1901 in the United States

Decades:	1880s; 1890s; 1900s; 1910s; 1920s;
See also:	; History of the United States (1865–1918); Timeline of United States history (1900–1929); List of years in the United States;

Events from the year 1901 in the United States.

Incumbents

Governors and Lieutenant Governors
Governors 2 Lieutenant Governors 2

January 3 - Census Commissioner predicts a US population of at least 300 million by 2001
January 5 – Typhoid fever breaks out in a Seattle jail, the first of two typhoid outbreaks in the USA during the year.
January 10 – In the first great Texas gusher, oil is discovered at Spindletop in Beaumont, Texas.
January 28 – Baseball's American League declares itself a Major League.
February 20 – The Hawaii Territory Legislature convenes for the first time.
February 25 – U.S. Steel, the first billion-dollar corporation and at some time the world's largest producer of steel, is incorporated by industrialist J. P. Morgan.
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.

April 25 – New York State becomes the first to require automobile license plates.
May 3 – The Great Fire of 1901 begins in Jacksonville, Florida.
May 17 – The U.S. stock market crashes for the first time.
May 27 – In New Jersey, the Edison Storage Battery Company is founded.
June 12 – Cuba becomes a U.S. protectorate.

June 22 to July 31 – The worst heat wave in US history until the 1930s, affecting most areas east of the 100th meridian, is estimated to have killed over 9,500 people.
July 24 – O. Henry is released from prison in Columbus, Ohio after serving 3 years for embezzlement from the First National Bank in Austin, Texas.
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 U.S. President William McKinley at the Pan-American Exposition in Buffalo, New York. McKinley dies 8 days later.
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 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, New Hampshire, nurse Jane Toppan is arrested for murdering the Davis family of Boston with an overdose of morphine.
October 29 – Leon Czolgosz, the assassin of William McKinley, is executed by electrocution.
November 1 – Sigma Phi Epsilon is founded in Richmond, Virginia.
November 15 – The Alpha Sigma Alpha Fraternity is founded at Longwood University.
November 28 – The new state constitution of Alabama requires voters to have passed literacy tests.
December 3 – U.S. 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."

January 4 – Raoul Berger, Ukrainian-born American attorney and law professor (d. 2000)
May 8 – Turkey Stearnes, baseball player (d. 1979)
July 22 – Pancho Barnes, pioneer aviator (died 1975)
July 30 – John A. Carroll, United States Senator from Colorado from 1957 till 1963. (died 1983)
August 3 – John C. Stennis, United States Senator from Mississippi from 1947 till 1989. (died 1995)
August 4 – Louis Armstrong, trumpeter (died 1971)
August 8 – Ernest Lawrence, nuclear physicist, winner of the Nobel Prize in Physics in 1939 (died 1958)
August 23 – John Sherman Cooper, United States Senator from Kentucky 1946-1949, 1952-1955 and 1956-1973. (died 1991)
September 28 – Ed Sullivan, entertainment writer and television host (died 1974)
December 5 – Walt Disney, business magnate, animator, producer, director, screenwriter and voice actor (died 1966)
December 12 – Fred Barker, son of Ma Barker and a member of the Barker-Karpis gang (died 1935)

January 6 – James W. Bradbury, United States Senator from Maine from 1847 till 1853. (born 1802)
March 13 – Benjamin Harrison, 23rd President of the United States from 1889 till 1893 and United States Senator from Indiana from 1881 to 1887. (born 1833)
September 14 – William McKinley, 25th President of the United States from 1897 till 1901. (born 1843)
October 29 – Leon Czolgosz, Assassin of President William McKinley (born 1873)
November 26 – John Denny, buffalo soldier and Medal of Honor recipient (born 1846)

v t e 1901 in North America
Sovereign states	Antigua and Barbuda Bahamas Barbados Belize Canada Costa Rica Cuba Dominica Dominican Republic El Salvador Grenada Guatemala Haiti Honduras Jamaica Mexico Nicaragua Panama Saint Kitts and Nevis Saint Lucia Saint Vincent and the Grenadines Trinidad and Tobago United States
Dependencies and other territories	Anguilla Aruba Bermuda Bonaire British Virgin Islands Cayman Islands Curaçao Greenland Guadeloupe Martinique Montserrat Puerto Rico Saint Barthélemy Saint Martin Saint Pierre and Miquelon Saba Sint Eustatius Sint Maarten Turks and Caicos Islands United States Virgin Islands