| August 24 |
| 79 |
|
Mount Vesuvius erupts destroying Pompeii, Stabiae, Herculaneum and other smaller settlements. |
| 410 |
|
German barbarians sack Rome. |
| 1542 |
|
In South America, Gonzalo Pizarro returns to the mouth of the Amazon River after having sailed the length of the great river as far as the Andes Mountains. |
| 1572 |
|
Some 50,000 people are put to death in the 'Massacre of St. Bartholomew' as Charles IX of France attempts to rid the country of Huguenots. |
| 1780 |
|
King Louis XVI abolishes torture as a means to get suspects to confess. |
| 1814 |
|
British troops under General Robert Ross capture Washington, D.C., which they set on fire in retaliation for the American burning of the parliament building in York (Toronto), the capital of Upper Canada. |
| 1847 |
|
Charlotte Bronte, using the pseudonym Currer Bell, sends a manuscript of Jane Eyre to her publisher in London. |
| 1869 |
|
Cornelius Swarthout of Troy, New York, patents the waffle iron. |
| 1891 |
|
Thomas Edison files a patent for the motion picture camera. |
| 1894 |
|
Congress passes the first graduated income tax law, which is declared unconstitutional the next year. |
| 1896 |
|
Thomas Brooks is shot and killed by an unknown assailant begining a six year feud with the McFarland family. |
| 1912 |
|
By an act of Congress, Alaska is given a territorial legislature of two houses. |
| 1942 |
|
In the battle of the Eastern Solomons, the third carrier-versus-carrier battle of the war, U.S. naval forces defeat a Japanese force attempting to screen reinforcements for the Guadalcanal fighting. |
| 1948 |
|
Edith Mae Irby becomes the first African-American student to attend the University of Arkansas. |
| 1954 |
|
Congress outlaws the Communist Party in the United States. |
|
Born on August 24 |
| 1810 |
|
Theodore Parker, anti-slavery movement leader. |
| 1890 |
|
Jean Rhys, writer (Wild Sargasso Sea). |
| 1895 |
|
Richard Cushing, the director of the Society for the Propagation of the Faith. |
| 1898 |
|
Malcolm Cowley, poet, translator, literary critic and social historian. |
| 1899 |
|
Jorge Luis Borges, Argentine writer (Ficciones). |
| 1905 |
|
Arthur "Big Boy" Crudup, blues singer, a major influence on Elvis Presley. |
| 1915 |
|
Alice H.B. Sheldon, science fiction writer and artist, CIA photo-intelligence operative, lecturer at American University and major in the U.S. Army Air Force. |
| 1929 |
|
Yasir Arafat, leader of the Palestinian Liberation Movement. |
| 1951 |
|
Oscar Hijeulos, novelist (The Mambo Kings Play Songs of Love). |
| |
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