1919 in science - Definition

The year 1919 in science and technology

Physics

• Einstein's theory of general relativity confirmed by Arthur Eddington's observation of a total eclipse of the Sun
• James Jeans discovers that the dynamical constants of motion determine the distribution function for a system of particles

Technology

• XWA (now CFCF),in Montreal, Quebec is the first public radio station in North America to go the air.
• US Navy Naval Curtiss aircraft NC-4 commanded by Albert Cushing Read departs Trepassey, Newfoundland, for Lisbon via the Azores on the first transatlantic flight
• John Alcock and Arthur Whitten Brown depart St. John's, Newfoundland on the first nonstop transatlantic flight
• The British dirigible R-34 lands in New York, completing the first crossing of the Atlantic by an airship.

Nobel Prizes

• Johannes Stark is awarded the Nobel Prize for Physics
• Jules Bordet is awarded the Nobel Prize for Medicine

Births

• January 23 - Hans Hass, zoologist and oceanographer

Deaths

• February 19 - Frederick DuCane Godman (b. 1834), lepidopterist, entomologist and ornithologist.
• April 4 - Sir William Crookes (b. 1832), chemist and physicist.
• June 30 - John William Strutt, 3rd Baron Rayleigh (b. 1842), Nobel Prize-winning physicist.
• August 8 - Ernst Haeckel (b. 1834), zoologist.