Events on May 24 49
Year 919
The nobles of Franconia and Saxony elect Henry the Fowler at the Imperial Diet in Fritzlar as king of the East Frankish Kingdom.
Year 1487
The ten-year-old Lambert Simnel is crowned in Christ Church Cathedral, Dublin, Ireland, with the name of Edward VI in a bid to threaten King Henry VII's reign.
Year 1595
Nomenclator of Leiden University Library appears, the first printed catalog of an institutional library.
Year 1607
100 English settlers disembark in Jamestown, the first English colony in America.
Year 1667
The French Royal Army crosses the border into the Spanish Netherlands, starting the War of Devolution opposing France to the Spanish Empire and the Triple Alliance.
Year 1683
The Ashmolean Museum in Oxford, England, opens as the world's first university museum.
Year 1689
The English Parliament passes the Act of Toleration protecting dissenting Protestants but excluding Roman Catholics.
Year 1738
John Wesley is converted, essentially launching the Methodist movement; the day is celebrated annually by Methodists as Aldersgate Day and a church service is generally held on the preceding Sunday.
Year 1798
The Irish Rebellion of 1798 led by the United Irishmen against British rule begins.
Year 1813
South American independence leader Simón Bolívar enters Mérida, leading the invasion of Venezuela, and is proclaimed El Libertador ("The Liberator").
Year 1822
Battle of Pichincha: Antonio José de Sucre secures the independence of the Presidency of Quito.
Year 1844
Samuel Morse sends the message "What hath God wrought" (a biblical quotation, Numbers 23:23) from the Old Supreme Court Chamber in the United States Capitol to his assistant, Alfred Vail, in Baltimore, Maryland, to inaugurate a commercial telegraph line between Baltimore and Washington D.C.
Year 1856
John Brown and his men kill five slavery supporters at Pottawatomie Creek, Kansas.
Year 1883
The Brooklyn Bridge in New York City is opened to traffic after 14 years of construction.
Year 1915
World War I: Italy declares war on Austria-Hungary, joining the conflict on the side of the Allies.
Year 1930
Amy Johnson lands in Darwin, Northern Territory, becoming the first woman to fly solo from England to Australia (she left on May 5 for the 11,000 mile flight).
Year 1935
The first night game in Major League Baseball history is played in Cincinnati, Ohio, with the Cincinnati Reds beating the Philadelphia Phillies 2-1 at Crosley Field.
Year 1940
Acting on the orders of Soviet leader Joseph Stalin, NKVD agent Iosif Grigulevich orchestrates an unsuccessful assassination attempt on exiled Russian revolutionary Leon Trotsky in Coyoacán, Mexico.
Year 1941
World War II: In the Battle of the Atlantic, the German Battleship Bismarck sinks then-pride of the Royal Navy, HMS Hood, killing all but three crewmen.
Year 1948
Arab-Israeli War: Egypt captures the Israeli kibbutz of Yad Mordechai, but the five-day effort gives Israeli forces time to prepare enough to stop the Egyptian advance a week later.
Year 1958
United Press International is formed through a merger of the United Press and the International News Service.
Year 1960
Following the 1960 Valdivia earthquake, the largest ever recorded earthquake, Cordón Caulle begins to erupt.
Year 1961
American civil rights movement: Freedom Riders are arrested in Jackson, Mississippi, for "disturbing the peace" after disembarking from their bus.
Year 1962
Project Mercury: American astronaut Scott Carpenter orbits the Earth three times in the Aurora 7 space capsule.
Year 1976
The Judgment of Paris takes place in France, launching California as a worldwide force in the production of quality wine.
Year 1981
Ecuadorian president Jaime Roldós Aguilera, his wife, and his presidential committee die in an aircraft accident while travelling from Quito to Zapotillo minutes after the president gave a famous speech regarding the 24 de mayo anniversary of the Battle of Pichincha.
Year 1982
Liberation of Khorramshahr: Iranians recapture of the port city of Khorramshahr from the Iraqis during the Iran-Iraq War.
Year 1988
Section 28 of the United Kingdom's Local Government Act 1988, a controversial amendment stating that a local authority cannot intentionally promote homosexuality, is enacted.
Year 1992
The last Thai dictator, General Suchinda Kraprayoon, resigns following pro-democracy protests.
Year 1992
The ethnic cleansing in Kozarac, Bosnia and Herzegovina begins when Serbian militia and police forces enter the town.
Year 1994
Four men convicted of bombing the World Trade Center in New York in 1993 are each sentenced to 240 years in prison.
Year 1999
The International Criminal Tribunal for the former Yugoslavia in The Hague, Netherlands indicts Slobodan Milošević and four others for war crimes and crimes against humanity committed in Kosovo.
Year 2014
A 6.4 magnitude earthquake occurs in the Aegean Sea between Greece and Turkey, injuring 324 people.
Year 2014
At least three people are killed in a shooting at Brussels' Jewish Museum of Belgium.