24 June History
- 1314 - Scottish forces, led by Robert the Bruce, win an overwhelming victory against English King Edward II at the Battle of Bannockburn.
- 1340 - The English fleet defeats the French fleet at Sluys, off the Flemish coast.
- 1497 - Explorer John Cabot lands in North America in present-day Canada.
- 1509 - Henry VIII is crowned King of England.
- 1664 - The colony of New Jersey, named after the Isle of Jersey, is founded.
- 1647 - Margaret Brent, demands a voice and a vote for herself in the Maryland colonial assembly.
- 1675 - King Philip's War begins.
- 1812 - Napoleon crosses the Nieman River and invades Russia.
- 1859 - At the Battle of Solferino, also known as the Battle of the Three Sovereigns, the French army, led by Napoleon III, defeats the Austrian army under Franz Joseph I.
- 1861 - Federal gunboats attack Confederate batteries at Mathias Point, Virginia.
- 1862 - U.S. intervention saves the British and French at the Dagu forts in China.
- 1896 - Booker T. Washington becomes the first African American to receive an honorary MA degree from Harvard University.
- 1910 - The Japanese army invades Korea.
- 1913 - Greece and Serbia annul their alliance with Bulgaria following border disputes over Macedonia and Thrace.
- 1931 - The Soviet Union and Afghanistan sign a treaty of neutrality.
- 1940 - France signs an armistice with Italy.
- 1941 - President Franklin Roosevelt pledges all possible support to the Soviet Union.
- 1943 - Royal Air Force Bombers hammer Muelheim, Germany, in a drive to cripple the Ruhr industrial base.
- 1948 - The Soviet Union begins the Berlin Blockade, America responds with the Berlin Airlift.
- 1953 - John F. Kennedy and Jacqueline Bouvier announce their engagement.
- 1955 - Soviet MIG's down a U.S. Navy patrol plane over the Bering Strait.
- 1964 - The Federal Trade Commission announces that, starting in 1965, cigarette makers must include warning labels about the harmful effects of smoking.
- 1970 - The U.S. Senate votes overwhelmingly to repeal the Gulf of Tonkin Resolution
24 June Birthdays
- 1813 - Henry Ward Beecher, clergyman.
- 1842 - Ambrose Bierce, American writer and satirist (The Friend's Delight, The Devil's Dictionary).
- 1848 - Brooks Adams, American historian, son of Charles Francis Adams (The Law of Civilization and Decay).
- 1883 - Victor Francis Hess, physicist.
- 1895 - Jack Dempsey, American boxer and world heavyweight champion.
- 1901 - Harry Partch, composer.
- 1912 - Norman Cousins, editor of the Saturday Review.
- 1915 - Fred Hoyle, British mathematician and astronomer.
- 1916 - John Ciardi, poet.
- 1930 - Claude Chabrol, French film director (The Cousins, Madame Bovary).