1872 in the United States

1872 in the United States
Decades:	1850s 1860s – 1870s – 1880s 1890s
Years:	1869 1870 1871 – 1872 – 1873 1874 1875
Flag
37 stars (1867 – 1877)
Timeline of United States history History of the United States (1865–1918)

Events from the year 1872 in the United States.

Incumbents

• President: Ulysses S. Grant (Republican)
• Vice President: Schuyler Colfax (Republican)
• Chief Justice: Salmon P. Chase
• Speaker of the House of Representatives: James G. Blaine (R-Maine)
• Congress: 42nd

Events

• January 2 – Brigham Young is arrested for bigamy (25 wives).
• February 13 – Rex, the most famous parade on Mardi Gras, parades for the first time in New Orleans for Grand Duke Alexei Mikhailovich of Russia.
• February 20 – The Metropolitan Museum of Art opens in New York City.
• March 1 – Yellowstone National Park is established as the world's first national park
• March 5 – George Westinghouse patents the air brake for railways.
• March 26 – Earthquake at Lone Pine, California with an estimated Richter magnitude of 7.6 or greater.
• May 10 – Victoria Woodhull becomes the first woman nominated for President of the United States.
• May 22 – Reconstruction: President Ulysses S. Grant signs the Amnesty Act of 1872 into law restoring full civil rights to all but about 500 Confederate sympathizers.
• June 4 – Two men lead investors to land near the Wyoming-Colorado border claiming to have found diamonds there, starting a diamond craze in the western US (which is later revealed as a fraud).
• September 26 – The first Shriners Temple (called Mecca) is established in New York City.
• October 1 – The Virginia Agricultural and Mechanical College begins its first academic session (the university is later renamed Virginia Tech).
• November – Ulysses S. Grant defeats Horace Greeley in the U.S. presidential election
• November 5 – Women's suffrage: In defiance of the law, suffragist Susan B. Anthony votes for the first time (on November 18 she was served an arrest warrant and in the subsequent trial she was fined $100 - she never paid the fine).
• November 7 – The Mary Celeste sets sail from New York, bound for Genoa.
• November 9 – Great Boston Fire of 1872: In Boston, Massachusetts, a large fire begins to burn on Lincoln Street. The two day event destroyed about 65 acres (260,000 m²) of city, 776 buildings, much of the financial district and caused US$60 million in damage.
• November 28 – The geologist Clarence King uncovers the diamond hoax in Wyoming in The New York Times.
• November 29 – Indian Wars: The Modoc War begins with the Battle of Lost River.
• December 4 – The crewless American ship Mary Celeste is found by the British brig Dei Gratia.

Ongoing

• Reconstruction era (1865–1877)
• Gilded Age (1869–c. 1896)

Births

• January 31 - Zane Grey, writer (died 1939)
• July 4 - Calvin Coolidge, American president

Deaths

• January 7 - James Fisk, entrepreneur
• April 2 - Samuel Morse, inventor of the Morse code

References

External links

Media related to 1872 in the United States at Wikimedia Commons