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Joe DiMaggio leaves the batter's box on his way to a single -- and his 56th straight game with a hit. (AP Photo)

• Joe DiMaggio's 56-game hitting streak: 56k | 300k

In a year when prewar tension filled every home in America, Joe DiMaggio captured the nation's attention by compiling one of the greatest individual achievements in sports history. The Yankee Clipper's 56-game hitting streak became permanently etched in American sports lore that summer and is still recognized today as perhaps the most unbreakable record in all of sports.

DiMaggio's streak received almost as much attention from the media as Adolph Hitler in 1941. In his 1988 book titled "Streak," Michael Seidel writes, "On the very day that DiMaggio's challenge to George Sisler's modern-day streak record of 41 games straight made front page news in The Washington Post, a parallel headline boasted that American airplane production would soon be outstripping the Nazi production of 2,000 planes a month. In double columns, side-by-side, DiMaggio eased by Sisler and the United States prepared to ease by Germany.