1879

1879 (MDCCCLXXIX) was a common year starting on Wednesday of the Gregorian calendar and a common year starting on Monday of the Julian calendar, the 1879th year of the Common Era (CE) and Anno Domini (AD) designations, the 879th year of the 2nd millennium, the 79th year of the 19th century, and the 10th and last year of the 1870s decade. As of the start of 1879, the Gregorian calendar was 12 days ahead of the Julian calendar, which remained in localized use until 1923.

Quick Facts

1879 in various calendars
Gregorian calendar	1879 MDCCCLXXIX
Ab urbe condita	2632
Armenian calendar	1328 ԹՎ ՌՅԻԸ
Assyrian calendar	6629
Baháʼí calendar	35–36
Balinese saka calendar	1800–1801
Bengali calendar	1285–1286
Berber calendar	2829
British Regnal year	42 Vict. 1 – 43 Vict. 1
Buddhist calendar	2423
Burmese calendar	1241
Byzantine calendar	7387–7388
Chinese calendar	戊寅年 (Earth Tiger) 4576 or 4369 — to — 己卯年 (Earth Rabbit) 4577 or 4370
Coptic calendar	1595–1596
Discordian calendar	3045
Ethiopian calendar	1871–1872
Hebrew calendar	5639–5640
Hindu calendars
- Vikram Samvat	1935–1936
- Shaka Samvat	1800–1801
- Kali Yuga	4979–4980
Holocene calendar	11879
Igbo calendar	879–880
Iranian calendar	1257–1258
Islamic calendar	1296–1297
Japanese calendar	Meiji 12 (明治１２年)
Javanese calendar	1807–1808
Julian calendar	Gregorian minus 12 days
Korean calendar	4212
Minguo calendar	33 before ROC 民前33年
Nanakshahi calendar	411
Thai solar calendar	2421–2422
Tibetan calendar	ས་ཕོ་སྟག་ལོ་ (male Earth-Tiger) 2005 or 1624 or 852 — to — ས་མོ་ཡོས་ལོ་ (female Earth-Hare) 2006 or 1625 or 853

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Events

January

January 1
- The Specie Resumption Act takes effect. The United States Note is valued the same as gold, for the first time since the American Civil War.
- Brahms' Violin Concerto is premiered in Leipzig with Joseph Joachim as soloist and the composer conducting.
January 11 – The Anglo-Zulu War begins.
January 22 – Anglo-Zulu War – Battle of Isandlwana: A force of 1,200 British soldiers is wiped out by over 20,000 Zulu warriors.
January 22: Battle of Isandlwana
January 23 – Anglo-Zulu War – Battle of Rorke's Drift: Following the previous day's defeat, a smaller British force of 140 successfully repels an attack by 4,000 Zulus.
January 22–23: Battle of Rorke's Drift

February

February 3 – Mosley Street in Newcastle upon Tyne (England) becomes the world's first public highway to be lit by the electric incandescent light bulb invented by Joseph Swan.^[1]
February 8 – At a meeting of the Royal Canadian Institute, engineer and inventor Sandford Fleming first proposes the global adoption of standard time.

March

March 3 – United States Geological Survey is founded.^[2]
March 11 – The Ryukyu Domain is incorporated into the Okinawa Prefecture of Japan and the last ruler, Shō Tai, exiled to Tokyo.
March 25 – Dvořák's Symphony No. 5 in F major, Op. 76, B. 54, is premiered (four years after being written) in Prague with Adolf Čech conducting.
March 28 – Anglo-Zulu War – Battle of Hlobane: British forces suffer a defeat.
March 29 – Anglo-Zulu War – Battle of Kambula: British forces defeat 20,000 Zulus.

April

April 5 – War of the Pacific: Chile formally declares war on Bolivia and Peru.^[3]
April 12 – Mary Baker Eddy founds the Church of Christ, Scientist in Boston, Massachusetts.
April 26 – The National Park, later renamed the Royal National Park, is declared in New South Wales, Australia, the world's second-oldest purposed national park.
April – Postman Ferdinand Cheval begins to build his Palais Idéal at Hauterives in France.

May

May 2 – The Spanish Socialist Workers' Party (Partido Socialista Obrero Español) is founded clandestinely at the Casa Labra tavern in Madrid, by printer Pablo Iglesias.^[4]
May 7 – The current constitution of the State of California in the United States is ratified.
May 10 – The Archaeological Institute of America (AIA) is formed.
May 12 – English Catholic convert John Henry Newman is elevated to Cardinal.
May 14 – The first group of 463 Indian indentured labourers arrive in Fiji, aboard the Leonidas.
May 26 – Russia and the United Kingdom sign the Treaty of Gandamak, establishing an Afghan state.
May 30 – New York City's Gilmore's Garden is renamed Madison Square Garden by William Henry Vanderbilt and is opened to the public at 26th Street and Madison Avenue.

June

June 1 – Anglo-Zulu War: Louis-Napoléon, Prince Imperial of France, son of Napoléon III, is killed in a skirmish with Zulus while attached to the British Army.^[5]
June 4 – Yasukuni Shrine is officially renamed from Tokyo Shokonsha Shrine in Japan.^[6]
June 6 – William Denny and Brothers launch the world's first ocean-going steamer to be built of mild steel, the SS Rotomahana, on the River Clyde in Scotland.^[7] On October 2 they launch the first transatlantic steamer of the same material, the SS Buenos Ayrean; on December 1 she makes her maiden voyage out of Glasgow, bound for South America.^[8]
June 14 – Sidney Faithorn Green, a priest in the Church of England, is tried and convicted for using Ritualist practices.
June 21 – German chemical company Linde is founded by Carl von Linde.
June 30 – The 1879 Surigao earthquake measuring M_w  7.4 causes major damage in the northern tip of Mindanao Island.^[9]

July

July 1
- An 8.0 earthquake shakes southern Gansu, killing 22,000 people.
- American Christian Restorationist Charles Taze Russell publishes the first issue of the monthly Zion's Watch Tower and Herald of Christ's Presence which, as The Watchtower, will become the most widely circulated magazine in the world.
July 4 – Anglo-Zulu War – Battle of Ulundi: A British victory effectively ends the war.^[10]
July 8 – Led by George W. De Long, the ill-fated United States Jeannette Expedition departs San Francisco, in an attempt to reach the North Pole, by pioneering a route through the Bering Strait.
July 16 – The city of Kotka is founded in Kymenlaakso, Finland, by separating its two islands from the old Kymi parish.^[11]

August

August 1 – Tokio Marine (insurer) is founded in Japan, as Tokio Marine Holdings.^[12]
August 16 – Fulham F.C. is founded in London as a church soccer team.
August 21 – Claimed apparition to local people at Knock, County Mayo, Ireland, of the Blessed Virgin Mary, Saint Joseph, Saint John the Evangelist and Jesus Christ (as the Lamb of God).

September

September 8 – A fire in The Octagon, Dunedin (New Zealand), claims 12 victims.
September 19 – The Blackpool Illuminations in England are switched on for the first time.
September 23 – The Macedo-Romanian Cultural Society is founded.^[13]
September 25 – A fire in Deadwood, South Dakota, leaves 2,000 people homeless and 300 buildings destroyed; total loss of property is estimated at $3 million.
September 26 – Wilhelm Marr founds the Antisemitenliga (League of Antisemites),^[14] the first German organization committed specifically to combating the alleged threat to German culture posed by Jews.
September 29 – Meeker Massacre: Nathan Meeker and others are killed in an uprising at the White River Ute Indian reservation in Colorado.
September – Henry George self-publishes his major work Progress and Poverty.^[15]

October

October 1 – University of Nebraska Cornhusker Marching Band is founded in Lincoln, Nebraska. The group will go on to perform the first football halftime show in 1892 and, under Director Donald A. Lentz, invent Band Day.
October 2 – Qing dynasty China signs the Treaty of Livadia with the Russian Empire.
October 7 – The Dual Alliance is formed by Germany and Austria-Hungary.
October 8 – War of the Pacific: Battle of Angamos – The Chilean Navy defeats Peruvian naval forces.
October 13 – The first female students are admitted to study for degrees of the University of Oxford in England, at the new Lady Margaret Hall and Somerville Hall, and with the Society of Oxford Home-Students.^[10]
October 17 – Sunderland Association Football Club is formed by a group of schoolteachers in northeast England.
October 22 – Using a filament of carbonized thread, Thomas Edison tests his first practical electric light bulb (it lasts 13+1⁄2 hours before burning out).
October 28 – The Hall effect is discovered by Edwin Hall at Johns Hopkins University in the United States.

November

November 4 – Thomas Edison applies for a patent for his invention of the incandescent light bulb (U.S. Patent 223,898 will be granted on January 27, 1880).^[16]
November 10 – The Bell Telephone Company and Western Union reach an agreement in the United States, in which the former agrees to stay out of telegraphy and the latter to keep out of the telephone business.^[17]
November – Land is acquired for Simmons College of Kentucky, a historically black school, established as a Baptist institution.