General
Population: 1.68 Billion*
- Business: Richard Steiff designs first teddy bears
Crayola crayons introduced
Safety razors first introduced by Gillette
- Entertainment: Music includes Strauss, Delius, Bruckner's symphony (posthumously), Edmund Eysler, Juan Manen, Ermanno Wolf-Ferrari, D'Albert, Elgar
Popular songs include The Beer That Made Milwaukee Famous, Melody of Love, March of the Toys, Ida! Sweet as Apple Cider, Hiawatha
First recording of an opera – Verdi's Ernani
Writers include Shaw (Man and Superman), Baum (The Wizard of Oz), WEB Du Bois (The Souls of Black Folk),
Samuel Butler (posthumously), Hofmannsthal, Henry James, Gerfart Hauptmann, Theodor Herzl, Jack London (Call of the Wild), Strindbert,
GE Moore, Johannes Haller, Wilhelm Bolsche, Henri Poincare, Otto Weininger (suicide age 23)
Nobel Prize for literature Bjornsterne Bjornson
Art includes Alma-Tadema, PW Steer, Joseph Israels (Jewish Wedding), Gustav Klimt,
Film The Great Train Robbery first motion picture to tell complete story
- Medicine: Einthoven invents the electrocardiograph
- Religion: Pope Leo XIII dies and Giuseppe Melchiorre Sarto Riese named Pope Pius X
Pope Pius X bans castrati performances
- Science: Agnes Clerke writes about problems with astrophysics
JJ Thompson writes about conduction of electricity through gasses
Becquerel and the Curies win prizes in physics
Arrhenius in chemistry
Rutherford disproves Kelvin's theory about the age of the sun due to furnace effect minimixing cooling
- Technology: Gilette invents disposable blade
Marconi sends wireless message across the Atlantic
RA Zsigmondy invents ultramicroscope
- Transportation: First heavier-than-air flight by Wright brothers
- Deaths: Philosopher Herbert Spencer, Impressionist Camille Pissarro, Scandalous Dean of Westminster FW Farrar, Painter James Abbot McNeill Whistler,
Novelist JH Shorthouse, Explorer Paul du Chaillu, Philanthropist Montagu Corry, Paul Gauguin, Composer Hugo Wolf Pope Leo XIII,
Painter James Whistler
Africa
- General: Sixth Zionist Congress declines offer for Jewish settlement in E Africa
- Congo Free State: General agitation about appalling labour conditions in Congo Free State – Belgian commission investigated
- Fulani Empire: Britain captures Kano and Sokoto in W Africa – French and British control former empire
- Hausaland: Sokoto caliphate in Hausaland Africa taken over by Britain
- Nigeria: British complete conquest of north
- Zaire: Scandal breaks in Belgium over rule in Zaire – 2 years
Americas
- General: Boundary dispute between Alaska and Canada settled
- Brazil: Republic of Acre (South America) annexed - see 1899
- Canada: Landslide hits Frank, Alberta
- Colombia: Revolution in Panama brings independence from Colombia
- Ecuador: German Hans Meyer climbs and explores Chimborazo
- Panama: US finances Panama canal site
Panamanian Declaration of Independence penned in room 1162 of New York's Waldorf Astoria
Nearly bloodless coup gains Panama's separation from Colombia
Yellow fever outbreak
Asia
- China: Plague
- Dutch East Endies: End of Acheh War
- Hong Kong: Plague
- India: Plague
Coronation Durbar for Edward VI King-Emperor at Delhi
- Tibet: British British viceroy of India (Lord Curzon) sends military expedition that forces trade agreement
Europe
- General: King Edward VII visits Paris – French president Loubet visists London – the Entente Cordiale established
- Austria: Deutsches Museum in Munich opened
- France: First Tour de France
- Great Britain: England's Women's Social and Political Union founded
Building of Liverpool Cathedral
U of Liverpool and Manchester founded
Motor-car regulations set 20mph speed limit
Emmeline Pankhurst founds National Women's Social and Political Union
Royal Naval College in Dartmouth founded
England's Women's Social and Political Union founded,
- Monaco: Albert I Prince of Monaco founds International Peace Institute
- Russia: London Congress – Russian Social Democratic Party splits into Mensheviks (led by Plechanoff) and Bolsheviks (led by Lenin and Trotsky)
Russian paper claims to have uncovered great Jewish conspiracy Protocols of the Elders of Zion – forgery
Anti-Jewish pogroms in Russia
- Serbia: King Alexander I of Serbia and Queen Draga murdered – Peter Karageorgevich accedes to throne as Peter I
Middle East
Pacific
1903 
