About.com
http://history1800s.about.com/library/bltimelines.htm?pid=2765&cob=home
1850 Jan 27, Samuel Gompers (d.1924) was born in London. Gompers,
labor leader and first president of the American Federation of Labor (AFL),
apprenticed as a cigar maker in, London. At the age of 13, Gompers arrived
in America, joined the Cigarmakers' Union in 1864 and became the union's
president in 1877. In 1881 Gompers was among the founders of the Federation
of Organized Trades and Labor Unions of the U.S. and Canada, which was
reorganized as the American Federation of Labor in 1886. He served as president
of the AFL every year from its inception (except 1895) until his death.
As the acknowledged leader of America's labor movement, Gompers stressed
practical demands of hours and wages and opposed theorists and radicals.
(HN, 1/27/99)(HNQ, 2/24/00)
1850 Jan 29, Henry Clay introduced in the Senate a compromise
bill on slavery that included the admission of California into the Union
as a free state.
(AP, 1/29/98)
1850 Feb 18, The city of SF was incorporated. [see Apr 15]
(SFEC, 1/11/98, DB p.41)
1850 Mar 7, In a three-hour speech to the U.S. Senate, Daniel
Webster endorsed the Compromise of 1850 as a means of preserving the Union.
(AP, 3/7/98)
1850 Mar 16, Nathaniel Hawthorne's "The Scarlet Letter" was first
published.
(AP, 3/16/97)
1850 Mar 18, American Express was founded.
(HN, 3/18/98)
1850 Mar 27, A 22-pound gold nugget was found near the town of
Columbia, Tuolemne County, and the population swelled to 15,000. The party
of Thadeus Hildreth hit pay dirt.
(SFEC, 1/5/97, p.T5)(SFEC, 3/19/00, p.T6)
1850 Apr 4, The city of Los Angeles was incorporated.
(AP, 4/4/97)
1850 Apr 15, The city of San Francisco was incorporated.
(AP, 4/15/97)
1850 Apr 20, Daniel Chester French (d.1931), sculptor, was born.
He had his estate in Stockbridge, Mass. His work included the Lincoln Memorial
and the Minute Man. His Chesterwood estate became a museum with an annual
6-month summer season. [413-298-3579]
(HN, 4/20/98)(WSJ, 5/4/99, p.A20)
1850 Apr, During the debate on the Compromise of 1850, Senator
Henry Foote, a unionist and supporter of the compromise, drew a pistol
on Senator Thomas Hart Benton, an opponent of the deal. Other senators
intervened before Foote could fire.
(SFC, 7/25/98, p.A6)
1850 Summer, James Strang announced that he was divinely directed
to become a king arranged for his coronation at St. James on Big Beaver
Island in Lake Michigan.
(Smith., Aug. 1995, p.86)
1850 Jul 2, Prussia agreed to pull out of Schleswig and Holstein,
Germany.
(HN, 7/2/98)
1850 Jul 4, President Zachary Taylor stood hatless in the sun
for hours listening to long-winded speeches. He returned to the White House
and attempted to cool off by eating cherries, cucumbers and drinking iced
milk. Severe stomach cramps followed and it is likely that Taylor's own
physicians inadvertently killed him with a whole series of debilitating
treatments. [see Jul 9]
(HN, 7/11/99)
1850 Jul 9, The 12th president of the United States Zachary Taylor
(b.1784) died of cholera at the age of 55 after serving only 16 months.
He was succeeded by Millard Fillmore. Taylor was a Southerner, a slaveholder
and the hero of the Mexican War in 1848 when he was nominated by the Whig
Party as a candidate for president of the United States. He was an inoffensive
candidate in the anxious years leading up to the Civil War because he had
never taken a position on a political issue or even cast a vote in his
life. During his 16 months as president, Congress addressed the explosive
issue of slavery's expansion to the west with the Compromise of 1850, but
Taylor himself never had the opportunity to act on this issue.
(WUD,1994,p.1679)(SFC, 9/26/96, p.E10)(AP, 7/9/97)(HN, 7/9/98)(HN,
7/11/99)
1850 Jul 10, Millard Fillmore (Whig) was sworn in as the 13th
president following the death of Zachary Taylor.
(SFC, 2/21/97, p.A25) (AP, 7/10/97)(HN, 7/10/98)
1850 Jul 15, Mother Francis Xavier Cabrini, the first American
canonized saint, was born.
(HN, 7/15/98)
1850 Jul 20, John Graves Shedd, president of Marshall Field and
Company, first Chicago merchant to give his employees a half-day off on
Saturdays, was born.
(HN, 7/20/98)
1850 Jul 25, Gold was discovered in the Rogue River in Oregon,
extending the quest for gold up the Pacific coast.
(HN, 7/25/98)
1850 Aug 5, Guy de Maupassant, short story writer and author of
"The Necklace," was born.
(HN, 8/5/98)
1850 Aug 28, Richard Wagner's opera "Lohengrin'' was premiered
at Weimar, Germany, under the direction of Franz Liszt.
(WSJ, 3/16/98, p.A20)(RTH, 8/28/99)
1850 Sep 9, California was admitted as the 31st state of the US.
(INV, 7/95, p.12)(SFC, 6/13/96, p.A17)(SFC, 1/25/97, p.A17)(AP,
9/9/97)
1850 Sep 10, California, in the midst of a gold rush, entered
the Union as the 31st state. [see Sep 9]
(HN, 9/10/98)
1850 Sep 18, Congress passed the second Fugitive Slave Bill into
law (the first was enacted in 1793), allowed slaveowners to reclaim slaves
who had escaped to other states. Dedicated Massachusetts abolitionist Silas
Soule ironically gave his life for the red man, not the black.
(AP, 9/18/97)(HN, 9/18/98)
1850 Sep 20, The slave trade in Washington, D.C., was abolished
as a provision of Henry Clay's Compromise of 1850. Because each state had
its own slavery code when the District of Columbia was founded in 1800,
Washington had adopted Maryland's laws. Although the 1850 legislation made
the slave trade illegal, slavery itself was still legal. Nevertheless,
Washington became a haven for free blacks. By 1860, free blacks outnumbered
slaves almost four-to-one. President Abraham Lincoln put an end to Washington's
slavery altogether in 1862, freeing about 2,989 African Americans who were
then slaves according to the slavery code.
(HNPD, 9/20/98)(HN, 9/20/98)
1850 Sep 28, Flogging was abolished as a form of punishment in
the U.S. Navy.
(AP, 9/28/97)
1850 Sep 29, Mormon leader Brigham Young was named the first governor
of the Utah Territory.
(HN, 9/29/98)
1850 Nov 13, Robert Lewis Stevenson (d.1894), novelist who wrote,
among other books, "Treasure Island" and "The Strange Case of Dr. Jekyll
and Mr. Hyde," was born. Robert Louis Stevenson: Interviews and Recollections"
was ed. by R.C. Terry and published in 1996.
(Smith., 8/95, p.54)(SFC, 9/1/96, Par. p.12)(HN, 11/13/98)
1850 Donald Grant Mitchell wrote his best-selling novel "Reveries
of a Bachelor," under the pen name Ik Marvel.
(SFEM, 6/28/98, p.30)
1850 Books prior to this year were printed on alkaline paper and
tended to survive. Books printed after this date were on acidic paper and
began to crumble with age.
(SFEC, 1/18/98, Z1 p.8)
1850 A building census in Norfolk, Virginia indicated that there
were 10,000 18th and early 19th century structures. Of these only a handful
survive.
(Hem. 1/95, p. 69)
1850 Ivan Turgenev, Russian writer, produced his greatest
play: "A Month in the Country."
(WSJ, 4/26/95, p.A-14)
1850 Ferry commuting began on the SF Bay.
(SFC, 4/21/97, p.A11)
1850 Suisun City, Calif. was founded. Suisun means "West Wind"
in the language of the Patwan Indians who lived in this area.
(Hem., Nov.'95, p.91,95)
1850 The Allan Pinkerton Agency was founded. "We never sleep"
was their motto. The company's emblem-a wide open eye-inspired the term
"private eye. In 1999 the agency was sold to a Swedish company, Securitas
AB.
(HNQ, 8/7/98)(SFC, 2/23/99, p.C4)
1850 Nevada City, Ca., was named.
(SFC, 4/14/96, T-3)
1850 US President Millard Fillmore issued an executive order that
designated the southern point of the Marin Headlands a military reservation
later called Lime Point Military Reservation.
(The Park, Summer 1995)
1850 Pres. Fillmore signed and enforced the Fugitive Slave Act
that authorized the return of slaves seeking sanctuary back to their masters.
(SFC, 2/10/97, p.A1)
1850 Senator Henry Clay of Kentucky introduced the 8 provisions
of the Great Compromise Bill. The provisions of the Great Compromise bill
were reduced to 5 and passed one by one. They were in sum: 1) the admission
of California as a free state; 2) slavery in the territories of Utah and
New Mexico would be resolved by popular sovereignty; 3) slavery would be
ended in the District of Columbia; 4) the federal government would assume
a $10 million debt by Texas; 5) the federal government would be responsible
for the return of runaway slaves. W.F. Seward stated: "The unity of our
empire hangs on the decision of this day."
(SFC, 2/21/97, p.A25)
1850 Laws in California were passed that allowed the enslavement
of Indians.
(SFEC, 9/20/98, Z1 p.4)
1850 The Arapaho Indians issued a $5 bill.
(SFEC, 1/25/98, Z1 p.8)
1850 Erasmus Corning founded the New York Central Railroad. He
later built a banking network along its route that nurtured the growth
of new communities.
(WSJ, 5/8/95, p.A-14)
1850 Woodsmen marched west from New York clearing forests of white
pine, yellow birch, hemlock, maple, and oak.
(NOHY, Weiner, 3/90, p.51)
1850 Heinrich Schliemann, German businessman, moved to California
and made a fortune in banking.
(Nat. Hist., 4/96, p.45)
1850 In California Gregorio Briones, a soldier of the Spanish
and then Mexican army, claimed title to 13,320 acres of west Marin land.
(SFC, 5/26/97, p.A10)
1850 Brigham Young was appointed governor of the Utah territory.
(SFC, 4/9/96, A-7)
1850 The Ansonia Clock Co. was founded in Derby, Conn., by Anson
G. Phelps. After 2 fires and reorganizations the company moved to NY in
1880.
(SFC, 12/15/98, Z1 p.6)
1850 Folgers Coffee established itself on the Barbary Coast and
was the first major coffee company in SF.
(SFC, 6/28/97, p.D2)
1850 The US census showed a black population of 3,639,000 people
of whom 90% were born in America. The mulatto count was 406,000.
(SFC, 5/3/96, p.A-25)
1850 An estimated 50,000 Irish prostitutes worked in new York
City.
(WSJ, 3/17/97, p.A18)
1850 George Jones of London built a hexagonal ended instrument
using a diatonic German concertina fingering system to which he added another
row of accidental notes making the instrument chromatic. It became known
as the Anglo-chromatic or Anglo system concertina.
(BAAC, 8/96, p.6)
1850 Baking Powder was invented.
(SFC, 1/11/97, p.B7)
1850 James Harrison of Australia designed an ice-making machine.
(WSJ, 1/11/99, p.R14)
1850 Only 2% of the American population lived past 65.
(SFEM, 6/28/98, p.40)
1850 Honore de Balzac (b.1799), French novelist, died.
(WUD, 1994, p.115)
1850 John C. Calhoun died while a senator from South Carolina.
He was elected vice president under two presidents, John Quincy Adams in
1824 and Andrew Jackson in 1828.
(HNQ, 8/19/99)k
1850 Expeditions to the Arctic found evidence of the Franklin
Expedition. Three graves dug into the permafrost were discovered in 1850,
their headstones dated 1846. A written record was found in 1859, indicating
that Franklin died on June 11, 1847, and that Erebus and Terror were abandoned
in April 1848. The crews' deaths have been attributed to either scurvy
or lead poisoning originating from the solder on food tins. Both ships
and the remains of most of the 129 crewmen have never been found.
(HNQ, 6/11/98)
c1850 Rabbits were introduced to Australia and soon became pests.
[see 1856]
(Nat. Hist., 4/96, p.16)
1850 On the Orkney mainland Skara Brae was rediscovered by William
Watt, the laird of Skaill, after a fierce storm stripped the grass from
a high sand dune.
(SFEC, 3/23/97, p.T3)
1850 In Vienna F. Walther re-arranged the reeds of a 3-row diatonic
accordion to play a 46 note chromatic scale and created the chromatic button
accordion.
(BAAC, 8/96, p.6)
1850-1853 Millard Fillmore is the 13th President of the US.
(A&IP, ESM, p.96b, photo)
1850-1854 Of the 1200 murders in San Francisco in this period, only
one results in a legal execution.
(SFC, 11/15/95, p.B-1)
1850s In New York City the African-American community of Seneca
Village was razed to make way for Central Park. The village had 264 frame
houses, 3 churches, 2 cemeteries and a school.
(AM, May/Jun 97 p.62)
1850s The US Navy established its repair facility on Mare Island.
(SFEC, 2/9/97, p.W4)
1850s In California John C. Fremont occupied Fremont's Ranch in
Bear Valley, north of Mariposa, a Mexican land-grant of 44,000 acres. He
later became the state's first US Senator and the first Republican candidate
for president. He also became a Civil War general and a governor of the
Arizona territory. In 2000 David Roberts authored "A Newer World: Kit Carson,
John C. Fremont, and the Claiming of the American West.
(SFEC, 4/12/98, p.T6)(SFC, 6/5/98, p.A20)(SFC, 6/5/98, p.A20)(WSJ,
1/10/00, p.A24)
c1850s Mormon settlers began moving to Lana'i, Hawaii, with the idea
of establishing a "City of Joseph" under their leader William Gibson. Gibson
placed title to all the community land under his own name and even under
threat of excommunication refused to give up the deed.
(SFEM, 10/13/96, p.24)
1850s The political organization called the American Party, which
flourished in the 1850s, is better known as the Know-Nothing Party. Originally
a clandestine organization, members were instructed to say that they "know
nothing" when asked about the party, hence the name. Primarily, the party
was anti-immigrant and stood in opposition to whatever political power
immigrant groups happened to have in Northern cities. In 1854 the American
Party won significant elections in seven state governments. The party's
national platform in 1856 included anti-Catholic and anti-alien planks.
(HNQ, 8/27/98)
1850s John Augustus of Boston persuaded the courts to release
young offenders into his custody instead of sending them to prison. This
was the start of the practice of probation.
(SFEC, 11/21/99, Z1p.2)
1850s Elizabeth Ware Packard led successful struggles in 13 states
to obtain due process of law for women, who previously could be committed
to mental institutions simply on the word of their husbands.
(SFC, 3/25/98, p.A22)
1850s Publishers switched to cheaper paper based on wood pulp
instead of rags and linen. The new material contained an acid residue to
ate the wood fibers and destroyed books in as little as 30 years.
(WSJ, 7/10/97, p.A6)
1850s English inventor Alexander Parkes is credited with being
the first to make plastic in the 1850s. Parkes' plastic was a cellulosic
made by treating a mixture of cotton and nitric acid with camphor. In the
United States, John and Isaiah Hyatt developed a similar plastic in 1869
as a substitute for ivory in the manufacture of billiard balls, which they
called celluloid. The first completely synthetic plastic, Bakelite, was
invented in 1907 and produced in 1909 by Dr. Leo H. Baekeland. Parkes mixed
chloroform and castor oil to make the first plastic which he called Parkesine.
(HNQ, 5/8/98)(WSJ, 1/11/98, p.R18)
c1850s Staffordshire potters in England made many different Shakespeare
figurines.
(SFC, 9/4/96, z1 p.5)
1850s In France the Yonne Department had almost 99,000 acres of
grapevines for wine. Diseases such as oidium and phyloxera destroyed the
Chablis vines in the late 19th century.
(SFC, 7/16/97, Z1 p.4)
1850-1891 Sophia Kovalevsky, mathematician. In 1983 her biography by
Don H. Kennedy was published: "Little Sparrow: A Portrait of Sophia Kovalevsky."
(NH, 6/96, p.20)
1850-1898 Edward Bellamy, American author. His work included the utopian
novel "Looking Backward, 2000-1887," which forecast what America might
look like if people worked together for the common good.
(WSJ, 12/10/99, p.W17)
1850-1900 The Hawaii of this period is described in the 1997 novel "A
Map of Paradise" by Linda Ching Sledge.
(SFEC, 8/17/97, BR p.3)
1850-1910 This period is covered in the book Railroad Crossing: Californians
and the Railroad 1850-1910 by William Deverall.
(SFC, 7/8/96, p.D2)
1850-1910 Margaret Collier Graham, American writer: "People need joy
quite as much as clothing. Some of them need it far more."
(AP, 6/16/99)
1850-1919 Ella Wheeler Wilcox, American poet: "The only folks
who give us pain are those we love the best."
(AP, 6/5/98)
1850-1925 Emma Carleton, American journalist: "Reputation is a
bubble which a man bursts when he tries to blow it for himself."
(AP, 6/4/97)
1850-1933 Augustine Birrell, English author and statesman: "History
is a pageant and not a philosopher."
(AP, 9/10/97)
1850-1956 The Empire Mine in Grass Valley, Ca., produced over
5.8 million ounces of gold. It had 365 miles of tunnels and was later turned
into a 784-acre state park.
(SFEC, 4/12/98, p.T7)
1850-1990 The human population has tripled in this period.
(NOHY, 3/1990, p.52)
1851 Feb 15, Black abolitionists invaded a Boston courtroom to
rescue a fugitive slave.
(440 Int'l., 2/15/99)
1851 Mar 21, Emperor Tu Duc ordered that Christian priests be
put to death.
(HN, 3/21/99)
1851 Mar, The 58 men of the Mariposa Battalion under Major James
D. Savage were the first whites to enter Yosemite Valley. Their first view
of the valley was from the plateau later named Mount Beatitude. They expelled
Chief Tenaya and his band of Ahwahneechee Indians. Dr. Bunnell, a physician
in the battalion, named the valley Yosemite to honor the local Indians.
He did not realize that the word "yohemeti" meant "some of them are killers"
and was an insult against the valley people.
(SFEC, 5/18/97, Z1 p.4)(SFEC,12/28/97, Z1 p.1)
1851 Apr. 23, The first Canadian postage stamp was issued.
(CFA, '96, p.44)
1851 May 25, Jose Justo de Urquiza of Argentina led a rebellion
against his former ally, the absolute ruler Juan Manuel de Rosas.
(HN, 5/25/99)
1851 May, Freed slave and abolitionist Sojourner Truth attended
a national women's convention in Akron, Ohio, where the female delegates
were heckled by men in the audience who claimed that men were superior
to women. Frances Gage, president of the convention, recorded Sojourner
Truth's words that day. "Dat man ober dar say dat women needs to be helped
into carriages and lifted ober ditches, and to hab de best place everywhar.
Nobody eber helps me into carriages, or ober mud-puddles, or gibs me any
best place! And ain't I a woman! Look at me! Look at my arm! I have ploughed,
and planted and gathered into barns, and no man could head me! And ain't
I a woman? I could work as much and eat as much as a man--when I could
get it--and bear de lash as well! And ain't I a woman? I have borne thirteen
chilern, and seen 'em mos' all sold into slavery, and when I cried out
with my mother's grief, none but Jesus heard me! And ain't I a woman?"
Sojourner Truth's words, according to Gage, "turned the sneers and jeers
of an excited crowd into notes of respect and admiration."
(HN, 7/13/99)
1851 Jun 2, Maine became the first state to enact a law prohibiting
alcohol. By the Civil War 13 Northern states had bans on alcohol sales.
In 1998 Thomas R. Pegram authored "Battling Demon Rum," a history of anti-alcohol
movements in the US.
(AP, 6/2/97)(WSJ, 10/5/98, p.A28)
1851 Jun 5, Harriet Beecher Stow published the first installment
of Uncle Tom's Cabin in The National Era.
(HN, 6/5/99)
1851 Jun 21, Daniel Carter Beard, organized the first [US] boy
scout troop, was born.
(HN, 6/21/98)
1851 Aug 12, Isaac Singer was granted a patent on his sewing machine.
(AP, 8/12/97)
1851 Aug 22, The schooner America outraced the Aurora off the
English coast to win a trophy that became known as the America's Cup.
(AP, 8/22/97)
1851 Sep 13, Walter Reed (d.1902), U.S. Army doctor, was born.
In 1900 he went to Cuba and verified that yellow fever was caused by a
mosquito.
(HN, 9/13/98)(WSJ, 10/22/99, p.B1)
1851 Sep 18, The first edition of The New York Times was published.
(AP, 9/18/97)
1851 Nov 6, Charles Henry Dow, American financial journalist,
was born. He (with Edward D. Jones) inaugurated the 'Dow-Jones' averages.
(HN, 11/6/99)
1851 Nov 13, The London-to-Paris telegraph opened.
(HN, 11/13/98)
1851 Nov 14, Herman Melville's novel "Moby Dick" was first published
in the United States. In 1996 it was featured on The Learning Channel.
(V.D.-H.K.p.278)(WSJ, 9/5/96, p.A14)(AP, 11/14/97)
1851 Dec 10, Melvil Dewey, creator of the Dewey Decimal System,
was born.
(HN, 12/10/98)
1851 Dec 24, Fire devastated the Library of Congress in Washington,
D.C., destroying about 35,000 volumes.
(AP, 12/24/97)
1851 Dec 29, The first American Young Men's Christian Assn. was
organized, in Boston.
(AP, 12/29/97)
1851 Emanuel Gottlieb Leutze painted "Washington Crossing the
Delaware." It was later acquired by the NY Metropolitan Museum of Art.
(SFC, 9/30/97, p.A7)(WSJ, 4/9/99, p.W16)
1851 John Everett Millais began to paint his work "Ophelia," completed
in 1852.
(WSJ, 2/19/97, p.A15)
1851 Eugene Scribe, French playwright, wrote "When Ladies Battle"
(Bataille de Dames) with Ernest Legouve. Scribe is known for writing the
"well made play." The setting is Lyon, France in Oct. 1817.
(WSJ, 1/2/96, p. A-7)
1851 A lighthouse was built at Point Loma near San Diego, Ca.
(AAM, 3/96, p.46)
1851 Mormon pioneers founded San Bernadino in southern California.
(SFC, 4/9/96, A-7)
1851 Books Inc. first opened as an independent bookseller in San
Francisco.
(Hem., Nov.'95, p.134)
1851 The New-York Times was founded by Henry J. Raymond, Republican
Speaker of the NY State Assembly, and banker George Jones as a conservative
counterpoint to Horace Greeley's Tribune.
(SFEM, 1/16/00, p.17)
1851 La Vielle Russie was opened in Manhattan by the family of
Peter Schaffer and featured Russian antiquities.
(SFEM, 6/9/96, p.20)
1851 John Kiehl opened an apothecary at Third Ave. and 13th Street
in Manhattan to sell potions, lotions and remedies such as to cure baldness
and enhance virility. He also sold a get-rich essence called Money Drawing
Oil. In 1999 the firm did some $40 million in business with just freebies
and word of mouth advertising.
(F, 10/7/96, p.76)(WSJ, 12/29/99, p.B1)
1851 Abolitionist Sojourner Truth delivered her "Ain't I a Woman?"
speech at a women's right conference in Akron, Ohio.
(SFC, 3/30/97, Z1. p.6)
1851 President Fillmore sent the USS Michigan, the Navy's first
iron-hulled warship, to Beaver Island to arrest James Strang. Strang was
put on trial in Detroit and was declared innocent of all charges. Strang
then effectively detached his kingdom from the US but maintained voting
rights.
(Smith., Aug. 1995, p.88)
1851 The Fort Laramie Treaty was signed between the US government
and the Sioux Indians. The Sioux pledged not to harass the wagon trains
traveling the Oregon Trail in exchange for a $50,000 annuity. The treaty
did not last long.
(HT, 3/97, p.43)
1851 In Minnesota Chief Shakopee and the Dakota Indians were pressured
into selling 24 million acres for pennies an acre. Food and money from
the federal government was to be distributed to the Indians as part of
the treaty.
(WSJ, 2/5/98, p.A1,6)
1851 Photography had a major breakthrough with the development
of a new emulsion called collodion, which caused photosensitive salts to
adhere to a sheet of glass.
(Smith., 5/95, p.75)
1851 Fewer than 100,000 Indians remained in California.
(SFEC, 9/20/98, Z1 p.4)
1851 Rawlinson unlocked the Persian cuneiform script. The key
to unlocking these scripts was found in the names of great rulers.
(RFH-MDHP, p.193)
1851 Francisco Guerrero, Mexican official in Alta California,
was struck in the back of the head by a slingshot and died. His murder
was believed to have kept him from testifying in a murder trial.
(SFEC, 9/21/97, p.C7)
1851 By this year more than half the population of Great Britain
was living in towns, and country-house owners found it increasingly hard
to dominate politics or protect their own positions.
(NG, Nov. 1985, M. Girouard, p.689)
1851 Big Ben, the tower clock of the House of Parliament in London,
was designed by Edmund Beckett Denison. He was assisted by clockmaker Edward
John Dent and Sir George Airy, the royal astronomer. Originally the name
"Big Ben" referred only to the clock's huge bell.
(SFC, 9/30/98, Z1 p.3)
1851 The Great Exhibition in London was the first-ever World's
Fair. Some 6 million people came to see the new glass and iron Crystal
Palace.
(WSJ, 1/26/98, p.A16)
1851 In France Louis Napoleon staged a coup. Victor Hugo sought
refuge on the Channel island of Guernsey where he wrote "Les Miserables"
and other works.
(WSJ, 2/10/98, p.A16)
1851 In Hungary Vilmos Zsolnay founded a ceramics factory in Pecs
that became renowned for its colored tile.
(Hem., 6/98, p.128)
1851 Kate Chopin (d.1904), American writer, was born as Katherine
O'Flaherty: She wrote tales of love and passion that presented women testing
the boundaries of social convention. "There are some people who leave impressions
not so lasting as the imprint of an oar upon the water."
(AP, 3/11/99)(SFEC, 11/14/99, BR p.5)
1851-1920 Mrs. Humphrey Ward, an erudite antisufragist, wrote novels
on major issues of her day.
(WSJ, 11/15/96, p.A14)
1851-1962 In California the Benicia Arsenal was active. It was the 1st
ordnance supply depot in the West.
(SFEC, 8/29/99, p.A14)
1852 Jan 17, At the Sand River Convention, the British recognized
the independence of the Transvaal Board.
(HN, 1/17/99)
1852 Feb 16, Charles Taze Russell, founder of the Jehovah's Witnesses,
was born.
(HN, 2/16/98)
1852 Feb 26, Dr. John Harvey Kellogg was born.
(HNPD, 2/26/99)
1852 Mar 13, A familiar symbol of the United States, Uncle Sam,
made his debut as a cartoon character in the New York Lantern.
(AP, 3/13/97)
1852 Mar 20, Harriet Beecher Stowe's (1811-1896) "Uncle Tom's
Cabin" was published. It based on the theme that slavery is incompatible
with Christianity. [see June 5, 1851]
(Civilization, July-Aug, 1995, p. 14)(SFC, 3/30/97, Z1. p.6)(HN,
3/20/98)
1852 Apr 13, Frank W. Woolworth (d.1919), founder of the retail
chain of 5&10 cent stores, was born on a farm near Watertown New York.
(SFC,10/20/97, p.B2)(HN, 4/13/98)
1852 Apr 29, The first edition of Peter Mark Roget's Thesaurus
was published. He was a London physician of French-Swiss ancestry who began
to collect and organize English words to improve his public speaking.
(HN, 4/29/98)(WSJ, 9/3/98, p.B1)
1852 Jun 29, Statesman Henry Clay of Kentucky died. He was a master
politician in the era preceding the Civil War. Born in 1777, Clay was a
lawyer by trade. He began his lengthy political career in the Kentucky
legislature and made three unsuccessful bids as the Whig Party's presidential
candidate. By the time of his death, Clay had served his country as secretary
of state under John Quincy Adams, U.S. Senator and Speaker of the House
of Representatives. Clay was the chief architect of the Compromise of 1850,
a contribution that earned him the nickname "The Great Compromiser."
(HNPD, 6/29/99)
1852 Jul 27, George Foster Peabody, philanthropist and namesake
of the Peabody awards for excellence in broadcasting, was born.
(HN, 7/27/98)
1852 Nov 27, Ada Lovelace (b.1815), Lord Byron's daughter and
the inventor of computer language, was bled to death by physicians at age
36. She had helped Charles Babbage develop his "Analytical Engine," that
performed mathematical calculations through the use of punched cards.
(SFC, 1/22/98, p.D7)(SFC, 4/30/98, p.E1)
1852 Dec 24, The race between the B&O railroad and the C&O
Canal to reach the Ohio River, that began in 1828, ended with the railroad
victorious.
(SFEC, 4/25/99, p.T6)
1852 Dec 31, The richest year of the gold rush ended, with $81.3
million in gold produced.
(HN, 12/31/98)
1852 Eugene Delacroix painted "Desdemona Cursed by Her Father."
(WSJ, 9/24/98, p.A16)
1852 The first piano accordion appeared in Paris.
(BAAC, 8/96, p.6)
1852 Sam Brannan, San Francisco newspaperman, arrived in Calistoga,
Ca. and began plans for a health spa to rival the famed Saratoga Hot Springs
in New York State. [see 1848]
(Article on Calistoga by Sybil McCabe, 7/95)
1852 Seattle, USA, began as a sawmill.
(WSJ, 9/19/95, p.A-1)
1852 The Mission of the Holy Rosary in the town of Truchas was
built. It is the youngest and simplest of the 6 adobe missions scattered
along the western shoulder of the Sangre de Cristo mountains between Taos
and Santa Fe, New Mexico.
(SFC, 5/12/96, p.T-5)
1852 John Neumann, Catholic missionary, became the bishop of Philadelphia.
he was later made a saint.
(SFEC, 9/14/97, p.A18)
1852 The Mormons conceded for the first time that they practiced
polygamy, or "plural marriage."
(SFC, 4/9/96, A-7)
1852 Maria Vernet Worth, a Parisian shop clerk, became the 1st
professional model when her husband found that he sold more dresses when
she helped.
(SFEC, 2/6/00, Z1 p.2)
1852 In US Pres. elections Gen'l. Winfield Scott ran as a Whig
against Franklin Pierce. In 1852, the U.S. Congress passed a resolution
giving Scott the pay and rank of a lieutenant general. Scott, not Ulysses
S. Grant, was the first to hold this rank since George Washington.
(SFC, 10/22/96, p.E8)(HNQ, 3/16/99)
1852 The US Senate rejected treaties with 18 California tribes
that included some of the Yosemite band.
(SFEC, 5/18/97, Z1 p.4)
1852 California passed laws that allowed slave masters to reside
indefinitely.
(SFC, 7/18/98, p.A15)
1852 James Strang, king of Big Beaver Island, announced and won
election as a state representative in Michigan.
(Smith., Aug. 1995, p.88)
1852 Wells Fargo Bank was founded by Henry Wells and William Fargo.
Henry C. Wells founded Wells, Fargo & Co. with William C. Fargo in
San Francisco. It evolved into Wells Fargo Bank, headquartered in San Francisco
and now one of the largest financial institutions in the U.S.
(SFEC, 1/4/98, Z1p.4)(SFC, 6/9/98, p.A10)(HNQ, 11/20/98)
1852 Smith & Wesson founded its business in Springfield, Mass.
(WSJ, 9/12/97, p.A20)
1852 Tennessee Coal, Iron and Railroad Co. was formed as Sewanee
Mining Co.
(WSJ, 5/28/96, R45)
1852 Heinrich Schliemann, German businessman, moved from California
to Russia and made another fortune selling indigo and potassium nitrate
to the Russian army.
(Nat. Hist., 4/96, p.46)
1852 More than 20,000 Chinese immigrants arrived to the US. They
were fleeing floods, droughts, famines and revolutions.
(SFC, 7/8/96, p.D2)
1852 John Kennedy invented dog tags and tried without success
to sell them to the Union Army' but numerous soldiers bought them individually.
(SFC, 3/8/96, p.E3)
1852 The number of Chinese in California reached 25,000, about
one-tenth of the non-Indian population.
(SFEC, 9/20/98, Z1 p.4)
1852 There was heavy flooding on the Red River in North Dakota
and Manitoba.
(SFC, 5/3/97, p.A11)
1852 Daniel Webster, famed orator and senator from Massachusetts,
died. In 1997 Robert V. Remini wrote his biography: "Daniel Webster."
(WSJ, 9/30/97, p.A20)
1852 Mr. Formwalt, the first mayor of Atlanta, Georgia, was stabbed
to death by a ruffian.
(WSJ, 4/9/96, p.A-1)
1852 Chinese began Immigrating to the US in large numbers with
some 20,000 going to California. A foreign miner's tax was enacted in California
and enforced largely against the Chinese. Other states passed similar taxes.
(SFEC, 2/6/00, Rp.10)
1852 In England the Victoria and Albert Museum was founded by
Henry Cole as the South Kensington Museum and later named after Queen Victoria
and Prince Albert. It was the first museum to collect and exhibit photography.
Charles Thurston Thompson was the first "superintendent of photography."
(WSJ, 11/4/97, p.A20)(WSJ, 3/24/98, p.A20)
1852 In Dublin John Henry Newman delivered a series of lectures
that were meant to establish the principles of the new Catholic University
of which he was the first rector. The collected work was published in 1996
by Yale Univ. Press as "The Idea of a University. "
(WSJ, 9/16/96, p.A14)
1852 Louis Napoleon, the little nephew of Napoleon Bonaparte,
established the Second Empire in France and called himself Napoleon III.
He married the Spanish beauty Eugenie and ran a semi-liberal autocracy
for 18 years. In a review of Paris Babylon by Rupert Christiansen.
(WSJ, 3/14/95, P.A-16)
1852 In France Louis Braille died of tuberculosis at age 43. He
was blinded by an accident and spent years developing a system to read
by touch. In 1997 Russell Freedman wrote "Out of Darkness: The Story of
Louis Braille."
(SFEC, 7/6/97, BR p.10)
1852 In Iran Baha' Allah, founder of the Baha'i Faith, became
aware of his mission as a messenger of God while in the notorious Teheran
prison known as the Black Pit for involvement in the unsuccessful attempt
in 1852 on the life the shah of Persia, Naser od-Din. Released and exiled
to Baghdad in 1853, Baha' Allah revived the Babi faith that had sprung
from Shi'ah Islam in the 1840s. He went on to found the Baha'i movement
that subsequently spread throughout the world.
(HNQ, 4/6/99)
1852 In Poland Ignacy Lukasiewicz, a druggist, found oil seeping
from the ground and in an attempt to make vodka distilled it to produce
the first kerosene.
(SFEC, 8/3/97, Z1 p.2)
1852-1870 In France Napoleon III, Louis Napoleon Bonaparte, the nephew
of Napoleon Bonaparte I, served as emperor.
(WUD, 1994, p.950)
1852-1892 The Salt Lake Temple on Temple Square in Salt lake City was
constructed over this period.
(THM, 4/27/97, p.N2)
1852-1911 Edwin Austin Abbey, American illustrator and muralist.
(AHD, 1971, p.2)
1853-1929 Lillie Langtry, English actress: "The sentimentalist ages
far more quickly than the person who loves his work and enjoys new challenges."
(AP, 7/27/98)
1852-1929 James Brander Matthews, American author and educator:
"A highbrow is a person educated beyond his intelligence."
(AP, 4/8/97)
1852-1932 Grace King, American author: "Patience! Patience! Patience
is the invention of dullards and sluggards. In a well-regulated world there
should be no need of such a thing as patience."
(AP, 6/1/97)
1852-1933 Henry van Dyke, American clergyman: "Self is the only
prison that can ever bind the soul."
(AP, 11/26/97)
1852-1935 Paul Bourget, French author: "We had better live as we think,
otherwise we shall end up by thinking as we have lived."
(AP, 2/11/00)
1853 Jan 19, Verdi's opera "Il Trovatore" premiered in Rome.
(AP, 1/19/98)
1853 Jan 28, Cuban revolutionary Jose Marti was born in Havana.
(AP, 1/28/98)
1853 Mar 2, The Territory of Washington was organized.
(HN, 3/2/99)
1853 Mar 6, Verdi's opera "La Traviata" premiered in Venice, Italy.
(AP, 3/6/98)
1853 Mar 8, The first bronze statue of Andrew Jackson was unveiled
in Washington, D.C.
(HN, 3/8/98)
1853 Mar 30, Vincent Van Gogh (d.1890), Dutch artist, was born.
His work included "The Drawbridge and Sunflowers in a Vase," and "Harvest
in Prevance," which was done both in oil and as a watercolor. The watercolor
sold in 1997 for $14.7 mil. He produced an estimated 900 paintings and
1200 drawings but sold virtually none of them. In 1997 it was reported
that more than 100 of his paintings and drawings might be fakes. 300 of
his canvasses were painted in the last 15 months of his life.
(AAP,1964)(WUD,1994, p.606)(SFC, 6/26/97, p.A21)(SFC, 7/5/97,
p.A8)(SFEC, 1/4/98, Z1p.8)(HN, 3/30/98)
1853 Apr 1, Cincinnati became the first U.S. city to pay its firefighters
a regular salary.
(AP, 4/1/98)
1853 Apr 18, The first train in Asia began running from Bombay
to Tanna.
(HN, 4/18/98)
1853 May 14, Gail Borden applied for a patent for condensed milk.
(HN, 5/14/98)
1853 Jul 8, An expedition led by Commodore Matthew Perry arrived
in Yedo Bay, Japan, on a mission to seek diplomatic and trade relations
with the Japanese. He forced Japan to open its ports with his big gunboats,
the Black Ships.
(AP, 7/8/97)(SFEC, 1/25/98, Z1 p.2)
1853 Jul 14, Commodore Matthew Perry relayed to Japanese officials
a letter from former President Fillmore, requesting trade relations.
(AP, 7/14/97)
1853 Jul, Ships of Commodore Perry anchored in Tokyo Bay. Commodore
Perry arrived at Uraga, Japan.
(SFEC, 2/9/97, p.W4)(Jap. Enc., BLDM, p. 215)
1853 Sep 14, The Allies landed at Eupatoria on the west coast
of Crimea.
(HN, 9/14/98)
1853 Sep 20, The Allies defeated the Russians at the battle of
Alma on the Crimean Peninsula.
(HN, 9/20/98)
1853 Sep 30, Johannes Brahms meets Robert and Clara Shumann. In
this year Brahms composes his Sonata in C major and his famous Liebestreu.
In this year Brahms also meets Joseph Joachim, Konzertmeister of the King
of Hanover, while traveling with the Hungarian violinist, Eduard Remenyi.
(BLW, Geiringer, 1963 ed., p.36 )
1853 Nov 26, Bat Masterson was born in Henryville, Quebec.
(SFC, 8/2/97, p.E3)
1853 Nov 28, Olympia was established as capital of the Washington
Territory.
(DT Internet 11/28/97)
1853 Dec 30, The United States bought some 45,000 square miles
of land from Mexico in a deal known as the Gadsden Purchase. It included
parts of Arizona and New Mexico (29,640 sq. miles) south of the Gila River.
The purchase was ratified by Congress on April 25, 1854.
(AWAM, Dec. 94, p.31)(HFA, '96, p.28)(AHD, p.537)(AP, 12/30/97)
1853 Jean Ingres painted his portrait: "Princesse Albert de Broglie."
(WSJ, 5/28/99, p.W12)
1853 Rembrandt Peale painted a portrait of Martha Washington based
on a 1795 portrait done by his father, Charles Vincent Peale.
(SFEC, 7/27/97, DB p.35)
1853 Solomon Northrup and Henry W. Derbu authored "Twelve Years
a Slave, Narrative of Solomon Northrup, a Citizen of New York, Kidnapped
in Washington in 1841, and Rescued in 1853 from a Cotton Plantation Near
the Red River in Louisiana."
(ON, 11/99, p.7)
1853 In California a Morse telegraph was station was erected on
the SF hill now known as Telegraph Hill.
(HT, 5/97, p.12)
1853 Silas Coombs, lumberman from Maine, moved to the Mendocino
coast of California and lived at what is now the Little River Inn.
(SFEC, 4/13/97, p.T9)
1853 In Boston Sarah Parker Remond was thrown out of theater for
refusing to be seated in an area reserved for blacks. She fell and filed
suit and was awarded monetary. The theater was desegregated.
(SFEC, 4/5/98, BR p.5)
1853 Heinrich Steinweg founded his piano dynasty three years after
arriving to the US from Germany. His story is told in "The Steinway Saga:
An American Dynasty" by D.W. Fostle. He later designed a piano with a heavier
internal mechanism that needed to be balanced by fatter keys and thus set
the standard 48-inch wide keyboard.
(WSJ, 6/2/95, p.A-9)(WSJ, 11/4/97, p.A1)
c1853 Senator William Gwin, a leader of pro-slavery interests
in California, proposed to divide California to create a pro-slavery southern
half. He was opposed by David C. Broderick.
(SFEC, 3/1/98, p.W26)
1853 The US government fortified the 22-acre island of Alcatraz
to protect SF from attack.
(SFEC, 3/8/98, p.W38)
1853 James Strang, king of Big Beaver Island, declared that his
female subjects should dress in loose, knee-length smocks worn over modest
pantaloons similar to those popularized by Amelia Bloomer, an earlier new
York feminist.
(Smith., Aug. 1995, p.90)
1853 Levi Strauss and Co. got its start peddling tough pants to
California gold miners. The first pair sold for $13.50 a dozen.
(SFC, 1/23/96, p.C4)(SFC, 1/9/99, p.D3)
1853 The New Haven Clock Co. was founded. It made inexpensive
brass movements until it bought a clock manufacturing company in 1856.
In 1946 it changed its name to the New haven Clock and Watch Co., and went
out of business in 1959.
(SFC, 3/19/97, z1 p.3)
1853 The hypodermic needle was invented for morphine injection.
It was believed that addiction would be prevented if the digestive system
was bypassed.
(SFEC, 11/10/96, zone 1 p.2)
1853 Karl Gerhardt discovered aspirin.
(SFEC,11/2/97, Z1 p.6)
1853 The low pressure steam engine was developed and reduced the
low frequency noise of the single-cylinder steam engines on riverboats,
which could be heard for miles.
(SFEC, 1/23/00, Z1 p.2)
1853 Elisha Graves Otis invented the safety elevator. It was initially
powered by steam.
(HT, 5/97, p.23)
1853 Austen Layard published his paper on Assyrian-Egyptian Cross-Dating.
By using seal-impressions of rulers occurring on the same piece of clay,
he was able to assign a date to the Assyrian dynasty because the Egyptian
ruler's reign was firmly dated.
(RFH-MDHP, 1969, p.59)
1853 In California the freighter Tennessee was wrecked off the
Marin headlands. The event spurred Congress to fund a lighthouse at Point
Bonita.
(WSJ, 9/17/96, p.A12)(G, Winter 96/97, p.3)
1853 Off the California coast the ship Carrier Pigeon, a merchant
sailing vessel, was wrecked on its way from Boston to SF. The wreck prompted
the erection of the Pigeon Point lighthouse in San Mateo Ct.
(SFEC, 5/25/97, p.T3)(SFEC,11/16/97, p.B8)
1853 Chief Tenaya of the Yosemite Ahwahneechee was killed by a
Paiute chief near Mono Lake.
(SFEC, 5/18/97, Z1 p.4)
1853 Napoleon III assigned Georges Haussmann to modernize Paris.
For the next 17 years Haussmann, as prefect of the Seine, transformed Paris.
He is responsible for the tree lined grand boulevards, the Bois de Boulogne,
several railroad stations, the aqueducts, and a tourist friendly sewer
system. Haussmann employed one Parisian in five and financed his projects
using private capital raised with bonds. The project forced some 200,000
residents from their homes. He used surpluses in his operational budget
to cover deficits in his capital budgets. The debts paralyzed the city
until the Gaullist era.
(WSJ, 1/17/1995, p.A-16)(SFEC, 6/28/98, p.T9)(WSJ, 12/9/98, p.A20)
1853 French wines were first ranked at the order of Napoleon.
The top grades were selected on the basis of price, not taste.
(SFEC, 2/1/98, p.T4)
1853 Steam locomotives were introduced on railways in India.
(NG, 5/95, p.140)
1853 In Mexico Benito Juarez, patriot and reformer, was locked
up for 11 days in the dungeon of the fortress of San Juan de Ulua in Veracruz.
(SFEC, 5/17/98, p.T12)
1853 In the Ottoman Empire the Sultan moved from Topkapi to Dolmabahce
Palace in Constantinople.
(Sky, 4/97, p.58)
1853-1857 Franklin Pierce is the 14th President of the US.
(A&IP, ESM, p.96b, photo)
1853-1864 The Taiping army Of Hong Xiuquan took the city of Nanjing
as its heavenly capital in the Taiping Rebellion. He claimed to be Jesus'
brother and ruled there until 1864. Imperial troops crushed his movement
and tens of millions died.
(WSJ, 1/5/96, p.A-8)(WSJ, 4/26/99, p.A6)
1853-1890 Theo Van Gogh, the younger brother of Vincent Van Gogh. Theo's
widow, Johanna Van Gogh-Bonger, inherited the paintings of Vincent that
had been in Theo's hands.
(SFC, 1/18/99, p.B2)
1853-1902 Cecil Rhodes, imperialist. He discovered a vast lode of diamonds
at Kimberley and founded the De Beers Mining Co. He ran for Cape parliament
in 1881 and was prime minister of the Cape Colony from 1890-1896. He founded
Rhodesia (later Zimbabwe) for mineral speculation and endowed the Rhodes
scholarships upon his death with £3 million.
(WSJ, 1/11/98, p.R18)
1853-1927 Hudson Maxim, brother of Hiram, invented high quality smokeless
powders used in cannon projectiles and torpedoes.
(V.D.-H.K.p.268)
1853-1927 Joao Capistrano de Abreu, Brazilian historian. He later wrote
"Chapters of Brazil Colonial History, 1500-1800," first published in 1907.
The Oxford Library of Latin America published a new edition in 1998.
(WSJ, 2/3/98, p.A20)
1854 Feb 23, Great Britain officially recognized the independence
of the Orange Free State.
(HN, 2/23/99)
1854 Feb 28, Some 50 slavery opponents met in Ripon, Wis., to
call for creation of a new political group, which became the Republican
Party.
(AP, 2/28/00)
1854 Mar 8, U.S. Commodore Matthew C. Perry made his second landing
in Japan. Within a month, he concluded a treaty with the Japanese.
(AP, 3/8/98)
1854 Mar 14, Thomas Riley Marshall, 28th U.S. Vice President,
was born.
(HN, 3/14/98)
1854 Mar 15, Emil von Behring, first recipient of the Nobel Prize
for medicine in 1901, was born.
(HN, 3/15/99)
1854 Mar 28, During the Crimean War, Britain and France declared
war on Russia.
(AP, 3/28/97)
1854 Mar 31, Sir Dugald Clerk, inventor of the two-stroke motorcycle
engine, was born.
(HN, 3/31/98)
1854 Apr 16, San Salvador was destroyed by an earthquake.
(HN, 4/16/98)
1854 Apr 25, Congress ratifies the Gadsden Purchase. [see 1853,
Gadsden]
(HFA, '96, p.28)
1854 May 30, The territories of Nebraska and Kansas were established.
The Kansas-Nebraska Act repealed the Missouri Compromise and opened the
north to slavery. This period of Kansas history was incorporated into the
1998 novel "The All-True Travels and Adventures of Lidie Newton," by Jane
Smiley.
(AP, 5/30/97)(HN, 5/30/98)
1854 May 30, Vermont native Elisha Graves Otis unveiled his invention,
the safety elevator at the New York World's Fair. Audiences gasped as Otis,
riding on the hoist's platform, dramatically ordered the lifting rope cut.
Instead of falling, the car locked safely into the elevator shaft. Prior
to the 1850s there was no existing market for passenger elevators because
there was no safety mechanism in the event of a cable break. Otis, born
in 1811, was a master mechanic working at a bedstead factory in Yonkers,
N.Y., when he built a hoisting machine with two sets of metal teeth at
the car's sides. If the lifting rope broke, the teeth would lock into place,
preventing the car from falling. Otis, who died in 1865, never realized
the potential of his invention. His sons built the Otis Elevator Company,
enabling the skylines of cities throughout the world to be transformed
with skyscrapers.
(HNPD, 5/30/99)
1854 Jun 10, The U.S. Naval Academy in Annapolis, Maryland, held
its first graduation.
(HN, 6/10/98)
1854 Jun 17, The Red Turban revolt broke out in Guangdong,
.
(HN, 6/17/98)
1854 Jun 21, The first Victoria Cross was awarded to Charles Lucas,
an Irishman and mate aboard the HMS Hecla for conspicuous gallantry at
Bomarsrund in the Baltic. The medal was made from metal from a cannon captured
at Sebastopol.
(Camelot, 6/21/99)
1854 Jul 6, The Republican Party was officially organized in Jackson,
Michigan.
(HN, 7/6/98)
1854 Jul 12, George Eastman, inventor of the Kodak camera, was
born in Waterville, N.Y.
(AP, 7/12/99)
1854 Aug 9, Henry David Thoreau published "Walden," in which he
described his experiences while living near Walden Pond on Cape Cod in
Massachusetts.
(Hem, Dec. 94, p.44)(AP, 8/9/97)
1854 Sep 27, The first great disaster involving an ocean liner
in the Atlantic occurred when the steamship Arctic sank with 300 people
aboard.
(AP, 9/27/97)
1854 Oct 16, Oscar Wilde (d.1900), dramatist, poet, novelist and
critic, was born. "Anybody can make history. Only a great man can write
it." [see 1856-1900]
(HN, 10/16/98)(AP, 2/16/99)
1854 Oct 17, James Simpson, a Baltimore inventor, received a patent
for a multiwalled ice pitcher.
(SFC, 12/30/98, Z1 p.2)
1854 Oct 25, During the Crimean War, a brigade of British light
infantry was destroyed by Russian artillery as they charged down a narrow
corridor in full view of the Russians. The Crimean War is largely remembered
for the Charge of the Light Brigade, a hopeless but gallant British cavalry
charge against a heavily defended Russian force. The battle began when
the Russians attacked the British-French supply depot at Balaclava near
Chersonesos, some eight miles from Sevastopol, on the Black Sea Crimean
Peninsula. Taken by surprise, the British counterattacked but failed to
follow up. Through a staff error, Gen. Lord Cardigan's Light Brigade of
673 horsemen was ordered to charge the Russian position through a mile-long
valley and prevent them from carrying away some captured cannon. The Light
Brigade advanced up the valley, taking casualties all the way, and reached
the guns. But once there, they could not hold their position and were forced
to retreat. Of the 673 men who took part in the senseless charge, only
195 were present at roll call that night. The Charge of the Light Brigade
ended the battle, but Balaclava remained in the hands of the British-French
Allies. The event was described in a poem by Tennyson.
(SFC,12/190/97, p.F6)(AP, 10/25/97)(HNPD, 10/25/98)(HN, 10/25/98)
1854 Nov 4, Florence Nightingale (d.1910) and 38 nurses arrived
at the Barrack Hospital in Scutari following the outbreak of the Crimean
War. She was appointed to oversee female nurses to be dispatched to military
hospitals in Turkey to help with increasing casualties. She had been trained
as a nurse--against the belief that nursing was not a suitable profession
for women--before serving as Superintendent of the Establishment for Gentlewomen
during Illness in London in 1853. At Scutari, soldiers appreciated her
kindness and devotion as a nurse. Among other things, she later became
known for her ideas about hospital reform and for creating reading rooms
in hospitals. In 1907, she was the first woman to be awarded the Order
of Merit. She died at the age of 90, at home in London. In 1951 Cecil Woodham-Smith
authored "Florence Nightingale."
(HNPD, 11/4/98)(HN, 11/4/98)(ON, SC, p.12)
1854 Nov 5, The British and French defeated the Russians at Inkerman,
Crimea.
(HN, 11/5/98)
1854 Nov 6, The king of American march music, John Philip Sousa,
was born in Washington, D.C. He later wrote 5 novels
(AP, 11/6/97)(SFEC, 2/8/98, Z1 p.8)
1854 Dec 8, Pope Pius IX proclaimed the dogma of the Immaculate
Conception. In an encyclical he stated that: "The Blessed Virgin Mary was,
from the first moment of her conception, by a singular grace and privilege
of almighty God... Preserved immune from all stain of original sin. Ineffabilis
Deus."
(AP, 12/8/97)(PTA, 1980, p.510)(WSJ, 6/3/99, p.A27)
1854 Dec 9, Alfred, Lord Tennyson's poem, "The Charge of
the Light Brigade," was published in England.
(AP, 12/9/97)
1854 Eugene Delacroix painted "Arabs Stalking a Lion."
(WSJ, 9/24/98, p.A16)
1854 A lighthouse, the first on the West Coast, was completed
on Alcatraz.
(SFEC, 3/8/98, p.W38)
1854 The Detroit Observatory, the second oldest building of the
Univ. of Michigan was initiated by Henry P. Tappan, first pres. of the
U of M.
(LSA, Spring 1995, p.39)
1854 Dr. George W. L. Bickley, a Virginian who had moved to Ohio,
organized the first "castle," or local branch, of the Knights of the Golden
Circle in Cincinnati and soon took the order to the South, where it was
enthusiastically received. Its principal object was to provide a force
to colonize the northern part of Mexico and thus extend proslavery interests,
and the Knights became especially active in Texas. The Knights of the Golden
Circle was a secret society organized in the 1850s in the American Midwest
that promoted the extension of slavery. During the American Civil War the
society sympathized with the Confederacy, encouraged desertion in the Union
Army, resisted enlistment and interfered with the draft. At its peak there
were some 200,000 members. It changed its name to the Order of American
Knights in 1863 and in 1864 to the Sons of Liberty. Northern authorities
arrested many members in 1864 and sentenced to death three of its leaders.
The death sentences were later suspended, the leaders ordered released
in 1866 by the Supreme Court.
http://www.dev.infoplease.com/ce5/CE028675.html
(HNQ, 8/2/99)
1854 The Royal and Ancient Club of the Old Course at St. Andrews
was established. It oversaw the rules of the game of golf which was played
as early as ~1473.
(SFC, 6/25/95, p.T-9)
1854 The New England Emigrant Aid Society was created to colonize
Kansas with Northern abolitionists. The Massachusetts Emigrant Aid Society,
founded by Eli Thayer of Worcester, Massachusetts, promoted the settlement
of anti-slavery groups in Kansas, with the ultimate objective of making
it a free state. Adhering to the cause of "popular sovereignty," the organization-which
was reincorporated in February, 1855 as the New England Emigrant Aid Company-founded
the town of Lawrence and other Free State communities. Active into 1857,
it helped settle some 2,000 people in Kansas.
(WSJ, 3/27/98, p.W10)(HNQ, 10/5/99)
1854 The Republican Party was formed in Ripon, Wisconsin, by a
group of anti-slavery politicians at the Little White Schoolhouse.
(Hem., 7/96, p.28)
1854 The California Legislature defined a public grave-yard as
a place where the bodies of six or more persons are buried.
(WSJ, 12/16/98, p.CA1)
1854 Yosemite Valley was granted to California as a public trust.
(SFEC, 5/18/97, Z1 p.4)
1854 Ulysses S. Grant was stationed at Fort Humboldt in northern
California.
(SFEC, 4/13/97, p.T5)
1854 The US Navy bought Mare Island near Vallejo, Ca., for $83,491.
Commander David Farragut was the first skipper. He later became the Navy's
first admiral.
(SFC, 5/7/97, p.A15)
1854 Washington State became a US territory.
(HT, 3/97, p.8)
1854 Keshena Falls, Wisconsin. The Menominee (people of the wild
rice) Chiefs Oshkosh and Keshena met with federal Indian agents and agree
to retain only 275,000 acres from their original nine and a half million
acres. As part of the settlement the chiefs and their followers were promised
eternal government protection. In 1954 Congress voted to withdraw that
support.
(NG, Aug., 1974, p.235)
1854 The Bradley & Hubbard Manufacturing Co. was founded in
Meriden, Conn. The company made clocks, tables, frames, irons, chandeliers
and other metal objects. Their lamps are prized by collectors.
(SFC, 8/6/97, Z1 p.6)
1854 Stephen Hedges of NYC patented his convertible chair, a half
round table hinged to a half round chair.
(SFC, 7/8/98, Z1 p.3)
1854 Phillip Morris began making cigarettes in London.
(SFC, 9/27/97, p.E3)
1854 Bernard Riemann conjectured that the universe as a whole
might be non-Euclidean in nature, curving into a "hypersphere"...
(WSJ, 2/17/95, p.A-10)
1854 Archeologist G.B. de Rossi, while excavating the Christian
catacombs in Rome discovered a marble-pillared chamber filled with rubble
and fragments of inscriptions suggesting the burial of several early Popes.
(ITV, 1/96, p.60)
1854 Elisabeth of Bavaria (16) married the Habsburg Emp. Franz
Josef II (23).
(WSJ, 12/8/97, p.A13)
1854 In England the Crystal Palace, a glass and steel structure
built for the Great Exhibition of 1851 was moved to the park at Sydenham,
south London. The grounds at the suggestion of Prince Albert were landscaped
with statues of extinct animals by the sculptor Water-house Hawkins.
(T.E.-J.B. p.20)
1854 Japan signed the Treaty of Kanagawa with the US.
(Jap. Enc., BLDM, p. 215)
c1854-1856 George Robinson Fardon (1807-1886), British photographer,
took pictures of SF for his "San Francisco Album 1854-1856," believed to
be the first camera survey of an American city.
(SFC, 6/19/99, p.B3)
1854-1860 The six golden years of French photographer Felix Nadar, representing
the best of his portrait photography.
(Smith., 5/95, p.72)
1854-1912 Jules Henri Poincare, French mathematician and physicist,
investigated the idea of space and led to the notion that space is too
complex for mathematics. Rather space is an assumption, and it can be described
and controlled only so far as we assume it. In other words there is no
such thing as space. Instead, there are as many spaces as there are people...
for every person can assume an indefinite number of different spaces...
(V.D.-H.K.p.272)
1854-1923 Bourke Cockran, American politician and orator: "You
simply cannot hang a millionaire in America."
(AP, 11/18/97)
1854-1928 Leos Janacek, Czech composer. His work included the opera
"Makropulos" (1926), The Dostoevsky based "From the House of the Dead"
and "Katya Kabanova."
(WSJ, 1/3/96, p.A-7)(WSJ, 8/20/96, p.A8)(WUD, 1994, p.763)(SFC,
1/27/97, p.A20)(WSJ, 6/03/97, p.A20)
1854-1932 George Eastman, American inventor, industrialist, and philanthropist.
(AHD, 1971, p.411)
1854-1937 Frances Brundage, artist and illustrator. She did paintings
of Victorian children and illustrated over 240 books along with calendars,
postcards, cloth dolls and prints.
(SFC, 8/4/99, Z1 p.5)