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The devastating 1908 Messina earthquake strikes southern Italy, killing around 82,000 and leveling Messina and Reggio Calabria;
The 1908 Summer Olympics in London introduce standardized rules and the opening ceremony parade;
The mysterious Tunguska event flattens over 2,000 square kilometers of Siberian forest, likely from a meteoroid airburst;
The Lisbon Regicide sees King Carlos I of Portugal and his heir Luís Filipe assassinated, shocking the nation;
The Young Turk Revolution forces Sultan Abdul Hamid II to restore the Ottoman constitution;
The Ford Model T begins mass production, revolutionizing global transportation.

1908 in various calendars
Gregorian calendar	1908 MCMVIII
Ab urbe condita	2661
Armenian calendar	1357 ԹՎ ՌՅԾԷ
Assyrian calendar	6658
Baháʼí calendar	64–65
Balinese saka calendar	1829–1830
Bengali calendar	1314–1315
Berber calendar	2858
British Regnal year	7 Edw. 7 – 8 Edw. 7
Buddhist calendar	2452
Burmese calendar	1270
Byzantine calendar	7416–7417
Chinese calendar	丁未年 (Fire Goat) 4605 or 4398 — to — 戊申年 (Earth Monkey) 4606 or 4399
Coptic calendar	1624–1625
Discordian calendar	3074
Ethiopian calendar	1900–1901
Hebrew calendar	5668–5669
Hindu calendars
- Vikram Samvat	1964–1965
- Shaka Samvat	1829–1830
- Kali Yuga	5008–5009
Holocene calendar	11908
Igbo calendar	908–909
Iranian calendar	1286–1287
Islamic calendar	1325–1326
Japanese calendar	Meiji 41 (明治４１年)
Javanese calendar	1837–1838
Julian calendar	Gregorian minus 13 days
Korean calendar	4241
Minguo calendar	4 before ROC 民前4年
Nanakshahi calendar	440
Thai solar calendar	2450–2451
Tibetan calendar	མེ་མོ་ལུག་ལོ་ (female Fire-Sheep) 2034 or 1653 or 881 — to — ས་ཕོ་སྤྲེ་ལོ་ (male Earth-Monkey) 2035 or 1654 or 882

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1908 (MCMVIII) was a leap year starting on Wednesday of the Gregorian calendar and a leap year starting on Tuesday of the Julian calendar, the 1908th year of the Common Era (CE) and Anno Domini (AD) designations, the 908th year of the 2nd millennium, the 8th year of the 20th century, and the 9th year of the 1900s decade. As of the start of 1908, the Gregorian calendar was 13 days ahead of the Julian calendar, which remained in localized use until 1923.

This is the longest year in either the Julian or Gregorian calendars, having a duration of 31622401.38 seconds of Terrestrial Time (or ephemeris time), measured according to the definition of mean solar time.^[1]

Brazilian supercentenarian Inah Canabarro Lucas was the last known person born in 1908 when she died on April 30, 2025.^[2]

Events

January

1908 Baby New Year on the cover of *The Saturday Evening Post*.

January 1 – The British Nimrod Expedition led by Ernest Shackleton sets sail from New Zealand for Antarctica on the Nimrod.
January 3 – A total solar eclipse is visible in the Pacific Ocean and is the 46th solar eclipse of Solar Saros 130.
January 13 – A fire breaks out at the Rhoads Opera House in Boyertown, Pennsylvania, killing 171 people.
January 15 – Alpha Kappa Alpha, the first race inclusive sorority is founded on the campus of Howard University in Washington, D.C.
January 24 – Robert Baden-Powell's Scouting for Boys begins publication in London. The book eventually sells over 100 million copies, and effectively begins the worldwide Boy Scout movement.

February

February 1 – Lisbon Regicide: King Carlos I of Portugal and Prince Luis Filipe are shot dead in Lisbon.^[3]
February 3 – Panathinaikos A.O., a well-known professional multi-sports club of Greece, is founded in Athens.^[4]
February 12 – The first around-the-world car race, the 1908 New York to Paris Race, begins.
February 29 – The State Normal and Industrial School for Women, precursor to James Madison University, is founded in Harrisonburg, Virginia.

March

March
- A 40,000-year-old Neanderthal boy skeleton is found at Le Moustier in southwest France, by Otto Hauser.
- Arthur Mee's The Children's Encyclopædia begins publication in London.
- Clifford W. Beers's memoir of psychiatric abuse, A Mind That Found Itself, was published.
March 4
- The Pretoria branch of Transvaal University College, precursor to the University of Pretoria, is established.
- The Collinwood school fire near Cleveland, Ohio kills 175.
- Bank of Communications, a major financial services provider in China, is founded in Beijing.
March 9 – Football Club Internazionale is founded in Milan, Italy.
March 23 – American diplomat Durham Stevens, an employee of Japan's Ministry of Foreign Affairs, is assassinated in San Francisco by two Korean immigrants, unhappy with his recent support for the increasing Japanese presence in Korea.
March 27 – The first Scout troop outside the U.K. is formed in Gibraltar.
March 29 – French aviator Henri Farman makes the world's first flight with a passenger, Léon Delagrange.

April

April 8 – H. H. Asquith of the Liberal Party takes office as Prime Minister of the United Kingdom, succeeding Sir Henry Campbell-Bannerman.^[5]
April 20 – Sunshine rail disaster: A rear-end collision of two trains in Melbourne, Australia kills 44 people and injures more than 400.^[6]
April 21 – Frederick Cook claims to have reached the North Pole on this date.

May

May 14–October 31 – The Franco-British Exhibition (1908) is held in London.
May 26 – At Masjed Soleyman in southwest Persia, the first major commercial oil discovery in the Middle East is made. The rights to the resource are quickly acquired by the United Kingdom.

June

June 26 – Carl Gustaf Emil Mannerheim, a future President of Finland, meets the 13th Dalai Lama in Shanxi, China, becoming only the third European to be granted an audience with him.^[7]
June 28 – An annular solar eclipse is visible from Central America, North America, Atlantic Ocean and Africa and is the 33rd solar eclipse of Solar Saros 135.
June 29 – Kohlerer-Bahn by Bleichert opens in Bolzano, South Tyrol, the first modern aerial enclosed cable car solely for passenger service.^[8]
June 30 (June 17 OS) – The Tunguska event near the Podkamennaya Tunguska River in Krasnoyarsk Krai, Siberia, Russian Empire, is believed to have been caused by the air burst of a large meteoroid or comet fragment, at an altitude of 5–10 kilometres (3–6 mi) above the Earth's surface.^[9]

July

July 1 – SOS comes into force internationally as a distress signal (originally for ship-to-shore wireless telegraphy).^[10]
July 3 – Young Turk Revolution in the Ottoman Empire: Major Ahmed Niyazi, with 200 followers (Ottoman troops and civilians), begins an open revolution by defecting from the 3rd Army Corps in Macedonia, decamping into the hill country.
July 6 – Robert Peary sets sail for the North Pole.
July 8 – French aviator Léon Delagrange makes the world's first flight with a female passenger, his partner and fellow sculptor Thérèse Peltier.^[11]
July 11–12 – The steamship Amalthea, housing 80 British strikebreakers in Malmö harbour, Sweden, is bombed by Anton Nilson; 1 is killed, 20 injured.
July 13–25 – The 1908 Summer Olympics are held in London. (Originally scheduled to be in Rome, but changed due to the Mount Vesuvius eruption of 1906.^[12] Figure skating events are held in London from October 28–29.)
July 19 – Feyenoord, the first Dutch football club to win the UEFA Champions League, is founded at Rotterdam, Netherlands
July 23 – Young Turk Revolution: The Committee of Union and Progress (CUP) issues a formal ultimatum to Sultan Abdul Hamid II, to restore the constitution of 1876 within the Ottoman Empire; it is restored the following day.
July 24 – Italian Dorando Pietri wins the Olympic marathon (run from Windsor Castle to London) in one of the most dramatic arrivals in Olympic history, only to be disqualified soon afterwards for receiving assistance; victory is awarded to Irish-American Johnny Hayes.
July 26 – The Federal Bureau of Investigation is founded in the United States.^[13]
July 27–28 – The 1908 Hong Kong typhoon sinks the passenger steamer Ying King, causing 421 deaths.*July 29 - The White Star Line company begins the construction of the Titanic

August

August 8
- Wilbur Wright flies in France for the first time, demonstrating controlled powered flight in Europe.
- The Hoover Company of Canton, Ohio, acquires manufacturing rights to the upright portable vacuum cleaner patented on June 22 by James M. Spangler.
August 17 – “Fantasmagorie”, an animated short film by Émile Cohl, which is widely regarded as the first animated cartoon is officially released.
August 24 – After an intense power struggle, Sultan Abdelaziz of Morocco is deposed and is succeeded by his brother Abd al-Hafid.
August 28 – American Messenger Company, predecessor of United Parcel Service, is founded in Washington (state).^[14]

September

September 10 – The first Minas Geraes-class Dreadnought battleship for Brazil, Minas Geraes, is launched at Armstrong Whitworth's yard on the River Tyne in England, catalysing the "South American dreadnought race".
September 17 – At Fort Myer, Virginia, Thomas Selfridge becomes the first person to die in an airplane crash. The pilot, Orville Wright, is severely injured in the crash but recovers.
September 28 – Classes begin at Benjamin Franklin Institute of Technology in Boston, Massachusetts, established under the terms of Franklin's will.

October

October 1
- Official launch of Henry Ford's Ford Model T automobile, the first having left the Ford Piquette Avenue Plant in Detroit, Michigan, on September 27.^[15] The initial price is set at US$850.^[16]
- Penny Post is established between the United Kingdom and United States.^[17]
October 5 – Bulgaria declares its independence from the Ottoman Empire; Ferdinand I of Bulgaria becomes Tsar.
October 6 – The Bosnian crisis begins, after the Austro-Hungarian Empire annexes Bosnia and Herzegovina from the Ottoman Empire.
October 8 – The University of Omaha, precursor of the University of Nebraska Omaha, is founded as a private non-sectarian college.
October 29 – Olivetti, the well-known typewriter and business equipment company, is founded in Italy.^[18]

November

November 3 – 1908 United States presidential election: Republican candidate William Howard Taft defeats William Jennings Bryan, 321 electoral votes to 162.
November 6 – Western bandits Butch Cassidy and the Sundance Kid are supposedly killed in Bolivia, after being surrounded by a large group of soldiers. There are many rumors to the contrary however, and their grave sites are unmarked.
November 14 – The Guangxu Emperor of China dies, probably poisoned. The following day, his aunt and the power behind the throne, Empress Dowager Cixi, dies.^[19]
November 15 – King Leopold II of Belgium formally relinquishes his personal control of the Congo Free State (becoming Belgian Congo) to Belgium, following evidence collected by Roger Casement of maladministration.
November 19 – Women's suffrage is passed in Victoria, Australia.^[20]
November 25
- The Christian Science Monitor newspaper is first published, in the United States.
- A fire breaks out on SS Sardinia as it leaves Malta's Grand Harbour, resulting in the ship's grounding and the deaths of at least 118 people.^[21]

December

December 2 – Emperor Puyi ascends the Chinese throne at age 2 in succession to his uncle. He will reign for 3 years, then again for 11 days, and finally for 11 years as a puppet emperor.
December 16 – Construction begins on the RMS Olympic, at the Harland and Wolff Shipyard in Belfast.
December 23 – A hybrid solar eclipse is visible from Atlantic Ocean and is the 23rd solar eclipse of Solar Saros 140.
December 28 – The 7.1 M_w Messina earthquake shakes Southern Italy with a maximum Mercalli intensity of XI (Extreme), killing between 75,000 and 200,000.

Undated

This is the coldest recorded year since 1880, according to NASA reports.^[22]