1879 in the United States

← 1878 1877 1876 1879 in the United States → 1880 1881 1882
Decades:	1850s 1860s 1870s 1880s 1890s
See also:	History of the United States (1865–1918) Timeline of the history of the United States (1860-1899) List of years in the United States

Events from the year 1879 in the United States.

Incumbents

Federal government

• President: Rutherford B. Hayes (R-Ohio)
• Vice President: William A. Wheeler (R-New York)
• Chief Justice: Morrison Waite (Ohio)
• Speaker of the House of Representatives: Samuel J. Randall (D-Pennsylvania)
• Congress: 45th (until March 4), 46th (starting March 4)

State governments

Governors and lieutenant governors

Governors Governor of Alabama: Rufus W. Cobb (Democratic) Governor of Arkansas: William Read Miller (Democratic) Governor of California: William Irwin (Democratic) Governor of Colorado: John Long Routt (Republican) (until January 14), Frederick Walker Pitkin (Republican) (starting January 14) Governor of Connecticut: Richard D. Hubbard (Democratic) (until January 9), Charles B. Andrews (Republican) (starting January 9) Governor of Delaware: John P. Cochran (Democratic) (until January 21), John W. Hall (Democratic) (starting January 21) Governor of Florida: George Franklin Drew (Democratic) Governor of Georgia: Alfred H. Colquitt (Democratic) Governor of Illinois: Shelby Moore Cullom (Republican) Governor of Indiana: James D. Williams (Democratic) Governor of Iowa: John H. Gear (Republican) Governor of Kansas: George T. Anthony (Republican) (until January 13), John P. St. John (Republican) (starting January 13) Governor of Kentucky: James B. McCreary (Democratic) (until September 2), Luke P. Blackburn (Democratic) (starting September 2) Governor of Louisiana: Francis T. Nicholls (Democratic) Governor of Maine: Seldon Connor (Republican) (until January 8), Alonzo Garcelon (Democratic) (starting January 8) Governor of Maryland: John Lee Carroll (Democratic) Governor of Massachusetts: Alexander H. Rice (Republican) (until January 2), Thomas Talbot (Republican) (starting January 2) Governor of Michigan: Charles Croswell (Republican) Governor of Minnesota: John S. Pillsbury (Republican) Governor of Mississippi: John M. Stone (Democratic) Governor of Missouri: John Smith Phelps (Democratic) Governor of Nebraska: Silas Garber (Republican) (until January 9), Albinus Nance (Republican) (starting January 9) Governor of Nevada: Lewis R. Bradley (Democratic) (until January 6), John H. Kinkead (Republican) (starting January 6) Governor of New Hampshire: Benjamin F. Prescott (Republican) (until June 5), Natt Head (Republican) (starting June 5) Governor of New Jersey: George B. McClellan (Democratic) Governor of New York: Lucius Robinson (Democratic) (until end of December 31) Governor of North Carolina: Zebulon Baird Vance (Democratic) (until February 5), Thomas Jordan Jarvis (Democratic) (starting February 5) Governor of Ohio: Richard M. Bishop (Democratic) Governor of Oregon: W. W. Thayer (Democratic) Governor of Pennsylvania: John F. Hartranft (Republican) (until January 21), Henry M. Hoyt (Republican) (starting January 21) Governor of Rhode Island: Charles C. Van Zandt (Republican) Governor of South Carolina: Wade Hampton III (Democratic) (until February 26), William Dunlap Simpson (Democratic) (starting February 26) Governor of Tennessee: James D. Porter (Democratic) (until February 16), Albert S. Marks (Democratic) (starting February 16) Governor of Texas: Richard B. Hubbard (Democratic) (until January 21), Oran M. Roberts (Democratic) (starting January 21) Governor of Vermont: Redfield Proctor (Republican) Governor of Virginia: Frederick W. M. Holliday (Democratic) Governor of West Virginia: Henry M. Mathews (Democratic) Governor of Wisconsin: William E. Smith (Republican) Lieutenant governors Lieutenant Governor of California: James A. Johnson (Democratic) Lieutenant Governor of Colorado: Lafayette Head (Republican) (until January 14), Horace Austin Warner Tabor (Republican) (starting January 14) Lieutenant Governor of Connecticut: Francis Loomis (Democratic) (until January 9), David Gallup (Republican) (starting January 9) Lieutenant Governor of Florida: Noble A. Hull (Democratic) (until month and day unknown), vacant (starting month and day unknown) Lieutenant Governor of Illinois: Andrew Shuman (Republican) Lieutenant Governor of Indiana: Isaac P. Gray (Democratic) Lieutenant Governor of Iowa: Frank T. Campbell (Republican) Lieutenant Governor of Kansas: Lyman U. Humphrey (Republican) Lieutenant Governor of Kentucky: John C. Underwood (Democratic) (until September 2), James E. Cantrill (Democratic) (starting September 2) Lieutenant Governor of Louisiana: Louis A. Wiltz (Democratic) Lieutenant Governor of Massachusetts: Horatio G. Knight (Republican) (until January 2), John D. Long (Republican) (starting January 2) Lieutenant Governor of Michigan: Alonzo Sessions (Republican) Lieutenant Governor of Minnesota: James Wakefield (Republican) Lieutenant Governor of Mississippi: William H. Sims (Democratic) Lieutenant Governor of Missouri: Henry Clay Brockmeyer (Democratic) Lieutenant Governor of Nebraska: Othman A. Abbott (Republican) (until January 9), Edmund C. Carns (Republican) (starting January 9) Lieutenant Governor of Nevada: Jewett W. Adams (Democratic) Lieutenant Governor of New York: William Dorsheimer (Democratic) (until end of December 31) Lieutenant Governor of North Carolina: Thomas J. Jarvis (Democratic) (until February 5), vacant (starting February 5) Lieutenant Governor of Ohio: Jabez W. Fitch (Democratic) Lieutenant Governor of Pennsylvania: John Latta (Democratic) (until January 21), Charles Warren Stone (Republican) (starting January 21) Lieutenant Governor of Rhode Island: Albert Howard (Republican) Lieutenant Governor of South Carolina: William Dunlap Simpson (Democratic) (until February 26), vacant (starting February 26) Lieutenant Governor of Tennessee: Hugh M. McAdoo (Democratic) (until month and day unknown), John R. Neal (Democratic) (starting month and day unknown) Lieutenant Governor of Texas: vacant (until January 21), Joseph Draper Sayers (Democratic) (starting January 21) Lieutenant Governor of Vermont: Eben Pomeroy Colton (Republican) Lieutenant Governor of Virginia: James A. Walker (Democratic) Lieutenant Governor of Wisconsin: James M. Bingham (Republican)

Events

December 31: Edison demonstrates his light bulb.

• January – The constitution of California is ratified.
• January 1 – The Specie Resumption Act takes effect: the Greenback is valued the same as gold for the first time since the American Civil War.
• February 12 – At New York City's Madison Square Garden, the first artificial ice rink in North America opens.
• February 15 – Women's rights: 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.
• April 8 – Milk sold in glass bottles for the first time.
• April 12 – Mary Baker Eddy founds the Church of Christ, Scientist in Boston. ^[1]
• May 10
  • The Archaeological Institute of America (AIA) is formed.
  • Meteorite falls near Estherville, Iowa.
• May 30 – New York City's Gilmore's Garden is renamed Madison Square Garden after President James Madison by William Henry Vanderbilt, and is opened to the public at 26th Street and Madison Avenue.
• June 21 – Infielder William White plays in one game for the Providence Grays and in conjecture becomes the first African American to play MLB.
• July 1 – 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 8 – The ill-fated U.S. Jeannette Expedition departs San Francisco in an attempt to reach the North Pole by pioneering a route through the Bering Strait.
• July 19 – Doc Holliday kills for the first time after a man shoots up Holliday's New Mexico saloon.
• September – Henry George self-publishes his major work Progress and Poverty . ^[2]
• September 25 – Deadwood, South Dakota fire: 2000 people are left homeless and 300 buildings destroyed; total loss of property is estimated at $3 million.
• September 29 – Meeker Massacre: Nathan Meeker and others are killed in an uprising at the White River Ute Indian Reservation in Colorado.
• October 22 – Using a filament of carbonized thread, Thomas Edison tests the first practical electric light bulb (it lasts 13½ hours before burning out).
• November – Simmons College of Kentucky, a historically black school, is founded.
• December 31 – Thomas Edison demonstrates incandescent lighting to the public for the first time in Menlo Park, New Jersey.
• Undated – Laton Alton Huffman photographs Native American woman Pretty Nose. ^[3]

Ongoing

• Gilded Age (1869–c. 1896)
• Depression of 1873–79 (1873–1879)

Sport

• September 26 – The Providence Grays defeat the Boston Red Caps 7–6 to clinch their First National League pennant

Births

• January 3 – Grace Coolidge, First Lady of the United States and Second Lady of the United States as wife of Calvin Coolidge (died 1957)
• January 12
  • Ray Harroun, race car driver (died 1968)
  • Calbraith Perry Rodgers, pioneer aviator, makes first transcontinental U.S. flight (died 1912 in aviation accident)
• January 13 – Melvin Jones, founder of Lions Clubs International (died 1961)
• January 20 – Ruth St. Denis, dancer (died 1968)
• February 3 – Guy Gillette, U.S. Senator from Iowa from 1936 to 1945 (died 1973)
• February 12 – George McGill, U.S. Senator from Kansas from 1930 to 1939 (died 1963)
• February 17 – Dorothy Canfield Fisher, activist and novelist (died 1958)
• March 6 – William P. Cronan, 19th Naval Governor of Guam (died 1929)
• March 18 – Emma Carus, opera singer (died 1927)
• March 27 – Edward Steichen, photographer, painter and curator (died 1973)
• April 1 – Louise Gunning, vaudeville singer (died 1960)
• April 9 – Thomas Meighan, film actor (died 1936)
• April 14 – James Branch Cabell, novelist (died 1958)
• April 24 – Oris Paxton Van Sweringen, financier (died 1936)
• May 3 – Clyde L. Herring, U.S. Senator from Iowa from 1937 to 1943 (died 1945)
• May 12
  • George Landenberger, U.S. Navy captain and 23rd Governor of American Samoa (died 1936)
  • Georgia Ann Robinson, community worker, first African American woman to be appointed a Los Angeles police officer (died 1961)
• May 19
  • Nancy Astor, née Langhorne, American-born British politician (died 1964 in the United Kingdom)
  • Waldorf Astor, American-born British politician and newspaper proprietor (died 1952 in the United Kingdom)
• May 22 – Eastwood Lane, composer (died 1951)
• June 3 – Raymond Pearl, biologist (died 1940)
• June 13 – Lois Weber, film director and screenwriter (died 1939)
• June 21 – Henry Creamer, songwriter (died 1930)
• July 1
  • Nicky Arnstein, professional gambler and con artist, married to Fanny Brice (died 1965)
  • H. Craig Severance, architect (died 1941)
• July 10 – Charles P. Snyder, admiral (died 1964)
• July 28 – Lucy Burns, women's rights campaigner (died 1966)
• August 2 – James M. Tunnell, U.S. Senator from Delaware from 1941 to 1947 (died 1957)
• August 8 – Wesley Newcomb Hohfeld, professor of jurisprudence (died 1918)
• August 15 – Ethel Barrymore, actress (died 1959)
• August 20 – Ralph Budd, railroad president (died 1962)
• August 27 – Otis F. Glenn, U.S. Senator from Illinois from 1928 to 1933 (died 1959)
• August 28 – Sydney Ayres, silent film actor (died 1916)
• September 13 – James Larkin Pearson, poet and newspaper publisher, North Carolina Poet Laureate from 1953 to 1981 (died 1981)
• September 14 – Margaret Sanger, birth control advocate (died 1966) ^[4]
• September 19 – Louis Joseph Vance, novelist (died 1933)
• October 2 – Wallace Stevens, poet (died 1955)
• October 5 – Francis Peyton Rous, pathologist, recipient of the Nobel Prize in Physiology or Medicine in 1966 (died 1970)
• October 12 – Chris Smith, African American vaudeville composer and performer (died 1949)
• October 15 – Jane Darwell, née Patti Woodard, actress (died 1967)
• October 21 – Eugene Burton Ely, pioneer aviator (died 1911 in aviation accident)
• November 2 – Marion Jones Farquhar, tennis player (died 1965) ^[5]
• November 4 – Will Rogers, humorist (died 1935)
• November 5 – Hannah J. Patterson, suffragist and social activist (died 1937)
• November 10 – Vachel Lindsay, poet (died 1931)
• November 15 – Lewis Stone, actor, known for playing Judge Hardy (died 1953)
• November 26 – Charles Goddard, playwright and screenwriter (died 1951)
• November 28 – Guy V. Howard, U.S. Senator from Minnesota from 1936 to 1937 (died 1954)
• December 1 – Beth Slater Whitson, lyricist (died 1930)
• December 4 – Richard Von Albade Gammon, University of Georgia football fullback (died 1897)
• December 5 – Clyde Cessna, aviator, aircraft designer and manufacturer (died 1954)
• December 10 – Jouett Shouse, politician (died 1968)
• December 12 – Laura Hope Crews, actress (died 1942)
• December 15 – Bert H. Miller, U.S. Senator from Idaho in 1949 (died 1949)
• December 20 – Earle Ovington, aviator, flew first experimental airmail (died 1936)
• December 25 – Grace George, actress (died 1961)
• December 26 – Christie Benet, U.S. Senator from South Carolina in 1918 (died 1951)
• December 28
  • Arthur O. Austin, electrical engineer and inventor (died 1964)
  • Billy Mitchell, general, military aviation pioneer (died 1936)

Deaths

• February 2 – Richard Henry Dana Sr., poet, critic and lawyer (born 1787)
• March 2
  • John Eberhard Faber, pencil manufacturer (born 1822 in Germany)
  • Wade Keyes, Acting Confederate States Attorney General in 1861 and 1863–1864 (born 1821)
• March 16 – George Goldthwaite, U.S. Senator from Alabama from 1871 to 1877 (born 1809)
• April 12 – Richard Taylor, Confederate general (born 1826)
• April 30 – Sarah Josepha Hale, writer (born 1788)
• May 24 – William Lloyd Garrison, abolitionist (born 1805)
• June 1
  • James Shields, U.S. Senator from Illinois from 1849 to 1855, from Minnesota from 1858 to 1859 and from Missouri in 1879 (born 1810 in Ireland)
  • Louisa Caroline Huggins Tuthill, children's writer (born 1799)
• June 26 – Richard H. Anderson, United States Army officer during the Mexican–American War, Confederate general during the American Civil War (born 1821) ^[6]
• July 4 – Sarah Dorsey, novelist and historian (born 1829)
• July 7 – George Caleb Bingham, realist painter (born 1811)
• July 11 – William Allen, U.S. Senator from Ohio from 1837 to 1849 (born 1803)
• July 16 – Frederick Langenheim, pioneer of panoramic photography (born 1809 in Germany)
• July 26 – Robert Ward Johnson, U.S. Senator from Arkansas from 1862 to 1865 (born 1814)
• August 30 – John Bell Hood, Confederate general (born 1831)
• September 8 – William Morris Hunt, painter (born 1824)
• September 30 – Francis Gillette, U.S. Senator from Connecticut from 1854 to 1855 (born 1807)
• October 11 – Ethel Lynn Beers, poet (born 1827)
• October 13 – Henry Charles Carey, economist (born 1793)
• October 31
  • Jacob Abbott, children's writer (born 1803)
  • Joseph Hooker, Union Army general during the American Civil War (born 1814)
• November 1 – Zachariah Chandler, U.S. Senator from Michigan from 1857 to 1875 and in 1879 (born 1813)
• December 31 – George S. Houston, Governor of Alabama from 1874 to 1878 and U.S. Senator from Alabama in 1879 (born 1811)

See also

• Timeline of United States history (1860–1899)

References

1. "Biography of Mary Baker Eddy". ChristianScience.com.
2. Commercially published in 1880 by D. Appleton & Company, New York.
3. "Review: The High's "Go West!" finds sweet spot where popular appeal and substance meet". ArtsATL. Archived from the original on 2015-09-21. Retrieved 2015-07-27.
4. "Margaret Sanger | Biography, Birth Control, & Significance | Britannica". www.britannica.com. Retrieved 7 March 2022.
5. "Olympedia – Marion Jones". www.olympedia.org. Retrieved 20 July 2021.
6. "Richard Heron Anderson | American general". Encyclopedia Britannica. Retrieved 26 January 2021.

External links

• Media related to 1879 in the United States at Wikimedia Commons