* Andrew Ainslie Common ( 1841 – 1903 ), built his own very large reflecting telescopes and demonstrated that photography could record astronomical features invisible to the human eye.

* 1903 – The Kishinev pogrom in Kishinev ( Bessarabia ) begins, forcing tens of thousands of Jews to later seek refuge in Israel and the Western world.

* 1903 – Mickey Cochrane, American baseball player ( d. 1962 )

* 1903 – Harold Edgerton, American electrical engineer ( d. 1990 )

* 1903 – Jan Tinbergen, Dutch economist, recipient of the Bank of Sweden Prize ( d. 1994 )

* 1903 – Ferenc Keserű, Hungarian water polo player ( d. 1968 )

* 1819 – Sir George Stokes, 1st Baronet, Irish-English mathematician and physicist ( d. 1903 )

After what the MCC saw as the problems of the earlier professional and amateur series they decided to take control of organising tours themselves, and this led to the first MCC tour of Australia in 1903 – 04.

* 1903 – Fall of the Ottoman Empire: an unsuccessful uprising led by the Internal Macedonian Revolutionary Organization against Ottoman Turkey, also known as the Ilinden – Preobrazhenie Uprising, takes place.

In Serbia Nikola Pašić ( 1845 – 1926 ) and his Radical Party dominated Serbian politics after 1903 ; they also monopolized power in Yugoslavia from 1918 to 1929 ; during the dictatorship of the 1930s, it furnished the prime minister.

* 1903 – Macedonian rebels in Kruševo proclaim the Kruševo Republic, which exists only for 10 days before Ottoman Turks lay waste to the town.

* 1903 – Habib Bourguiba, Tunisian politician ( d. 2000 )

* 1903 – Louis Leakey, Kenyan-English archaeologist ( d. 1972 )

* 1903 – A 30 million cubic-metre landslide kills 70 in Frank, Alberta, Canada.

* 1876 – Alexander I of Serbia ( d. 1903 )

* Adrian ( costume designer ) ( 1903 – 1959 ), born Adrian Adolph Greenberg, costume designer for over 250 films

* Adrian Rollini ( 1903 – 1956 ), American multi-instrumentalist best known for his jazz music

* 1903 – German engineer Karl Jatho allegedly flies his self-made, motored gliding airplane four months before the first flight of the Wright brothers.

* 1903 – James Gould Cozzens, American novelist ( d. 1978 )

* 1903 – Lewis Sargent, American actor ( d. 1970 )

* 1826 – Karl Gegenbaur, German anatomist ( d. 1903 )

* 1903 – Arpad Elo, American chess player, created the Elo rating system ( d. 1992 )

Alexander I or Aleksandar Obrenović ( Cyrillic: Александар Обреновић ; 14 August 1876 – 11 June 1903 ) was king of Serbia from 1889 to 1903 when he and his wife, Queen Draga, were assassinated by a group of Army officers, led by Colonel Dragutin Dimitrijević

* May 2 – Giulio Natta, Italian chemist, Nobel Prize laureate ( b. 1903 )

Giulio Natta ( 26 February 1903 – 2 May 1979 ) was an Italian chemist and Nobel laureate.

The Italian film industry took shape between 1903 and 1908, led by three major organizations-Cines, based in Rome ; and the Turin-based companies ' Ambrosio ' and ' Itala Film '.

* 1903 – Galeazzo Ciano, Italian politician ( d. 1944 )

Pope Leo XIII ( 2 March 1810 – 20 July 1903 ), born Vincenzo Gioacchino Raffaele Luigi Pecci to an Italian comital family, was the 256th Pope of the Roman Catholic Church, reigning from 1878 to 1903.

The United Mine Workers in 1903 send Joe Fenoglio to organize the Italian workers, thus beginning the Thurber Coal Miners Strike.

Gian Galeazzo Ciano, 2nd Count of Cortellazzo and Buccari (; 18 March 1903 – 11 January 1944 ) was an Italian Minister of Foreign Affairs and Benito Mussolini's son-in-law.

His wife, the American Mary Alsop King, wrote her recollections of their diplomatic experiences – Letters of a Diplomat's Wife, 1883 – 1900 ( New York, 1903 ), and Italian Letters of a Diplomat's Wife ( 1904 ).

Sacco was found to have an Italian passport, anarchist literature, a loaded. 32 Colt Model 1903 automatic pistol, and twenty-three. 32 Automatic cartridges in his possession, several of these being of the same obsolescent type as the empty Winchester. 32 casing found at the crime scene, and the others manufactured by the firms of Peters and Remington, whose cases also were found at the crime scene.

Joseph " Joe Cargo " Valachi ( September 22, 1903 – April 3, 1971 ), Italian American, also known as " Charles Chanbano " and " Anthony Sorge " was the first Mafia member to publicly acknowledge the existence of the Mafia.

Latino sine flexione (" Latin without inflections "), or Peano ’ s Interlingua ( abbreviated as IL ), is an international auxiliary language invented by the Italian mathematician Giuseppe Peano ( 1858 – 1932 ) in 1903.

His first residence in southern France was in Cabasson, near Le Lavandou, then he settled a short distance away, in the small hamlet of Saint-Clair, where he spent the remainder of his life, leaving only for Italian trips in 1903 and 1908, and for his annual Indépendants exhibits in Paris.

After acting against a major Italian uprising in the city in 1902, he was made Feldmarschalleutnant and took command of the 8th Infantry Division at Innsbruck in 1903.

With the growth of Italian immigration came the growth in the influence of the Roman Catholic Church such that the Parish of Our Lady, Help of Christians, was founded in the downtown area of St. Louis in 1900 to serve primarily recent Sicilian immigrants, while the Parish of St. Ambrose was founded in what later came to be known as the Hill in 1903 to serve primarily the recent northern Italian immigrants.

Alessandro Pavolini ( September 27, 1903 – April 28, 1945 ) was an Italian politician, journalist, and essayist, notable for his involvement in the Fascist government during World War II and also for his cruelty against the opponents of fascism.

Giuseppe Zanardelli ( October 29, 1826 – December 26, 1903 ) was an Italian jurisconsult, nationalist and political figure.

The club eventually joined the competition for the Italian Football Championship 1903, but did not win a game in the tournament until 1907 when they beat local rivals Genoa 3 – 1.

Occasionally, the official texts are published in a modern language, including such well-known texts as the motu proprio Tra le sollecitudini ( 1903 ) by Pope Pius X ( in Italian ) and Mit brennender Sorge ( 1937 ) by Pope Pius XI ( in German ).

His first known published poem is La Dignità Episcopale ( 1889 ) after which he published Foglie d ' Allora ( 1896 ) and Versi ( 1903 ) another collection of Italian poems.

Candido Jacuzzi ( 24 February 1903 – 7 October 1986 ) was an Italian immigrant to the United States of America.

For example, after the papal conclave, 1903, before the election of Giuseppe Sarto as Pope Pius X was announced, several conclavists apparently attempted to signal his election from the window by " imitating the sewing motions of a tailor, sarto in Italian ".

Giovanni Costa ( October 15, 1826 – January 31, 1903 ), known as Nino, was an Italian landscape painter and revolutionary.