Events 1880-1893

• 1880
• Parcel post introduced to England
• Edison in U.S. and J.W. Swan in England independently patent first practical electric lights
• First performances of Gilbert & Sullivan’s Pirates of Penzance
• Lord Beaconsfield (Disraeli) resigns as British Prime Minister, succeeded by William E. Gladstone
• First British telephone directory issued by London Telephone Company
• Ballpoint pen invented
• Boer Republic declares independence from Britain in Transvaal
• Malaria traced to a blood parasite
• Typhoid fever bacillus identified
• Robert Koch discovers anthrax vaccine
• First wireless telephone message transmitted by Alexander Graham Bell
• First photographic reproductions in newspapers
• Battle of Maiwand in Afghan War
• Atheist member of Parliament, Charles Bradlaugh, unseated for refusing to take oath of office.
• 1881
• Flogging abolished in British Army, Navy
• Boers defeat British forces in South Africa, Britain recognizes independent Boer Republic
• Natural History Museum, South Kensington, London opens
• Disraeli dies
• Alexander 11, Czar of Russia, assassinated
• U.S. President James A. Garfield assassinated
• London’s Savoy Theatre opens as first electrically-illuminated public building
• Serum effective against cholera discovered
• Start of the “Disappearings” in the East End of London
• American Association of the Red Cross founded
• Photographic roll film is patented.
• 1882
• Gasoline-powered internal combustion engine invented
• Electric illumination of London begins
• London Chamber of Commerce established
• British fleet bombards Alexandria, Egypt, British troops defeat Egyptian nationalist forces and occupy Cairo, and dual control of Egypt by France and Britain abolished
• Electric fan invented
• Tuberculosis bacillus discovered
• Psychoanalysis pioneered by Viennese physician Josef Breuer, a colleague of Freud
• Oscar Wilde tours North America.
• 1883
• Krakatoa explodes near Java
• Maxim machine gun invented
• British Egyptian forces wiped out in Sudan by forces of the Mahdi
• Worldwide cholera pandemic begins
• Nietzsche’s Also Sprach Zarathustra published in first of four parts in Germany
• Karl Marx dies
• Fire guts London’s Harrod’s store; first malted milk produced in U.S.
• Dynamiters strike near Local Government Office, Whitehall
• Treasure Island by R.L. Stevenson published
• British establish control of Egypt.
• 1884
• Linotype typesetting machine patented
• Gold discovered in the Transvaal
• British General Gordon trapped at Khartoum by Mahdi following his rescue of 2,500 women, children and wounded men from the city
• First deep tube of London’s underground railway opens
• Compound steam turbine invented
• Anaesthetic properties of cocaine in medical practice discovered
• Socialist Fabian Society founded in London
• Fountain pen invented
• Dynamiters strike Old Scotland Yard
• Phonograph patented
• Statue of Liberty presented to U.S. by France.
• 1885
• Khartoum falls to Mahdi, Gen. Gordon and forces massacred
• World’s first successful gasoline drive motor vehicle reaches speed of 9 mph
• First identification system based on fingerprints devised
• Rabies vaccine devised by Pasteur
• Gilbert & Sullivan’s The Mikado opens at London’s Savoy Theatre
• Gladstone replaced as Prime Minister by the Marquis of Salisbury
• Roller coaster patented
• Dictating machine invented
• Karl Marx’ Das Kapital (Vol. 2) published
• Indian National Congress meets for first time. 
• 1886
• Britain annexes Burma
• Gold rush to South Africa’s Transvaal
• Das Kapital published in English
• Coca-Cola first goes on sale, Dr. Pepper introduced in US.
• Irish Home Rule Bill introduced to Parliament by Gladstone
• R.L. Stevenson’s Strange Case of Dr. Jekyll and Mr. Hyde published
• Typewriter ribbon patented
• Geronimo captured in U.S.
• First tuxedo introduced.
• 1887
• First round-the-world bicycle trip completed in San Francisco
• Earmuffs patented
• Abe Lincoln’s coffin opened to make sure he was still in it (he was)
• Britain annexes Zululand
• Lloyd’s of London writes its first non-maritime insurance policy
• Esperanto invented
• First Sherlock Holmes story, A Study in Scarlet, published in Beeton’s Christmas Annual
• Queen Victoria’s Golden Jubilee. 
• 1888
• Kaiser Wilhelm I1 begins reign in Germany
• Britain establishes protectorate over Sarawak and North Borneo
• Alternating current electric motor developed by Nikola Tesla
• First Kodak camera marketed
• Pneumatic bicycle tire patented
• National Geographic begins publication
• Book of the Thousand Nights and a Night by Sir Richard Burton published
• Jack the Ripper terrorizes London.
• 1889
• London dock strikes
• Cecil Rhodes’ British South Africa Company granted royal charter
• British army adopts Maxim machine gun
• Cordite patented as a smokeless explosive
• Cleveland Street scandal over a London West End homosexual brothel involves both the Prince of Wales and the Duke of Clarence
• Worldwide influenza pandemic begins
• Reporter Nellie Bly begins round-the-world journey in attempt to beat 88-day record of Jules Verne’s Phileas Fogg
• Eiffel Tower completed in Paris.
• 1890
• London’s first electric underground railway tube opens
• First execution by electrocution occurred
• Cecil Rhodes becomes prime minister of Cape Colony
• Java Man fossils found in Java
• Britain establishes protectorate over Zanzibar
• Battle of Wounded Knee ends Indian Wars in U.S. with massacre of 350 Sioux
• First volume of James Frazier’s The Golden Bough published (next 15 to follow over next 25 years)
• Bismarck dismissed as prime minister of Germany
• London’s “Disappearings” end as mysteriously as they began
• Peanut butter is invented.