1904
year
1904 (MCMIV) was a leap year starting on Friday of the Gregorian calendar and a leap year starting on Thursday of the Julian calendar, the 1904th year of the Common Era (CE) and Anno Domini (AD) designations, the 904th year of the 2nd millennium, the 4th year of the 20th century, and the 5th year of the 1900s decade. As of the start of 1904, the Gregorian calendar was 13 days ahead of the Julian calendar, which remained in localized use until 1923.
Events
January
January 7 – The distress signal CQD is established, only to be replaced 2 years later by SOS.
January 12 – The Herero Wars in German South West Africa begin.
January 17 – Anton Chekhov's last play, The Cherry Orchard, opens at the Moscow Art Theatre directed by Constantin Stanislavski.
January 23 – The Ålesund fire destroys most buildings in the town of Ålesund, Norway, leaving about 10,000 people without shelter.
January 25 – Halford Mackinder presents a paper on "The Geographical Pivot of History" to the Royal Geographical Society of London in which he formulates the Heartland Theory, originating the study of geopolitics.
February
February 7 – The Great Baltimore Fire in Baltimore, Maryland, destroys over 1,500 buildings in 31 hours.
February 8–9 – Battle of Port Arthur: A surprise Japanese naval attack on Port Arthur (Lüshun) in Manchuria starts the Russo-Japanese War.
February 10 – Roger Casement publishes his account of Belgian atrocities in the Congo.
February 17 – Puccini's opera Madama Butterfly debuts at La Scala in Milan, to no great acclaim.
This brief starts where responsible research should: with the source description of “1904” as year. Everything that follows is an evidence route, not borrowed authority.
Why this record matters
The subject matters to the general reference register because the source frames it as year. Its deeper value depends on whether names, dates, institutions and citations support that framing.
Named sources, stable identifiers and responsible institutions provide the strongest route from overview to verifiable evidence. The source revision retrieved here is dated Sep 23, 2026. The linked authority identifier is Q2046. None of the 0 selected statements returned an explicit reference. The first chronological checks are 1904 and 1923.
Overview language is designed for orientation and should not be treated as a substitute for the evidence cited beneath it. The lead is largely declarative, so disagreement and counter-evidence require a deliberate search beyond the opening account. Authority statements aid reconciliation but still require their own references, qualifiers and ranks to be checked.
How to read it
Use the entry as an orientation point, then follow its citations and revision history. Names, dates and institutional relationships should be checked against the original record.
- Subject orientation
- Search vocabulary
- Locating named sources
The closest primary source, responsible institution and strongest cited specialist reference.
Three-step research path
- Establish the record: confirm the title “1904”, its source revision and the description used here.
- Expand the search: follow 1904 primary sources, 1904 archive and year research across catalogues and specialist indexes.
- Test the account: compare the strongest cited source with the responsible institution’s current record and note any disagreement.
Questions for further research
- Which source most directly establishes the central claim about “1904”?
- Which cited source is closest to the event, object or claim?
- What terminology or title could unlock a more precise catalogue search?
Search terms from this dossier
This entry incorporates text from “1904” on English Wikipedia. Contributors are listed in the page history. Text is available under the Creative Commons Attribution-ShareAlike 4.0 License. Selected authority identifiers and statements are retrieved from Wikidata under CC0; their references and qualifiers remain part of the verification path.