1897

1897 was a common year starting on Friday (see link for calendar).

Events

• January 1 – Brooklyn, New York merges with New York City.
• January 4 – A British force is ambushed by Chief Ologbosheri, son-in-law of the Oba of Benin. This leads to a Punitive Expedition against Benin.
• February 2 – Harrisburg, the Pennsylvania state capitol, is destroyed by fire.
• February 18- Benin is put to the torch by the Punitive Expedition.
• March 4 – William McKinley succeeds Grover Cleveland as President of the United States.
• April 5 – "Ordinance of April 5," equalizing German and Czech in Bohemia, signed in Austria-Hungary (see Kasimir Felix Graf von Badeni).
• April 27 – Grant's Tomb is dedicated.
• May 19 – Oscar Wilde is released from prison.
• June 2 – Mark Twain, responding to rumors that he was dead, is quoted by the New York Journal as saying, "The report of my death was an exaggeration."
• July 17 – Klondike Gold Rush begins when 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 31 – First ascent of Mount Saint Elias, second highest peak in the United States and Canada.
• August 29 – First Zionist Congress convenes in Basel, Switzerland.
• September 1 – The Boston subway opens, becoming the first underground metro in North America.
• December 9 – First issue of the feminist newspaper La Fronde is published by Marguerite Durand.
• December 28 – The play Cyrano de Bergerac, by Edmond Rostand, premieres in Paris.
• December 30 – Natal annexes Zululand.

• Queen Victoria celebrates her Diamond Jubilee.
• France allows women to study at the Ecole des Beaux-Arts.
• First use of the word computer meaning an electronic calculation device.
• Coseley Urban District Council formed

Births

January-March

• January 3  – Marion Davies, American actress (d. 1961)
• January 23 – Margarete Schütte-Lihotzky, Austrian architect and anti-Nazi activist (d. 2000)
• February 4 – Ludwig Erhard, Chancellor of Germany (d. 1977)
• February 10 – John F. Enders, American scientist, winner of the Nobel Prize in Physiology or Medicine (d. 1985)
• February 10  – Dame Judith Anderson, Australian actress (d. 1992)
• February 11 – Yves de La Casiniere, composer
• February 27 – Marian Anderson, American contralto (d. 1993)
• March 4 – Lefty O'Doul, baseball player and restaurateur (d. 1969)
• March 5 – Soong May-ling, wife of Chiang Kai-Shek (d. 2003)
• March 15 – Jackson Scholz, American sprinter (d. 1986)
• March 24 – Wilhelm Reich, Austrian psychotherapist (d. 1957)
• March 28 – Sepp Herberger, German football coach (d. 1977)
• March 29 – Ruby Muhammad, wife of Elijah Muhammad

April-June

• April 7 – Walter Winchell, American broadcast journalist (d. 1972)
• April 9 – John B. Gambling, American radio talk-show host (d. 1974)
• April 26 – Olga Tschechowa, actress (d. 1980)
• April 26  – Douglas Sirk, German-born director (d. 1987)
• April 26  – Eddie Eagan, American boxer and bobsledder (d. 1967)
• April 27 – Mary, Princess Royal of England (d. 1965)
• May 14 – Sidney Bechet, American jazz musician (d. 1959)
• May 18 – Frank Capra, American producer, director, and writer (d. 1991)
• May 19 – Frank Luke, American World War I pilot (d. 1918)
• May 21 – Nikola Avramov, Bulgarian painter (d. 1945)
• June 7 – George Szell, Hungarian conductor (d. 1970)
• June 10 – Grand Duchess Tatiana of Russia (d. 1918)
• June 13 – Paavo Nurmi, Finnish runner (d. 1973)

July-September

• July 24 – Amelia Earhart, American aviator
• July 29 – Sir Neil Ritchie, British general (d. 1983).
• August 2 – Max Weber, member of the Swiss Federal Council (d. 1974)
• August 28 – Charles Boyer, French actor (d. 1978)
• September 8 – Jimmie Rodgers, American country music singer (d. 1933)
• September 12 – Irene Joliot-Curie, French scientist (d. 1956)
• September 17 – Earl Webb, baseball player (d. 1965)
• September 23 – Walter Pidgeon, Canadian actor (d. 1984)
• September 25 – William Faulkner, American novelist (d. 1962)
• September 26 – Pope Paul VI (d. 1978)

October-December

• October 3 – Louis Aragon, French writer (d. 1982)
• October 15 – Johannes Sikkar, Estonian statesman (d. 1960)
• November 15 – Sacheverell Sitwell, English writer (d. 1988)
• November 23 – Nirad C. Chaudhuri, Indian writer (d. 1999)
• December 18 – Fletcher Henderson, American jazz musician (d. 1952)
• December 30 – Alfredo Bracchi, Italian author (d. 1976)

Deaths

• February 19 – Karl Weierstrass, German mathematician (b. 1815
• March 19 – Antoine Thomson d'Abbadie, Irish-born traveler (b. 1810)
• April 3 – Johannes Brahms, German composer (b. 1833)
• September 9 – Richard Holt Hutton, English writer and theologian (b. 1826)
• September 21 – Wilhelm Wattenbach, German historian (b. 1819)
• October 29 – Henry George, American economist (b. 1839)
• November 20 – Ernest Giles, Australian explorer (b. 1835)
• December 17 – Alphonse Daudet, French writer (b. 1840)
• Jang Seung-eop, Korean painter (b. 1843)