Memphis Blues is composed by 'father of the blues' W.C. Handy

Democrat Woodrow Wilson defeats Republicans Taft and Roosevelt to become the 28th president of the USA

A new and spectacular Grand Central Station opens in New York, designed by Charles Reed and Alan Stern

Cecil B. de Mille, Jesse Lasky and Sam Goldwyn join forces to form a film production company

The Armory Show (officially the International Exhibition of Modern Art) is a sensation in New York

In O Pioneers Willa Cather finds her major theme, life on the frontier

The US navy begins transmitting by radio a regular time signal, much used by the nation's watchmakers and menders.

In Pollyanna Eleanor Porter introduces an immensely successful character, the irrepressibly optimistic orphan Pollyanna Whittier

The Woolworth Building opens in New York as the world's tallest skyscraper, a distinction it retains until 1930

US poet Robert Frost publishes his first book of poems, A Boy's Will

Henry Ford pioneers the moving assembly line in the manufacture of cars at his company's Michigan plant

The Brillo Manufacturing Company markets the first Brillo pads in the USA

The foxtrot, possibly introduced by US performer Harry Fox, becomes an immensely popular ballroom dance

Edith Wharton's novel The Custom of the Country begins publication in serial form

The New York World publishes the first crossword puzzle, devised by English-born journalist Arthur Wynne

President Woodrow Wilson proclaims US neutrality in the European war

George Ruth acquires the nickname Babe when he joins the baseball team the Baltimore Orioles

Tarzan makes his first appearance in Edgar Rice Burroughs' novel Tarzan of the Apes

The first issue of the weekly journal The New Republic is published in the USA

The poem 'Mending Wall' features in Robert Frost's collection North of Boston

Margaret Anderson publishes in Chicago the first issue of The Little Review, a monthly literary magazine

The Assemblies of God is established as the largest affiliation of Pentecostal churches

Martha, 29 years old and the last passenger pigeon in the world, dies in the Cincinnati zoo in Ohio

The American writer Amy Lowell publishes an Imagist collection of poems, Sword Blades and Poppy Seed

The sculptor Constantin Brancusi has his first one-man exhibition, at Stieglitz's gallery in New York