April 1900

April 1, 1900 (Sunday)

• Bayern Munich played its first game, defeating the MTV 1879 club, 7–1.
• RWE AG, Germany's largest electrical power company, began supplying electricity, starting with the city of Düsseldorf.

  April 2, 1900 (Monday)

• The associate degree was created by the University of Chicago, and granted to fifteen students who had completed their freshman and sophomore years.
• Meeting at the Waldorf Astoria Hotel in New York City, the Automobile Club of America announced its plans to push for the construction of a transcontinental road to run from New York City to San Francisco.

  April 3, 1900 (Tuesday)

• Admiral George Dewey, hero of the Spanish–American War, announced his candidacy for President of the United States, bringing the cancellation of a celebrated tour of the United States. In an exclusive interview with the New York World, Dewey made the mistake of saying, "I am convinced that the office of the president is not a very difficult one to fill, his duties mainly to execute the laws of congress." Dewey withdrew his candidacy the next month, after revealing that he had never voted in an election.
• The United States Senate passed the Foraker Act, providing for the government of Puerto Rico, 49–31, and sent the measure to the House of Representatives, which approved it 161–153.
• Born: Camille Chamoun, Lebanese state leader, second President of Lebanon; in Deir al-Qamar, Ottoman Empire

  April 4, 1900 (Wednesday)

• In Brussels, an assassin fired two shots at the Prince of Wales as the Prince's railroad car was preparing to leave Brussels-North railway station for Copenhagen. Identified as a 16-year-old Jean-Baptiste Sipido, the would-be killer, protesting against the Second Boer War, jumped upon the footboard of the carriage and fired through the window, but missed. Sipido was tried and acquitted, and lived until 1959.
• The Convention Hall in Kansas City, which was three months away from hosting the Democratic Convention, was destroyed in a fire that consumed the building in 30 minutes.
• Queen Victoria visited her subjects in Dublin, Ireland after landing the night before at Kingstown on the yacht Victoria and Albert.
• At Reddersburg in South Africa, Boer troops led by General Christiaan de Wet forced the surrender of the Royal Irish Rifles after a 24-hour battle, taking 546 prisoners.

  April 5, 1900 (Thursday)

• The patent application for the first mercury-vapor lamp, now commonplace in street lights around the world because of its longevity and luminescence, was filed by American inventor Peter Cooper Hewitt. U.S. Patent No. 682,692 would be granted on September 17, 1901.
• Olga Nethersole was acquitted by a jury of charges of public nuisance, arising from the performance of the play Sapho. Two days later, Sapho was being presented again on Broadway for 55 more performances.
• The Irish Guards were created by command of Queen Victoria to commemorate the bravery of Irish forces in South Africa.
• Born: Spencer Tracy, American actor, recipient of two consecutive Academy Awards for Best Actor for Captains Courageous and Boys Town; in Milwaukee

  April 6, 1900 (Friday)

• World heavyweight boxing champion Jim Jeffries retained his title in a bout that lasted only 55 seconds. In Detroit, challenger Jack Finnegan was TKO'd less than a minute into the first round, a record that still stands. Finnegan, who was outweighed by Jeffries 250 pounds to 180, got up after each of three knockdowns before the towel was thrown in. In 1988, Mike Tyson would KO Michael Spinks in 91 seconds, the last heavyweight title fight to be decided in the first round.
• The city of Havana, Cuba banned the playing of African drums, a prohibition that remained in effect until 1940, when conga drums again became part of Cuban music.
• Kentucky's highest court declared J. C. W. Beckham to be the Governor, ruling against William S. Taylor. Taylor had been sworn in as Governor earlier in the year after being certified the winner of the 1899 state election, but a lower court ruled William Goebel to be the winner. Goebel was assassinated, and Lt. Governor Beckham was sworn in during February.

  April 7, 1900 (Saturday)

• More than 100 people were killed near Austin, Texas, when the McDonald Dam burst at 11:15 in the morning and sent a torrent of waters from the Colorado River rushing through the state capital. The dam had been constructed only seven years earlier, and burst following four days of rain. The town of Circleville was reported to have been washed away. Flooding of the Concho River had destroyed the town of Watervalley the day before.
• At Thomas Edison's laboratory, an agent of the Goldschmidt Chemische-Thermo Industrie of Essen, Germany, demonstrated a process to melt iron in five seconds. "Louis Dreyfus of Frankfort-on-Main ... showed Mr. Edison his new process for attaining an enormous degree of heat in an incredibly short period of time by the combustion of a certain chemical compound which the inventor keeps a secret," The New York Times reported, "then placed a six-inch long iron wrench in a crucible and created a fire that reached 3,000 degrees centigrade."
• General Arthur MacArthur was named to replace General Elwell Stephen Otis as military governor of the Philippines.
• The gunboat USS Wheeling arrived at Taku Forts to reinforce the American military presence in China.

  April 8, 1900 (Sunday)

• In the first major event associated with the introduction of Buddhism to the United States, The Buddha's birthday was celebrated in an elaborate ceremony in San Francisco. The Buddhist mission had begun its outreach to European-Americans in weekly lectures beginning on January 4.

  April 9, 1900 (Monday)

• In a session of the Académie des Sciences in Paris, physicist Paul Ulrich Villard presented the paper "Sur la reflexion et la refraction des rayons cathodiques et des rayons deviables du radium", describing, for the first time gamma ray radiation that penetrated through shielding.

  April 10, 1900 (Tuesday)

• The Supreme Court of Ohio upheld the constitutionality of the first anti-lynching law in the United States. Passed in 1896, the "Act for the Suppression of Mob Violence" permitted damages to be recovered from a local government for negligence in preventing a person from being lynched.
• Died: Frank Hamilton Cushing, 42, ethnologist for the Smithsonian Institution and expert on the Zuni Indian culture, after choking on a fishbone.

  April 11, 1900 (Wednesday)

• King Leopold of Belgium, by declaration made on April 9, turned over to the nation all of his properties "which contribute to the charms and beauty of the localities in which they are situated" on condition that they be preserved as park land, creating the Royal Trust of Belgium. More were turned over in 15 November 1900.
• The United States Navy purchased its first submarine, the USS Holland, for $150,000. Commissioned on October 12, the sub was long, held a crew of six, and ran on electric batteries when submerged.

  April 12, 1900 (Thursday)

• U.S. President William McKinley signed into law "An Act Providing a Civil Government for Porto Rico", also called the Foraker Act, and appointed Charles Herbert Allen as the first American Governor of Puerto Rico.
• James Richard Cocke, 70, an American physician who pioneered alternative medicine including homeopathy and hypnotherapy, killed himself with a gunshot to the head.

  April 13, 1900 (Friday)

• For the fourth time since 1893, the United States House of Representatives passed a resolution to provide that U.S. senators be elected by popular vote rather than by the individual state legislatures, by a margin of 242–15. As with the previous resolutions, the measure failed in the Senate. It was not until 1913 that the law changed, by the amendment of the United States Constitution.
• At Knossos, workmen first excavated the royal palace of Minos.

  April 14, 1900 (Saturday)

• French President Émile Loubet formally opened the Paris World Exhibition. The fair would close on November 12. The first Michelin Guide was published to coincide with the opening of the exposition and the first modern step-type escalator, designed by Charles Seeberger, was in use.
• The Automobile Club of America staged the first car race in U.S. history, a race on Long Island, starting at in Springfield to Babylon, New York, and back. As one of nine drivers, A.L. Riker won the race in 2 hours, minutes, and a silver cup provided by Leonce Blanchet.
• The Union Cycliste Internationale, the controlling body for bicycling events around the world, was founded in Switzerland.
• Charlie Williams, playing for Manchester City against Sunderland, became the first goalkeeper to score a goal in the history of the English Football League.
• Born: Nina Petrovna Khrushchev, wife of Nikita Khrushchev
• Died: Osman Nuri Pasha, Ottoman army officer, field marshal and hero of the Siege of Plevna

  April 15, 1900 (Sunday)

• American troops in the Philippines sustained their heaviest one-day loss of the year as 19 soldiers in the 43rd Infantry were killed at the Siege of Catubig on the first day of battle. The United States Department of War reported that 200 insurgents were killed on the same day.
• At or near Easter, the Antikythera mechanism, an ancient computer used to calculate astronomical positions, was found by Elias Stadiatos, a sponge fisherman.
• Milan played its first official football match, losing to Torino, 3–0. The club had won a warmup game against Mediolanum on March 11, 3–0.

  April 16, 1900 (Monday)

• The first book of stamps in the United States was placed on sale in American post offices. According to the 1900 report of the United States Postmaster General, "These books are issued in three sizes, containing, respectively, 12, 24, and 48 2-cent stamps in sheets of six stamps each, with paraffined paper interleaved between the sheets ..."
• Born: Polly Adler, famed brothel operator in New York City, recounted in A House Is Not a Home; in Yanow, Russian Empire