August 24

August 24 is the 236th day of the year (237th in leap years) in the Gregorian calendar. There are 129 days remaining until the end of the year.

Events

• 49 BC – Julius Caesar's general Gaius Scribonius Curio is defeated in the Second Battle of the Bagradas River by the Numidians under Publius Attius Varus and King Juba of Numidia. Curio commits suicide to avoid capture.
• 79 – Mount Vesuvius erupts. The cities of Pompeii, Herculaneum, and Stabiae are buried in volcanic ash (note: this traditional date has been challenged, and many scholars believe that the event occurred on October 24).
• 410 – The Visigoths under Alaric begin to pillage Rome for three days, which they are allowed to do after capturing it.
• 1200 – King John of England, signee of the first Magna Carta, marries Isabella of Angouleme in Bordeaux Cathedral.
• 1215 – Pope Innocent III declares Magna Carta invalid.
• 1349 – Six thousand Jews are killed in Mainz after being blamed for the bubonic plague.
• 1391 – Jews are massacred in Palma de Mallorca.
• 1456 – The printing of the Gutenberg Bible is completed.
• 1511 – Afonso de Albuquerque of Portugal conquers Malacca, the capital of the Sultanate of Malacca.
• 1561 – Willem of Orange marries duchess Anna of Saxony.
• 1572 – St. Bartholomew's Day Massacre: On the orders of king Charles IX of France, a massacre of Huguenots (French Protestants) begins.
• 1608 – The first official English representative to India lands in Surat.
• 1662 – The Act of Uniformity requires England to accept the Book of Common Prayer.
• 1682 – William Penn receives the area that is now the state of Delaware, and adds it to his colony of Pennsylvania.
• 1690 – Calcutta, India is founded.
• 1814 – British troops invade Washington, D.C. and burn down the White House and several other buildings.
• 1815 – The modern Constitution of the Netherlands is signed.
• 1816 – The Treaty of St. Louis is signed in St. Louis, Missouri.
• 1820 – Constitutionalist insurrection at Oporto, Portugal.
• 1821 – The Treaty of Córdoba is signed in Córdoba, now in Veracruz, Mexico, concluding the Mexican War of Independence from Spain.
• 1831 – Charles Darwin is asked to travel on HMS Beagle.
• 1857 – The Panic of 1857 begins, setting off one of the most severe economic crises in United States history.
• 1870 – The Wolseley Expedition reaches Manitoba to end the Red River Rebellion.
• 1875 – Captain Matthew Webb became first person to swim the English Channel
• 1891 – Thomas Edison patents the motion picture camera.
• 1898 – Count Muravyov, Foreign Minister of Russia presents a rescript that convoked the First Hague Peace Conference.
• 1902 – A statue of Joan of Arc is unveiled in Saint-Pierre-le-Moûtier.
• 1909 – Workers start pouring concrete for the Panama Canal.
• 1912 – Alaska becomes a United States territory.
• 1914 – World War I: German troops capture Namur.
• 1929 – Second day of two-day Hebron massacre during the 1929 Palestine riots: Arab attacks on the Jewish community in Hebron in the British Mandate of Palestine, result in the death of 65-68 Jews and the remaining Jews being forced to leave the city.
• 1931 – France and the Soviet Union sign a neutrality/no attack treaty.
• 1931 – Resignation of the United Kingdom's Second Labour Government. Formation of the UK National Government.
• 1932 – Amelia Earhart becomes the first woman to fly across the United States non-stop (from Los Angeles to Newark, New Jersey).
• 1933 – The Crescent Limited train derails in Washington, D.C., after the bridge it was crossing was washed out by the 1933 Chesapeake–Potomac hurricane.
• 1936 – The Australian Antarctic Territory is created.
• 1937 – In the Spanish Civil War, the Basque Army surrenders to the Italian Corpo Truppe Volontarie following the Santoña Agreement.
• 1942 – World War II: The Battle of the Eastern Solomons. Japanese aircraft carrier Ryūjō is sunk and US carrier USS Enterprise heavily damaged.
• 1944 – World War II: Allied troops begin the attack on Paris.
• 1949 – The treaty creating NATO goes into effect.
• 1950 – Edith Sampson becomes the first black U.S. delegate to the United Nations.
• 1954 – The Communist Control Act goes into effect. The American Communist Party is outlawed.
• 1954 – Getúlio Dornelles Vargas, president of Brazil, commits suicide and is succeeded by João Café Filho.
• 1963 – Buddhist crisis: As a result of the Xa Loi Pagoda raids, the US State Department cables the US Embassy in Saigon to encourage Army of the Republic of Vietnam generals to launch a coup against President Ngo Dinh Diem if he did not remove his brother Ngo Dinh Nhu.
• 1963 – Don Schollander swims the 200-metre freestyle in less than 2 minutes for the first time, in a world record time of 1:58.
• 1967 – Led by Abbie Hoffman, a group of hippies temporarily disrupt trading at the NYSE by throwing dollar bills from the viewing gallery, causing trading to cease as brokers scramble to grab them.
• 1968 – France explodes its first hydrogen bomb, thus becoming the world's fifth nuclear power.
• 1981 – Mark David Chapman is sentenced to 20 years to life in prison for murdering John Lennon.
• 1989 – Colombian drug barons declare "total war" on the Colombian government.
• 1989 – Cincinnati Reds manager Pete Rose is banned from baseball for gambling by Commissioner A. Bartlett Giamatti.
• 1991 – Mikhail Gorbachev resigns as head of the Communist Party of the Soviet Union.
• 1991 – Ukraine declares itself independent from the Soviet Union.
• 1992 – Hurricane Andrew hits South Florida as a Category 5 Hurricane.
• 1994 – Initial accord between Israel and the PLO about partial self-rule of the Palestinians on the West Bank.
• 1995 – Computer software developer Microsoft releases its Windows 95 operating system.
• 1998 – The Netherlands is selected as the site for the trial of the two Libyan suspects of the 1988 Pan Am bombing.
• 1998 – First RFID human implantation tested in the United Kingdom.
• 2001 – Air Transat Flight 236 runs out of fuel over the Atlantic Ocean (en route to Lisbon from Toronto) and makes an emergency landing in the Azores.
• 2004 – Eighty-nine passengers die after two airliners explode after flying out of Domodedovo International Airport, near Moscow. The explosions are caused by suicide bombers (reportedly female) from the Russian Republic of Chechnya.
• 2006 – The International Astronomical Union (IAU) redefines the term "planet" such that Pluto is now considered a Dwarf Planet.

Births

• 1113 – Geoffrey of Anjou, Count of Anjou (d. 1151)
• 1198 – King Alexander II of Scotland (d. 1249)
• 1358 – King John I of Castile (d. 1390)
• 1393 – Arthur III, Duke of Brittany (d. 1458)
• 1552 – Lavinia Fontana, Italian painter (d. 1614)
• 1580 – John Taylor, English poet (d. 1654)
• 1591 – Robert Herrick, English poet (d. 1674)
• 1635 – Peder Griffenfeld, Danish statesman (d. 1699)
• 1669 – Alessandro Marcello, Italian composer (d. 1747)
• 1707 – Selina Hastings, Countess of Huntingdon, English Evangelical Revivalist (d. 1791)
• 1750 – Letizia Ramolino, mother of Napoleon Bonaparte (d. 1836)
• 1758 – Sophia Frederica of Mecklenburg-Schwerin, queen of Denmark and Norway (d. 1794)
• 1759 – William Wilberforce, English abolitionist (d. 1833)
• 1772 – King William I of the Netherlands (d. 1840)
• 1787 – James Weddell, English explorer of Antarctica (d. 1834)
• 1817 – Aleksey Konstantinovich Tolstoy, Russian writer (d. 1875)
• 1837 – Théodore Dubois, French composer and teacher (d. 1924)
• 1845 – James C. Calhoun, American soldier, brother-in-law of George Armstrong Custer (d. 1876)
• 1851 – Tom Kendall, Australian cricketer (d. 1924)
• 1852 – Deacon White, American baseball player (d. 1919)
• 1863 – Dragutin Lerman, Croatian explorer (d. 1918)
• 1865 – King Ferdinand I of Romania (d. 1927)
• 1872 – Max Beerbohm, British caricaturist (d. 1956)
• 1880 – Joshua Lionel Cowen, American entrepreneur, creator of Lionel Trains (d. 1965)
• 1884 – Earl Derr Biggers, American author (d. 1933)
• 1887 – Harry Hooper, American baseball player (d. 1974)
• 1890 – Duke Kahanamoku, Hawaiian swimmer and surfer (d. 1968)
• 1890 – Jean Rhys, British writer (d. 1979)
• 1893 – Haim Ernst Wertheimer, German-born Israeli biochemist, recipient of the Israel Prize (d. 1978)
• 1895 – Richard Cushing, archbishop of Boston (d. 1970)
• 1897 – Fred Rose, American songwriter and publishing executive (d. 1954)
• 1898 – Malcolm Cowley, American literary critic (d. 1989)
• 1899 – Jorge Luis Borges, Argentine writer (d. 1986)
• 1899 – Albert Claude, Belgian biologist, Nobel laureate (d. 1983)
• 1899 – Gaylord DuBois, American comic book writer (d. 1993)
• 1901 – Preston Foster, American actor (d. 1970)
• 1902 – Fernand Braudel, French historian (d. 1985)
• 1902 – Carlo Gambino, Sicilian-born American mafioso (d. 1976)
• 1903 – Karl Hanke, Nazi official (d. 1945)
• 1904 – Alice White, American actress (d. 1983)
• 1905 – Arthur Crudup, American singer and guitarist (d. 1976)
• 1905 – Siaka Stevens, President of Sierra Leone (d. 1988)
• 1907 – Bruno Giacometti, Swiss architect
• 1909 – Ronald Grieveson, South African cricketer (d. 1998)
• 1911 – Lofty England, English automotive engineer and race team manager (d. 1995)
• 1911 – Michel Pablo, Greek Trotskyist leader (d. 1996)
• 1912 – Durward Kirby, American television personality (d. 2000)
• 1913 – Charles Snead Houston, American mountaineer (d. 2009)
• 1915 – James Tiptree, Jr., American writer (d. 1987)
• 1916 – Léo Ferré, French composer and singer (d. 1993)
• 1916 – Hal Smith, American actor (d. 1994)
• 1917 – Dennis James, American game show host (d. 1997)
• 1918 – Sikander Bakht, Governor of Kerala (d. 2004)
• 1919 – Enrique Llanes, Mexican professional wrestler (d. 2004)
• 1920 – Alex Colville, Canadian painter
• 1921 – Sam Tingle, Zimbabwean racing driver (d. 2008)
• 1922 – René Lévesque, Premier of Quebec (d. 1987)
• 1922 – Howard Zinn, American historian and activist (d. 2010)
• 1923 – Arthur Jensen, American psychologist
• 1924 – Alyn Ainsworth, British bandleader (d. 1990)
• 1924 – Jimmy Gardner (British actor), British actor (d. 2010)
• 1927 – David Ireland, Australian author
• 1927 – Harry Markowitz, American economist, Nobel laureate
• 1929 – Yasser Arafat, Palestinian leader (d. 2004)
• 1929 – Betty Dodson, American feminist and sex educator
• 1930 – Roger McCluskey, American racing driver (d. 1993)
• 1932 – Robert D. Hales, LDS apostle
• 1934 – Kenny Baker, English actor
• 1936 – A. S. Byatt, English novelist
• 1936 – Kenny Guinn, American Governor, Nevada
• 1937 – Moshood Kashimawo Olawale Abiola, Nigerian politician (d. 1998)
• 1938 – Halldór Blöndal, Icelandic politician
• 1938 – David Freiberg, American bassist (Quicksilver Messenger Service and Jefferson Starship)
• 1938 – Mason Williams, American guitarist and composer
• 1940 – Francine Lalonde, Quebec politician
• 1942 – Max Cleland, American politician
• 1942 – Howard Jacobson, British novelist and newspaper columnist
• 1943 – John Cipollina, American guitarist (Quicksilver Messenger Service) (d. 1989)
• 1943 – Pini Zahavi, Israeli football agent
• 1944 – Bill Goldsworthy, Canadian ice hockey player (d. 1996)
• 1944 – Gregory Jarvis, American astronaut (d. 1986)
• 1944 – Rocky Johnson, Canadian professional wrestler
• 1945 – Ken Hensley, English musician (Uriah Heep)
• 1945 – Vince McMahon, American professional wrestling promoter
• 1947 – Anne Archer, American actress
• 1947 – Paulo Coelho, Brazilian author
• 1947 – Roger De Vlaeminck, Belgian cyclist
• 1947 – Joe Manchin, American politician, governor of West Virginia
• 1947 – Vladimir Masorin, Russian admiral
• 1948 – Jean-Michel Jarre, French musician
• 1948 – Kim Sung-Il, Chief of Staff of Republic of Korea Air Force
• 1949 – Joe Regalbuto, American actor
• 1949 – Charles Rocket, American actor (d. 2005)
• 1949 – Pia Degermark, Swedish actress
• 1950 – John Banaszak, Pittsburgh Steelers three-time Super Bowl champion
• 1950 – Tim White, American anthropologist
• 1951 – Orson Scott Card, American writer
• 1951 – Oscar Hijuelos, American author
• 1952 – Bob Corker, American politician, junior senator of Tennessee
• 1952 – Holly Hallstrom American model for The Price is Right
• 1952 – Mike Shanahan, American football coach
• 1952 – Linton Kwesi Johnson, Jamaican dub poet
• 1953 – Ron Holloway, American tenor saxophonist
• 1954 – Philippe Cataldo, French singer
• 1954 – Alain Daigle, French Canadian ice hockey player
• 1955 – Mike Huckabee, American politician, Governor/Presidential candidate
• 1956 – John Culberson, American politician
• 1956 – Dick Lee, Singaporean singer-songwriter
• 1957 – Jeffrey Daniel, American dancer and singer (Shalamar)
• 1957 – Stephen Fry, English comedian and actor
• 1958 – Steve Guttenberg, American actor
• 1958 – Tracy Harris, American artist
• 1958 – Chris Offutt, American author
• 1959 – Adrian Kuiper, former South African cricketer
• 1960 – Kim Christofte, Danish footballer
• 1960 – Takashi Miike, Japanese filmmaker
• 1960 – Cal Ripken, Jr., American baseball player
• 1961 – Ingrid Berghmans, Belgian judoka
• 1961 – Jared Harris, English actor
• 1962 – Craig Kilborn, American talk show host
• 1962 – David Koechner, American actor
• 1962 – Major Garrett, American journalist
• 1963 – John Bush, American singer (Anthrax)
• 1963 – Hideo Kojima, Japanese video game director
• 1964 – Éric Bernard, French racing driver
• 1964 – Dana Gould, American comedian and writer
• 1964 – Salizhan Sharipov, Russian cosmonaut
• 1965 – Marlee Matlin, American actress
• 1965 – Reggie Miller, American basketball player
• 1965 – Brian Rajadurai, Sri Lankan cricketer
• 1967 – Michael Thomas, English footballer
• 1968 – Benoît Brunet, French Canadian ice hockey player
• 1968 – Shoichi Funaki, Japanese professional wrestler
• 1968 – Andreas Kisser, Brazilian guitarist (Sepultura)
• 1968 – Tim Salmon, American baseball player
• 1968 – James Toney, Professional boxer
• 1970 – David Gregory, American television journalist
• 1970 – Dan Henderson, American Mixed martial artist
• 1970 – Tugay Kerimoğlu, Turkish footballer
• 1971 – Pierfrancesco Favino, Italian actor
• 1972 – Jean-Luc Brassard, Canadian freestyle skier
• 1973 – Andrew Brunette, Canadian ice hockey player
• 1973 – Dave Chappelle, American actor and Comedian
• 1973 – Inge de Bruijn, Dutch swimmer
• 1973 – Grey DeLisle, voice actress
• 1973 – Carmine Giovinazzo, American actor
• 1974 – Orla Fallon, Irish Vocalist for Celtic Woman
• 1974 – Jennifer Lien, American actress
• 1975 – Mark de Vries, Surinamese-Dutch footballer
• 1975 – Alex O'Loughlin, Australian actor
• 1976 – Nordin Wooter, Dutch footballer
• 1977 – Denílson, Brazilian footballer
• 1977 – Robert Enke, German footballer (d. 2009)
• 1977 – Per Gade, Danish footballer
• 1977 – John Green, American author
• 1977 – Jürgen Macho, Austrian footballer
• 1978 – Rafael Furcal, Dominican baseball player
• 1978 – Derek Morris, Canadian ice hockey player
• 1978 – Beth Riesgraf, American actress
• 1979 – Orlando Engelaar, Dutch footballer
• 1979 – Elva Hsiao, Taiwanese singer
• 1979 – Michael Redd, American basketball player
• 1979 – Markus Walger, German rugby player
• 1980 – Sonja Bennett, Canadian actress
• 1981 – Jiro Wang, Taiwanese singer, actor, model
• 1981 – Chad Michael Murray, American actor
• 1982 – Kim Kallstrom, Swedish footballer
• 1983 – Marcel Goc, German ice hockey player
• 1983 – Christopher Parker, British actor
• 1984 – Kyle Schmid, Canadian actor
• 1984 – Yesung, Korean singer (Super Junior)
• 1984 – Charlie Villanueva, American basketball player
• 1986 – Nick Adenhart, American baseball player (d. 2009)
• 1986 – Fabiano Santacroce, Italian footballer
• 1987 – Anže Kopitar, Slovenian ice hockey player
• 1987 – Jon Scheyer, American basketball player
• 1988 – Rupert Grint, English actor
• 1988 – Helga Krapf, Filipina actress
• 1990 – Juan Pedro Lanzani, Argentine actor and singer
• 2003 – Alexandre Coste, son of Albert II, Prince of Monaco

Deaths

• 79 – Pliny the Elder, Roman writer and naturalist (b. 23)
• 1042 – Michael V, Byzantine Emperor (b. 1015)
• 1103 – King Magnus III of Norway (b. 1073)
• 1217 – Eustace the Monk, French mercenary and pirate (b. c.1170)
• 1540 – Girolamo Francesco Maria Mazzola, Italian painter (b. 1503)
• 1542 – Gasparo Contarini, Italian diplomat and cardinal (b. 1483)
• 1572 – Victims of the St. Bartholomew's Day Massacre:

• Gaspard de Coligny, French Huguenot leader (b. 1519)
• Pierre de la Ramée, French humanist (b. 1515)
• Charles de Téligny, French Huguenot soldier (b. c.1535)

• 1595 – Thomas Digges, English astronomer (b. 1546)
• 1647 – Nicholas Stone, English sculptor and architect (b. 1586)
• 1664 – Maria Cunitz, Silesian astronomer (b. c.1610)
• 1679 – Jean François Paul de Gondi, French cardinal and agitator (b. 1614)
• 1680 – Thomas Blood, Irish-born thief of the British crown jewels (b. 1618)
• 1683 – John Owen, English non-conformist theologian (b. 1616)
• 1759 – Ewald Christian von Kleist, German poet (b. 1715)
• 1779 – Saint Cosmas of Aetolia, Greek Orthodox martyr (b. 1714)
• 1798 – Thomas Alcock, English clergyman (b. 1709)
• 1818 – James Carr, U.S. Congressman (b. 1777)
• 1831 – August von Gneisenau, Prussian field marshal (b. 1760)
• 1832 – Nicolas Léonard Sadi Carnot, French mathematician (b. 1796)
• 1841 – Theodore Edward Hook, English author (b. 1788)
• 1841 – John Ordronaux, privateer of the War of 1812 (b. 1778)
• 1888 – Rudolf Clausius, German physicist (b. 1822)
• 1895 – Albert F. Mummery, British mountaineer (b. 1855)
• 1921 – Nikolay Gumilyov, Russian poet (b. 1886)
• 1930 – Tom Norman, English freak showman (b. 1860)
• 1940 – Paul Gottlieb Nipkow, German television pioneer (b. 1860)
• 1943 – Simone Weil, French philosopher and social activist (b. 1909)
• 1945 – Midori Naka, Japanese actress, survivor of the Hiroshima atomic bombing, died of radiation poisoning (b. 1909)
• 1946 – James Clark McReynolds, U.S. Supreme Court justice (b. 1862)
• 1954 – Getúlio Vargas, President of Brazil (b. 1882)
• 1956 – Kenji Mizoguchi, Japanese film director (b. 1898)
• 1958 – Paul Henry, Northern Irish artist (b. 1876)
• 1967 – Henry J. Kaiser, American industrialist (b. 1882)
• 1967 – Lam Bun, Hong Kong radio commentator (murdered) (b. 1930)
• 1974 – Alexander de Seversky, Russian-American aviation pioneer (b. 1894)
• 1977 – Buddy O'Connor, Canadian ice hockey player (b. 1916)
• 1978 – Louis Prima, American band leader (b. 1910)
• 1979 – Hanna Reitsch, German test pilot (b. 1912)
• 1979 – Sampson Sievers, Russian Orthodox Christian monk and wonder-worker (b. 1898)
• 1980 – Yootha Joyce, British actress (b. 1927)
• 1982 – Félix-Antoine Savard, French Canadian catholic priest and novelist (b. 1896)
• 1983 – Scott Nearing, American writer, educator and activist (b. 1883)
• 1985 – Paul Creston, American composer (b. 1906)
• 1987 – Malcolm Kirk, English wrestler (b. 1936)
• 1990 – Sergei Dovlatov, Russian writer (b. 1941)
• 1990 – Gailli AbedElrhman, Sudanese writer (b. 1931)
• 1991 – Bernard Castro, Italian inventor (b. 1904)
• 1995 – Alfred Eisenstaedt, German-born photographer (b. 1898)
• 1997 – Werner Abrolat, German actor (b. 1924)
• 1998 – E.G. Marshall, American actor (b. 1910)
• 1999 – Alexandre Lagoya, Greek-Italian classical guitarist (b. 1929)
• 2000 – Andy Hug, Swiss karateka and kickbox champion (b. 1964)
• 2001 – Jane Greer, American actress (b. 1924)
• 2002 – Nikolay Guryanov Russian Orthodox Christian mystic and priest (b. 1909)
• 2003 – Sir Wilfred Thesiger, British explorer (b. 1910)
• 2004 – Elisabeth Kübler-Ross, Swiss-born psychiatrist (b. 1926)
• 2005 – Kaleth Morales, Colombian Vallenato singer (b. 1984)
• 2005 – Harold "Hal" Kalin, American singer (The Kalin Twins) (b. 1934)
• 2006 – Léopold Simoneau, French Canadian tenor (b. 1916)
• 2006 – Cristian Nemescu, Romanian film director (b. 1979)
• 2007 – Andrée P. Boucher, Mayor of Quebec City (b. 1937)
• 2007 – Aaron Russo, American film producer and director (b. 1943)
• 2010 – Satoshi Kon, Japanese film director (b. 1963)

Holidays and observances

• Christian Feast Day
  • Abban of Ireland
  • Bartholomew (Roman Catholic, Anglican)
  • Ouen
• Earliest date on which the Notting Hill Carnival can fall, while August 31 is the latest; celebrated on last Monday in August and the day before. (Notting Hill)
• Mundus patet, a harvest feast involving the dead. (Roman Empire)
• National Day or Den' Nezalezhnosti, celebrates the independence of Ukraine from the Soviet Union in 1991.

External links

• BBC: On This Day
• The New York Times: On This Day
• On This Day in Canada