1885

Events 
 Benz builds the first single-cylinder engine for car.
 John K Starley creates the first genuine bicycle, the Rover.
 John Boyd Dunlop invents the pneumatic tire.
 W.S. Gilbert & Arthur Sullivan's The Mikado
 The Times reports that "A lady well known in literary and scientific circles" has been cremated by the Cremation Society in Woking, Surrey. She is the first person to be officially cremated in the United Kingdom.
 Cholera epidemic in Spain – one of the victims is the king Alfonso XII.
 Third Burmese War begins.
 Clint Eastwood defeats Mad Dog Tannen.
 Sitting Bull joins Buffalo Bill.
 Randolph Churchill becomes a viceroy of India.
 Nikola Tesla sells a number of his patents to George Westinghouse.
 William Stanley, Jr. builds the first practical alternating current transformer device, the induction coil.
 Local anesthetic.
 First skyscraper – Home Insurance Building in Chicago, Illinois, USA (10 floors) is built.
 Bicycle Playing Cards are first produced.
 Grover Cleveland replaces Chester A. Arthur as President of the United States

 Births 
 January 8 – John Curtin, Australia's 14th Prime Minister
 September 17 – George Cleveland, Canadian actor

 Deaths 
 March 31 – Charlotte Brontë, British writer