Year '1894' ('
MDCCCXCIV') was a
common year starting on Monday (link will display the full calendar) of the
Gregorian calendar (or a
common year starting on Saturday of the 12-day slower
Julian calendar).
Events of 1894
January - March
★
January 7 -
W.K. Dickson receives a patent for
motion picture film.
★
January 8 - A fire at the
1893-1894
World's Columbian Exposition in
Chicago causes a good deal of damage.
★
January 9 -
New England Telephone and Telegraph installs the first
battery-operated
telephone switchboard (
Lexington, Massachusetts).
★
February 15 - 04:51
GMT, French
anarchist Martial Bourdin attempts to destroy the
Royal Greenwich Observatory,
London,
England with a bomb.
★
March 1 -
Thomas McGreevy, Canadian politician and contractor, is released from prison after serving time for defrauding the government.
★
March 4 - The
First Sino-Japanese War: Great fire in
Shanghai; over 1,000 buildings are destroyed.
★
March 12 - For the first time,
Coca-Cola is sold in bottles.
★
March 15 - Anarchist
Jean Pauwels dies in a
Madeline church in
Paris when his bomb explodes in his pocket.
★
March 21 -
Syzygy of planets as
Mercury transited the
Sun as seen from
Venus, and Mercury and Venus both simultaneously transited the Sun as seen from
Saturn.
★ End of the rule of chief
Touch the Clouds
★
March 25 -
Coxey's Army, the first significant American protest march, departs
Massillon, Ohio for
Washington D.C.
April - June
★ May - Outbreak of
bubonic plague in the
Tai Ping Shan area of
Hong Kong. The disease would eventually kill a total of 2,552 people in the territory that year.
★
May 1
★
★ Coxey's Army arrives in Washington D.C.
★
★
May Day Riots of 1894 break out in
Cleveland, Ohio.
★
May 11 -
Pullman Strike: Three thousand
Pullman Palace Car Company workers go on a "wildcat" (without
union approval) strike in
Illinois.
★
May 14
★
★
Meteor shower in Southern
France.
★
★
Blackpool Tower is opened in
Blackpool,
Lancashire,
England.
★
May 21 - The
Manchester Ship Canal and
Docks are opened by
Queen Victoria.
★
June 22 -
Dahomey becomes a
French colony.
★
June 23 -
International Olympic Committee is founded at the
Sorbonne,
Paris, at the initiative of Baron
Pierre de Coubertin.
★
June 24 - Assassination of
Sadi Carnot,
president of France.
★
June 30 -
Tower Bridge in London opened for traffic.
July - September
★
July 4 - The short-lived
Republic of Hawaii is proclaimed by
Sanford B. Dole.
★
August 1 - Declaration of war between the
Qing Empire of
China and the
Empire of Japan, over their rival claims of influence on their common ally, the
Joseon Dynasty of
Korea. The event marks the start of the first
Sino-Japanese War.
★
August 15 -
Sante Geronimo Caserio is executed for the assassination of
Marie François Sadi Carnot.
★
September 1 -
Great Hinckley Fire: A
forest fire in
Hinckley, Minnesota kills more than 450 people.
★
September 4 - In
New York City, 12,000 tailors
strike against
sweatshop working conditions.
October - December
★
October 1 - The
Owl Club of
Cape Town,
South Africa has its first formal meeting.
★
October 12 - In
Mississippi, the
Great Fire of Biloxi sweeps through the city.
★
October 15 -
Alfred Dreyfus is arrested for spying:
Dreyfus affair begins.
★
October 30 - Domenico Menegatti obtains a patent for a procedure to be applied in producing
pandoro industrially.
★
November 1 -
Russian Tsar
Alexander III dies and is succeeded by his son
Nicholas II.
★
November 5 -
West Palm Beach, Florida is incorporated as a city.
★
December 18 - Women in
South Australia become the first in
Australia to gain the right to vote and to be elected to Parliament.
★
December 21 -
Mackenzie Bowell becomes
Canada's fifth
prime minister.
★
December 22 - French army officer
Alfred Dreyfus is convicted of treason in the midst of a European controversy known as the
Dreyfus Affair.
Undated
★ Western countries give up their
extraterritorial rights in
Japan.
★
Grace Kimmins founds the
Guild of the Poor Brave Things.
★
Kate Chopin writes "The Story of An Hour" (fiction).
★ French police arrest 200 anarchists in their homes in sweep of country.
★
National College of Music, London, is founded by the Moss family.
★ In the
US, the
American Academy of Rome is founded.
★ In the
US, the
Society of Beaux-Arts Architects is founded.
★
Elyria High School is built, becoming the first chartered high school west of the
Allegheny Mountains.
Births
January - June
★
January 1 -
Satyendra Nath Bose, Indian physicist (d.
1974)
★
January 20 -
Walter Piston, American composer (d.
1976)
★
January 30 - King
Boris III of Bulgaria (d.
1943)
★
January 31 -
Isham Jones, American jazz musician (d.
1956)
★
February 3 -
Norman Rockwell, American artist and illustrator (d.
1978)
★
February 8 -
Ludwig Marcuse, German philosopher (d.
1971)
★
February 10 -
Harold Macmillan,
Prime Minister of the United Kingdom (d.
1986)
★
February 11 -
Alfonso Leng, Chilean composer (d.
1974)
★
February 14 -
Jack Benny, American actor and comedian (d.
1974)
★
February 25 -
Meher Baba,
Avatar of the Age, was born in India (d.
1969)
★
February 28 -
Ben Hecht, American playwright, and film writer (d.
1964)
★
March 17 -
Paul Green, novelist and
Pulitzer Prize-winning playwright (d.
1981)
★
March 19 -
Moms Mabley, American comedienne (d.
1975)
★
March 30 -
Nikolai P. Barabashov, Russian astronomer (d.
1971)
★
April 10 -
Shri Ghanshyam Das Birla, Indian industrialist, Gandhian, and educationalist (d.
1983)
★
April 10 -
Ben Nicholson English abstract artist (d.
1982)
★
April 13 -
Arthur Fadden, thirteenth
Prime Minister of Australia (d.
1973)
★
April 15 -
Bessie Smith, American blues singer (d.
1937)
★
April 17 -
Nikita Sergeevich Khrushchev, Soviet politician (d.
1971)
★
April 26 -
Rudolf Hess, Nazi official (d.
1987)
★
April 27 -
Nicolas Slonimsky, Russian/American musicologist (d.
1995)
★
May 11 -
Martha Graham, American dancer and choreographer (d.
1991)
★
May 16 -
Walter Yust, American encyclopædia editor (d.
1960)
★
May 27
★
★
Louis-Ferdinand Céline, French writer (d.
1961)
★
★
Dashiell Hammett, American author (d.
1961)
★
May 31 -
Fred Allen, American comedian (d.
1956)
★
June 4 -
Gabriel Pascal, Hungarian Film Producer (d.
1954)
★
June 7 -
Roy Thomson, Canadian publisher (d.
1976)
★
June 9 -
Nedo Nadi, Italian fencer (d.
1940)
★
June 14 -
Marie-Adélaïde, Grand Duchess of Luxembourg (d.
1924)
★
June 23 - King
Edward VIII of the United Kingdom (d.
1972)
July - December
★
July 9 -
Pyotr Leonidovich Kapitsa, Russian physicist,
Nobel Prize laureate (d.
1984)
★
July 18 -
Isaac Babel, Ukrainian writer (d.
1940)
★
July 19 -
Khawaja Nazimuddin, second
Prime Minister of Pakistan (d.
1965)
★
July 26 -
Aldous Huxley, English author (d.
1963)
★
August 3 -
Harry Heilmann, baseball player (d.
1951)
★
August 21 - Katie Harris, folklorist (d.
2001)
★
August 28 -
Karl Böhm, Austrian conductor (d.
1981)
★
August 28 -
Elisha Scott, footballer (d.
1959)
★
September 2 -
Joseph Roth, Austrian writer (d.
1939)
★
September 7 -
George Waggner, American film director, producer, and actor (d.
1984)
★
September 13 -
J. B. Priestley, English novelist and playwright (d.
1984)
★
September 13 -
Julian Tuwim, Polish poet (d.
1953)
★
September 15 -
Jean Renoir, French film director (d.
1979)
★
September 24 -
Tommy Armour, Scottish golfer (d.
1968)
★
October 5 -
Bevil Rudd, South African athlete (d.
1948)
★
October 7 -
Del Lord, Hollywood director (d.
1970)
★
October 14 -
E. E. Cummings, American poet (d.
1962)
★
October 15 -
Moshe Sharett, second
Prime Minister of Israel (d.
1965)
★
October 18 -
H. L. Davis, American author (d.
1960)
★
October 25 -
Claude Cahun, French photographer and writer (d.
1954)
★
October 25 -
Aşık Veysel Şatıroğlu, Turkish poet, songwriter and saz player (d.
1973)
★
November 2 -
Alexander Lippisch, German aerodynamics engineer (d.
1976)
★
November 4 -
Chafik Charobim, Egyptian impressionist painter (d.
1975)
★
November 24 -
Herbert Sutcliffe, English cricketer (d.
1978)
★
November 26 -
Norbert Wiener, American mathematician (d.
1964)
★
November 29 -
Lucille Hegamin, American singer and entertainer (d.
1970)
★
December 5 -
Philip K. Wrigley,
American chewing gum manufacturer and executive in
Major League Baseball (d.
1977)
★
December 8 -
James Thurber, American writer (d.
1961)
★
December 17 -
Arthur Fiedler, American conductor (d.
1979)
★
December 20 -
Robert Menzies, twelfth
Prime Minister of Australia (d.
1978)
★
December 22 -
Edwin Linkomies, Finnish Prime Minister (d.
1963)
★
December 26 -
Jean Toomer, Poet (d.
1967)
★
December 31 -
Pola Negri, Polish actress (d.
1987)
: ''See also .''
Deaths
January - June
★
January 1 -
Heinrich Hertz, German physicist (b.
1857)
★
January 13 -
Nadezhda von Meck, patron of Tchaikovsky (b.
1831)
★
February 4 -
Adolphe Sax, Belgian instrument maker, inventor of the saxophone (b.
1814)
★
February 6 -
Maria Deraismes, French feminist (b.
1828)
★
February 8 -
Robert Michael Ballantyne, Scottish novelist (b.
1825)
★
March 3 -
Ned Williamson, American baseball player (b.
1857)
★
March 20 -
Lajos Kossuth, Hungarian politician (b.
1802)
★
June 3 -
Karl Eduard Zachariae, German jurist and expert on Byzantine law (b.
1812)
★
June 7 -
Hassan I of Morocco (b.
1836)
★
June 23 -
Marietta Alboni, opera singer (b.
1826)
★
June 25 -
Marie François Sadi Carnot, French statesman (b.
1837) (assassinated)
July - December
★
September 13 -
Emmanuel Chabrier, composer (b.
1841)
★
October 20 -
James Anthony Froude, historian (b.
1818)
★
October 30 -
Juan Cortina, Mexican folk hero (b.
1824)
★
November 1 - Tsar
Alexander III of Russia (b.
1845)
★
November 20 -
Anton Rubinstein, Russian pianist and composer (b.
1829)
★
November 25 -
Solomon Caesar Malan, Swiss-born orientalist (b.
1812)
★
December 3 -
Robert Louis Stevenson, Scottish author (b.
1850)
★
December 9 -
Pafnuty Chebyshev, Russian mathematician (b.
1821)
★
December 12 -
John Sparrow David Thompson,
Prime Minister of Canada (b.
1845)
★
December 28 -
Chamaraja Wodeyar, Maharajah of Mysore (b.
1863)
: ''See also .''
Fictional events of the year
★
Sherlock Holmes returns to London from "The Great Hiatus".