Events January January 2 The Standard Oil Trust is secretly created in the United States to control multiple corporations set up by John D. Rockefeller and his associates. Irish-born author Oscar Wilde arrives in New York at the beginning of a lecture tour of the United States and Canada. January 12 – Holborn Viaduct power station in the City of London, the world's first coal-fired public electricity generating station, begins operation.
February February 3 – American showman P. T. Barnum acquires the elephant Jumbo from the London Zoo. February 4 – Charles J. Guiteau, the murderer of President James A. Garfield, is sentenced to death (found guilty on January 25), despite an insanity defense raised by his lawyer.
March March 2 – Roderick Maclean fails in an attempt to assassinate Queen Victoria, at Windsor. March 6 (February 22 Old Style) – The Principality of Serbia becomes the Kingdom of Serbia following a proclamation. March 20 – British gunboats enter Monrovia, with Arthur Havelock demanding that Liberia cede disputed territory to the British colony of Sierra Leone, of which he is Governor. March 22 – Polygamy is made a felony by the Edmunds Act, passed by the United States Congress. March 24 – Robert Koch announces the discovery of the bacterium responsible for tuberculosis (Mycobacterium tuberculosis). March 28 Republican Jules Ferry makes primary education in France free, non-clerical (laique) and obligatory. German medical products company Beiersdorf is founded. March 29 – The Knights of Columbus, a Catholic fraternal service organization, is founded in New Haven, Connecticut.
April April 3 – Old West outlaw Jesse James is shot in the back of the head and killed by Robert Ford in St. Joseph, Missouri. April 29 – The Elektromote, the world's first trolleybus, begins operation in Berlin.
May May 1 The Berlin Philharmonic orchestra is founded in Germany, as Frühere Bilsesche Kapelle. Édouard Manet exhibits his painting A Bar at the Folies-Bergère at the Paris Salon. May 2 – The Kilmainham Treaty, an agreement between the British government and Irish nationalist leader Charles Stewart Parnell to abate tenant rent arrears, is announced; Parnell is released from Kilmainham Gaol in Dublin. May 6 Phoenix Park Murders in Ireland: Lord Frederick Cavendish, the newly appointed Chief Secretary for Ireland, and Thomas Henry Burke, his Permanent Undersecretary, are fatally stabbed in Phoenix Park, Dublin, by members of the Irish National Invincibles (militant Irish republicans). The Chinese Exclusion Act, prohibiting the immigration of Chinese laborers, is the first law which restricts immigration into the United States. May 18 – Burnley F.C. in Northern England changes codes, from rugby football to association football. May 20 – The Triple Alliance is formed between Germany, Austria-Hungary and Italy.
June June 6 Supposedly, the Bombay Cyclone of 1882 in the Arabian Sea causes flooding in Bombay harbor, leaving about 100,000 dead; this alleged event has, however, been proved a hoax. Battle of Embabo: The Shewan forces of Menelik II defeat the Gojjame army. June 11 – The 'Urabi revolt breaks out in Egypt against Khedive Tewfik Pasha and European influence in that country. June 28 – The Anglo-French Convention of 1882 is signed, marking territorial boundaries between Guinea and Sierra Leone. June 30 – U.S. presidential assassin Charles J. Guiteau is hanged in Washington, D.C. June Ferdinand von Lindemann publishes his proof of the transcendentality of pi. St Andrew's Ambulance Association is founded in Glasgow, Scotland; St. John Ambulance Canada is also founded this year.
July July 11–13 – Anglo-Egyptian War: The British Mediterranean Fleet carries out the Bombardment of Alexandria, its forces capturing the city of Alexandria, Egypt, and securing the Suez Canal. July 23 – The Imo Incident occurs in Seoul, Korea, as a result of bad rations and late payment for soldiers of the Joseon Army. July 26 Boers establish the republic of Stellaland in southern Africa. Richard Wagner's opera Parsifal debuts, at the Bayreuth Festspielhaus in Bavaria. July 31 – The Hebrew Moshava of Rishon LeZion in Palestine is founded.
August August 3 – The United States Congress passes the Immigration Act of 1882, imposing a head tax on immigrants to the U.S. and excluding undesirables. August 5 – Standard Oil of New Jersey, the company later known as ExxonMobil, is established. August 18 – The Married Women's Property Act 1882 receives royal assent in Britain; it enables women to buy, own and sell property, and to keep their own earnings. August 20 – Pyotr Ilyich Tchaikovsky's 1812 Overture debuts in Moscow. August 29 – The Australian cricket team historically defeats England at The Oval for the first time on English soil, a humiliation for the English and the origin for The Ashes test series.
September September 4 – Thomas Edison flips the switch to the first commercial electrical power plant in the United States, lighting one square mile of lower Manhattan. This is considered by many as the day that begins the electrical age. September 5 The first United States Labor Day parade is held in New York City. Tottenham Hotspur F.C. is founded (as Hotspur F.C.) in London. September 13 Anglo-Egyptian War: British troops occupy Cairo, and Egypt becomes a British protectorate. Selwyn College, Cambridge, is founded after Queen Victoria grants a Charter of Incorporation.
September 18 – Great Comet of 1882: Her Majesty's Astronomer at the Cape, David Gill, reports watching the comet rise a few minutes before the Sun, describing it as "The nucleus was then undoubtedly single, and certainly rather under than over 4″ in diameter; in fact, as I have described it, it resembled very much a star of the 1st magnitude seen by daylight."
October October 5 – The Society for Ethical Culture of Chicago (the modern-day Ethical Humanist Society of Chicago) is founded by Felix Adler. October 10 – The Bank of Japan opens in Tokyo City. October 14 – The University of the Punjab at Lahore (British India), is founded in modern-day Pakistan. October 16 – The New York, Chicago and St. Louis Railroad ("Nickel Plate Road") runs its first trains over the entire system between Buffalo, New York, and Chicago. Nine days later the Seney Syndicate sells the road to William Henry Vanderbilt, for US$7.2 million. October 21 – Waseda University is founded by Shigenobu Ōkuma in Japan as Tokyo Specializing School.
November November 2 – The Great Fire of Oulu destroys 27 buildings in the downtown of Oulu, Finland.Kustaa Hautala: Oulun kaupungin historia IV (Kirjapaino Oy Kaleva, 1976, Oulu) p. 319-323 (in Finnish) November 14 – Franklyn Leslie shoots Billy Claiborne dead in the streets of Tombstone, Arizona. November 16 – The British Royal Navy's destroys Abari village in Niger.
December December 6 – A transit of Venus, the last until 2004, occurs. December – Zikhron Ya'akov is founded in northern Israel.
Date unknown The first International Polar Year, an international scientific program, begins. Zulu king Cetshwayo kaMpande returns to South Africa from England. A peace treaty is signed between Paraguay and Uruguay. Pogroms in Southern Russia end. Nikola Tesla claims this is when he conceives the rotating magnetic field principle, which he later uses to invent his induction motor. The British Chartered Institute of Patent Agents (the modern-day Chartered Institute of Patent Attorneys) is founded. Redruth Mining School opens in Cornwall. The Personal Liberty League is established to oppose the temperance movement in the United States. Carolyn Merrick is elected president of the Woman's Christian Temperance Union in the United States. Founding of the following sports clubs: Albion Rovers F.C. (through the amalgamation of two Coatbridge clubs, Albion and Rovers) in the urban west of Scotland; Christchurch Rangers, the earliest predecessor of Queens Park Rangers F.C., in London; Glentoran F.C. in Belfast in the north of Ireland; Thames Ditton Lawn Tennis Club, the oldest lawn tennis club still on its original site, in the outer London suburbs; Waterloo F.C., a rugby union club, as Serpentine on Merseyside in the north of England.
Births
January
January 5 – Edwin Barclay, 18th president of Liberia (d. 1955) January 6 Fan Noli, Albanian poet, political figure (d. 1965) Ferdinand Pecora, Sicilian-born American lawyer (d. 1971) Sam Rayburn, Speaker of the United States House of Representatives (d. 1961) January 9 – Otto Ruge, Norwegian general (d. 1961)Otto Ruge (Store norske leksikon) January 12 – Milton Sills, American actor (d. 1930) January 17 Arnold Rothstein, American gangster (d. 1928) Noah Beery, American actor (d. 1946) January 18 – A. A. Milne, British author (d. 1956) January 20 – Johnny Torrio, Italian-born American gangster (d. 1957) January 22 – Theodore Kosloff, Russian-born actor (d. 1956) January 23 – Anna Abrikosova, Soviet Roman Catholic religious sister and servant of God (d. 1936) January 25 – Virginia Woolf, English writer (d. 1941) January 28 Mary Boland, American actress (d. 1965) Gengo Hyakutake, Japanese admiral (d. 1976) Pascual Orozco, Mexican revolutionary (d. 1915) January 30 – Franklin D. Roosevelt, 32nd President of the United States (d. 1945) January 31 – Fritz Leiber, American stage, screen actor (d. 1949)
February
February 1 Vladimir Dimitrov, Bulgarian artist (d. 1960) Louis St. Laurent, 12th Prime Minister of Canada (d. 1973) February 2 Anne Bauchens, American film editor (d. 1967) James Joyce, Irish author (d. 1941) February 4 – E. J. Pratt, Canadian poet (d. 1964) February 5 – Louis Wagner, French Grand Prix racer, aviator (d. 1960) February 11 Valli Valli, German-born British actress (d. 1927) Joe Jordan, American ragtime composer (d. 1971) February 12 – Walter Nash, 27th Prime Minister of New Zealand (d. 1968) February 15 – John Barrymore, American actor (d. 1942) February 18 – Petre Dumitrescu, Romanian general (d. 1950) February 20 – Alexander Carrick, Scottish sculptor (d. 1966) February 22 – Eric Gill, English sculptor, writer (d. 1940) February 24 – Bosman di Ravelli, South African concert pianist, composer, and writer (d. 1967) February 26 – Husband E. Kimmel, American admiral (d. 1968) February 28 Geraldine Farrar, American soprano (d. 1967) Herbert Silberer, Austrian psychoanalyst (d. 1923)
March
March 3 – Charles Ponzi, Italian-born American con man (d. 1949) March 6 – F. Burrall Hoffman, American architect (d. 1980) March 8 – Alfred A. Cunningham, first United States Marine Corps aviator (d. 1939) March 12 – Carlos Blanco Galindo, 32nd President of Bolivia (d. 1943) March 14 Wacław Sierpiński, Polish mathematician (d. 1969) Giuseppe Tellera, Italian general (d. 1941) March 15 – Jim Lightbody, American middle-distance runner (d. 1953) March 18 – Gian Francesco Malipiero, Italian composer (d. 1973) March 20 – René Coty, 17th President of France (d. 1962) March 22 – John W. Wilcox Jr., American admiral (d. 1942) March 23 – Emmy Noether, German mathematician (d. 1935) March 24 – George Monckton-Arundell, 8th Viscount Galway, English politician, 5th Governor-General of New Zealand (d. 1943) March 30 Melanie Klein, Austrian-born British child psychoanalyst (d. 1960) Vittorio Tur, Italian admiral (d. 1969)Biographical Dictionary Men of the Navy.
April
April 7 – Kurt von Schleicher, Chancellor of Germany (d. 1934) April 17 – Artur Schnabel, Polish pianist (d. 1951) April 18 Monteiro Lobato, Brazilian writer (d. 1948) Leopold Stokowski, English conductor (d. 1977) April 19 – Getúlio Vargas, 14th and 17th president of Brazil (d. 1954) April 20 Nicolae Ciupercă, Romanian general and politician (d. 1950) Holland Smith, American general (d. 1967) April 21 – Percy Williams Bridgman, American physicist, Nobel Prize laureate (d. 1961)