November 7 Holidays, Observances and History

November 7 holidays, observances and history: here is everything the day holds, from bison and books to Marie Curie, Joni Mitchell, and a bridge that fell into the sea.

November 7, 2026 is a big Saturday. It falls on the first Saturday in November, which means National Bison Day, National Play Outside Day, National Book Lovers Day, Learn to Homebrew Day, National Wine Tasting Day, Pumpkin Destruction Day, Sausage and Kraut Day and World Numbat Day all fall on it at once. It is the 311th day of 2026, with 54 days left in the year.

November 7 holidays and observances

Twelve observances fill the day. Click any name for the full story:

• National Bison Day (2026): honoring the American bison, brought back from the brink of extinction to become the national mammal.
• National Play Outside Day (2026): observed on the first Saturday of every month — put down the screens, get outside and play.
• National Book Lovers Day (2026): the November edition, on the first Saturday of the month — a day for readers to celebrate books and reading.
• Learn to Homebrew Day (2026): established by the American Homebrewers Association; clubs and shops offer demonstrations and advice on malt, hops, yeast and water.
• National Wine Tasting Day (2026): taste a new wine, visit a vineyard or wine shop tasting, or host one at home — look, smell, taste, describe.
• Pumpkin Destruction Day (2026): after Halloween, dispose of jack-o’-lanterns by smashing, dropping or launching them, often at community events — and compost what remains.
• Sausage and Kraut Day (2026): a hearty dish with German roots and American comfort-food status — best with mustard and good bread.
• World Numbat Day (2026): raising awareness for the endangered numbat, the small termite-eating marsupial found only in Western Australia, threatened by habitat loss and introduced predators.
• National Notary Public Day: observed on November 7; notaries witness signatures and verify identities — a day to thank a notary who helped with a house purchase, a will or a power of attorney.
• National Bittersweet Chocolate with Almonds Day: enjoy a bar or bake with it — brownies, bark or trail mix — and learn the difference between bittersweet, semisweet and milk chocolate.
• National Canine Lymphoma Awareness Day: established to educate dog owners and encourage regular checks; watch for swollen lymph nodes, lethargy and loss of appetite, and book a regular veterinary check-up.
• International Inuit Day: established by the Inuit Circumpolar Council in 2006, the international body representing Arctic peoples — Inuit, Yupik and Chukchi — in Canada, Greenland, and parts of the United States and Russia.

Featured holiday: National Bison Day

Our featured holiday is National Bison Day, and its story is one of the great conservation comebacks. Bison once numbered in the tens of millions across North America; hunting and habitat loss reduced them to a few hundred by the late 1800s. The American Bison Society, founded in 1905, helped lead the recovery, and today bison roam again in national parks and tribal herds. In 2016 the bison was designated the national mammal of the United States.

How to mark it:

• Learn about conservation. Read up on bison recovery and the herds of Yellowstone and beyond.
• Visit a herd. Find a national park, refuge or museum exhibit near you.
• Support restoration. Support organisations restoring bison to tribal lands and prairies.

This day in history: November 7

• 1665 — The London Gazette is first published: first appearing as the Oxford Gazette during the Great Plague, when the royal court had moved to Oxford, it became the official journal of record for the British government — and remains the United Kingdom’s official newspaper of record.
• 1811 — The Battle of Tippecanoe: fought near the confluence of the Tippecanoe and Wabash rivers, it destroyed the Native American military alliance built by Tecumseh and his brother Tenskwatawa, made Harrison a national hero and inspired the 1840 campaign slogan “Tippecanoe and Tyler too.”
• 1885 — Canada’s transcontinental railway is completed: the last spike was driven at Craigellachie, British Columbia, joining the country by rail from coast to coast.
• 1916 — Jeannette Rankin becomes the first woman elected to Congress: four years before women won the national vote with the 19th Amendment. A lifelong pacifist, she voted against US entry into both World Wars and was the only member of Congress to vote against the declaration of war on Japan in 1941.
• 1940 — The Tacoma Narrows Bridge collapses: nicknamed “Galloping Gertie,” the bridge twisted violently in a 40 mph wind before its deck broke apart and fell into Puget Sound. The collapse was captured on film and became a classic engineering lesson in aerodynamics, resonance and bridge design; remarkably, no one was killed except a dog left in a car on the bridge.
• 1991 — Magic Johnson announces he is HIV-positive: at a time when HIV/AIDS was widely misunderstood and stigmatised, Earvin “Magic” Johnson’s announcement changed the public conversation overnight. He became a leading advocate for HIV prevention, treatment and education, and his long, healthy life with the virus helped change how the world understood it.
• 2000 — The 2000 US presidential election is too close to call: the contest between Al Gore and George W. Bush ended on election night too close to call, beginning a 36-day recount dispute.

Famous birthdays on November 7

• Marie Curie (1867): born in Warsaw, Poland; the first woman to win a Nobel Prize and the only person to win Nobel Prizes in two sciences — Physics in 1903 (shared with Pierre Curie and Henri Becquerel) and Chemistry in 1911 for discovering radium and polonium. She coined the word “radioactivity,” pioneered research that led to cancer treatment, and ran mobile X-ray units — the “Little Curies” — for wounded soldiers in the First World War.
• Albert Camus (1913): born in Dréan, Algeria; author of The Stranger (1942) and The Plague (1947), who framed modern “absurdism.” He worked in the French Resistance in the Second World War, editing Combat, and died in a car accident in 1960 at age 46.
• Billy Graham (1918): born in Charlotte, North Carolina; his televised crusades drew millions, he counselled presidents from Truman to Obama, and he became known as “America’s Pastor.” His crusades were among the first large public events in the American South held without segregated seating.
• Joni Mitchell (1943): born in Fort Macleod, Alberta, Canada; singer-songwriter of Blue (1971), Court and Spark (1974) and Hejira (1976), also a painter, winner of multiple Grammy Awards including a Lifetime Achievement Award, and inducted into the Rock and Roll Hall of Fame in 1997.
• Kamal Haasan (1954): the Indian actor and filmmaker, one of the most acclaimed stars of Tamil cinema. He began as a child artist, built a career spanning more than 200 films in Tamil, Telugu, Malayalam, Hindi and other languages, won multiple National Film Awards and Filmfare Awards, and entered politics by founding Makkal Needhi Maiam in 2018.
• David Guetta (1967): the French DJ and producer who brought electronic dance music to the global mainstream. From Parisian clubs to the breakthrough album One Love (2009) and hits including “When Love Takes Over” and “Titanium,” he has sold tens of millions of records and won Grammy Awards.
• Lorde (1996): born Ella Yelich-O’Connor in Takapuna, Auckland, New Zealand; signed with Universal Music Group in 2009. Her debut single “Royals” (2013), written when she was 16, topped charts worldwide and won two Grammy Awards; she is renowned for unconventional musical styles and introspective songwriting, with albums Pure Heroine (2013), Melodrama (2017) and Solar Power (2021).

Related days

Yesterday: November 6 — National Nachos Day, Love Your Lawyer Day, National Saxophone Day.

Tomorrow: November 8 — Diwali.

Browse the month: November hub.