- Jan 1 The Cobble Hill Tunnel in Brooklyn is completed
Historic Correspondence
Jan 10 Poets Elizabeth Barrett and Robert Browning begin corresponding
- Jan 23 Uniform US election day for President & VP authorized
Historic Publication
Jan 29 American writer Edgar Allan Poe's poem "The Raven" 1st published in The Evening Mirror newspaper (New York City)
2,000-year-old Glass Treasure Shattered by a Drunk
Feb 7 The Portland Vase, thought to date to the 1st century BC is shattered into more than 80 pieces by a drunken visitor to the British Museum
- Feb 15 William Parsons, Earl of Rosse, 1st uses 72 inch (183 cm) reflector
Annexation of Texas
Mar 1 US President John Tyler signs a resolution annexing the Republic of Texas
- Mar 3 Florida becomes 27th state of the Union
- Mar 3 For the first time the US Senate overrides presidential (Tyler) veto
- Mar 3 US Congress authorizes ocean mail contracts for foreign mail delivery
President Inaugurated
Mar 4 James K. Polk inaugurated as 11th US President
- Mar 5 7th Grand National: William Loft aboard outsider Cure-All wins in record time of 10 minutes, 47 seconds
Treaty of Waitangi
Mar 11 The Flagstaff War: In New Zealand, Chiefs Hone Heke and Kawiti lead 700 Māoris to chop down the British flagpole and drive settlers out of the British colonial settlement of Kororareka because of breaches of the 1840 Treaty of Waitangi.
- Mar 14 -5.3°F (-20.7°C) in Groningen, Netherlands
- Mar 17 Bristol man Henry Jones patents self-raising flour
- Mar 17 Rubber band patented by Stephen Perry of London
- Mar 26 Joseph Francis from NYC, patents a corrugated sheet-iron lifeboat
- Mar 26 Patent awarded for adhesive medicated plaster, precursor of band-aid
- Mar 28 Mexico drops diplomatic relations with US
- Apr 2 H L Fizeau & Leon Foucault take 1st photo of the Sun
- Apr 10 More than 1,000 buildings damaged by fire in Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania
- Apr 18 Whaling ship the Manhattan captained by Mercator Cooper is the first ship officially permitted visit Edo, Japan, in 220 years rescuing shipwrecked sailors
- Apr 29 Macon B. Allen & Robert Morris Jr are 1st African Americans to open a law practice in the US
- May 2 Argentinian Domingo Sarmiento publishes his anti-tyranny work "Facundo Civilización y Barbarie"
- May 3 1st African American lawyer, Macon B Allen, admitted to the bar in Massachusetts
- May 3 Fire kills 1,600 in popular theater in Canton, China
- May 14 Utrecht-Arnhem Railway opens
- May 20 1st legislative assembly convenes in Hawaii
- May 20 HMS Erebus and HMS Terror with 134 men under John Franklin sail from the River Thames in England, beginning a disastrous expedition to find the Northwest Passage. All hands are lost.
- May 23 New York City Police Department (NYPD) is formed, replacing an old night watch system
- May 28 Fire in Quebec, Canada, 1,500 houses destroyed
- Jun 1 Homing pigeon completes 11,000 km trip (Namibia-London) in 55 days
Event of Interest
Jun 10 Andrew Jackson's African Grey parrot "Poll" is removed from his funeral for swearing at The Hermitage, Tennessee. Funeral attendee William Menefee Norment recorded: "Before the sermon and while the crowd was gathering, a wicked parrot that was a household pet got excited and commenced swearing so loud and long as to disturb the people and had to be carried from the house”
- Jun 12 George Abernethy becomes 1st governor of Oregon Country
Film & TV History
Jul 3 Pioneering French magician Jean Eugène Robert-Houdin opens his magic theatre in Paris
Event of Interest
Jul 4 Henry David Thoreau moves into his shack on Walden Pond
- Jul 4 Texas Congress votes for annexation to US
- Jul 14 1st postmasters' provisional stamps issued, NYC
- Jul 19 Fire in NYC destroys 1,000 homes and kills many
- Aug 4 Emigrant ship Cataraqui wrecks in Bass Strait with the loss of 400 lives, only nine survive, Australia's deadliest maritime civil disaster [1]
- Aug 6 The Russian Geographical Society is founded in Saint Petersburg
- Aug 28 Scientific American magazine publishes its first issue
- Sep 10 King Willem II opens Amsterdam Stock exchange
Scientific Discovery
Sep 13 English chemist Michael Faraday discovers the 'Faraday effect', the influence of a magnetic field on polarized light
- Sep 23 1st baseball team, NY Knickerbockers organize, adopt rule code
- Sep 23 Hunger strike in Hague
- Oct 9 Eminent and controversial Anglican priest John Henry Newman leaves Anglican Curch of England and is received into the Roman Catholic Church
- Oct 10 Naval School (now called US Naval Academy) opens at Annapolis
- Oct 13 Texas ratifies a state constitution
Music Premiere
Oct 19 Richard Wagner's opera "Tannhäuser" premieres in Dresden
- Nov 4 First nationally observed uniform election day in the United States, the first Tuesday after the first Monday in November
- Nov 15 Opera "Maritana" is produced (London)
- Nov 29 The Sonderbund is defeated by the joint forces of other Swiss cantons under General Guillaume-Henri Dufour
- Dec 2 US President James K. Polk announces to Congress that the United States should aggressively expand into the West, a widely held belief termed "manifest destiny" by newspaper editor John O'Sullivan
- Dec 6 Alpha Sigma Phi Fraternity is founded at Yale College.
Event of Interest
Dec 17 German explorer Ludwig Leichhardt arrives in Port Essington after a nearly 4,800 km (3,000 mi) overland journey to explore Australia's Northern Territory
