Directory

1892 CE

In Samoa, 1892 had 367 days instead of 366, repeating July 4 twice. This means that the International Date Line was drawn from the east of the country to go west.

Geopolitics & Diplomacy

  • January 1 – Ellis Island begins processing immigrants to the United States.source
  • March 1 – Theodoros Deligiannis ends his term as Prime Minister of Greece and Konstantinos Konstantopoulos takes office.source
  • March 6–8 – Exclusive Agreement: Rulers of six Trucial States (Abu Dhabi, Dubai, Sharjah, Ajman, Ras al-Khaimah and Umm al-Quwain) and Bahrain sign an agreement, by which they become de facto British protectorates.source
  • July 4–26 – British general election: The Conservative and Liberal Unionist coalition government loses its majority in the House of Commons, eventually leading to Prime Minister Lord Salisbury's resignation on August 12.source
  • August 18 – William Ewart Gladstone assumes the U.K. premiership, as head of the Liberal government, with Irish Nationalist Party support.source
  • September 8 – The Pledge of Allegiance is first recited in the United States.source
  • November 8 – 1892 United States presidential election: Grover Cleveland is elected over Benjamin Harrison and James B. Weaver, to win the second of his non-consecutive terms.source
  • December 5 – John Thompson becomes Canada's fourth prime minister.source
  • Diplomat Henry Galway secures a treaty by which Ovonramwen, Oba of Benin, ostensibly accepts British protection for his kingdom.source

Conflict & Security

  • April – The Johnson County War breaks out between small farmers and large ranchers in Wyoming.source
  • May 19 – Battle of Yemoja River: British troops defeat Ijebu infantry in modern-day Nigeria, using a maxim gun.source
  • May 22 – The British conquest of Ijebu Ode marks a major extension of colonial power into the Nigerian interior.source
  • June 30 – The Homestead Strike begins in Homestead, Pennsylvania, culminating in a battle between striking workers and private security agents on July 6.source
  • July 6 – Homestead Strike: The arrival of a force of 300 Pinkerton detectives from New York and Chicago results in a fight in which about 10 men are killed.source
  • November 8 – An anarchist bomb kills six in a police station in Avenue de l'Opéra, Paris.source
  • November 17 – French troops occupy Abomey, capital of the kingdom of Dahomey.source

Exploration & Expansion

  • July 16 – Liberian freed slave Martha Ann Ricks meets Queen Victoria.source
  • October 30 – The Historical American Exposition opens in Madrid.source

Religion & Belief

  • February 29 – St. Petersburg, Florida is incorporated as a town.source
  • December 8 – The various congregations of Trappists leave the Cistercian Order entirely and merge to form a new order with the approval of Pope Leo XIII named the 'Order of Reformed Cistercians of Our Lady of La Trappe', formalising their identity and spirituality as a separate monastic community.source

Economy & Finance

  • April 15 – The General Electric Company is established through the merger of the Thomson-Houston Electric Company and the Edison General Electric Company.source
  • July 4 – Samoa changes its time zone from 4 hours ahead of Japan to being 3 hours behind California, such that it crosses the International Date Line, and Monday, July 4 occurs twice.source
  • September 15 – Sergei Witte replaces Ivan Vyshnegradsky as Russian finance minister.source

Technology & Infrastructure

  • February 27 – Rudolf Diesel applies for a patent in Germany, on his compression ignition engine (the Diesel engine).source
  • March 15 – Jesse W. Reno patents the first escalator, installed at Coney Island as a pleasure ride.source
  • March 31 – The world's first fingerprinting bureau is formally opened by the Buenos Aires Chief of Police; it has been operating unofficially since the previous year.source
  • May 20 – The last broad gauge train runs from Paddington on the Great Western Railway of England.source
  • June 6 – The Chicago "L" begins operation for the first time with the opening of the Chicago and South Side Rapid Transit Railroad.source
  • August 9 – Thomas Edison receives a patent for a two-way telegraph.source

Science & Discovery

  • September 9 – Amalthea, the fifth moon of Jupiter, is discovered by Edward Emerson Barnard.source
  • Viruses are first described by Russian biologist Dmitri Ivanovsky.source

Health & Medicine

  • A cholera outbreak occurs in Hamburg, Germany.source

Crime & Justice

  • June 7 – Homer Plessy, a mixed-race man, is arrested for deliberately sitting in a whites-only railroad car in Louisiana, leading to the landmark United States Supreme Court decision Plessy v. Ferguson, which legitimizes "separate but equal" racial segregation in the United States.source
  • July 6 – Dr. José Rizal, Filipino writer, philosopher and political activist, is arrested by Spanish authorities in connection with La Liga Filipina.source
  • August 4 – The father and stepmother of Lizzie Borden are found murdered in their Fall River, Massachusetts home; she will be acquitted of their murder.source
  • September 22 – The 'Little Pastry Chef', a French police informant among anarchists, is murdered in Saint-Denis.source
  • October 5 – Master criminal Adam Worth is captured in Liège, Belgium, during an attempted robbery of a money delivery cart.source
  • October 5 – The Dalton Gang, attempting to rob two banks in Coffeyville, Kansas, is shot by the townspeople; only Emmett Dalton, with 23 wounds, survives, to spend 14 years in prison.source

Disasters & Accidents

  • June 5 – An oil fire in Oil City, Pennsylvania, United States, kills 130 people.source
  • July 8 – The Great Fire of 1892 devastates the city of St. John's, Newfoundland.source
  • November 24 – The Hotel Zinzendorf catches fire in the city of Winston-Salem, North Carolina; 45 people die.source

Climate & Environment

  • March 17 – The St. Patrick's Day Snowstorm besieges Tennessee with upwards of 26 inches of snow, establishing accumulation records that still stand.source
  • July 12 – A hidden lake bursts out of a glacier on the side of Mont Blanc, flooding the valley below and killing around 200 villagers and holidaymakers in Saint-Gervais-les-Bains.source

Culture & Society

  • March 11 – The first basketball game is played in public, between students and faculty at the Springfield, Massachusetts, YMCA before 200 spectators. The final score is 5–1 in favor of the students, with the only goal for the faculty being scored by Amos Alonzo Stagg.source
  • March 15 – The Liverpool Football Club is founded in England by John Houlding, the owner of Anfield; Houlding decides to form his own team after Everton leaves Anfield, in an argument over rent.source
  • March 18 – Sir Frederick Stanley, Governor General of Canada, announces his intention to donate the Stanley Cup for ice hockey.source
  • March 20 – The first ever French rugby championship final takes place in Paris. Pierre de Coubertin referees the match, which Racing Club de France wins 4–3 over Stade Français.source
  • May 24 – Prince George (later George V of the United Kingdom) becomes Duke of York.source
  • June 3 – Liverpool Football Club officially comes into existencesource
  • June 11 – The Limelight Department, later one of the world's first film studios, is officially established in Melbourne, Australia.source
  • July 13 – The United International Bureau for the Protection of Intellectual Property (UIBPIP or BIRPI) is established in Bern, Switzerland.source
  • July 25 – The Community of the Resurrection, an Anglican religious community for men, is founded by Charles Gore and Walter Frere, initially in Oxford.source
  • August 15 – Valparaíso, Chile founds its first football team, Santiago Wanderers.source
  • September – Women are first admitted to Yale University's graduate school.source
  • October 1 – The University of Chicago holds its first classes.source
  • October 12 – To mark the 400th anniversary Columbus Day holiday, the "Pledge of Allegiance" is first recited in unison by students in U.S. public schools.source
  • October 31 – The first collection of Arthur Conan Doyle's Sherlock Holmes stories from The Strand Magazine, The Adventures of Sherlock Holmes, is published in London.source
  • November 2 – The first football club in Bohemia, Slavia Praha is established, originally under name of Akademický cyklistický odbor Slavia (A.C.O.S.), focusing on cycling.source
  • November 8 – The four-day New Orleans General Strike begins.source
  • December 9 – The Newcastle East End F.C. is renamed Newcastle United F.C., following the demise of the Newcastle West End F.C. and East End's move to St James' Park, formerly West End's home, in the north east of England.source
  • December 17 – First issue of Vogue is published in the United States.source
  • December 18 – The Nutcracker ballet, with music by Pyotr Ilyich Tchaikovsky, is premiered at the Imperial Mariinsky Theatre in Saint Petersburg, Russia.source
  • A 50-year-old tortoise called Timothy, previously serving as a naval mascot, is brought to the estate of Powderham Castle in England, where she lives until her death in 2004.source

Births

  • February 3 – Juan Negrín, Spanish physician, politician and 67th Prime Minister of Spain (d. 1956)source
  • February 13 – Robert H. Jackson, Associate Justice of the Supreme Court of the United States, chief prosecutor at the Nuremberg Trials (d. 1954)source
  • February 15 – James Forrestal, first United States Secretary of Defense (d. 1949)source
  • February 18 – Wendell Willkie, U.S. Republican presidential candidate (d. 1944)source
  • May 9 – Ștefan Foriș, Hungarian-Romanian journalist and politician (d. 1946)source
  • June 25 – Shirō Ishii, Japanese microbiologist, lieutenant general of Unit 731 (d. 1959)source
  • June 26 – Pearl S. Buck, American writer, Nobel Prize laureate (d. 1973)source
  • July 15 – Walter Benjamin, German philosopher and cultural critic (suicide 1940)source
  • August 14 – Kaikhosru Shapurji Sorabji, English composer and pianist (d. 1988)source
  • August 15 – Louis de Broglie, French physicist, Nobel Prize laureate (d. 1987)source
  • September 6 – Edward Victor Appleton, English physicist, Nobel Prize laureate (d. 1965)source
  • September 10 – Arthur Compton, American physicist, Nobel Prize laureate (d. 1962)source
  • October 7 – Louis C. Fraina, founder of the Communist Party USA (d. 1953)source
  • October 9 – Ivo Andrić, Serbo-Croatian writer, Nobel Prize laureate (d. 1975)source

Deaths

  • January 2 – Sir George Biddell Airy, English astronomer royal (b. 1801)source
  • January 14 – Prince Albert Victor, Duke of Clarence and Avondale, second in line for the throne of the United Kingdom (b. 1864)source
  • January 31 – Charles Spurgeon, English preacher (b. 1834)source
  • March 13 – Ernest Louis, a grandson of Queen Victoria, becomes Grand Duke of Hesse and the Rhine on the death of his father, Grand Duke Louis IV.source
  • March 26 – Walt Whitman, American poet (b. 1819)source
  • April 19 – Fr. Thomas Pelham Dale SSC, Anglo-Catholic clergyman prosecuted for Ritualist practices in the 1870s (b. 1821)source
  • April 25 – William Backhouse Astor Jr., American businessman (b. 1830)source
  • July 11 – Ravachol, French illegalist anarchist (b. 1859)source
  • July 17 – Carlo Cafiero, Italian anarchist and leader of the Italian section of the International Workingmen's Association (b. 1846)source
  • September 7 – John Greenleaf Whittier, American poet, abolitionist (b. 1807)source
  • October 2 – Ernest Renan, French philosopher, philologist, historian and writer (b. 1823)source
  • October 25 – Caroline Harrison, First Lady of the United States (b. 1832)source
  • November 15 – Thomas Neill Cream, Scottish-Canadian serial killer (b. 1850)source
  • December 18 – John M. Lloyd, American bricklayer and police officer (b. 1835)source