1916

Events
Below, the events of World War I have the "WWI" prefix.

January

 * January 1 – The British Royal Army Medical Corps carries out the first successful blood transfusion using blood that had been stored and cooled.
 * January 9 – WWI: Gallipoli Campaign: Last British troops evacuated from Gallipoli, as the Ottoman Empire prevails over a joint British and French operation to capture Istanbul.
 * January 13 – WWI: Battle of Wadi: Ottoman Empire forces defeat the Allied British during the Mesopotamian campaign in modern-day Iraq.
 * January 24
 * In Browning, Montana, the temperature drops from +6.7 °C to -48.8 °C (44 °F to -56 °F) in one day, the greatest change ever on record for a 24-hour period.
 * Brushaber v. Union Pacific Railroad Co.: The Supreme Court of the United States upholds the national income tax.
 * January 29 – WWI: Paris is bombed by German zeppelins for the first time.
 * January 30 – The McMahon–Hussein Correspondence between Hussein bin Ali, Sharif of Mecca and the British oficial Henry McMahon concerning the Arab Revolt against the Ottoman Empire ends.
 * January 31 – WWI: An attack is planned on Verdun, France.

February

 * February 3 – Parliament buildings in Ottawa, Canada are burned down.
 * February 9 – 6.00 p.m. – Tristan Tzara "founds" the art movement Dadaism (according to Hans Arp).
 * February 11
 * Emma Goldman is arrested for lecturing on birth control in the United States.
 * The Baltimore Symphony Orchestra presents its first concert in the United States.
 * The Romanian football club Sportul Studențesc is founded in Bucharest.
 * February 12 – WWI: Battle of Salaita Hill (East African Campaign) – South African and other British Empire troops fail to take a German East African defensive position.
 * February 21 – WWI: The Battle of Verdun begins in France.

March

 * March 7 – In Munich German automobile company BMW (Die Bayerischen Motoren Werke) is founded.
 * March 8–9 – Mexican Revolution: Pancho Villa leads about 500 Mexican raiders in an attack against Columbus, New Mexico, killing 12 U.S. soldiers. A garrison of the U.S. 13th Cavalry Regiment fights back and drives them away.
 * March 15 – United States President Woodrow Wilson sends 12,000 United States troops over the U.S.–Mexico border to pursue Pancho Villa; the 13th Cavalry regiment enters Mexican territory.
 * March 16 – Mexican Revolution: The U.S. 7th and 10th Cavalry regiments under John J. Pershing cross the border to join the hunt for Villa.
 * March 22
 * The temporary Emperor of China, Yuan Shikai, abdicates the throne and the Republic of China is restored once again.
 * J. R. R. Tolkien marries Edith Bratt in England (they will serve as the inspiration for the fictional characters Lúthien and Beren).
 * March 24 – The French ferry SS Sussex is torpedoed by SM UB-29 in the English Channel with at least 50 killed (including the composer Enrique Granados), resulting on May 4 in the Sussex pledge by Germany to the United States suspending its intensified submarine warfare policy.

April

 * April – The toggle light switch is invented by William J. Newton and Morris Goldberg.
 * April 11 – WWI: Egyptian Expeditionary Force begins occupation of the Sinai Peninsula.
 * April 20 – The Chicago Cubs play their first game at Weeghman Park (modern-day Wrigley Field), defeating the Cincinnati Reds 7–6 in 11 innings.
 * April 22 – The Chinese troop transport SS Hsin-Yu capsizes off the Chinese coast; at least 1,000 are killed.
 * April 24–30 – The Easter Rising occurs in Ireland. Members of the Irish Republican Brotherhood proclaim an Irish Republic and the Irish Volunteers and Irish Citizen Army occupy the General Post Office and other buildings in Dublin before surrendering to the British Army.
 * April 24–May 10 – Voyage of the James Caird: an open boat journey from Elephant Island in the South Shetland Islands to South Georgia in the southern Atlantic Ocean (800 nmi) undertaken by Sir Ernest Shackleton and five companions to obtain rescue for the main body of the Imperial Trans-Antarctic Expedition following the loss of its ship Endurance.
 * April 27 – WWI: Gas attack at Hulluch in France: The 47th Brigade, 16th (Irish) Division is decimated in one of the most heavily concentrated German gas attacks of the war.
 * April 29 – WWI: Siege of Kut ends with the surrender of British forces to the Ottoman Empire at Kut-al-Amara on the Tigris in Basra Vilayet during the Mesopotamian campaign.

May

 * May 16
 * United States Marines invade the Dominican Republic.
 * Britain and France conclude the secret Sykes–Picot Agreement, which is to divide Arab areas of the Ottoman Empire, following the conclusion of WWI and the partitioning of the Ottoman Empire, into French and British spheres of influence.
 * May 31–June 1 – WWI: Battle of Jutland between the British Royal Navy's Grand Fleet and the Imperial German Navy's High Seas Fleet in the North Sea, the war's only large-scale clash of battleships. The result is tactically inconclusive but British dominance of the North Sea is maintained.

June

 * June – Arab Revolt begins.
 * June 4 – WWI: The Brusilov Offensive, the height of Russian operations in the war, begins with their breaking through Austro-Hungarian lines.
 * June 5 – WWI: The HMS Hampshire (1903) sinks having hit a mine off the Orkney Islands, Scotland, with Lord Kitchener aboard.
 * June 5 – the Arab Revolt begins against the Ottoman Empire to create a single unified Arab state spanning from Aleppo to Aden, and is formally declared by Hussein bin Ali, Sharif of Mecca on June 10.
 * June 15 – U.S. President Woodrow Wilson signs a bill incorporating the Boy Scouts of America.

July

 * July 1–November 18 – WWI: Battle of the Somme, opening with the Battle of Albert: More than one million soldiers died; with 57,470 British Empire casualties on the first day, 19,240 of them killed, the British Army's bloodiest day. The immediate result is tactically inconclusive.
 * July 1–12 – At least one shark attacks 5 swimmers along 80 mi of New Jersey coastline during the Jersey Shore shark attacks of 1916, resulting in 4 deaths and the survival of one youth who requires limb amputation. This event is the inspiration for author Peter Benchley, over half a century later, to write Jaws.
 * July 2 – Battle of Erzincan: Russian forces defeat troops of the Ottoman Empire in Armenia.
 * July 15 – In Seattle, William Boeing incorporates Pacific Aero Products (later renamed Boeing).
 * July 15–19 – WWI: During the Battle of Delville Wood 766 men from the South African Brigade are killed in South Africa's biggest loss during World War I.
 * July 19–20 – WWI: Battle of Fromelles: An attack by Australian and British troops is repulsed by the German army with heavy casualties.
 * July 22 – In San Francisco, a bomb explodes on Market Street during a Preparedness Day parade, killing 10 injuring 40 (Warren Billings and Tom Mooney are later wrongly convicted of it).
 * July 26 – WWI: East African Campaign – The German armed ship SMS Graf von Goetzen scuttles herself on Lake Tanganyika.
 * July 29 – In Ontario, Canada, a lightning strike ignites a forest fire that destroys the towns of Cochrane and Matheson, killing 233.
 * July 30 – German agents cause the Black Tom explosion in Jersey City, New Jersey, an act of sabotage destroying an ammunition depot and killing at least 7 people.

August

 * c. August – Robert Baden-Powell publishes The Wolf Cub's Handbook in the U.K., establishing the basis of the junior section of the Scouting movement, the Wolf Cubs (modern-day Cub Scouts).
 * August 3–5 – WWI: Sinai and Palestine Campaign: Battle of Romani: British Imperial troops secure victory over a joint Ottoman-German force.
 * August 7 – WWI: Portugal joins the Allies.
 * August 9 – Lassen Volcanic National Park is established in California.
 * August 16 – Migratory Bird Treaty between Canada and the United States signed.
 * August 21 – Peru declares neutrality.
 * August 25 – U.S. President Woodrow Wilson signs legislation creating the National Park Service.
 * August 27 – WWI: The Kingdom of Romania declares war on the Central Powers, entering the war on the side of the Allies.
 * August 28 – WWI:
 * Germany declares war on Romania.
 * Italy declares war on Germany.
 * August 29 – The United States passes the Philippine Autonomy Act.
 * August 30 – The crew of the Endurance is rescued from Elephant Island.

September

 * September 1 – Bulgaria declares war on Romania, going on to take Dobruja.
 * September 2 – WWI: British pilot Leefe Robinson becomes the first to shoot down a German airship over Britain.
 * September 4 – WWI: East African Campaign – Dar es Salaam surrenders to British Empire forces, securing them control of the Central Line of railway through German East Africa.
 * September 5 – Release of D. W. Griffith's film Intolerance: Love's Struggle Through the Ages in the United States.
 * September 11 – A mechanical failure causes the central span of the Quebec Bridge, a cantilever-type structure, to crash into the Saint Lawrence River for the second time, killing 13 workers.
 * September 13 – Mary, a circus elephant, is hanged in the town of Erwin, Tennessee for killing her handler, Walter "Red" Eldridge.
 * September 15–22 – WWI: Battle of Flers–Courcelette in France: British advance. The battle is significant for the first use of the tank in warfare; also for the debut of the Canadian and New Zealand Divisions in the Battle of the Somme.
 * September 19 – WWI: East African Campaign – Belgian troops occupy Tabora in German East Africa.
 * September 27 – Iyasu V of Ethiopia is deposed in a palace coup, in favour of his aunt Zewditu.

October

 * October 7 – Georgia Tech and Cumberland College football game ends in a score of 222-0
 * October 12 – Hipólito Yrigoyen is elected President of Argentina.
 * October 14 – Perm State University is founded in Russia.
 * October 16 – Margaret Sanger opens the first U.S. birth control clinic - a forerunner of Planned Parenthood.
 * October 21 – Friedrich Adler shoots Count Karl von Stürgkh, Minister-President of Austria.
 * October 27 – Battle of Segale: Negus Mikael of Wollo, marching on the Ethiopian capital in support of his son Emperor Iyasu V, is defeated by Fitawrari Habte Giyorgis, securing the throne for Empress Zewditu.

November

 * November 1
 * Pavel Milyukov delivers his "stupidity or treason" speech in the Russian State Duma, precipitating the downfall of the Boris Stürmer government.
 * The first 40-hour work week officially begins in the Endicott-Johnson factories of Western New York.
 * November 5
 * The Kingdom of Poland (1916–18) is proclaimed by a joint act of the emperors of Germany and Austria.
 * Everett massacre: An armed confrontation in Everett, Washington, between local authorities and members of the Industrial Workers of the World results in seven deaths.
 * Honan Chapel, Cork, Ireland, a product of the Irish Arts and Crafts movement (1894–1925), is dedicated.
 * November 7
 * U.S. presidential election, 1916: Democratic President Woodrow Wilson narrowly defeats Republican Charles E. Hughes.
 * Republican Jeannette Rankin of Montana becomes the first woman elected to the United States House of Representatives.
 * Radio station 2XG, located in the Highbridge section of New York City, makes the first audio broadcast of presidential election returns.
 * November 13 – Prime Minister of Australia Billy Hughes is expelled from the Labor Party over his support for conscription.
 * November 18 – WWI: Battle of the Somme: In France, British Expeditionary Force commander Douglas Haig calls off the battle, which started on July 1.
 * November 21
 * Emperor Franz Joseph I of Austria dies of pneumonia at the Schönbrunn Palace, Vienna, aged 86, after a reign of 68 years and is succeeded by his grandnephew Charles I.
 * WWI: Hospital ship HMHS Britannic, designed as the third for White Star Line, sinks in the Kea Channel of the Aegean Sea after hitting a mine. 30 lives are lost. At 48,158 gross register tons, she is the largest ship lost during the war.
 * November 22 – Writer Jack London dies of kidney failure at his California home aged 40.
 * November 23 – WWI: Eastern Front – Bucharest, the capital of Romania, is occupied by troops of the Central Powers.

December

 * December 12 – In the Dolomites, 100 avalanches bury 18,000 Austrian and Italian soldiers.
 * December 18 – WWI: The Battle of Verdun ends in France with German troops defeated.
 * December 21 – WWI: El Arish occupied by the British Empire Desert Column during advance across the Sinai Peninsula.
 * December 22 – The British Sopwith Camel aircraft makes its maiden flight. It is designed to counter the German Fokker aircraft.
 * December 23 – WWI: The Desert Column captures the Ottoman garrison during the Battle of Magdhaba.
 * December 30
 * Humberto Gómez and his mercenaries seize Arauca in Colombia and declare the Republic of Arauca. He proceeds to pillage the region before fleeing to Venezuela.
 * (December 17 Old Style) – The mystic Grigori Rasputin is murdered in Saint Petersburg.
 * December 31 – The Hampton Terrace Hotel in North Augusta, South Carolina, one of the largest and most luxurious hotels in the United States at the time, burns to the ground.

Date unknown

 * Food is rationed in Germany.
 * Ferdinand de Saussure's Cours de linguistique générale is collected posthumously and published.
 * Oxycodone, a narcotic painkiller closely related to codeine is first synthesized in Germany.
 * Ernst Rüdin publishes his initial results on the genetics of schizophrenia.
 * Louis Enricht claims he has a substitute for gasoline.
 * Rodeo's first side-delivery bucking chute is designed and made by the Bascom boys (Raymond, Mel, Earl) and their father John W. Bascom at Welling, Alberta Canada.
 * Gustav Holst composes The Planets, Opus 32.
 * Bray Studios begins the Farmer Al Falfa series, the first of the Terrytoons.
 * The Society of Motion Picture and Television Engineers is founded in the United States as the Society of Motion Picture Engineers.
 * The 1916 Summer Olympics in Berlin, Germany, are cancelled.

In fiction

 * In the 1941 film Citizen Kane, Charles Foster Kane runs for New York governor and loses. Also in 1916, Emily Monroe Norton divorces him and, in either this year or in 1917, he marries Susan Alexander.

January

 * January 3
 * Maxene Andrews, American singer (The Andrews Sisters) (d. 1995)
 * Betty Furness, American actress and consumer activist (d. 1994)
 * Bernard Greenhouse, American cellist (d. 2011)
 * Warren King, American cartoonist (d. 1978)
 * January 7
 * Elena Ceaușescu, wife of Romanian dictator Nicolae Ceaușescu and Deputy Prime Minister and First Lady of Romania (d. 1989)
 * Paul Keres, Estonian chess player (d. 1975)
 * January 9 – Peter Twinn, English mathematician and WWII code-breaker (d. 2004)
 * January 10 – Sune Bergström, Swedish biochemist, recipient of the Nobel Prize in Physiology or Medicine (d. 2004)
 * January 12
 * Pieter Willem Botha, President of South Africa (d. 2006)
 * Mary Wilson, Lady Wilson of Rievaulx, English poet
 * January 17 – Peter Frelinghuysen Jr., American politician (d. 2011)
 * January 18 – Silviu Brucan, Romanian author and politician (d. 2006)
 * January 19 – Harry Huskey, American computer designer
 * January 22 – Henri Dutilleux, French composer (d. 2013)
 * January 23 – David Douglas Duncan, American photojournalist
 * January 24
 * Rafael Caldera, President of Venezuela (d. 2009)
 * Marvin Creamer, American sailor
 * Arnoldo Foà, Italian actor (d. 2014)
 * January 27 – Stjepan Filipović, a People's Hero of Yugoslavia (d.1942)
 * January 28 – Dottie Hunter, Canadian baseball player (d. 2005)

February

 * February 9 – Tex Hughson, American baseball player (d. 1993)
 * February 10 – Louis Guttman, American-born Israeli university professor (d. 1987)
 * February 11 – Ivan Hristov Bashev, Bulgarian Foreign Minister (d. 1971)
 * February 12 – Joseph Alioto, Mayor of San Francisco (d. 1998)
 * February 13 – John Reed, British actor and opera singer (d. 2010)
 * February 14
 * Marcel Bigeard, French military officer (d. 2010)
 * Sally Gray, English actress (d. 2006)
 * Denham Harman, American gerontologist (d. 2014)
 * Charles Wycliffe Joiner, American judge
 * Masaki Kobayashi, Japanese film director (d. 1996)
 * February 15
 * Ernest Millington, English politician (d. 2009)
 * Mary Jane Croft, American actress (d. 1999)
 * February 18 – Maria Altmann, Austrian Holocaust survivor and heiress (d. 2011)
 * February 20 – Jean Erdman, American dancer
 * February 23 – Retta Scott, first woman to receive screen credit as an animator at the Walt Disney Animation Studios (d. 1990)
 * February 26
 * Jackie Gleason, American comedian, actor and musician (d. 1987)
 * Preacher Roe, American baseball player (d. 2008)
 * February 28
 * Svend Asmussen, Danish jazz violinist
 * Cesar Climaco, Filipino politician (d. 1984)
 * February 29 – Dinah Shore, American singer (d. 1994)

March

 * March 1 – Emelyn Whiton, American Olympic sailor (d. 1962)
 * March 3 – Paul Halmos, Hungarian-born mathematician (d. 2006)
 * March 4
 * William Alland, American actor, producer, writer and director (d. 1997)
 * Giorgio Bassani, Italian writer (d. 2000)
 * Hans Eysenck, German-born psychologist (d. 1997)
 * March 5 – Jack Hamm, American cartoonist (d. 1996)
 * March 11 – Harold Wilson, Prime Minister of the United Kingdom (d. 1995)
 * March 13
 * Lindy Boggs, American politician (d. 2013)
 * Jacque Fresco, American futurist and designer
 * John Aspinwall Roosevelt, American businessman and philanthropist (d. 1981)
 * Robert O. Peterson, American businessman and philanthropist (d. 1994)
 * March 14 – Horton Foote, American writer (d. 2009)
 * March 15
 * Frank Coghlan Jr., American actor (d. 2009)
 * Harry James, American musician and band leader (d. 1983)
 * March 16
 * Mercedes McCambridge, American actress (d. 2004)
 * Tsutomu Yamaguchi, Japanese survivor of Hiroshima and Nagasaki atomic bombings (d. 2010)
 * March 17 – Volodia Teitelboim, Chilean author and politician (d. 2008)
 * March 19 – Irving Wallace, American novelist (d. 1990)
 * March 20 – Pierre Messmer, French politician (d. 2007)
 * March 24 – Donald Hamilton, Swedish-born writer (d. 2006)
 * March 26
 * Christian B. Anfinsen, American chemist, Nobel Prize laureate (d. 1995)
 * Harry Rabinowitz, British film composer and conductor (d. 2016)
 * March 29
 * Peter Geach, British philosopher (d. 2013)
 * Eugene McCarthy, U.S. Senator from Minnesota and Presidential candidate (d. 2005)
 * March 31 – Lucille Bliss, American voice actor (d. 2012)

April

 * April 2 – Menachem Porush, member of Israeli Knesset for Agudat Yisrael (d. 2010)
 * April 3
 * Herb Caen, American journalist (d. 1997)
 * Peter Gowland, American photographer (d. 2010)
 * April 5
 * Albert Henry Ottenweller, American bishop (d. 2012)
 * Gregory Peck, American actor (d. 2003)
 * April 10 – Lee Jung-seob, Korean oil painter (d. 1956)
 * April 11 – Alberto Ginastera, Argentine composer (d. 1983)
 * April 12
 * Beverly Cleary, American author
 * Benjamin Libet, American pioneering scientist in the field of human consciousness (d. 2007)
 * Movita Castaneda, American actress (d. 2015)
 * April 13 – Phyllis Fraser, American actor and publisher (d. 2006)
 * April 15
 * Alfred S. Bloomingdale, American department store heir (d. 1982)
 * Helene Hanff, American writer and critic (d. 1997)
 * April 17
 * Sirimavo Bandaranaike, Sri Lankan politician (d. 2000)
 * A. Thiagarajah, Sri Lankan Tamil teacher and politician (d. 1981)
 * April 18 – José Joaquín Trejos Fernández, President of Costa Rica (d. 2010)
 * April 22 – Yehudi Menuhin, American-born violinist (d. 1999)
 * April 24
 * Stanley Kauffmann, American film critic (d. 2013)
 * Lou Thesz, American professional wrestler (d. 2002)
 * April 25 – R. J. Rushdoony, American founder of Christian Reconstructionism (d. 2001)
 * April 26
 * Dorothy Salisbury Davis, American writer (d. 2014)
 * Vic Perrin, American voice actor (d. 1989)
 * George Tuska, American comic strip artist (d. 2009)
 * April 28 – Ferruccio Lamborghini, Italian automobile manufacturer (d. 1993)
 * April 29 – Ramón Amaya Amador, Honduran author (d.1966)
 * April 30
 * Claude Elwood Shannon, American information theorist (d. 2001)
 * Robert Shaw, American conductor (d. 1999)

May

 * May 1 – Glenn Ford, Canadian actor (d. 2006)
 * May 4 – Jane Jacobs, née Butzner, American-born urban activist (d. 2006)
 * May 5 – Zail Singh, Indian politician and 7th President of India (d. 1994)
 * May 6
 * Robert H. Dicke, American experimental physicist (d. 1997)
 * Sif Ruud, Swedish actress (d. 2011)
 * May 8
 * Chinmayananda, Indian spiritual leader (d. 1993)
 * João Havelange, Brazilian industrialist and football league president (d. 2016)
 * May 10 – Milton Babbitt, American composer (d. 2011)
 * May 11 – Camilo José Cela, Spanish writer, Nobel Prize laureate (d. 2002)
 * May 14 – Sammy Luftspring, Canadian boxer (d. 2000)
 * May 15 – Vera Gebuhr, Danish actress (d. 2014)
 * May 16 – Ephraim Katzir, 4th President of Israel (d. 2009)
 * May 17 – Lenka Reinerová, Czech writer (d. 2008)
 * May 20
 * Owen Chadwick, British author and historian (d. 2015)
 * Trebisonda Valla, Italian athlete (d. 2006)
 * May 21
 * Lydia Mendoza, American musician (d. 2007)
 * Tinus Osendarp, Dutch runner (d. 2002)
 * Harold Robbins, American novelist (d. 1997)
 * May 26
 * Halil İnalcık, Turkish historian (d. 2016)
 * Henriette Roosenburg, Dutch journalist (d. 1972)
 * May 31
 * Bert Haanstra, Dutch filmmaker (d. 1997)
 * Bernard Lewis, British historian

June

 * June 3 – Jack Manning, American film, stage and television actor (d. 2009)
 * June 4 – Robert F. Furchgott, American chemist, recipient of the Nobel Prize in Physiology or Medicine (d. 2009)
 * June 5 – Eddie Joost, baseball player and manager (d. 2011)
 * June 6 – Hamani Diori, former President of Niger (d. 1989)
 * June 8 – Francis Crick, English molecular biologist, recipient of the Nobel Prize in Physiology or Medicine (d. 2004)
 * June 9
 * Jurij Brězan, Sorbian writer (d. 2006)
 * Robert McNamara, U.S. Secretary of Defense (d. 2009)
 * June 12 – Raúl Héctor Castro, American politician (d. 2015)
 * June 14 – Dorothy McGuire, American actress (d. 2001)
 * June 15
 * Olga Erteszek, American undergarment designer and lingerie company owner (d. 1989)
 * Horacio Salgán, Argentine tango musician (d. 2016)
 * Herbert A. Simon, American economist, Nobel Prize laureate (d. 2001)
 * June 16 – Phil Chambers, American actor (d. 1993)
 * June 17 – Einar Englund, Finnish composer (d. 1999)
 * June 18 – Julio César Turbay Ayala, Colombian politician (d. 2005)
 * June 23 – Len Hutton, English cricketer (d. 1990)
 * June 24 – William B. Saxbe, American politician (d. 2010)
 * June 29 – Ruth Warrick, American actress (d. 2005)

July

 * July 1
 * Lawrence Halprin, American architect (d. 2009)
 * Olivia de Havilland, British-born American actress
 * July 2
 * Zélia Gattai, Brazilian author and photographer (d. 2008)
 * Hans-Ulrich Rudel, German pilot (d. 1982)
 * Ken Curtis, American motion picture and television actor and singer (d. 1991)
 * July 3 – John Kundla, American basketball coach
 * July 4
 * Iva Toguri D'Aquino ("Tokyo Rose") (d. 2006)
 * Fernand Leduc, Canadian painter (d. 2014)
 * July 6 – Harold Norse, American writer (d. 2009)
 * July 8 – Jean Rouverol, American actress, screenwriter, and author
 * July 9 – Edward Heath, Prime Minister of the United Kingdom (d. 2005)
 * July 11
 * Mortimer Caplin, American lawyer and educator
 * Hans Maier, Dutch water polo player
 * Aleksandr Mikhailovich Prokhorov, Russian physicist, Nobel laureate (d. 2002)
 * Reg Varney, British actor (d. 2008)
 * Gough Whitlam, 21st Prime Minister of Australia (d. 2014)
 * July 14 – Natalia Ginzburg, Italian author (d. 1991)
 * July 18 – L. Patrick Gray III, American Federal Bureau of Investigation director (d. 2005)
 * July 19 – Phil Cavarretta, baseball player (d. 2010)
 * July 22
 * William A. Culpepper, American judge (d. 2015)
 * Marcel Cerdan, French boxer (d. 1949)
 * July 23 – Sandra Gould, American actress (d. 1999)
 * July 25 – Fred Lasswell, American cartoonist (d. 2001)
 * July 27 – Elizabeth Hardwick, American literary critic and novelist (d. 2007)
 * July 28 – David Brown, American producer (d. 2010)
 * July 30 – Dick Wilson, American actor (d. 2007)
 * July 31
 * Bill Todman, American game show producer (d. 1979)
 * Ignacio Trelles, Mexican football player and coach

August

 * August 1 – Fiorenzo Angelini, Italian Cardinal (d. 2014)
 * August 5 – Kermit Love, American puppeteer (d. 2008)
 * August 6 – Dom Mintoff, Prime Minister of Malta (d. 2012)
 * August 14 – Ralph de Toledano, American conservationist and author (d. 2007)
 * August 16 – Iggy Katona, American race car driver (d. 2003)
 * August 18 – Neagu Djuvara, Romanian historian, essayist, and diplomat
 * August 20 – Paul Felix Schmidt, Estonian chess player (d. 1984)
 * August 21
 * Frank O. Braynard, American maritime writer and historian (d. 2007)
 * Geoffrey Keen, English actor (d. 2005)
 * Consuelo Velázquez, Mexican songwriter (d. 2005)
 * August 24 – Hal Smith, American actor (d. 1994)
 * August 25
 * Van Johnson, American actor (d. 2008)
 * Frederick Chapman Robbins, American pediatrician and virologist, recipient of the Nobel Prize in Physiology or Medicine (d. 2003)
 * Saburō Sakai, Japanese fighter ace (d. 2000)
 * August 27
 * Martha Raye, American actress (d. 1994)
 * Larry Thor, Canadian actor (d. 1976)
 * August 28 – Jack Vance, American writer (d. 2013)
 * August 29 – Luther Davis, American screenwriter (d. 2008)
 * August 30 – Shag Crawford, American baseball umpire (d. 2007)
 * August 31
 * Daniel Schorr, American journalist (d. 2010)
 * John S. Wold, American politician

September

 * September 1
 * Dorothy Cheney, American tennis player (d. 2014)
 * Joseph Minish, American politician (d. 2007)
 * September 3 – Tommy J. Smith, Australian trainer (d. 1998)
 * September 13 – Roald Dahl, Welsh-born author (d. 1990)
 * September 14
 * Eric Bentley, English-born American critic and playwright
 * John Heyer, Australian documentary filmmaker (d. 2001)
 * September 15
 * Margaret Lockwood, Indian-born English actress (d. 1990)
 * Frederick C. Weyand, U.S. Army General (d. 2010)
 * September 16 – Frank Leslie Walcott, Barbadian labour leader (d. 1999)
 * September 17 – Mary Stewart, born Mary Rainbow, English-born fantasy and mystery writer (d. 2014)
 * September 18 – John Jacob Rhodes, American politician and lawyer (d. 2003)
 * September 21 – Zinovy Gerdt, Russian actor (d. 1996)
 * September 23 – Aldo Moro, Prime Minister of Italy (d. 1978)
 * September 24 – Ruth Leach Amonette, American businesswoman (d. 2004)
 * September 27
 * Frank Handlen, American artist
 * Trento Longaretti, Italian painter
 * S. Yizhar (aka Yizhar Smilansky), Israeli author (d. 2006)
 * September 28 – Peter Finch, English-born Australian actor (d. 1977)

October

 * October 3
 * Frank Pantridge, Irish physician and inventor (d. 2004)
 * James Herriot, English veterinarian and author (d. 1995)
 * Shelby Storck, American television producer (d. 1969)
 * October 4 – Vitaly Ginzburg, Russian physicist, Nobel laureate (d. 2009)
 * October 9 – Robert Brubaker, American actor (d. 2010)
 * October 10 – Bernard Heuvelmans, Belgian-French cryptozoologist (d. 2001)
 * October 12 – Alice Childress, American actress, playwright, and novelist (d. 1994)
 * October 14 – C. Everett Koop, United States Surgeon General (d. 2013)
 * October 15 – Hassan Gouled Aptidon, President of Djibouti (d. 2006)
 * October 19
 * Jean Dausset, French immunologist, recipient of the Nobel Prize in Physiology or Medicine (d. 2009)
 * Emil Gilels, Ukrainian pianist (d. 1994)
 * October 26 – François Mitterrand, President of France (d. 1996)
 * October 30 – Leon Day, American baseball player (d. 1995)
 * October 31 – Carl Johan Bernadotte, Prince of Sweden (d. 2012)

November

 * November 4 – Walter Cronkite, American television journalist (d. 2009)
 * November 5 – Jim Tabor, American baseball player (d. 1953)
 * November 10 – Louis le Brocquy, Irish painter (d. 2012)
 * November 11 – Robert Carr, English politician (d. 2012)
 * November 12 – Rogelio de la Rosa, Filipino actor and politician (d. 1986)
 * November 14 – Sherwood Schwartz, American television writer and producer (d. 2011)
 * November 15 – Bill Melendez, American animator (d. 2008)
 * November 16 – Daws Butler, American voice actor (d. 1988)
 * November 17 – Shelby Foote, American historian and novelist, author of The Civil War: A Narrative (d. 2005)
 * November 23
 * Michael Gough, Malayan-born English actor (d. 2011)
 * P. K. Page, Canadian poet (d. 2010)
 * November 24 – Forrest J Ackerman, American writer (d. 2008)
 * November 26 – Gerhard Unger, German tenor (d. 2011)
 * November 27 – Chick Hearn, American basketball announcer (d. 2002)
 * November 28
 * Lilian, Princess of Réthy, born Mary Lilian Baels, English-born Belgian queen consort of Leopold III (d. 2002)
 * Ramón José Velásquez, President of Venezuela (d. 2014)
 * November 29 – Fran Ryan, American actress (d. 2000)
 * November 30 – John C. Harkness, American architect

December

 * December 1 – Wan Li, Chinese government official (d. 2015)
 * December 5 – Hilary Koprowski, Polish virologist and immunologist (d. 2013)
 * December 7 – George Russell Weller, American salesman known for the Santa Monica Farmer's Market incident (d. 2010)
 * December 8 – Richard Fleischer, American film director (d. 2006)
 * December 9
 * Jerome Beatty, Jr., American author of children's literature (d. 2002)
 * Kirk Douglas, American film actor
 * December 11 – Dámaso Pérez Prado, Cuban musician (d. 1989)
 * December 14 – Shirley Jackson, American writer (d. 1965)
 * December 15 – Maurice Wilkins, New Zealand-born physicist, recipient of the Nobel Prize in Physiology or Medicine (d. 2004)
 * December 16 – Birgitta Valberg, Swedish actress (d. 2014)
 * December 18
 * Douglas Fraser, Scottish-born union leader (d. 2008)
 * Betty Grable, American actress (d. 1973)
 * December 19
 * Roy Baker, English film director (d. 2010)
 * Elisabeth Noelle-Neumann, German political scientist (d. 2010)
 * December 24 – Ron G. Mason, English oceanographer (d. 2009)
 * December 25
 * Ahmed Ben Bella, 1st President of Algeria (d. 2012)
 * Graciela Naranjo, Venezuelan singer and actress (d. 2001)
 * December 27 – Cathy Lewis, American actress (d. 1968)

January

 * January 5 – Ulpiano Checa, Spanish painter, sculptor and illustrator (b. 1860)
 * January 8 – Rembrandt Bugatti, Italian sculptor (b. 1884)
 * January 9 – Ada Rehan, Irish-American Shakespearean actress (b. 1859)
 * January 11 – Takashima Tomonosuke, Japanese general (b. 1844)
 * January 13 – Victoriano Huerta, Mexican general and statesman, 35th President of Mexico (b. 1854)
 * January 17 – Arthur V. Johnson, American actor and director (b. 1876)

February

 * February 6 – Rubén Darío, Nicaraguan writer (b. 1867)
 * February 12 – Richard Dedekind, German mathematician (b. 1831)
 * February 13 – Vilhelm Hammershøi, Danish painter (b. 1864)
 * February 19 – Ernst Mach, Austrian physicist and philosopher (b. 1838)
 * February 20 – Klas Pontus Arnoldson, Swedish writer and pacifist, recipient of the Nobel Peace Prize (b. 1844)
 * February 23 – Hugo von Pohl, German admiral (b. 1855)
 * February 25 – David Bowman, Australian politician (b. 1860)
 * February 28 – Henry James, American writer (b. 1843)

March

 * March 4 – Franz Marc, German Expressionist painter (killed in battle) (b. 1880)
 * March 11 – Florence Baker, Hungarian-born explorer (b. 1841)
 * March 20 – Ota Benga, Congolese pygmy brought to America as part of an exhibition at the Bronx zoo (b. ca. 1883)
 * March 24 – Enrique Granados, Spanish composer (ship sinking) (b. 1867)
 * March 25 – Ishi, last known member of the Yana people (b. ca. 1860)

April

 * April 11 – Richard Harding Davis, American journalist and author (b. 1864)
 * April 19 – Ephraim Shay, American inventor (b. 1839)
 * April 21 – John Surratt, suspected of involvement in the Abraham Lincoln assassination, son of Mary Surratt (d. 1844)

May

 * May 3 – Padraig Pearse, Irish nationalist (executed) (b. 1879)
 * May 11
 * Max Reger, German modernist composer (b. 1873)
 * Karl Schwarzschild, German physicist (b. 1873)
 * May 12 – James Connolly, Irish socialist (executed) (b. 1868)
 * May 13 – Sholem Aleichem, Ukrainian Yiddish writer (b. 1859)
 * May 19 – Georges Boillot, French Grand Prix driver (killed in battle) (b. 1884)
 * May 21 – Artúr Görgei, Hungarian military general and politician (b. 1818)
 * May 27 – Joseph Gallieni, French general (b. 1849)
 * May 31 – Horace Hood, British admiral (killed in action) (b. 1870)

June

 * June 5 – Herbert Kitchener, 1st Earl Kitchener, British field marshal and statesman (drowned) (b. 1850)
 * June 6 – Yuan Shikai, Chinese military official and politician, president of the Republic (b. 1859)
 * June 7 – Émile Faguet, French writer and critic (b. 1847)
 * June 9 – Richard C. Saufley, American naval aviation pioneer (b. 1884)
 * June 12 – Silvanus P. Thompson, English professor of physics, electrical engineer, member of the Royal Society and author (b. 1851)
 * June 18
 * Max Immelmann, German fighter ace (killed in battle) (b. 1890)
 * Helmuth von Moltke, German general (b. 1848)
 * June 24 – Victor Chapman, French-American fighter pilot (killed in action) (b. 1890)
 * June 25 – Thomas Eakins, American realist painter (b. 1844)
 * June 29 – Georges Lacombe, French painter (b. 1868)

July

 * July 6 – Odilon Redon, French painter (b. 1840)
 * July 16 – Élie Metchnikoff, Russian microbiologist, recipient of the Nobel Prize in Physiology or Medicine (b. 1845)
 * July 20 – Reinhard Sorge, German dramatist and poet (killed in battle) (b. 1892)
 * July 22 – James Whitcomb Riley, American poet (b. 1849)
 * July 23 – Sir William Ramsay, Scottish chemist, Nobel Prize laureate (b. 1852)
 * July 27 – Charles Fryatt, English mariner (executed) (b. 1872)
 * July 29 – Claude Charles Castleton, Australian VC recipient (killed in battle) (b. 1893)

August

 * August 3 – Roger Casement, Irish nationalist (executed) (b. 1864)
 * August 5 – George Butterworth, English composer (b. 1885)
 * August 8 – Kamimura Hikonojō, Japanese admiral (b. 1849)
 * August 10 – Henry Moseley, English physicist and chemist (killed in battle) (b. 1887)
 * August 17 – Umberto Boccioni, Italian painter and sculptor (b. 1882)
 * August 31 – Martha McClellan Brown, American activist (b. 1838)

September

 * September 8 – Friedrich Baumfelder, German composer, conductor, and pianist (b. 1836)
 * September 14 – José Echegaray y Eizaguirre, Spanish writer, Nobel Prize laureate (b. 1832)

October

 * October 10 – Antonio Sant'Elia, Italian architect (killed in battle) (b. 1888)
 * October 11 – King Otto of Bavaria (b. 1848)
 * October 12 – Tony Jannus, American aviator and aircraft designer (b. 1889)
 * October 18 – Ignacio Pinazo, Spanish painter (b. 1849)
 * October 21 – Karl von Stürgkh, Prime Minister of Austria (b. 1859)
 * October 25 – Gérard Encausse, Papus, French occultist (b. 1865)
 * October 28
 * Oswald Boelcke, German World War I fighter ace, (b. 1891)
 * Cleveland Abbe, American meteorologist (b. 1838)
 * October 29 – John Sebastian Little, American politician and congressman (b. 1851)
 * October 31 – Charles Taze Russell, Protestant evangelist, forerunner of Jehovah's Witnesses (b. 1852)

November

 * November 1 – Prince Franz Anton von Thun und Hohenstein, Austrian noble and statesman, former Prime Minister (b. 1847)
 * November 9 – Ion Dragalina, Romanian general (killed in battle) (b. 1860)
 * November 10 – Walter Sutton, geneticist and physician (b. 1877)
 * November 12 – Percival Lowell, American astronomer (b. 1855)
 * November 14
 * Henry George, Jr., American politician (b. 1862)
 * Franklin Ware Mann, American inventor (b. 1856)
 * Saki, British writer (b. 1870)
 * November 15 – Henryk Sienkiewicz, Polish writer, Nobel Prize laureate (b. 1846)
 * November 21 – Emperor Franz Joseph I of Austria (b. 1830)
 * November 22 – Jack London, American author (b. 1876)
 * November 23 – Lanoe Hawker VC, British World War I fighter ace, killed in action by Manfred von Richthofen (b. 1890)
 * November 24 – Hiram Stevens Maxim, American firearms inventor (b. 1840)
 * November 27 – Emile Verhaeren, Belgian poet (b. 1855)
 * November 28 – Martinus Theunis Steyn, Boer lawyer, politician, and statesman, sixth and last President of the Orange Free State (1896-1902) (b. 1857)

December

 * December 5 – Hans Richter, Austrian–Hungarian conductor (b. 1843)
 * December 8 – John Porter Merrell, American admiral (b. 1846)
 * December 9 – Natsume Sōseki, Japanese writer (b. 1867)
 * December 10 – Ōyama Iwao, Japanese field marshal and a founder of the Imperial Japanese Army (b. 1842)
 * December 16
 * Friedrich Ernst Dorn, German physicist (b. 1848)
 * Ognjeslav Stepanović, Serbian inventor (b. 1851)
 * December 25 – Albert Chmielowski, Polish Catholic saint (b. 1845)
 * December 28 – Eduard Strauss, Austrian composer (b. 1835)
 * December 30 (December 17 OS) – Grigori Rasputin, Russian mystic (killed) (b. 1869)

Nobel Prizes

 * Physics – not awarded
 * Chemistry – not awarded
 * Medicine – not awarded
 * Literature – Carl Gustaf Verner von Heidenstam
 * Peace – not awarded