1874

1845–1958	Germany [earth sciences]	German naturalist and explorer Alexander von Humboldt lays the basis of modern geography with the publication of Kosmos/Cosmos, in which he arranges geographic knowledge in a systematic fashion.
7 December 1872 - 26 May 1876	UK [earth sciences]	The British ship Challenger undertakes the world's first major oceanographic survey. Under the command of the Scottish naturalist Wyville Thomson, the crew collect marine animals and water samples, dredge and core samples of the ocean bottom, and make hundreds of temperature and depth measurements.
1874	Netherlands, France [chemistry]	The Dutch chemist Jacobus Henricus van't Hoff and the French chemist Joseph-Achile Le Bel, independently propose a three-dimensional shape for organic molecules based on a tetrahedral carbon atom.
1874	Austria [medicine]	The Austrian surgeon Theodor Billroth develops the study of the bacterial causes of fever associated with wounds with the publication of Untersuchungen über die Vegetationsformen von Coccobacteria septica/Investigations of the Vegetal Forms of Coccobacteria septica.
1874	Austria-Hungary, USA, UK [opera]	The operetta Die Fledermaus/The Bat by the Austrian composer Johann Strauss is first performed, in Vienna, Austria. It is first performed in the USA the same year (in New York City), and in Britain in 1876 (in London, England).
c. 1874	USA [painting]	The US artist James Abbot McNeill Whistler paints Nocturne in Black and Gold: Falling Rocket. This picture is attacked by the English art critic John Ruskin as ‘a pot of paint... flung in the public's face’. Whistler sues for libel, and though he wins his case, he is awarded only a farthing (quarter of a penny) in damages.
1874	France [painting]	The first Impressionist exhibition is held in Paris, France, with works by (among others) Cézanne, Degas, Pissarro, and Sisley.
1874	Germany [physiology]	The German psychologist Wilhelm Wundt publishes Grundzüge der physiologischen Psychologie/Principles of Physiological Psychology.
1874	UK [shops and shopping]	Jesse Boot expands his mother's shop in Britain, aiming to produce cheap high-quality products, in particular drugs. This will grow into the Boots pharmaceutical chain.
1874	Russia, France [solo and chamber music]	The Russian composer Modest Petrovich Mussorgsky completes his piano work Pictures at an Exhibition. This is orchestrated by several composers, notably by the French composer Maurice Ravel in 1922.
1874	USA [clothing and fashion]	The first jeans with rivets are produced by Levi Strauss of San Francisco, California.
1874	England [fiction]	The English writer Thomas Hardy publishes his novel Far from the Madding Crowd.
1874	USA [tools]	US inventor Joseph Glidden designs a machine for making barbed wire. Inexpensive and easy to put up, it transforms the open range of the western USA into fenced pastureland.
1874	England [transport]	The English inventor H J Lawson develops the ‘safety bicycle’. Because it has two equal-sized wheels, rubber tyres, and is powered by an endless chain between the pedals and the rear wheel, it has greater stability and is easier to brake than other bicycles.
3 February 1874	USA [births and deaths]	Gertrude Stein, US avant-garde writer and eccentric, born in Allegheny, Pennsylvania (–1946).
4 February 1874	UK, Africa [wars]	The British general Garnet Wolseley burns the Ashanti capital of Kumasi in west Africa (modern Ghana), ending the war between the Ashanti and Britain.
18 February 1874	UK [administration]	The Conservative politician Benjamin Disraeli becomes British prime minister, with Stafford Northcote as chancellor of the Exchequer, Edward Stanley, Earl of Derby, as foreign secretary, and Richard Cross as home secretary.
15 March 1874	France, Annam [colonies and mandate]	France assumes a protectorate over Annam (part of modern Vietnam), which breaks off its vassalage to China.
25 April 1874	Italy [births and deaths]	Guglielmo Marconi, Italian physicist and inventor of radio, born in Bologna, Italy (–1937).
4 July 1874	USA [other structures]	The St Louis Bridge over the Mississippi River at St Louis, Missouri, is officially opened. Built by US engineer James Buchanan Eads, it consists of three hollow-steel arch trusses each over 150 m/500 ft long, making it the longest bridge in the world. A landmark in engineering, the arches are cantilevered so they can be raised, the foundations are planted to record depths of 30 m/100 ft, and it pioneers the use of structural steel.
10 August 1874	USA [births and deaths]	Herbert Hoover, thirty-first president of the USA 1929–33, a Republican, born in West Branch, Iowa (–1964).
13 September 1874	Austria [births and deaths]	Arnold Schoenberg, Austrian composer who develops a new ‘atonal’ method of musical composition, born in Vienna, Austria (–1951).
25 October 1874	UK, Pacific [colonies and mandate]	Britain annexes the Fiji islands in the southwest Pacific Ocean.
12 November 1874 - 12 August 1877	Africa [exploration]	Welsh-born US journalist and explorer Henry Stanley explores the shores of Lake Victoria and circumnavigates Lake Tanganyika before travelling down the Congo River (now the Zaïre) to Africa's west coast, establishing beyond argument that Lake Victoria is the principal source of the Nile.
27 November 1874	Israel, Poland, Russian Empire [births and deaths]	Chaim Weizmann, first president of Israel 1949–52, born in Motol, Poland, then part of the Russian Empire (–1952).
30 November 1874	England [births and deaths]	Winston Churchill, British prime minister 1940–45 and 1951–55, who leads Britain through World War II, born at Blenheim Palace, Oxfordshire, England (–1965).