1834

1800–1850	USA [consumer products]	A revolution in retail and wholesale trade occurs: specialization transforms the urban retail market, replacing the general store with individual stores for hardware, groceries, dry goods, furnishing, books, tobacco, and so on. Cash-only sales policies are instituted around 1806.
1810–1859	USA [agriculture]	US cotton production, the vast majority of which is grown in the southern states, rises from 171,000 bales in 1810 to just under 5.4 million in 1859.
1827–1838	Ireland, Germany, USA [statistics and demography]	A period of Irish and German migration to the USA begins due to a severe winter in 1829, increased legislation against German Jews, economic stress in Ireland, and Irish factionalism.
1827–1838	USA [zoology]	US ornithologist John James Audubon publishes the first volume of his multi-volume work Birds of America.
1831–1840	USA, UK [statistics and demography]	Emigration to the USA is 75,810 from Britain and 207,381 from Ireland.
27 December 1831 - 2 October 1836	South America, Pacific [zoology]	The English naturalist Charles Darwin undertakes a five-year voyage, to South America and the Pacific, as naturalist on the Beagle. The voyage convinces him that species have evolved gradually but he waits over 20 years to publish his findings.
1834	France [physics]	French physicist Benoît-Pierre Clapeyron develops the second law of thermodynamics: entropy always increases in a closed system.
1834	England [technology]	The English mathematician William George Horner develops the zoetrope, a motion picture device that is an improvement over the phenakistoscope. It consists of two discs with images on one side observed through slits on the other.
1834	Russia [births and deaths]	Dimitry Ivanovich Mendeleyev, Russian chemist who develops the periodic table of the elements, born in Tobolsk, Siberia, Russia (–1907).
1834	Russia [fiction]	The Russian poet Alexander Pushkin publishes the short story ‘Pikovaya dama’/‘Queen of Spades’.
1834	USA [food and drink]	Tomatoes begin to catch on in the USA (despite their 300-year presence), but will not become popular until 1900 as they are commonly believed to be poisonous.
1834	USA [motor vehicles]	US blacksmith Thomas Davenport constructs the first battery-powered electric motor. He uses it to operate a small car on a short section of track – the first streetcar.
1834	France [painting]	The French artist and caricaturist Honoré Daumier publishes his lithograph Rue Transnonain, 14 April 1834.
c. 1834	USA [painting]	The US artist Edward Hicks paints The Peaceable Kingdom, one of the best-known images of US naive art. He paints this scene several times.
17 March 1834	Germany [births and deaths]	Gottlieb Daimler, German mechanical engineer who builds one of the first successful cars powered by an internal combustion engine, born in Schorndorf, Württemberg (now Germany) (–1900).
18 March 1834	UK [unions and associations]	Labourers from Tolpuddle in Dorset, England (the ‘Tolpuddle Martyrs’), are sentenced to transportation to the colonies for forming a lodge (local branch) of the British socialist Robert Owen's Grand National Consolidated Trades Union.
20 May 1834	France [births and deaths]	Marie-Joseph-Paul-Yves-Roch-Gilbert de Motier, marquis de Lafayette, French aristocrat and political leader who fought against the British during the American Revolution, dies in Paris, France (76).
7 July 1834	Spain [political events]	A civil war begins in Spain as Don Carlos, brother of the late King Ferdinand VII of Spain, claims the throne occupied by the infant queen, Isabella II. The Carlists are supported by the Catholic Church, the Basques, and other conservative elements, and are opposed by Britain and France.
19 July 1834	France [births and deaths]	Edgar Degas, French artist known for his paintings, drawings, and bronzes of the human figure in motion, born in Paris, France (–1917).
25 July 1834	England [births and deaths]	Samuel Taylor Coleridge, English Romantic poet, literary critic, and philosopher, dies in Highgate, London, England (61).
1 August 1834	UK [law and government]	Slavery is abolished throughout the British Empire, thanks largely to the efforts of the English philanthropist and politician William Wilberforce.
14 August 1834	UK [welfare]	The Poor Law Amendment Act in Britain revises the provision of relief to the unemployed and elderly, establishing workhouses where conditions are to be made hard in order that only the truly needy will submit themselves to them.
16 October 1834	UK [everyday life]	The Houses of Parliament in London, England, are destroyed by fire.
16 October 1834	UK [civic and commercial buildings]	A fire in London, England, destroys the Houses of Parliament and parts of the city. Reconstruction measures will include the building of Big Ben and Buckingham Palace.
10 December 1834	UK [administration]	The Tory politician Robert Peel becomes prime minister of Britain following the resignation of Lord Melbourne.
17 December 1834	UK [political parties]	The British prime minister, Robert Peel, issues the Tamworth Manifesto. Ostensibly an address to his constituents, it redefines the orientation of the Tory Party, giving it a policy of liberal conservatism, accepting the Reform Act of 1832, and agreeing to pass more equitable reforms.
23 December 1834	England [births and deaths]	Thomas Malthus, English economist and demographer who theorized that population growth, unless checked, would always outstrip the food supply, dies in St Catherine, near Bath, England (68).