January 18 » An X-ray generating machine is exhibited for the first time by H. L. Smith.
February 1 » La bohème premieres in Turin at the Teatro Regio (Turin), conducted by the young Arturo Toscanini.
February 21 » An Englishman raised in Australia, Bob Fitzsimmons, fought an Irishman, Peter Maher, in an American promoted event which technically took place in Mexico, winning the 1896 World Heavyweight Championship in boxing.
March 1 » Henri Becquerel discovers radioactive decay.
March 2 » The Battle of Adwa: The Italian Army defeated by the Ethiopian Army in Adwa, Tigray, Ethiopia.
August 16 » Skookum Jim Mason, George Carmack and Dawson Charlie discover gold in a tributary of the Klondike River in Canada, setting off the Klondike Gold Rush.
Day of death April 15, 1897
The temperature on April 15, 1897 was about 7.2 °C. The airpressure was 76 cm mercury. The atmospheric humidity was 80%. Source: KNMI
April 30 » J. J. Thomson of the Cavendish Laboratory announces his discovery of the electron as a subatomic particle, over 1,800 times smaller than a proton (in the atomic nucleus), at a lecture at the Royal Institution in London.
May 26 » Dracula, a Gothic horror novel by Irish author Bram Stoker, is published.
August 10 » German chemist Felix Hoffmann discovers an improved way of synthesizing acetylsalicylic acid (aspirin).
August 31 » Thomas Edison patents the Kinetoscope, the first movie projector.
September 10 » Lattimer massacre: A sheriff's posse kills 19 unarmed striking immigrant miners in Lattimer, Pennsylvania, United States.
December 30 » The British Colony of Natal annexes Zululand.
When copying data from this family tree, please include a reference to the origin: J. Ham, "Family tree Ham", database, Genealogy Online (https://www.genealogieonline.nl/stamboom-ham/I47174.php : accessed January 30, 2026), "Jan van de Poll (1896-1897)".
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