| January 1 | Origin of Japanese Era |
| January 6 | Pope Pius IX encyclical "On the Church in Armenia" |
| January 6 | U.S. Congress begins investigating Credit Mobilier scandal |
| January 11 | 1st livestock market newspaper published, Drover's Journal, Chicago |
| January 13 | P B S Pinchback relinquishes office at Louisiana governor |
| January 14 | "Celluloid" registered as a trademark |
| January 14 | P B S Pinchback elected to Senate |
| January 22 | Britains SS Northfleet sinks at Dungeness England, 300 die |
| February 11 | Spanish Cortes fires king Amadeus I |
| February 12 | Congress abolishes bimetallism and authorizes $1 and $3 gold coins |
| February 20 | University of California gets its 1st Med School (UC/SF) |
| February 27 | Dutch socialist Samuel van Wooden demands law against child labor |
| March 3 | Congress authorizes federal departmental postage stamps |
| March 3 | U.S. Congress and government raise own salary, retroactively |
| March 9 | Royal Canadian Mounted Police founded |
| March 22 | Slavery is abolished in Puerto Rico |
| March 23 | Slavery abolished in Puerto Rico |
| April 1 | British White Star steamship Atlantic sinks off Nova Scotia, 547 die |
| April 1 | Mehmed Kemals play "Vatan" premeres in Constantinople |
| April 13 | Colfax Massacre in Grant Parish Louisiana (60 blacks killed) |
| May 1 | 1st U.S. postal card issued |
| May 1 | Emperor Franz Jozef opens 5th World's Fair in Vienna |
| May 1 | International Exhibition opens in Vienna |
| May 7 | U.S. Marines attack Panama |
| May 23 | 1st Preakness: G Barbee aboard Survivor wins in 2:43 |
| May 23 | Canada's North West Mounted Police Force (RCMPF) forms |
| May 23 | Postal cards sold in San Francisco for 1st time |
| May 24 | Leo Delibes' opera "Le Roi l'a Dit," premieres in Paris |
| June 2 | Construction begins on Clay St. (SF) for world's 1st cable railroad |
| June 4 | 1st contract workers of British-Indies Co arrives in Suriname |
| June 5 | Sultan Bargash closes slave market of Zanzibar |
| June 7 | 7th Belmont: James Roe aboard Springbok wins in 3:01.75 |
| June 16 | President Grant decrees Wallowa Valley for Nez-Perce indians |
| June 18 | Susan B. Anthony fined $100 for attempting to vote for President |
| June 22 | Prince Edward Island joins Canada |
| July 1 | Henry Flipper of Georgia is 2nd black to enter West Point |
| July 1 | Prince Edward Island becomes 7th Canadian province |
| July 4 | Aquarium opens in Woodward Gardens |
| July 10 | French poet Paul Verlaine wounds Arthur Rimbaud with pistol |
| July 21 | Jesse James and James Younger gang's 1st train robbery (Adair Iowa) |
| August 1 | San Francisco's 1st cable car begins service |
| August 2 | 1st trial run of San Francisco cable car, Clay Street between Kearny and Jones |
| August 14 | "Field and Stream" begins publishing |
| August 18 | 1st ascent of Mount Whitney, California, 14,494' |
| August 23 | Albert Bridge creossing Thames opens |
| August 26 | 1st kindergarten public school opens in St. Louis |
| September 6 | Regular Cable Car service begins on Clay Street |
| September 15 | Last German troops leave France |
| September 16 | German troops leave France |
| September 17 | 19 students attend opening class at Ohio State University |
| September 18 | Government bond agent Jay Cooke and Co collapses, causing panic on Wall St |
| September 19 | Black Friday: Jay Cooke and Co fails, causing a securities panic |
| September 20 | Panic sweeps New York Stock Exchange (railroad bond default/bank failure) New York shut banks for 10 days due to a bank scandal |
| September 23 | Tom Allen beats Mike McCale for Heavyweight Boxing title |
| October 4 | Toronto Argonaut Football Club forms |
| October 8 | 1st women's prison run by women opens at Indiana Reformatory Institute |
| October 11 | Toronto Argonaut Football Club 1st game losing to University of Toronto |
| October 18 | 1st football game between Toronto Argonauts and Hamilton Tigers |
| October 18 | Columbia Princeton Rutgers and Yale set rules for collegiate football |
| October 20 | P. T. Barnum Hippodrome featuring "Greatest Show on Earth," opens (New York City) |
| October 30 | P. T. Barnum's circus, "Greatest Show on Earth," debuts (New York City) |
| November 4 | Dentist John Beers of San Francisco patents gold crown |
| November 12 | Bay District Race Track opens |
| November 20 | Rival cities of Buda and Pest unite to form the capital of Hungary |
| December 6 | 1st international football game in US: Yale 2, Eton (England) 1 |
| December 30 | American Metrological Society forms (New York City) weights, measures and money |
