January 1905

January 1, 1905 (Sunday)

• In a major defeat in the Russo-Japanese War, General Anatoly Stessel of the Russian Army surrendered Port Arthur, located in mainland China, to the Japanese.
• Born: Malek Bennabi, Algerian philosopher; in Constantine, French Algeria

  January 2, 1905 (Monday)

• As terms of surrender were drawn up for Russia, the Russian squadron of five battleships and three cruisers put into anchor at Sainte-Marie Island off the coast of Africa and Madagascar.
• Born:
• * Michael Tippett, English composer; in Wetherden, Suffolk
• * Anna May Wong, American actress and the first Chinese-American film star in the U.S.; in Los Angeles
• Died: Clara Augusta Jones Trask, 65, American dime novelist who wrote hundreds of books under the pen names "Hero Strong" and "Clara Augusta"

  January 3, 1905 (Tuesday)

• Japan took former possession of Port Arthur and renamed it Ryojun, holding it for 40 years. The area would revert in 1945 to China and is now the Lushunkou District.
• Born: Nobuhito, Prince Takamatsu, Japanese philanthropist, younger brother of Emperor Hirohito; in at the Aoyama Palace in Tokyo

  January 4, 1905 (Wednesday)

• Gheorghe Grigore Cantacuzino became Prime Minister of Romania for the second time, having previously served from 1899 to 1900, and remains in office for more than two years.
• The city of Bend, Oregon, plotted out in 1900 by Alexander Drake, was incorporated as a town for local logging companies, and would have a population of 536 in 1910. By the year 2020, it would have almost 100,000 residents.

  January 5, 1905 (Thursday)

• Baroness Emma Orczy's play The Scarlet Pimpernel, the forerunner of her novel, opened at the New Theatre in London, beginning a run of 122 performances and numerous revivals.

  January 6, 1905 (Friday)

• The Lick Observatory announced the discovery of a sixth moon of Jupiter, made by their astronomer Charles D. Perrine. Unlike the first five Jovian satellites discovered, the sixth one would be referred to as "Jupiter VI" until 1975, and is now called Himalia.
• The U.S. Senate confirmed the nomination of William D. Crum, an African-American, to the office of collector of customs at Charleston, South Carolina after Crum's nomination by President Theodore Roosevelt.
• Danish prime minister Johan Henrik Deuntzer and his cabinet resigned over a disagreement regarding Denmark's military.
• Died: José María Gabriel y Galán, 34, Spanish poet, died of pneumonia

  January 7, 1905 (Saturday)

• The Colorado State Legislature entered an agreement with Alva Adams to allow him to take office as Governor of Colorado while a challenge by Republican candidate James Peabody was being investigated. Under the arrangement, Adams took office on January 10 on condition that he was to step down voluntarily if the legislature concluded that Peabody had won the popular vote. Adams resigned on March 17 after the investigation concluded that Peabody had won.

  January 8, 1905 (Sunday)

• At the excavation site in Egypt near Saqqara, where British archaeologist Howard Carter was an inspector for the Egyptian Antiquities Service, the Egyptian guards of the site were in a fist fight with 15 tourists from France, many of whom were intoxicated. The government of France filed a formal protest with Egyptian authorities, and Carter took the side of his workers. To appease the French in the "Saqqara Affair", Carter was fired from his job and without formal employment for the next three years. In 1923, he would gain worldwide fame in finding the tomb of Tutankhamen.

  January 9, 1905 (Monday)

• U.S. Secretary of the Navy Paul Morton and Admiral of the Navy George Dewey reviewed the largest concentration of American warships up to that time, as 40 ships, "including six of the most powerful battleships afloat", were brought into port at Hampton Roads, Virginia.
• Died: Louise Michel, 74, French anarchist known as "the French grand dame of anarchy"

  January 10, 1905 (Tuesday)

• Chile and Bolivia signed a treaty of peace and amity.

  January 11, 1905 (Wednesday)

• Under the supervision of five editors, work began on the comprehensive Catholic Encyclopedia, subtitled "An International Work of Reference on the Constitution, Doctrine, Discipline, and History of the Catholic Church" and published by the Robert Appleton Company. The first volume would appear in 1907.
• Died: Yehudah Aryeh Leib Alter, 57, Polish Talmudic scholar Hasidic rabbi

  January 12, 1905 (Thursday)

• Marie Walcker, the last victim of German-born American serial killer and bigamist Johann Otto Hoch, died of poisoning in Chicago a month after her their marriage. On January 30, Hoch was arrested in New York City, initially for having married and deserted multiple women, but soon was charged with Marie Walcker's murder, for which he would be convicted. Hoch was suspected of perhaps as many as 50 murders, but only charged with Walcker's death. He would be hanged on February 23, 1906.
• Born: Tex Ritter, American actor and singer; in Murvaul, Texas

  January 13, 1905 (Friday)

• Alexander, Prince of Lippe, the last sovereign monarch of the German principality of Lippe, died after a nominal reign of 10 years, leaving no children to succeed him and ending the Lippe-Detmold line. Prince Alexander's power had been exercised by regents because of his mental illness, and the question of a successor would not be resolved until October until the last regent, Alexander's cousin Leopold IV, Count of Lippe-Biesterfeld. After World War One, the principality would be abolished and would exist as a "Free State" until the end of World War Two; it is now part of the German state of North Rhine-Westphalia.
• Born: Kay Francis, American stage and film actress and Warner Brothers leading lady; in Oklahoma City, Oklahoma Territory

  January 14, 1905 (Saturday)

• Jens Christian Christensen took office as the new Prime Minister of Denmark.
• Born:
• * Takeo Fukuda, Prime Minister of Japan from 1976 to 1978; in Gunma, Gunma Prefecture
• * Sterling Holloway, American character actor and voice actor known for providing the distinct sound of Winnie the Pooh for Disney films; in Cedartown, Georgia
• Died: Ernst Abbe, 64, German optical instruments developer who created the Abbe refractometer and the "Abbe number measure of wave dispersion

  January 15, 1905 (Sunday)

• A series of three high tsunamis killed 61 people in the Norway in the villages of Ytre Nesdal and Bødal, after a rockslide swept down Mount Ramnefjell and crashed into Lake Lovatnet.
• Born: Torin Thatcher, English stage and film actor known for his portrayal of villains; in Bombay, British India

  January 16, 1905 (Monday)

• The Ottawa Hockey Club retained the Stanley Cup, winning the best-2-of-3 series in the second and deciding game against the Dawson City Nuggets, who had traveled from Canada's Yukon Territory by dog sled, ship, and train over more than three weeks to challenge Ottawa for the Cup. After prevailing in the first game, 9 to 2 over the Nuggets on January 13, the day after the exhausted Nugget players arrived in the capital, the champions easily won Game 2, with a final score of Ottawa Hockey Club 23, Dawson City Nuggets 2.

  January 17, 1905 (Tuesday)

• In France, Prime Minister Émile Combes and his cabinet announced their resignations after being implicated in the Affair of the Cards, a system set up by the War Ministry to purge the French Army officers corps of Jesuits.
• Born:
• * D. R. Kaprekar, Indian recreational mathematician; in Dahanu, Bombay province, British India "Kaprekar numbers", where the square of the number can be divided into two parts that add up to the original number are named in his honor.
• * Guillermo Stábile, Argentine soccer football centre forward who was the top scorer in the 1930 World Cup while playing for the Argentina national team; later the manager for the Argentina team from 1939 to 1960; in Buenos Aires
• * Saeb Salam, Prime Minister of Lebanon in 1952, 1953, 1960-1961 and 1970-1973; in Beirut, Ottoman Empire

  January 18, 1905 (Wednesday)

• U.S. District Judge Charles Swayne of Florida was impeached by the U.S. House of Representatives.
• Born: Joseph Bonanno, Italian-born American gangster nicknamed "Joe Bananas", and crime boss for the Bonanno crime family from 1931 to 1968; as Giuseppe Carlo Bonnano in Castellammare del Golfo, Sicily
• Nahoko Takada, Japanese educator, trade unionist, politician, socialist and peace activist in Fukushima, Empire of Japan

  January 19, 1905 (Thursday)

• Tsar Nicholas II of the Russian Empire narrowly escaped injury during the "blessing of the waters" of the Neva River near Saint Petersburg. One of the guns firing a salute malfunctioned and sent grapeshot down into the crowd of dignitaries, narrowly missing the Tsar.
• Died: Debendranath Tagore, 87, Indian philosopher who led the Brahmoism religious movement

  January 20, 1905 (Friday)

• An arbitration treaty was signed at Washington between the United States, Sweden, and Norway.
• Lobbyists from the U.S. territory of New Mexico presented their arguments against being consolidated with the Arizona Territory for admission as a single state.
• Died: Gyula Szapáry, 72, Prime Minister of the Kingdom of Hungary 1890 to 1892

  January 21, 1905 (Saturday)

• The Dominican Republic signed an agreement with the United States to allow the U.S. to administer the collection of customs taxes for Santo Domingo for 50 years, with the U.S. to assume responsibility for payment of the Republic's debts to foreign nations from Dominican income. The agreement was done as an exercise of the "Roosevelt Corollary" to the Monroe Doctrine.
• Born: Christian Dior, French fashion designer and founder of the Christian Dior SE line; in Granville, Manche département