1906
Events
January–February
- January 12 - Persian Constitutional Revolution: A nationalistic coalition of merchants, religious leaders and intellectuals in Persia forces the shah Mozaffar ad-Din Shah Qajar to grant a constitution, and establish a national assembly, the Majlis.
- January 16–April 7 - The Algeciras Conference convenes, to resolve the First Moroccan Crisis between France and Germany.
- January 22 - The strikes a reef off Vancouver Island, Canada, killing over 100 in the ensuing disaster.
- January 31 - The Ecuador–Colombia earthquake, and associated tsunami, cause at least 500 deaths.
- February 7 - is launched, sparking a naval race between Britain and Germany.
- February 11
- * Pope Pius X publishes the encyclical Vehementer Nos, denouncing the 1905 French law on the Separation of the Churches and the State.
- * Two British members of a poll tax collecting expedition are killed near Richmond, Natal, sparking the Bambatha Rebellion.
March–April
- March 10 - Courrières mine disaster: An explosion in a coal mine in France kills 1,060.
- March 18 - In France, Romanian inventor Traian Vuia becomes the first person to achieve an unassisted takeoff in a heavier-than-air powered monoplane, but it is incapable of sustained flight.
- April 14 - The Azusa Street Revival, the primary catalyst for the revival of Pentecostalism this century, opens in Los Angeles.
- April 18
- * The 1906 [San Francisco earthquake|San Francisco Earthquake] on the San Andreas Fault destroys much of San Francisco, California, killing at least 3,000, with 225,000–300,000 left homeless, and $350 million in damages.
- * Xerox, the global digital office machine brand, is founded in Rochester, New York as the Haloid Photographic Company.
- April 23 - In the Russian Empire, the Fundamental Laws are announced at the first state Duma.
May–June
July–August
- July 6 - The Second Geneva Convention meets.
- July 12 - Alfred Dreyfus is exonerated. He is reinstalled in the French Army on July 21, thus ending the Dreyfus affair.
- July 20 - In the Grand Duchy of Finland, a new electoral law is ratified, guaranteeing full women's suffrage, the first in modern Europe. Women can also stand in national elections.
- August 4 - The first Imperial German Navy submarine, U-1, is launched.
- August 16
- * 1906 Aleutian Islands earthquake: An earthquake with an estimated magnitude of 8.35 occurs off the Rat Islands in Alaska.
- * 1906 Valparaíso earthquake: A magnitude 8.2 earthquake in Valparaíso, Chile leaves nearly 4,000 dead and approximately 20,000 injured.
- August 23 - Unable to control a rebellion, Cuban President Tomás Estrada Palma requests United States intervention. This leads to the Second Occupation of Cuba, which lasts until 1909.
September–October
- September 11 - Mahatma Gandhi coins the term Satyagraha, to characterize the nonviolence movement in South Africa.
- September 18 - A typhoon and tsunami kill an estimated 10,000 in Hong Kong.
- September 20 - The RMS Mauretania is launched on the River Tyne, becoming the world's largest ship.
- September 30 - The first Gordon Bennett Cup in ballooning is held, starting in Paris. The winning team, piloting the balloon United States, lands in Fylingdales, Yorkshire, England.
- October 1 - The Grand Duchy of Finland becomes the first nation to include the right of women to stand as candidates when it adopts universal suffrage.
- October 6 - The National Consultative Assembly of Iran convenes for the first time.
- October 11 - A United States diplomatic crisis with Japan arises when the San Francisco public school board orders Japanese students to be taught in racially segregated schools.
- October 16 - Imposter Wilhelm Voigt impersonates a Prussian officer and takes over the city hall in Köpenick for a short time.
- October 23 - An aeroplane of Alberto Santos-Dumont takes off at Bagatelle in France, and flies 60 meters. This is the first officially recorded powered flight in Europe.
- October 28 - The Union Minière du Haut Katanga, a mining trust, is created in the Belgian Congo.
- October 28 - A train falls off a drawbridge in New Jersey, drowning 53 people, and results in what is widely considered the first ever press release.
November–December
- November 1 - International Exhibition opens in Christchurch, New Zealand.
- November 3 - becomes adopted internationally as a distress signal on inclusion in the service regulations of the first International Radiotelegraph Convention signed in Berlin and coming into effect on 1 July 1908.
- November 18 - The steamboat Dix sinks en route from Seattle to Port Blakely claiming the lives of approximately 50 passengers and crew.
- December 4 - Alpha Phi Alpha fraternity forms at Cornell University, Ithaca, New York; it is the first Black Greek-lettered collegiate order of its kind.
- December 6 - The Transvaal Colony is granted responsible self-government by Britain.
- December 13 - The United Kingdom, France and Italy sign an agreement to preserve, in Ethiopia, the integrity of the ancient empire of Abyssinia.
- December 15 - The London Underground's Great Northern, Piccadilly and Brompton Railway opens.
- December 22 - The 7.9 1906 Manasi earthquake in Xinjiang, China, kills nearly 300 people.
- December 24 - Reginald Fessenden makes the first radio broadcast: a poetry reading, a violin solo, and a speech, from Brant Rock, Massachusetts.
- December 26 - The world's first feature film, The Story of the Kelly Gang, is first shown, at the Melbourne Athenaeum in Australia.
- December 30 - The All-India Muslim League is founded as a political party in Dhaka in the British Raj; it becomes a driving force for the creation of an independent Pakistan.
Date unknown
Births
January–February
- January 11 - Albert Hofmann, Swiss chemist
- January 12 - Eric Birley, British historian and archaeologist
- January 13 - Zhou Youguang, Chinese linguist
- January 14 - William Bendix, American film, radio and television actor
- January 15 - Aristotle Onassis, Greek shipping magnate
- January 16 - Diana Wynyard, English actress
- January 21 - Igor Moiseyev, Russian choreographer
- January 22 - Robert E. Howard, American pulp fiction writer
- January 28 - Pat O'Callaghan, Irish athlete
- February 4
- * Dietrich Bonhoeffer, German religious, resistance leader
- * Clyde Tombaugh, American astronomer
- February 5 - John Carradine, American actor
- February 7
- * Oleg Antonov, Soviet aircraft designer
- * Puyi, Last Emperor of China
- February 8 - Chester Carlson, American physicist, inventor
- February 10 - Lon Chaney Jr., American actor
- February 14 - Nazim al-Qudsi, 26th Prime Minister of Syria and 14th President of Syria
- February 17
- * Galo Plaza, 29th President of Ecuador
- * Käte Selbmann, German politician
- February 18 - Hans Asperger, Austrian pediatrician
- February 26 - Madeleine Carroll, British actress
- February 28 - Bugsy Siegel, American gangster
March–April
- March 1
- * Phạm Văn Đồng, Prime Minister of Vietnam
- * Abdus Sattar, 8th President of Bangladesh
- March 6 - Lou Costello, American actor
- March 13 - Dave Kaye, British pianist
- March 16 - Francisco Ayala, Spanish novelist
- March 19 - Adolf Eichmann, German war criminal
- March 20 - Ozzie Nelson, American actor, director and producer
- March 21 - Jim Thompson, American businessman
- March 25 - A. J. P. Taylor, English historian
- March 26 - Rafael Méndez, Mexican trumpet player
- March 31 - Shin'ichirō Tomonaga, Japanese physicist, Nobel Prize laureate
- April 1 - Alexander Yakovlev, Russian politician, architect of perestroika
- April 4 - Bea Benaderet, American actress
- April 5 - Yin Shun, Chinese Buddhist master
- April 6 - Virginia Hall, American spy with the Special Operations Executive during WWII
- April 9 - Antal Doráti, Hungarian-born American conductor
- April 13 - Samuel Beckett, Irish writer, Nobel Prize laureate
- April 22 - Eddie Albert, American actor and activist
- April 24 - William Joyce, Irish-American World War II Nazi propaganda broadcaster
- April 25
- * Joel Brand, Hungarian rescue worker
- * William J. Brennan Jr., Associate Justice of the Supreme Court of the United States
- * A. W. Haydon, American inventor
- April 28
- * Tony Accardo, American gangster
- * Kurt Gödel, Austrian logician, mathematician, and philosopher of mathematics
- April 29 - Pedro Vargas, Mexican singer and actor
May–June
- May 3 - Mary Astor, American actress and writer
- May 6 - André Weil, French mathematician
- May 8 - Roberto Rossellini, Italian director
- May 11
- * Jacqueline Cochran, American aviator
- * Richard Arvin Overton, oldest living man in the United States and oldest surviving American veteran
- May 15 - Humberto Delgado, Portuguese general, politician
- May 16 - Arturo Uslar Pietri, Venezuelan writer
- May 19
- * Bruce Bennett, American athlete, actor
- * Jimmy MacDonald, Scottish-American sound effects artist, voice actor
- May 20 - Giuseppe Siri, Italian Roman Catholic cardinal
- May 27 - Ajahn Buddhadasa, Thai Buddhist monk
- May 29 - T. H. White, British writer
- June 3 - Josephine Baker, American-born French entertainer
- June 6 - Max August Zorn, German-born American mathematician
- June 15 - Léon Degrelle, Belgian fascist
- June 17 - James H. Flatley, American admiral, aviator
- June 19 - Sir Ernst Chain, German-born British biochemist, Nobel Prize laureate
- June 22
- * Anne Morrow Lindbergh, American author, aviator
- * Billy Wilder, Austrian-born American screenwriter, film director and producer
- June 24 - Pierre Fournier, French cellist
- June 26
- * Viktor Schreckengost, American industrial designer, teacher, sculptor and artist
- * M. P. Sivagnanam, Indian politician
- June 27 - Catherine Cookson, English author
- June 28 - Maria Goeppert Mayer, German physicist, Nobel Prize laureate
July–August
- July 1
- * Jean Dieudonné, French mathematician, academic
- * Estée Lauder, American cosmetics entrepreneur
- * Ivan Neill, British Army officer and Irish Unionist politician
- July 2
- * Hans Bethe, German-born American physicist, Nobel Prize laureate
- * Károly Kárpáti, Hungarian Jewish wrestler
- July 3
- * Alberto Lleras Camargo, Colombian politician, 20th President of Colombia
- * George Sanders, Russian-born British actor
- July 4 - Vincent Schaefer, American chemist, meteorologist
- July 7
- * Helene Johnson, African-American poet
- * Satchel Paige, American baseball player
- July 8 - Philip Johnson, American architect
- July 11 - Herbert Wehner, German politician
- July 17 - Dunc Gray, Australian track cyclist
- July 18 - S. I. Hayakawa, Canadian-born American academic, politician
- July 21 - Caroline Smith, American diver
- July 23 - Vladimir Prelog, Croatian chemist, Nobel Prize laureate
- August 5
- * Joan Hickson, British actress
- * John Huston, American film director, screenwriter, and actor
- * Wassily Leontief, Russian economist, Nobel Prize laureate
- August 5 - Marie-José of Belgium, last Queen of Italy
- August 14 - Horst P. Horst, German photographer
- August 17 - Marcelo Caetano, Prime Minister of Portugal
- August 19 - Philo Farnsworth, American inventor
- August 26 - Albert Sabin, Polish-born American medical researcher
- August 27 - Ed Gein, American serial killer
- August 28 - John Betjeman, English poet
- August 30 - Joan Blondell, American actress
September–October
- September 1
- * Joaquín Balaguer, 41st, 45th, & 49th President of the Dominican Republic, writer
- * Eleanor Alice Burford, English writer
- September 4 - Max Delbrück, German-born American biologist, Nobel Prize laureate
- September 6 - Luis Federico Leloir, French-born Argentine chemist, Nobel Prize laureate
- September 8 - Andrei Kirilenko, Soviet politician
- September 17 - J. R. Jayewardene, President of Sri Lanka
- September 26
- * José Figueres Ferrer, 32nd, 34th, & 38th President of Costa Rica
- * Dmitri Shostakovich, Russian composer
- September 27 - William Empson, English poet, critic
- October 6 - Janet Gaynor, American Academy Award-winning actress
- October 9 - Léopold Sédar Senghor, 1st President of Senegal
- October 10 - R. K. Narayan, Indian novelist
- October 14
- * Hassan al-Banna, Egyptian founder of the Muslim Brotherhood
- * Hannah Arendt, German political theorist
- October 23 - Gertrude Ederle, American swimmer
- October 24 - Marie-Louise von Motesiczky, Austrian-born British painter
- October 26 - Primo Carnera, Italian boxer
- October 29 - Fredric Brown, American writer
November–December
- November 2
- * Ferit Melen, 14th Prime Minister of Turkey
- * Luchino Visconti, Italian theatre, cinema director, writer
- November 5
- * Philip Roberts, British general
- * Fred Lawrence Whipple, American astronomer
- November 9 - Arthur Rudolph, German rocket engineer
- November 10 - Josef Kramer, German Nazi concentration camp commandant
- November 13
- * Wanrong, last empress of China
- * Hermione Baddeley, English character actress
- November 14 - Louise Brooks, American actress
- November 15 - Curtis LeMay, United States Air Force general, vice-presidential candidate
- November 16 - Henri Charrière, French author
- November 17 - Soichiro Honda, Japanese industrialist
- November 18
- * Alec Issigonis, Greek-born British automobile designer
- * Klaus Mann, German writer
- * George Wald, American scientist, Nobel Prize laureate
- November 22 - Jørgen Juve, Norwegian football player and journalist
- December 5 - Ahn Eak-tai, Korean composer and conductor
- December 9 - Grace Hopper, American computer scientist, naval officer
- December 13
- * Princess Marina of Greece and Denmark
- * Laurens van der Post, South African author, journalist
- December 19 - Leonid Brezhnev, Soviet leader
- December 24 - James Hadley Chase, English writer
- December 25 - Ernst Ruska, German physicist, Nobel Prize laureate
- December 27 - Oscar Levant, American pianist, composer, author, comedian, and actor
- December 30 - Carol Reed, English film director
Deaths
January–June
- January 1 - Todor Ivanchov, 11th Prime Minister of Bulgaria
- January 13 - Alexander Stepanovich Popov, Russian physicist
- January 18 - Sir William Forbes Gatacre, British general
- January 19 - Bartolomé Mitre, Argentine statesman, military figure and author, 6th President of Argentina
- January 20 - Maria Cristina of the Immaculate Conception Brando, Italian Roman Catholic nun, saint
- January 25 - Joseph Wheeler, American general, politician
- January 29 - King Christian IX of Denmark
- February 8 - Giuseppina Gabriella Bonino, Italian Roman Catholic religious professed
- February 9 - Paul Laurence Dunbar, American poet and publisher
- February 13 - Albert Gottschalk, Danish painter
- February 18 - John B. Stetson, American hat maker
- February 26 - Jean Lanfray, Swiss convicted murderer
- February 27 - Samuel Langley, American astronomer, physicist, and aeronautics pioneer
- March 1 - José María de Pereda, Spanish writer
- March 4 - John Schofield, American general
- March 8 - Henry Baker Tristram, English clergyman, ornithologist
- March 12 - Manuel Quintana, 15th President of Argentina
- March 13
- * Susan B. Anthony, American civil rights, women's suffrage activist
- * Joseph Monier, French gardener, inventor
- March 17 - Johann Most, German-American anarchist
- March 19 - Victor Fatio, Swiss zoologist
- March 20 - Adeline Dutton Train Whitney, American author of juvenile literature for girls
- March 23 - Thomas Lake Harris, American poet
- March 29
- * Slava Raškaj, Croatian painter
- * Albert Sorel, French historian
- April 6 - Alexander Kielland, Norwegian author
- April 19
- * Pierre Curie, French physicist, Nobel Prize laureate, in road accident
- * Spencer Gore, British tennis player, cricketer
- April 25 - John Knowles Paine, American composer
- May 10 - Hashim Jalilul Alam Aqamaddin, Sultan of Brunei
- May 14 - Carl Schurz, German revolutionary, American statesman
- May 23 - Henrik Ibsen, Norwegian playwright
- June 5 - Eduard von Hartmann, German philosopher
- June 10 - Richard Seddon, 15th Prime Minister of New Zealand
- June 17 - Harry Nelson Pillsbury, American chess champion
- June 25 - Stanford White, American architect
July–December
- July 1 - Manuel García, Spanish opera singer, music educator and vocal pedagogue
- July 11 - Grace Brown, American murder/and or drowning victim
- July 17 - Carlos Pellegrini, 11th President of Argentina
- August 6 - George Waterhouse, 7th Prime Minister of New Zealand
- August 14 - Aniceto Arce, 27th President of Bolivia
- August 19 - Ezequiél Moreno y Díaz, Colombian Roman Catholic priest, saint
- September 1 - Giuseppe Giacosa, Italian poet, librettist
- September 5 - Ludwig Boltzmann, Austrian physicist
- September 13 - Emily Pitts Stevens, American school founder
- September 23 - August Bondeson, Swedish author
- October 9 - Adelaide Ristori, Italian actress
- October 16 - Varina Davis, First Lady of the Confederate States of America
- October 19
- * Arthur von Mohrenheim, Russian diplomat
- * Charles Pfizer, German-American chemist, co-founder of Pfizer
- October 22 - Paul Cézanne, French painter
- October 23 - Vladimir Stasov, Russian music critic
- October 30 - Gathorne Gathorne-Hardy, 1st Earl of Cranbrook, British politician
- November 1 - Archduke Otto of Austria
- November 7 - Todor Burmov, 1st Prime Minister of Bulgaria
- November 9 - Saint Elizabeth of the Trinity, French Discalced Carmelite religious professed and saint
- November 12 - William Rufus Shafter, American general
- November 16 - Mother Veronica of the Passion, Ottoman-born religious leader
- November 19, - Georgia Cayvan, American stage actress
- November 28 - Jennie Yeamans, Australian-born American actress
- November 30
- * Sir Edward Reed, British naval architect, author, politician, and railroad magnate
- * John Ward (geologist), English palaeontologist
- December 7 - Élie Ducommun, Swiss journalist and activist, Nobel Prize laureate
- December 8 - Sylvia Gerrish, American musical theatre star
- December 13 - Jan Gerard Palm, Dutch composer
- December 21 - Rajendrasuri, Indian religious reformer
- December 30 - Josephine Butler, British feminist, social reformer
Nobel Prizes