1885 in the United States
Encyclopedia
Incumbents
- PresidentPresident of the United StatesThe President of the United States of America is the head of state and head of government of the United States. The president leads the executive branch of the federal government and is the commander-in-chief of the United States Armed Forces....
: Chester A. ArthurChester A. ArthurChester Alan Arthur was the 21st President of the United States . Becoming President after the assassination of President James A. Garfield, Arthur struggled to overcome suspicions of his beginnings as a politician from the New York City Republican machine, succeeding at that task by embracing...
(RepublicanRepublican Party (United States)The Republican Party is one of the two major contemporary political parties in the United States, along with the Democratic Party. Founded by anti-slavery expansion activists in 1854, it is often called the GOP . The party's platform generally reflects American conservatism in the U.S...
) (until March 4), Grover ClevelandGrover ClevelandStephen Grover Cleveland was the 22nd and 24th president of the United States. Cleveland is the only president to serve two non-consecutive terms and therefore is the only individual to be counted twice in the numbering of the presidents...
(DemocraticDemocratic Party (United States)The Democratic Party is one of two major contemporary political parties in the United States, along with the Republican Party. The party's socially liberal and progressive platform is largely considered center-left in the U.S. political spectrum. The party has the lengthiest record of continuous...
) (starting March 4) - Vice PresidentVice President of the United StatesThe Vice President of the United States is the holder of a public office created by the United States Constitution. The Vice President, together with the President of the United States, is indirectly elected by the people, through the Electoral College, to a four-year term...
:- until March 4: vacant
- March 4–November 25: Thomas A. HendricksThomas A. HendricksThomas Andrews Hendricks was an American politician who served as a Representative and a Senator from Indiana, the 16th Governor of Indiana , and the 21st Vice President of the United States...
(DemocraticDemocratic Party (United States)The Democratic Party is one of two major contemporary political parties in the United States, along with the Republican Party. The party's socially liberal and progressive platform is largely considered center-left in the U.S. political spectrum. The party has the lengthiest record of continuous...
) - starting November 25: vacant
- Chief JusticeChief Justice of the United StatesThe Chief Justice of the United States is the head of the United States federal court system and the chief judge of the Supreme Court of the United States. The Chief Justice is one of nine Supreme Court justices; the other eight are the Associate Justices of the Supreme Court of the United States...
: Morrison WaiteMorrison WaiteMorrison Remick Waite, nicknamed "Mott" was the seventh Chief Justice of the United States from 1874 to 1888.-Early life and education:... - Speaker of the House of RepresentativesSpeaker of the United States House of RepresentativesThe Speaker of the United States House of Representatives, or Speaker of the House, is the presiding officer of the United States House of Representatives...
: John G. Carlisle (DDemocratic Party (United States)The Democratic Party is one of two major contemporary political parties in the United States, along with the Republican Party. The party's socially liberal and progressive platform is largely considered center-left in the U.S. political spectrum. The party has the lengthiest record of continuous...
-Kentucky) - CongressUnited States CongressThe United States Congress is the bicameral legislature of the federal government of the United States, consisting of the Senate and the House of Representatives. The Congress meets in the United States Capitol in Washington, D.C....
: 48th48th United States CongressThe Forty-eighth United States Congress was a meeting of the legislative branch of the United States federal government, consisting of the United States Senate and the United States House of Representatives. It met in Washington, D.C. from March 4, 1883 to March 4, 1885, during the last two years...
(until March 4), 49th49th United States CongressThe Forty-ninth United States Congress was a meeting of the legislative branch of the United States federal government, consisting of the United States Senate and the United States House of Representatives. It met in Washington, D.C. from March 4, 1885 to March 4, 1887, during the first two years...
(starting March 4)
Events
January–March
- February 9 – The first JapanJapanJapan is an island nation in East Asia. Located in the Pacific Ocean, it lies to the east of the Sea of Japan, China, North Korea, South Korea and Russia, stretching from the Sea of Okhotsk in the north to the East China Sea and Taiwan in the south...
ese arrive in HawaiiHawaiiHawaii is the newest of the 50 U.S. states , and is the only U.S. state made up entirely of islands. It is the northernmost island group in Polynesia, occupying most of an archipelago in the central Pacific Ocean, southwest of the continental United States, southeast of Japan, and northeast of...
. - February 21 – United States President Chester A. ArthurChester A. ArthurChester Alan Arthur was the 21st President of the United States . Becoming President after the assassination of President James A. Garfield, Arthur struggled to overcome suspicions of his beginnings as a politician from the New York City Republican machine, succeeding at that task by embracing...
dedicates the Washington MonumentWashington MonumentThe Washington Monument is an obelisk near the west end of the National Mall in Washington, D.C., built to commemorate the first U.S. president, General George Washington...
. - March 3 – A subsidiary of the American Bell Telephone Company, American Telephone and Telegraph (AT&T), is incorporated in New YorkNew YorkNew York is a state in the Northeastern region of the United States. It is the nation's third most populous state. New York is bordered by New Jersey and Pennsylvania to the south, and by Connecticut, Massachusetts and Vermont to the east...
. - March 4 – Grover ClevelandGrover ClevelandStephen Grover Cleveland was the 22nd and 24th president of the United States. Cleveland is the only president to serve two non-consecutive terms and therefore is the only individual to be counted twice in the numbering of the presidents...
is inauguratedFirst inauguration of Grover ClevelandThe first inauguration of Grover Cleveland as the 22nd President of the United States took place on March 4, 1885. The inauguration marked the commencement of the first four-year term of Grover Cleveland as president and the only term of Thomas A. Hendricks as Vice President. Cleveland was also...
as President of the United StatesPresident of the United StatesThe President of the United States of America is the head of state and head of government of the United States. The president leads the executive branch of the federal government and is the commander-in-chief of the United States Armed Forces....
.
April–June
- April 30 – A bill is signed in the New York State legislature forming the Niagara Falls State ParkNiagara FallsThe Niagara Falls, located on the Niagara River draining Lake Erie into Lake Ontario, is the collective name for the Horseshoe Falls and the adjacent American Falls along with the comparatively small Bridal Veil Falls, which combined form the highest flow rate of any waterfalls in the world and has...
. - May – The Depression of 1882–85Depression of 1882–85The Depression of 1882–85 or Recession of 1882–85 was a recession in the United States that lasted from March 1882 to May 1885, according to the National Bureau of Economic Research. At 38 months in length this is the third-longest recession in the NBER's chronology of business cycles from 1854 to...
ends. - June 17 – The Statue of LibertyStatue of LibertyThe Statue of Liberty is a colossal neoclassical sculpture on Liberty Island in New York Harbor, designed by Frédéric Bartholdi and dedicated on October 28, 1886...
arrives in New York HarborNew York CityNew York is the most populous city in the United States and the center of the New York Metropolitan Area, one of the most populous metropolitan areas in the world. New York exerts a significant impact upon global commerce, finance, media, art, fashion, research, technology, education, and...
.
July–September
- July 14 – Sarah E. GoodeSarah E. GoodeSarah E. Goode was an entrepreneur and inventor. She was the first African American woman to receive a United States patent.Goode was born in 1850 into slavery. She was freed after the American Civil War and proceeded to open a furniture store in Chicago, Illinois...
is the first female African-American to apply for and receive a patentPatentA patent is a form of intellectual property. It consists of a set of exclusive rights granted by a sovereign state to an inventor or their assignee for a limited period of time in exchange for the public disclosure of an invention....
, for the invention of the hideaway bed. - August 25 – Laura Ingalls WilderLaura Ingalls WilderLaura Elizabeth Ingalls Wilder was an American author who wrote the Little House series of books based on her childhood in a pioneer family...
married Almanzo WilderAlmanzo WilderAlmanzo James Wilder was the husband of Laura Ingalls Wilder and father of Rose Wilder Lane, both noted U.S. writers.- Early life :...
. - September 2 – The Rock Springs massacreRock Springs MassacreThe Rock Springs massacre, also known as the Rock Springs Riot, occurred on September 2, 1885, in the present-day United States city of Rock Springs, Wyoming, in Sweetwater County...
occurs in Rock Springs, WyomingRock Springs, WyomingRock Springs is a city in Sweetwater County, Wyoming, United States. The population was 18,708 at the 2000 census. Rock Springs is the principal city of the Rock Springs micropolitan statistical area, which has a population of 37,975....
; 150 white miners attack their ChineseChinaChinese civilization may refer to:* China for more general discussion of the country.* Chinese culture* Greater China, the transnational community of ethnic Chinese.* History of China* Sinosphere, the area historically affected by Chinese culture...
coworkers, killing 28, wounding 15, and forcing several hundred more out of town. - September 8 – Saint Thomas AcademySaint Thomas AcademySaint Thomas Academy , originally known as Saint Thomas Aquinas Seminary, and formerly known as Saint Thomas Military Academy is the only all male, Roman Catholic, college-preparatory, military high school in Minnesota. It is located in Mendota Heights near Saint Paul...
is founded in MinnesotaMinnesotaMinnesota is a U.S. state located in the Midwestern United States. The twelfth largest state of the U.S., it is the twenty-first most populous, with 5.3 million residents. Minnesota was carved out of the eastern half of the Minnesota Territory and admitted to the Union as the thirty-second state...
.
October–December
- October 13 – The Georgia Institute of TechnologyGeorgia Institute of TechnologyThe Georgia Institute of Technology is a public research university in Atlanta, Georgia, in the United States...
is established in AtlantaAtlanta, GeorgiaAtlanta is the capital and most populous city in the U.S. state of Georgia. According to the 2010 census, Atlanta's population is 420,003. Atlanta is the cultural and economic center of the Atlanta metropolitan area, which is home to 5,268,860 people and is the ninth largest metropolitan area in...
, GeorgiaGeorgia (U.S. state)Georgia is a state located in the southeastern United States. It was established in 1732, the last of the original Thirteen Colonies. The state is named after King George II of Great Britain. Georgia was the fourth state to ratify the United States Constitution, on January 2, 1788...
as the Georgia School of Technology. - November 25 – Vice President Thomas A. HendricksThomas A. HendricksThomas Andrews Hendricks was an American politician who served as a Representative and a Senator from Indiana, the 16th Governor of Indiana , and the 21st Vice President of the United States...
dies in office. - December 1 – The U.S. Patent Office acknowledges this date as the day Dr PepperDr PepperDr Pepper is a soft drink, marketed as having a unique flavor. The drink was created in the 1880s by Charles Alderton of Waco, Texas and first served around 1885. Dr Pepper was first nationally marketed in the United States in 1904 and is now also sold in Europe, Asia, Canada, Mexico, Australia ...
is served for the very first time; the exact date of Dr Pepper's invention is unknown.
Undated
- The first skyscraperSkyscraperA skyscraper is a tall, continuously habitable building of many stories, often designed for office and commercial use. There is no official definition or height above which a building may be classified as a skyscraper...
(the Home Insurance BuildingHome Insurance BuildingThe Home Insurance Building was built in 1884 in Chicago, Illinois, USA and destroyed in 1931 to make way for the Field Building . It was the first building to use structural steel in its frame, but the majority of its structure was composed of cast and wrought iron...
) is built in ChicagoChicagoChicago is the largest city in the US state of Illinois. With nearly 2.7 million residents, it is the most populous city in the Midwestern United States and the third most populous in the US, after New York City and Los Angeles...
, IllinoisIllinoisIllinois is the fifth-most populous state of the United States of America, and is often noted for being a microcosm of the entire country. With Chicago in the northeast, small industrial cities and great agricultural productivity in central and northern Illinois, and natural resources like coal,...
, USA (10 floors). - Michigan Technological UniversityMichigan Technological UniversityMichigan Technological University is a public research university located in Houghton, Michigan, United States. Its main campus sits on on a bluff overlooking Portage Lake...
(originally Michigan Mining School) opens its doors for the first time in what is now the Houghton County Fire Hall. - Camp DudleyCamp Dudley, YMCAFounded in 1885 by Sumner F. Dudley, Camp Dudley YMCA is the oldest continually running boys camp in the United States. It is located in Westport, New York, on the shores of Lake Champlain...
, the oldest continually running boys' camp in America, is founded.