May 1900 Explained
The following events occurred in May 1900:
May 1, 1900 (Tuesday)
May 2, 1900 (Wednesday)
May 3, 1900 (Thursday)
May 4, 1900 (Friday)
May 5, 1900 (Saturday)
- Albert Ellis of the Pacific Islands Company signed a lease with the chiefs of the Banaban people of Ocean Island, a tiny atoll that is now part of the nation of Kiribati, granting the company a 999-year exclusive right to mine phosphate,[15] in exchange for 50 British pounds per year. The islanders, including the misidentified "King of Ocean Island", Temate, did not have the authority to sell mining rights, and were likely not aware of what Ellis intended to do. Following the British annexation of Ocean Island on September 28, 1901, "The British government reduced the term of the lease to a more realistic 99 years".[16]
- General Arthur MacArthur replaced General Elwell Stephen Otis as military governor of the Philippines. The father of General Douglas MacArthur set up his office at the Malacañan Palace in Manila.[17]
May 6, 1900 (Sunday)
May 7, 1900 (Monday)
- San Francisco Mayor James D. Phelan addressed an anti-Asian rally at Union Square and declared "The Chinese and Japanese are not bonafide citizens. They are not the stuff of which American citizens can be made."[20]
- Mount Vesuvius began erupting, with lava threatening the city of Torre del Greco, Italy.[21]
- Died: Harry Burke, University of Cincinnati track meet captain, due to a fatal injury to his spine after an accident involving the pole vault[10] [11]
May 8, 1900 (Tuesday)
May 9, 1900 (Wednesday)
May 10, 1900 (Thursday)
- Japan's Crown Prince Yoshihito and Princess Kujo Sadako were married in Tokyo, marking the first Japanese imperial wedding to include a religious ceremony.[28] Soon thereafter, commoners began requesting similar ceremonies and the Shinto wedding soon became popular throughout the nation.[29]
- Responding to the famine in British India, the United States paid for the shipment of donations of 200,000 bushels of corn and substantial quantities of seed, via the ship Quito, which sailed from Brooklyn. Christian Herald editor Louis Klopsch, who had lobbied the government to pay the shipping costs, also cabled $40,000 to India for famine relief.[30]
May 11, 1900 (Friday)
- One construction worker was killed, and another severely injured, in a 70foot fall while working on the Manhattan anchorage of the new Williamsburg Bridge.[31]
- Former heavyweight boxing champion "Gentleman Jim" Corbett took on title holder James J. Jeffries, attempting to regain the title that he had lost in 1897, and almost succeeded. In the bout at the New York Athletic Club, Corbett was the better fighter for the first 22 rounds, but in the 23rd, Jeffries knocked him down with a right to the jaw. Corbett's amazing endurance and Jeffries's comeback made the fight a boxing classic.[32]
May 12, 1900 (Saturday)
- Lin Shao-mao who had led a rebellion on the island of Taiwan against its Japanese rulers, surrendered along with his men in a formal ceremony held at Ahou (now Pingtung City). Lin and his men were allowed to live peaceably at Houpilin, but he was eventually killed in a battle on May 30, 1902.[33]
- Field cornet S. Eloff led a force of 240 Boers in an assault on the town of Mafeking, South Africa during the Siege of Mafeking.
- Born: Helene Weigel, Austrian-born German actress, wife of Bertolt Brecht; in Vienna (d. 1971)
May 13, 1900 (Sunday)
- Wilbur Wright wrote to aviation expert Octave Chanute, sharing his own findings and seeking advice on the ideal place to test a flying machine. Written on the letterhead of the Wright Cycle Co. of 1127 West Third Street in Dayton, Ohio, Wright's initial missive began, "For some years I have been afflicted with the belief that flight is possible to man. My disease has increased in severity and I feel that it will soon cost me an increased amount of money, if not my life." Over the next several years, the correspondence continued between Wright and Chanute, whose suggestions aided in the Wright brothers' first flight on December 17, 1903.[34]
May 14, 1900 (Monday)
May 15, 1900 (Tuesday)
May 16, 1900 (Wednesday)
- Chicago's Chief Milk Inspector, Thomas Grady, announced plans to ban dangerous additives from milk. "Formalin, the chemical used in milk preservatives, will kill a cat", he told reporters. "What will it do to a child?"[40] Formalin, a diluted form of formaldehyde, had been added to raw milk near the end of the 19th century before its toxic effects were realized. The United Kingdom banned the practice in 1901.[41]
May 17, 1900 (Thursday)
May 18, 1900 (Friday)
- At 9:17 p.m. in London, the Reuters news agency broke the news of the victory at Mafeking, South Africa. As author Phillip Knightley noted, "Britain went mad. The celebrations lasted for five nights, and surpassed the victory celebrations of the First and Second World Wars in size, intensity, and enthusiasm. Baden-Powell became the most popular English hero since Nelson, and a household name not only in Britain but also throughout the United States."[46]
May 19, 1900 (Saturday)
May 20, 1900 (Sunday)
- Voters in Switzerland overwhelmingly rejected a law providing for sickness and accident insurance. The Kranken und Unfallversicherungsgesetz (KUVG), sponsored by Ludwig Forrer and passed the Federal Assembly, but was challenged by a referendum, where more than 70% of the voters were against it. Health reform would finally pass in 1911.[51]
- The Free Homes Bill was signed into law by U.S. President William McKinley, and the debts of all homesteaders in Oklahoma were forgiven by the United States government. Up until then, settlers had been compelled to pay, in addition to other requirements, an annual federal fee ranging from $1.00 to $2.50 per acre.[52]
- Born: Sumitranandan Pant, Hindi poet; in Kausani, Punjab Province, British India (now Uttarakhand state (d. 1977)
May 21, 1900 (Monday)
- Plans for the Nicaragua Canal ended when the United States Senate killed it after they declined to bring it up for debate and a vote. While the Hepburn Bill had passed the House, 225–35, Alabama's Senator John Tyler Morgan was unable to persuade the Senate to vote on the matter. A motion to bring an early vote as "unfinished business" failed by a vote of 28–21.[53] A commission then recommended construction of a Panama Canal.
- Following an emergency meeting in Beijing, representatives of the foreign powers (the United States, the United Kingdom, Germany, France and Japan) provided a five-day ultimatum to the Empress Dowager Cixi of China. If the Boxers were not arrested and punished by that time, armies would be sent to invade.[54]
May 22, 1900 (Tuesday)
- At 4:30 in the afternoon, an explosion at the Cumnock Mining Company, near Sanford, North Carolina, killed 22 coal miners. The accident was believed to have been "caused by a broken gauze in a safety lamp".[55]
- The first patent for the "player piano", a self-playing mechanical piano that used a role of perforated paper to guide the movement of the piano keys, was granted to American inventor Edwin S. Votey, who marketed the device under the brand name "Pianola".[56]
- The first test was made of the Adams Air Splitting Train, on a run from Washington, D.C., to Baltimore, then back again. Inventor Frederick Adams had forecast that the aerodynamic, "cigar-shaped" train could be run at a speed of 100mph with less expenditure than is now required to keep up a speed of 50mph.[57] However, the train achieved no more than 60mph.[58]
- Born: Clyde Tolson, first Associate Director of the Federal Bureau of Investigation and right-hand man of J. Edgar Hoover; in Laredo, Missouri (d. 1975)
May 23, 1900 (Wednesday)
May 24, 1900 (Thursday)
May 25, 1900 (Friday)
- The Lacey Act, 16 U.S.C. § 3371–3378, was signed into law by U.S. President William McKinley. Sponsored by conservationist and Iowa Congressman John F. Lacey, the Act was described on its centennial as the "first far-reaching federal wildlife protection law" and one "setting the stage for a century of progress in safeguarding wildlife resources".[67] Its most important provision was to make it a federal crime to ship "wild animals and birds take in defiance of existing state laws" across state lines.[68]
May 26, 1900 (Saturday)
- The Battle of Palonegro concluded after fifteen days in Santander, Colombia, marking a turning point in the Thousand Days' War. General Próspero Pinzón of the Conservative forces defeated Liberal forces commander Gabriel Vargas Santos. An estimated 2,500 people died during the fighting.[69] In January 1901, a pile of hundreds of human skulls would be assembled as a grisly monument that would not be dismantled until 12 years later.[70]
May 27, 1900 (Sunday)
May 28, 1900 (Monday)
- At noon, the Orange Free State was annexed to the British Empire, in a proclamation at Bloemfontein by its new military governor, Major General George T. Pretyman.[72] Located in South Africa, the Orange Free State had existed as an independent republic from 1854 until Britain's victory in the Second Boer War. President Martinus Theunis Steyn, who had fled Bloemfontein in March, claimed control over the unoccupied areas of the state until surrendering in 1902. Adding an area of 48326sqmi to the Empire, the area was renamed the Orange River Colony.[73] The colony would become part of the Union of South Africa in 1910.
- At the 1900 Paris Exposition, Gare d'Orsay opened as the first electrified urban rail terminal.
- Millions of observers turned out to watch a total eclipse of the sun, visible in a pathway that ran through Mexico and the southeastern United States and to Spain. As the first since the introduction of the Brownie camera, and with more advance publicity than ever before, the eclipse became the most photographed event up to that time. "Amateur photographers throughout the city are making extensive preparations for the event," noted The New York Times, "and it would be hard to estimate the number of snapshots that will be taken to-day."[74] "It has been eleven years since a similar event was witnessed, but the advancement of astronomical science and the marvelous improvements in telescopes, photography, and electrical apparatus insured more complete observations than ever before known."[75] The eclipse began at about Eastern time with totality at 8:36 in the morning.[76]
- Born: Tommy Ladnier, American jazz musician and trumpeter known for promoting Dixieland jazz' in Mandeville, Louisiana (d. 1939)
May 29, 1900 (Tuesday)
- The word "escalator" was introduced into the English language, as the Patent and Trademark Office formally granted the trademark to Charles Seeberger for a moving stairway.[77] However, Seeberger lost the trademark fifty years later when a patent commissioner ruled that the term had become generic, in Haughton Elevator Co. v. Seeberger, 85 U.S.P.Q. 80 (Comm'r Pat. 1950)[78]
- William P. Dun Lany and Herbert R. Palmer were awarded a patent for their invention, described as "a certain new and useful improvement in Facsimile Telegraphs ... to simplify such telegraph instrument, to render them more accurate and efficient, more easily adjustable to meet the varying conditions presented, and adapt them to receive a message or picture by a direct impression or a hammer and anvil movement instead of by an electrochemical change in the receiving surface." They received U.S. Patent No. 650,381 for the device,[79] which Palmer would demonstrate a year later at Columbia University.[80]
May 30, 1900 (Wednesday)
- Lord Roberts was met outside of Johannesburg by its Governor, Fritz Krause, for terms of surrender. "He begged me to defer entering the town for twenty-four hours, as there were many armed burghers still inside," General Roberts cabled. "I agreed to this, as I am most anxious to avert the possibility of anything like disturbance inside the town ..."[81] At 10:00 the next morning, Lord Roberts and the British army entered the town, hauled down the South African flag from the courthouse, and raised the Union Jack in its place.[82] The armies then began the march to the capital, Pretoria, which had been evacuated the day before.
May 31, 1900 (Thursday)
Notes and References
- Book: Gunter . Dinhobl . Ralf . Roth . Across the Borders: Financing the World's Railways in the Nineteenth and Twentieth Centuries . . 2008 . 196–97.
- Book: Haimson, Leopold H. . Leopold H. Haimson . The Making of Three Russian Revolutionaries: Voices from the Menshevik Past . . 1987 . 472.
- Book: Rowe, Leo Stanton . Leo Stanton Rowe . The United States and Porto Rico . . 1904 . 118.
- News: Most Appalling Mine Horror! . . May 2, 1900 . 1.
- Book: World Almanac and Book of Facts 1901 . 96.
- News: House Votes for Nicaragua Canal . . May 3, 1900 . 1.
- "Text of the Bill", NYT, Id.
- Book: The Annual Register: A Review of Public Events at Home and Abroad For the Year 1900 . . 1901 . 13–16.
- News: Sale of Islands Abandoned . . May 4, 1900 . 1.
- News: College Athlete Badly Hurt . The New York Times . May 4, 1900 . 1.
- Book: The Scroll of Phi Delta Theta . 24 . 542 . . 1900 . July 10, 2021.
- Annual Register, p. 13
- Theodore S. . Woolsey . The Naval War Code . . 1901 . 305.
- Web site: Archived copy . 2009-01-11 . dead . https://web.archive.org/web/20090327030130/http://www.depts.ttu.edu/museumttu/Traveling%20Trunks/HISTORY%20OF%20LUBBOCK%20KITrev.pdf . 2009-03-27.
- Book: McIntyre, W. David . W. David McIntyre . Winding up the British Empire in the Pacific Islands . . 2014 . 14.
- Book: Stanley, David . Fiji Islands Handbook . . 1996 . 223.
- Book: Nimmo, William F. . Stars and Stripes Across the Pacific . . 2001 . 38.
- Annual Register, p13
- News: Berlin Festivities End . The New York Times . May 7, 1900 . 7.
- Book: Kent, Noel J. . America in 1900 . . 2000 . 107–108.
- Annual Register, p. 13
- Carolyn Bonner and Kit Bonner, Always Ready: Today's U.S. Coast Guard (Zenith Imprint, 2004), p. 10
- Kevin Davies, Cracking the Genome: Inside the Race to Unlock Human DNA (Simon and Schuster, 2001), p. 250
- T. R. Birkhead, A Brand New Bird: How Two Amateur Scientists Created the First Genetically Engineered Animal (Basic Books, 2003) p. 116
- "Trenton Defeats Millville", Philadelphia Inquirer, May 9, 1900, p. 6
- http://www.capitalcentury.com/1900.html "1900: Basketball's first dynasty"
- American Pharmacy (1852–2002): A Collection of Historical Essays, p. 93
- Book: Jaffe, Richard M. . Neither Monk Nor Layman: Clerical Marriage in Modern Japanese Buddhism . . 2001 . 218.
- Book: Edwards, Walter . Modern Japan Through Its Weddings . . 1990 . 103–104.
- [Merle Eugene Curti]
- News: TWO MEN FALL SEVENTY FEET. One Killed, Other Terribly Injured at New East River Bridge Anchorage. . The New York Times . 12 May 1900 . 13 December 2021.
- Book: Miller, Stuart . The 100 Greatest Days in New York Sports . . 2006 . 215–219.
- Web site: David . Oakley . On the Trail of Lin Shao-Mao, the Last Outlaw .
- Book: Stephanie Sammartino . McPherson . Joseph Sammartino . Gardner . Wilbur & Orville Wright: Taking Flight . . 2003 . 38–40.
- Annual Register, p. 14
- "Clark Gives Up Seat in Senate", New York Times, May 16, 1900, p1
- "Another Man Named to Succeed Clark", New York Times, May 19, 1900, p. 1
- Robert E. Martin, "It Does Rain FISH!", Popular Science (July 1932), pp. 24–25;
- "Rained Fish", AP report in the Lowell (Mass.) Sun, May 16, 1900, p. 4
- News: Food Preservative Fatal . The New York Times . May 17, 1900 . 2.
- Book: Gratzer, Walter Bruno . Terrors of the Table: The Curious History of Nutrition . Oxford University Press . 2005 . 101–102.
- Book: Forrest, George . Sepoy Generals, Wellington to Roberts . W. Blackwood . 1901 . 434.
- Book: Peter . Thompson . Robert . Macklin . The Life and Adventures of Morrison of China . . 2008 . 204.
- Book: Papers Relating to the Foreign Relations of the United States . G.P.O. . 1902 . 127.
- Katharine M. Rogers, L. Frank Baum, pp73–94
- Phillip Knightley, The First Casualty: The War Correspondent as Hero and Myth-maker from the Crimea to Iraq (JHU Press, 2004) p. 76
- Book: Rutherford, Noel . Shirley Baker and the King of Tonga . . 1996 . 222.
- Book: MacKenzie, John M. . John M. MacKenzie . The Empire of Nature: Hunting, Conservation, and British Imperialism . . 1997 . 202.
- Book: Arthur Bernard . Knapp . Vincent C. . Pigott . Eugenia W. . Herbert . Social Approaches to an Industrial Past: The Archaeology and Anthropology of Mining . . 1998 . 103–104.
- Book: Russell R. . Elliott . William D. . Rowley . History of Nevada . . 1987 . 211.
- Matthius Leimgruber, Solidarity Without the State?: Business and the Shaping of the Swiss Welfare State, 1890–2000 (Cambridge University Press, 2008), p. 36
- Oklahoma Historical Society, Review of Inception and Progress (1905) pp. 27–28
- "Set-Back for the Nicaragua Canal", New York Times, May 22, 1900, p. 1
- X. L. Woo, Empress Dowager Cixi (Algora Publishing, 2002), p. 214
- News: Twenty-Two Killed . . May 24, 1900 . 2.
- Book: Ord-Hume, Arthur W. J. G. . Player Piano: History of Mechanical Piano . . 1970.
- Atmospheric Resistance; Its Relation to the Speed of Railway Trains . Railway and Locomotive . August 1900 . 345.
- News: 'Air Splitting' Train Tried . The New York Times . May 23, 1900 . 1.
- Ron Owens, Medal of Honor: Historical Facts & Figures (Turner Publishing Company, 2004), pp. 20–21
- "Associated Press Loses", The Post-Standard (Syracuse), February 20, 1900, p. 2
- Web site: Archived copy . . 2007-11-30 . dead . https://web.archive.org/web/20110729010041/http://ap.org/pages/about/history/history_first.html . 2011-07-29 .
- James Melvin Lee, History of American Journalism (Houghton Mifflin 1917), p. 415
- Edwin Howard Simmons, The United States Marines: A History (Naval Institute Press, 2003), p. 73
- "Beautiful Rites in Rome Today", The Daily Gazette (Janesville, Wis.), May 24, 1900, p1
- "John Baptist de la Salle", The Catholic Encyclopedia (Universal Knowledge Foundation, 1913), pp444–48.
- Ferdinand Holböck, Married Saints and Blesseds: Through the Centuries (Ignatius Press, 2002), pp. 269–271
- Annual Register, p. 16
- Web site: Nation Marks Lacy Act Centennial, 100 Years of Federal Wildlife Law Enforcement . https://web.archive.org/web/20060204053951/http://www.fws.gov/pacific/news/2000/2000-98.htm . dead . February 4, 2006 . May 30, 2000 . United States Fish and Wildlife Service.
- Mark V. Barrow, A Passion for Birds: American Ornithology After Audubon (Princeton University Press, 2000), pp. 132–133
- Book: Ruiz, Bert . The Colombian Civil War . McFarland . 2001 . 41–42.
- Book: De La Pedraja, René . Wars of Latin America, 1899–1941 . McFarland . 2006 . 25.
- News: 117 Vietnamese church martyrs are canonized . Chicago Herald . June 20, 1988 . 3.
- News: The Free State Annexation . The New York Times . May 31, 1900 . 2.
- Book: Appletons' Annual Cyclopaedia and Register of Important Events 1903 . 638.
- News: Local Eclipse Preparations . The New York Times . May 28, 1900 . 1.
- News: Eclipse Observers Report Success . The New York Times . May 29, 1900 . 1.
- "Princeton Party's Success", Id.
- Patent and Trade Mark Review, p. 304
- Siegrun D. Kane, Trademark Law, pp. 5–18
- https://patents.google.com/patent/US650381 "Facsimile telegraph."
- "Pictures Sent by Wire", Chicago Daily Tribune, April 13, 1901, p. 1
- "Fate of Pretoria Not Yet Certain", New York Times, June 1, 1900, p. 1
- The Times History of the War in South Africa 1899–1902 (Sampson Low, Marston, 1906), v.4, pp. 151–152
- Byron Farwell, The Encyclopedia of Nineteenth-century Land Warfare (W. W. Norton & Company, 2001), 124
- Chester M. Biggs, Jr., The United States Marines in North China, 1894–1942 (McFarland Press, 2003) pp. 65–66
- Annual Register, p. 16