- Jan 1 French troops occupy Nioro, West-Sudan, 3000 killed
- Jan 1 King Pakketvaart sails to Neth Indies
Event of Interest
Jan 26 Oscar Wilde's "Duchess of Padua" premieres in NYC
Oscar Wilde
- Jan 27 Mine explosion kills 109 at Mount Pleasant Pennsylvania
- Jan 29 Liliuokalani is proclaimed Queen of Hawaii, its last monarch
- Jan 31 The first attempt of a Portuguese republican revolution breakes out in the northern city of Porto
- Feb 6 1st great train robbery by Dalton Gang (Southern Pacific #17)
- Feb 9 1st shipment of asparagus arrives in San Francisco from Sacramento
- Feb 15 AIK is founded at Biblioteksgatan 8 in Stockholm by Isidor Behrens.
- Feb 18 Capt Archinard's army fights with Nyamina of Niger in West-Sudan
- Feb 24 French troops under Captain Archinard occupy Diena West Sudan
- Feb 26 1st buffalo purchased for Golden Gate Park
Event of Interest
Feb 26 Henrik Ibsen's "Hedda Gabler" premieres in Oslo
Henrik Ibsen
- Feb 28 Oscar Grundén skates world record 500m (50.8 sec)
- Mar 3 US Congress creates Courts of Appeal
- Mar 3 US Congress creates Office of Superintendent of Immigration (Treasury Dept)
- Mar 3 The Penalty Spot Kick rule in Association Football is conceived, but does not come into effect until the next season.
Great Blizzard of 1891
Mar 9 Great Blizzard of 1891 begins in England and lasts until March 13; Kills 200 people and 6,000 animals
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- Mar 10 Almon Strowger, an undertaker in Topeka, Kansas, patents the strowger switch, a device which led to the automation of telephone circuit switching
- Mar 17 British Steamer "Utopia" sinks off Gibraltar killing 574
- Mar 18 Britain is linked to the continent by Telephone
- Mar 20 53rd Grand National: Irish jockey, trainer Harry Beasley wins aboard 4/1 Come Away
- Mar 28 1st world weightlifting championship won by Edward Lawrence in London, England
- Apr 1 London-Paris telephone connection opens
Event of Interest
Apr 1 French painter Paul Gauguin leaves Marseille for Tahiti
Paul Gauguin
Event of Interest
Apr 25 US President Benjamin Harrison visits San Francisco
Benjamin Harrison
Event of Interest
May 5 Music Hall (Carnegie Hall) opens in New York, Tchaikovsky is guest conductor
Pyotr Ilyich Tchaikovsky
Assassination Attempt
May 11 The Otsu Scandal: While visiting Japan, Prince Nicholas (later Tsar Nicholas II) survives an assassination attempt
Nicholas II
Music Premiere
May 15 Jules Massenet's opera "Grisélidis" premieres in Paris
Jules Massenet
- May 15 Operations begin at Philips & Co in Holland
Event of Interest
May 20 History of cinema: The first public display of Thomas Edison's prototype kinetoscope to members of the National Federation of Women's Club
Thomas Edison
- May 21 Australian boxer Peter Jackson and future world heavyweight champion Jim Corbett fight a No Contest in 61 rounds at California Athletic Club, San Francisco
- May 31 Work on trans-Siberian railway begins
- Jun 9 French painter Paul Gauguin arrives in Papeete, Tahiti
- Jun 10 25th Belmont: Ed Garrison riding Foxford wins in 2:08.75
- Jun 11 Puerto Rican flag adopted
Event of Interest
Jun 16 John Abbott becomes Canada's third prime minister
John Abbott
- Jun 27 US National Championship Women's Tennis, Philadelphia Cricket Club: Mabel Cahill beats defending champion Ellen Roosevelt 6-4, 6-1, 4-6, 6-3
- Jun 29 US National Forest Service organized
- Jun 29 Street railway in Ottawa, Ontario, Canada, commences operation.
- Jul 4 Wimbledon Men's Tennis: Wilfred Baddeley wins first of 3 Wimbledon singles championships; beats Joshua Pim 6-4, 1-6, 7-5, 6-0
- Jul 5 Hail kills 16 horses in Rapid City, South Dakota
- Jul 7 Marcellus F. Berry, an American Express employee is granted four copyrights for what he called "the travelers cheque"
- Jul 8 61°F, highest temperature for July 1891, in Baltimore and Philadelphia
- Jul 9 Wimbledon Women's Tennis: Lottie Dod beats Blanche Bingley-Hillyard 6-2, 6-1 in a repeat matchup and result of the 2 previous finals
- Jul 14 American John T. Smith patents corkboard
- Jul 26 Henry James' "American" premieres in London
- Jul 26 France annexes Tahiti.
- Jul 27 Titus van Wyck succeeds M de Savornin Lohman as governor of Suriname
- Aug 5 World's 1st traveler's cheques issued by American Express
- Aug 15 San Sebastian Church in Manila, the first all-steel church in Asia, is officially inaugurated and blessed.
- Aug 16 President Benjamin Harrison attends the dedication of the Bennington Battle Monument in Bennington, Vermont
- Aug 17 1st public bathhouse with showers opens in NYC (People's Bath)
- Aug 17 Electric self-starter for automobile patented
- Aug 18 Hurricane hits Martinique, about 700 die
- Aug 19 William Huggins describes astronomical application of spectrum
- Aug 21 Dutch Mackay government resigns
- Aug 24 Thomas Edison patents motion picture camera
- Aug 31 US National Championship Men's Tennis, Newport R.I.: Defending champion Oliver Campbell beats Clarence Hobart 2-6, 7-5, 7-9, 6-1, 6-2; second of 3 straight titles
- Sep 3 Cotton pickers organize union & stage strike in Texas
- Sep 3 John Stephens Durham named US minister to Haiti
- Sep 7 Captain Frederick Lugard's army reaches Kavalli, Equatoria
- Sep 11 The Jewish Colonization Association is established by Baron Maurice de Hirsch.
- Sep 14 "Empire State Express" train goes from NYC to East Buffalo, a distance of 436 miles, in a record 7H6M
- Sep 18 Harriet Maxwell Converse is 1st white woman to become an Indian chief
Event of Interest
Oct 1 Stanford University, California opens its doors after being founded by Leland Stanford and his wife Jane with a $40M donation (1891 dollars), in memory of their son. Among its first graduation class, future US President Herbert Hoover.
Leland Stanford
Herbert Hoover
- Oct 7 British Open Men's Golf, St Andrews: Hugh Kirkaldy wins by 2 strokes from brother Andrew Kirkaldy and Willie Fernie; last Open contested in a single day over 36 holes
- Oct 12 Astronomical Society of France is inaugurated
- Oct 20 1st International 6 day bike race at New York's Madison Square Garden begins
- Oct 25 1st International 6 day bike race (NY Madison Square Garden) ends
- Oct 28 Quake strikes Mino-Owari, Japan kills 7,300
- Nov 10 1st Women's Christian Temperance Union meeting held (in Boston)
- Nov 10 Granville T Woods patents electric railway
- Nov 30 Pope Leo XIII's encyclical "Rerum novarum" published
- Dec 2 52nd Congress (1891-93) convenes
- Dec 7 52nd US Congress (1st to appropriate $1 billion) holds 1st session
- Dec 19 1st Negro Catholic priest ordained in US, Charles Uncles, Baltimore
- Dec 19 Canadian Rugby Union forms
- Dec 20 Strongman Louis Cyr withstands pull of 4 horses
Event of Interest
Dec 21 1st game of basketball, based on rules created by James Naismith, played by 18 students in Springfield, Massachusetts
James Naismith
- Dec 29 Edison patents "transmission of signals electrically" (radio)