Music Premiere
Jan 1 Johannes Brahms' Violin Concerto in D major premieres in Leipzig
Cricket History
Jan 2 Australian fast bowler Fred Spofforth dismisses 3 English batsmen with consecutive deliveries during the 3rd Test at the Melbourne Cricket Ground for Test cricket's first "hat-trick"
- Jan 2 British battleship Thunder explodes in Gulf of Ismid, 9 die
- Jan 2 Dr Benjamin Mays, named president of Atlanta Board of Education
- Jan 9 Cheyenne prisoners led by Dull Knife revolt at Ft Robinson
- Jan 9 Kirland Warbler discovered on Andros Island in Bahamas
Anglo-Zulu War
Jan 11 Anglo-Zulu War begins as British Lt-General Chelmsford invades Zululand in South Africa
Theater Premiere
Jan 21 Henrik Ibsen's play "Et Dukkehjem" (A Doll's House) premieres in Copenhagen
The British: 139. Zulu Warriors: 4,000. Let Battle Begin
Jan 22 Battle of Rorke's Drift: British garrison of 150 holds off 3,000-4,000 Zulu warriors. Eleven Victoria Crosses and a number of other decorations were awarded to the defenders.
- Jan 22 James Shields (D) elected US senator from Missouri after previously serving as US senator from Illinois & Minnesota
- Jan 22 Zulu warriors attack British Army camp in Isandhlwana, South Africa
- Jan 23 US National Archery Association forms in Crawfordsville, Indiana
- Jan 25 The Bulgarian National Bank is founded
Battle of Interest
Jan 29 Custer Battlefield National Monument established in Montana
Historic Expedition
Feb 10 Henry Morton Stanley departs for the Congo
- Feb 12 1st artificial ice rink in North America (Madison Square Garden, NYC)
- Feb 12 News about British loss at Battle of Isandlwana to Zulu attack (Anglo-Zulu War) reaches London
- Feb 14 Chilean troops occupy Antofagasta
- Feb 15 US Congress authorizes women lawyers to practise before Supreme Court
- Feb 18 Arabs capture Egyptian premier Nabar Pasha
Statue of Liberty
Feb 18 Sculptor Frédéric-Auguste Bartholdi is awarded a patent for his design for the Statue of Liberty
Wonder of Woolworths Begins its Meteoric Rise
Feb 22 First "Woolworth's Great Five Cent Store" opened by Frank Winfield Woolworth in Utica, New York. It fails almost immediately.
- Feb 25 US Congress passed 1st Timberland Protection Act
- Feb 27 Russian Chemist Constantin Fahlberg discovers saccharin (artificial sweetener) [1]
- Feb 28 "Exodus of 1879" southern blacks flee political and economic exploitation
- Mar 1 Library of Hawaii founded
- Mar 3 1st female lawyer heard by US Supreme Court (Belva Ann Bennett Lockwood)
- Mar 3 US Geological Survey director authorized in Department of the Interior
- Mar 23 War of the Pacific fought between Chile and the joints forces of Bolivia and Peru. Chile successfully takes over Arica and Tarapacá, leaving Bolivia a landlocked country.
- Mar 27 Longest championship fight (136 rounds)
- Mar 28 41st Grand National: Garry Moore aboard 5/1 chance The Liberator wins by 2 lengths from Jackal
- Mar 29 English FA Cup Final, Kennington Oval, London: Old Etonians beat Clapham Rovers, 1-0; Charles Clerke scores winner
- Mar 29 Tsjaikovski's opera "Jevgeni Onegin" premieres in Moscow
- Apr 5 Chile declares war on Bolivia and Peru, starting the War of the Pacific.
- Apr 8 Khedive Ismael of Egypt fires French and British ministers
- Apr 8 Milk sold in glass bottles for 1st time
- Apr 18 Trial of Standing Bear-Crook on indians citizen rights begins
- Apr 20 1st mobile home (horse drawn) used in a journey from London & Cyprus
- Apr 26 National Park (later renamed Royal National Park) established south of Sydney, Australia. World's second-oldest national park.
- May 8 George Selden files for 1st patent for a gasoline-driven automobile
- May 10 Meteor falls near Estherville, Iowa
- May 14 The first group of 463 Indian indentured labourers arrive in Fiji aboard the Leonidas
- May 16 Antonín Dvořák's "Slavonic Dances" premieres
- May 16 Treaty of Gandamak to set up Afghan state between Russia & English
- May 20 5th Kentucky Derby: Charlie Shauer aboard Lord Murphy wins in 2:37
- May 21 Battle of Iquique: Chilean naval forces overcome Peruvian ships (War of the Pacific)
- May 24 7th Preakness: L Hughes aboard Harold wins in 2:40.5
- May 30 92°F highest temperature ever recorded in Cleveland in May
- May 30 An F4 tornado strikes Irving, Kansas, killing 18 and injuring 60.
- May 30 Gilmore Garden (NYC) renamed Madison Square Garden
- May 31 1st electric railway opens at Berlin Trades Exposition
Event of Interest
May 31 Madison Square Garden opens in New York, named after 4th President James Madison
Music History
Jun 16 W. S. Gilbert and Arthur Sullivan's comic opera "HMS Pinafore" debuts at Bowery Theater NYC
- Jun 18 W. H. Richardson, an African-American inventor, patents the children's carriage (Patent no. 405599)
Event of Interest
Jun 21 Frank Winfield Woolworth opens his 1st successful "Woolworth's Great Five Cent Store" on North Queen Street, Lancaster, Pennsylvania
Historic Publication
Jul 1 Charles Taze Russell publishes the first edition of the religious magazine The Watchtower
- Jul 1 Ex-khedive Ismael Pasha sails from Alexandria to Naples
- Jul 4 Africaner Union forms by Rev SJ du Toit at Cape colony
- Jul 4 Battle at Ulundi: Lord Chelmsford beats Zulu King Cetshwayo
- Jul 12 Agricultural and industrial tariffs are introduced in Germany
- Jul 15 Wimbledon Men's Tennis: John Hartley beats Vere St. Leger Goold 6-2, 6-4, 6-2
- Jul 17 1st railroad opens in Hawaii
- Jul 20 Swedish expedition headed by Nils Adolf Erik Nordenskiöld, aboard SS Vega, becomes the first to navigate the Northeast passage
- Jul 31 The first cable connection between South Africa and Europe is laid by the British electrical engineer Charles Tilston Bright as part of his project to link the British Empire with growing telecommunications technologies
- Aug 7 The opening of the Poor Man's Palace in Manchester.
- Aug 12 1st National Archery Association tournament (Chicago)
- Aug 17 Ferdinand de Lesseps forms French Panama Canal Company
- Aug 20 Government Kappeijne of Coppello resigns
- Aug 21 The Virgin Mary, along with St. Joseph and St. John the Evangelist, reportedly appears to the people of Knock, County Mayo, Ireland.
- Aug 23 Governor-general Charles Gordon of Sudan returns to Cairo
- Sep 5 George Washington De Long, American Arctic Explorer, and commander on board the Jeannette, becomes trapped with his crew in pack ice during his attempt to reach the North Pole
- Sep 15 Pim Mulier forms Royal Haarlemsche Football Club based in Haarlem, Netherlands; oldest existing club in Dutch football
- Sep 19 The Blackpool Illuminations are switched on for the first time.
- Sep 19 Thomas Ray becomes youngest to break a world track & field record pole-vaulting 11' 2½" at age 17 years & 198 days
Event of Interest
Sep 20 Ulysses S. Grant and family go to SF for elaborate extended visit
- Sep 23 Baldwin steam motors tram 1st tried in Sydney Australia
- Sep 23 Richard Rhodes invented a hearing aid called the Audiophone
Sports History
Sep 27 British Open Men's Golf, St Andrews: Scotsman Jamie Anderson wins by 3 shots from countrymen Jamie Allen & Andrew Kirkaldy; 3rd consecutive title
- Sep 28 Sydney, Australia, inaugurates steam motor tram route
- Sep 29 NL owners meeting in Buffalo adopt reserve clause, giving each team exclusive rights to their players
- Oct 1 Cincinnati Enquirer publishes first report on Baseball's reserve clause; rights to players retained by team upon the contract's expiration; replaced by free agency
- Oct 7 Germany & Austrian-Hungary sign Twofold Covenant
- Oct 8 War of the Pacific: the Chilean Navy defeats the Peruvian Navy in the Battle of Angamos, Peruvian Admiral Miguel Grau is killed in the encounter.
- Oct 12 British troops occupy Kabul, Afghanistan
- Oct 19 Afghan's emir Mohammed Yakub forced to resign
Historic Invention
Oct 22 Thomas Edison perfects carbonized cotton filament light bulb
Historic Invention
Nov 4 African American inventor Thomas Elkins patents the Refrigerating Apparatus [1]
- Nov 4 James Ritty patents first cash register, to combat stealing by bartenders in his saloon in Dayton, Ohio
- Nov 6 Canada celebrates 1st Thanksgiving Day
- Nov 19 National Association of Trotting Horse Breeders determines what "is" a trotter
- Nov 28 Battle at Lydenburg South Africa: Gen Wolseley beats Sekhukhenes Pedi-Zulu
- Dec 5 1st automatic telephone switching system patented
- Dec 13 First federal fish hatching steamer launched (Wilmington, Delaware)
- Dec 20 Thomas Edison privately demonstrated incandescent light at Menlo Park
- Dec 26 Johannes Brahms' "Tragic Ouverture" premieres
- Dec 28 North British Railway's train falls as Tay bridge collapses (Scotland)
- Dec 30 W. S. Gilbert and Arthur Sullivan's comic opera "The Pirates of Penzance" premieres in Paignton, England and at Fifth Avenue Theatre NYC the next day
- Dec 31 Cornerstone laid for Honolulu's Iolani Palace (only royal palace in US)
- Dec 31 Edison gives 1st public demonstration of his incandescent lamp