January 1 » Nigeria becomes a British protectorate.
May 3 » The Great Fire of 1901 begins in Jacksonville, Florida.
June 11 » The boundaries of the Colony of New Zealand are extended by the UK to include the Cook Islands.
August 14 » The first claimed powered flight, by Gustave Whitehead in his Number 21.
August 28 » Silliman University is founded in the Philippines. It is the first American private school in the country.
December 12 » Guglielmo Marconi receives the first transatlantic radio signal (the letter "S" [***] in Morse Code), at Signal Hill in St John's, Newfoundland.
Day of death February 24, 1963
The temperature on February 24, 1963 was between -14.1 °C and 1.1 °C and averaged -6.3 °C. There was 8.3 hours of sunshine (79%). The average windspeed was 2 Bft (weak wind) and was prevailing from the northeast. Source: KNMI
January 2 » Vietnam War: The Viet Cong wins its first major victory, at the Battle of Ap Bac.
February 19 » The publication of Betty Friedan's The Feminine Mystique reawakens the feminist movement in the United States as women's organizations and consciousness raising groups spread.
March 21 » Alcatraz Federal Penitentiary (in California) closes.
June 11 » Buddhist monk Thích Quảng Đức burns himself with gasoline in a busy Saigon intersection to protest the lack of religious freedom in South Vietnam.
July 7 » Buddhist crisis: The police of Ngô Đình Nhu, brother and chief political adviser of President Ngo Dinh Diem, attacked a group of American journalists who were covering a protest.
October 18 » Félicette, a black and white female Parisian stray cat becomes the first cat launched into space.
When copying data from this family tree, please include a reference to the origin: Wesley Brown, "The Brown Tree", database, Genealogy Online (https://www.genealogieonline.nl/the-brown-tree/P7435.php : accessed January 17, 2026), "William "Billy" Thorne (± 1883-1963)".
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