1896
Centuries: 18th century - 19th century - 20th century
Decades: 1840s 1850s 1860s 1870s 1880s - 1890s - 1900s 1910s 1920s 1930s 1940s
Years: 1891 1892 1893 1894 1895 - 1896 - 1897 1898 1899 1900 1901
Events
- January 4 - Utah becomes the 45th state of the United States
- January 5 - An Austrian newspaper reports that Wilhelm Röntgen discovered a type of radiation later known as X-rays.
- January 12 - H.L. Smith takes the first x-ray photograph.
- January 18 - The X-ray machine is exhibited for the first time.
- February 1 - The opera La Boheme premieres (Turin).
- February 11 - Oscar Wilde's play Salomé premieres in Paris.
- March 1 - With the Battle of Adowa, Ethiopia defended its independence from Italy.
- April 6 - 15 April: First Olympic Games in Athens,Greece
- May 1 - Charles Tupper becomes Canada's sixth prime minister.
- May 18 - The U.S. Supreme Court announces its decision in the infamous case Plessy v. Ferguson.
- July 11 - Wilfrid Laurier becomes Canada's seventh prime minister.
- November - William McKinley defeats William Jennings Bryan in the U.S. presidential election
Births
- January 2 - Dziga Vertov, filmmaker
- January 4 - Everett Dirksen, American politician (+ 1969)
- January 12 - Rex Ingram, director and actor (+ 1950)
- January 14 - Martin Niemöller, German theologian and pacifist (+ 1984)
- January 14 - John Dos Passos, author (+ 1970)
- February 11 - Else Lasker-Schuler, writer
- February 18 - André Breton, poet, principal theoretician of surrealism
- April 30 - Gary Davis, reverend
- June 19 - Wallis Simpson, Duchess of Windsor
- December 6 - Ira Gershwin, lyricist
- December 14 - George VI Windsor, father of Elizabeth II
- December 14 - Jimmy Doolittle, American World War II General.
- December 24 - F Scott Fitzgerald, American writer.
Deaths
- January 8 - Paul Verlaine, lyric poet
- May 20: Clara Schumann, Austrian composer
- October 11: Anton Bruckner, Austrian composer
- Alfred Nobel, inventor of dynamite and creator of the Nobel Prize