1909 - Definition and Overview

Events

• January 16 - Ernest Shackleton's expedition finds the magnetic South Pole.
• January 28 - United States troops leave Cuba after being there since the Spanish-American War.
• February 12 - The National Association for the Advancement of Colored People (NAACP) is founded.
• February 23 - The Silver Dart makes the first powered flight in Canada and the British Empire.
• February 24 - The Hudson Motor Car Company is founded.
• March 4 - End of term for Theodore Roosevelt, 26th President of the United States. He is succeeded by William Howard Taft.
• March 18 - Einar Dessau uses a short-wave radio transmitter becoming the first to broadcast as a ham radio operator.
• March 23 - Theodore Roosevelt leaves New York for a post-presidency safari in Africa. The trip was sponsored by the Smithsonian Institution and National Geographic Society.
• March 31 - Serbia accepts Austrian control over Bosnia-Herzegovina.

April-June

• April 6 - Robert Peary allegedly reaches the North Pole.
• April 27 - Sultan of the Ottoman Empire Abdul Hamid II is overthrown and succeeded by his brother, Muhammad V. He leaves the country the next day.
• June 1 - The Alaska-Yukon-Pacific Exposition opens in Seattle.
• June 9 – Alice Huyler Ramsey, a 22-year-old housewife and mother from Hackensack, New Jersey, became the first woman to drive across the United States. With three female companions, none of whom could drive a car, for fifty-nine days she drove a Maxwell automobile the 3,800 miles from Manhattan, New York to San Francisco, California.
• June 15 - Representatives from England, Australia and South Africa meet at Lords and form the Imperial Cricket Conference.
• June 22 - Construction begins on the Cape Cod Canal, which would separate Cape Cod from mainland Massachusetts, United States.

July-September

• July 13 - Gold discovered near Cochrane, Ontario.
• July 16 - A revolution forces Mohammad Ali Shah, Persian Shah of the Qajar dynasty to abdicate in favor of his son Ahmad Shah Qajar. He proceeds in leaving Persia for Imperial Russia, reportedly seeking the assistance of Nicholas II of Russia in regaining the throne.
• July 25 - Louis Bleriot is the first man to fly across the English Channel in a heavier-than-air craft.
• September 9 - Comet Halley first recorded on a photographic plate.
• September 10-21 – Hurricane sweeps over Louisiana and Mississippi - 350 dead
• September 25 – Auroras seen in Singapore.

October-December

• October 2 - The first rugby football match played in Twickenham
• November 11 - US Navy founds a navy base in Pearl Harbor, Hawaii
• November 13 - Ballinger-Pinchot scandal begins: Collier's magazine accuses US Secretary of the Interior Richard Ballinger of questionable dealings in Alaskan coal fields.
• November 18 - Two United States warships are sent to Nicaragua after 500 revolutionaries (including two Americans) are executed by order of dictator Jose Santos Zelaya.
• December 17 - Leopold II of Belgium dies and is succeeded by his nephew Albert I of Belgium.

• William Dickson Boyce, a United States businessman visiting London, England, United Kingdom of Great Britain and Ireland is introduced to members of the Scouting movement. The following year Boyce becomes founder of the Boy Scouts of America.
• Karl Landsteiner develops system of blood groups.
• Leon's, a Canadian furniture chain is first opened.
• Britain introduces Minimum Wage Laws.
• Old age pensions in Britain
• Paul Ehrlich creates the Salvarsan treatment for syphilis
• Mohorovicic discontinuity discovered
• Centennial anniversary of Miami University (Ohio)

Births

• January 1 - Barry Goldwater, American politician (d. 1998)
• January 3 - Victor Borge, Danish entertainer (d. 2000)
• January 5 - Stephen Cole Kleene, American mathematician (d. 1994)
• January 8 - Willy Millowitsch, actor (d. 1999)
• January 15 - Jean Bugatti, automobile designer (d. 1939)
• January 15 - Gene Krupa, drummer (d. 1973)
• January 16 - Ethel Merman, singer, actress (d. 1984)
• January 19 - Hans Hotter, German bass-baritone (d. 2003)
• January 22 - U Thant, 3rd United Nations Secretary General (d. 1974)
• January 22 - Ann Sothern, actress (d. 2001)
• February 3 - Simone Weil, philosopher (d. 1943)
• February 9 - Dean Rusk, United States Secretary of State (d. 1994)
• February 9 - Carmen Miranda, actress, singer (d. 1955)
• February 11 - Joseph Mankiewicz, filmmaker (d. 1993)
• February 11 - Max Baer (The Livermore Larruper), American boxer/actor (d. 1959)
• February 15 - Guillermo Gorostiza Paredes, Spanish football player (d. 1966)
• February 15 - Miep Gies (Hermine Santrouschitz), Anne Frank friend, biographer
• February 24 - August Derleth, American writer (d. 1971)
• February 26 - King Talal, King of Jordan (d.1972)
• March 1 - David Niven, actor (d. 1983)
• March 2 - Mel Ott, Baseball Hall of Famer (d. 1958)
• March 4 - Harry Helmsley, real estate entrepreneur (d. 1997)
• March 19 - Louis Hayward, actor (d. 1985)
• March 22 - Gabrielle Roy, author (d. 1983)
• March 24 - Clyde Barrow, half of American criminal duo (d. 1934)
• March 27 - Golo Mann, historian and publicist (d. 1994)
• April 13 - Stanislaw Marcin Ulam, Polish/American mathematician (d. 1984)
• April 30 - Juliana of the Netherlands (d. 2004)
• May 7 - Edwin H. Land, inventor and founder of Polaroid (d. 1991)
• May 10 - Mother Maybelle Carter, country musician (d. 1978)
• May 15 - James Mason, British actor (d. 1984)
• May 19 - Bruce Bennett, actor
• May 30 - Benny Goodman, American jazz musician (d. 1986)
• June 14 - Burl Ives, singer (d. 1995)
• June 17 - Elmer Lee Andersen, governor of Minnesota (d. 2004)
• June 20 - Errol Flynn, Australian actor (d. 1959)
• July 18 - Mohammed Daoud Khan, Afghan president (d. 1978)
• July 28 - Malcolm Lowry, British novelist (d. 1957)
• July 30 - C. Northcote Parkinson, British historian and author (d. 1993)
• August 9 - Adam von Trott zu Solz, lawyer, diplomat (d. 1944)
• August 25 - Ruby Keeler, singer, actress (d. 1993)
• August 25 - Michael Rennie, actor (d. 1971)
• August 26 - Jim Davis, actor (d. 1981)
• September 14 - Peter Scott, British ornithologist and painter (d. 1989)
• September 21 - Kwame Nkrumah, Ghanian politician (d. 1972)
• September 28 - Al Capp, American cartoonist (d. 1979)
• October 14 - Bernd Rosemeyer, race car driver (d. 1938)
• October 24 - Bill Carr, American athlete (d. 1966)
• October 28 - Francis Bacon, British painter (d. 1992)
• November 4 - Skeeter Webb, Professional Baseball Player (d. 1986)
• November 10 - Paweł Jasienica, Polish historian (d. 1970)
• November 18 - Johnny Mercer, American songwriter (d. 1976)
• November 23 - Nigel Tranter, Scottish historian, writer (d. 2000)
• November 24 - Gerhard Gentzen, German mathematician (d. 1945)
• November 27 - James Agee, American writer (d. 1955)
• December 23 - Barney Ross, American boxing champion (d. 1967)
• Giulio Racah, Italian mathematician and physicist (d. 1965)

Deaths

• January 12 - Hermann Minkowski, German mathematician (b. 1864)
• January 14 - Arthur William a Beckett, British journalist (b. 1844)
• April 10 - Algernon Charles Swinburne, English poet (b. 1837)
• May 19 - Isaac Albéniz, Spanish composer (b. 1860)
• August 27 - Emil Christian Hansen, Danish fermentation physiologist (b. 1842)
• December 17 - Leopold II of Belgium (b. 1835)

Nobel Prizes

• Physics - Guglielmo Marconi, Carl Ferdinand Braun for the development of wireless telegraphy (radio)
• Chemistry - Wilhelm Ostwald for his work on catalysis, chemical equilibria, and reaction velocities
• Medicine - Emil Theodor Kocher for his work on the physiology, pathology, and surgery of the thyroid gland
• Literature - Selma Lagerlöf
• Peace - Auguste Marie Francois Beernaert and Paul-Henri-Benjamin d'Estournelles de Constant