1887

Events

January

• January 11 - Louis Pasteur's anti-rabies treatment is defended in the Académie Nationale de Médecine, by Dr. Joseph Grancher.
• January 20
• * The United States Senate allows the United States Navy to lease Pearl Harbor as a naval base.
• * British emigrant ship Kapunda sinks after a collision off the coast of Brazil, killing 303 with only 16 survivors.
• January 21
• * The Amateur Athletic Union is formed in the United States.
• * Brisbane receives a one-day rainfall of .
• January 24 - Battle of Dogali: Abyssinian troops defeat the Italians.
• January 28
• * In a snowstorm at Fort Keogh, Montana, the largest snowflakes on record are reported. They are wide and thick.
• * Construction work begins on the foundations of the Eiffel Tower in Paris, France.

  February

• February 2 - The first Groundhog Day is observed in Punxsutawney, Pennsylvania.
• February 4 - The Interstate Commerce Act of 1887, passed by the 49th United States Congress, is signed into law by President Grover Cleveland.
• February 5 - The Giuseppe Verdi opera Otello premieres at La Scala, Milan.
• February 5 - The 1887 Hartford Railroad Disaster leaves thirty-seven dead in Vermont.
• February 8 - The Dawes Act, or the General Allotment Act, is enacted in the United States.
• February 23 - The French Riviera is hit by a large earthquake, killing around 2,000 along the coast of the Mediterranean.
• February 26 - At the Sydney Cricket Ground, George Lohmann becomes the first bowler to take eight wickets, in a Test innings.

  March

• March 3 - Anne Sullivan begins teaching Helen Keller.File:Helenkellerannesullivan1898.jpg|thumb|125px|right| March 3: Helen Keller and Sullivan.
• March 7 - North Carolina State University is established, as North Carolina College of Agriculture and Mechanic Arts.
• March 13 - Chester Greenwood patents earmuffs in the United States.

  April

• April 1 - The final of the first All-Ireland Hurling Championship is held.
• April 4 - Argonia, Kansas, elects Susanna M. Salter as the first female mayor in the United States.
• April 10 - The Catholic University of America is founded in Washington, D.C.
• April 20 - Occidental College is founded in Los Angeles, California.
• April 20−30 - Schnaebele incident: A French/German border incident nearly leads to war between the two countries.

  May

• May 3 - An earthquake hits Sonora, Mexico.
• May 5 - Ricardo Palma founds the Peruvian Academy of Language.
• May 14 - The cornerstone of the new Stanford University, in northern California, is laid.
• May 25 - The Hells Canyon massacre begins: 34 Chinese gold miners are ambushed and murdered in Hells Canyon, Oregon, United States.

  June

• June 8 - Herman Hollerith receives a U.S. patent for his punched card calculator.
• June 18 - The Reinsurance Treaty is closed between Germany and Russia.
• June 20 - The British Empire celebrates Queen Victoria's Golden Jubilee, marking the 50th year of her reign.
• June 21 - Zululand becomes a British colony.
• June 23 - The Rocky Mountains Park Act becomes law in Canada, creating that nation's first national park, Banff National Park.
• June 28 - Minot, North Dakota, is incorporated as a city.
• June 29 - The United Retail Federation is established in Brisbane, Australia.

  July

• July 1 - Construction of the iron structure of the Eiffel Tower starts in Paris, France.
• July 6
• * King Kalākaua of Hawai'i is forced by anti-monarchists to sign the 'Bayonet Constitution', stripping the Hawaiian monarchy of much of its authority, as well as disenfranchising most native Hawaiians, all Asians and the poor.
• * Berthe bombing, targetting a Parisian landowner in conflict with several Italian anarchists. Nobody is sentenced but Vittorio Pini and Paolo Chiericotti are heavily suspected by French authorities.
• July 12 - Odense Boldklub, the Danish football team, is founded as the Odense Cricket Club.
• July 19 - Dorr Eugene Felt receives the first U.S. patent for his comptometer.
• July 21 - Ten Italian workers are killed and six are injured by a train in New Jersey.
• July 26
• * L. L. Zamenhof publishes "Unua Libro", the first description of Esperanto, the constructed international auxiliary language.
• * Blackpool F.C. is created in England, U.K.
• July - James Blyth operates the first working wind turbine at Marykirk, Scotland.

  August

• August 13 - Hibernian F.C. of Scotland defeats Preston North End F.C. of England to win the 'Championship of the World', after the two teams win the Association football Cup competitions in their respective countries.
• August - The earliest constituent of the U.S. National Institutes of Health is established at the Marine Hospital, Staten Island, as the Laboratory of Hygiene.

  September

• September 5 - The Theatre Royal, Exeter, England, burns down, killing 186 people.
• September 28 - The 1887 Yellow River flood begins in China, killing 900,000 to 2,000,000 people.

October

• October 1 - The British Empire takes over Balochistan.
• October 3 - Florida A&M University opens in Tallahassee, Florida.
• October 12 - Yamaha Corporation, the global musical instrument and audiovisual brand, is founded as Yamaha Organ Manufacturing in Hamamatsu, Japan.
• October 17 - French Indochina was established, comprising Cochinchina, Annam, Tonkin, and Cambodia.
• October 18 - Johannes Brahms conducts the premiere of his Double Concerto, composed for violinist Joseph Joachim and cellist Robert Hausmann.

  November

• November 3 - The Coimbra Academic Association, the students' union of the University of Coimbra in Portugal, is founded.
• November 6 - The Association football club Celtic F.C. is formed in Glasgow, Scotland, by Irish Marist Brother Walfrid, to help alleviate poverty in the city's East End by raising money for his charity, the 'Poor Children's Dinner Table'.
• November 8 - Emile Berliner is granted a U.S. patent for the Berliner Gramophone.
• November 10 - Louis Lingg, sentenced to be hanged for his alleged role in the Haymarket affair, kills himself by dynamite.
• November 11 - August Spies, Albert Parsons, Adolph Fischer and George Engel are hanged for inciting riot and murder in the Haymarket affair.
• November 13 - Bloody Sunday: Police in London clash with radical and Irish nationalist protesters.
• November
• * Results of the Michelson–Morley experiment are published, indicating that the speed of light is independent of motion.
• * Arthur Conan Doyle's detective character Sherlock Holmes makes his first appearance, in the novel A Study in Scarlet, published in Beeton's Christmas Annual.

  December

• December 4 – Örgryte IS, the Swedish football team is founded by Wilhelm Friberg.
• December 5 - The International Bureau of Intellectual Property is established.
• December 25 - Glenfiddich single malt Scotch whisky is first produced.

  Date unknown

• Heinrich Hertz discovers the photoelectric effect on the production and reception of electromagnetic waves ; this is an important step towards the understanding of the quantum nature of light.
• Franz König publishes "Über freie Körper in den Gelenken" in the medical journal Deutsche Zeitschrift für Chirurgie, describing the disease Osteochondritis dissecans for the first time.
• Teachers College, later part of Columbia University, is founded.
• The first English-language edition of Friedrich Engels' 1844 study of The Condition of the Working Class in England, translated by Florence Kelley, is published in New York City.
• Publication in Barcelona of Enrique Gaspar's El anacronópete, the first work of fiction to feature a time machine.
• Publication begins of Futabatei Shimei's The Drifting Cloud , the first modern novel in Japan.
• The Hermetic Order of the Golden Dawn is founded.
• Nagase Shoten, predecessor of Japanese cosmetics and toiletry brand Kao Corporation, is founded in Nihonbashi, Tokyo, Japan.
• Tokyo Fire Insurance, predecessor of Sompo Japan Nipponkoa Insurance, is founded.
• Taiwan becomes a Chinese province
• Global construction and real estate development company Skanska is founded in Malmö, Sweden.
• American financial services company A. G. Edwards is founded by General Albert Gallatin Edwards in St. Louis, Missouri.
• Heyl & Patterson Inc., a pioneer in coal unloading equipment, is founded by Edmund W. Heyl and William J. Patterson in Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania.
• The first battery rail car is used on the Royal Bavarian State Railways.

  Births

January–February

• January 1
• * Wilhelm Canaris, head of German military intelligence in World War II
• * Max Ritter von Müller, German World War I fighter ace
• January 2 – Mayme Ousley, American politician and the first female mayor in Missouri history
• January 3 - August Macke, German painter
• January 10 - Robinson Jeffers, American poet
• January 13 - Jorge Chávez, Peruvian aviator
• January 17 - Ola Raknes, Norwegian psychoanalyst, philologist
• January 19 - Alexander Woollcott, American intellectual
• January 23
• * Miklós Kállay, 34th prime minister of Hungary
• * Dorothy Payne Whitney, American-born philanthropist, social activist
• January 28 - Arthur Rubinstein, Polish-born pianist and conductor
• February 2 - Ernst Hanfstaengl, German-born American businessman and politician
• February 3 - Georg Trakl, Austrian poet
• February 5 - Corneliu Dragalina, Romanian general
• February 6 - Josef Frings, Archbishop of Cologne
• February 12 - Edelmiro Julián Farrell, Argentine general, 28th President of Argentina
• February 17
• * Joseph Bech, Luxembourgish politician, 2-time prime minister of Luxembourg
• * Leevi Madetoja, Finnish composer
• February 20 - Vincent Massey, Governor General of Canada
• February 21 - Korechika Anami, Japanese general