I made a mistake today and loaded in the notes for tomorrow instead – nothing like forgetting what day it was. Below you can find the right information for the history of March 24th. I will also go back and make notations for the previous post.

Leading off is news from Great Britain. In 1199 King Richard I (Lionheart)was wounded by a crossbow bolt while fighting in France which lead to his death on April 6th. In 1603 James VI of Scotland was proclaimed James I of England upon the death of Queen Elizabeth I. In 1765 Parliament riled up the American colonists by passing the Quartering Act, and in 1829 they pleased their Catholic citizens by passing the Roman Catholic Relief Act to allow Catholics to serve in Parliament.

South of the border President Jose Gregorio Monagas abolished slavery in Venezuela in 1854, a decade before the US, while further south in Argentina Isabel Peron was ousted in a military coup, something that unfortunately has been an all-too-frequent occurrence in South America.

In other events, Robert Koch announced the discovery of the bacterium responsible for tuberculosis in 1882, which eventually led to its eradication. In 1921 the first Women’s Olympiad began in Monte Carlo, the first international women’s sports event. And in 2018 students all across the US staged the March for Our Lives to call for greater gun control in the wake of the Stoneman High School shootings in Parkland, Florida.

Figures who joined us on this date included: John Wesley Powell (1834) American soldier, geologist, and explorer who led the first expedition of the Grand Canyon; Hungarian-American magician Harry Houdini (1874); New York governor and twice unsuccessful Republican Presidential candidate Thomas E Dewey(1902); and “Great Escape” actor Steve McQueen (1930).

Those leaving us this date in history include Queen Elizabeth I of England (1603); American poet Henry Wadsworth Longfellow(1882); French science fiction writer Jules Verne (1905) one of my favorite authors; and English W76WII Field Marshall Bernard Montgomery (1976).

Among other designations for the date are World Tuberculosis Day and National Tree Planting Day in Uganda