Brief Timeline of American Literature, Music, and Movies
1890-1899

Pre-1650 1650 1700 1750 1800 1810 1820 1830 1840
  1850 1860 1870 1880 1890 1900 1910 1920
Literature, Music, and Movies
1890s 1900s 1910s 1920s
1890-1899
 Music Movies Literature
1890
  • 1878. The world's earliest playable recording: voices for an experimental talking clock.
  • 1888. The Phonograph's Salutation. Spoken by William Gladstone.
  • 1890-1891 "The Third Verse of Mary and John, or The Lovers' Quarrel" (Will White) (RealAudio file from a wax cylinder recording at Early Recorded Sounds and Wax Cylinders.)
  • 1890. July 16. Big Ben Clock Tower (archive.org)
  • 1890. August 2. Trumpeter Landfrey's Charge of the Light Brigade (Landfrey was at the Charge of the Light Brigade in 1854)
    		•  
  • Emily Dickinson, Poems 
  • Howells, A Hazard of New Fortunes 
  • Jacob Riis, How the Other Half Lives 
  • James, The Tragic Muse
  • Sarah Orne Jewett, Tales of New England 

    •  
    1891
  • "Five Minutes with the Minstrels" ([Voss's] First Regiment Band) (RealAudio file from a wax cylinder recording at Early Recorded Sounds and Wax Cylinders.)
  • "La Media Noche" (United States Marine Band) (RealAudio file from a wax cylinder recording at Early Recorded Sounds and Wax Cylinders.)
    		•   
  • Death of Melville (b. 1819) in obscurity in New York. 
  • Mary E. Wilkins Freeman,  A New England Nun and Other Stories 
  • Rose Terry Cooke, Huckleberries Gathered from New England Hills 
  • Howells, Criticism and Fiction 
  • Dickinson, Poems: Second Series
  • Hamlin Garland,Main-Travelled Roads
  • Mary N. Murfree, In the "Stranger People's" Country
  • Sophia Alice Callahan (Creek, 1868-1894), Wynema: A Child of the Forest (first novel by a Native American woman author)
    		•
    1892
  • (1892-1893) "Lanciers with Figures Called" (Issler's Popular Orchestra)(RealAudio file from a wax cylinder recording at Early Recorded Sounds and Wax Cylinders.)
  • "Take Your Time, Gentlemen" (Press Eldridge) (RealAudio file from a wax cylinder recording at Early Recorded Sounds and Wax Cylinders.)
  • "The Esquimaux Dance" (Peter Tuson; features as instruments clarinet, piano, anvil, and dog) (RealAudio file from a wax cylinder recording at Early Recorded Sounds and Wax Cylinders.)
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  • The Clown and his Dogs (dir. Emile Renaud)
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  • Death of Whitman (b. 1819)
  • Frances E. W. Harper, Iola Leroy, the most popular work by an African-American woman writer of the 19th century.
  • Death of Rose Terry Cooke (b. 1827)
  • Mary Hallock Foote, The Chosen Valley
  • William Dean Howells, The Quality of Mercy
  • Grace King, Tales of a Time and Place
  • Joel Chandler Harris, Uncle Remus and His Friends
    		•
    1893
    		  
  • Blacksmith Scene (William K. L. Dickson, Edison Studios)
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  • Henry James, The Real Thing and Other Tales
  • Stephen Crane, Maggie: A Girl of the Streets. Crane publishes this edition at his own expense under the pseudonym Johnston Smith.
  • Alice French (Octave Thanet), Stories of a Western Town
  • Henry Blake Fuller, The Cliff-Dwellers
  • Joseph Nicolar, The Life and Traditions of the Red Man (newly discovered Native American text)
  • McClure's Magazine  (New York), 1893-1933, which will become famous for publishing "muckraking" articles from c.1901-12, reformist exposes such as Ida Tarbell's "The History of the Standard Oil Company," Lincoln Steffens's "The Shame of Minneapolis," and Ray Stannard Baker's "The Right to Work." S. S. McClure's My Autobiography  (1914) was written by Willa Cather. 
    		•
    1894
  • Hallelujah Chorus (Battery Band of New York)(RealAudio file from a wax cylinder recording at Early Recorded Sounds and Wax Cylinders.)
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  • Annie Oakley (RealPlayer)
  • Athlete with Wand
  • Buffalo Dance (first appearance of Native Americans before a moving picture camera)
  • Chinese Opium Den
    Corbett and Courtenay before the Kinetograph (boxing)
  • Edison Kinetographic Record of a Sneeze (Fred Ott's Sneeze)
  • Carmencita, the Spanish Dancer and scenes from Japan
  • Imperial Japanese Dance
  • Sandow (the strong man)
  • Leonard-Cushing Fight
  • Miss Jerry (adventures of a "girl reporter")
    		•
  • Twain, Pudd'nhead Wilson 
  • Harriet Prescott Spofford, A Scarlet Poppy and Other Stories
  • Kate Chopin, Bayou Folk 
  • Howells, A Traveler from Altruria (utopian novel)
  • Death of Constance Fenimore Woolson (b. 1840)
  • Edward Everett Hale, The Brick Moon and Other Stories
  • Gertrude Atherton, Before the Gringo Came
    		•
    1895
  • "And Her Golden Hair was Hanging Down Her Back" (Banta's Orchestra)  (RealAudio file from a wax cylinder recording at Early Recorded Sounds and Wax Cylinders.)
  • "Old Folks at Home" (Swanee River)
  • L' Arroseur arrosé 
  • Dickson Experimental Sound Film (Note: This has recently been restored to include both sound and picture as Edison intended.)
  • Chapeaux à transformations
  • Le Déjeuner du chat
  • The Execution of Mary Stuart (dir. Thomas Edison)
  • The Oxford and Cambridge University Boat Race
  • Repas de bébé (dir. Louis Lumière; one of the first movies ever shot; first shown on December  28, 1895)
  • Rough Sea at Dover
    		•
  • Death of Frederick Douglass 
  • Alice Brown, Meadow-Grass: Tales of New England Life
  • Alice Dunbar-Nelson, Violets and Other Tales
  • Constance Fenimore Woolson, The Front Yard and Other Italian Stories
  • Stephen Crane,The Red Badge of Courage; Black Riders 
  • Ina Coolbrith (1841-1928), Songs from the Golden Gate 
  • Hamlin Garland, Rose of Dutcher's Coolly
  • James Lane Allen, A Kentucky Cardinal
  • Simon Pokagon, An Indian on the Problems of His Race
    		•
    1896
  • "Four Popular Songs of the Day" (at archive.org)
  • Butterfly Dance
  • Bois du Bologne (dir. Georges Méliès)
  • Awakening of Rip (several short films put together form an adaptation of Washington Irving's "Rip Van Winkle")
  • The Kiss (This brief scene from The Widow Jones, which featured a kiss between May Irwin and John Rice, was considered scandalous in its day.) 
  • Li Hung Chang at Grant's Tomb
  • The Prodigal's Return; 3 a.m. (comedy)
  • Babies' Quarrel
  • American Falls from Above, American Side (Niagara Falls)
  • Atlantic City Boardwalk 
  • Trilby and Little Billee (from George Du Maurier's phenomenally popular novel Trilby)
  • The Terrible Railway Accident
  • Train Coming Out of Station, Philadelphia, Pa.
    		•
  • Henry James, "The Figure in the Carpet" 
  • Crane, George's Mother; The Little Regiment and Other Episodes of the American Civil War 
  •  Sarah Orne Jewett, The Country of the Pointed Firs 
  • Harold Frederic, The Damnation of Theron Ware 
  • Abraham Cahan, Yekl
  • Dickinson, Poems: Third Series 
  • Paul Laurence Dunbar, Lyrics of Lowly Life
  • James Lane Allen, Summer in Arcady
  • Birth of F. Scott Fitzgerald (d. 1940)
  • Macmillan Co.  founded.
    		•
    1897
  • "The Mocking Bird" (whistling solo) (RealAudio file from a  wax cylinder recording at Cylinders on the Web)Updated Link
  •  "The Liberty Bell March"  (Edison Concert Band) (Note: For those born after 1897, this is probably better known as the theme song to Monty Python's Flying Circus.) (RealAudio file from a wax cylinder recording at Early Recorded Sounds and Wax Cylinders.)
  • "It Don't Seem Like the Same Old Smile" (George Gaskin) (RealAudio file from a wax cylinder recording at Early Recorded Sounds and Wax Cylinders.)
    		•
  • Arrest in Chinatown
  • The Bad Boy and Poor Old Grandpa
  • Elephants at the Zoo
  • Fastest Wrecking Crew in the World 
  • Mr. Edison at Work in His Chemical Laboratory
  • President Cleveland and President McKinley
  • Return of Lifeboat
  • Ten Nights in a Barroom
  • Visit of St. Nicholas 
  • Unveiling of the Washington Monument 
  • An Unfriendly Call (comedy)
  • Young America (comedy)
    		•
  • Edwin Arlington Robinson, Children of the Night
  • Simon Pogagon, "The Future of the Red Man"
  • Mary Hartwell Catherwood, The Spirit of an Illinois Town and The Little Renault
  • Ellen Glasgow, The Descendant
  • Kate Chopin, A Night in Acadie
  • James, What Maisie Knew; The Spoils of Poynton 
  • Ruth McEnery Stuart, In Simpkinsville: Character Tales
  • Richard Harding Davis, Soldiers of Fortune
  • Doubleday & McClure founded.
  • Death of Harriet Jacobs 
  • Birth of William Faulkner (d. 1962) 
    		•
    1898
  • "The Charge of Roosevelt's Rough Riders" (Columbia Orchestra) (RealAudio file from a  wax cylinder recording at Early Recorded Sounds and Wax Cylinders.)
  • "The Sleigh-Ride Party"(The Greater New York Quartet)(RealAudio from Early Recorded Sounds and Wax Cylinders.)
  • "Cocoanut Dance" (Vess L. Ossman, the Banjo King)(RealAudio from Robert's Old Schmaltz Archives)
  • "Baby, Baby" (Miss Minnie S. Emmett, "first female American recording star")(RealAudio from Early Recorded Sounds and Wax Cylinders.)
  • "A Bunch of Rags" (Vess L. Ossman at archive.org)
  • Chopin, Nocturne in F (Joseph Pizzarello)(RealAudio from Early Recorded Sounds and Wax Cylinders.)
  • Roosevelt's Rough Riders Embarking for Santiago
  • Roosevelt's Rough Riders
  • War Correspondents, 21 April 1898 (New URL)
    		•
  • Gertrude Atherton, The Californians
  • Finley Peter Dunne, Mr. Dooley in Peace and in War
  • Henry James, "The Turn of the Screw" 
  • Stephen Crane, The Open Boat and Other Tales of Adventure
  • Brander Matthews, Outlines in Local Color
  • Abraham Cahan, The Imported Bridegroom and Other Stories
  • Frank Norris, Moran of the "Lady Letty"
  • Death of Edward Bellamy (b. 1850)

    • Death of Harold Frederic (b. 1856)
    1899
  • "Whistling Rufus" (Vess L. Ossman, the Banjo King) (RealAudio file from a  wax cylinder recording at Early Recorded Sounds and Wax Cylinders.)
  • "At the Circus"(RealAudio file from a  wax cylinder recording at Early Recorded Sounds and Wax Cylinders.)
  • "Snyder, Does Your Mother Know You're Out? (with yodels)" (German dialect song; George P. Watson at archive.org)
  • "Mrs. McCloud's Reel" (Irish bagpipe)(RealAudio file from a  wax cylinder recording at Early Recorded Sounds and Wax Cylinders.)
    		•  .
  • Chesnutt, The Conjure Woman and  The Wife of His Youth and Other Stories of the Color Line
  • Crane,The Monster and  War is Kind 
  • Kate Chopin, The Awakening
  • Alice Dunbar-Nelson, The Goodness of St. Rocque and Other Stories
  • Alice Brown, Tiverton Tales
  • Charlotte Perkins Gilman, The Yellow Wall-paper
  • James,The Awkward Age 
  • Norris, McTeague; Blix
  • Harriet Prescott Spofford (1835-1921), The Nemesis of Motherhood
    		•

    This page provides a limited sample of the music and films available during the period 1890-1899.  The music links here appear courtesy of the sites listed at the bottom of the page; please visit them for more information about the music of this era. Films are listed with their principal star or director.  Music files on this page are in RealAudio unless otherwise noted.

    Because they reflect the attitudes, beliefs, and prejudices of their times, some materials of this era may be offensive to listeners.  The perspectives expressed in these films or recordings do not represent the attitudes of  the site author.
    To see pictures of wax cylinder phonographs and other early recording equipment, go to http://www.tinfoil.com/gallery.htm
    A selection of 50 songs and accompanying commentary is available at this link: http://aceterrier.com/?page_id=1502

    Redhotjazz.com http://www.redhotjazz.com
    Cylinder Digitization Project
    Dismuke's Virtual Talking Machine Site.
    The American Variety Stage page at the Library of Congress
    The Victrola Shop
    iPod users might be interested in the Radio Memories and Edison's Attic podcasts available (free) through iTunes.

    Comments to D. Campbell.
    About this site