1897

June

• June 12 – 1897 Assam earthquake: An earthquake of magnitude of 8.0 rocks Assam, India, killing over 1,500 people.
• June 18 – Kyoto University is officially established in Japan.
• June 22 – The British Empire celebrates Queen Victoria's Diamond Jubilee, marking the 60th year of her reign. No other British monarch will celebrate such a jubilee until Victoria's great-great-granddaughter Elizabeth II in 2012.

July

• July 11 – S. A. Andrée's Arctic Balloon Expedition of 1897 begins. The ill-fated expedition to fly over the Arctic results in the death of the entire team within months.
• July 17 – The Klondike Gold Rush begins when the first successful prospectors arrive in Seattle
• July 25 – Writer Jack London sails to join the Klondike Gold Rush, where he will write his first successful stories.
• July 26–August 2 – Siege of Malakand: British troops are besieged by Pashtun tribesmen in Malakand, on the Northwest frontier of British India (modern-day Khyber Pakhtunkhwa in Pakistan).
• July 31 – Mount Saint Elias, the second highest peak in the United States and Canada, is first ascended.

August

• August 10 – At the Bayer pharmaceutical company, pharmacist Felix Hoffmann successfully synthesizes acetylsalicylic acid, after isolating a compound from a plant of the Spiraea family; the company markets it under the brand name "Aspirin".
• August 21 – The Olds Motor Vehicle Co. is founded in Lansing, Michigan, by Ransom E. Olds.
• August 29 – The First Zionist Congress convenes in Basel, Switzerland.
• August 31 – Thomas Edison is granted a patent for the Kinetoscope, a precursor of the movie projector.

September

• September 1 – The Tremont Street subway is opened in Boston, Massachusetts.
• September 10 – Lattimer massacre: A sheriff's posse kills 19 unarmed immigrant miners in Pennsylvania.
• September 11 – After months of searching, generals of Menelik II of Ethiopia capture Gaki Sherocho, the last king of Kaffa, bringing an end to that ancient kingdom.
• September 12 – Battle of Saragarhi: Twenty-one Sikhs of the 36th Sikhs regiment of the British Indian Army defend an army post to the death, against 10,000 Afghan and Orakzai tribesmen, in the Tirah Campaign on the Northwest frontier of the British Raj (modern-day Khyber Pakhtunkhwa in Pakistan).
• September 20 – Greece and Turkey sign a peace treaty to end the Greco-Turkish War.
• September 21 – Francis P. Church responds (anonymously) to a letter to the editor of The Sun (New York City) that is known as the famous "Yes, Virginia, there is a Santa Claus" letter.

October

• October 5 – After a long siege, Brazilian government troops take Canudos in north Brazil, crushing Antônio Conselheiro and his followers.
• October 6 – Ethiopia adopts the tricolor flag: green is for the land, yellow for gold, and red is symbolic of strength and the blood shed.
• October 12
• The Korean Empire is proclaimed, marking the end of the Joseon dynasty after just over 500 years.
• The city of Belo Horizonte, Brazil is created. The construction of the second Brazilian planned city is completed successfully; an immigration of 1,000,000 people is estimated.
• (Cruiser # 3, later CM-1) is recommissioned, since 1890, for several months of duty in the Hawaiian Islands.
• October 13 – , a pre-dreadnought battleship of the Royal Navy, is launched at Portsmouth, England; she will be deployed widely in World War I.
• October 23 – The Kappa Delta sorority is founded in Farmville, Virginia.

November

• November 1 – Juventus FC is founded as an association football club in Turin.
• November 25 – Spain grants Puerto Rico autonomy.

December

• December 9 – The first issue of the feminist newspaper La Fronde is published by Marguerite Durand in Paris.
• December 12
• The comic strip The Katzenjammer Kids debuts in the New York Journal.
• Belo Horizonte, the first planned city in Brazil, is incorporated.
• December 14 – Pact of Biak-na-Bato: The Philippine Revolution is settled, with Spanish promises to reform.
• December 28 – The play Cyrano de Bergerac, by Edmond Rostand, premieres in Paris.
• December 30 – Natal annexes Zululand.

Date unknown

• The first electric bicycle is invented.
• Karl Lueger becomes mayor of Vienna.
• Zhejiang University is founded in China.
• Émile Durkheim publishes his classic study Suicide.
• The pan-African anthem "Nkosi Sikelel' iAfrika" ("God Bless Africa") is composed as a Xhosa hymn by South African teacher Enoch Sontonga.
• Dos Equis beer is first brewed in Mexico, in anticipation of the new century. "Dos equis" is Spanish for "two x", a reference to the 20th Century (XX in Roman numerals)
• Alexander Scriabin publishes his Piano Sonata no. 2 "Sonata-Fantasia" in G sharp minor

Births

January–February

• January 3
• Marion Davies, American actress (d. 1961)
• Pola Negri, Polish-born American actress (d. 1987)
• January 6 – Ferenc Szálasi, 37th prime minister of Hungary (d. 1946)
• January 8 – Dennis Wheatley, English writer (d. 1977)
• January 11 – Georges Stuttler, French footballer (d. 1976)
• January 14 – Hasso von Manteuffel, German general, politician (d. 1978)
• January 23
• Subhas Chandra Bose, Indian political leader, led the Indian National Army (d. 1945?)
• Margarete Schütte-Lihotzky, Austrian architect, anti-Nazi activist (d. 2000)
• January 26 – Yakov Alksnis, Soviet aviator, commander of the Red Army Air Forces (d. 1938)
• January 28 – Ivan Stedeford, British industrialist (d. 1975)
• February 1 – Denise Robins, British romance novelist (d. 1985)
• February 4 – Ludwig Erhard, Chancellor of Germany (d. 1977)
• February 8 – Zakir Husain, Indian politician, 3rd President of India (d. 1969)
• February 9 – Charles Kingsford Smith, Australian aviator famous for his trans-Pacific flight (d. 1935)
• February 10
• Judith Anderson, Australian-born British actress (d. 1992)
• John Franklin Enders, American scientist, recipient of the Nobel Prize in Physiology or Medicine (d. 1985)
• February 19 – Elizabeth Rummel, German-Canadian mountaineer and environmental activist (d. 1980)
• February 21 – Celia Lovsky, Austrian-born American actress (d. 1979)
• February 25 – Peter Llewelyn Davies, British publisher, inspiration for Peter Pan (d. 1960)
• February 27
• Marian Anderson, African-American contralto (d. 1993)
• Ferdinand Heim, World War II German general (Scapegoat of Stalingrad) d. 1977)

March–April

• March 1 – Shoghi Effendi, Ottoman Guardian of the Bahá'í Faith (d. 1957)
• March 4 – Lefty O'Doul, American baseball player, restaurateur (d. 1969)
• March 5 – Set Persson, Swedish communist politician (d. 1960)
• March 11 – Henry Cowell, American avant-garde composer (d. 1965)
• March 16 – Flora Eldershaw, Australian novelist, critic, and historian (d. 1956)
• March 18 – John Langdon-Davies, British writer (d. 1971)
• March 19 – Betty Compson, American actress (d. 1974)
• March 24 – Wilhelm Reich, Austrian psychotherapist (d. 1957)
• March 28
• Frank Hawks, American aviator (d. 1938)
• Sepp Herberger, German football coach (d. 1977)
• March 31 – Oto Iskandar di Nata, Indonesian politician (d. 1945)
• April 7
• Erich Löwenhardt, German World War I fighter ace (d. 1918)
• Walter Winchell, American broadcast journalist (d. 1972)
• April 8 – Herbert Lumsden, British general (d. 1945)
• April 10 – Prafulla Chandra Sen, Indian politician and Chief Minister of West Bengal (d. 1990)
• April 13 – Werner Voss, German World War I fighter ace (d. 1917)
• April 17 – Thornton Wilder, American dramatist (d. 1975)
• April 19
• Jiroemon Kimura, Japanese supercentenarian, world's longest lived man, last surviving man born in the 19th century and last surviving person born in 1897 (d. 2013)
• Vivienne Segal, American actress (d. 1992)
• April 20 – Sudhakar Chaturvedi, Indian Vedic scholar and longevity claimant (d. 2020)
• April 21 – A. W. Tozer, American Protestant pastor (d. 1963)
• April 23 – Lester B. Pearson, 14th Prime Minister of Canada, recipient of the Nobel Peace Prize (d. 1972)
• April 24 – Manuel Ávila Camacho, Mexican general, politician, and 45th President of Mexico, 1940-1946 (d. 1955)
• April 25 – Mary, Princess Royal and Countess of Harewood, British princess (d. 1965)
• April 26
• Eddie Eagan, American boxer, bobsledder (d. 1967)
• Douglas Sirk, German film director (d. 1987)

May–June

• May 2 – John Frederick Coots, American songwriter (d. 1985)
• May 4 – Phelps Phelps, 38th Governor of American Samoa, United States Ambassador to the Dominican Republic (d. 1981)
• May 10 – Einar Gerhardsen, 15th prime minister of Norway (d. 1987)
• May 12 – Earle Nelson, American serial killer and rapist (d. 1928)
• May 14 – Sidney Bechet, American-born jazz saxophonist (d. 1959)
• May 17
• Laura Bromwell, American stunt pilot (d. 1921)
• Odd Hassel, Norwegian chemist, Nobel Prize laureate (d. 1981)
• May 18 – Frank Capra, American film producer, director and writer (d. 1991)
• May 19 – Frank Luke, American World War I pilot (d. 1918)
• May 27 – John Cockcroft, English physicist, Nobel Prize laureate (d. 1967)
• May 29 – Erich Wolfgang Korngold, Austrian composer (d. 1957)
• June 2 – Tan Malaka, Indonesian teacher, philosopher, founder of Struggle Union and Murba Party, guerilla and fighter (d. 1949)
• June 5 – Charles Hartshorne, American philosopher, theologian and ornithologist (d. 2000)
• June 7
• Kirill Meretskov, Soviet military officer, Marshal of the Soviet Union (d. 1968)
• George Szell, Hungarian conductor (d. 1970)
• June 8
• John G. Bennett, British mathematician (d. 1974)
• Mariano Suárez, 27th president of Ecuador (d. 1980)
• June 10 – Grand Duchess Tatiana Nikolaevna of Russia (d. 1918)
• June 11 – Ram Prasad Bismil, Indian revolutionary (H.R.A. founder) (d. 1927)
• June 12 – Anthony Eden, Prime Minister of the United Kingdom (d. 1977)
• June 13 – Paavo Nurmi, Finnish runner (d. 1973)
• June 16 – Georg Wittig, German chemist, Nobel Prize laureate (d. 1987)
• June 19
• Cyril N. Hinshelwood, English chemist, Nobel Prize laureate (d. 1967)
• Moe Howard, American comedian, actor (The Three Stooges) (d. 1975)
• June 22
• Norbert Elias, German sociologist (d. 1990)
• Edmund A. Chester, American broadcaster, journalist (d. 1973)
• June 24 – Daniel K. Ludwig, American businessman; billionaire philanthropist (d. 1992)
• June 26 – Viola Dana, American actress (d. 1987)

July–August

• July 1 – Bert Schneider, Canadian boxer (d. 1986)
• July 5 – Mogens Wöldike, Danish conductor (d. 1988)
• July 9 – Albert Coady Wedemeyer, American general (d. 1989)
• July 10 – John Gilbert, American actor (d. 1936)
• July 11 – Bull Connor, American civil rights opponent (d. 1973)
• July 14 – Plaek Phibunsongkhram, Thai field marshal, prime minister, and dictator (d. 1964)
• July 20 – Tadeusz Reichstein, Polish-born chemist, recipient of the Nobel Prize in Physiology or Medicine (d. 1996)
• July 24 – Amelia Earhart, American aviator (d. 1937)
• July 28 – James Fairbairn, Australian pastoralist, aviator, and politician (d. 1940)
• July 29 – Sir Neil Ritchie, British WWII general (d. 1983)
• August 4 – José Nucete Sardi, Venezuelan historian and diplomat (d. 1972)
• August 5 – Aksel Larsen, Danish politician (d. 1972)
• August 10 – Jack Haley, American actor (d. 1979)
• August 11 – Enid Blyton, British children's writer (d. 1968)
• August 15 – Jane Ingham, English botanist and scientific translator (d. 1982)
• August 16
• Carlo Del Prete, Italian aviator (d. 1928)
• Hersch Lauterpacht, Ukrainian-born international lawyer (d. 1960)
• August 22 – Elisabeth Bergner, Austrian actress (d. 1986)
• August 26 – Yun Posun, 2nd president of South Korea (d. 1990)
• August 31 – Fredric March, American actor (d. 1975)

September–October

• September 7 – Al Sherman, Russian-born American Tin Pan Alley songwriter (d. 1973)
• September 8 – Jimmie Rodgers, American singer (d. 1933)
• September 10 – Otto Strasser, German Nazi politician (d. 1974)
• September 12 – Irène Joliot-Curie, French physicist, recipient of the Nobel Prize in Chemistry (d. 1956)
• September 13 – Michel Saint-Denis, French-born actor, theatre director, drama theorist and radio broadcaster (d. 1971)
• September 15 – Kurt Daluege, German Nazi officer, war criminal (d. 1946)
• September 20 – Humberto de Alencar Castelo Branco, 26th President of Brazil (d. 1967)
• September 22 – Frank O'Connor, American actor, rancher, and painter (d. 1979)
• September 23 – Walter Pidgeon, Canadian actor (d. 1984)
• September 25 – William Faulkner, American writer, Nobel Prize laureate (d. 1962)
• September 26
• Pope Paul VI (d. 1978)
• Arthur Rhys-Davids, British World War I fighter ace (d. 1917)
• September 30 – Alfred Wintle, British army officer, eccentric (d. 1966)
• October 3 – Louis Aragon, French author (d. 1982)
• October 7 – Elijah Muhammad, African-American co-founder of the Nation of Islam (d. 1975)
• October 8 – Rouben Mamoulian, Armenian-American film, theatre director (d. 1987)
• October 15 – Johannes Sikkar, Estonian statesman (d. 1960)
• October 20 – Yi Un, Korean Crown Prince (d. 1970)
• October 28 – Edith Head, American costume designer (d. 1981)
• October 29 – Joseph Goebbels, German Nazi propagandist (d. 1945)
• October 30 – Agustín Lara, Mexican composer and interpreter of songs and boleros (d. 1970)

November–December

• November 4 – Dmitry Pavlov, Soviet general (d. 1941)
• November 9 – Ronald George Wreyford Norrish, British chemist, Nobel Prize laureate (d. 1978)
• November 12 – Milward Simpson, American politician, governor and senator from Wyoming (d. 1993)
• November 15
• Sir Sacheverell Sitwell, Bt, English author (d. 1988)
• Aneurin Bevan, Welsh politician (d. 1960)
• November 18 – Patrick Blackett, Baron Blackett, English physicist, Nobel Prize laureate (d. 1974)
• November 19 – Quentin Roosevelt, youngest son of American President Theodore Roosevelt, killed in action as fighter pilot (d. 1918)
• November 23 – Nirad C. Chaudhuri, Bengali author (d. 1999)
• November 24 – Lucky Luciano, Sicilian-American Mafia boss Salvatore Lucania (d. 1962)
• November 26 – Robert Accard, French footballer (d. 1971)
• November 30 – Virginia Henderson, American nurse theorist (d. 1996)
• December 2 – Dean Alfange, American politician (d. 1989)
• December 5 – Gershom Scholem, German-born Israeli Jewish philosopher, historian (d. 1982)
• December 9 – Hermione Gingold, English actress (d. 1987)
• December 14
• Kurt Schuschnigg, 11th Chancellor of Austria (d. 1977)
• Margaret Chase Smith, American politician, U.S. Senator from Maine ( d. 1995 )
• December 18 – Fletcher Henderson, American musician (d. 1952)
• December 24 – Lazare Ponticelli, Italian-French supercentenarian; last surviving officially recognized French veteran of the First World War (d. 2008)
• December 31 – Rhys Williams, Welsh actor (d. 1969)

Date unknown

• Abd-al Karim, Afghan emir (d. 1927)
• Nisar Muhammad Yousafzai, Afghan revolutionary and decorated War Hero of the Afghan War of Independence (d. 1937)

Deaths

January–June

• January 1 – Joseph S. Skerrett, American admiral (b. 1833)
• January 9 – Thomas Gwyn Elger, English astronomer (b. 1836)
• January 25 – Albion P. Howe, Union Army general (b. 1818)
• January 30 – Robert Themptander, 4th prime minister of Sweden (b. 1844)
• February 1 – Jeanne Merkus, Dutch deaconess, guerilla soldier and political activist (b. 1839)
• February 4 – Charles Bendire, U.S. Army captain, ornithologist (b. 1836)
• February 15 – Dimitrie Ghica, 10th prime minister of Romania (b. 1816)
• February 17 – Edmund Colhoun, American admiral (b. 1821)
• February 19 – Karl Weierstrass, German mathematician (b. 1815)
• March 6 – Sir Thomas Elder, Australian businessman and philanthropist (b. 1818)
• March 9 – Jamal ad-Din al-Afghani, Iranian teacher, writer (b. 1838)
• March 10 – Savitribai Phule, Indian social reformer and poet (b. 1831)
• March 11 – Henry Drummond, Scottish evangelical writer, lecturer (b. 1851)
• March 19 – Antoine Thomson d'Abbadie, Irish-born traveler (b. 1810)
• April 1 – Jandamarra, Australian Aboriginal insurrectionist (b. c. 1873)
• April 3 – Johannes Brahms, German composer (b. 1833)
• April 8 – Heinrich von Stephan, German postal director (b. 1831)
• April 10 – Friedrich Franz III, Grand Duke of Mecklenburg-Schwerin (b. 1851)
• April 30 – A. Viola Neblett, American activist, suffragist, women's rights pioneer (b. 1842)
• May 3 – Sir Frederick Knight, British politician (b. 1812)
• May 4 – Duchess Sophie Charlotte in Bavaria (b. 1847)
• May 7
• Ion Ghica, 3-time prime minister of Romania (b. 1816)
• Henri d'Orléans, Duke of Aumale (b. 1822)
• May 10 – Andrés Bonifacio, Filipino revolutionary (b. 1863)
• May 12 – Minna Canth, Finnish writer and social activist (b. 1844)
• May 21 – Gregorio Luperón, Dominican revolutionary leader (b. 1839)
• May 23 – Pusapati Ananda Gajapati Raju, Indian rajah (b. 1850)
• June 17 – Sebastian Kneipp, German priest and naturopath (b. 1821)
• June 19 – Louis Brière de l'Isle, French general (b. 1827)

July–December

• July 1 – Ropata Wahawaha, New Zealand Māori military leader (b. c.1820)
• July 6
• Tommy Burns, English diver (b. 1867 or 1868)
• Celia Barrios de Reyna, First Mother of the Nation of Guatemala (b. 1834)
• August 8
• Antonio Cánovas del Castillo, incumbent Prime Minister of Spain and historian (assassinated) (b. 1828)
• Viktor Meyer, German chemist (b. 1848)
• August 17 – Sir William Jervois, British military engineer and diplomat (b. 1821)
• August 24
• Sébastien Lespès, French admiral (b. 1828)
• Mutsu Munemitsu, Japanese statesman, diplomat (b. 1844)
• August 31 – Louisa Lane Drew, English-born American actress, theater manager (b. 1820)
• September 9
• Richard Holt Hutton, English writer, theologian (b. 1826)
• Ferenc Pulszky, Hungarian politician (b. 1814)
• September 20 – Louis Pierre Mouillard, French artist and aviation pioneer (b. 1834)
• September 21 – Wilhelm Wattenbach, German historian (b. 1819)
• September 27
• Charles-Denis Bourbaki, French military leader (b. 1816)
• George M. Robeson, American politician (b. 1829)
• September 30 – Saint Thérèse of Lisieux, French Roman Catholic and Discalced Carmelite nun, saint (b. 1873)
• October 2 – Edward Maitland, British writer (b. 1824)
• October 3 – Yamaji Motoharu, Japanese general (b. 1841)
• October 9
• John M. B. Clitz, American admiral (b. 1821)
• Jan Heemskerk, Dutch politician, 16th Prime Minister of the Netherlands (b. 1818)
• October 13 – William Daniel, American temperance movement leader (b. 1826)
• October 19 – George Pullman, American inventor and industrialist (b. 1831)
• October 26 – John J. Robison, American politician in Michigan (b. 1824)
• October 27
• Princess Mary Adelaide of Cambridge (b. 1833)
• , Chilean politician (b. 1847)
• Alexander Milton Ross, Canadian abolitionist, naturalist (b. 1832)
• October 28 – Hercules Robinson, 1st Baron Rosmead, British colonial governor (b. 1824)
• October 29 – Henry George, American economist (b. 1839)
• November – Francisco Gonzalo Marín, Cuban poet, freedom fighter (b. 1863)
• November 3 – Thomas Lanier Clingman, American "Prince of Politicians" (b. 1812)
• November 13 – Ernest Giles, Australian explorer (b. 1835)
• November 15 – Lucinda Barbour Helm, American women's religious activist (b. 1839)
• November 17 – George Hendric Houghton, American Protestant Episcopal clergyman (b. 1820)
• November 18 – Sir Henry Doulton, English pottery manufacturer (b. 1820)
• November 19 – William Seymour Tyler, American educator, historian (b. 1810)
• November 23 – Étienne Stéphane Tarnier, French obstetrician (b. 1828)
• December 14 – Robert Simpson, Scottish-Canadian businessman (b. 1834)
• December 16 – Alphonse Daudet, French writer (b. 1840)
• December 19 – Stanislas de Guaita, French poet (b. 1861)
• December 28 – William Corby, American Catholic priest (b. 1833)

Date unknown

• Isidora Goyenechea, Chilean industrialist, mine owner (b. 1836)

References

Further reading

• 1897 Annual Cyclopedia (1898) highly detailed coverage of "Political, Military, and Ecclesiastical Affairs; Public Documents; Biography, Statistics, Commerce, Finance, Literature, Science, Agriculture, and Mechanical Industry" for year 1897; massive compilation of facts and primary documents; worldwide coverage; 824 pp