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Date |
Event(s) |
| 1 | 1855 | - 1855: John Snow, investigating London's piped water supply, showed graphically that cholera could be transmitted by water from a particular pump.
- 1855: End of Aberdeen's coalition government. Palmerston's first government comes to power
- 1855: Yale lock invented
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| 2 | 1856 | - 1856: Crimean War comes to an end. The Victoria Cross is instituted for military bravery
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| 3 | 1857 | - 1857: Cyrus Field made his first attempt at laying a trans-Atlantic telegraph cable. In 1866, his fourth attempt was successful.
- 1857: The Second Opium War opens China to European trade. The Indian Mutiny erupts against British Rule on the sub-continent
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| 4 | 1858 | - 1858: Derby establishes his second minority government. Parliament passes the India Act
- 1858: Eraser fitted to end of pencil
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| 5 | 1859 | - 1859: Darwin in 'On the Origin of Species by Means of Natural Selection or the Preservation of Favored Races in the Struggle for Life', asserted all life had a common ancestor and that the origin of species was natural selection
- 1859: End of Derby's second minority government. Palmerston brings his second Liberal government to power.
- 1859: Smiles' 'Self-Help' published
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| 6 | 1860 | - 1860: Joseph Wilson Swan invented the light bulb, an incandescent lamp using a carbon filament.
- 1860: Gladstone's budget and the Anglo-French Cobden Treaty codifies and extends the principles of free trade
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| 7 | 1861 | - 1861: Ignaz Philipp Semmelweis published his deduction that childbirth fever was transmitted on the hands of doctors during their examinations
- 1861: Death of Prince Albert, Prince Consort
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| 8 | 1862 | - 1862: Pasteur published the 'germ theory:': Infection is caused by self-replicating microorganisms, and that attenuated viral cultures granted immunity. These beneficent antigens he named 'vaccines' in honor of Jenner and his vaccinia virus
- 1862: Parliament passes the Limited Liability Act in order to provide vital stimulus to accumulation of capital in shares
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| 9 | 1863 | - 1863: Edward, Prince of Wales, marries Princess Alexandra of Denmark. The Salvation Army is founded
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| 10 | 1865 | - 1865: Lister, using carbolic acid as antiseptic and sterilizing his instrument, proved the efficacy of antiseptic surgery
- 1865: Death of Palmerston. Russell establishes his second Liberal government
- 1865: Lewis Carroll publishes 'Alice's Adventure in Wonderland'
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| 11 | 1866 | - 1866: Gregor Mendel, in "Versuche ?ber Pflantenhybriden," interpreted heredity in terms of a pairing of dominant and/or recessive unit characters; that is, ones that could in practice be treated as indivisible and independent particles
- 1866: Alfred Nobel patented dynamite
- 1866: Russell and Gladstone fail to have their moderate Reform Bill passed in parliament. Derby takes power in his third minority Conservative government
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| 12 | 1867 | - 1867: Karl Marx, in Das Kapital, maintained the value, or exchange relation, of commodities is characterized by its alienation from its use-value, and thus its value as the product of human labor, which the capitalist treats as a variable and against which he accounts his surplus.
- 1867: Derby and Disraeli's Second Reform Bill doubles the franchise to two million. Canada becomes the first independent dominion in the British Empire under the Dominion of Canada Act
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| 13 | 1868 | - 1868: Disraeli succeeds Derby as Prime Minister. Gladstone becomes Prime Minister for the first time
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| 14 | 1869 | - 1869: George M. Beard distinguished 'neurasthenia,' a nervous disease of men, from hysteria, a women's disease, as, in an earlier time, men's 'hypochondriasis' had been distinguished from women's ' vapeurs.' Subforms of neurasthenia came to be called phobias.
- 1869: The Irish Church is disestablished. The Suez Canal is opened
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| 15 | 1870 | - 1870: Primary education becomes compulsory in Britain through the Forster-Ripon English Elementary Education Act. Parliament also passes the Women's Property Act, extending the rights of married women, and the Irish Land Act
- 1870: First British postcard devised by Anthony Trollope
- 1870: Wheeler introduces toilet paper roll in US
- 1870: Inauguration of London to Calcutta telegraph line, first electronic link between Europe and India
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| 16 | 1871 | - 1871: Trade Unions are legalized
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| 17 | 1872 | - 1872: Secret voting is introduced for elections. Parliament passes the Scottish Education Act
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| 18 | 1873 | - 1873: Gladstone's government resigns after the defeat of their Irish Universities Bill. Disraeli declines to take up office instead
- 1873: Parmalee invents automatic fire sprinklers
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| 19 | 1874 | - 1874: Disraeli becomes Conservative Prime Minister for the second time
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| 20 | 1875 | - 1875: Disraeli purchases a controlling interest for Britain in the Suez Canal. Agricultural depression increases
- 1875: Parliament passes R.A. Cross's Conservative social reforms
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| 21 | 1876 | - 1876: Alexander Graham Bell invented the telephone.
- 1876: Nikolas August Otto designed the first four-stroke piston engine
- 1876: Queen Victoria becomes Empress of India. The massacre of Christians in Turkish Bulgaria leads to anti-Turkish campaigns in Britain, led by Gladstone
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| 22 | 1877 | - 1877: Confederation of British and Boer states established in South Africa
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| 23 | 1878 | - 1878: The Congress of Berlin is held. Disraeli announces 'peace with honour'
- 1878: Edweard Muybridge photographs horse in motion
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| 24 | 1879 | - 1879: A trade depression emerges in Britain. The Zulu War is fought in South Africa. The British are defeated at Isandhlwana, but are victorious at Ulundi
- 1879: Gladstone's Midlothian campaign denounces imperialism in South Africa and Afghanistan
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| 25 | 1880 | - 1880: Gladstone establishes his second Liberal government
- 1880: The first Anglo-Boer War begins
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| 26 | 1881 | - 1881: Savoy Theatre introduces electric lighting
- 1881: Parliament passes the Irish Land and Coercion Acts
- 1881: Death of Billy the Kid
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| 27 | 1882 | - 1882: Britain occupies Egypt. A triple alliance is established between Germany, Austria and Italy
- 1882: Standard Oil controls 95% of the U.S. oil refining capacity
- 1882: Stillwell invents brown paper bag
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| 28 | 1884 | - 1884: Freud published a paper in which he found cocaine, an alkaloid in coca, effective against fatigue and neurasthenia.
- 1884: Hilaire de Chardonnet invented the first artificial textile, which was made from cellulose. It was later named rayon
- 1884: Parliament passes the third Reform Act which further extends the franchise
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| 29 | 1885 | - 1885: Death of General Gordon at Khartoum. Burma is annexed. Salisbury succeeds Gladstone with his first minority Conservative government. Parliament passes the Redistribution Act
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| 30 | 1886 | - 1886: Gladstone's third Liberal government fails to pass its first Irish Home Rule Bill through the House of Commons. Gladstone resigns as Prime Minister. Split in the Liberal Party. Salisbury establishes his second Conservative-Liberal-Unionist government. The Royal Niger Company is chartered. Gold is discovered in the Transvaal
- 1886: Statue of Liberty erected in New York Harbour
- 1886: Coca-Cola syrup invented
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| 31 | 1887 | - 1887: Emile Berliner patents the gramophone
- 1887: Queen Victoria celebrates her Golden Jubilee. The Independent Labour Party is founded. The British East Africa Company is chartered
- 1887: UK telegraph companies control 107,000 miles of submarine cable
- 1887: There are estimated to be 5,400 cash registers in US (increases to 16,900 in 1890)
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| 32 | 1888 | - 1888: Celluloid photographic film introduced
- 1888: The County Councils' Act establishes representative county based authorities
- 1888: Kodak box camera
- 1888: Coin-operated public telephone
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| 33 | 1889 | - 1889: London Dockers' Strike. The British South Africa Company is chartered
- 1889: The Eiffel Tower, designed by French engineer Alexandre Gustave Eiffel, is completed for the Paris Exposition.
- 1889: First Official Secrets Act in UK
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| 34 | 1892 | - 1892: Leon Bouly invents cinematographic film camera
- 1892: Gladstone forms his fourth Liberal government
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| 35 | 1893 | - 1893: Whitcomb L. Judson invented the zip to help a friend with a stiff back who could not bend over to do up his shoes
- 1893: Second Irish Home Rule Bill fails to pass the House of Lords
- 1893: New Zealand becomes the first nation to grant women the right to vote
- 1893: Car number plates introduced in France
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| 36 | 1894 | - 1894: Rosebery takes power with his minority Liberal government
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| 37 | 1895 | - 1895: Oscar Wilde jailed
- 1895: Wilhelm Conrad R?ntgen, using a Crookes' tube, observed a new form of penetrating radiation, which he named X-rays
- 1895: Guglielmo Marconi sent longwave wireless telegraphic, or radio, signals over a distance of more than a mile
- 1895: Salisbury forms his third Unionist ministry
- 1895: Kellogg's Corn Flakes go on sale
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| 38 | 1896 | - 1896: Freud suggested analyzing childhood conflicts in the study of neuroses. He also devised a psychoanalytic technique called 'free association' which allows emotionally-charged, repressed material to be consciously recognized
- 1896: The British conquest of the Sudan begins
- 1896: Lightner Witmer establishes at the University of Pennsylvania a clinic of psychology, the first psychological clinic in America and perhaps in the world
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| 39 | 1897 | - 1897: Queen Victoria celebrates her Diamond Jubilee
- 1897: Telephone penetration in US is 7 per 1,000 people
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| 40 | 1898 | - 1898: Christopher Latham Sholes patented the typewriter. His QWERTY keyboard is still with us today.
- 1898: British rule over Sudan fully established. German Naval expansion begins
- 1898: Campbell's soups first appear with red and white labels, colors suggested by Cornell University's football uniforms.
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| 41 | 1899 | - 1899: British disasters in South Africa
- 1899: Boer War begins in South Africa and lasts three years
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| 42 | 1900 | - 1900: Salisbury wins the 'Khaki' election. The Labour Representation Committee is formed. Parliament passes the Commonwealth of Australia Act
- 1900: Max Planck proposes quantum theory
- 1900: There are reckoned to be 6,000 accountants in England
- 1900: Australia Becomes a Commonwealth
- 1900: Boxer Rebellion in China
- 1900: Italy's King Assassinated
- 1900: Kodak Introduces $1 Brownie Cameras
- 1900: Max Planck Formulates Quantum Theory
- 1900: Sigmund Freud Publishes The Interpretation of Dreams
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| 43 | 1901 | - 1901: Willis H. Carrier invented the industrial air conditioner
- 1901: Vacuum Cleaner invented by Hubert Cecil Booth
- 1901: Death of Queen Victoria. She is succeeded by her son, Prince Albert, as King Edward VII
- 1901: Marconi sends wireless message from Cornwall to Newfoundland
- 1901: First Nobel Prizes Awarded
- 1901: First Trans-Atlantic Radio Signal
- 1901: U.S. President McKinley Assassinated
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| 44 | 1902 | - 1902: Invention of the Teddy Bear
- 1902: Boer War Ends
- 1902: Mount Pel?e Erupts
- 1902: The Teddy Bear is Introduced
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| 45 | 1903 | - 1903: Orville Wright and Wilbur Wright achieved flight in a manned, gasoline power-driven, heavier-than-air flying machine.
- 1903: First Flight at Kitty Hawk
- 1903: First Message to Travel Around the World
- 1903: First Silent Movie, The Great Train Robbery
- 1903: Plague in India
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| 46 | 1904 | - 1904: First telephone answering machine
- 1904: Beatrix Potter's 'The Tale of Benjamin Bunny' is published
- 1904: First Popular American Film
- 1904: Ground Broken on Panama Canal
- 1904: New York City Subway Opens
- 1904: Russo-Japanese War Begins
- 1904: Trans-Siberian Railway Completed
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| 47 | 1905 | - 1905: Einstein evolved the Special Theory of relativity.
- 1905: Aliens Act in Britain tries to control immigration
- 1905: Bloody Sunday - Russian Revolution of 1905
- 1905: Einstein Proposes His Theory of Relativity
- 1905: Freud Publishes His Theory of Sexuality
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| 48 | 1906 | - 1906: Finland First European Country to Give Women the Right to Vote
- 1906: Kellogg's Starts Selling Corn Flakes
- 1906: San Francisco Earthquake
- 1906: Upton Sinclair Writes The Jungle
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| 49 | 1907 | - 1907: Electric washing machine - The Thor - on sale
- 1907: Ten Rules of War Established at the Second Hague Peace Conference
- 1907: First Electric Washing Machine
- 1907: Picasso Introduces Cubism
- 1907: Typhoid Mary Captured for the First Time
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| 50 | 1908 | - 1908: Henry Ford created the Model T automobile
- 1908: Electric iron and toaster patented
- 1908: Earthquake in Italy Kills 150,000
- 1908: Ford Introduces the Model-T
- 1908: Three Year-Old Pu Yi Becomes Emperor of China
- 1908: Turks Revolt in the Ottoman Empire
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| 51 | 1909 | - 1909: French Engineer Louis Bleriot is first to cross the English Channel in an airplane
- 1909: Pianos reach maximum market penetration in UK households at one per ten people
- 1909: 800 million postcards sold in England
- 1909: Japan's Prince Ito is Assassinated
- 1909: Plastic Is Invented
- 1909: Robert Peary Becomes the First to Reach the North Pole
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| 52 | 1910 | - 1910: Georges Claude discovered that electricity conducted through a tube of the rare inert gas, neon, gives a bright red glow and that other gases gave off other colors, e.g., argon gives blue, helium gives yellow and white, etc.
- 1910: First live opera broadcast
- 1910: Halley's Comet Makes an Appearance
- 1910: The Tango Catches On
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| 53 | 1911 | - 1911: British National Insurance Act lays foundation for health and unemployment insurance
- 1911: The Chinese Revolution
- 1911: Ernest Rutherford Discovers the Structure of an Atom
- 1911: Greenwich Mean Time Adopted
- 1911: The Incan City of Machu Picchu Discovered
- 1911: Mona Lisa Is Stolen
- 1911: Roald Amundsen Reaches the South Pole
- 1911: Standard Oil Company Broken Up
- 1911: Triangle Shirtwaist Factory Catches on Fire
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| 54 | 1912 | - 1912: The Sinking of the Titanic 1,515 people lose their lives.
- 1912: Parachutes Invented
- 1912: Piltdown Man, the 'Missing Link,' Discovered (Fraud)
- 1912: SOS Accepted as Universal Distress Signal
- 1912: The Titanic Sinks
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| 55 | 1913 | - 1913: Leo Baekeland invented a plastic laminate, known as Bakelite, and later as 'formica'.
- 1913: First assembly line introduced in Ford automobile factory
- 1913: The "Armory Show," an international display of some 1600 works of modern art, and one of the more important U.S. art exhibitions ever held, opens at the 69th-regiment armory in New York City; it arouses public curiosity, generates sensational news coverage, and helps change the direction of American art
- 1913: First Crossword Puzzle
- 1913: Henry Ford Creates Assembly Line
- 1913: Personal Income Tax Introduced in U.S.
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| 56 | 1914 | - 1914: First World War starts
- 1914: Archduke Ferdinand Assassinated
- 1914: Battle of the Marne
- 1914: Charlie Chaplin First Appeared as the Little Tramp
- 1914: First Traffic Light
- 1914: Panama Canal Officially Opened
- 1914: World War I Begins
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| 57 | 1915 | - 1915: Armenian Genocide
- 1915: D.W. Griffith's The Birth of a Nation Released
- 1915: Germans Use Poison Gas as a Weapon
- 1915: Lusitania Sunk by German U-Boat
- 1915: Second Battle of Ypres
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| 58 | 1916 | - 1916: Navy employs animal trainer 'Captain' Joseph Woodward's music hall sea lions for U-boat sabotage.
- 1916: Coca-Cola adopts a distinctive bottle which identifies the company internationally
- 1916: Battle of the Somme
- 1916: Battle of Verdun
- 1916: Easter Rising in Ireland
- 1916: First Self-Service Grocery Store Opens in U.S.
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| 59 | 1917 | - 1917: Bolshevik revolution in Russia installs a new government headed by V.I. Lennin
- 1917: French artist Marcel Duchamp submits a porcelain urinal, signed "R. Mutt" and titled "Fountain," to the New York Independents Exhibition; it is rejected.
- 1917: First Pulitzer Prizes Awarded
- 1917: Mata Hari Executed for Being a Spy
- 1917: Russian Revolution
- 1917: U.S. Enters World War I
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| 60 | 1918 | - 1918: Influenza Epidemic
- 1918: Russian Czar Nicholas II and His Family are Killed
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| 61 | 1919 | - 1919: Eddington and Frank W. Dyson measured the bending of starlight by the gravitational pull of the sun, thus confirming Einstein's general theory of relativity
- 1919: Prohibition Begins in the U.S.
- 1919: Treaty of Versailles Ends World War I
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| 62 | 1920 | - 1920: Bubonic Plague in India
- 1920: League of Nations Established
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| 63 | 1921 | - 1921: Stage debut of John Gielgud
- 1921: Extreme Inflation in Germany
- 1921: Irish Free State Proclaimed
- 1921: Lie Detector Invented
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| 64 | 1922 | - 1922: BBC launched as limited company
- 1922: Kemal Atat?rk Founds Modern Turkey
- 1922: Tomb of King Tut Discovered
- 1922: Michael Collins Killed in Ambush
- 1922: Mussolini Marches on Rome
- 1922: The Reader's Digest Published
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| 65 | 1923 | - 1923: Electrolux produced the first electric refrigerator
- 1923: Kodak introduces home movie equipment
- 1923: Charleston Dance Becomes Popular
- 1923: Hitler Jailed After Failed Coup
- 1923: Ruhr Occupied by French and Belgian Forces
- 1923: Talking Movies Invented
- 1923: Teapot Dome Scandal
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| 66 | 1924 | - 1924: First Olympic Winter Games
- 1924: Leopold and Loeb Murder a Neighbor Out of Boredom
- 1924: V.I. Lenin Dies
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1855 - 1924 (68 years)