March 1900 - March 24, 1900 (Saturday)

March 24, 1900 (Saturday)

• Press Clay Southworth, 14, shot the last passenger pigeon in the wild, near his farm in Sargents, Ohio. The species became extinct when the last living passenger pigeon died on September 1, 1914, in the Cincinnati Zoo.
• Mayor Van Wyck broke ground for the underground "rapid transit tunnel" that would become the first part of the New York City Subway, linking Manhattan and Brooklyn. Using a silver spade, Van Wyck started in front of City Hall. "Tunnel day, for as such it will be known", wrote the New York Times, "was a greater day to the people, for it marked a beginning of a system of tunnels in future years and for future generations ..."
• The first workplace smoking ban was issued by the Willis L. Moore, Chief of the U.S. Weather Bureau, the forerunner of the National Weather Service, for all of its offices. The Director's Instruction No. 51 declared that "The smoking of cigarettes in the offices of the Weather Bureau is hereby prohibited. Officials in charge of stations will rigidly enforce this order, and will also include in their semiannual confidential reports information as to those of their assistants who smoke cigarettes outside of office hours."
• The Puerto Rican appropriation bill of $2,095,455.88 was signed by President McKinley after passing House 135–87