Year 1901 (MCMI) was a common year starting on Tuesday (link will display calendar) of the Gregorian calendar (or a common year starting on Monday ^[1] of the 13-day-slower Julian calendar). It was the first year of the 20th century.

Events of 1901

January

January 1: Commonwealth of Australia forms as British colonies federate.

• January 1
  • The world celebrates the beginning of the Twentieth Century.
  • The British colonies of New South Wales, Queensland, South Australia, Tasmania, Victoria and Western Australia federate as the Commonwealth of Australia. Edmond Barton becomes first Prime Minister.
  • Nigeria becomes a British protectorate
• January 5 - Typhoid fever breaks out in a Seattle jail, the first of two typhoid outbreaks in USA during the year.
• January 7 - Alferd Packer is released from prison after serving 18 years for cannibalism.
• January 10 - In the first great Texas gusher, oil is discovered at Spindletop in Beaumont, Texas.
• January 22 - After reigning for almost 64 years, longer than any other British monarch, Queen Victoria dies at the age of 81. Her eldest son, Prince Albert Edward, Prince of Wales becomes King, reigning as King Edward VII until 1910. His son, Prince George, Duke of York becomes Duke of Cornwall.
• January 28 - Baseball's American League declares itself a Major League.

January 22: King Edward VII ascends the British throne and becomes Emperor of India.

February

• February 14 - King Edward VII opens his first parliament.
• February 20 - The legislature of Hawaii Territory convenes for the first time.

March

• March 2 - The U.S. Congress passes the Platt Amendment, limiting the autonomy of Cuba as a condition for the withdrawal of American troops.
• March 4 - United States President William McKinley begins his 2nd term. Theodore Roosevelt is sworn in as Vice President of the United States.
• March 6 - In Bremen, an assassin attempts to kill Wilhelm II of Germany.
• March 17 - A showing of 71 Vincent van Gogh paintings in Paris, 11 years after his death, creates a sensation.
• March 31 - The United Kingdom Census 1901 is taken.

March 6: Kaiser Wilhelm II of Germany survives assassination attempt.

April

• April 25 - New York State becomes the first to require automobile license plates.
• April 29 - Anti-Jewish rioting breaks out in Budapest.

May

• May 3 - The Great Fire of 1901 begins in Jacksonville, FL.
• May 5 - Official end of the Caste War of Yucatán, although Mayan skirmishers continue sporadic fighting for another decade.
• May 9 - Australia opens its first parliament in Melbourne.
• May 17 - The U.S. stock market crashes for the first time.
• May 24 - 78 miners die in the Caerphilly pit disaster in South Wales.
• May 25 - The Club Atlético River Plate is founded in Argentina.
• May 27 - In New Jersey, the Edison Storage Battery Company is founded.
• May 28 - Iran (known as Persia until 1935) grants William Knox D'Arcy a concession, giving him the right to prospect for oil.

June

• June 2 - Katsura Taro becomes Prime Minister of Japan.
• June 12 - Cuba becomes a US protectorate.

June 12: Cuba becomes a United States protectorate.

July

• July 4 - The 1,282 foot (390 meters) covered bridge crossing the St. John River at Hartland, New Brunswick, Canada opens. It is the longest covered bridge in the world.
• July 24 - O. Henry is released from prison in Columbus, Ohio after serving three years for embezzlement from the First National Bank in Austin, Texas.

August

• August 5 - Peter O'Connor sets the first International Association of Athletics Federations recognised long jump world record of 24ft 11žins. The record will stand for 20 years.
• August 6 - Beginning of the Discovery Expedition: Robert Falcon Scott sets sail on the RRS Discovery to explore the Ross Sea in Antarctica.
• 30 August - Hubert Cecil Booth patents an electric vacuum cleaner.

September

September 7: The Boxer Rebellion in China ends with the signing of the Peking Protocol.

September 14: Theodore Roosevelt becomes President of the United States on the death of William McKinley.

• September 2 - U.S. Vice President Theodore Roosevelt utters the famous phrase, "Speak softly and carry a big stick" at the Minnesota State Fair.
• September 5 - The National Association of Professional Baseball Leagues (later renamed Minor League Baseball), is formed in Chicago.
• September 6 - American anarchist Leon Czolgosz shoots US President William McKinley at the Pan-American Exposition in Buffalo, New York. McKinley dies eight days later.
• September 7 - The Boxer Rebellion in China officially ends with the signing of the Boxer Protocol.
• September 14 - Theodore Roosevelt succeeds William McKinley as President of the United States.
• September 26 - The body of U.S. President Abraham Lincoln is exhumed and reinterred in concrete several feet thick.

October

• October 2 - The Royal Navy's first submarine is launched at Barrow.
• October 4 - The American yacht Columbia defeats the Irish Shamrock in the America's Cup yachting race.
• October 16 - U.S. President Theodore Roosevelt invites African American leader Booker T. Washington to the White House. The American South reacts angrily to the visit, and racial violence increases in the region.
• October 23 - Yale University celebrates its bicentennial.
• October 24 - Michigan schoolteacher Annie Taylor goes down Niagara Falls in a barrel and survives.
• October 29
  • In Amherst, Massachusetts, nurse Jane Toppan is arrested for murdering the Davis family of Boston with an overdose of morphine.
  • Leon Czolgosz, the assassin of William McKinley, is executed by electrocution.

November

• November 1 - Sigma Phi Epsilon is founded in Richmond, VA.
• November 9 - Prince George, Duke of Cornwall becomes Prince of Wales and Earl of Chester.
• November 15 - Alpha Sigma Alpha is founded at Longwood University.
• November 28 - The new state constitution of Alabama requires voters to have passed literacy tests.

December

• December 3 - US President Theodore Roosevelt delivers a 20,000-word speech to the House of Representatives asking Congress to curb the power of trusts "within reasonable limits."
• December 10 - The first Nobel Prize ceremony is held in Stockholm on the fifth anniversary of Alfred Nobel's death.
• December 12 - Guglielmo Marconi receives the first trans-Atlantic radio signal in Newfoundland, Canada; it is Morse code for the letter "S."
• December 20 - The final spike is driven into the Mombasa-Victoria-Uganda Railway in what is now Kisumu, Kenya.

Undated

• Scotland Yard creates a fingerprint archive.
• Europium is isolated by Eugčne-Anatole Demarçay.
• William S. Harley draws up plans for his first prototype motorcycle.
• The okapi is observed for the first time (previously known only to local natives).
• Independent Maya of Eastern Yucatán surrender to Mexico.
• Intercollegiate Prohibition Association established in Chicago.
• Sh? Tai (Shang Tai), the last king of the Ry?ky? Kingdom in modern Okinawa, Japan, dies.
• New Zealand inventor, Ernest Godward invents the spiral hairpin, one of the most widely-used devices on the planet.
• The first reliable census in India is taken.

Ongoing

• Second Boer War
• Thousand Days War (1899-1902)
• Philippine-American War (1899-1913)

Births

January-February

• January 3 - Ngo Dinh Diem, 1st President of South Vietnam (d. 1963)
• January 4 - CLR James, Trinidad-born writer and journalist (d. 1989)
• January 14 - Bebe Daniels, American actress (d. 1971)
• January 16
  • Fulgencio Batista, Cuban leader (d. 1973)
  • Frank Zamboni, American inventor (d. 1988)
• January 24 - Harry Calder, South African cricketer (d. 1995)
• January 26 - Stuart Symington, American politician (d. 1988)
• January 27 - Art Rooney, American football team owner (d. 1988)
• January 29 - E. P. Taylor, Canadian business tycoon (d. 1989)
• January 30 - Rudolf Caracciola, German race car driver (d. 1959)
• February 1 - Clark Gable, American actor (d. 1960)
• February 2 - Jascha Heifetz, Lithuanian violinist (d. 1987)
• February 10 - Stella Adler, American actress (d. 1992)
• February 15 - Joăo Branco Núncio, Portuguese bullfighter (d. 1976)
• February 22 - Mildred Davis, American actress (d. 1969)
• February 25 - Zeppo Marx, American comedian (d. 1979)
• February 27 - Horatio Luro, Argentine horse trainer (d. 1991)
• February 28 - Linus Pauling, American chemist, recipient of the Nobel Prize in Chemistry and Peace (d. 1994)

March-April

• March 4
  • Charles Goren, American bridge player (d. 1991)
  • Jean Joseph Rabearivelo, Malagasy-French poet (d. 1937)
• March 17 - Alfred Newman, American film composer (d. 1970)
• March 21 - Karl Arnold, German politician (d. 1958)
• March 22 - Greta Kempton, American artist (d. 1991)
• March 24 - Ub Iwerks, American cartoonist (d. 1971)
• March 27
  • Carl Barks, American cartoonist (d. 2000)
  • Erich Ollenhauer, German politician (d. 1963)
  • Eisaku Sato, Prime Minister of Japan, recipient of the Nobel Peace Prize (d. 1975)
  • Kenneth Slessor, Australian poet (d. 1971)
• March 28 - Jack Weil, American entrepreneur
• April 1 - Whittaker Chambers, American spy (d. 1961)
• April 15 - Joe Davis, English snooker and billiards player (d. 1978)
• April 18 - Al Lewis, American songwriter (d. 1967)
• April 29 - Emperor Hirohito of Japan (d. 1989)
• April 30 - Simon Kuznets, Ukrainian-born economist, Nobel Prize laureate (d. 1985)

May-June

• May 5 - Blind Willie McTell, American singer (d. 1959)
• May 7 - Gary Cooper, American actor (d. 1961)
• May 17 - Werner Egk, German composer (d. 1983)
• May 18 - Vincent du Vigneaud, American chemist, Nobel Prize laureate (d. 1978)
• May 20 - Max Euwe, Dutch chess player (d. 1981)
• May 21
  • Horace Heidt, American bandleader (d. 1986)
  • Sam Jaffe, American film producer (d. 2000)
  • Suzanne Lilar, Belgian essayist, novelist, and playwright (d. 1992)
• May 31 - Alfredo Antonini, American conductor and composer (d. 1983)
• June 3 - Chang Hsüeh-liang, Chinese military leader (d. 2001)
• June 6 - Sukarno, first President of Indonesia (d. 1970)
• June 17 - F. F. E. Yeo-Thomas, English World War II hero (d. 1964)
• June 18 - Grand Duchess Anastasia of Russia (d. 1918)
• June 23 - Chuck Taylor, American basketball player and salesman (d. 1969)
• June 24 - Harry Partch, American composer (d. 1974)
• June 29 - Nelson Eddy, American singer and actor (d. 1967)

July-August

• July 7 - Eiji Tsuburaya, Japanese film director and special effects designer (d. 1970)
• July 9 - Barbara Cartland, English novelist (d. 2000)
• July 17 - Bruno Jasie?ski, Polish poet (d. 1938)
• July 20 - Heinie Manush, American baseball player (d. 1971)
• July 21 - Albert Hamilton Gordon, American businessman and philanthropist
• July 31 - Jean Dubuffet, French painter (d. 1985)
• August 1 - Pancho Villa, Filipino boxer (d. 1925)
• August 4 - Louis Armstrong, American jazz musician (d. 1971)
• August 8 - Ernest Lawrence, American physicist, Nobel Prize laureate (d. 1958)
• August 10 - Franco Dino Rasetti, Italian scientist (d. 2001)
• August 18 - Jean Guitton, French writer and philosopher (d. 1999)
• August 20 - Salvatore Quasimodo, Italian writer, Nobel Prize laureate (d. 1968)
• August 26
  • Maxwell Taylor, American general (d. 1987)
  • Chen Yi, Chinese military commander and politician (d. 1972)
• August 30 - John Gunther, American writer (d. 1970)

September-October

• September 9
  • James Blades, English percussionist (d. 1999)
  • Hendrik Frensch Verwoerd, Prime Minister of South Africa (d. 1966)
• September 12 - Ben Blue, Canadian-born comedian and actor (d. 1975)
• September 15 - Sir Donald Bailey, British civil engineer (d. 1985)
• September 22 - Charles B. Huggins, Canadian-born cancer researcher, recipient of the Nobel Prize in Physiology or Medicine (d. 1997)
• September 23 - Jaroslav Seifert, Czech writer, Nobel Prize laureate (d. 1986)
• September 28
  • Ed Sullivan, American entertainer (d. 1974)
  • William S. Paley, American businessman (d. 1990)
• September 29
  • Enrico Fermi, Italian physicist, Nobel Prize laureate (d. 1954)
  • Lanza del Vasto, Italian philosopher, poet, and activist (d. 1981)
• October 2 - Alice Prin, French singer (d. 1953)
• October 10 - Alberto Giacometti, Swiss sculptor (d. 1966)
• October 24 - Gilda Gray, Polish-born dancer and actress (d. 1959)

November-December

• November 3 - Léopold III of Belgium (d. 1983)
• November 4 - Masako Nashimoto, Crown Princess of Korea (d. 1989)
• November 7 - Norah McGuinness, Irish painter and illustrator (d. 1980)
• November 18 - George Gallup, American statistician and opinion pollster (d. 1984)
• November 22 - Joaquin Rodrigo, Spanish composer (d. 1999)
• November 29 - Mildred Harris, American actress (d. 1944)
• December 5
  • Milton Erickson, American psychiatrist (d. 1980)
• December 5
  • Walt Disney, American animator and film producer (d. 1966)
  • Werner Heisenberg, German physicist, Nobel Prize laureate (d. 1976)
• December 16 - Margaret Mead, American cultural anthropologist (d. 1978)
• December 19 - Rudolf Hell, German inventor (d. 2002)
• December 25 - Princess Alice, Duchess of Gloucester (d. 2004)
• December 27 - Marlene Dietrich, German-American actress (d. 1992)
• December 31 - Karl-August Fagerholm, Prime Minister of Finland (d. 1984)
• date unknown - Nadezhda Alliluyeva-Stalin, second wife of Joseph Stalin (d. 1932)

Deaths

January - June

• January 1 - Ignatius L. Donnelly, U.S. politician and writer (b. 1831)
• January 8 - John Barry, Irish recipient of the Victoria Cross (b. 1873)
• January 11 - Vasily Kalinnikov, Russian composer (b. 1866)
• January 16
  • Arnold Böcklin, Swiss artist (b. 1827)
  • Mahadev Govind Ranade, Indian reformer (b. 1842)
• January 21 - Elisha Gray, American inventor and appliance manufacturer (b. 1835)
• January 22 - Queen Victoria, Queen of the United Kingdom and Empress of India (b. 1819)
• January 27 - Giuseppe Verdi, Italian composer (b. 1813)
• February 11 - King Milan I of Serbia (b. 1854)
• February 22 - George Francis FitzGerald, Irish mathematician (b. 1851)
• February 26 - Lucyna ?wierczakiewiczowa, Polish writer (b. 1829)
• March 13 - Benjamin Harrison, 23rd President of the United States (b. 1833)
• April 3 - Richard D'Oyly Carte, English impresario (b. 1844)
• April 19 - Alfred Horatio Belo, American businessman and newswriter (b. 1839)
• May 1 - Lewis Waterman, American inventor and businessman (b. 1837)
• May 22 - Gaetano Bresci Italian anarchist and assassin (b 1869)
• May 24 - Charlotte Mary Yonge, English novelist (b. 1823)
• June 2 - George Leslie Mackay, Canadian missionary (b. 1844)
• June 9 - Walter Besant, English writer (b. 1836)

July - December

• July 4 - Johannes Schmidt, German linguist (b. 1843)
• July 6 - Prince Chlodwig zu Hohenlohe-Schillingsfürst, Chancellor of Germany (b. 1819)
• August 5 - Victoria, Empress of Germany (b. 1840)
• August 12 - Francesco Crispi, Italian Prime Minister (b. 1819)
• August 24 - Clara Maass, American nurse (b. 1876)
• September 5 - Ignacij Klemen?i?, Slovenian physicist (b. 1853)
• September 9 - Henri de Toulouse-Lautrec, French painter (b. 1864)
• September 14 - William McKinley, 25th President of the United States (b. 1843)
• October 1 - Abdor Rahman Khan, Emir of Afghanistan (b. 1844)
• October 10 - Lorenzo Snow, Mormon leader (b. 1814)
• October 19 - Carl Frederik Tietgen, Danish financier and industrialist (b. 1829)
• October 29 - Leon Czolgosz, Polish-American assassin of U.S. President William McKinley (b. 1873)
• November 7 - Li Hongzhang, Chinese general (b. 1823)
• November 27 - Clement Studebaker, American manufacturer (b. 1831)
• November 30 - Edward John Eyre, English explorer (b. 1815)
• December 1 - George Lohmann, English cricketer (b. 1865)

Nobel prizes

• Physics - Wilhelm Conrad Röntgen
• Chemistry - Jacobus Henricus van 't Hoff
• Medicine - Emil Adolf von Behring
• Literature - Sully Prudhomme
• Peace - Jean Henri Dunant, Frédéric Passy

Notes

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