September 17 is the 260th day of the year (261st in leap years). There are 105 days remaining.
- 879 - King Charles III of France
- 1271 - Wenceslas II of Bohemia and Poland
- 1552 - Camillo Borghese, later Pope Paul V
- 1743 - Marquis de Condorcet, mathematician, philosopher, and political scientist
- 1819 - Thomas Hendricks, former Vice President of the United States (+ 1885)
- 1857 - Konstantin Tsiolkovsky, rocket scientist, inventor (+ 1935)
- 1874 - Ben Turpin, actor, comedian (+ 1940)
- 1879 - Rube Foster, Negro League baseball star (some sources say 1878) (+ 1930)
- 1883 - William Carlos Williams, physician and writer (+ 1963)
- 1890 - Gabriel Heatter, journalist (+ 1972)
- 1900 - John Willard Marriott, hotelier (+ 1985)
- 1907 - Warren Burger, 15th Chief Justice of the United States (+ 1995)
- 1923 - Hank Williams, musician (+ 1953)
- 1927 - George Blanda, National Football League and American Football League star
- 1928 - Roddy McDowall, actor (+ 1998)
- 1929 - Sir Stirling Moss, Formula One racer
- 1930 - Edgar Mitchell, astronaut
- 1931 - Anne Bancroft, actress
- 1934 - Maureen Connolly, tennis star (+ 1969)
- 1935 - Ken Kesey, author (+ 2001)
- 1937 - Orlando Cepeda, Baseball Hall of Famer
- 1947 - Jeff MacNelly, Pulitzer Prize winning political cartoonist
- 1948 - John Ritter, actor
- 1951 - Cassandra Peterson (Elvira), actress
- 1956 - Rita Rudner, comedienne
- 1962 - Baz Luhrmann, film director and producer
- 1973 - Anastacia, singer
- 1863 - Alfred de Vigny, author
- 1908 - Lt. Thomas Selfridge, first to die in an airplane crash. Orville Wright was the pilot.
- 1972 - Akim Tamiroff, actor
- 1973 - Hugo Winterhalter, band leader
- 1977 - Marc Bolan, musician (T-Rex)
- 1980 - Anastazio Somoza Debayle, former president of Nicaragua
- 1984 - Richard Basehart, actor
- 1993 - Christian Nyby, film and television director
- 1996 - Spiro Agnew, former Vice President of the United States
- 1997 - Red Skelton, actor, comedian
September 16 ·
September 18 ·
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historical anniversaries
See Also: January, February, March, April, May, June, July, August, September, October, November, December - more historical anniversaries