1907 Fun Facts, Trivia and History

1907 Fun Facts, Trivia and History

Top Ten Baby Names of 1907

Mary, Helen, Margaret, Anna, Ruth, John, William, James, George, Robert

US Life Expectancy

(1907) Males: 45.6 years, Females: 49.9 years

Firsts, Inventions and Wonders

Morris Michtom, the inventor of the Teddy Bear in 1902, opened the Ideal Novelty and Toy Company.

The Plaza Hotel opened in New York City (5th Ave& 59th St). The Price for one night was $2.50.

Before 1907, a carat, the unit of measurement for gemstones and pearls, could be anywhere between 187 milligrams to 215.99 milligrams, depending on what part of the world you were in. An agreement in Paris put it at 200 mg, and the United States started using that number in 1913.

UPS was initially called American Messenger Company and was started in 1907 by two teenagers, Claude Ryan and Jim Casey, in Seattle.

The First AA Battery was invented.

The Bank of Italy (later Bank of America) opened at 3433 Mission Street, San Francisco.

E.W. Scripps founded United Press (International).

The first Ziegfeld Follies was produced in 1907 at Jardin de Paris’s roof theatre.

The word “blurb” was invented in 1907 by humorist Gelett Burgess.

Scott introduced paper towels in 1907 for public bathroom use and kitchen use in 1931.

The world’s first fully synthetic plastic was Bakelite, invented in New York in 1907 by Leo Baekeland, who coined the term ‘plastics’.

The first trial to be called the “trial of the century” was in 1907, when Harry K. Thaw was tried for the murder of Stanford White.

The Hero

A Mexican railroad brakeman named Jesus Garcia saved the entire town of Nacozari, Sonora, by single-handedly driving a damaged and burning train containing dynamite six kilometers away from the town before it exploded, killing him

The Most Popular Singers and Artists of 1907 include

Henry Burr, Albert Campbell, Enrico Caruso, Arthur Collins, Byron G. Harlan, The Hayden Quartet, Ada Jones, Harry Lauder, Harry Macdonough, Corinne Morgan, Billy Murray, The Peerless Quartet, Prince’s Orchestra, Frank Stanley, Elise Stevenson, Cal Stewart, Harry Tally, Helen Trix, The United States Marine Band, The Victor Orchestra, Bert Williams

Pop Culture Facts & History

Until 1907, marrying your dead wife’s sister was illegal in England.

Father’s Day was inspired, in part, by the 1907 Monongah Mining Disaster in West Virginia that killed 361 men, 250 of them fathers, leaving around a thousand fatherless children.

Joseph Stalin said at the funeral of his first wife: “This creature softened my heart of stone. She died, and with her died my last warm feelings for humanity.”

Joseph Stalin, Vladimir Lenin, and Maxim Litvinov were all involved in a 1907 armed robbery that resulted in the deaths of 40 people and injured 50 others, stealing $3.4 in 2017 million dollars.

Ringling Brothers Greatest Show on Earth bought Barnum & Bailey Circus.

“Gentleman’s Agreement” refers to an informal agreement between the US and Japan in 1907.

Kellogg’s promoted their cornflakes with something called the Wink Day campaign. Women were encouraged to “wink at your grocer and see what you get”; they got a free cereal box.

Ben-Hur (2016) was a remake of Ben-Hur (1959), a remake of a 1925 silent film and a 1907 silent film.

The ball atop One Times Square started on December 31, 1907, as 100 incandescent light bulbs on a wood and iron structure hoisted with a rope. The ball drop tradition has been observed yearly since, except in 1942 and 1943, in observance of wartime blackouts.

The Huia bird went extinct in 1907, but its song exists today because an elderly Maori man recorded them 1949 from childhood memories.

The Irish Crown Jewels were stolen in 1907, and the crime has never been solved.

Australian swimmer Anette Kellerman was the first woman to wear a one-piece bathing suit and was arrested for indecency in 1907. She was also one of the first women to attempt to swim the English Channel.

During the Panic of 1907, John D. Rockefeller, the wealthiest man in America, pledged half of his wealth to maintain America’s credit and got other bankers to help. The Panic of 1907 led to the formation of The Federal Reserve Bank.

Polio has existed throughout written human history, but there was never a significant epidemic until 1907, when 2,700 contracted polio in Vermont; by 1952, there were over 50,000 cases in just the United States.

John “Babbacombe” Lee (1864 – March 19, 1945) survived three attempts to arrest him for murder in 1885 when the gallows malfunctioned and were released in 1907.

Interesting…

Dropping a bomb from a balloon is, to this day, a violation of the Hague Conventions of 1899 and 1907, although there is no such prohibition for dropping a bomb from an aircraft.

Harvard’s Widener Library is named after a 1907 alum, Harry Elkins Widener, who died on the Titanic.

Researcher George Soper published the results of his investigation into recent typhoid outbreaks in the New York area. He said that Mary Mallon (Typhoid Mary) was the likely source of the outbreak.

“Uncle Fed” Messer lived in North Carolina, US, from August 21, 1791, until February 8, 1907.

In Nigeria, a local tribe worshiped the god of smallpox, Sopona. The priests secretly infected people they didn’t like. Based on this information, the British colonial rulers banned the worship of Sopona in 1907.

The phrase “the whole 9 yards” is unrelated to football or sports. No one knows the origins; it is “the most prominent etymological riddle of our time.” It is based on an earlier “whole 6 yards” phase traced to circa 1907.

From 1907 to 1922, U.S. citizen women lost citizenship if they married foreigners.

The Handshaking Record

On January 1, 1907, Theodore Roosevelt shook the hands of 8,510 people, setting a world record he held for over 70 years.

Nobel Prize Winners

Physics – Albert Abraham Michelson
Chemistry – Eduard Buchner
Medicine – Charles Louis Alphonse Laveran
Literature – Rudyard Kipling
Peace – Ernesto Teodoro Moneta, Louis Renault

Popular and Best-selling Books From 1907

Fiction Bestsellers

1. The Lady of the Decoration by Frances Little
2. The Weavers by Gilbert Parker
3. The Port of Missing Men by Meredith Nicholson
4. The Shuttle by Frances Hodgson Burnett
5. The Brass Bowl by Louis J. Vance
6. Satan Sanderson by Hallie Erminie Rives
7. The Daughter of Anderson Crow by George Barr McCutcheon
8. The Younger Set by Robert W. Chambers
9. The Doctor by Ralph Connor
10. Half a Rogue by Harold MacGrath

Other Books of Note

Pragmatism by William James
Christianity and the Social Crisis by Walter Rauschenbusch
The American Scene by Henry James
New Basis for Civilization by Simon Patten
Creative Evolution by Henri Bergson

Sports

World Series Champions: Chicago Cubs
Challenge Cup Champs: Kenora Thistles/Montreal Wanderers
U.S. Open Golf: Alec Ross
U.S. Tennis (Men/Ladies): William Larned/Evelyn Sears
Wimbledon (Men/Women): Norman Brookes/May Sutton
NCAA Football Champions: Yale
Kentucky Derby Winner: Pink Star
Boston Marathon Winner: Thomas Longboat Time: 2:24:24

More 1907 History Resources

Most Popular Baby Names (BabyCenter.com)
Popular and Notable Books (popculture.us) 
Broadway Shows that Opened in 1907
1907 Calendar, courtesy of Time and Date.com 
Fact Monster 
1907 in Movies (according to IMDB) 
Wikipedia 1907