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Date |
Event(s) |
| 1 | 1899 | - 6 Mar 1899: Aspirin first marketed by Bayer
- 11 Oct 1899: Start of Second Boer War
|
| 2 | 1900 | - 1900: School leaving age in Britain raised to 14 years
- 1900: Central Line opens in London: underground is electrified
- 1900: Escalator shown at Paris exhibition
- 9 Feb 1900: Davis Cup tennis competition established
- 27 Feb 1900: Labour Party formed
|
| 3 | 1901 | - 1901: Commonwealth of Australia founded
- 1901: Hubert Cecil Booth patents the vacuum cleaner
- 22 Jan 1901: Queen Victoria dies – Edward VII king
- 2 Feb 1901: Queen Victoria's funeral – interred beside Prince Albert in the Frogmore
Mausoleum at Windsor Great Park
- Jun 1901: Denunciation of use of concentration camps by British in Boer War
- 2 Oct 1901: Britain's first submarine launched
- 12 Dec 1901: First successful radio transmission across the Atlantic, by Marconi – Morse
code from Cornwall to Newfoundland
|
| 4 | 1902 | - 1902: Balfour's Education Act provides for secondary education
- 1902: Cremation Act – cremation can only take place at officially recognised establishments,
and with two death certificates issued
- 1902: Marie Curie discovers radioactivity
- 24 May 1902: Empire Day (later Commonwealth Day) first celebrated
- 31 May 1902: Treaty of Vereeniging ends Second Boer War
- 9 Aug 1902: Coronation of Edward VII
|
| 5 | 1903 | - 1903: Workers' Education Association (WEA) formed in Britain
- 1903: Women's Social and Political Union formed in Britain by Emmeline Pankhurst
- 1903: Henry Ford sets up his motor company
- 14 Dec 1903: First flight of Wilbur & Orville Wright
|
| 6 | 1904 | - 1904: Leeds University established
- 8 Apr 1904: France and UK sign the Entente Cordiale
- 4 May 1904: America takes over construction of the Panama Canal from the French
(completed 1914)
|
| 7 | 1905 | - 1905: The title 'Prime Minister' noted in a royal warrant for the first time – placed the Prime
Minister in order of precedence in Britain immediately after the Archbishop of York
- 1905: Aliens Act in Britain: Home Office controls immigration
- 1905: Germany lays down the first Dreadnought battleship
- 11 Apr 1905: Einstein publishes Special Theory of Relativity
|
| 8 | 1906 | - 1906: Introduction of free school meals for poor children
- 10 Feb 1906: Launching of HMS Dreadnought, first turbine-driven battleship
- 15 Mar 1906: Rolls-Royce Ltd registered
- 26 May 1906: Vauxhall Bridge opened in London
- 20 Sep 1906: Launching of Cunard's RMS Mauretania on the Tyne
|
| 9 | 1907 | - 1907: New Zealand becomes a Dominion
- 1907: Imperial College, London, is established
- 1907: First airship flies over London
- 1907: Lumiere develops a process for colour photography
- Jul 1907: Leo Hendrik Baekeland patents Bakelite, the first plastic invented that held its
shape after being heated
- 1 Aug 1907: Baden-Powell leads the first Scout camp on Brownsea Island
- 9 Nov 1907: The Cullinan Diamond presented to Edward VII on his birthday
|
| 10 | 1908 | - 1908: Coal Mines Regulation Act in Britain limits men to an eight hour day
- 1908: Separate courts for juveniles established in Britain
- 1908: Lord Baden-Powell starts the Boy Scout movement
- 1 Jul 1908: SOS became effective as an international signal of distress
- 12 Aug 1908: First 'Model T' Ford made
|
| 11 | 1909 | - 1909: Beveridge Report prompts creation of labour Exchanges
- 1909: Peary reaches the north pole
- 1909: First commercial manufacture of Bakelite – start of the plastic age
- 1 Jan 1909: Old Age Pensions Act came into force
- 16 Jan 1909: Ernest Shackleton's expedition finds the magnetic South Pole
- 15 Mar 1909: Selfridges department store opens in London
- 25 Jul 1909: Bleriot flies across the Channel (36 minutes, Calais to Dover)
|
| 12 | 1910 | - 1910: Railway strike and coal strikes in Britain
- 1910: Constitutional crisis in Britain
- 1910: Dr Crippen caught by radio telegraphy; hanged 23 Nov at Pentonville
- 1910: Madame Curie isolates radium
- 1910: Halley's comet reappears
- 1910: Tango becomes popular in North America and Europe
- 6 May 1910: Edward VII dies – George V becomes King
|
| 13 | 1911 | - 1911: Parliament Act in Britain reduces the power of the House of Lords
- 1911: British MPs receive a salary
- 1911: First British Official Secrets Act
- 1911: Rutherford: theory of atomic structures
- 1911: Strikes by seamen, dock and transport workers (1911-1912)
- 2 Apr 1911: Census: Population - England and Wales: 36 Million; Scotland: 4.6 Million; N Ireland: 1.25 Million
- 22 Jun 1911: Coronation of George V
- 14 Dec 1911: National Insurance introduced in Britain
|
| 14 | 1912 | - 1912: Irish Home Rule crisis grows in Britain
- 1912: Britain nationalises the telephone system
- 1912: Discovery of the 'Piltdown Man' – hoax, exposed in 1953
- 18 Jan 1912: Captain Scott's last expedition – he and his team reach the south pole on Jan
18th; all die on the way back, their bodies found in November
- 14 Apr 1912: The 'unsinkable' Titanic sinks on maiden voyage – loss of 1,513 lives
- 13 May 1912: Royal Flying Corps (later the RAF) founded in Britain
|
| 15 | 1913 | - 1913: Third Irish Home Rule Bill rejected by House of Lords – threat of civil war in Ireland –
formation of Ulster Volunteers to oppose Home Rule
- 1913: Suffragette demonstrations in London – Mrs Pankhurst imprisoned
- 1913: Trade Union Act in Britain establishes the right to use Union funds for political
purposes
- 1913: Invention of stainless steel by Harry Brearley of Sheffield
- 1913: Geiger invents his counter to measure radioactivity
- 4 Jun 1913: Emily Davison, a suffragette, runs out in front of the king's horse, Anmer, at the
Epsom Derby and dies
|
1899 - 1913 (13 years)