January 28 » Walter Arnold of East Peckham, Kent, becomes the first person to be convicted of speeding. He was fined one shilling, plus costs, for speeding at 8mph (13km/h), thereby exceeding the contemporary speed limit of 2mph (3.2km/h).
April 6 » In Athens, the opening of the first modern Olympic Games is celebrated, 1,500 years after the original games are banned by Roman emperor Theodosius I.
May 18 » The United States Supreme Court rules in Plessy v. Ferguson that the "separate but equal" doctrine is constitutional.
May 26 » Nicholas II becomes the last Tsar of Imperial Russia.
July 28 » The city of Miami, Florida is incorporated.
November 17 » The Western Pennsylvania Hockey League, which later became the first ice hockey league to openly trade and hire players, began play at Pittsburgh's Schenley Park Casino.
Christening day April 4, 1897
The temperature on April 4, 1897 was about 2.9 °C. The airpressure was 75 cm mercury. The atmospheric humidity was 80%. Source: KNMI
May 26 » Dracula, a Gothic horror novel by Irish author Bram Stoker, is published.
June 22 » British colonial officers Charles Walter Rand and Lt. Charles Egerton Ayerst are assassinated in Pune, Maharashtra, India by the Chapekar brothers and Mahadeo Vinayak Ranade, who are later caught and hanged.
July 11 » Salomon August Andrée leaves Spitsbergen to attempt to reach the North Pole by balloon. He later crashes and dies.
September 11 » After months of pursuit, generals of Menelik II of Ethiopia capture Gaki Sherocho, the last king of Kaffa, bringing an end to that ancient kingdom.
September 12 » Tirah Campaign: In the Battle of Saragarhi, ten thousand Pashtun tribesmen suffer several hundred casualties while attacking 21 Sikh soldiers in British service.
December 9 » Activist Marguerite Durand founds the feminist daily newspaper La Fronde in Paris.
When copying data from this family tree, please include a reference to the origin: Gert Esterhuizen, "Family tree Eric Esterhuizen", database, Genealogy Online (https://www.genealogieonline.nl/stamboom-eric-esterhuizen/I13398.php : accessed February 24, 2026), "Andries Dewald PRETORIUS (1896-????)".
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