenaica and Fezzan in a single country ) developed Italian Libya from 1934 to 1940, creating a huge infrastructure ( from 4, 000 km of roads to 400 km of narrow gauge railways to new industries and to dozen of new agricultural villages ).

Total native Italian population for Libya was 110, 575 out of a total population of 915, 440 in 1940 ( General Staff War Office 1939, 165 / b ).

On 13 September 1940, Mussolini's highway was used for the invasion of Egypt by Italian forces stationed in Libya.

Italian troops crossed the border on 28 October 1940, beginning the Greco-Italian War, but were stopped by determined Greek defence, and ultimately driven back into Albania.

Mussolini, in October 1940, used his Albanian base to launch an attack on Greece, which led to the defeat of the Italian forces and the Greek occupation of Southern Albania in what was seen by the Greeks as the liberation of Northern Epirus.

In October 1940, during the Greco-Italian War, Albania served as a staging-area for Italian dictator Benito Mussolini's unsuccessful invasion of Greece.

* 1940 – World War II: the British Army's 11th Hussars assault and take Fort Capuzzo in Libya, Africa from Italian forces.

* 1940 – Vittorio Storaro, Italian cinematographer

* 1940 – Paolo Borsellino, Italian magistrate ( d. 1992 )

* 1940 – World War II: Battle of Cape Spada – The Royal Navy and the Regia Marina clash ; the Italian light cruiser Bartolomeo Colleoni sinks, with 121 casualties.

* 1940 – Tommaso Padoa-Schioppa, Italian banker and economist ( d. 2010 )

On 19 May 1940 Ribbentrop met the new Italian Ambassador Dino Alfieri, who described the meeting as follows :" He commented at length on the " dazzling " successes of the German armies, extolling the military genius of the Führer ... who had " revealed himself as the greatest military genius since Napoleon "... He spoke of the inevitable clash between the young nations and the old ; of the necessity of breaking the ring with which the Judaeo-democratic-plutocratic powers were trying to encircle Germany and Italy ; and of the need to create a new European civilization.

* 1860 – Vito Volterra, Italian mathematician ( d. 1940 )

* Alviero Martini ( born 1940 ), Italian fashion designer