1879

{| align=right cellpadding=3 id=toc style="margin-left: 15px;"\n|- \n| align="center" colspan=2 | Years:
1876 1877 1878 - 1879 - 1880 1881 1882 \n|-\n| align="center" colspan=2 | Decades:
1840s 1850s 1860s - 1870s - 1880s 1890s 1900s \n|- \n| align="center" | Centuries:
18th century - 19th century - 20th century

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\n1879 in art
\n1879 in literature
\n1879 in music
\n1879 in science
\n1879 in sports
\n1879 in Canada\n----\nList of state leaders in 1879
\nList of religious leaders in 1879\n|}

Table of contents

1 Events 2 Births 3 Deaths

Events

\n* January 11 - Anglo-Zulu War begins\n* January 22 - Zulu troops massacre British troops at the Battle of Isandlwana. At Rorke's Drift, outnumbered British soldiers drive the attackers away after hours of fighting.\n* February 12 - At New York City's Madison Square Garden the first artificial ice rink in North America opens.\n* February 15 - Women's rights: American President Rutherford B. Hayes signs a bill allowing female attorneyss to argue cases before the Supreme Court of the United States.\n* February 22 - In Utica, New York, Frank Woolworth opens the first of many of 5 and 10-cent Woolworth stores.\n* March 3 - The United States Geological Survey is created\n* March 13 - Marriage of The Duke of Connaught and Strathearn, third son of Queen Victoria, to Princess Louise of Prussia.\n* March 29 - Anglo-Zulu War: Battle of Kambula: British forces defeat 20,000 Zulus.\n* May 26 - Russia and the United Kingdom sign the Treaty of Gandamak establishing an Afghan state.\n* May 30 - New York City's Gilmores Garden is renamed Madison Square Garden by William Vanderbilt and is opened to the public at 26th Street and Madison Avenue.\n* July 4 - Taughannock Giant unearthed on the shore of Lake Cayuga in Ithaca (later proven to be a hoax)\n* July 19 - Doc Holliday kills for the first time after a man shoots-up Holliday's New Mexico saloon.\n* October 21 - Using a filament of carbonized thread, Thomas Edison tests the first practical electric light bulb (it lasted 13 1/2 hours before burning out).\n* December 28 - The central part of the Tay Rail Bridge in Dundee, Scotland collapses as a train passed over it, killing 75.\n* December 30 - The Pirates of Penzance is first performed (Paignton, Devon, England)\n* December 31 - Thomas Edison demonstrates incandescent lighting to the public for the first time (Menlo Park, New Jersey.\n*Hall effect discovered by Dr. Edwin Hall\n*Somerville College founded\n*Stefan-Boltzmann law discovered by Jožef Stefan\n*Dual Alliance formed by Germany and Austria-Hungary

Births

\n* January 3 - Grace Coolidge, First Lady\n* January 12 - Ray Harroun, first winner of the Indianapolis 500 (d. 1968)\n* January 13 - Melvin Jones, founder of Lions Clubs International\n* January 28 - Francis Picabia, painter, poet \n* February 22 - J. N. Bronsted, physical chemist.\n* March 8 - Otto Hahn, winner of the Nobel Prize in Chemistry 1944 (d. 1968)\n* March 14 - Albert Einstein, physicist, winner of the Nobel Prize in physics 1921 (d. 1955)\n* March 26 - Othmar Ammann, engineer, Verrazano Narrows Bridge (d. 1965)\n* March 30 - Coen de Koning, Dutch speed skater\n* April 20 - Paul Poiret, French couturier (d. 1944)\n* May 6 - Bedřich Hrzony´, Czech orientalist and linguist\n* May 17 - Simon Petlyura, Ukrainian independence fighter (d. 1926)\n* May 19 - Nancy Astor, British parliamentarian (d. 1964)\n* May 19 - Viscount Waldorf Astor, British businessman and politician (d. 1952)\n* May 23 - Dezső Lauber, Hungarian sportsman\n* May 25 - Max Aitken, Statesman, newspaper baron (d. 1964)\n* May 27 - Karl Bühler, psychologist (d. 1963)\n* September 14 - Margaret Sanger, birth control advocate\n* September 15 - Joseph Lyons, tenth Prime Minister of Australia (d. 1939)\n* October 21 - Joseph Canteloube French composer and singer\n* October 29 - Leon Trotsky - Russian revolutionary\n* November 10 - Patrick Pearse Irish patriot and leader of the 1916 Easter Rising \n* November 26 – Charles W. Goddard, playwright and screenwriter (d. 1951)\n* December 18 - Paul Klee, Swiss artist\n* December 21 - Joseph Stalin - Soviet leader\n* December 28 - Billy Mitchell - military aviation pioneer

Deaths

\n* February 11 - Honore Daumier, caricaturist/painter.\n* February 11 - Willem J van Zeggelen, Dutch author.\n* February 25 - Charles Peace, notorious British criminal (executed)\n* March 30 - Thomas Couture, French painter and teacher.\n*April 30 - Sarah Josepha Hale, United States author.\n* June 1 - Napoleon Eugene, Prince Imperial, only son of French Emperor Napoleon III, killed fighting the Zulus \n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n