The Canadian Pacific Railway takes over the Ottawa, Northern and Western Railway.
The 13th County Championship cricket season begins in the UK, with 15 counties competing.
Born: Arturo Licata, Italian supercentenarian, last surviving man born in 1902, in Enna (died 2014)
Born: Alfred Kastler, French physicist and Nobel Prize laureate, in Guebwiller (died 1984)
The Commonwealth Public Service Act creates Australia's Public Service.
Died: Bret Harte, 65, US writer (throat cancer)
British passenger ship SS Camorta sinks while en route from Madras, India, to Rangoon, Burma, after being hit by a cyclone in the Irrawaddy Delta; all 737 passengers and crew lose their lives.
Born: - Max Ophüls, German film director, in Saarbrücken (died 1957)
Died: William T. Sampson, 62, US admiral
In Saint Vincent, the volcano La Soufrière erupts, devastating the northern portion of the island and killing 2,000 people.
Died: Agostino Roscelli, 83, Italian priest and Catholic saint, founder of the Institute of Sisters of the Immaculata
In Martinique, Mount Pelée erupts, destroying the town of Saint-Pierre and killing over 30,000.
Born: André Michel Lwoff, French microbiologist, recipient of the Nobel Prize in Physiology or Medicine, in Paris (died 1994)
Born: David O. Selznick, US film producer, in Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania (died 1965)
In the second round of France's legislative election, the Bloc des gauches alliance of Socialists, Radicals, and the Opportunist Republicans, over the Progressive Republicans. The dearth of seats won by Pierre Waldeck-Rousseau's Republicans results in Radical Émile Combes being selected to form a government.
Brazilian inventor Augusto Severo de Albuquerque Maranhão, 38, and his companion, French engineer Georges Saché, 25, fly Severo's semi-rigid airship Pax over Paris. They lose control of the aircraft, which catches fire and explodes 1,200 feet over Montparnasse Cemetery, killing both men.
The 1902 Copa de la Coronación football competition begins in Spain, the forerunner of the Copa del Rey.
Lyman Gilmore claims to have flown a steam-powered fixed-wing aircraft on this date; the proof is alleged to have been destroyed in a 1935 fire.
The final of the Copa de la Coronación football tournament is won by Club Bizcaya, who defeat FC Barcelona 2-1.
Born: Richard J. Daley, US politician, in Chicago (d. 1976)
King Alfonso XIII of Spain comes of age and officially begins his reign.
Valerios Stais identifies the Antikythera mechanism as an astronomical clock; it would later be recognised as a type of ancient analog computer.
Born: Meredith Willson, US musician, composer and playwright, in Mason City, Iowa (died 1984)
Cuba gains independence from the United States, becoming the Republic of Cuba.
Born:
Earl Averill, US baseball player, in Snohomish, Washington (died 1983)
Marcel Lajos Breuer, Hungarian architect, in Pécs (died 1981)
Anatole Litvak, Ukrainian film director, in Kiev (died 1974)
White Star Line's latest ship, the SS Ionic, is launched at the Harland and Wolff shipyard in Belfast, Northern Ireland.
The Belgian steamer Stanleyville is wrecked off Takoradi, in the British colony of Gold Coast.
Died: Almon Brown Strowger, 62, US inventor (aneurysm)
British destroyer HMS Recruit strikes rocks near Cape Cornwall, in thick fog. The ship is refloated and towed into Penzance by tugs.
The Pacts of May are signed by representatives of Chile and Argentina in an attempt to resolve territorial disputes.
Born: Henri Guillaumet, French aviator, in Bouy (dued 1940)
The Treaty of Vereeniging officially ends the Second Boer War.
Following a court ruling that the reserve clause in contracts between players and United States National League baseball clubs does not apply to players signed with an American League team,Connie Mack trades Nap Lajoie and Bill Bernhard with the Cleveland Bronchos.
