On this day: September 24

Events on September 24

• 787 The Second Council of Nicaea begins at the Church of Holy Wisdom in the city of Nicaea in Bithynia. Wikipedia
• 1568 At San Juan de Ulúa (present-day Veracruz, Mexico), a Spanish naval fleet forced English privateers to halt their trade. Wikipedia
• 1645 English Civil War: Royalists commanded by King Charles I suffered a significant defeat at the Battle of Rowton Heath. Wikipedia
• 1674 Second Tantrik Coronation of Shivaji. Wikipedia
• 1789 The Judiciary Act of 1789 was signed into law, establishing the U.S. federal judiciary and setting the number of Supreme Court justices at six. Wikipedia
• 1841 Raja Muda Hashim, the uncle of Omar Ali Saifuddin II, Sultan of Brunei, conceded land to the British adventurer James Brooke to establish the Raj of Sarawak. Wikipedia
• 1869 Jay Gould, James Fisk, and other speculators plotted but failed to control the United States gold market, causing prices to plummet. Wikipedia
• 1877 At the Battle of Shiroyama, the final engagement of the Satsuma Rebellion, the Imperial Japanese Army defeated rebel samurai of the Satsuma Domain led by Saigō Takamori. Wikipedia
• 1890 Wilford Woodruff, the president of the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints, wrote the first draft of a manifesto that officially disavowed the future practice of plural marriage. Wikipedia
• 1903 Alfred Deakin became the second Australian prime minister, succeeding Edmund Barton, who left office to become a founding justice of the High Court of Australia. Wikipedia
• 1911 His Majesty's Airship No. 1, Britain's first rigid airship, was wrecked by strong winds before her maiden flight at Barrow-in-Furness. Wikipedia
• 1941 Operation Barbarossa: A Wehrmacht training event known as the Mogilev Conference began, marking an increase in violence against Jews and other civilians in the areas under General Max von Schenckendorff's command. Wikipedia
• 1945 Dozens of Jews were injured in the Topoľčany pogrom, one of the worst episodes of anti-Jewish violence in postwar Czechoslovakia. Wikipedia
• 1946 Cathay Pacific Airways is founded in Hong Kong. Wikipedia
• 1948 The Honda Motor Company is founded. Wikipedia
• 1950 The "Great Smoke Pall", generated by the Chinchaga fire, the largest recorded fire in North American history, was first recorded in present-day Nunavut and may eventually have circled the entire globe. Wikipedia
• 1964 The Warren Commission released its report to the U.S. president, concluding that Lee Harvey Oswald acted alone in the assassination of John F. Kennedy. Wikipedia
• 1975 Dougal Haston and Doug Scott of the Southwest Face expedition became the first people to reach the summit of Mount Everest by ascending one of its faces. Wikipedia
• 1992 After his neighbor identified handwriting samples placed on local billboards by police, Oba Chandler was arrested three years after he committed a triple murder in the Tampa Bay area in Florida. Wikipedia
• 1993 Norodom Sihanouk became King of Cambodia with the restoration of the monarchy after a 23-year interregnum. Wikipedia
• 1996 Representatives of 71 nations sign the Comprehensive Nuclear-Test-Ban Treaty at the United Nations. Wikipedia
• 2007 Between 30,000 and 100,000 people take part in anti-government protests in Yangon, Burma, the largest in 20 years. Wikipedia
• 2008 Thabo Mbeki resigns as president of South Africa. Wikipedia
• 2014 The Mars Orbiter Mission makes India the first Asian nation to reach Mars orbit, and the first nation in the world to do so in its first attempt. Wikipedia
• 2015 At least 1,100 people are killed and another 934 wounded after a stampede during the Hajj in Saudi Arabia. Wikipedia
• 2019 The Supreme Court of the United Kingdom unanimously ruled that advice given by Prime Minister Boris Johnson to Queen Elizabeth II that Parliament should be prorogued was unlawful. Wikipedia

Born on September 24

• 15 Vitellius, Roman emperor (died 69) Wikipedia
• 1501 Gerolamo Cardano, Italian mathematician, physician, and astrologer (died 1576) Wikipedia
• 1583 Albrecht von Wallenstein, Bohemian general (died 1634) Wikipedia
• 1717 Horace Walpole, English historian, author, and politician (died 1797) Wikipedia
• 1755 John Marshall, American Continental Army officer, jurist, and politician, 4th Chief Justice of the United States Supreme Court (died 1835) Wikipedia
• 1801 Mikhail Ostrogradsky, Ukrainian-Russian mathematician and physicist (died 1862) Wikipedia
• 1878 Charles-Ferdinand Ramuz, Swiss author and poet (died 1947) Wikipedia
• 1884 İsmet İnönü, Turkish general and politician, 2nd President of Turkey (died 1973) Wikipedia
• 1895 André Frédéric Cournand, French physician and physiologist, Nobel Prize laureate (died 1988) Wikipedia
• 1896 F. Scott Fitzgerald, American novelist and short story writer (died 1940) Wikipedia
• 1898 Howard Florey, Australian pharmacologist and pathologist, Nobel Prize laureate (died 1968) Wikipedia
• 1905 Severo Ochoa, Spanish–American physician and biochemist, Nobel Prize laureate (died 1993) Wikipedia
• 1911 Konstantin Chernenko, Soviet politician, General Secretary of the Communist Party and de facto leader of the USSR (died 1985) Wikipedia
• 1930 John W. Young, American captain, engineer, and astronaut (died 2018) Wikipedia
• 1936 Jim Henson, American puppeteer, director, producer, and screenwriter, created The Muppets (died 1990) Wikipedia
• 1941 Linda McCartney, American singer, photographer, and activist (died 1998) Wikipedia
• 1954 Marco Tardelli, Italian footballer and coach Wikipedia
• 1954 Ashton B. Carter, American military civilian official (Secretary of Defense, 2015-17), and academic administrator Wikipedia
• 1958 Kevin Sorbo, American actor and producer Wikipedia
• 1976 Stephanie McMahon, American wrestler and businesswoman Wikipedia
• 1980 John Arne Riise, Norwegian footballer Wikipedia
• 1991 Oriol Romeu, Spanish footballer Wikipedia

Died on September 24

• 366 Pope Liberius Wikipedia
• 768 Pepin the Short, Frankish king (born 714) Wikipedia
• 1143 Pope Innocent II Wikipedia
• 1180 Manuel I Komnenos, Byzantine emperor (born 1118) Wikipedia
• 1435 Isabeau of Bavaria (born 1370) Wikipedia
• 1459 Eric of Pomerania, King of Norway, Denmark and Sweden (born 1382) Wikipedia
• 1494 Poliziano, Italian poet and scholar (born 1454) Wikipedia
• 1541 Paracelsus, German-Swiss physician, botanist, and chemist (born 1493) Wikipedia
• 1802 Alexander Radishchev, Russian author and critic (born 1749) Wikipedia
• 1834 Pedro I of Brazil (born 1798) Wikipedia
• 1904 Niels Ryberg Finsen, Faroese-Danish physician and author, Nobel Prize laureate (born 1860) Wikipedia
• 1945 Hans Geiger, German physicist and academic, co-invented the Geiger counter (born 1882) Wikipedia
• 1991 Dr. Seuss, American children's book writer, poet, and illustrator (born 1904) Wikipedia
• 2004 Françoise Sagan, French author and screenwriter (born 1935) Wikipedia

Holidays and observances

• Armed Forces Day (Peru) Wikipedia
• Christian feast day: Anathalon (in Brescia) Wikipedia
• Christian feast day: Antonio Gonzalez Wikipedia
• Christian feast day: Blessed Anton Martin Slomšek Wikipedia
• Christian feast day: Bystrík Wikipedia
• Christian feast day: Blessed Colomba Gabriel Wikipedia
• Christian feast day: Blessed Émilie Gamelin (Canada) Wikipedia
• Christian feast day: Gerard of Csanád Wikipedia
• Christian feast day: Our Lady of Mercy and its related observance: La Mercè (Barcelona) Wikipedia
• Christian feast day: Our Lady of Ransom (Mercedarians) Wikipedia
• Christian feast day: Our Lady of Walsingham (Church of England) Wikipedia
• Christian feast day: Pacificus of San Severino Wikipedia
• Christian feast day: Rupert of Salzburg Wikipedia
• Christian feast day: Blessed William Spenser Wikipedia
• Christian feast day: September 24 (Eastern Orthodox liturgics). Wikipedia
• Constitution Day (Cambodia) Wikipedia
• Heritage Day (South Africa) Wikipedia
• Independence Day, celebrates the independence of Guinea-Bissau from Portugal in 1973. Wikipedia
• Mahidol Day (Thailand) Wikipedia
• New Caledonia Day (New Caledonia) Wikipedia
• Republic Day (Trinidad and Tobago) Wikipedia

Sources

• Wikipedia — “September 24” — events, births, deaths and observances (text under CC BY-SA 4.0) (checked 2026-10-15)
• Wikipedia — “Selected anniversaries/September 24” — the anniversaries editors chose for the date and the article each one is about (checked 2026-10-15)
• Wikidata — in how many language editions each entry's own article exists, used to fill the lists (CC0) (checked 2026-10-15)
• vacanza/holidays (open-source holiday rules, MIT licence) — holiday rules used to build the lists (checked 2026-10-15)

The events, births, deaths and observances above are from the English Wikipedia article “September 24” and the articles it links to (authors and history), retrieved 2026-10-15 through the Wikimedia “On this day” feed. They are licensed under CC BY-SA 4.0; this selection is shared under the same licence. Every anniversary that Wikipedia's editors selected for September 24 stays on the list; the remaining places, up to 26 events, 22 births and 14 deaths, go to the entries whose own article — about the event itself, or else the person or thing it is about — appears in the most language editions (counted from Wikidata); an article about a person or thing, which covers far more than one day, counts half. An entry with no article of its own counts, also at half, by the least covered article it links, and one that links only places counts for nothing. Each list runs by year, and the wording is unchanged apart from removing references to pictures, audio and video.