April 24 is the 114th day of the year (115th in leap years) in the Gregorian calendar. There are 251 days remaining until the end of the year.
1704 - The first regular newspaper in Colonial America, the News-Letter, is published in Boston, Massachusetts.
1800 – The Library of Congress in Washington, DC opens.
1877 – Russo-Turkish War: Russia declares war on the Ottoman Empire.
1885 - American sharpshooter Annie Oakley is hired to be part of Buffalo Bill's Wild West.
1895 - Joshua Slocum sets sail from Boston, Massachusetts on his boat Spray, on his way to becoming the first person to sail single-handedly around the world.
1898 – The Spanish-American War begins.
1904 - The Lithuanian press ban ends after over 40 years.
1915 – The arrest of 250 Armenian intellectuals and community leaders in Istanbul marks the beginning of the Armenian Genocide.
1916 – The Irish Easter Rising begins in Dublin.
1926 - The Treaty of Berlin is signed. Germany and the Soviet Union each pledge neutrality in the event of an attack on the other, for the next five years.
1933 - Nazi Germany begins with the persecution of Jehovah's Witnesses by shutting down the Watch Tower Society in Magdeburg.
1953 – Winston Churchill is knighted by Queen Elizabeth II.
1965 - A civil war starts in the Dominican Republic.
1967 – Soviet cosmonaut Vladimir Komarov
dies in Soyuz 1 when his parachute fails to open.
1974 - President of Austria Franz Jonas dies in office aged 74, following a long period of illness.
1990 – Gruinard Island in Scotland is declared free of Anthrax.
1990 – STS-31: The Hubble Space Telescope is launched from Space Shuttle Discovery.
1993 - An Irish Republican Army bomb hits the Bishopsgate area of London.
2004 - The United States lifts (ends) economic sanctions on
Libya.
Bangladesh, collapses. Over 2,500 are injured.
Born on this date: 1533 – William I of Orange (d. 1584) 1777 - Maria Clementina of Austria 1829 - James Sheakley, Territorial Governor of Alaska (d. 1917)