1903

Centuries: 19th century - 20th century - 21st century

Decades: 1850s 1860s 1870s 1880s 1890s - 1900s - 1910s 1920s 1930s 1940s 1950s

Years: 1898 1899 1900 1901 1902 - 1903 - 1904 1905 1906 1907 1908

Events:

• February 15 - Morris Michtom[?] and his wife Rose introduce the first teddy bear in America.
• February 23 - Cuba leases Guantanamo Bay to the United States "in perpetuity"
• March 2 - In New York City the Martha Washington Hotel opens, becoming the first hotel exclusively for women.
• March 14 - The Hay-Herran Treaty, granting the United States the right to build the Panama Canal, is ratified by the United States Senate. The Colombian Senate would later reject the treaty.
• March 23 - The Wright Brothers apply for a patent on their invention of the first successful airplane.
• March 31 - Richard Pearse reputedly flies a heavier than air machine in an uncontrolled powered flight, crash landing on a hedge. (Poorly documented.)
• April 29 - 30,000,000 cubic metre landslide kills 70 in Frank, Alberta[?]
• December 7 - Orville Wright flies aircraft with a petrol engine in first documented successful controlled powered flight.
• December 30 - A fire at the Iroquois Theater[?] in Chicago kills 600.

• Thomas Hunt Morgan discovers that chromosomes contain genes

Art, Culture & Fashion

• 1903 in film
  • The Great Train Robbery, by Edwin S. Porter[?]
• 1903 in literature
• 1903 in music
  • February 11 - Anton Bruckner's 9th Symphony premieres in Vienna
• 1903 in sports

Births:

• January 27 - John Carew Eccles, psychologist, winner of Nobel Prize in Physiology or Medicine 1963, (+ 1997)
• January 11 - Hans Redlich[?], composer
• January 18 - Werner Hinz[?], actor (+ 1985)
• January 23 - Randolph Scott, actor (+ 1987)
• February 6 - Claudio Arrau, pianist (+ 1991)
• February 11 - Alan Paton, writer
• February 11 - Rex Lease[?], American actor
• February 12 - Georges Simenon, Belgian writer (+ 1989)
• February 13 - Georges Simenon, thriller writer (+ 1989)
• February 16 - Edgar Bergen, ventriloquist (+ 1978)
• February 21 - Anaïs Nin, writer (+ 1977)
• February 22 - Frank Plumpton Ramsey, mathematician
• February 24 - Franz Burda[?], German publisher (+ 1986)
• February 27 - Grethe Weiser[?], actress (+ 1970)
• February 28 - Vincente Minnelli[?], director (+ 1986)
• March 10 - Bix Beiderbecke, jazz trumpeter (+ 1931)
• March 10 - Clare Booth Luce[?], publisher, writer (+ 1987)
• March 11 - Lawrence Welk, Champagne musicmaker (+ 1992)
• March 18 - O. E. Plauen[?], illustrator and cartoonist (+ 1944)
• April 3 - Peter Huchel[?], lyricist and author of radio plays (+ 1981)
• April 25 - Andrey Nikolaevich Kolmogorov, Russian mathematician (+ 1987)
• May 3 - Bing Crosby - singer
• May 8 - Fernandel, actor
• May 20 - Barbara Hepworth, sculptor (+ 1975)
• May 29 - Bob Hope, comedian
• June 6 - Aram Khachaturian, composer [[+ 1978)
• June 19 - Lou Gehrig, (baseball player)
• July 1 - Amy Johnson, aviator (+ 1941)
• July 2 - Olav V, (King of Norway)
• September 13, Claudette Colbert
• October 1 - Vladimir Horowitz, pianist
• November 7 - Konrad Lorenz
• December 28 - John von Neumann, Hungarian-American mathematician

Deaths:

• February 11 - Henryk Szulc[?], composer
• February 22 - Hugo Wolf, composer
• February 26 - Richard Jordan Gatling, inventor
• March 16 - Judge Roy Bean[?], jurist, Old West pioneer
• Theodor Mommsen, German classical scholar and historian

Nobel Prizes:

• Physics - Antoine Henri Becquerel, Pierre Curie, Marie Curie
• Chemistry - Svante August Arrhenius
• Medicine - Niels Ryberg Finsen
• Literature - Bjørnstjerne Bjørnson
• Peace - William Randal Cremer[?]