August 9 birthdays & history

Famous people born on August 9

• 1963Whitney Houston, American singer-songwriter, producer, and actress
• 1896Jean Piaget, Swiss psychologist and philosopher
• 1968Gillian Anderson, American-British actress, activist and writer
• 1939Romano Prodi, Italian academic and politician, 52nd Prime Minister of Italy
• 1776Amedeo Avogadro, Italian physicist and chemist
• 1914Tove Jansson, Finnish author and illustrator
• 1972Juanes, Colombian singer and songwriter
• 1985Anna Kendrick, American actress and singer
• 1911William Alfred Fowler, American astronomer and astrophysicist, Nobel Laureate
• 1976Audrey Tautou, French model and actress

What happened on August 9

• 1821A statue of the Polynesian god A'a was presented to members of the London Missionary Society on the south Pacific island of Ra'iatea.
• 1842The Webster–Ashburton Treaty is signed, establishing the United States–Canada border east of the Rocky Mountains.
• 1854American Transcendentalist philosopher Henry David Thoreau publishes his memoir Walden.
• 1892Thomas Edison receives a patent for a two-way telegraph.
• 1897The first meeting of the International Congress of Mathematicians was held in Zürich, Switzerland.
• 1902In a ceremony at Westminster Abbey, Edward VII and Alexandra were crowned King and Queen of the United Kingdom and the British Dominions, and Emperor and Empress of India.
• 1902Edward VII and Alexandra of Denmark are crowned King and Queen of the United Kingdom of Great Britain and Ireland.
• 1907The first Boy Scout encampment concludes at Brownsea Island in southern England.
• 1934The Blue Lotus, the fifth volume of The Adventures of Tintin by the Belgian cartoonist Hergé and noted for its emphasis on countering negative misconceptions of Chinese people, began serialisation.
• 1936Summer Olympics: Jesse Owens wins his fourth gold medal at the games.
• 1944The United States Forest Service authorized the use of Smokey Bear as its mascot to replace Bambi.
• 1988Wayne Gretzky was traded from the Edmonton Oilers to the Los Angeles Kings in one of the most controversial player transactions in ice hockey history.

Also observed on August 9

• International Day of the World's Indigenous Peoples (United Nations)
• Meyboom (Brussels and Leuven, Belgium)
• National Day, celebrates the independence of Singapore from Malaysia in 1965.
• National Peacekeepers' Day, celebrated on Sunday closest to the day (Canada)
• National Women's Day (South Africa)
• Day of the Finnish art, also birthday of Tove Jansson (Finland)