Year 1885 (MDCCCLXXXV) was a common year starting on Thursday (link will display the full calendar) of the Gregorian calendar and a common year starting on Tuesday of the 12-day slower Julian calendar.

Events

January–March

Feb. 21]]: Washington Monument dedicated.

• January 4 – The first successful appendectomy is performed by Dr. William W. Grant on Mary Gartside.
• January 20 – L.A. Thompson patents the roller coaster.
• January 24 – Edge Hill College opens in Liverpool
• January 26 – Troops loyal to the Mahdi Muhammad Ahmad conquer Khartoum.
• February 5 – King L opold II of Belgium establishes the Congo Free State as a personal possession.
• February 7 – The play La vida alegre y muerte triste by dramatist Jos Echegaray opens.
• February 9 – The first Japanese arrive in Hawaii.
• February 21 – United States President Chester A. Arthur dedicates the Washington Monument.
• February 23 – A British executioner fails to hang John 'Babbacombe' Lee. Lee, sentenced for the murder of Emma Keyse, has his sentence commuted to life imprisonment.
• February 26 – The final act of the Berlin Conference regulates European colonization and trade in Africa.
• February 28 – February concludes without having a full moon.
• March–May – The North-West Rebellion is suppressed in Canada.
• March 3 – A subsidiary of the American Bell Telephone Company, American Telephone and Telegraph (AT&T), is incorporated in New York.
• March 4 – Grover Cleveland succeeds Chester A. Arthur as President of the United States.
• March 14 – W. S. Gilbert and Arthur Sullivan's The Mikado opens at the Savoy Theatre.
• March 26 – The Times reports that "A lady well-known in literary and scientific circles" has been cremated by the Cremation Society in Woking, Surrey. Jeannette C. Pickersgill is the first person to be officially cremated in the United Kingdom.
• March 26 – The Prussian government, motivated by Otto von Bismarck, expels all ethnic Poles and Jews without German citizenship from Prussia in the Prussian deportations.
• March 30 – The Battle for Kushka triggers the Panjdeh Incident, which nearly gives rise to war between the British Empire and Russian Empire.
• March 31 – The United Kingdom establishes a protectorate over Bechuanaland.

April–June

• April 2 – The battle of Frog Lake, Alberta between the Cree and mounties.
• April 3 – Gottlieb Daimler is granted a German patent for his single-cylinder water-cooled engine design.
• April 11 – Luton Town Football Club are created by the merger of (Luton) Wanderers F.C. and Luton Excelsior F.C.
• April 14 – Final engagement of Sino French War, with a French victory at K p. China withdraws its forces from Tonkin.
• April 30 – A bill is signed in the New York State legislature forming the Niagara Falls State Park.
• May 2
  • Good Housekeeping Magazine goes on sale for the first time in the United States.
  • North-West Rebellion – Battle of Cut Knife: Cree and Assiniboine warriors win their largest victory over Canadian forces.
  • The Congo Free State is established by King L opold II of Belgium.
• May 9 – May 12 – Battle of Batoche: Canadian government forces inflict a decisive defeat on M tis rebels.
• May 20 – The first public train departs Swanage station on the newly built Swanage Railway in England.
• June 17 – The Statue of Liberty arrives in New York Harbor.
• June 23 – Robert Cecil, 3rd Marquess of Salisbury becomes British Prime Minister.
• June 24 – Randolph Churchill becomes Secretary of State for India.

July–September

• July 6 – Louis Pasteur successfully tests his vaccine against rabies. The patient is Joseph Meister, a boy who was bitten by a rabid dog.
• July 14 – Sarah E. Goode is the first female African-American to apply for and receive a patent, for the invention of the hideaway bed.
• July 15 – The Reservation at Niagara Falls opens, enabling access to all for free. Thomas V. Welch is the first Superintendent of the Park.
• July 20 – Professional football (soccer) is legalized in Britain.
• July 28 – Louis Riel's trial for treason begins in Regina.
• August 19 – S Andromedae, the only supernova seen in the Andromeda Galaxy so far by astronomers, and the first ever noted outside the Milky Way, is discovered.
• September 2 – The Rock Springs Massacre occurs in Rock Springs, Wyoming; 150 white miners attack their Chinese coworkers, killing 28, wounding 15, and forcing several hundred more out of town.
• September 6 – Eastern Rumelia declares its union with Bulgaria, completing the Unification of Bulgaria.
• September 8 – Saint Thomas Academy is founded in Minnesota.
• September 12 – Arbroath 36-0 Bon Accord, the highest score ever in professional soccer.
• September 15 – A train wreck of the P.T. Barnum Circus kills giant elephant Jumbo.
• September 18 – The union of Eastern Rumelia with Bulgaria is proclaimed at Plovdiv.
• September 30 – A British force abolishes the Boer republic of Stellaland and adds it to British Bechuanaland.

October–December

• October 13 – The Georgia Institute of Technology is established in Atlanta, Georgia as the Georgia School of Technology.
• November – The Third Burmese War begins.
• November 7 – Canadian Pacific Railway: In Craigellachie, British Columbia, construction ends on a railway extending across Canada. Prime Minister Sir John A. Macdonald considers the project to be vital to Canada due to the exponentially greater potential for military mobility.
• November 14–November 28 – Serbo-Bulgarian War: Serbia declares war against Bulgaria but is defeated in the Battle of Slivnitsa on November 17–November 19.
• November 16 – Louis Riel, Canadian rebel leader of the M tis, is executed for high treason.
• December 1 – The U.S. Patent Office acknowledges this date as the day Dr Pepper is served for the very first time; the exact date of Dr Pepper's invention is unknown.
• December 28 – 72 Indian lawyers, academics and journalists gather in Bombay to form the Congress Party.

Date unknown

The Benz Patent Motorwagen was built in 1885

• Karl Benz produces the Benz Patent-Motorwagen, regarded as the first automobile (patented and publicly launched the following year).^[1]
• Gottlieb Daimler and Wilhelm Maybach produce the Daimler Reitwagen, regarded as the first motorcycle.^[2][3][4]
• John Kemp Starley demonstrates the Rover safety bicycle, regarded as the first practical modern bicycle.^[5]
• Chile's Matrimony and Civil Registry laws come into effect.
• A cholera outbreak occurs in Spain.
• The Committee of Fifteen tries to expel all remaining Chinese from the Puget Sound area.
• Nikola Tesla sells a number of his patents to George Westinghouse.
• Millwall F.C. are founded by workers on the Isle of Dogs as Millwall Rovers.
• The first skyscraper (the Home Insurance Building) is built in Chicago, Illinois, USA (10 floors).
• Bicycle Playing Cards are first produced.
• Soldiers' and Sailors' Families Association is established in the UK to provide charitable assistance.
• Camp Dudley, the oldest continually running boys' camp in America, is founded.
• John Ormsby publishes his new English translation of Don Quixote, acclaimed as the most scholarly made up to that time. It will remain in print through the 20th Century.
• Michigan Technological University (originally Michigan Mining School) opens its doors for the first time in what is now the Houghton County Fire Hall.

Births

January–March

• January 6 – Florence Turner, American actress (d. 1946)
• January 8 – John Curtin, Prime Minister of Australia (d. 1945)
• January 11
  • Jack Hoxie, American actor, rodeo performer (d. 1965)
  • Alice Paul, American women's rights activist (d. 1977)
• January 16 – Zhou Zuoren, Chinese writer (d. 1967)
• January 21 – Umberto Nobile, Italian politician and airship designer (d. 1978)
• January 26 – Michael Considine, Australian politician (d. 1959)
• January 27
  • Jerome Kern, American composer (d. 1945)
  • Eduard K nneke, German composer (d. 1953)
  • Harry Ruby, American musician, composer, and writer (d. 1974)
• January 28 – Wladyslaw Raczkiewicz, former President of Poland (d. 1947)
• February 1 – Friedrich Kellner, German diarist, (d. 1970)
• February 7
  • Sinclair Lewis, American writer, Nobel Prize laureate (d. 1951)
  • Hugo Sperrle, German field marshal (d. 1953)
• February 9 – Alban Berg, Austrian composer (d. 1935)
• February 13
  • Bess Truman, First Lady of the United States (d. 1982)
  • George Fitzmaurice, French-American Motion Picture director (d. 1940)
• February 14
  • Syed Zafarul Hasan, Muslim philosopher (d. 1949)
  • Zengo Yoshida, Japanese admiral (d. 1966)
• February 15 – Princess Alice of Battenberg (d. 1969)
• February 18 – Richard S. Edwards, American admiral (d. 1956)
• February 21 – Sacha Guitry, Russian-born dramatist, writer, director, and actor (d. 1957)
• February 24
  • Chester Nimitz, U.S. admiral (d. 1966)
  • Stanis aw Ignacy Witkiewicz, Polish writer and painter (d. 1939)
• March 6 – Ring Lardner, American writer (d. 1933)
• March 7 – John Tovey, British admiral of the fleet (d. 1971)
• March 11 – Sir Malcolm Campbell, English land and water racer (d. 1948)
• March 14 – Raoul Lufbery, World War I American pilot (d. 1918)
• March 31 – Pascin, Bulgarian painter (d. 1930)

April–June

• April 1 – Wallace Beery, American actor (d. 1949)
• April 3 – Allan Dwan, Canadian-born film director (d. 1981)
• April 4 – Bee Ho Gray, Wild West star, silent film actor and vaudeville performer (d. 1951)
• April 13
  • Otto Plath, father of American Poet, Sylvia Plath, and entomologist (d. 1940)
  • Vean Gregg, American baseball player (d. 1964)
• April 17 – Karen Blixen, Danish author (d. 1962)
• May 2 – Hedda Hopper, American columnist (d. 1966)
• May 5 – Agust n P o Barrios, Paraguayan guitarist and composer (d. 1944)
• May 7 – George 'Gabby' Hayes, American actor (d. 1969)
• May 9 – Eduard C. Lindeman, American social worker and author (d. 1953)
• May 12 – Paltiel Daykan, Russian-born Israeli jurist (d. 1969)
• May 14 – Otto Klemperer, German conductor (d. 1973)
• May 21
  • Oscar A.C. Lund, Swedish film actor, director, and writer (d. 1963)
  • Sophie of Sch nburg-Waldenburg, consort of William of Wied, Prince of Albania (d. 1936)
• May 22 – Toyoda Soemu, Japanese admiral (d. 1957)
• May 24 – Susan Sutherland Isaacs, educational psychologist and psychoanalyst (d.1948)
• May 27 – Richmond K. Turner, American admiral (d. 1961)
• June 5 – Georges Mandel, French politician and World War II hero (d. 1944)
• June 9 – John Edensor Littlewood, British mathematician (d. 1977)
• June 14 – E. L. Grant Watson, writer, anthropologist, and biologist (d. 1970)
• June 19 – John Palm, Cura ao born composer (d. 1925)
• June 22 – Milan Vidmar, Slovenian electrical engineer and chess player (d. 1962)

July–September

• July 4 – Louis B. Mayer, American film producer (d. 1957)
• July 6 – Ernst Busch, German field marshal (d. 1945)
• July 14 – King Sisavang Vong of Laos (d. 1959)
• July 28 – Monte Attell, American boxer (d. 1960)
• August 1 – George de Hevesy, Hungarian chemist, Nobel Prize laureate (d. 1966)
• August 7 – Billie Burke, American actress (d. 1970)
• September 11 – D. H. Lawrence, English author (d. 1930)
• September 22 – Ben Chifley, Prime Minister of Australia (d. 1951)
• September 22 – Erich Von Stroheim, Austrian-born motion picture actor & director (d. 1957)
• September 25 – Mineichi Koga, Japanese admiral (d. 1944)

October–December

• October 3 – Sophie Treadwell, American playwright and journalist (d. 1970)
• October 7 – Niels Bohr, Danish physicist, Nobel Prize laureate (d. 1962)
• October 11 – Fran ois Mauriac, French writer, Nobel Prize laureate (d. 1970)
• October 24 – Rachel Katznelson-Shazar, Zionist political figure and wife of third President of Israel (d. 1975)
• October 30 – Ezra Pound, American poet (d. 1972)
• November 2 – Harlow Shapley, American astronomer (d. 1972)
• November 5 – Will Durant, American philosopher and writer (d. 1981)
• November 8
  • Eva Morris, last surviving person documented as born in 1885 (d. 2000)
  • Tomoyuki Yamashita, Japanese general (d. 1946)
• November 9 (October 28 (O.S.)) – Velimir Khlebnikov, Russian poet (d. 1922)
• November 11
  • George Patton, American general (d. 1945)
  • Edgar J. Kaufmann, American merchant and patron of Fallingwater (d. 1955)
• November 15 – Frederick Handley-Page, British aviation pioneer & aircraft company founder (d. 1962)
• November 20 – Heinrich Br ning, Chancellor of Germany 1930-1932 (d. 1970)
• November 30 – Albert Kesselring, German field marshal (d. 1960)
• December 2 – George Minot, American physician, recipient of the Nobel Prize in Physiology or Medicine (d. 1950)
• December 19 – Joe "King" Oliver, American jazz musician (d. 1938)

Date unknown

• Lee W. Stanley, American cartoonist (d. unknown)

Deaths

January–June

• January 11 – Mariano Ospina Rodr guez, President of Colombia (b. 1805)
• January 13 – Schuyler Colfax, Vice President of the United States (b. 1823)
• January 26 – Charles "Chinese" Gordon, British general (killed in battle) (b. 1833)
• February 1 – Sidney Gilchrist Thomas, inventor (b. 1850)
• February 8 – Nikolai Severtzov, Russian explorer and naturalist (b.1827)
• March 12 – Pr spero Fern ndez Oreamuno, President of Costa Rica (b. 1834)
• April 2 – Justo Rufino Barrios, Central American leader (b. 1835)
• April 25 – Queen Emma of Hawaii (b. 1836)
• May 2 – Ter zia Zakoucs Hungarian Slovene authoress (b. 1817)
• May 4 – Irvin McDowell, American general (b. 1818)
• May 22 – Victor Hugo, French author (b. 1802)
• June 17 – Edwin Freiherr von Manteuffel, German field marshal (b. 1809)
• June 22 – Muhammad Ahmad, Mahdi (b. 1844)

July–December

• July 23 – Ulysses S. Grant, American Civil War general and the 18th President of the United States (b. 1822)
• August – Aga Khan II, religious leader (b. 1830)
• August 10 – James Wilson Marshall, American contractor and builder of Sutter's Mill (b. 1810)
• August 29 – Moriz Ludassy, Hungarian journalist (b. 1825)
• September 6 – Narc s Monturiol i Estarriol, Catalan intellectual, artist and engineer, inventor of the first combustion engine-driven submarine, which was propelled by an early form of air-independent propulsion (b. 1819).
• September 15 – Jumbo, the great elephant & star attraction in PT Barnum's circus (train accident) (b. 1861)
• October 29 – George B. McClellan, American Civil War general (b. 1826)
• November 16 – Louis Riel, Canadian leader (hanged for treason) (b. 1844)
• November 24 – Nicol s Avellaneda, Argentine president (b. 1837)
• November 25
  • King Alfonso XII of Spain (b. 1857)
  • Thomas Hendricks, 21st Vice President of the United States (b. 1819)
• November 26 – Thomas Andrews, Irish chemist (b. 1813)
• December 8 – William Henry Vanderbilt, American entrepreneur (b. 1821)
• December 15 – Ferdinand II of Portugal, consort of Queen Maria II (b. 1816)

In fiction

• September 2–September 7 – The film Back to the Future Part III takes place during this time.

References

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