1888

Millennium:	2nd millennium
Centuries:	18th century 19th century 20th century
Decades:	1860s 1870s 1880s 1890s 1900s
Years:	1885 1886 1887 1888 1889 1890 1891

1888 in various calendars

Gregorian calendar	1888 MDCCCLXXXVIII
Ab urbe condita	2641
Armenian calendar	1337 ԹՎ ՌՅԼԷ
Assyrian calendar	6638
Baháʼí calendar	44–45
Balinese saka calendar	1809–1810
Bengali calendar	1295
Berber calendar	2838
British Regnal year	51 Vict. 1 – 52 Vict. 1
Buddhist calendar	2432
Burmese calendar	1250
Byzantine calendar	7396–7397
Chinese calendar	丁亥年 (Fire Pig) 4585 or 4378     — to — 戊子年 (Earth Rat) 4586 or 4379
Coptic calendar	1604–1605
Discordian calendar	3054
Ethiopian calendar	1880–1881
Hebrew calendar	5648–5649
Hindu calendars
- Vikram Samvat	1944–1945
- Shaka Samvat	1809–1810
- Kali Yuga	4988–4989
Holocene calendar	11888
Igbo calendar	888–889
Iranian calendar	1266–1267
Islamic calendar	1305–1306
Japanese calendar	Meiji 21 (明治２１年)
Javanese calendar	1817–1818
Julian calendar	Gregorian minus 12 days
Korean calendar	4221
Minguo calendar	24 before ROC 民前24年
Nanakshahi calendar	420
Thai solar calendar	2430–2431
Tibetan calendar	阴火猪年 (female Fire-Pig) 2014 or 1633 or 861     — to — 阳土鼠年 (male Earth-Rat) 2015 or 1634 or 862

Year 1888 (MDCCCLXXXVIII) was a leap year starting on Sunday (click on link for calendar) of the Gregorian calendar and a leap year starting on Friday of the, at the time 12-day slower Julian calendar. In Germany, 1888 is known as the Year of the Three Emperors. Currently, it is the year that, when written in Roman numerals, has the most digits (13). This will be surpassed as late as 2888.

Events

January–March

March 11: Great Blizzard of 1888.

• January 3 – The 91-centimeter telescope is first used at Lick Observatory in California.
• January 12 – The 'Schoolhouse Blizzard' hits Dakota Territory, the states of Montana, Minnesota, Nebraska, Kansas, and Texas, leaving 235 dead, many of them children on their way home from school.
• January 13 – The National Geographic Society is founded in Washington, D.C.
• February 6 : Gillis Bildt becomes Prime Minister of Sweden ( 1888 - 1889 ) .
• February 27 – In West Orange, New Jersey, Thomas Edison meets with Eadweard Muybridge, who proposes a scheme for sound film.
• March 8 – The Agriculture College of Utah, (later Utah State University) is founded in Logan, Utah.
• March 9 – Frederick III becomes German Emperor and King of Prussia.
• March 11 – The Great Blizzard of 1888 begins along the eastern seaboard of the United States, shutting down commerce and killing more than 400.
• March 15 – Start of the Sikkim Expedition, a British military expedition to expel the Tibetans from northern Sikkim.
• March 16 – Foundation stone for a new National Library of Greece is laid in Athens.
• March 20 – The very first Romani language operetta premieres in Moscow, Russia.
• March 23 – A meeting called by William McGregor to discuss establishment of The Football League is held in London.
• March 27 – The Rescue of the Renown: Dorus Rijkers saves the 30-man crew of the Renown off the Netherlands coast, risking his own life.

April–June

• April 3 – The Brighton Beach Hotel in Coney Island is moved 520 feet using six steam locomotives by civil engineer B. C. Miller to save it from ocean storms.
• April 6 – First New Year's Day of the solar calendar adopted by Siamese King Chulalongkorn with the 106th anniversary of Bangkok's founding in 1782 as its epoch (reference date).
• April 11 – The Concertgebouw in Amsterdam is inaugurated.
• April 21 – The Texas State Capitol building, completed at a cost of 3 million dollars, opens to the public in Austin.
• May 1 – The United States Congress establishes the Fort Belknap Indian Reservation.
• May 13 – In Brazil, the Lei Áurea abolishes the last remnants of slavery.
• May 28 – In Scotland, Celtic F.C. plays its first official match winning 5–2 against Rangers F.C.
• May 30 – Hong Kong's Peak Tram began operation.
• June – Annie Besant organizes the London matchgirls strike of 1888.
• June 3
  • The Kingdom of Sedang is formed in modern-day Vietnam.
  • Casey at the Bat is published.
• June 15 – Wilhelm II becomes German Emperor and King of Prussia. 1888 is the Year of the Three Emperors.
• June 19 – In Chicago, the Republican Convention opens at the Auditorium Building. Benjamin Harrison and Levi P. Morton win the nominations for President and Vice President of the United States, respectively.
• June 29 – Handel's Israel in Egypt is recorded onto wax cylinder at The Crystal Palace in London, the earliest known recording of classical music.
• June 30 – The Marine Biological Association of the United Kingdom opens its laboratory on Plymouth Hoe.

July–September

August 31: Victim found from Jack the Ripper?

• July 25 – Frank Edward McGurrin, a court stenographer from Salt Lake City, Utah, purportedly the only person using touch typing at this time, wins a decisive victory over Louis Traub in a typing contest held in Cincinnati, Ohio. This date can be called the birthday of the touch typing method that is widely used now.
• July 27 – The Parliament of the United Kingdom passes an act that permits bicycles on the road, on condition that they are equipped with a bell that should be rung while on the carriageway. This rule is eventually abolished in 1930.
• August 5 – Bertha Benz arrives in Pforzheim, having driven 40 miles (64 km) from Mannheim in a car manufactured by her husband Karl Benz, thus completing the first "long-distance" drive in the history of the automobile.
• August 7 – Whitechapel murders: The body of London prostitute Martha Tabram is found, a possible victim of Jack the Ripper.
• August 9  – A fire destroys Main Building, the heart of Wells College in Aurora, New York, causing a loss of $130,000.
• August 20 – There is a mutiny at Dufile, India, and the Emin Pasha is imprisoned.
• August 28 – The longest date in Roman numerals (VIII-XXVIII-MDCCCLXXXVIII)
• August 31 – Whitechapel murders: The mutilated body of London prostitute Mary Ann Nichols is found. She is considered the first victim of Jack the Ripper.
• 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 in cricket 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
  • Whitechapel murders: The mutilated body of London prostitute Annie Chapman is found. She is considered to be the second victim of Jack the Ripper.
  • In England, the first 6 Football League matches are played.
  • In a letter accepting renomination as President of the United States, Grover Cleveland declares the Chinese "impossible of assimilation with our people and dangerous to our peace and welfare".

• September 27 – Whitechapel murders: The 'Dear Boss letter' signed "Jack the Ripper", the first time the name is used, is received by London's Central News Agency.
• September 30 – Whitechapel murders: The bodies of London prostitutes Elizabeth Stride and Catherine Eddowes, the latter mutilated, are found. They are generally considered Jack the Ripper's third and fourth victims, respectively.

October 9: Washington Monument opens.

October–December

• October 1 – Sofia University officially opens, becoming the first university in liberated Bulgaria.
• October 9 – The Washington Monument officially opens to the general public in Washington, D.C.
• October 14
  • Louis Le Prince films the first motion picture: Roundhay Garden Scene in Roundhay, Leeds, West Yorkshire, England, two seconds and 18 frames in length (followed by his movie Leeds Bridge).
  • Seeking to extend Mahdist control over what is now southwestern Ethiopia, governor Khalil al-Khuzani is routed at the Battle of Guté Dili by an alliance of Shewan forces under Ras Gobana Dacche and Moroda Bekere, ruler of Leqa Naqamte. Only a handful, including Khalil, barely manage to flee the battle field.
• October 25 – St Cuthbert's Society in the University of Durham in England is founded after a general meeting chaired by the Reverend Hastings Rashdall.
• October 30 – The Rudd Concession, a written concession for exclusive mining rights in Matabeleland, Mashonaland and adjoining territories, is granted by King Lobengula of Matabeleland to Charles Rudd, James Rochfort Maguire and Francis Thompson who are acting on behalf of South African-based politician and businessman Cecil Rhodes, providing a basis for white settlement of Rhodesia.
• November 6 – United States presidential election, 1888: Democratic Party incumbent Grover Cleveland wins the popular vote, but loses the Electoral College vote to Republican challenger Benjamin Harrison, therefore losing the election.
• November 7 – C. V. Raman, physicist and Nobel laureate, discoverer of Raman scattering, is born in Thiruvanaikaval, India.
• November 9 – Whitechapel murders: The mutilated body of London prostitute Mary Jane Kelly is found. She is considered to be the fifth, and last, of Jack the Ripper's victims. A number of similar murders in England follow, but the police attribute them to copy-cat killers.
• November 20 – The first St V-parade by students in Brussels.
• November 27 – International sorority Delta Delta Delta is founded at Boston University.
• November 29 – Celebration of Thanksgiving (United States) and the first day of Hanukkah coincide.
• December 18 – Richard Wetherill and his brother-in-law discover the Indian ruins of Mesa Verde in southwestern Colorado.
• December 23 – During a bout of mental illness (and having quarreled with his friend Paul Gauguin), Dutch painter Vincent van Gogh infamously cuts off the lower part of his own left ear in a brothel and is removed to the local hospital in Arles.

Date unknown

• Sarawak and Sabah become British protectorates.
• Edward King, Anglican bishop of Lincoln in England, is prosecuted for using ritualistic practices; the special ecclesiastical court finds largely in his favour.
• Susan B. Anthony organizes a Congress for Women's Rights in Washington, D.C.
• The dolphin Pelorus Jack is first sighted in Cook Strait, New Zealand.
• The first tram line is opened in Tallinn.
• The Camborne School of Mines is founded in Cornwall, England.
• John Robert Gregg first publishes Gregg shorthand in the United States.
• Rudyard Kipling's short story collection Plain Tales from the Hills is published in Calcutta, India.
• The Finnish epic Kalevala is published for the first time in the English language by American linguist John Martin Crawford.
• The Baldwin School is founded in Bryn Mawr, Pennsylvania.
• Chin Gee Hee starts the Quong Tuck Company.
• Katz's Delicatessen is founded in the Lower East Side of Manhattan.

Births

January–March

• January 1 – Victor Goldschmidt, Swiss geochemist (d. 1947)
• January 8 – Matt Moore, Irish-born actor (d. 1960)
• January 16 – Robert Henry English, American admiral (d. 1943)
• January 18 – Thomas Sopwith, English aviation pioneer and yachtsman (d. 1989)
• c. January 20 – Huddie William Ledbetter (Lead Belly), American folk and blues singer (d. 1949)
• January 23 – Aritomo Gotō, Japanese admiral (d. 1942)
• January 24
  • Vicki Baum, Austrian writer (d. 1960)
  • Ernst Heinkel, German aircraft designer (d. 1958)
• February 2 – Frederick Lane, Australian swimmer (d. 1969)
• February 8 – Edith Evans, British actress (d. 1976)
• February 17 – Otto Stern, German physicist, Nobel Prize laureate (d. 1969)
• February 19
  • Adelina Domingues, World's oldest person between May 2002 and August 2002 (d. 2002)
  • Tom Phillips, British admiral (d. 1941)
  • Aurora Quezon, First Lady of the Philippines (d. 1949)
  • 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
  • Arthur Schlesinger, Sr., American historian (d. 1965)
  • 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 7
  • Claude Roger-Marx, French writer (d. 1977)
  • William L. Laurence, American journalist (d. 1977)
• March 10 – Barry Fitzgerald, Irish actor (d. 1966)
• March 26 – Elsa Brändström, Swedish nurse (d. 1948)
• March 29 – James E. Casey, founder of the United Parcel Service (d. 1983)
• March 30 – Anna Q. Nilsson, Swedish-American silent film star (d. 1974)

April–June

• April 3
  • Sir Neville Cardus, British music and cricket writer (d. 1975)
  • Thomas C. Kinkaid, American admiral (d. 1972)
• April 4
  • Tris Speaker, American professional baseball player, member of the Baseball Hall of Fame (d. 1958)
  • Zdzisław Żygulski, Sr., Polish literary historian (d. 1975)
• April 6
  • Hans Richter, German filmmaker (d. 1976)
  • Gerhard Ritter, German historian (d. 1967)
• 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 8 – Maurice Boyau, French World War I fighter ace (d. 1918)
• May 9 – Francesco Baracca, Italian World War I fighter ace (d. 1918)
• May 10 – Max Steiner, Austrian-American composer (d. 1971)
• May 11
  • Irving Berlin, American composer (d. 1989)
  • Willis Augustus Lee, American admiral (d. 1945)
• 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)
• May 28 – Jim Thorpe, American athlete (d. 1953)
• May 31 – Jack Holt, American actor (d. 1951)
• 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 16 – Peter Stoner, American mathematician, astronomer and Christian apologist (d. 1980)
• June 17 – Heinz Guderian, German general (d. 1954)
• June 24
  • Boshirō Hosogaya, Japanese admiral (d. 1964)
  • Gerrit Rietveld, Dutch architect (d. 1964)
• June 27 – Antoinette Perry, New York stage director, Tony Award named for her (d. 1946)
• June 29 – Joseph 'Squizzy' Taylor, Australian underworld figure (d. 1927)

July–September

• July 5 – Herbert Spencer Gasser, American physiologist, Nobel Prize laureate (d. 1963)
• July 8 – John R. Sinnock, eighth Chief Engraver of the United States Mint (d. 1947)
• July 10 – Giorgio de Chirico, Italian painter (d. 1978)
• July 16
  • Percy Kilbride, American actor (d. 1964)
  • Frits Zernike, Dutch physicist, Nobel Prize laureate (d. 1966)
• July 17 – Shmuel Yosef Agnon, Israeli writer, Nobel Prize laureate (d. 1970)
• July 22
  • Kirk Bryan, American geologist (d. 1950)
  • 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 4 – Syedna Taher Saifuddin, Bohra spiritual leader (d. 1965)
• August 6
  • Stephen Galatti, Director of AFS, American Field Service (d. 1964)
  • Heinrich Schlusnus, German baritone (d. 1952)
• August 13
  • Gleb W. Derujinsky, Russian-American sculptor (d. 1975)
  • John Logie Baird, Scottish inventor (d. 1946)
• August 16
  • Armand J. Piron, American jazz musician (d. 1943)
  • T. E. Lawrence ("Lawrence of Arabia"), British liaison officer during the Arab Revolt, writer, and academic (d. 1935)
• August 25 – Allama Mashriqi, Pakistani scholar and politician (d. 1963)
• August 29 – Gunichi Mikawa, Japanese admiral (d. 1981)
• September 4 – Margaret Emma Henley, J. M. Barrie's inspiration for the name "Wendy" in Peter Pan (d. 1894)
• September 5 – Sarvepalli Radhakrishnan, Indian philosopher and politician, 2nd 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 14 - Thakur Anukulchandra, Indian social reformer and philanthropist (d. 1969)
• September 16 – Frans Eemil Sillanpää, Finnish writer, Nobel Prize laureate (d. 1964)
• September 20 – John Painter, World's Oldest Man between 1999 and 2001 (d. 2001)
• September 26
  • J. Frank Dobie, American folklorist and journalist (d. 1964)
  • T. S. Eliot, British (American-born) writer, Nobel Prize laureate (d. 1965)

October–December

• October 3 – Claud Allister, English actor (d. 1970)
• October 4 – Lucy Tayiah Eads, Kaw tribal chief (d. 1961)
  • Friedrich Olbricht, German general (d. 1944)
• 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)
  • Paul Popenoe, American eugenicist (d. 1979)
• October 17 – Paul Bernays, Swiss mathematician (d. 1977)
• October 19 – Venkatarama Ramalingam Pillai, Indian Freedom Fighter, Tamil Poet (d. 1972)
• October 20 – Sadayoshi Tanabe, Japanese academic and bibliographer (d. 2000)
• October 24 – Carlo Bergamini, Italian admiral (d. 1943)
• October 25 – Lester Cuneo, American actor (d. 1925)
• October 30 – Alan Goodrich Kirk, American admiral (d. 1963)
• November 1 – George Kenner, German artist, made 110 paintings and drawings during the First World War while interned as a POW (d. 1971)
• November 7 – Chandrasekhara Venkata Raman, Indian physicist, Nobel Prize laureate (d. 1970)
• November 15
  • Harald Sverdrup, Norwegian scientist (d. 1957)
  • José Raúl Capablanca, World chess champion 1921–1927 (d. 1942)
• November 16 – Luis Cluzeau Mortet, Uruguayan composer and musician (d. 1957)
• November 23 – Harpo Marx, American comedian (d. 1964)
• November 26 – Francisco Canaro, Uruguayan-born violinist and composer (d. 1964)
• November 24
  • Dale Carnegie, American writer and lecturer (d. 1955)
  • Cathleen Nesbitt, British actress (d. 1982)
• November 28 – Edgar Church, American comic book collector (d. 1978)
• November 30 – Ralph Hartley, American electronics researcher and inventor (d. 1970)
• December 3 – Rabbi Yitzhak HaLevi Herzog, Polish-born Chief Rabbi of Ireland and of Israel (d. 1959)
• December 4
  • King Alexander of Yugoslavia (d. 1934)
  • Donald B. Beary, American admiral (d. 1966)
• December 5 – Gerard Oliver Dixon, (G.O.D), Eccentric owner of Pasadena local comic book store (1888 - present)
• December 6 – Will Hay, British actor and comedian (d. 1949)
• December 7 – Joyce Cary, Northern Irish author (d. 1957)
• December 16 – Alphonse Juin, Marshal of France (d. 1967)
• December 18
  • Robert Moses, American civil engineer, public works director, and highway and bridge builder (d. 1981)
  • Dame Gladys Cooper, English actress, (d. 1971)
• December 19 – Fritz Reiner, Hungarian conductor (d. 1963)
• December 20 – Yitzhak Baer, German-born Israeli historian (d. 1980)
• December 26 – Marius Canard, French Orientalist (d. 1982)
• December 28 – F. W. Murnau, German film director (d. 1931)

Date unknown

• Mariano Andreu, Spanish painter (d. 1976)
• Philip Francis Nowlan, science fiction writer, creator of the Buck Rogers character (d. 1940)

Deaths

January–June

• January 19 – Anton de Bary, German biologist (b. 1831)
• January 20 – William Pitt Ballinger, Texas lawyer, southern statesman (b. 1825)
• 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)
• February 5 – Anton Mauve, Dutch painter (b. 1838)
• February 22 – Anna Kingsford, British women's rights activist (b. 1846)
• February 24 – Seth Kinman, American hunter and settler (b. 1815)
• March 6
  • Louisa May Alcott, American novelist (b. 1832)
  • Josif Pančić, Serbian botanist (b. 1814)
• March 9 – German Emperor and King of Prussia, Wilhelm I (b. 1797)
• March 12 – Henry Bergh, founder of the American Society for the Prevention of Cruelty to Animals (b. 1813)
• March 16 – Hippolyte Carnot, French statesman (b. 1801)
• March 23 – Morrison Waite, Chief Justice of the United States (b. 1816)
• March 27 – Francesco Faà di Bruno, Italian mathematician (b. 1825)
• March 29 – Charles-Valentin Alkan, French composer and pianist (b. 1813)
• April 15 – Matthew Arnold, English poet (b. 1822)
• April 17 – Ephraim George Squier, American archaeologist and newspaper editor (b. 1821)
• April 19 – Thomas Russell Crampton, English engineer (b. 1816)
• May 15 - Edwin Hamilton Davis, American archaeologist and physician (b. 1811)
• May 19 – Julius Rockwell, United States politician (Massachusetts, b. 1805)
• May 26 – Ascanio Sobrero, Italian chemist (b. 1812)
• June 7 – Edmond Leboeuf, marshal of France (b. 1809)
• June 15 – German Emperor and King of Prussia, Friedrich III (b. 1831)
• June 23  - Edmund Gurney, British psychologist (b. 1847)

July–December

• July 20 – Paul Langerhans, German pathologist and biologist (b. 1847)
• August 5 – Philip Sheridan, American general (b. 1831)
• August 9 – Charles Cros, French poet (b. 1831)
• August 16 – John Pemberton, American founder of Coca-Cola (b. 1831)
• August 20 – Henry Richard, Welsh peace campaigner (b. 1812)
• August 23 – Philip Henry Gosse, British scientist (b. 1810)
• August 24 – Rudolf Clausius, German physicist, contributor to thermodynamics (b. 1822)
• September 6 – Lester Wallack, theater impresario (b. 1820)
• September 11 – Domingo Faustino Sarmiento, politician, writer, and father of education (b. 1811)
• September 23 – François Achille Bazaine, French general (b. 1811)
• September 24 – Karl von Prantl, German philosopher (b. 1820)
• October 16
  • John Wentworth, Mayor of Chicago (b. 1815)
  • Horatio Spafford, American author of the hymn "It Is Well With My Soul" (b. 1828)
• November 24 – Cicero Price, American commodore (b. 1805)
• December 2 – Namık Kemal, Turkish patriotic poet, social reformer (b. 1840)
• December 3 – Carl Zeiss, optician and founder of company now known as Carl Zeiss AG (b. 1816)
• December 22 – Mikhail Loris-Melikov, Russian statesman and general (b. 1826)
• December 31 – Samson Raphael Hirsch, German rabbi (b. 1808)