February 3 – WWI: The United States severs diplomatic relations with Germany.
February 12: Club Deportivo Toluca F.C. was founded on February 12, 1917 in the house of the Ferrat-Solá family, located at number #37 on the avenue Juárez the charter of Deportivo Toluca was lifted; forming a board of directors that was joined by personalities such as Leonardo and Joaquín Sánchez, Abel Moreno and Manuel Lara.
February 24 – WWI: Walter Hines Page, United States ambassador to the United Kingdom, is shown the intercepted Zimmermann Telegram, in which Germany offers to give the American Southwest back to Mexico, if Mexico will take sides with Germany, in case the United States declares war on Germany.
April 9–May 16 – WWI: Battle of Arras – British Empire troops make a significant advance on the Western Front but are unable to achieve a breakthrough.
WWI: The Egyptian Expeditionary Force begins the Second Battle of Gaza. This unsuccessful frontal attack on strong Ottoman defences along with the first battle, results in 10,000 casualties, the dismissal of force commander General Archibald Murray, and the beginning of the Stalemate in Southern Palestine.
A month of civil violence in Milan, Italy ends, after the Italian army forcibly takes over the city from anarchists and anti-war revolutionaries; 50 people are killed and 800 arrested.[12]
June 7 – WWI: Battle of Messines opens with the British Army detonating 24 ammonalmines under the German lines, killing 10,000 in the deadliest deliberate non-nuclear man-made explosion in history.
July – The first Cottingley Fairies photographs are taken in Yorkshire, England, apparently depicting fairies (a hoax not admitted by the child creators until 1981).
July 8–13 – WWI: First Battle of Ramadi – British troops fail to take Ramadi from the Ottoman Empire; a majority of British casualties are due to extreme heat.
July 16–17 – Russian troops mutiny, abandon the Austrian front, and retreat to Ukraine; hundreds are shot by their commanding officers during the retreat.
The Parliament of Finland, with a Social Democratic majority, passes a "Sovereignty Act", declaring itself, as the representative of the Finnish people, sovereign over the Grand Principality of Finland. The Russian Provisional Government does not recognize the act, as it would have devolved Russian sovereignty over Finland, formerly exercised by the Russian Emperor as Grand Prince of Finland, and alter the relationship between Finland and Russia into a real union, with Russia solely responsible for the defence and foreign relations of an independent Finland.
October 12 – WWI: First Battle of Passchendaele: – Allies fail to take a German defensive position, with the biggest loss of life in a single day for New Zealand, over 800 men and 45 officers are killed, roughly 1 in 1,000 of the nation's population at this time.
Carl Swartz leaves office as Prime Minister of Sweden, after dismal election results for the right-wing in the Riksdag elections in September. He is replaced by liberal leader and history professor Nils Edén.
October 23 – A Brazilian ship is destroyed by a German U-boat, encouraging Brazil to enter World War I.
November 2 – Zionism: The British Foreign SecretaryArthur Balfour makes the Balfour Declaration, proclaiming British support for the "establishment in Palestine of a national home for the Jewish people..., it being clearly understood that nothing shall be done which may prejudice the civil and religious rights of existing non-Jewish communities".
Militants from Trotsky's committee join with trusty Bolshevik soldiers, to seize government buildings and pounce on members of the provisional government.
"Night of Terror" in the United States: Influential suffragettes from the Silent Sentinels are deliberately subjected to physical assaults by guards while imprisoned.
The Parliament of Finland passes another "Sovereignty Act", dissolving Russian sovereignty over Finland and effectively declaring Finland independent.
November 19 – WWI: Battle of Caporetto ends with Austrian and German forces driving the Italian army to retreat 150 kilometres south to the Piave river. The Italians lose 13,000 killed, 30,000 wounded, around 270,000 taken prisoner (mostly willingly) and 50,000 deserted; the government of Paolo Boselli collapses on November 29.
December 26 – United States President Woodrow Wilson uses the Federal Possession and Control Act to place most U.S. railroads under the United States Railroad Administration, hoping to transport troops and materials for the war effort more efficiently.
The first edition of the World Book Encyclopedia – simply known as The World Book – is published by the Hanson-Roach-Fowler Company,[18] and is one of the first American encyclopedias to cover the major areas of knowledge to a mass audience.
Women are permitted to stand in national elections in the Netherlands.
^New Zealand. Army. Expeditionary Force (1924). Roll of Honour, the Great War, 1914-1918. W.A.G. Skinner. p. xv.
^Shackleton, Ernest (1919). South. London: William Heinemann. pp. 334–337.
^Canada. Parliament. House of Commons (1939). Official Report of Debates, House of Commons. Queen's Printer. p. 4044.
^SA Legion – Atteridgeville Branch. "The SS Mendi – A Historical Background". Navy News. South African Navy. Archived from the original on March 5, 2012. Retrieved November 20, 2008.
^"Germans and their Dead. Revolting Treatment. Science and the Barbarian Spirit". The Times. No. 41454. London. April 17, 1917. p. 5.
^"Cadavers Not Human.; Gruesome Tale Believed to be Somebody's Notion of an April Fool Joke" (PDF). The New York Times. April 20, 1917.
^Badsey, Stephen (2014). The German Corpse Factory: a Study in First World War Propaganda. Solihull: Helion. ISBN 9781909982666.
^Neander, Joachim (2013). The German Corpse Factory: The Master Hoax of British Propaganda in the First World War. Saarbrücken: Saarland University Press. ISBN 9783862231171.
^Nuala Finnegan; Dylan Brennan (May 5, 2016). Rethinking Juan Rulfo's Creative World: Prose, Photography, Film. Routledge. p. 51. ISBN 978-1-317-19606-8.
^"William Knowles, Nobel Winner in Chemistry, Dies at 95". The New York Times. June 15, 2012.
^Johnson Publishing Company (December 18, 2000). Jet. Johnson Publishing Company. p. 18.
^Chase's Calendar of Events 2003. McGraw-Hill. September 2002. p. 314. ISBN 978-0-07-139098-9.
^"Eric Hobsbawm 1917-2012: Magnificent Historian and Colleague". Birkbeck, University of London. October 1, 2012. Retrieved June 24, 2021.
^David William Foster (1978). Augusto Roa Bastos. Twayne. p. 9. ISBN 978-0-8057-6348-5.
^Gale Cengage (1993). American Newspaper Publishers, 1950-1990. Gale Research. p. 103. ISBN 978-0-8103-5386-2.
^Grundberg, Andy (October 7, 2009). "Irving Penn, Fashion Photographer, Is Dead at 92". The New York Times. Retrieved October 7, 2009.
^United States Congress (1978). The Soviet Union: Internal Dynamics of Foreign Policy, Present and Future : Hearings Before the Subcommittee on Europe and the Middle East of the Committee on International Relations, House of Representatives, Ninety-fifth Congress, First Session ... U.S. Government Printing Office. p. 328. ISBN 978-0-522-85705-4.
^"Kerruish, Henry Charles" (PDF). www.tynwald.org. November 3, 2011. Archived from the original (PDF) on April 14, 2012. Retrieved November 3, 2011.
^"July 23 Birthdays in History". Brainyhistory.com. Retrieved February 13, 2012.
^Evanier, Mark; Sherman, Steve; et al. (March 20, 2008). "Jack Kirby Biography". Jack Kirby Museum & Research Center. Archived from the original on September 17, 2013. Retrieved February 24, 2012.
^William Grimes (May 3, 2008). "Philipp von Boeselager, Who Attempted an Assassination of Hitler, Dies at 90". New York Times.
^Carlson, Michael (July 30, 2017). "June Foray obituary". The Guardian. Retrieved March 19, 2018.
^Korean Newsletter. Korean Information Office, Embassy of Korea. 1979. p. 12.
^"Indira Gandhi". Britannica Presents 100 Women Trailblazers. February 16, 2019. Retrieved July 28, 2021.
^"Arthur C. Clarke | Biography, Works, & Facts". Encyclopedia Britannica. Retrieved December 13, 2020.
^"Albert Ball | British pilot | Britannica". www.britannica.com. Retrieved May 7, 2022.
^"Kristian Birkeland | Plasma-Universe.com".
^Leiwo, Hanne (June 11, 2017). "Hugo Simbergin kuolemasta 100 vuotta – muistomerkki paljastettiin kuolinpaikalla Ähtärissä". Yle. Archived from the original on June 2, 2023. Retrieved February 26, 2023.
^Helmut Rechenberg; Jagdish Mehra (2000). The Formulation of Matrix Mechanics and Its Modifications 1925–1926. Springer New York. p. 21.
^Aaronsohn, Sarah (1890–1917)
^"Tringë Smajli, the Albanian heroine who fought bravely against the Ottoman Empire". October 10, 2020.
Further reading
Williams, John. The Other Battleground The Home Fronts: Britain, France and Germany 1914-1918 (1972) pp 175–242.
Primary sources and year books
New International Year Book 1917 (1918), Comprehensive coverage of world and national affairs, 904 pp
American Year Book: 1917 (1918), large compendium of facts about the U.S. online complete edition