May 1900

May 1, 1900 (Tuesday)

• Ottoman Sultan Abdul Hamid issued an imperial edict for the construction of the Hejaz railway, to link Damascus to the holy cities of Mecca and Medina.
• Thousands of Russian workers marched in the streets of Kharkov, the first in what would be a series of large protests in Russia's cities.
• Military rule of Puerto Rico by the United States ended. Charles Herbert Allen was sworn in as the American territorial governor, replacing military governor George Whitefield Davis.
• An explosion killed 246 coal miners by carbon monoxide poisoning. The blast, at at the Pleasant Valley Coal Company near Scofield, Utah, sent CO into two different shafts.
• Born: Ignazio Silone, Italian writer; in Pescina

  May 2, 1900 (Wednesday)

• The Hepburn Bill for construction of the proposed Nicaragua Canal passed the United States House of Representatives by a vote of 225–35, but would end up stalling in the United States Senate. The bill proposed American purchase of land in Costa Rica and Nicaragua to build a canal from Greytown, Nicaragua on the Caribbean to Breto on the Pacific.

  May 3, 1900 (Thursday)

• Negotiations between Denmark and the United States for purchase of what would become the Virgin Islands fell through. The Danish West Indies would eventually be sold to America in 1917.
• Harry Burke, captain of the University of Cincinnati track team, was fatally injured while practicing the pole vault. The pole snapped and the fall broke Burke's thoracic spine. He died four days later.
• Lord Roberts begins the Advance on Pretoria, moving his troops from Bloemfontein northwards.

  May 4, 1900 (Friday)

• Kaiser Wilhelm pledged 500,000 marks to India for famine relief.
• The United States Senate ratified the 1899 amendment to the Geneva Conventions, applying it to naval war.
• In Lubbock, Texas, The Avalanche published its first issue as the city's first major newspaper. Through mergers, it eventually became the Lubbock Avalanche-Journal.
• Died: Augustus Pitt Rivers, 73, British army officer, ethnologist and archaeologist

  May 5, 1900 (Saturday)

• Albert Ellis of the Pacific Islands Company signed a lease with the chiefs of the Banaban people of Ocean Island, a tiny atoll that is now part of the nation of Kiribati, granting the company a 999-year exclusive right to mine phosphate, in exchange for 50 British pounds per year. The islanders, including the misidentified "King of Ocean Island", Temate, did not have the authority to sell mining rights, and were likely not aware of what Ellis intended to do. Following the British annexation of Ocean Island on September 28, 1901, "The British government reduced the term of the lease to a more realistic 99 years".
• General Arthur MacArthur replaced General Elwell Stephen Otis as military governor of the Philippines. The father of General Douglas MacArthur set up his office at the Malacañan Palace in Manila.

  May 6, 1900 (Sunday)

• The 18th birthday of Crown Prince Wilhelm of Germany was celebrated in ceremonies at the Royal Chapel in Berlin. Austrian Emperor Franz Joseph named the Crown Prince as Chief of the Hussar regiment. The Prince became Governor of Pomerania and the Prince of Oeis, titles lost after his father was deposed in 1918.

  May 7, 1900 (Monday)

• San Francisco Mayor James D. Phelan addressed an anti-Asian rally at Union Square and declared "The Chinese and Japanese are not bonafide citizens. They are not the stuff of which American citizens can be made."
• Mount Vesuvius began erupting, with lava threatening the city of Torre del Greco, Italy.
• Died: Harry Burke, University of Cincinnati track meet captain, due to a fatal injury to his spine after an accident involving the pole vault

  May 8, 1900 (Tuesday)

• Richard Etheridge, the first African-American keeper of a Coast Guard station, died while attempting a rescue near the Pea Island Life-Saving Station at North Carolina. He was posthumously awarded the Gold Life Saving Medal for heroism, albeit not until March 5, 1996.
• University of Cambridge zoologist William Bateson was riding a train to London when he read the recently rediscovered 1866 paper by Gregor Mendel, and soon became the greatest champion of Mendel's discoveries of the laws of heredity. As one author would later note, "the first half of genetics was officially underway". Bateson translated Mendel's paper and published it in the 1902 book Mendel's Principles of Heredity: A Defence.
• The National Basket Ball League title was won by the Trenton Nationals, who defeated the Millville Glass Blowers, 22–19, in the third game of the best-of-three championship of the first professional basketball league in the United States.

  May 9, 1900 (Wednesday)

• At the annual convention of the American Pharmaceutical Association in Richmond, Virginia, the first organization of pharmacy schools was created. The American Conference on Pharmaceutical Facilities later was renamed the American Association of Colleges of Pharmacy.

  May 10, 1900 (Thursday)

• Japan's Crown Prince Yoshihito and Princess Kujo Sadako were married in Tokyo, marking the first Japanese imperial wedding to include a religious ceremony. Soon thereafter, commoners began requesting similar ceremonies and the Shinto wedding soon became popular throughout the nation.
• Responding to the famine in British India, the United States paid for the shipment of donations of 200,000 bushels of corn and substantial quantities of seed, via the ship Quito, which sailed from Brooklyn. Christian Herald editor Louis Klopsch, who had lobbied the government to pay the shipping costs, also cabled $40,000 to India for famine relief.
• British forces encounter Boer resistance at Sand River; after a long fought battle, the British forces put the Boers to flight.

  May 11, 1900 (Friday)

• One construction worker was killed, and another severely injured, in a fall while working on the Manhattan anchorage of the new Williamsburg Bridge.
• Former heavyweight boxing champion "Gentleman Jim" Corbett took on title holder James J. Jeffries, attempting to regain the title that he had lost in 1897, and almost succeeded. In the bout at the New York Athletic Club, Corbett was the better fighter for the first 22 rounds, but in the 23rd, Jeffries knocked him down with a right to the jaw. Corbett's amazing endurance and Jeffries's comeback made the fight a boxing classic.

  May 12, 1900 (Saturday)

• Lin Shao-mao who had led a rebellion on the island of Taiwan against its Japanese rulers, surrendered along with his men in a formal ceremony held at Ahou. Lin and his men were allowed to live peaceably at Houpilin, but he was eventually killed in a battle on May 30, 1902.
• Field cornet S. Eloff led a force of 240 Boers in an assault on the town of Mafeking, South Africa during the Siege of Mafeking.
• Born: Helene Weigel, Austrian-born German actress, wife of Bertolt Brecht; in Vienna

  May 13, 1900 (Sunday)

• Wilbur Wright wrote to aviation expert Octave Chanute, sharing his own findings and seeking advice on the ideal place to test a flying machine. Written on the letterhead of the Wright Cycle Co. of 1127 West Third Street in Dayton, Ohio, Wright's initial missive began, "For some years I have been afflicted with the belief that flight is possible to man. My disease has increased in severity and I feel that it will soon cost me an increased amount of money, if not my life." Over the next several years, the correspondence continued between Wright and Chanute, whose suggestions aided in the Wright brothers' first flight on December 17, 1903.

  May 14, 1900 (Monday)

• The International Olympic Committee staged the second modern Olympic games in Paris, starting with competition held in fencing. There were no opening or closing ceremonies and the games were spread over five months.
• Joseph Chamberlain, Member of Parliament of the United Kingdom and Secretary of State for the Colonies introduced the Australian Commonwealth Bill in the House of Commons. The bill became law on July 9 and Australia became independent on January 1, 1901.
• Born: Leo Smit, Dutch composer; in Amsterdam

  May 15, 1900 (Tuesday)

• Montana's William A. Clark resigned from the United States Senate while that body debated his expulsion. After Clark's name was stricken from the Senate roster, the news came that Montana Lieutenant Governor Archibald E. Spriggs, acting in the absence of Governor Robert Burns Smith, had reappointed Clark to fill the vacancy. When Governor Smith returned, Martin Maginnis was appointed on May 18.
• Fish fell from the sky during a late afternoon thunderstorm in Providence, Rhode Island. Richard H. Tingley, a witness, reported that "streets and yards for several blocks were alive with squirming little perch and bullspouts". The fish were heaviest at Olneyville.

  May 16, 1900 (Wednesday)

• Chicago's Chief Milk Inspector, Thomas Grady, announced plans to ban dangerous additives from milk. "Formalin, the chemical used in milk preservatives, will kill a cat", he told reporters. "What will it do to a child?" Formalin, a diluted form of formaldehyde, had been added to raw milk near the end of the 19th century before its toxic effects were realized. The United Kingdom banned the practice in 1901.

  May 17, 1900 (Thursday)

• At 3:30 in the morning, the Siege of Mafeking ended after seven months, when Colonel Bryan Mahon led troops to relieve the besieged British residents during the Second Boer War. General Piet Cronjé attacked the city on October 13, 1899, and Colonel Robert Baden-Powell had led the defence.
• At the village of Kaolo "midway between Peking and Paotingfu ", 61 Chinese Christian converts were massacred in the worst attack to that time in the Boxer Rebellion. American minister Conger telegraphed, "Situation becoming serious. Request warship Taku soon as possible."
• The first copy of The Wonderful Wizard of Oz, by L. Frank Baum, came off the press. The first run of 10,000 copies sold out prior to publication.