Famous Birthdays on March 24

Annabella Gloria Philomena Sciorra is an American actress. She came to prominence with her film debut in True Love (1989) and worked steadily throughout the 1990s in films such as Jungle Fever (1991), The Hard Way (1991), The Hand That Rocks the Cradle (1992), The Addiction (1995), Cop Land (1997), and What Dreams May Come (1998). She received an Emmy Award nomination for her portrayal of Gloria Trillo on The Sopranos (2001–2004), appeared as Detective Carolyn Barek on Law & Order: Criminal Intent (2005–2006), and had recurring roles on GLOW (2018), Truth Be Told (2019–2020), and Tulsa King (2022). Her stage credits include The Motherfucker with the Hat.

Gabriele Susanne Kerner, known artistically as Nena, is a German singer. In 1983, as the lead vocalist of the band Nena, she recorded the Neue Deutsche Welle song "99 Luftballons". In the same year, the band re-recorded this song in English as "99 Red Balloons". Nena's re-recording of some of the band's old hit songs as a solo artist, produced by the co-composer of most of them, her former Nena band colleague and keyboard player Uwe Fahrenkrog-Petersen, rekindled her solo career in 2002. Combined with the success of the Nena band years, she has sold over 25 million records, making her the most successful German pop singer in chart history.

Józef Jerzy Kukuczka was a Polish mountaineer, regarded as one of the greatest high-altitude climbers in history. In 1987, he became the second man to climb all 14 eight-thousanders in the world, a feat known as the "Crown of the Himalayas." He accomplished this feat in less than eight years, and climbed all, except for Lhotse, by new routes or in winter. He is the only person to have climbed two eight-thousanders in one winter, and his ascents of Cho Oyu, Kangchenjunga and Annapurna were the first winter ascents. His ascent of K2 in 1986, in alpine style with Tadeusz Piotrowski, is now known as the Polish Line. No other mountaineers have attempted an ascent using the route since.

Andrew William Mellon, known also as A. W. Mellon, was an American banker, businessman, industrialist, philanthropist, art collector, and politician. The son of Mellon family patriarch Thomas Mellon, he established a vast business empire before moving into politics. He served as United States Secretary of the Treasury from March 9, 1921, to February 12, 1932, presiding over the boom years of the 1920s and the Wall Street crash of 1929. A conservative Republican, Mellon favored policies that reduced taxation and the national debt of the United States in the aftermath of World War I. Mellon also helped fund and manage Kennywood Park in West Mifflin, Pennsylvania.

Yuma Asami , is a Japanese actress, singer, and a former adult video (AV) actress and model. Starring in more than 600 adult films between 2005 and 2013, Asami was widely recognized as one of Japan's most famous and acclaimed adult film actresses with her popularity resulting in mainstream media appearances as well. A leading actress of two major Japanese AV studios, Alice Japan and S1 No.1 Style, Asami was known for her youthful looks, large bust, and her natural onscreen charisma which was largely credited in helping her establish herself as Japan's top adult performer. Between 2008 and 2013, she was also a member of the idol group Ebisu Muscats, where she performed with numerous other famous AV actresses like Sola Aoi, Akiho Yoshizawa, Tina Yuzuki (Rio) and Aino Kishi.

Dorothy Irene Height was an African-American civil rights and women's rights activist. She focused on the issues of Foundational Black American women, including unemployment, illiteracy, and voter awareness. Height is credited as the first leader in the civil rights movement to recognize inequality for women and Foundational Black Americans as problems that should be considered as a whole. She was the president of the National Council of Negro Women for 40 years. Height's role in the "Big Six" civil rights movement was frequently ignored by the press due to sexism. In 1974, she was named to the National Commission for the Protection of Human Subjects of Biomedical and Behavioral Research, which published the Belmont Report, a bioethics report in response to the infamous Tuskegee Syphilis Study.

Terrance Jerod Ford Sr. is an American former professional basketball player who currently serves as an assistant coach for the Milwaukee Bucks of the National Basketball Association (NBA). Having been awarded numerous top basketball accolades in high school and college, Ford entered the 2003 NBA draft and was selected eighth overall by the Bucks. Ford's recurring back injuries resulted in him missing many games in his three seasons with the Bucks, but in 2005, it was announced that he was fit to play basketball again Ford was traded to the Raptors prior to the 2006–07 NBA season, and established himself as the starting point guard, helping the team win the Atlantic Division crown and reach the 2007 NBA Playoffs. Following an injury sustained in the 2007–08 NBA season, however, Ford had difficulties reclaiming the starting spot and was traded to the Indiana Pacers. He signed with KK Zagreb of Croatia during the 2011 NBA lockout where he appeared in three games. On December 9, 2011, Ford signed a contract with the San Antonio Spurs.

David Dacko was a Central African politician who served as the first President of the Central African Republic from 14 August 1960 to 31 December 1965 and as the third President of the Central African Republic from 21 September 1979 to 1 September 1981. He also served as Prime Minister of the Central African Republic from 1 May 1959 to 14 August 1960. After his second removal from power in a coup d'état led by General André Kolingba, he pursued an active career as an opposition politician and presidential candidate with many loyal supporters; Dacko was an important political figure in the country for over 50 years.

Edward Henry Weston was an American photographer. He has been called "one of the most innovative and influential American photographers" and "one of the masters of 20th century photography." Over the course of his 40-year career Weston photographed an increasingly expansive set of subjects, including landscapes, still lifes, nudes, portraits, genre scenes, and even whimsical parodies. It is said that he developed a "quintessentially American, and especially Californian, approach to modern photography" because of his focus on the people and places of the American West. In 1937 Weston was the first photographer to receive a Guggenheim Fellowship, and over the next two years he produced nearly 1,400 negatives using his 8 × 10 view camera. Some of his most famous photographs were taken of the trees and rocks at Point Lobos, California, near where he lived for many years.

Dean Mervyn Jones was an Australian cricket player, coach and commentator who played Tests and One Day Internationals (ODIs) for Australia. He had an excellent record in Test cricket and is best remembered for revolutionising the ODI format. Jones was a part of the Australian team that won their first world title during the 1987 Cricket World Cup. Through the late 1980s and early 1990s, he was recognised as among the best ODI batsmen in the world, a view which has been validated in the retrospective ICC Player Rankings. His batting was often characterised by his agile footwork against both pace and spin, aggressive running between wickets, and willingness to take risks and intimidate bowlers. In 2019, Jones was inducted into the Australian Cricket Hall of Fame.

Georgius Agricola was a German Renaissance humanist scholar, mineralogist and metallurgist. Born in the small town of Glauchau, in the Electorate of Saxony of the Holy Roman Empire, he was broadly educated, but took a particular interest in the mining and refining of metals. He was the first to drop the Arabic definite article al-, exclusively writing chymia and chymista in describing activity that we today would characterize as chemical or alchemical, giving chemistry its modern name. For his groundbreaking work De Natura Fossilium published in 1546, he is generally referred to as the father of mineralogy and the founder of geology as a scientific discipline.

Thomas Cushing III was an American lawyer, merchant, and statesman from Boston, Massachusetts. Active in Boston politics, he represented the city in the provincial assembly from 1761 to its dissolution in 1774, serving as the lower house's speaker for most of those years. Because of his role as speaker, his signature was affixed to many documents protesting British policies, leading officials in London to consider him a dangerous radical. He engaged in extended communications with Benjamin Franklin who at times lobbied on behalf of the legislature's interests in London, seeking ways to reduce the rising tensions of the American Revolution.

Patrick Gerald Duggan, known professionally as Patrick Malahide, is a British actor of stage and screen. His acting credits include The New Avengers (1976), ITV Playhouse (1977), The Eagle of the Ninth (1977), Sweeney 2 (1978), The Professionals (1978), Comfort and Joy (1984), The Singing Detective (1986), A Month in the Country (1987), Minder (1979–1988), Middlemarch (1994), The Inspector Alleyn Mysteries (1993–1994), Captain Corelli's Mandolin (2001), The World Is Not Enough (1999), New Tricks, (2006), Brideshead Revisited (2008), The Paradise (2012), Luther (2015–2019), Bridget Jones's Baby (2016), Game of Thrones (2012–2016), Mortal Engines (2018), The Protégé (2021), and Liaison (2023).

Dennis Brian Erickson is an American football coach who most recently served as the head coach for the Salt Lake Stallions of the Alliance of American Football (AAF) league. He was also the head coach at the University of Idaho, the University of Wyoming (1986), Washington State University (1987–1988), the University of Miami (1989–1994), Oregon State University (1999–2002), and Arizona State University (2007–2011). During his tenure at Miami, Erickson's teams won two national championships, in 1989 and 1991. A coach who won conference championships with four different programs, his record as a college football head coach is 179–96–1 (.650).

Roscoe Conkling "Fatty" Arbuckle was an American silent film actor, director, and screenwriter. He started at the Selig Polyscope Company and eventually moved to Keystone Studios, where he worked with Mabel Normand and Harold Lloyd as well as with his nephew, Al St. John. He also mentored Charlie Chaplin, Monty Banks, and Bob Hope and brought vaudeville star Buster Keaton into the movie business. Arbuckle was one of the most popular silent stars of the 1910s and one of the highest-paid actors in Hollywood, signing a contract in 1920 with Paramount Pictures for $1 million a year.

Curtis Lee Hanson was an American film director, screenwriter, and producer. Born in Reno, Nevada, Hanson grew up in Los Angeles. After dropping out of high school, Hanson worked as photographer and editor for Cinema magazine. In the 1970s, Hanson participated as a writer for the horror film The Dunwich Horror (1970) and made his directorial debut the B-Movie Sweet Kill (1973), where he lacked creative control to fulfill his vision. While Hanson continued directing, he rose to prominence screenwriting critically acclaimed films such as The Silent Partner (1978), White Dog (1982), and Never Cry Wolf (1983).

Rudolf Jozef "Ruud" Krol is a Dutch former professional footballer who was capped 83 times for the Netherlands national team. Most of his career he played for his home town club, Ajax. He became a coach after retirement. Regarded as one of the greatest defenders of all time, Krol mainly played as a sweeper or left-back, though he could play anywhere across the back line, or in midfield as a defensive midfielder, due to his range of passing with both feet, temperament, tactical intelligence, and his ability to start attacking plays after winning back the ball.

Ali Akbar Salehi is an Iraqi-born Iranian academic, diplomat and former head of the Atomic Energy Organization of Iran, who served in this position from 2009 to 2010 and also from 2013 to 2021. He served for the first time as head of the AEOI from 2009 to 2010 and was appointed to the post for a second time on 16 August 2013. Before the appointment of his latter position, he was foreign affairs minister from 2010 to 2013. He was also the Iranian representative in the International Atomic Energy Agency from 1998 to 2003.

Ranil Wickremesinghe is a Sri Lankan politician who served as the ninth president of Sri Lanka from 2022 to 2024. He has also served as Prime Minister of Sri Lanka from 1993–1994, 2001–2004, 2015–2018, 2018-2019 and in 2022. Wickremesinghe has held several ministerial roles, including Minister of Finance, Minister of Defence, Minister of Technology and Minister of Women, Child Affairs and Social Empowerment. Wickremesinghe has led the United National Party (UNP) since 1994. He is also the eighth executive president of Sri Lanka, a role established by the 1977 constitutional amendment that expanded presidential powers.