Events of 1898

1898 world map

January–March

• January 1 – New York City annexes land from surrounding counties, creating the City of Greater New York. The city is geographically divided into five boroughs: Manhattan, Brooklyn, Queens, The Bronx, and Staten Island.

• January 13 – Emile Zola publishes J'Accuse a letter accusing the French government of anti-Semitism and wrongfully placing Alfred Dreyfus in jail.

• February 15 – Spanish-American War: The USS Maine explodes and sinks in Havana harbor, Cuba for then unknown reasons, killing 266 men. This event helps lead the United States to declare war on Spain.

February 15: USS Maine is sunk.

• March 24 – Robert Allison of Port Carbon, Pennsylvania becomes the first person to buy an American-built automobile when he buys a Winton automobile that had been advertised in Scientific American.

• March 26 – The Sabi Game Reserve in South Africa, the first officially designated game reserve, is created.

April–June

• April 5 – Annie Oakley promotes the service of women in combat situations with the United States military. On this day, she writes a letter to President McKinley "offering the government the services of a company of 50 'lady sharpshooters' who would provide their own arms and ammunition should war break out with Spain." In the history of women in the military, there are records of female U.S. Revolutionary and Civil War soldiers who enlisted using male pseudonyms, but Oakley's letter represents possibly the earliest political move towards women's rights for combat service in the United States military.

• April 22 – Spanish-American War: The United States Navy begins a blockade of Cuban ports and the USS Nashville captures a Spanish merchant ship.

• April 25 – Spanish-American War: The United States declares war on Spain; the U.S. Congress announces that a state of war has existed since April 21 (later backdating this one more day to April 20).

• May 1 – Spanish-American War – Battle of Manila Bay: Commodore Dewey destroys the Spanish squadron. The first battle of the war, as well as the first battle in the Philippines Campaign.

• May 2 – Thousands of Chinese scholars and Beijing citizens protest in front of the Capital Control Yuan, asking for reform.

• May 7/9 – Bava-Beccaris massacre: Hundreds of demonstrators are killed when General Fiorenzo Bava-Beccaris orders troops to fire on a rally in Milan, Italy (in 1900, King Umberto I of Italy is killed in an act of vengeance for his praise of the shooting).

• May 8 – The first games of the Italian Football League are played.

• May 12 – Bombardment of San Juan, the first major battle of the Puerto Rico Campaign during the Spanish-American War.

• May 28 – Secondo Pia takes the first photographs of the Shroud of Turin and discovers that the image on Shroud itself appears to be a photographic negative.

The original flag of the Philippines as conceived by General Emilio Aguinaldo. The blue is of a lighter shade than the currently mandated royal blue, the sun has eight points as currently but many more rays and it has a mythical face.

• June 1 – The Trans-Mississippi Exposition World's Fair opens in Omaha, Nebraska.

• June 12 – Philippine Declaration of Independence: General Emilio Aguinaldo declares the Philippines' independence from Spain.

• June 13 – Yukon Territory is formed, with Dawson chosen as its capital.

July–September

• July 3 – Joshua Slocum completes a 3-year solo circumnavigation of the world.

• July 7 – The United States annexes the Hawaiian Islands.

• July 17 – Spanish-American War – Battle of Santiago Bay: Troops under United States General William R. Shafter take the city of Santiago de Cuba from the Spanish.

• July 25 – Spanish-American War: The United States invasion of Puerto Rico begins with a landing at Guánica Bay.

• August 12 – Spanish-American War: Hostilities end between American and Spanish forces in Cuba.

• August 20 – Opening of the Gornergratbahn railway, connecting Zermatt to the Gornergrat.

• August 25 – 700 Greeks and 15 Englishmen are slaughtered by the Turks in Heraklion, Greece, leading to the establishment of the autonomous Cretan State.

• August 28 – Caleb Bradham names his soft drink Pepsi-Cola.

• September 2 – Battle of Omdurman: British and Egyptian troops led by Horatio Kitchener defeat Sudanese tribesmen led by Khalifa Abdullah al-Taashi, thus establishing British dominance in the Sudan.

• September 10 – Luigi Lucheni assassinates Empress Elisabeth of Austria-Hungary.

• September 18 – Fashoda incident: A diplomatic dispute between France and the United Kingdom ends in victory for the British.

• September 21 – Empress Dowager Cixi of China engineers a coup d'etat, marking the end of the Hundred Days' Reform; the Guangxu Emperor is arrested.

October–December

• October 1 – The Vienna University of Economics and Business Administration is founded under the name K.U.K. Exportakademie.

• October 3 – Battle of Sugar Point: Ojibwe tribesmen defeat U.S. government troops in northern Minnesota.

• October 6 – The Phi Mu Alpha Sinfonia Fraternity (then the Sinfonia Club) is founded at the New England Conservatory in Boston.

• October 12 – The first town council is established in Mateur.

November 26: blizzard.

• November 26 – A 2-day blizzard known as the Portland Gale piles snow in Boston, Massachusetts, and severely impacts the Massachusetts fishing industry and several coastal New England towns.

• December 9 – The first of the two Tsavo maneaters is shot by John Henry Patterson; the second is killed 3 weeks later, after 135 workers had been killed.

• December 10 – The Treaty of Paris is signed, ending the Spanish-American War.

• December 26 – Marie and Pierre Curie announce discovery of a substance they call radium.

Undated

• Exploits of Louis de Rougemont begin to appear in Wide World Magazine.

• North Petherton becomes the first town in England to install Acetylene lighting.

• John Jacob Abel isolates epinephrine (adrenaline).

• William Ramsay and Morris Travers discover neon.

• Wakita is founded in the Cherokee Strip, Oklahoma.

• The Fork Union Military Academy is founded.

• The British conquer and burn Benin City.

• Wilhelm van Berkel invents the Berkel meat slicer, the first meat slicer in Rotterdam.

• As a result of the merger of several small oil companies, John D. Rockefeller's Standard Oil Company controls 84% of the USA's oil and most American pipelines.

• Watsonian Curling Club founded in Edinburgh, Scotland

Births

January–March

• January 16 – Margaret Booth, American film editor (d. 2002)

• January 21 – Ahmad Shah Qajar, Shah of Persia (d. 1930)

• January 22 – Elazar Shach, Haredi rabbi (d. 2001)

• January 23

• * Sergei Eisenstein, Russian film director (d. 1948)

• * Jorge Eliécer Gaitán, Colombian politician (d. 1948)

• January 26 – Katarzyna Kobro, Russian sculptor (d.1951)

• February 1 – Leila Denmark, American pediatrician

• February 3 – Alvar Aalto, Finnish architect (d. 1976)

• February 10 – Bertolt Brecht, German writer (d. 1956)

• February 11 – Leó Szilárd, Hungarian-American physicist (d. 1964)

• February 14 – Fritz Zwicky, Swiss physicist and astronomer (d. 1974)

• February 15 – Allen Woodring, American runner (d. 1982)

• February 18

• * Enzo Ferrari, Italian race car driver and automobile manufacturer (d. 1988)

• * Luis Muñoz Marín, Puerto Rican poet, journalist and politician (d. 1980)

• February 24 – Kurt Tank, German aeronautical engineer (d. 1983)

• February 28 – Hugh O'Flaherty, Irish Catholic priest (d. 1963)

• March 4 – Georges Dumézil, French philologist (d. 1940)

• March 11 – Dorothy Gish, American actress (d. 1968)

• March 14 – Arnold Chikobava, Georgian linguist (d. 1985)

• March 31 – Hermann van Pels, German-Dutch father of Peter van Pels, housemate of Anne Frank (d. 1944)

April–June

• April 1 – William James Sidis, American mathematician (d. 1944)

• April 3 – George Jessel, American comedian (d. 1981)

• April 4 – Agnes Ayres, American actress (d. 1940)

• April 6 – Jeanne Hébuterne, French painter (d. 1920)

• April 26

• *Vicente Aleixandre, Spanish writer, Nobel Prize laureate (d. 1984)

• *John Grierson, Scottish documentary filmmaker (d. 1972)

• May 3 – Golda Meir, Prime Minister of Israel (d. 1978)

• May 5 – Blind Willie McTell, American singer (d. 1959)

• May 5 – Elsie Eaves, American civil engineer (d. 1983)

• May 13

• *Sultan Hisamuddin Alam Shah, King of Malaysia (d. 1960)

• *Justin Tuveri, Italian veteran of the First World War (d. 2007)

• May 15 – Arletty, French model and actress (d. 1992)

• May 16 – Tamara de Lempicka, Art Deco painter (d. 1980)

• May 17 – Alfred Joseph Casson, Canadian painter (d. 1992)

• May 21 – Armand Hammer, American entrepreneur and art collector (d. 1990)

• May 23 – Scott O'Dell, American author (d. 1989)

• May 31 – Dr. Norman Vincent Peale, American clergyman (d. 1993)

• June 4 – Harry Crosby, American publisher and poet (d. 1929)

• June 5 – Federico García Lorca, Spanish poet (d. 1936)

• June 6 – Ninette de Valois, Irish dancer and founder of The Royal Ballet, London (d. 2001)

• June 17

• *M. C. Escher, Dutch artist (d. 1972)

• *Harry Patch, British WWI soldier, last Tommy Atkins (d. 2009)

• June 22 – Erich Maria Remarque, German writer (d. 1970)

July–September

• July 2 – Gen Paul, French artist (d. 1975)

• July 3 – Donald Healey, English motor engineer and race car driver (d. 1988)

• July 6 – Hanns Eisler, German composer (d. 1962)

• July 14 – Youssef Wahbi, Egyptian actor and film director (d. 1982)

• July 17

• *Berenice Abbott, American photographer (d. 1991)

• *George Robert Vincent, American sound recording pioneer (d. 1985)

• July 22

• *Stephen Vincent Benét, American writer (d. 1943)

• *Alexander Calder, American artist (d. 1976)

• July 28 – Lawrence Gray, American actor (d. 1970)

• July 29 – Isidor Isaac Rabi, American physicist, Nobel Prize laureate (d. 1968)

• July 30 – Henry Moore, English sculptor (d. 1986)

• August 15 – Jan Brzechwa, Polish poet (d. 1966)

• August 18 – Lance Sharkey, Australian Communist Leader (d. 1967)

• August 20 – Leopold Infeld, Polish physicist (d. 1968)

• August 26 – Peggy Guggenheim, American art collector (d. 1979)

• August 29 – Preston Sturges, American director and writer (d. 1959)

• September 13 – Roger Désormière, French conductor (d. 1963)

• September 22 – Katherine Alexander, American actress (d. 1981)

• September 24 – Howard Walter Florey, Australian-born pharmacologist, recipient of the Nobel Prize in Physiology or Medicine (d. 1968)

• September 25 – Robert Brackman, American artist (d. 1980)

• September 26 – George Gershwin, American composer (d. 1937)

• September 29 – Trofim Lysenko, Russian biologist (d. 1976)

• September 30

• *Renée Adorée, French actress (d. 1933)

• *Princess Charlotte of Monaco (d. 1977)

October–December

• October 7 – Joe Giard, American baseball player (d. 1956)

• October 10

• *Lilly Daché, French milliner (d. 1989)

• *Marie Pierre Koenig, French general and politician (d. 1970)

• October 15 – Boughera El Ouafi, Algerian athlete (d. 1959)

• October 18 – Lotte Lenya, Austrian actress and singer (d. 1981)

• November 8 – Marie Prevost, Canadian actress (d. 1937)

• November 12 – Leon Štukelj, Slovene gymnast (d. 1999)

• November 17 – Maurice Journeau, French composer (d. 1999)

• November 18 – Joris Ivens, Dutch director (d. 1989)

• November 19 – Arthur R. von Hippel, German-born physicist (d. 2003)

• November 21 – René Magritte, Belgian artist (d. 1967)

• November 26 – Karl Ziegler, German chemist, Nobel Prize laureate (d. 1973)

• November 29 – C. S. Lewis, British author (d. 1963)

• November 30 – Firpo Marberry, American baseball pitcher (d. 1976)

• December 2 – Indra Lal Roy, Indian World War I pilot (d. 1918)

• December 6 – Alfred Eisenstaedt, American photojournalist (d. 1995)

• December 19 – Zheng Zhenduo, Chinese author and translator (d. 1958)

• December 20 – Irene Dunne, American actress (d. 1990)

• December 24 – Baby Dodds, American jazz drummer (d. 1959)

• date unknown – Mariya Klenova, Russian marine geologist (d. 1976)

Deaths

January–June

• January 3 – Lawrence Sullivan Ross, Confederate brigadier general, Texas governor, and president of Texas A&M University (b.1838)

• January 14 – Lewis Carroll, British writer, mathematician (Alice in Wonderland)(b. 1832)

• January 16 – Charles Pelham Villiers, longest-serving MP in the British House of Commons (b. 1802)

• January 18 – Henry George Lidell, Dean of Christ Church, Oxford (b. 1811)

• February 16 – Thomas Bracken, author of the official national anthem of New Zealand (God Defend New Zealand) (b. 1843)

• March 1 – George Bruce Malleson, Indian officer and author (b. 1825)

• March 15 – Henry Bessemer, British engineer and inventor (b. 1813)

• March 16 – Aubrey Beardsley, British artist (b. 1872)

• March 18 – Matilda Joslyn Gage, American feminist (b. 1826)

• March 27 – Sir Syed Ahmad Khan, Indian university founder (b. 1817)

• April 15 – Kepa Te Rangihiwinui, Maori military leader

• April 18 – Gustave Moreau, French painter (b. 1826)

• May 19 – William Ewart Gladstone, Prime Minister of the United Kingdom (b. 1809)

July–December

• July 1 – Siegfried Marcus, Austrian automobile pioneer (b. 1831)

• July 5 – Richard Pankhurst

• July 12 – Louis-François Richer Laflèche, Roman Catholic Bishop of Trois-Rivières, Native American missionary (b. 1818)

• July 30 – Otto von Bismarck, German statesman (b. 1815)

• August 8 – Eugène Boudin, French painter (b. 1824)

• September 2 – Wilford Woodruff, fourth president of The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints (b. 1807)

• September 5 – Sarah Emma Edmundson, Canadian nurse and spy (b. 1841)

• September 9 – Stéphane Mallarmé, French poet (b. 1842)

• September 10 – Elisabeth of Bavaria, empress consort of Austria, queen consort of Hungary (assassinated) (b. 1837)

• September 16 – Ramón Emeterio Betances, Puerto Rican politician, medical doctor and diplomat (b. 1827)

• September 20 – Theodor Fontane, German writer (b. 1819)

• September 28 – Tan Sitong, Chinese revolutionary (executed) (b. 1865)

• October 24 – Pierre Puvis de Chavannes, French painter (b. 1824)

• November 2 – George Goyder, surveyor-general of South Australia (b. 1826)

• December 24 – Sharbel Makhluf, Lebanese monk (b. 1828)