1888 (MDCCCLXXXVIII) is a leap year starting on Sunday (click on link for calendar) of the Gregorian calendar or a leap year starting on Tuesday of the Julian calendar. In Germany, 1888 is known as the 1888 Year of Three Emperors. Currently, it is the year that, when written in roman numerals, has the most digits (13). This record will not be equalled until 2388 (MMCCCLXXXVIII), or surpassed until 2888 (MMDCCCLXXXVIII).

Events

January

• January 3 - 91cm telescope first used at Lick Observatory
• January 12 - Blizzards in Dakota and Montana, Minnesota, Nebraska and Texas - 235 dead, many of which were children on their way home from school
• January 24 - Jacob L. Wortman patents the typewriter ribbon.
• January 26 - Australia celebrates the first centenary of European settlement.
• January 27 - In Washington, DC the National Geographic Society is founded.

February

• February 27- In West Orange, New Jersey, Thomas Edison meets with Eadweard Muybridge who proposes a scheme for sound film.

March

• March 11 - The "Great Blizzard of '88" begins along the eastern seaboard of the United States, shutting down commerce and killing more than 400.
• March 22 - The Football League is formed

April

• April 11 - The Concertgebouw in Amsterdam is inaugurated.

May

• May 13 - Brazil abolishes slavery.
• May 28 - Celtic played their first official match against Rangers and won 5-2

June

• June 3 - "Kingdom of Sedang" formed in modern-day Vietnam
• June 19 - In Chicago, Illinois, Republican Convention opens at Auditorium Building. General Benjamin Harrison & Levi Morton will win the nominations.

July

• July 25 - Frank McGurrin, a court stenographer from Salt Lake City who was purportedly the only person using touch typing at the time, won a decisive victory over Louis Taub in a typing contest held in Cincinnati. This date can be called as the birthday of touch typing method that is widely used now.
• July 27 - British parliament passes an act that permits bicycles on road on condition that they are equipped with a bell that should be rung while on the carriageway. The law is abolished 1930

August

• August 7 - The body of Martha Tabram was found, a possible murder victim of Jack the Ripper
• August 20 - There is a mutiny at Dufile and Emin Pasha is imprisoned.
• August 31 - Mary Ann Nichols is murdered. She is perhaps the first of Jack the Ripper's victims.

September

• September 4 - George Eastman registers the trademark Kodak, and receives a patent for his camera which uses roll film.
• September 6 - Charles Turner becomes the first bowler to take 250 wickets in an English season - a feat since accomplished only by Tom Richardson (twice), J.T. Hearne, Wilfred Rhodes (twice) and Tich Freeman (six times).
• September 8 - In London, the body of Annie Chapman is found. She is generally considered the second victim of Jack the Ripper.
• September 8 - In England the first 6 Football League matches ever were played.
• September 30 - In London, the bodies of Elizabeth Stride and Catherine Eddowes are found. They are generally considered Jack the Ripper's third and fourth victim respectively.

October

• October 9 - The Washington Monument officially opens to the general public.

November

• November 6 - U.S. presidential election, 1888: Democrat incumbent Grover Cleveland wins the overall popular vote, but is voted out of office because he loses in the Electoral College to Republican challenger Benjamin Harrison.
• November 9 - In London the body of Mary Jane Kelly is found. She is typically considered the fifth and last of Jack the Ripper's victims. A number of similar murders actually follow, but police attribute them to copycat killers.

December

Unknown dates

• Gramophone patented by Emile Berliner
• Annie Besant organizes a match girl strike
• John Robert Gregg first published Gregg Shorthand
• Prosecution of Edward King, Anglican bishop of Lincoln for using ritualistic practices begins
• Sarawak and Borneo become British protectorates
• Susan B. Anthony organizes a congress for women's rights in Washington DC
• National library in Athens, Greece
• First railways in China
• Kodak camera increases the popularity of photography as a hobby.
• The first recorded film, Roundhay Garden Scene, is made in Roundhay in Leeds, West Yorkshire, England. The film is two seconds and 18 frames in length.
• First sightings of the dolphin Pelorus Jack in Cook Strait, New Zealand
• Camborne School of Mines founded in Cornwall, UK.
• The Finnish epic, Kalevala published for the first time in the English Language. By John Martin Crawford.
• Unknown inventor develops Mum (deodorant), widely recognized as the first product developed to prevent odor.

Births

January-March

• January 1 - Victor Goldschmidt, Swiss geochemist (d. 1947)
• January 8 - Matt Moore, Irish-born actor (d. 1960)
• January 24 - Vicki Baum, Austrian writer (d. 1960)
  • Ernst Heinkel, German aircraft designer (d. 1958)
• February 2 - Frederick Lane, Australian swimmer (d. 1969)
• February 17 - Otto Stern, German physicist, Nobel Prize laureate (d. 1969)
• February 19 - José Eustasio Rivera, Colombian writer (d. 1928)
• February 20 - Georges Bernanos, French writer (d. 1948)
• February 25 - John Foster Dulles, United States Secretary of State (d. 1959)
• February 27 - Lotte Lehmann, German singer (d. 1976)
• March 1 - Ewart Astill, English cricketer (Leicestershire) (d. 1948)
• March 4 - Knute Rockne, American football player and coach (d. 1931)
• March 10 - Barry Fitzgerald, Irish actor (d. 1966)
• March 26 - Elsa Brändström, Russian nurse (d. 1948)

April-June

• April 4 - Tris Speaker, Baseball Hall of Famer (d. 1958)
• April 6 - Hans Richter, German filmmaker (d. 1976)
• April 18 - Duffy Lewis, Major League Baseball player (d. 1979)
• April 26 - Anita Loos, American writer (d. 1981)
• April 27 - Florence La Badie, Canadian actress (d. 1917)
• May 10 - Karl Barth, Protestant theologian (d. 1968)
  • Max Steiner, Austrian-American composer (d. 1971)
• May 11 - Irving Berlin, American composer (d. 1989)
• May 17 - Tich Freeman, English cricketer (d. 1965)
• May 23 - Zack Wheat, Baseball Hall of Famer (d. 1972)
• May 25 - Miles Malleson, English actor (d. 1969)
• May 27 - Louis Durey, French composer (d. 1979)
• June 3 - Tom Brown, American jazz musician (d. 1958)
• June 6 - Pete Wendling, American composer, pianist, and piano roll recording artist (d. 1974)
• June 9 - Ida Rentoul Outhwaite, Australian illustrator (d. 1960)
• June 13 - Fernando Pessoa, Portuguese writer (d. 1935)
• June 24 - Gerrit Rietveld, Dutch architect (d. 1964)
• June 27 - Antoinette Perry, New York Stage Director, Tony Award named for her (d. 1946}

July-October

• July 5 - Herbert Spencer Gasser, American physiologist, Nobel Prize laureate (d. 1963)
• July 10 - Giorgio Chirico, Italian painter (d. 1978)
• July 16 - Frits Zernike, Dutch physicist, Nobel Prize laureate (d. 1966)
• July 17 - Shmuel Yosef Agnon, Israeli writer, Nobel Prize laureate (d. 1970)
• July 22 - Selman Waksman, Ukrainian-born biochemist, recipient of the Nobel Prize in Physiology or Medicine (d. 1973)
• July 23 - Raymond Chandler, American-born novelist (d. 1959)
• August 14 - John Logie Baird, Scottish inventor (d. 1946)
• August 16 - Armand J. Piron, American jazz musician (d. 1943)
• August 16 - T. E. Lawrence ("Lawrence of Arabia") British liaison officer during the Arab Revolt, writer, and academic (d. 1935)
• September 5 - Sarvepalli Radhakrishnan, President of India (d. 1975)
• September 6 - Joseph P. Kennedy, Sr., American politician (d. 1969)
• September 12 - Maurice Chevalier, French singer and actor (d. 1972)
• September 16 - Frans Eemil Sillanpää, Finnish writer, Nobel Prize laureate (d. 1964)
• September 26 - J. Frank Dobie, American folklorist and journalist (d. 1964)
• September 26 - T. S. Eliot, American-born writer, Nobel Prize laureate (d. 1965)
• October 6 - Roland Garros, French pilot (d. 1918)
• October 7 - Henry A. Wallace, Vice President of the United States (d. 1965)
• October 8 - Ernst Kretschmer, German psychiatrist (d. 1964)
• October 9 - Nikolai Ivanovich Bukharin, Russian politician (d. 1938)
• October 16 - Eugene O'Neill, American writer, Nobel Prize laureate (d. 1953)
• October 16 - Paul Popenoe, American eugenicist (d. 1979)

November-December

• November 7 - Chandrasekhara Venkata Raman, Indian physicist, Nobel Prize laureate (d. 1980)
• November 15 - Harald Sverdrup, Norwegian scientist (d. 1957)
• November 15 - José Raúl Capablanca, World chess champion 1921-1927 (d. 1942)
• November 23 - Harpo Marx, American comedian (d. 1964)
• November 26 - Francisco Canaro, Uruguayan-born violinist and composer (d. 1964)
• November 30 - Ralph Hartley, American electronics researcher and inventor (d. 1970)
• December 4 - King Alexander of Yugoslavia (d. 1934)
• December 7 - Joyce Cary, Northern Irish author (d. 1957)
• December 19 - Fritz Reiner, Hungarian conductor (d. 1963)
• December 28 - F.W. Murnau, German film director (d. 1931)

Deaths

• January 19 - Anton de Bary, German biologist (b. 1831)
• January 29 - Edward Lear, British artist and writer (b. 1812)
• January 31 - John Bosco, Italian priest, youth worker, educator and founder of the Salesian Society (b. 1815)
• February 3 - Henry Maine, British jurist (b. 1822)
• March 6 - Louisa May Alcott, American novelist (b. 1832)
• March 9 - German Emperor Wilhelm I (b. 1797)
• March 12 - Henry Bergh, founder of the American Society for the Prevention of Cruelty to Animals (b. 1811)
• March 23 - Morrison Waite, Chief Justice of the United States (b. 1816)
• April 15 - Matthew Arnold, English poet (b. 1822)
• April 15 - Father Damien, Belgian priest (b. 1811)
• June 15 - German Emperor Friedrich III (b. 1831)
• July 20 - Paul Langerhans, German pathologist and biologist (b. 1847)
• August 9 - Charles Cros, French poet (b. 1831)
• August 23 - Philip Henry Gosse, British scientist (b. 1810)
• August 24 - Rudolf Clausius, German physicist, contributions to thermodynamics (b. 1822)
• October 16 - John Wentworth, Mayor of Chicago (b. 1815)
• October 16 - Horatio Spafford, author of hymn "It is well with my soul"
• December 31 - Samson Raphael Hirsch, German rabbi (b. 1808)

Marriages

• January 1 - Elias Disney & Flora Disney
• April 11 - Henry Ford & Clara Jane Bryant
• May 2 - Josephus Daniels & Addie Worth Bagley
• September 5 - Billy Sunday & Helen Amelia Thompson
• September 11 - Robert Homans & Agnes Mary Josephine Mellon
• November 29 - Axel Blixen-Finecke & Bertha Henriette Marie Castenschiold
• December 20 - Charles Urban & Julia Avery

1888

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