Holidays Calendar for August 24, 2026
Independence Day in Ukraine is celebrated on August 24. On that day in 1991, Ukraine officially declared its independence from the Soviet Union.
National Flag Day is one of the public holidays in Liberia. It is celebrated on August 24 to commemorate the adoption of the Liberian flag in 1847.
The day before Uruguay’s Independence Day, Uruguayans celebrate Nostalgia Night (Noche de la nostalgia). On August 24, many broadcasting stations and dancing clubs in Uruguay play oldies, and a lot of people attend nostalgic dance parties that last the whole night long.
International Strange Music Day is an unusual holiday celebrated on August 24. It was created by Patrick Grant, a New York City-based American composer.
Television Day (Hari Televisi) is observed in Indonesia annually on August 24. It commemorates the first broadcast of Televisi Republik Indonesia (TVRI), Indonesia’s first television network. Due to this, Television Day is also known as TVRI’s founding anniversary.
Malaysia is a federal state where the birthdays of state rulers (both hereditary monarchs and appointed governors) are official holidays in the respective states. For example, the birthday of the governor of Malacca is celebrated on August 24.
August 24 is the National Peach Pie Day. This food holiday is a perfect excuse to indulge yourself with a slice or two of delicious pie with peaches.
Many countries have designated various day as celebrations of certain types of food and dishes. The United States probably has more food days than any other country in the world. For example, on August 24 every year many Americans treat themselves to delicious waffles in honor of National Waffle Day.
This Day in History
- 2021 Died: Charlie Watts, English musician who was the drummer of the Rolling Stones from 1963 until his death. He has been ranked among the greatest drummers of all time.
- 2014 A 6.0 earthquake occurred in and around the city of Napa, California. It killed one person, injured about 200 and caused over $400 million in damage.
- 2014 Died: Leonid Stadnyk, Ukrainian man who was formerly listed as the world's tallest living man according to Guinness World Records.
- 2013 Died: Julie Harris, American stage, film and television actress. She won five Tony Awards, three Emmy Awards and a Grammy Award.
- 2006 The International Astronomical Union re-defined the term "planet". According to the new definition, Pluto is considered a dwarf planet.
- 2006 Died: Rocco Petrone, Italian American engineer who served as the third director of the NASA's Marshall Space Flight Center.
- 2004 Two domestic Russian passenger aircraft crashed almost simultaneously due to terrorist attacks, killing 99 people on board of both planes.
- 1997 Born: Alan Walker, Norwegian DJ and record producer. His popular singles include "Sing Me to Sleep", "Alone", "Tired", "The Spectre", "All Falls Down", "Darkside", "Diamond Heart", and more.
- 1995 Microsoft released Windows 95, which moved from a mainly 16-bit architecture to a pre-emptively multitasked 32-bit architecture.
- 1990 Born: Elizabeth Debicki, Australian actress. Australian actress. She is known for starring in The Night Manager and gained wider recognition for her portrayal of Diana, Princess of Wales in The Crown.
- 1990 Died: Sergei Dovlatov, Russian and later American journalist and writer. He was forced to emigrate from the Soviet Union in 1979.
- 1988 Born: Rupert Grint, English actor of stage and screen who rose to prominence due to his role as Ron Weasley in the Harry Potter film series.
- 1981 Born: Chad Michael Murray, American actor, writer, and former model. He is best known for playing the lead role of Lucas Scott in The WB/CW teen drama series One Tree Hill.
- 1981 Mark Chapman was sentenced to 20-years-to-life in prison for murdering John Lennon. All his subsequent parole applications were denied.
- 1979 Died: Hanna Reitsch, German aviatrix, Nazi test pilot, and the only woman awarded the Iron Cross First Class during the Second World War.
- 1975 Born: James D'Arcy, English actor and film director. He is known for his portrayals of Howard Stark's butler, Edwin Jarvis, in the MCU television series Agent Carter and the 2019 film Avengers: Endgame.
- 1967 Died: Henry J. Kaiser, American industrialist who is regarded as the father of modern American shipbuilding. He established the Kaiser Shipyards.
- 1964 Born: Salizhan Sharipov, Kyrgyz cosmonaut of Uzbek descent. He has been to space twice and has conducted two spacewalks.
- 1962 Born: David Koechner, American actor and comedian best known for his roles as Champ Kind in Anchorman and Todd Packer in The Office.
- 1961 Died: Günter Litfin, German tailor known as the first person to be shot to death whilst attempting to escape across the Berlin Wall.
- 1957 Born: Stephen Fry, English actor, comedian, writer, journalist, film director, broadcaster and activist. He is known for his collaborations with Hugh Laurie.
- 1951 Born: Orson Scott Card, American writer known best for his science fiction works. He is (as of 2024) the only person to have won a Hugo Award and a Nebula Award in consecutive years.
- 1949 The North Atlantic Treaty came into effect. It established the North Atlantic Treaty Organization (NATO), also called the North Atlantic Alliance.
- 1948 Born: Jean Michel Jarre, French composer, musician and record producer. He is a pioneer in the electronic, ambient, and new-age genres.
- 1947 Born: Paulo Coelho, Brazilian novelist and lyricist. His best-known novels include The Alchemist, Veronika Decides to Die, and The Devil and Miss Prym.
- 1945 Born: Ken Hensley, English musician, singer-songwriter and record producer best known for his work with the hard rock band Uriah Heep.
- 1927 Born: Harry Markowitz, American economist who was awarded the 1990 Nobel Memorial Prize in Economic Sciences, sharing it with two colleagues.
- 1899 Born: Jorge Luis Borges, Argentine short-story writer, essayist, poet and translator regarded as a key figure in the Spanish language literature.
- 1899 Born: Albert Claude, Belgian medical doctor and cell biologist who was co-awarded the 1974 Nobel Prize in Physiology or Medicine.
- 1853 George Crum, a cook at Moon's Lake House, Saratoga Springs, New York, became the first to cook potato chips, trying to appease a customer.
- 1832 Died: Nicolas Léonard Sadi Carnot, French physicist and military engineer who is often referred to as the "father of thermodynamics".
- 1815 King William I of the Netherlands issued the New Constitution of the Netherlands, which established a constitutional monarchy in the country.
- 1679 Died: Jean François Paul de Gondi, French churchman, memoirist and agitator in the Fronde, a series of civil wars in France against the king.
- 1595 Died: Thomas Digges, English mathematician and astronomer. He was the first to expound the Copernican heliocentrism in English.
- 1572 During the massacre known as the St. Bartholomew's Day massacre, from 5,000 to 30,000 Huguenots were killed in Paris and French provinces.
- 79 Mount Vesuvius erupted, burying the Roman settlements of Pompeii and Herculaneum underneath massive pyroclastic surges and ashfall deposits.