1886

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.
1881–1890	USA, UK [statistics and demography]	Emigration to the USA is 807,357 from Britain and 655,482 from Ireland.
1885–1890	South Africa [astronomy]	British astronomer David Gill photographs over 450,000 stars of 11th magnitude or brighter in the southern hemisphere, in South Africa.
1886	USA [chemistry]	US chemist Charles Martin Hall and French chemist Paul-Louis-Toussaint Héroult independently develop the same method for the production of aluminium by the electrolysis of aluminium oxide.
1886	Sweden [chemistry]	Swedish chemist Svante August Arrhenius introduces the idea that acids are substances that dissociate in water to yield hydrogen ions, H⁺, and that bases are substances that dissociate to yield hydroxide ions, OH^-.
1886	Scotland [fiction]	The Scottish writer Robert Louis Stevenson publishes his novels The Strange Case of Dr Jekyll and Mr Hyde and Kidnapped.
1886	USA [fiction]	The US writer Henry James publishes his novels The Bostonians and The Princess Casamassima.
1886	Russia [fiction]	The Russian writer Leo Tolstoy publishes his novella Smeat Ivana Ilyicha/The Death of Ivan Ilyich.
1886	France [orchestral music]	The French composer Camille Saint-Saëns completes his orchestral work Carnaval des animaux/Carnival of the Animals, though he forbids a performance of the work during his life time.
1886	France [painting]	The French artist Henri Rousseau paints Carnival Evening.
1886	France [painting]	The French artist Georges Seurat paints Sunday on the Island of Grande Jatte.
1886	USA [physics]	US astronomer and physicist Samuel Pierpont Langley begins the first systematic aerodynamic research. He measures lift and drag on models of wings and other objects, which he attaches to a counterweighted beam, mounted on a pivot, that may be rotated at a speed of up to 112 kph/70 mph.
1886	France [poetry]	The collection of prose poems Les Illuminations/Illuminations, by the French Symbolist poet Arthur Rimbaud, is published by his friend and fellow poet Paul Verlaine. Rimbaud was thought to be dead, but was in fact living in Africa. The poems were written between 1872 and 1874 when he was aged 17–19.
1886	UK [ships and shipping]	The British submarine Nautilus is launched. The first electric-powered submarine, it uses two electric 50 horsepower motors powered by a 100 cell storage battery to achieve a speed of 6 knots. The need for frequent battery recharges limits its range to 130 km/80 mi.
1886	Germany [ships and shipping]	The first oil tanker, the 90 m/300ft long German ship Gluckhauf, is launched. Oil is carried in tanks located along the hull. Previously, oil was transported in barrels on regular merchant ships. By 1900 99% of oil carried by sea is carried in such ships.
1886	USA [shops and shopping]	The first ‘Avon ladies’, door-to-door saleswomen for the Avon Calling cosmetics company, start working in the USA.
1886	Ottoman Empire, UK [sports]	John Collinson compiles the rules of bridge in Britain, after seeing the game played during a trip to Constantinople in the Ottoman Empire.
1 January 1886	Burma, UK [colonization]	Britain annexes Upper Burma, though guerrilla warfare continues.
22 February 1886	UK [newspapers]	The British newspaper The Times introduces a ‘personal column’ in its classified advertising section.
3 March 1886	Ottoman Empire, Serbia [treaties]	The Peace of Bucharest ends the war between Serbia and Bulgaria on the basis of the status quo.
5 April 1886	Ottoman Empire [diplomacy]	Abdul Hamid II, the Ottoman sultan, appoints Alexander of Bulgaria governor of Eastern Rumelia in a compromise that keeps the area under Ottoman sovereignty but places it under Bulgarian rule.
8 May 1886	USA [food and drink]	John S Pemberton invents the soft drink Coca-Cola in the USA: it goes on sale in Atlanta, Georgia, as ‘the intellectual beverage and temperance drink’, and is claimed to be a cure for headaches and dyspepsia.
26 May 1886	Russia, USA [births and deaths]	Al Jolson (stage name of Asa Yoelson), US popular singer and comedian, star of The Jazz Singer (1927), the first feature film with synchronized speech and music, born in Srednike, Russia (–1950).
8 June 1886	UK [legislation]	British prime minister William Ewart Gladstone's Liberal government is defeated on the second reading of the Irish Home Rule Bill, with 93 Liberals, including John Bright, Joseph Chamberlain, and the Marquess of Hartington voting with the opposition.
3 July 1886	USA [tools]	The New York Tribune is the first newspaper to put into operation the linotype machine, an automatic typesetting machine invented by Ottmar Mergenthaler in 1884.
26 July 1886	UK [elections]	Robert Cecil, Lord Salisbury, forms a Conservative government following their electoral victory.
31 July 1886	Hungary, Germany [births and deaths]	Franz (Ferencz) Liszt, Hungarian pianist and composer, dies in Bayreuth, Germany (74).
20 August - 21 August 1886	Ottoman Empire [revolution]	A military coup is effected in Sofia, Bulgaria, by discontented pro-Russian army officers.
4 September 1886	Ottoman Empire [political events]	King Alexander of Bulgaria abdicates following the coup and Stefan Nikolov Stambulov becomes regent.
16 October 1886	Israel, Poland [births and deaths]	David Ben-Gurion, Zionist statesman and first prime minister of the newly formed state of Israel 1948–53 and 1955–63, born in Plonsk, Poland (–1973).
28 October 1886	USA, France [other structures]	The Statue of Liberty is dedicated on Liberty Island (Bedloe's Island) in New York Harbour, New York, by US president Grover Cleveland. Designed by the French artist Frédéric-Auguste Bartholdi, on a frame built by Gustave Eiffel, it was presented to the USA by the French government to celebrate the 100th anniversary of US independence. Made of copper, it is 46 m/152 ft high. Its full name is Liberty Enlightening the World.