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The 1900s (pronounced "nineteen-hundreds") was the decade that began on January 1, 1900, and ended on December 31, 1909. The Edwardian era (1901–1910) covers a similar span of time. The term "nineteen-hundreds" is sometimes also used to mean the entire century from January 1, 1900, to December 31, 1999 (the years beginning with "19").
The Scramble for Africa continued, with the Orange Free State, South African Republic, Ashanti Empire, Aro Confederacy, Sokoto Caliphate and Kano Emirate being conquered by the British Empire, alongside the French Empire conquering Borno, the German Empire conquering the Adamawa Emirate, and the Portuguese Empire conquering the Ovambo. Atrocities in the Congo Free State were committed by private companies and the Force Publique, with a resultant population decline of 1 to 15 million. From 1904 to 1908, German colonial forces in South West Africa led a campaign of ethnic extermination and collective punishment, killing 24,000 to 100,000 Hereros and 10,000 Nama. The First Moroccan and Bosnian crises led to worsened tensions in Europe that would ultimately lead to World War I in the next decade. Cuba, Bulgaria, and Norway became independent.
The deadliest conventional war of this decade was the Russo-Japanese War, fought over rival imperial ambitions in Manchuria and the Korean Empire. Russia suffered a humiliating defeat in this conflict, contributing to a growing domestic unrest which culminated in the Russian Revolution of 1905. Unconventional wars of similar scale include insurrections in the Philippines (1899–1913), China (1899–1901), and Colombia (1899–1902). Lesser conflicts include interstate wars such as the Second Boer War (1899–1902), the Kuwaiti–Rashidi war (1900–1901), and the Saudi–Rashidi War (1903–1907), as well as failed uprisings and revolutions in Portuguese Angola (1902–1904), Rumelia (1903), Ottoman Eastern Anatolia (1904), Uruguay (1904), French Madagascar (1905–1906), Argentina (1905), Persia (1905–1911), German East Africa (1905–1907), and Romania (1907). A major famine took place in China from 1906 to 1907, possibly leading to 20–25 million deaths. This famine was directly caused by the 1906 China floods (April–October 1906), which hit the Huai River particularly hard and destroyed both the summer and autumn harvest. The 1908 Messina earthquake caused 75,000–82,000 deaths.
First-wave feminism made advances, with universities being opened for women in Japan, Bulgaria, Cuba, Russia, and Peru. In 1906, Finland granted women the right to vote, the first European country to do so. The foundation of the Women's Social and Political Union by Emmeline Pankhurst in 1903 led to the rise of the Suffragettes in Great Britain and Ireland. In 1908, a revolution took place in the Ottoman Empire, where the Young Turks movement restored the Ottoman constitution of 1876, establishing the Second Constitutional Era. Subsequently, ethnic tensions rose, and in 1909, up to 30,000 mainly Armenian civilians in Adana were slain by Turkish civilians.
The decade saw the widespread application of the internal combustion engine including mass production of the automobile, as well as the introduction of the typewriter. The Wright Flyer performed the first recorded controlled, powered, sustained heavier than air flight on December 17, 1903. Reginald Fessenden of East Bolton, Quebec, Canada made what appeared to be[clarification needed] the first audio radio broadcasts of entertainment and music ever made to a general audience. The first huge success of American cinema, as well as the largest experimental achievement to this point, was the 1903 film The Great Train Robbery, directed by Edwin S. Porter, while the world's first feature film, The Story of the Kelly Gang, was released on December 26, 1906, in Melbourne, Australia. Popular books of this decade included The Tale of Peter Rabbit (1902) and Anne of Green Gables (1908), which sold 45 million and 50 million copies respectively. Popular songs of this decade include "Lift Every Voice and Sing" and "What Are They Doing in Heaven?", which have been featured in 42 and 16 hymnals respectively.
During the decade, the world population increased from 1.60 to 1.75 billion, with approximately 580 million births and 450 million deaths in total. As of October 2026, the only remaining living person born in this decade is Ethel Caterham, born August 21, 1909. The last living man from this decade was Juan Vicente Pérez (May 27, 1909 – April 2, 2024).
There are several main varieties of how individual years of the decade are pronounced. Using 1906 as an example, they are "nineteen-oh-six", "nineteen-six", and "nineteen-aught-six". Which variety is most prominent depends somewhat on global region and generation. "Nineteen-oh-six" is the most common; "nineteen-six" is less common. In American English, "nineteen-aught-six" is also recognized but not much used.[citation needed]
Estimates for the world population by 1900 vary from 1.563 to 1.710 billion.
| PRB
(1973–2016) |
UN
(2015) |
Maddison
(2008) |
HYDE
(2010) |
Tanton
(1994) |
Biraben
(1980) |
McEvedy &
Jones (1978) |
Thomlinson
(1975) |
Durand
(1974) |
Clark
(1967) |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| 1,656M | 1,650M | 1,563M | 1,654M | 1,600M | 1,633M | 1,625M | 1,600M | 1,650–1,710M | 1,668M |



Prominent assassinations, targeted killings, and assassination attempts include:
| Year | Date | Name | Position | Culprits | Country | Description | Image |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| 1900 | February 3 | William Goebel | governor of Kentucky | unknown | United States | Either five or six shots were fired from the nearby State Building, one striking Goebel in the chest, seriously wounding him. | |
| 1900 | July 29 | Umberto I | King | Gaetano Bresci | Italy | Assassinated by anarchist Gaetano Bresci. | |
| 1901 | March 6 | Wilhelm II | Kaiser | Deidrich Weiland | Germany | Attempted assassination in Bremen by Deidrich Weiland. | |
| 1901 | September 6 | William McKinley | President | Leon Czolgosz | United States | Dies 8 days after being shot at the Pan-American Exposition in Buffalo, New York, by American anarchist Leon Czolgosz. | |
| 1902 | April 15 | Dmitry Sipyagin | Russian Interior Minister | Stepan Balmashov | Russian Empire | Sipyagin was assassinated in the Mariinsky Palace by Socialist-Revolutionary Stepan Balmashov. | |
| 1902 | September 29 | Émile Zola | novelist and journalist | unknown | France | Zola was killed by carbon monoxide poisoning caused by an improperly ventilated chimney. | |
| 1902 | November 4 | Hale Johnson | Mayor of Newton, Illinois | Harry Harris | United States | Hale was Killed while attempting to collect a debt owed to him by Harry Harris who shot him. | |
| 1903 | March 31 | Grigoriy Shcherbina | Russian consul | an unknown Albanian Ottoman officer | Ottoman Empire | According to Durham. A year later, the 35-year-old Consul died of bullet wounds sustained in the assassination attempt by an Albanian soldier. | |
| 1903 | June 11 | Aleksandar Obrenović, and Draga Mašin | King of Serbia, and Queen Consort | Army officers led by Dragutin Dimitrijević | Serbia | Killed in the royal palace as part of the May Overthrow. | |
| 1903 | June 11 | Lazar Petrović | Adjutant to King Aleksandar Obrenović | unknown assassin | Kingdom of Serbia | Killed as part of the May Overthrow. | |
| 1903 | June 11 | Dimitrije Cincar-Marković | Prime Minister of Serbia | rioters from the May Coup | Serbia | Markovic was killed in the May Coup. | |
| 1904 | November 26 | José Francisco Chaves | Superintendent of Public Instruction (former congressman and territory politician) | unknown | United States | Jose was shot by an unknown assassin in Pinoswells, New Mexico. | |
| 1904 | June 16 | Nikolai Bobrikov | Governor-General | Eugen Schauman | Finland | Assassinated by nationalist nobleman Eugen Schauman. | |
| 1904 | July 28 | Vyacheslav von Plehve | Russian Interior Minister | Yegor Sazonov | Russia | Plehve was Killed by a bomb thrown by a member of the SR Combat Organization | |
| 1905 | February 6 | Eliel Soisalon-Soininen | Chancellor of Justice | Lennart Hohenthal | Finland | Assassinated in his apartment in Helsinki by Lennart Hohenthal. | |
| 1905 | February 17 | Grand Duke Sergei Alexandrovich of Russia | Governor-General of Moscow | Ivan Kalyayev | Russian Empire | Alexandrovich was killed in a by a bomb Organized by the SR Combat Organization. | |
| 1905 | April 24 | John McPherson Pinckney | Texas Representative | J. N. Brown | United States | John was Killed during riot instigated by opponents of alcohol prohibition. | |
| 1905 | June 13 | Theodoros Deligiannis | Prime Minister | Antonios Gherakaris | Greece | Killed by gambler Antonios Gherakaris, reportedly for measures taken against gambling places. | |
| 1905 | October 21 | Tomasso Petto | New York mobster | unknown assassin | United States | The New York mobster and leading hitman in the Morello crime family was shot multiple times while walking to his home in Browntown. | |
| 1905 | December 30 | Frank Steunenberg | Governor of Idaho | Harry Orchard | United States | The fourth governor of the State of Idaho was shot by a former miner after Frank left his office. | |
| 1907 | March 8 | Marinos Antypas | socialist politician | Kyriakou | Greece | A group of farmers paid 30,000 drachmas to a supervisor named Kyriakou to kill Antypas, which he did on March 8, 1907. Kyriakou was never convicted for the crime. | |
| 1907 | March 11 | Dimitar Petkov | Prime Minister | Aleksandar Petrov | Bulgaria | Killed by an anarchist. | |
| 1907 | August 31 | Amin al-Soltan | Prime Minister | unknown assassin | Iran | Killed in front of the Parliament. | |
| 1908 | February 1 | Carlos I | King | Alfredo Luís da Costa and Manuel Buíça | Portugal | Assassinated in Lisbon, Portugal. | |
| 1909 | October 26 | Itō Hirobumi | Prime Minister | An Jung-geun | Japan | Also Resident-General of Korea, assassinated by Ahn Jung-geun at the Harbin train station in Manchuria, for many grievances against Japan, including the assassination of Empress Myeongseong of Korea. | |
| 1909 | November 14 | Ramón Lorenzo Falcón | Chief of Police | Simón Radowitzky | Argentina | Falcon was killed when a bomb was planted on his carriage by Simón Radowitzky |
This section needs expansion. You can help by adding missing information. (October 2021) |












The best selling books of the decade were Anne of Green Gables (1908) and The Tale of Peter Rabbit (1902), which sold 50 million and 45 million copies respectively. Serbian writers used the Belgrade literary style, an Ekavian writing form which set basis for the later standardization of the Serbian language. Theodor Herzl, the founder of political Zionism, published The Old New Land in 1902, outlining Herzl's vision for a Jewish state in the Land of Israel.
Below are the best-selling books in the United States of each year, as determined by Publishers Weekly.

This section needs expansion. You can help by adding missing information. (January 2010) |


Popular songs of the 1900s include "Lift Every Voice and Sing" and "What Are They Doing in Heaven?", which have been featured in 42 and 16 hymnals respectively.
This section needs expansion. You can help by adding missing information. (January 2010) |
This section needs expansion. You can help by adding missing information. (August 2023) |

This section needs expansion. You can help by adding missing information. (July 2018) |


Baseball |
Boxing
|
Cricket |
Since the deaths of Okagi Hayashi of Japan on 26 April 2025 and Inah Canabarro Lucas of Brazil on 30 April 2025, there is one remaining verified living person born in the 1900s decade, Ethel Caterham (born 21 August 1909) of the United Kingdom. The last surviving man born during this decade was Juan Vicente Pérez of Venezuela (27 May 1909 – 2 April 2024).
The following articles contain brief timelines which list the most prominent events of the decade:
1900 • 1901 • 1902 • 1903 • 1904 • 1905 • 1906 • 1907 • 1908 • 1909
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