1891 in science

The year 1891 in science and technology involved some significant events, listed below.

Biology

• March 3 – Yellowstone Timberland Reserve, predecessor of
  United States National Forest
  .
• The
  Resolution Island in Fiordland as a nature reserve.^[1]
• The New York Botanical Garden is founded in The Bronx largely due to the efforts of Nathaniel Lord Britton.
• Jane Willis Kirkaldy and Catherine Pollard become the first women to sit final examinations in biology at the University of Oxford (and achieve first class honours).^[2]

Chemistry

• Agnes Pockels first publishes the results of her researches into surface tension.^[3][4]
• The
  Hermann Emil Fischer
  ,

Geology

• tillite from a Precambrian glaciation.^[5]

• The
  global average temperature.^[6]

• crystallographic groups.^[7][8]
• Édouard Lucas first formulates the ménage problem.

Paleontology

• October –
  Java Man', at Trinil on the Solo River.^[9]

• Julius Ludwig August Koch begins publication of Die psychopathischen Minderwertigkeiten in Ravensburg, introducing the concept of psychopathology.^[10]
• Arnold Pick first uses the term dementia praecox in this form.^[11]
• Heinrich Wilhelm Gottfried von Waldeyer-Hartz names the neuron.^[12]
• Myxedema is first treated successfully, by George Redmayne Murray using thyroid extract.
• The earliest recorded attempt at hip replacement is carried out by Themistocles Gluck in Berlin, using ivory to replace the femoral head.^[13]
• Viennese pathologist Hans Chiari describes a form of Chiari malformation.

Technology

• March 10 –
  automatic telephone exchange using the Strowger switch.^[15]
• May 20 – First public demonstration of the
  Thomas Alva Edison, a showing of the film known as Dickson Greeting. Edison files patents on the camera and peephole viewer on August 24.^[16]
• Crompton & Co. introduce the electric kettle, in the United Kingdom.
• Michelin patent the removable pneumatic bicycle tire.^[17]
• transmission, designed by Émile Levassor.^[18]
• William Le Baron Jenney develops the construction of steel frame skyscrapers in Chicago with the Ludington, Manhattan and Second Leiter Buildings.
• The modern taximeter is invented by Friedrich Wilhelm Gustav Bruhn in Germany.

Awards

• Copley Medal: Stanislao Cannizzaro^[19]
• Wollaston Medal for Geology: John Wesley Judd

Births

• January 8 – Walther Bothe (died 1957), German physicist, winner of the Nobel Prize in Physics (1954).
• January 26 –
  neurosurgeon
  .
• April 22 – Harold Jeffreys (died 1989), English mathematician.
• May 15 – Fritz Feigl, (died 1971), Austrian-born Brazilian chemist
• July 5 – John Howard Northrop (suicide 1987), American biochemist, winner of the Nobel Prize in Chemistry (1946)
• July 27 – Jacob van der Hoeden, Dutch-Israeli veterinary scientist (died 1968)
• August 17 – Aly Tewfik Shousha (died 1964), Egyptian bacteriologist.
• September 14 –
  Ivan Matveyevich Vinogradov (died 1983), Russian
  mathematician.
• September 24 –
  cryptanalyst
  .
• October 24 – Ernest Melville DuPorte (died 1981), Caribbean-born Canadian insect morphologist.
• November 14 – Frederick Banting (died 1941), Canadian discoverer of insulin, winner of the Nobel Prize in Physiology or Medicine (1923).

Deaths

• January 6 –
  orthopaedic surgeon
  .
• February 10 –
  Sofia Kovalevskaya (born 1850), Russian mathematician
  .
• March 9 –
  naturalist
  .
• May 11 – Edmond Becquerel (born 1820), French physicist.
• June 9 –
  entomologist
  and actor.
• June 23
  • Sir Norman Pogson (born 1829), English-born astronomer.
  • Wilhelm Eduard Weber (born 1804), German physicist.
• August 30 – Emanoil Bacaloglu (born 1830), Romanian polymath.
• September 18 – William Ferrel (born 1817), American meteorologist.
• October 3 – Édouard Lucas (born 1842), French mathematician.
• November 18 – Joseph Wolstenholme (born 1829), English mathematician.
• December 21 – William Cavendish, 7th Duke of Devonshire (born 1808), English landowner and promoter of science.

References