1898
1898
Events
January–March
- January 1 – New York City annexes land from surrounding counties, creating the City of Greater New York, the world's second largest at this time. The city is geographically divided into five boroughs: Manhattan, Brooklyn, Queens, The Bronx and Staten Island.
- January 13 – Novelist Émile Zola's open letter to the President of the French Republic on the Dreyfus affair, J'accuse, is published on the front page of the Paris daily newspaper L'Aurore, accusing the government of wrongfully imprisoning Alfred Dreyfus and of antisemitism.
- February 12 – The electric car belonging to Henry Lindfield of Brighton runs away on a hill in Purley, London, England, and hits a tree; thus he becomes the world's first fatality from an automobile accident on the public highway.
- February 15 – Spanish–American War: The USS Maine explodes and sinks in Havana harbor, Cuba, for reasons never fully established, killing 266 men. This event helps lead the United States to declare war on Spain.