1888 is a leap year starting on Sunday (click on link for calendar). In Germany, 1888 is known as the 1888 Year of Three Emperors.

Events

• January 3 - 91cm telescope first used at Lick Observatory
• January 12 ? Blizzards in Dakota and Montana, Minnesota, Nebraska and Texas - 235 dead, many of which were children on their way home from school
• January 24 - Jacob L. Wortman patents the typewriter ribbon .
• January 27 - In Washington, DC the National Geographic Society is founded.
• March 11 - The "Great Blizzard of '88" begins along the eastern seaboard of the United States, shutting down commerce and killing more than 400.
• March 22 - The Football League is formed
• April 11 - The Concertgebouw in Amsterdam is inaugurated.
• May 13 - Brazil abolishes slavery.
• June 19 - In Chicago Republican Convention opens at Auditorium Building. General Benjamin Harrison & Levi Morton will win the nominations.
• August 7 - The body of Martha Tabram was found, a possible murder victim of Jack the Ripper
• August 31 - Mary Ann Nichols is murdered. She is perhaps the first of Jack the Ripper's victims.
• September 4 - George Eastman registers the trademark Kodak, and receives a patent for his camera which uses roll film.
• September 8 - In London, the body of Annie Chapman is found. She is generally considered the second victim of Jack the Ripper.
• September 8 - In England the first 6 Football League matches ever were played.
• September 30 - In London, the bodies of Elizabeth Stride and Catherine Eddowes are found. They are generally considered Jack the Ripper's third and fourth victim respectively.
• October 9 - The Washington Monument officially opens to the general public.
• November 6 - U.S. presidential election, 1888: Democrat incumbent Grover Cleveland wins the overall popular vote, but is voted out of office because he loses in the Electoral College to Republican challenger Benjamin Harrison.
• November 9 - In London the body of Mary Jane Kelly is found. She is typically considered the fifth and last of Jack the Ripper's victims. A number of similar murders actually follow, but police attribute them to copycat killers.

• Gramophone patented by Emile Berliner
• Annie Besant organizes a match girl strike
• Slavery abolished in Brazil
• Sarawak and Borneo become British protectorates
• Susan B. Anthony organizes a congress for women's rights in Washington DC
• National library in Athens, Greece
• First railways in China
• Kodak camera increases the popularity of photography as a hobby.
• The first recorded film, Roundhay Garden Scene, is made in Roundhay in Leeds, West Yorkshire, England. The film is two seconds (4 frames) in length.

Births

January-March

• January 1 - Victor Goldschmidt, Swiss geochemist (d. 1947)
• January 8 - Matt Moore, Irish-born actor (d. 1960)
• January 24 - Vicki Baum, Austrian writer (d. 1960)
• January 24 - Ernst Heinkel, German aircraft designer (d. 1958)
• February 2 - Frederick Lane, Australian swimmer (d. 1969)
• February 17 - Otto Stern, German physicist, winner of the Nobel Prize in Physics (d. 1969)
• February 19 - José Eustasio Rivera, Colombian writer (d. 1928)
• February 20 - Georges Bernanos, French writer (d. 1948)
• February 25 - John Foster Dulles, United States Secretary of State (d. 1959)
• February 27 - Lotte Lehmann, German singer (d. 1976)
• March 4 - Knute Rockne, American football player and coach (d. 1931)
• March 10 - Barry Fitzgerald, Irish actor (d. 1966)
• March 12 - Vaslav Nijinsky, Ukrainian ballet dancer (d. 1950)
• March 17 - Frank Buck , big game hunter (d. 1950)
• March 26 - Elsa Brändström, Russian nurse (d. 1948)

April-June

• April 4 - Tris Speaker, Baseball Hall of Famer (d. 1958)
• April 6 - Hans Richter, German filmmaker
• April 18 - Duffy Lewis, Major League Baseball player (d. 1979)
• April 26 - Anita Loos, American writer (d. 1981)
• April 27 - Florence La Badie, Canadian actress (d. 1917)
• May 10 - Max Steiner, Austrian-American composer (d. 1971)
• May 11 - Irving Berlin, American composer (d. 1989)
• May 17 - Tich Freeman, English cricketer (d. 1965)
• May 23 - Zack Wheat, Baseball Hall of Famer (d. 1972)
• May 25 - Miles Malleson, English actor (d. 1969)
• May 27 - Louis Durey, French composer (d. 1979)
• June 3 - Tom Brown, American jazz musician (d. 1958)
• June 6 - Pete Wendling, American composer, pianist, and piano roll recording artist (d. 1974)
• June 9 - Ida Rentoul Outhwaite, Australian illustrator (d. 1960)
• June 13 - Fernando Pessoa, Portuguese writer (d. 1935)
• June 24 - Gerrit Rietveld, Dutch architect (d. 1964)

July-October

• July 10 - Giorgio Chirico, Italian painter (d. 1978)
• July 17 - Shmuel Yosef Agnon, Israeli writer (d. 1970)
• July 23 - Raymond Chandler, American novelist (d. 1959)
• August 13 - John Logie Baird, Scottish inventor, first demonstrated the television (d. 1946)
• August 16 - Armand J. Piron, American jazz musician (d. 1943)
• September 5 - Sarvepalli Radhakrishnan, President of India (d. 1975)
• September 6 - Joseph P. Kennedy, Sr., American politician and father of President John F. Kennedy (d. 1969)
• September 12 - Maurice Chevalier, French singer and actor (d. 1972)
• September 16 - Frans Eemil Sillanpää, Finnish writer (d. 1964)
• September 26 - T. S. Eliot, American-born poet (d. 1965)
• September 26 - J. Frank Dobie, American folklorist and journalist (d. 1964)
• October 7 - Henry A. Wallace, Vice President of the United States (d. 1965)
• October 9 - Nikolai Ivanovich Bukharin, Russian politician (d. 1938)
• October 16 - Eugene O'Neill, American dramatist (d. 1953)

November-December

• November 15 - Harald Sverdrup, Norwegian scientist
• November 23 - Harpo Marx, comedian, The Marx Brothers (d. 1964)
• November 26 - Francisco Canaro, tango composer (d. 1964)
• November 30 - Ralph Hartley, electronics researcher and inventor
• December 4 - King Alexander of Yugoslavia
• December 19 - Fritz Reiner, Hungarian conductor (d. 1963)
• December 28 - F.W. Murnau, German director

Deaths

• January 19 - Anton de Bary, German biologist
• January 29 - Edward Lear, British artist and writer
• February 3 - Henry Maine, British jurist
• March 6 - Louisa May Alcott, American novelist
• March 9 - German Emperor Wilhelm I
• March 12 - Henry Bergh, founder of American Society for the Prevention of Cruelty to Animals
• April 15 - Matthew Arnold, English poet (b. 1822)
• April 15 - Father Damien, Belgian priest
• June 15 - German Emperor Friedrich III
• August 9 - Charles Cros, French poet
• August 23 - Philip Henry Gosse, British scientist
• October 16 - John Wentworth, mayor of Chicago, United States
• December 31 - Samson Raphael Hirsch, rabbi (b. 1808)