Famous birthdays, deaths and events of 1879
Birthdays
- January 1 - William Fox, Hungarian-born American film producer (d. 1952)
- January 1 - E. M. Forster, English novelist (d. 1970)
- January 3 - Grace Coolidge, First Lady of the United States (d. 1957)
- January 5 - Hans Eppinger, Austrian physician (d. 1946)
- January 9 - John Broadus Watson, American psychologist (d. 1958)
- January 12 - Ray Harroun, American race car driver (d. 1968)
- January 15 - Mazo de la Roche, Canadian author (d. 1961)
- January 18 - Henri Giraud, French general (d. 1949)
- January 19 - Boris Savinkov, Russian writer (d. 1925)
- January 28 - Francis Picabia, French-born painter and poet (d. 1953)
- February 13 - Sarojini Naidu, Indian freedom fighter (d. 1949)
- February 22 - Johannes Nicolaus Brønsted, Danish physical chemist (d. 1947)
- February 26 - Frank Bridge, English composer (d. 1941)
- March 4 - Josip Murn Aleksandrov, Slovenian poet (d. 1901)
- March 5 - Sir William Beveridge, British economist (d. 1963)
- March 8 - Otto Hahn, German Nobel Prize laureate (d. 1968)
- March 14 - Albert Einstein, German-born physicist
- March 20 - Maud Menten, Canadian biochemist (d. 1960)
- March 26 - Othmar Ammann, Swiss bridge engineer (d. 1965)
- March 27 - Miller Huggins, American baseball player and manager (d. 1929)
- March 30 - Coen de Koning, Dutch ice skater (d. 1954)
- April 13 - Edward Bruce, Director art projects (d. 1943)
- April 15 - Melville Henry Cane, American lawyer (d. 1980)
- April 20 - Paul Poiret, French couturier (d. 1944)
- April 21 - Kartini, Indonesian national figure (d. 1904)
- April 26 - Owen Willans Richardson, British physicist
- April 29 - Thomas Beecham, English conductor (d. 1961)
- May 2 - James F. Byrnes, American statesman
- May 3 - Fergus McMaster, Australian businessman (d. 1950)
- May 6 - Bedrich Hrozny, Czech orientalist (d. 1952)
- May 10 - Symon Petlura, Ukrainian statesman (d. 1926)
- May 17 - Simon Petlyura, Ukrainian independence fighter (d. 1926)
- May 19 - Nancy Astor, Viscountess Astor
- May 22 - Warwick Armstrong, Australian cricketer (d. 1947)
- May 22 - Alla Nazimova, Ukrainian-born actress
- May 23 - Dezső Lauber, Hungarian sportsman (d. 1966)
- May 24 - H. B. Reese, American inventor of Reese's and founder (d. 1956)
- May 25 - Max Aitken, 1st Baron Beaverbrook
- May 27 - Karl Bühler, German linguist and psychologist (d. 1963)
- May 27 - Hans Lammers, German SS officer (d. 1962)
- May 30 - Colin Blythe, English cricketer (d. 1917)
- June 3 - Raymond Pearl, American biologist (d. 1940)
- June 4 - Mabel Lucie Attwell, English children's author and illustrator (d. 1964)
- June 5 - Robert Mayer, German-born philanthropist (d. 1985)
- June 5 - René Pottier, French cyclist (d. 1907)
- June 7 - Knud Rasmussen, Greenland-born explorer (d. 1933)
- June 7 - Joan Voûte, Dutch astronomer (d. 1963)
- June 11 - Roger Bresnahan, baseball player (d. 1944)
- June 11 - Max Schreck, German actor (d. 1936)
- June 21 - Gemma Doyle, Victorian Debutante
- June 22 - Thibaudeau Rinfret, jurist and Chief Justice of Canada (d. 1962)
- July 1 - Léon Jouhaux, French labor leader
- July 3 - Alfred Korzybski, Polish linguist (d. 1950)
- July 5 - Wanda Landowska, Polish harpsichordist (d. 1959)
- July 5 - Dwight F. Davis, American tennis player and politician (d. 1945)
- July 9 - Ottorino Respighi, Italian composer (d. 1936)
- July 9 - Carlos Chagas, Brazilian physician (d. 1934)
- July 27 - Jack Laviolette, Canadian ice hockey player (d. 1960)
- August 7 - Johannes Kotze, South African cricketer (d. 1931)
- August 8 - Bob Smith, American founder of Alcoholics Anonymous (d. 1950)
- August 8 - Emiliano Zapata, Mexican revolutionary (d. 1919)
- August 13 - John Ireland, English composer (d. 1962)
- August 15 - Ethel Barrymore, American actress (d. 1959)
- August 18 - Aleksandr Rodzyanko, Russian general (d. 1970)
- August 31 - Alma Mahler, wife of Gustav Mahler
- September 2 - An Jung-geun, Korean assassin of Ito Hirobumi (d. 1910)
- September 6 - Joseph Wirth, Chancellor of Germany (d. 1956)
- September 6 - Max Schreck, German actor (d. 1936)
- September 14 - Margaret Sanger, American birth control advocate (d. 1966)
- September 15 - Joseph Lyons, 10th Prime Minister of Australia (d. 1939)
- September 17 - Rube Foster, American baseball player
- September 17 - Periyar E. V. Ramasamy, Indian Social Reformer (d. 1973)
- September 25 - Lope K. Santos, Filipino writer and labor leader
- September 27 - Hans Hahn, Austrian mathematician (d. 1934)
- September 27 - Cyril Scott, English composer (d. 1970)
- October 2 - Wallace Stevens, American poet (d. 1955)
- October 5 - Francis Peyton Rous, American pathologist
- October 7 - Joe Hill, American Labor Activist and Poet (d. 1915)
- October 9 - Max von Laue, German physicist
- October 15 - Jane Darwell, Academy Award-winning American actress (d. 1967)
- October 28 - Channing H. Cox, 49th Governor of Massachusetts (d. 1968)
- October 29 - Alva B. Adams, American politician (d. 1941)
- October 29 - Franz von Papen, Chancellor of Germany (d. 1969)
- October 31 - Sara Allgood, Irish actress (d. 1950)
- November 4 - Will Rogers, American humorist (d. 1935)
- November 7 - King Baggot, American actor (d. 1948)
- November 7 - Leon Trotsky, Russian revolutionary (d. 1940)
- November 9 - Milan Šufflay, Croatian politician (d. 1931)
- November 10 - Vachel Lindsay, American poet (d. 1931)
- November 10 - Patrick Pearse, Irish political activist (d. 1916)
- November 15 - Lewis Stone, American actor (d. 1953)
- November 26 - Belle da Costa Greene, American librarian (d. 1950)
- November 29 - Jacob Gade, Danish composer(d. 1963)
- December 5 - Clyde Cessna, American airplane manufacturer (d. 1954)
- December 7 - Rudolf Friml, American composer (d. 1972)
- December 18 - Paul Klee, Swiss-born painter (d. 1940)
- December 21 - Joseph Stalin, U.S.S.R Leader (d. 1953)
- December 24 - Queen Alexandrine of Denmark, Queen Consort to Christian X (d. 1952)
- December 24 - Émile Nelligan, Quebec poet (d. 1941)
- December 27 - Sydney Greenstreet, English actor (d. 1954)
- December 28 - Billy Mitchell, American military aviation pioneer (d. 1936)
- December 30 - Sri Ramana Maharshi, Indian philosopher (d. 1950)
Deaths
- January 16 - Octave Crémazie, French Canadian poet (b. 1827)
- February 11 - Honoré Daumier, French caricaturist and painter (b. 1808)
- February 23 - Albrecht Graf von Roon, Prime Minister of Prussia (b. 1803)
- March 1 - Joachim Heer, Swiss politician (b. 1825)
- March 13 - Adolf Anderssen, German chess player (b. 1818)
- March 30 - Thomas Couture, French painter and teacher (b. 1815)
- April 4 - Heinrich Wilhelm Dove, German physicist (b. 1803)
- April 16 - Bernadette Soubirous, French shepherd girl (b. 1844)
- May 15 - Gottfried Semper, German architect (b. 1803)
- May 17 - Asa Packer, railroad magnate and founder of Lehigh Valley Railroad (b. 1805)
- May 21 - Arturo Prat, Chilean naval officer (b. 1848)
- May 24 - William Lloyd Garrison, American abolitionist and publisher (b. 1805)
- June 1 - Napoléon Eugène, Prince Imperial son of Emperor Napoleon III (b. 1856)
- June 11 - Prince Willem of the Netherlands, disgraced heir apparent to the Dutch throne (b. 1840)
- July 16 - Edward Deas Thomson, Australian politician (b. 1800)
- July 17 - Maurycy Gottlieb, Ukrainian painter (b. 1856)
- August 3 - Joseph Severn, English painter (b. 1793)
- August 8 - Immanuel Hermann Fichte, German philosopher (b. 1797)
- August 30 - John Bell Hood, American Confederate general (b. 1831)
- September 14 - Bernhard von Cotta, German geologist (b. 1808)
- September 17 - Eugène Viollet-le-Duc, French architect (b. 1814)
- October 8 - Miguel Grau Seminario, Peruvian Admiral (b. 1834)
- October 28 - Marie Roch Louis Reybaud, French writer (b. 1799)
- October 31 - Jacob Abbott, American author (b. 1803)
- October 31 - Joseph Hooker, American General (b. 1814)
- November 5 - James Clerk Maxwell, Scottish physicist (b. 1831)
- December 6 - Erastus Brigham Bigelow, American industrialist (b. 1814)
Events
- January 11 - The Anglo-Zulu War begins.
- January 22 - Anglo-Zulu War: Battle of Isandlwana
- January 22 - Anglo-Zulu War: Battle of Rorke's Drift
- January 23 - Anglo-Zulu War: the Battle of Rorke's Drift ends.
- January 25 - The Bulgarian National Bank is founded.
- February 8 - Sandford Fleming first proposes adoption of Universal Standard Time at a meeting of the Royal Canadian Institute.
- February 12 - At New York City's Madison Square Garden the first artificial ice rink in North America opens.
- February 14 - The War of the Pacific breaks out when Chilean armed forces occupy the Bolivian port city of Antofagasta.
- February 15 - Women's rights: American President Rutherford B. Hayes signs a bill allowing female attorneys to argue cases before the Supreme Court of the United States.
- February 22 - In Utica, New York, Frank Woolworth opens the first of many of 5 and 10-cent Woolworth stores.
- March 3 - The United States Geological Survey is created.
- March 23 - War of the Pacific was fought between Chile and the joints forces of Bolivia and Peru. Chile successfully took over Arica and Tarapacá which left Bolivia as a landlocked country.
- March 29 - Anglo-Zulu War: Battle of Kambula: British forces defeat 20,000 Zulus.
- April 5 - Chile declares war on Bolivia and Peru, starting the War of the Pacific.
- May 14 - The first group of 463 Indian indentured labourers arrive in Fiji aboard the Leonidas.
- May 21 - War of the Pacific: Two Chilean ships blocking the harbor of Iquique (then belonging to Peru) battle two Peruvian vessels in the Battle of Iquique.
- May 26 - Russia and the United Kingdom sign the Treaty of Gandamak establishing an Afghan state.
- May 30 - New York City's Gilmores Garden is renamed Madison Square Garden by William Henry Vanderbilt and is opened to the public at 26th Street and Madison Avenue.
- May 30 - An F4 tornado strikes Irving, Kansas, killing 18 and injuring 60.
- June 1 - Napoleon Eugene, the last dynastic Bonaparte, is killed in the Anglo-Zulu War.
- July 1 - Charles Taze Russell publishes the first edition of the religious magazine The Watchtower.
- July 19 - Doc Holliday kills for the first time after a man shoots up his New Mexico saloon.
- August 7 - The opening of the Poor Man's Palace in Manchester.
- August 21 - The Virgin Mary, along with St. Joseph and St. John the Evangelist, reportedly appears to the people of Knock, County Mayo, Ireland.
- August 28 - Cetshwayo, last king of the Zulus, is captured by the British.
- September 18 - The Blackpool Illuminations are switched on for the first time.
- September 20 - Cliftonville Football Club, the oldest club in Ireland, is founded.
- October 7 - Germany and Austria-Hungary sign the "Twofold Covenant" and create the Dual Alliance.
- October 8 - War of the Pacific: the Chilean Navy defeats the Peruvian Navy in the Battle of Angamos, Peruvian Admiral Miguel Grau is killed in the encounter.
- October 21 - Using a filament of carbonized thread, Thomas Edison tests the first practical electric incandescent light bulb (it lasted 13½ hours before burning out).
- December 28 - The Tay Bridge Disaster: The central part of the Tay Rail Bridge in Dundee, Scotland collapses as a train passed over it, killing 75.
- December 31 - Thomas Edison demonstrates incandescent lighting to the public for the first time.
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