All year. 1900: The British fight the Boers (Dutch farmers and settlers) and their allies in South Africa. The war finally ended in 1902 with all of South Africa becoming a part of the British Empire.
May-August, 1900: The Boxer Rebellion in China. A patriotic society of Chinese, discontented with the Chinese emperor, the Dowager Empress, and with government policies, wish to drive all foreigners out of China. British, French, German, Japanese, Austrian, Russian, Italian and some American troops fight to put down the rebellion. Many missionaries and Chinese Christians are killed. The Europeans and others win the war and retain influence, particularly over China’s ports.
June, 1900: The Americans are also fighting rebels in the Philippines. The Filipinos originally rebelled against Spanish rule, and then after the Spanish American war ended in 1898, the Philippines became a territory of the United States. Filipino rebels have been offered amnesty if they will swear allegiance to the United States.
July 2, 1900: Count Ferdinand von Zeppelin’s hydrogen-filled airship powered by two engines made its first flight over Lake Constance in Switzerland. The flight lasted approximately one hour.
July 30, 1900: King Humbert I of Italy is assassinated by an anarchist, Angelo Bresci. His son, Victor Emmanuel, succeeds him to the throne.
September 8, 1900: A deadly hurricane destroys much of the property on Galveston Island, Texas and kills between 6000 and 12000 people. The Galveston hurricane of 1900 is the deadliest natural disaster ever to strike the United States.
November 6, 1900: William McKinley is elected president of the United States, and Theodore Roosevelt becomes vice-president. McKinley defeats William Jennngs Bryan, a populist Democrat.
Kodak introduces $1 Brownie cameras. The Brownie camera was the first hand-held camera that was cheap enough and simple enough for everyone to use.
March, 1900: UK archeologist Arthur Evans begins to excavate the ancient city of Knossos, Crete.
A cookbook from 1900, The Enterprising Housekeeper by Helen Louise Johnson.