The Perdicaris affair
The US sends seven warships to Morocco for one hostage
In 1904 the chieftain Raisuni kidnapped the wealthy American Ion Perdicaris in Tangier. Theodore Roosevelt sent seven warships, and Secretary of State Hay declared 'Perdicaris alive or Raisuli dead'. The Sultan met the kidnapper's demands, and the furore helped Roosevelt win re-election.
Wikipedia (English) · 20th century
Meanwhile around the world (±25 years)
Whole world
- 1914–1918 World War I — 10 years later
- 1918–1920 Spanish flu pandemic — 14 years later
- 1920 League of Nations founded — 16 years later
Europe
- 1886 Benz's first automobile — 18 years earlier
- 1889 Eiffel Tower — 15 years earlier
- 1905 Einstein's miracle year and relativity — 1 year later
- 1919 Treaty of Versailles — 15 years later
- 1928 Discovery of penicillin — 24 years later
Eastern Europe & Russia
- 1905–1907 Russian Revolution of 1905 — 1 year later
- 1908 Tunguska event — 4 years later
- 1917 October Revolution — 13 years later
- 1917–1922 Russian Civil War — 13 years later
- 1929–1933 Collectivization in the Soviet Union — 25 years later
Middle East
- 1905–1911 Persian Constitutional Revolution — 1 year later
- 1908 Oil struck at Masjed Soleyman — 4 years later
- 1908 Young Turk Revolution — 4 years later
- 1915–1917 Armenian genocide — 11 years later
- 1916 Sykes–Picot Agreement — 12 years later
Asia
- 1883 Eruption of Krakatoa — 21 years earlier
- 1885 Founding of the Indian National Congress — 19 years earlier
- 1894–1895 First Sino-Japanese War — 10 years earlier
- 1896–1898 Philippine Revolution — 8 years earlier
- 1911–1912 Xinhai Revolution — 7 years later
Americas
- 1879 Edison's incandescent lamp — 25 years earlier
- 1903 Wright brothers' first flight — 1 year earlier
- 1906 San Francisco earthquake — 2 years later
- 1914 Opening of the Panama Canal — 10 years later
- 1929 Wall Street Crash and the Great Depression — 25 years later
Oceania
- 1893 New Zealand women win the vote — 11 years earlier
- 1893 Overthrow of the Hawaiian Kingdom — 11 years earlier
- 1911 Amundsen reaches the South Pole — 7 years later
- 1912 The death of Scott's polar party — 8 years later
Alive at the time
- Leo Tolstoy (aged 76)
- Dmitri Mendeleev (aged 70)
- Thomas Edison (aged 57)
- Nikola Tesla (aged 48)
- Marie Curie (aged 37)
- Mahatma Gandhi (aged 35)
- Vladimir Lenin (aged 34)
- Ernest Rutherford (aged 33)
- Winston Churchill (aged 30)
- Joseph Stalin (aged 26)