99 Fun Facts About August Fun Facts and

The Senate named August after Augustus partly because that month had brought him which conquest?

Egypt came under Roman rule in that month, the Senate's decree noted, so Augustus took it for his name rather than September, the month of his birth.

What was August called in the early Roman calendar, when the year began in March?

Sextilis means 'sixth'; the name outlived the calendar change that made it the eighth month and lasted until the Senate renamed it for the emperor.

August's best-known birthstone is which yellow-green gem?

Peridot has often passed for emerald: the big green gems on the Shrine of the Three Kings in Cologne Cathedral, long believed to be emeralds, are in fact peridots.

Which flower, nicknamed the sword lily, is a birth flower of August?

Gladiolus is Latin for 'little sword', a name earned by its blade-shaped leaves; the poppy shares the month with it.

The two Western zodiac signs that fall in August are Virgo and which other?

Leo the sign runs from about 23 July to 22 August, but Earth's slow wobble has shifted the sky since those dates were set: the Sun now crosses Leo's stars from 10 August to mid-September.

Which meteor shower, peaking in mid-August, comes from debris left by Comet Swift-Tuttle?

The Perseids take their name from the constellation Perseus, the point they seem to streak from; the dust was shed by Comet Swift-Tuttle on its 133-year orbit.

The hot, sultry 'dog days' of August are named after the rising of which star?

Sirius, the Dog Star, returned to the dawn sky in high summer; its Greek name is said to mean 'scorcher', and the Greeks blamed it for heat, fever and mad dogs.

On the last Wednesday of August, crowds in Buñol, Spain, pelt one another with which fruit?

Tomatoes are the ammunition at La Tomatina, which is said to have begun in 1945 when a scuffle at a town parade spilled over into a vegetable stall.

Which Japanese city was hit by the first atomic bomb used in war, on 6 August 1945?

Hiroshima was bombed by the B-29 Enola Gay; three days later Nagasaki was hit only because cloud and smoke hid the crew's first choice, Kokura.

Which August 1969 music festival was held on Max Yasgur's dairy farm, miles from the town it was named after?

Woodstock kept its name though it never played there: the town of Wallkill blocked the planned site that summer, and Yasgur rented the organisers his fields in Bethel.

From the steps of which landmark did Martin Luther King Jr. give his 'I Have a Dream' speech in August 1963?

The Lincoln Memorial's steps were his stage on 28 August 1963; the famous 'dream' passage was improvised after he reached the end of his prepared text.

Which music star died on 16 August 1977, aged 42?

Elvis Presley was found at Graceland, his Memphis mansion, and mourning fans soon crowded its gates; the medical examiner blamed his heart that night, and the part drugs played has been argued over ever since.

Hurricane Katrina flooded most of a major Gulf Coast city in August 2005 when what gave way?

The city's levees and floodwalls failed in over 50 places, flooding about 80 percent of it; investigators blamed design errors by the Army Corps of Engineers that built them.

What was the first Berlin Wall, put up overnight on 13 August 1961, made of?

Barbed wire and fencing came first, strung by East German troops in a single night; concrete blocks began to replace them within days, and the Wall stood until 1989.

In August 1920, Harry Burn cast Tennessee's deciding suffrage vote after a letter from whom?

His mother, Febb Burn, wrote telling him to 'be a good boy' and vote for ratification; he arrived wearing the opponents' red rose, then voted aye, and Tennessee became the 36th state.

Which volcano's eruption in 79 AD, traditionally dated to 24 August, buried Pompeii and Herculaneum?

Vesuvius's date comes from copies of Pliny the Younger's letters; a charcoal graffito found at Pompeii in 2018 is dated to mid-October, which suggests the eruption came later.

The 1883 eruption of Krakatoa, in late August, produced a sound heard how far away?

About 3,000 miles away, on Rodrigues near Mauritius, the blast was taken for cannon fire from a ship; the eruption and its tsunamis killed about 36,000 people.

Which country celebrates Independence Day on 15 August, marking the end of British rule in 1947?

India's independence took effect on 15 August 1947; Pakistan, created by the same act of Parliament, marks its own a day earlier, on the 14th.

Richard Nixon became the first US president to do what, in August 1974?

Nixon became the first president to resign from office, announcing it on 8 August 1974 and leaving at noon on the 9th, after the House Judiciary Committee had approved three impeachment articles.

MTV launched in August 1981 by playing which song first?

'Video Killed the Radio Star' by the Buggles opened MTV at 12:01 am on 1 August 1981; the song is a nostalgic lament for an older medium pushed aside by new technology.

Diana, Princess of Wales, died after a car crash in which city on 31 August 1997?

Paris was where her car crashed in the Pont de l'Alma tunnel while trying to shake off photographers; a 2008 inquest blamed the driver and the pursuing paparazzi.

Which canal opened to shipping in August 1914, as the First World War began?

The Panama Canal opened when the SS Ancon made the first official transit, ten years after the United States took over a project that its first builders had abandoned.

The US Open tennis tournament starts in late August at a park in which New York borough?

Queens is home to Flushing Meadows-Corona Park, laid out over a former ash dump for the 1939 World's Fair; the US Open moved there from nearby Forest Hills in 1978.

The Little League World Series is played each August in South Williamsport, in which US state?

Pennsylvania is where Carl Stotz started Little League in Williamsport in 1939, with three teams, so local boys could play organised baseball; the first series followed in 1947.

The Sturgis Motorcycle Rally is held each August in which state?

Sturgis is a small city in the Black Hills of South Dakota; the rally began in 1938 when local dealer Clarence 'Pappy' Hoel and his Jackpine Gypsies club staged races and stunts.

Which city's Fringe, held every August, is billed as the world's largest performing arts festival?

Edinburgh's Fringe began in 1947, when eight theatre companies turned up uninvited at the first Edinburgh International Festival and performed on its fringe.

Which American sprinter won four gold medals at the Berlin Olympics in August 1936?

Jesse Owens won the 100 m, 200 m, long jump and 4x100 m relay in the first nine days of August 1936, a public rebuke to the Nazi hosts' racial ideology.

Neil Armstrong, the first person to walk on the Moon, was born in August 1930 in which state?

Ohio's Neil Armstrong was hooked by a plane ride he took as a small boy; as a teenager he took flying lessons at the airfield in his home town of Wapakoneta.

Which pop superstar was born on 16 August 1958 in Bay City, Michigan?

Madonna Louise Ciccone was born in Bay City, Michigan, on 16 August 1958 and moved to New York in 1978 to pursue dance before her self-titled 1983 debut album.

Which TV comedy legend, born in August 1911, later ran her own Hollywood studio?

Lucille Ball bought out Desi Arnaz's share of Desilu in 1962 and ran it alone; as its head she approved the pilots that became Star Trek and Mission: Impossible.

Jazz trumpeter Louis Armstrong was born in August 1901 in which city?

New Orleans's rough 'Battlefield' district was his childhood home; he always gave his birthday as 4 July 1900, but a baptismal record points to August 1901.

The 'Master of Suspense', filmmaker Alfred Hitchcock, was born in August 1899 in which country?

England's Leytonstone was his birthplace, above the family greengrocer's shop; he liked to tell how his father had police lock him in a cell at five, leaving him with a lifelong fear of them.

Mother Teresa, born in Skopje in August 1910, founded the Missionaries of Charity in which Indian city?

Calcutta's poverty drew her out of the convent school where she had taught for nearly twenty years; she began working in its slums in 1948 and founded her order in 1950.

Barack Obama, the 44th US president, was born on 4 August 1961 in which city?

Honolulu was also where Obama grew up: after four years abroad, he returned in 1971 to live with his grandparents and stayed until he finished school in 1979.

Fashion designer Coco Chanel was born in August 1883 in a charity hospital in which country?

Chanel was born on 19 August 1883 in Saumur, in France's Loire valley, in a hospice run by nuns; her mother was a laundrywoman, and Chanel later reinvented her own origin story.

Michael Jackson, the 'King of Pop', was born on 29 August 1958 in which US city?

Gary, Indiana, a steel town near Chicago, was the Jackson family's home at 2300 Jackson Street, where Michael started performing with his brothers in the Jackson 5 in the mid-1960s.

Which Hollywood star was found dead at her Brentwood home in August 1962, aged 36?

Marilyn Monroe died of a barbiturate overdose that the coroner ruled a probable suicide; her last film, Something's Got to Give, was never finished.

Which hurricane devastated South Florida in August 1992?

Hurricane Andrew flattened Homestead on 24 August 1992, destroying more than 25,000 homes; more than ten insurers failed, and Florida later adopted a tougher statewide building code.

Which famous painting was stolen from the Louvre in August 1911?

Vincenzo Peruggia, a former Louvre worker, walked out with the Mona Lisa on 21 August 1911; it was recovered in Florence in 1913 after he tried to sell it.

Which month, like August, has 31 days?

October is said to have had 31 days since Rome's earliest calendar, one of only four months that long; the month that became August was not among them and gained its 31st day later.

Whitney Houston was born in August 1963 in which state?

New Jersey's Newark was her birthplace; she grew up singing in the choir of its New Hope Baptist Church, and her memorial service was held in the same church in 2012.

Roman tradition credits King Numa with adding which two months to the ten-month calendar?

January and February are said to have filled a winter gap that the ten-month year left uncounted; once both sat ahead of March, the month later named August stood eighth.

Whose calendar reform of 46 BC gave the month now called August its modern length of 31 days?

Julius Caesar's calendar reform, enacted in 46 BC, lengthened the month from 29 days to the length it has kept ever since; nearly four decades passed before the Senate renamed it for the first emperor.

Which country celebrates its national day on 1 August, marking an Alpine alliance sworn in 1291?

Switzerland's day marks the 1291 pact of Uri, Schwyz and Unterwalden, yet it became an official nationwide holiday only in 1994, after voters approved a popular initiative.

Which country's Independence Day, 17 August, marks its 1945 proclamation of freedom from Dutch rule?

Indonesia's Sukarno read the proclamation in Jakarta two days after Japan's surrender; the Dutch fought on for four years before accepting it in 1949.

Which trait, shared by about one person in ten, is celebrated every 13 August?

Left-handedness has its own day because most tools, from scissors to school desks, are made for the right-handed nine in ten.

Spinel, added to August's birthstones in 2016, was long mistaken for which red gem in crown jewels?

Ruby is what the Black Prince's 'Ruby' in Britain's Imperial State Crown was taken for; it is really a large red spinel, a stone confused with ruby for centuries.

Among the Guanches of Tenerife, August was called Beñesmer, a name also given to what?

A harvest festival: when the grain was in, each Guanche kingdom held feasts of thanks, and a chronicler of the 1590s recorded that people could cross between kingdoms to attend even in wartime.

In the Southern Hemisphere, August is the seasonal equivalent of which Northern Hemisphere month?

February is August's mirror because seasons south of the equator run six months out of step with the north's, so spring there begins in September, as it does in March up north.

Astronomers meeting in Prague on 24 August 2006 voted to strip which world of its status as a planet?

Pluto was reclassified as a dwarf planet under the definition passed that day. Many astronomers had not made the trip to Prague, so they cast no vote.

Which Beatles album cover was photographed on a London zebra crossing in just ten minutes on 8 August 1969?

Abbey Road's cover was shot by Iain Macmillan from a step-ladder while a policeman held up the traffic behind him. Paul McCartney had sketched the idea.

Which swimmer won eight gold medals at the Beijing Olympics in August 2008, beating Mark Spitz's seven from 1972?

Michael Phelps won the seventh of them, the 100-metre butterfly, by 0.01 seconds, a finish so close that Serbia's delegation filed a protest.

Which sprinter ran the 100 metres in 9.58 seconds at the World Championships in Berlin on 16 August 2009?

Usain Bolt left Tyson Gay with silver even though the American's 9.71 seconds was, at the time, the third-fastest 100 metres ever run.

Taylor Swift's song 'August', one corner of a teenage love triangle told across three tracks, appears on which album?

Folklore tells one summer romance three ways: 'Cardigan' is Betty's side, 'Betty' is James's, and 'August' belongs to the girl he leaves behind.

Which guitarist was the last act at Woodstock, finally taking the stage on a Monday morning in August 1969?

Jimi Hendrix went on only after long delays caused by the rain. By then the crowd had fallen to about 30,000 people, and many left during his set.

The Iowa State Fair, held in Des Moines every August, has shown off a cow sculpted from what since 1911?

Butter was Norma 'Duffy' Lyon's medium at the fair from 1960 until she retired in 2006: besides dairy cows she sculpted Elvis Presley, John Wayne and a rendition of The Last Supper.

La Tomatina, a mass food fight that began on the last Wednesday of August 1945, is held in which country?

Spain's tomato battle fills the small town of Buñol, home to about 9,000 people. Since 2013 it has been ticketed and capped at 20,000 participants.

Mary Shelley, born on 30 August 1797, began which novel after Lord Byron challenged his guests to write a ghost story?

Frankenstein came to Mary Shelley at 18, after she had at first been unable to think of a story and grown anxious about it.

Which US Forest Service mascot was authorised on 9 August 1944, with a first poster painted by Albert Staehle?

Smokey Bear gained a living counterpart in 1950, when a three-month-old black bear cub found after a New Mexico wildfire was given his name.

Which ship, the largest of the three Christopher Columbus led out of Palos on 3 August 1492, ran aground off Hispaniola?

Santa María was wrecked on Christmas Day, so the fort Columbus had built from her stripped timbers was named La Navidad.

Napoleon Bonaparte was born on 15 August 1769 in Ajaccio, the main town of which Mediterranean island?

Corsica had been ceded by the Republic of Genoa just one year before Napoleon was born there, under the name Napoleone di Buonaparte.

Which small Gulf state did Iraqi forces invade on 2 August 1990, overrunning most of its army within two days?

Kuwait had been accused by Iraq earlier that year of slant drilling to take oil from across their shared border. The invasion marked the beginning of the Gulf War.

Burning Man, a late-August gathering named for the torching of a giant wooden effigy, is held in which state's desert?

Nevada's Black Rock Desert has hosted the event since 1990. It began in 1986 as a small gathering on Baker Beach in San Francisco.

Which Judy Garland musical had its Hollywood premiere at Grauman's Chinese Theatre on 15 August 1939?

The Wizard of Oz had already been tried out days earlier in small-town previews in Wisconsin and Massachusetts before it reached Hollywood.

Which Egyptian ruler died in Alexandria in August of 30 BC, after Octavian's forces had invaded her kingdom?

Cleopatra is popularly believed to have let an asp bite her, but Roman-era writers also describe a toxic ointment or a poisoned hairpin.

Which US agency was created on 25 August 1916 with a mandate to conserve scenery and wildlife for future generations?

The National Park Service was signed into being by Woodrow Wilson after a publicity campaign led by the business magnate Stephen Mather, who became its first director.

Which actress played Violet Weston, the pill-addicted matriarch of the 2013 film August: Osage County?

Meryl Streep earned a Best Actress Oscar nomination for the part, and Julia Roberts a supporting nomination as Violet's eldest daughter, Barbara.

Which landmark law, outlawing literacy tests, did President Lyndon B. Johnson sign on 6 August 1965?

The Voting Rights Act followed the televised police violence against marchers in Selma, after which Johnson told Congress to pass sweeping legislation.

Which Japanese city was hit by the 'Fat Man' atomic bomb on 9 August 1945, though it was only the secondary target?

Nagasaki was bombed because cloud and smoke covered the aiming point over Kokura, the primary target, and the plane flew on.

Which Japanese emperor announced his country's surrender in a recorded radio address broadcast at noon in August 1945?

Hirohito had never before spoken to the common people, and he used formal Classical Japanese that many ordinary listeners found unfamiliar.

Which Soviet leader was detained at his Crimean holiday dacha by KGB agents during the failed coup of August 1991?

Mikhail Gorbachev returned to office when the coup collapsed in two days, and the plotters all lost their posts.

Which exiled Russian revolutionary was attacked with an ice axe in his Mexico City study in August 1940?

Leon Trotsky had spent his first two years in Mexico at the Blue House of the painter Frida Kahlo, with whom he had an affair.

Which NASA rover landed in Gale crater on Mars in August 2012, lowered on a tether by a 'sky crane'?

Curiosity was named by Clara Ma, a twelve-year-old from Kansas, whose essay won a student contest that drew more than 9,000 proposals.

Which British scientist posted a public invitation to join his World Wide Web project on 6 August 1991?

Tim Berners-Lee had put the first website online at CERN the previous December. It simply described the project itself.

Which company released its first Personal Computer, the model 5150, on 12 August 1981?

IBM kept the price down by building the machine from standard, off-the-shelf components. Its design became the basis for the 'IBM PC compatible' standard.

London's Notting Hill Carnival, held over the August bank holiday weekend, celebrates the culture of which region?

The Caribbean carnival traces back to an indoor event staged in 1959 by the Trinidadian journalist Claudia Jones, in response to racial attacks the year before.

National Aviation Day in the United States falls on 19 August, the birthday of which flight pioneer?

Orville Wright was still alive when Franklin D. Roosevelt proclaimed the day in 1939, and he lived to see the dawn of supersonic flight.

Which actor played the bank robber Sonny in Dog Day Afternoon, based on a real Brooklyn hold-up on 22 August 1972?

Al Pacino won a BAFTA for the part. The real robbery, led by John Wojtowicz, turned into a hostage standoff that lasted fourteen hours.

August 'Auggie' Pullman, a ten-year-old starting school after years at home, is the hero of which R. J. Palacio novel?

Wonder gives its hero Treacher Collins syndrome, a condition that has meant many surgeries. A film version followed in 2017.

Which creature, once readily caught in the Great Lakes in late summer, gives August's full moon its traditional name?

Sturgeon were an important summer food staple for Native Americans living around the lakes, which is why August's full moon is called the Sturgeon Moon.

Lammas, a 1 August church festival marking the first fruits of the crop, is named after which blessed offering?

A loaf of bread was brought to church to be blessed on the day. The name comes from the Old English hlafmæsse, meaning 'loaf mass'.

Japan's Obon festival, most commonly held in mid-August with Bon Odori folk dances, honours the spirits of whom?

Ancestors are believed to revisit the household altars during Obon, so families return to their home towns to visit and clean the graves.

The Assumption of Mary, a feast celebrated on 15 August, was defined as Catholic dogma in 1950 by which pope?

Pius XII declared that Mary was taken body and soul into heaven at the end of her earthly life. Lutheran and many Anglican churches keep the same date as a feast of Mary.

Which Mississippi-born Nobel laureate wrote the 1932 Southern novel Light in August?

William Faulkner planned to call the book 'Dark House' until a casual remark by his wife Estelle, about the quality of the light that month, changed his mind.

Barbara Tuchman's Pulitzer-winning history The Guns of August is centred on the first month of which war?

World War I was the subject of a book that so impressed President Kennedy that he gave copies to his cabinet and military advisers and told them to read it.

The playwright August Wilson set most of his ten-play 'Century Cycle', including Fences, in which city's Hill District?

Pittsburgh's Hill District was where Wilson himself was born. Two plays in the cycle, Fences and The Piano Lesson, won him the Pulitzer Prize for Drama.

August Strindberg, the playwright of Miss Julie, is considered the 'father' of which country's modern literature?

Sweden also knew him as a novelist, poet and painter, and his 1879 book The Red Room has often been described as the country's first modern novel.

Which singer recorded the 1972 live double album Hot August Night at the Greek Theatre in Los Angeles?

Neil Diamond's album spent 29 weeks at number one in Australia during 1973 and 1974. It captures one of ten sold-out shows he played at the venue that month.

Which band's 1993 debut album August and Everything After produced the breakout radio hit 'Mr. Jones'?

Counting Crows printed handwritten lyrics to a song called 'August and Everything After' on the cover, then decided to leave that song off the album.

Which young actor played the runaway musical prodigy in the 2007 film August Rush, opposite Robin Williams?

Freddie Highmore's character is an eleven-year-old called Evan Taylor, who leaves his orphanage for New York City and performs as August Rush.

The Perseid meteors of mid-August are known to some Catholics as the 'tears' of which saint, martyred on 10 August?

Lawrence is said to have been burned alive on a gridiron, and a Mediterranean folk legend calls the shooting stars the sparks of his martyrdom.

The 'Glorious Twelfth' of August opens the shooting season in Great Britain for which moorland game bird?

Grouse may not be shot on a Sunday, so in years when the date falls on one the season opens a day late.

Which country celebrates its National Day on 9 August, the date in 1965 when it separated from Malaysia?

Singapore had previously kept its national day on 3 June, the date in 1959 when it won internal self-government from the United Kingdom.

Which pioneering photographic process was presented 'free to the world' as a gift by a government on 19 August 1839?

The daguerreotype was unveiled that day by the astronomer François Arago, and the state awarded its inventor, Louis Daguerre, a pension.

The 'Wow!' signal, a 72-second radio burst picked up in August 1977, is a famous puzzle in the search for what?

Alien intelligence was what the Big Ear radio telescope was listening for. Jerry Ehman circled the reading on a printout and wrote the comment that named it.

Gold found at Bonanza Creek on 16 August 1896 set off a stampede of prospectors to which region of north-western Canada?

The Klondike strike was made on a stream then called Rabbit Creek, and the stampede began only when news reached Seattle and San Francisco the following year.

Cowes Week, a sailing regatta held at the start of August since 1826, takes place off which island?

The Isle of Wight regatta grew out of George IV's interest in yachting, which began while he was still Prince Regent.

At Puck Fair, held each August in Killorglin, Ireland, which animal is caught in the mountains and crowned king?

A goat is crowned 'King Puck' by a local schoolgirl known as the Queen of Puck, then led back to the mountains at the end of the fair.

Which island gained independence from Britain on 6 August 1962, with Alexander Bustamante as its first prime minister?

Jamaica's new flag replaced the Union Jack across the island that day, and Princess Margaret opened the first session of its parliament.