← 1910 1909 1908 1911 in the United States → 1912 1913 1914
Decades:	1890s 1900s 1910s 1920s 1930s
See also:	History of the United States (1865–1918) Timeline of the history of the United States (1900-1930) List of years in the United States

This articleneeds additional citations forverification. Please helpimprove this article byadding citations to reliable sources. Unsourced material may be challenged and removed. Find sources: "1911 in the United States" – news ·newspapers ·books ·scholar ·JSTOR(August 2021) (Learn how and when to remove this message)

Events from the year1911 in the United States.

• President:William Howard Taft (R-Ohio)
• Vice President:James S. Sherman (R-New York)
• Chief Justice:Edward Douglass White (Louisiana)
• Speaker of the House of Representatives:

Joseph Gurney Cannon (R-Illinois) (until March 4)

Champ Clark (D-Missouri) (starting April 4)

• Congress:61st (until March 4),62nd (starting March 4)

• January 5 – TheKappa Alpha Psi fraternity is founded atIndiana University,Bloomington, Indiana.
• January 17 –Emmet O'Neal is sworn in as the 34thgovernor of Alabama replacingB. B. Comer.
• January 18 –Eugene Burton Ely lands on the deck of theUSSPennsylvania stationed inSan Francisco Bay, marking the first time an aircraft lands on a ship.
• January 30 – The destroyerUSSTerry makes the firstaeroplane rescue at sea, saving the life ofJohn McCurdy 10 miles fromHavana,Cuba.
• January –The Masses socialist magazine begins publication.
• March – The first installment of a serialized version ofFrederick Winslow Taylor'smonograph,The Principles of Scientific Management, appears inThe American Magazine. The complete series runs in the March, April, and May issues, giving a boost to the efficiency movement.^[1]
• March 10 – The Kansas legislature approves House Bill Number 906, effectively the firstblue sky law in the United States, culminating an effort byJoseph Norman Dolley, Kansas' banking commissioner.
• March 25 – TheTriangle Shirtwaist Factory fire inNew York City kills 146.
• March 29 – The United States Army formally adopts theM1911 pistol as its standard sidearm, thus giving the gun its 1911 designation.

• April 13 –Mexican Revolution: Rebels takeAgua Prieta on theSonora–Arizona border; government troops take the town back April 17 when the rebel leader "Red" López is drunk.
• April 17 –Southern Methodist University is chartered in Dallas, Texas.
• April 27 – Following the resignation and death ofWilliam P. Frye, acompromise is reached to rotate the office ofPresident pro tempore of the United States Senate.
• April 30 – Sparks from a burning hayshed ignite theGreat Fire of 1911, destroying much of downtownBangor, Maine.
• May 15 – TheU.S. Supreme Court declaresStandard Oil to be an "unreasonable"monopoly under theSherman Antitrust Act and orders the company to be dissolved.
• May 23 – The main branch of theNew York Public Library is officially opened.
• May 24 –Colorado National Monument is established.
• May 30 – The firstIndianapolis 500-mile auto race is run. The winner isRay Harroun in theMarmon 'Wasp.'
• June 5 –Charles F. Kettering files US patent 1,150,523, for anelectric Engine Starting Device.
• June 16
  • A 772-gram stonymeteorite strikes earth inColumbia County, Wisconsin, near the village ofKilbourn, damaging a barn.
  • IBM is incorporated as theComputing-Tabulating-Recording Company inEndicott, New York.
• July 24 –Hiram Bingham rediscoversMachu Picchu.

• August 8 –Public Law 62-5 sets the number of representatives in theUnited States House of Representatives at 435 (the law takes effect in 1913).
• August 29 –Ishi, last known member of theYana people, leaves the California wilderness.
• September 11 –Middle Tennessee State University is founded inMurfreesboro, Tennessee, as Middle Tennessee Normal School.
• September 25 – Groundbreaking forFenway Park inBoston, Massachusetts, begins.
• September 30 –Austin Dam breaks, wiping out the town ofAustin, Pennsylvania, and continuing downstream about 8 miles into the village of Costello.

• October 7 – OutlawElmer McCurdy and "associates" are chased after trying to rob a train inOklahoma. McCurdy on the run is eventually hunted down and shot by authorities. His body is never claimed and later is chemically petrified. Afterwards his remains serve as sideshow attractions in carnivals until 1976 when they are diagnosed by forensic experts to be McCurdy. McCurdy's body is finally buried in 1976 after a 65-year odyssey to the grave.
• October 24 –Orville Wright remains in the air 9 minutes and 45 seconds in aglider atKill Devil Hills, North Carolina, setting a new world record that stands for 10 years.^[2]
• October 28 –The Rosicrucian Fellowship's international headquarters opens atMount Ecclesia,Oceanside, California (preceded by its formal constitution on August 8, 1909, atSeattle, Washington).
• November 3 –Chevrolet officially enters theautomobile market to compete with theFord Model T.
• November 11
  • The Great Blue Norther of 11/11/11: A record cold snap hits the United States Midwest; many cities break record highs and lows on the same day.
  • The Upton Machine Company, nowWhirlpool Corporation, was founded in St Joseph, MI.
• November 17 – TheOmega Psi Phi fraternity is founded atHoward University.
• December 24 – TheLackawanna Cutoff, the first of two major cutoffs built by theDelaware, Lackawanna and Western Railroad, opens just 3 years after it was built.

• Progressive Era (1890s–1920s)
• Lochner era (c. 1897–c. 1937)

• January 9 –Slim Gaillard, jazz musician (died1991)
• February 6 –Ronald Reagan, film actor, 33rdgovernor of California from 1967 to 1975 and 40thpresident of the United States from 1981 to 1989 (died2004)
• March 9 –Ebby Halliday, American realtor (died2015)
• March 13
  • L. Ron Hubbard, science fiction author, founder ofScientology (died1986)^[3]
  • Marie Rudisill, American TV and radio personality (died2006)
• March 24 –Joseph Barbera, cartoonist (died2006)
• March 25 –Jack Ruby, assassin ofLee Harvey Oswald (the man who (according to four government investigations)^[4]assassinated President John F. Kennedy) (died1967)
• April 8 –Melvin Calvin, chemist, winner of theNobel Prize in Chemistry in 1961 (died1997)
• April 17 –Lester Rodney, journalist (died2009)
• April 18 –Huntington Hartford, businessman (died2008)
• May 8 –Robert Johnson, Mississippi blues guitar player and singer-songwriter (died1938)
• May 11 –Doodles Weaver, actor and singer (died1983)
• May 27 –Hubert Humphrey, 38thvice president of the United States from 1965 to 1969 and U.S. Senator from Minnesota from 1949 to 1964 and from 1971 to 1978 (died1978)
• June 5 –John C. Woods, US Army executioner (died in accident1950 in the Marshall Islands)
• June 11 –Norman Malcolm, philosopher (died1990)
• June 13 –Luis Walter Alvarez, physicist, winner of theNobel Prize in Physics in 1968 (died1988)
• June 25 –William Howard Stein, chemist, winner of the Nobel Prize in Chemistry in 1972 (died1980)
• June 26 –Babe Didrikson Zaharias, athlete and golfer (died1956)
• July 4 –Frederick Seitz, solid-state physicist (died2008)
• August 9 –William A. Fowler, physicist, winner of the Nobel Prize in Physics in 1983 (died1995)
• August 24 –Durward Kirby, American television host and announcer (died2000)
• September 21 –Clair Engle, U.S. Senator from California from 1959 to 1964 (died1964)
• September 23 –Jane Hadley Barkley,Second Lady of the United States (died1964)
• September 30 –Ruth Gruber, journalist (died2016)
• December 1 –Walter Alston, baseball player and manager (died1984)

• January 7 –William Hall Sherwood, pianist and music educator (born1854)
• January 9 –Edwin Arthur Jones, choral composer (born1853)
• January 24 –David Graham Phillips, journalist and novelist, murdered (born1867)
• February 1 –Charles Stillman Sperry, admiral (born1847)
• February 7 –Hannah Whitall Smith, Quaker author (born1832)
• February 22 –Frances Harper, African American abolitionist, poet and author (born1825)
• March 4 –Ellen Maria Colfax,Second Lady of the United States (born1836)
• March 18 –David Moffat, financier (born1839)
• April 13 –William Keith, landscape painter (born1838 in Scotland)
• April 14
  • George Cary Eggleston, memoirist (born 1839)
  • Addie Joss, baseball player (born1880)
  • Denman Thompson, actor and playwright (born1833)
• May 5
  • James A. Bland, African American musician and songwriter (born 1854)
  • Halsey Ives, art teacher and curator (born 1847)
• May 9 –Thomas Wentworth Higginson, writer, abolitionist and advocate of women's suffrage (born1823)
• May 21 –Williamina Fleming, astronomer (born1857 in Scotland)^[5]
• May 22 –Elizabeth Smith Miller, women's rights campaigner (born1822)
• May 30 –Milton Bradley, game pioneer and businessman (born1836)
• June 9 –Carrie Nation, temperance activist (born1846)
• June 27 –Elizabeth Litchfield Cunnyngham, missionary and church worker (born1831)
• July 2
  • Mary M. Cohen, American social economist and proto-feminist (born1854)
  • Clement A. Evans, Confederate general (born 1833)
• July 24 –Thomas J. Latham, lawyer and businessman (born1831)
• August 1 –Samuel Arza Davenport, politician (born1843)
• August 7 –Elizabeth Akers Allen, author, journalist and poet (born 1832)
• August 8 –William P. Frye, U.S. Senator (born1830)
• August 11 –Verner Clarges, silent film actor (born 1846)
• August 26 –Alfred Bayliss, English-American educator (born1847)
• September 9 –Francis March, lexicographer and philologist (born 1825)
• October 2 –Winfield Scott Schley, admiral (born 1839)
• October 7 –Elmer McCurdy, robber, killed in shootout (born 1880)
• October 14 –John Marshall Harlan, U.S. Supreme Court Justice (born 1833)
• October 17 –Abram Williams, U.S. Senator from California from 1886 to 1887 (born 1832)
• October 19 –Eugene Ely, aviation pioneer (born1886)
• October 24 –Ida Lewis, lighthouse keeper (born1842)
• October 29 –Joseph Pulitzer, newspaper publisher and journalist (born 1847 in Hungary)
• October 31 –John Joseph Montgomery, glider pioneer (born1858)
• November 8 –Oscar Bielaski, Major League Baseball player (born1847)
• November 15 –Philip Gengembre Hubert, architect (born1830 in France)
• December 2 –George Davidson, geodesist, astronomer, geographer, surveyor and engineer (born1825 in the United Kingdom)
• December 21 –Benjamin F. Jonas, U.S. Senator from Louisiana from 1879 to 1885 (born1834)
• December 20 –Rose Eytinge, actress (born1835)
• December 25 –Arthur F. Griffith, calculating prodigy (born 1880)

• List of American films of 1911
• Timeline of United States history (1900–1929)

• Media related to1911 in the United States at Wikimedia Commons

• 1911 in the United States
• 1910s in the United States
• 1911 by country
• 1911 in North America
• Years of the 20th century in the United States

• Webarchive template wayback links
• Articles with short description
• Short description is different from Wikidata
• Articles needing additional references from August 2021
• All articles needing additional references
• Commons category link from Wikidata