* 1909 – Robert Peary and Matthew Henson reach the North Pole.

* 1909 – William M. Branham, American evangelist ( d. 1965 )

* 1909 – Hermann Lang, German race car driver ( d. 1987 )

* 1909 – Juliana of the Netherlands ( d. 2004 )

* 1909 – F. E. McWilliam, Irish sculptor ( d. 1992 )

* 1909 – Lester Young, American saxophonist ( d. 1959 )

* 1909 – V. K. Gokak, Indian writer ( d. 1992 )

* 1909 – Adam von Trott zu Solz, German diplomat ( d. 1944 )

Monty Noble led Australia to victory in both 1907 – 08 and 1909.

* 1909 – Walter Van Tilburg Clark, American novelist ( d. 1971 )

* 1909 – Alice Huyler Ramsey and three friends become the first women to complete a transcontinental auto trip, taking 59 days to travel from New York, New York to San Francisco, California.

* 1909 – Bill Voce, England cricketer ( d. 1984 )

* 1871 – John Millington Synge, Irish writer ( d. 1909 )

* 1909 – Hugo Winterhalter, American composer and bandleader ( d. 1973 )

* 1909 – Paul Callaway, American organist and conductor ( d. 1995 )

* 1909 – Bruce Matthews, Canadian army officer and businessman ( d. 1991 )

* 1909 – First automobile race at the Indianapolis Motor Speedway takes place.

* 1909 – Nikolay Bogolyubov, Russian mathematician ( d. 1992 )

* 1829 – Carlo Acton, Italian composer and pianist ( d. 1909 )

* 1909 – Michael Rennie, English actor ( d. 1971 )

* 1909 – The Turkish military reverses the Ottoman countercoup of 1909 to force the overthrow of Sultan Abdul Hamid II.

* 1909 – Syd Buller, English cricketer ( d. 1970 )

* 1909 – Leila Danette, American actress

Sylvère Maes ( born 27 August 1909 in Zevekote – died 5 December 1966 in Ostend ) was a Belgian cyclist, who is most famous for winning the Tour de France in 1936 and 1939.

Born in 1909 as the youngest in a family of ten children, Maes rode his first cycling race in 1928, and immediately was one of the best young riders.

* 1909 – Belgian chemist Leo Baekeland announces the creation of Bakelite, the world's first synthetic plastic.

On December 17, 1909, Leopold II died at Laeken, and the Belgian crown passed to Albert, the son of Leopold's brother, Philip, Count of Flanders.

* Leopold II also engaged in a religious ceremony with Blanche Zélia Joséphine Delacroix, also known as Caroline Lacroix, a prostitute, on 14 December 1909, with no validity under Belgian law, at the Pavilion of Palms, Royal Palace of Laken, in Brussels, five days before his death.

Shortly before his accession to the throne in 1909, Albert undertook an extensive tour of the Belgian Congo, which had been annexed by Belgium in 1908 ( after having been previously owned by King Leopold II of Belgium as his personal property ), finding the area in poor condition.

Following the death of his uncle, Leopold II, Albert succeeded to the Belgian throne in December 1909, since Albert's own father had already died in 1905.

He relied on the discovery of the Belgian Professor Frans Alfons Janssens of the University of Leuven who described the phenomenon in 1909 and had called it ' chiasmatypie '.

Pioneer aviatrices include French, Raymonde de Laroche, the world's first licensed female pilot on March 8, 1910 ; Belgian, Helene Dutrieu, the first woman to fly a passenger, first woman to win an air race ( 1910 ), and first woman to pilot a seaplane ( 1912 ); French, Marie Marvingt the first woman to fly solo across the English Channel and the North Sea in a balloon ( October 26, 1909 ) and first woman to fly as a bomber pilot in combat missions ( 1915 ); American, Harriet Quimby, the USA's first licensed female pilot in 1911, and the first woman to cross the English Channel by airplane ; American Amelia Earhart, the first woman to fly solo across the Atlantic ( 1932 ); Bessie Coleman, the first African American female to become a licensed airplane pilot ( 1921 ); German, Marga von Etzdorf, first woman to fly for an airline ( 1927 ); Opal Kunz, one of the few women to train US Navy fighter pilots during World War II in the Civilian Pilot Training Program ; and the British Amy Johnson, the first woman to fly solo from Britain to Australia ( 1930 ).

Caters holds several records: he was the first Belgian aviator ( Sin't Job-in't-Goor, November 1909 ), the first Belgian licensed pilot ( Aéro-Club de Belgique, 2 December 1909 ), kilometer gold medal awardee in 1909, the first Belgian aircraft manufacturer and the first instructor of the emerging Belgian Air Force.

The BSAC had extended the Rhodesian Railways from Bulawayo through Livingstone to the Belgian Congo between 1904 and 1909 to serve the mines at Broken Hill and in Katanga.

* Alphonse Decorte ( 1909 – 1977 ), a Belgian football player

The original design for a Denil fishway was developed in 1909 by a Belgian scientist, G. Denil ; it has since been adjusted and adapted in many ways.

* 1909 Ornithologists James Chapin and Herbert Lang begin a six year biological survey of the Belgian Congo.

* Paul Henry ( Belgian footballer ) ( 1909 – 1994 ), Belgian footballer

* Percy Thornley Stallard ( 1909 – 2001 ), English racing cyclist

* Alfonso Sanz y Martínez de Arizala ( 28 January 1880, Madrid – 1970 ), married in 1922 to María de Guadalupe de Limantour y Mariscal ( d. 1977, Marbella ), daughter of Julio de Limantour y Marquet ( 17 June 1863, Mexico City – 11 October 1909, Mexico City ) and wife Elena Mariscal y ..., paternal granddaughter of French Joseph Yves de Limantour y Rence de la Pagame ( 1812, Ploemeur – 1885, Mexico City ) and wife Adèle Marquet y Cabannes ( 1820, Bordeaux –?

* 1818 – Marie of Saxe-Altenburg ( d. 1909 )

* 1909 – Alain Poher, French politician ( d. 1996 )

* 1909 – Yūji Koseki, Japanese composer ( d. 1989 )

* 1909 – Leo Fender, American businessman, founded Fender Musical Instruments Corporation ( d. 1991 )

* 1909 – Glenn Cunningham, American runner ( d. 1988 )

* 1909 – Saunders Mac Lane, American mathematician ( d. 2005 )