March 24 is the 83rd day of the year (84th in leap years) in the Gregorian calendar. There are 282 days remaining until the end of the year. March 24th is the 365th and last day of the year in many European implementations of the Julian calendar.
Holidays
- Christian Feast Day:
- Day of Remembrance for Truth and Justice (Argentina)
- World Tuberculosis Day (International)
History
In 1084, Holy Roman Emperor-to-be Henry IV enters Rome, chases out the Pope, and consecrates “Clement III” as Pope
In 1401, Turko-Mongol emperor Timur sacks Damascus.
In 1603, James VI of Scotland also becomes James I of England, upon the death of Elizabeth I.
In 1603, Tokugawa Ieyasu is granted the title of shogun from Emperor Go-Yozei, and establishes the Tokugawa Shogunate in Edo, Japan.
In 1629, First game law passed in American colonies, by Virginia.
In 1663, The Province of Carolina is granted by charter to eight Lords Proprietor in reward for their assistance in restoring Charles II of England to the throne
In 1664, Roger Williams was granted a charter to colonize Rhode Island.
In 1707, The Acts of Union 1707 is signed, officially uniting the Kingdoms of England and Scotland to create the Kingdom of Great Britain.
In 1720, Count Frederick of Hesse-Kassel is elected King of Sweden by the Riksdag of the Estates, after his consort Ulrika Eleonora abdicated the throne on 29 February. She had been wanting to rule jointly with her husband in the same manner as William and Mary in the British Isles, but after the Riksdag of the Estates said no to this, she chose to abdicate the throne in his favour instead.
In 1721, Johann Sebastian Bach dedicated six concertos to Christian Ludwig, margrave of Brandenburg-Schwedt, now commonly called the Brandenburg concertos, BWV 1046-1051.
In 1731, Naturalization of Hieronimus de Salis Parliamentary Act is passed.
In 1765, Britain enacted the Quartering Act, requiring American colonists to provide temporary housing to British soldiers.
In 1792, Benjamin West became the first American artist to be selected president of the Royal Academy in London.
In 1829, Catholic Emancipation: The Parliament of the United Kingdom passes the Roman Catholic Relief Act 1829, allowing Catholics to serve in Parliament.
In 1832, In Hiram, Ohio a group of men beat, tar and feather Mormon leader Joseph Smith.
In 1837, Canada gave the blacks the right to vote.
In 1854, In Venezuela, slavery was abolished
In 1860, Sakuradamon incident: Assassination of Japanese Chief Minister (Tairō) Ii Naosuke.
In 1860, the Clipper “Andrew Jackson” arrives in S.F., 89 days from New York.
In 1868, MetLife founded, aka Metropolitan Life Insurance Co.
In 1869, The last of Titokowaru‘s forces surrendered to the New Zealand government, ending his uprising.
In 1878, The British frigate HMS Eurydice sinks, killing more than 300.
In 1880, The first ‘hail’ insurance company was incorporated in Connecticut. It was known as Tobacco Growers’ Mutual Insurance Company. To farmers of tobacco affected by storms, it was a “hail” of an idea…
In 1882, Robert Koch announces the discovery of mycobacterium tuberculosis, the bacterium responsible for tuberculosis.
In 1882, Henry Wadsworth Longfellow, American poet and educator (b. 1807) died after suffering from peritonitis. He was an American poet and educator whose works include “Paul Revere’s Ride“, The Song of Hiawatha, and Evangeline. He was also the first American to translate Dante Alighieri’s The Divine Comedy and was one of the five Fireside Poets. Longfellow was born in Portland, Maine, which was then a part of Massachusetts. He studied at Bowdoin College. After spending time in Europe he became a professor at Bowdoin and, later, at Harvard College. His first major poetry collections were Voices of the Night (1839) and Ballads and Other Poems (1841). Longfellow retired from teaching in 1854 to focus on his writing, living the remainder of his life in Cambridge, Massachusetts, in a former headquarters of George Washington. His first wife Mary Potter died in 1835 after a miscarriage. His second wife Frances Appleton died in 1861 after sustaining burns when her dress caught fire. After her death, Longfellow had difficulty writing poetry for a time and focused on his translation. Longfellow wrote predominantly lyric poems, known for their musicality and often presenting stories of mythology and legend. He became the most popular American poet of his day and also had success overseas. He has been criticized, however, for imitating European styles and writing specifically for the masses.
In 1883, long-distance telephone service was inaugurated between Chicago and New York City.
In 1885, Sino-French War: Chinese victory in the Battle of Bang Bo on the Tonkin–Guangxi border.
In 1896, A. S. Popov makes the first radio signal transmission in history.
In 1898, First US automobile sold. Alexander Winton sells his first automobile that he built in Cleveland to mining engineer Robert Allison for $1000.
In 1900, Mayor of New York City Robert Anderson Van Wyck breaks ground for a new underground “Rapid Transit Railroad” that would link Manhattan and Brooklyn.
In 1905, Jules Verne, French author (b. 1828) died ill with diabetes. He was a French novelist, poet, and playwright best known for his adventure novels and his profound influence on the literary genre of science fiction. Born to bourgeois parents in the seaport of Nantes, Verne was trained to follow in his father’s footsteps as a lawyer, but quit the profession early in life to write for magazines and the stage. His collaboration with the publisher Pierre-Jules Hetzel led to the creation of the Voyages Extraordinaires, a widely popular series of scrupulously researched adventure novels including Journey to the Center of the Earth, Twenty Thousand Leagues Under the Sea, and Around the World in Eighty Days. Verne is generally considered a major literary author in France and most of Europe, where he has had a wide influence on the literary avant-garde and on surrealism. His reputation is markedly different in Anglophone regions, where he has often been labeled a writer of genre fiction or children’s books, not least because of the highly abridged and altered translations in which his novels are often reprinted. Verne is the second most-translated author in the world since 1979, between the English-language writers Agatha Christie and William Shakespeare, and probably was the most-translated during the 1960s and 1970s. He is one of the authors sometimes called “The Father of Science Fiction”, as are H. G. Wells and Hugo Gernsback.
In 1906, it is announced the report “Census of the British Empire” shows that England rules 1/5 of the globe. (“The sun never sets….”).
In 1907, The first issue of the Georgian Bolshevik newspaper Dro is published.
In 1920, first US coast guard air station established, Morehead City, NC.
In 1922, Irish War of Independence: In Belfast, Northern Irish policemen break into the home of a Catholic family and shoot all eight males inside.
In 1923, The Twin Cities are the first cities in the world to have the noiseless roller-bearing street cars.
In 1924, Greece became a republic.
In 1926, Safeway Stores is incorporated by M.B. Skaggs.
In 1927, Nanking Incident: Foreign warships bombard Nanjing, China, in defense of the foreign citizens within the city.
In 1930, the recently discovered ninth planet is given the name Pluto.
In 1934, United States Congress passes the Tydings–McDuffie Act allowing the Philippines to become a self-governing commonwealth. The measure – which took effect on July 4, 1946 – ended almost half-a-century of U.S. control of the island nation.
In 1941, British troops defeat British Somalia.
In 1941, German attack near El Agheila Libya.
In 1944, Ardeatine massacre: German troops murder 335 Italian civilians in Rome.
In 1944, World War II: In an event later dramatized in the movie The Great Escape, 76 Allied prisoners of war begin breaking out of the German camp Stalag Luft III. Only three made it home.
In 1944, Nicholas Alkemade fell 5,500 meters (18,000 feet) without a parachute & lived. 21-year-old Alkemade was one of seven crew members in Avro Lancaster B Mk. II, DS664, of No. 115 Squadron RAF. Returning from a 300 bomber raid on Berlin, east of Schmallenberg, DS664 was attacked by a Luftwaffe Ju 88 night-fighter, caught fire and began to spiral out of control. Because his parachute was unserviceable, Alkemade jumped from the aircraft without one, preferring to die by impact rather than burn to death. He fell 18,000 feet (5,500 m) to the ground below. His fall was broken by pine trees and a soft snow cover on the ground. He was able to move his arms and legs and suffered only a sprained leg. The Lancaster crashed in flames, killing pilot Jack Newman and three other members of the crew. They are buried in the CWGC’s Hanover War Cemetery.
In 1944, in occupied Rome, the Nazis executed more than 300 civilians in reprisal for an attack by Italian partisans the day before that killed 32 German soldiers. The Ardeatine massacre, or Fosse Ardeatine massacre (Italian: Eccidio delle Fosse Ardeatine) was a mass killing carried out in Rome on 24 March 1944 by German occupation troops during the Second World War as a reprisal for a partisan attack conducted on the previous day in central Rome against the SS Police Regiment Bozen.
In 1945, 600 transports and 1300 gliders stretching for over 300 miles carry the First Allied Airborne Army, comprised of 40,000 British and American paratroopers (17th Airborne Div.), across the Rhine near Wesel, Germany in Operation Varsity, the largest one-day airborne drop in history.
In 1946, The British Cabinet Mission, consisting of Lord Pethick-Lawrence, Sir Stafford Cripps and A. V. Alexander, arrives in India to discuss and plan for the transfer of power from the British Raj to Indian leadership.
In 1947, Congress proposes limitation of the presidency to two terms.
In 1947, John D. Rockefeller, Jr. donates the East River site in N.Y. to the United Nations.
In 1955, the first seagoing oil drill rig was placed in service.
In 1958, Rock’N’Roll teen idol Elvis Presley is drafted in the U.S. Army.
In 1959, The Party of the African Federation is launched by Léopold Sédar Senghor and Modibo Keïta.
In 1965, NASA spacecraft Ranger 9, equipped to convert its signals into a form suitable for showing on domestic television, brings images of the Moon into ordinary homes before crash landing.
In 1965, Robert F. Kennedy reaches the top of Mt. Kennedy in the Yukon Territory, becoming the first person to scale the highest unclimbed mountain in North America. The mountain was named by the Canadian government in honor of the Senators brother, the late President John F. Kennedy.
In 1967, U. of Michigan held the first “Teach-in” after bombing of North Vietnam.
In 1972, Great Britain imposes direct rule over North Ireland to stop the sectarian violence.
In 1973, Kenyan athlete Kip Keino defeats Jim Ryun at the first-ever professional track meet in Los Angeles.
In 1975, COVER STORY OF TIME “INDOCHINA: How much longer” According to my knowledge, about a month.
In 1976, In Argentina, the armed forces overthrow the constitutional government of President Isabel Perón and start a 7-year dictatorial period self-styled the National Reorganization Process. Since 2006, a public holiday known as Day of Remembrance for Truth and Justice is held on this day.
In 1980, Archbishop Óscar Romero is killed while celebrating Mass in San Salvador.
In 1986, The Loscoe gas explosion leads to new UK laws on landfill gas migration and gas protection on landfill sites.
In 1986, U.S. and Libyan forces clashed in the Gulf of Sidra in the Mediterranean. Libya fired missiles that missed U.S. aircraft; the United States retaliated, hitting two Libyan patrol boats and a missile battery.
In 1988, former national security aides Oliver L. North and John M. Poindexter and businessmen Richard V. Secord and Albert Hakim pleaded innocent to Iran-Contra charges. North and Poindexter were convicted, but had their convictions thrown out; Secord and Hakim received probation after each pleaded guilty to a single count under a plea bargain.
In 1989, in the nation’s worst oil spill, the supertanker Exxon Valdez (vahl-DEEZ’) ran aground on a reef in Alaska’s Prince William Sound and began leaking 11 million gallons of crude oil. It rammed a charted reef about 25 miles from Port Valdez, Alaska. Captain Joseph Hazelwood was jailed and acquitted in 1990 and he retained his sea license.
In 1991, In liberated Kuwait, banks reopened for the first time since Iraqi troops had shut them down the previous December.
In 1991, Gen. H. Norman Schwarzkopf, the American commander of Operation Desert Storm, told reporters in Saudi Arabia the United States was closer to establishing a permanent military headquarters on Arab soil.
In 1992, Jerry Brown pulled an upset win over Bill Clinton in Connecticut, causing serious damage to the Arkansas governor’s quest for the Democratic presidential nomination.
In 1993, Discovery of Comet Shoemaker–Levy 9.
In 1994, Robert F Kennedy Jr divorces Emily Black.
In 1994, the last U.S. troops, part of the U.N. rescue mission, withdraw from Somalia.
In 1995, The House of Representatives passed, 234-to-199, a welfare reform package calling for the most profound changes in social programs since the New Deal; President Clinton criticized the bill, saying it was “weak on work and tough on children.”
In 1998, Microsoft Corp. suffers a setback in its battle against rival Sun Microsystems Inc. A judge ruled that Microsoft cannot use Sun’s logo for Java, a coffee cup with steam rising from it, on any software packages or Web sites because Microsoft’s version of Java differs slightly from the original.
In 1998, A former FBI agent says papers found in James Earl Ray’s car support conspiracy theory in the Rev. Martin Luther King Jr.’s death.
In 1998, Rep. John Conyers, a Democratic critic of independent counsel Kenneth Starr, accused House Republicans Tuesday of putting together an impeachment strategy against President Clinton behind closed doors. “The Republican leadership is now planning to surreptitiously commence to staff for an impeachment investigation without any notice to Congress, to the Democrats on the Judiciary Committee, or to the American people,” Conyers said in a speech on the House floor.
In 1998, Jonesboro massacre: Mitchell Johnson and Andrew Golden, aged 11 and 13 respectively, fire upon teachers and students at Westside Middle School in Jonesboro, Arkansas; five people are killed and ten are wounded.
In 1998, A tornado sweeps through Dantan in India killing 250 people and injuring 3000 others.
In 1999, Kosovo War: NATO commences aerial bombardment against Yugoslavia, marking the first time NATO has attacked a sovereign country.
In 2000, S&P 500 index reaches an intraday high of 1,552.87, a peak that, due to the collapse of the dot-com bubble, it will not reach again for another seven-and-a-half years.
In 2000, Microsoft faxes detailed settlement offer to government lawyers. The Government rejects proposal two days later.
In 2003, The Arab League votes 21-1 in favor of a resolution demanding the immediate and unconditional removal of U.S. and British soldiers from Iraq.
In 2008, Bhutan officially becomes a democracy, with its first ever general election.
In 2014, A train overruns the buffers at Chicago O’Hare Airport station, injuring 32 people.
In 2015, Germanwings Flight 9525 crashes in the French Alps in an apparent mass murder-suicide, killing all 150 people on board
