1853 in the United States

Federal government

• President:

Millard Fillmore (W-New York) (until March 4)

Franklin Pierce (D-New Hampshire) (starting March 4)

• Vice President:

vacant (until March 4)

William R. King (D-Alabama) (March 4 – April 18)

vacant (starting April 18)

• Chief Justice: Roger B. Taney (Maryland)
• Speaker of the House of Representatives: Linn Boyd (D-Kentucky)
• Congress: 32nd (until March 4), 33rd (starting March 4)

January–March

• January – Stephen Foster's "My Old Kentucky Home, Good Night", which is later adopted as the state song of Kentucky under the name "My Old Kentucky Home", is published by Firth, Pond, & Company.
• January 6
  • President-elect Franklin Pierce and his family are involved in a train wreck near Andover, Massachusetts. Pierce's 11-year-old son Benjamin is killed in the crash.
  • East Florida Seminary is established; it is the oldest institution of what later becomes the University of Florida.
• February 22 – Washington University in St. Louis is founded as Eliot Seminary.
• March – Levi Strauss & Co. is founded in San Francisco, California.^[1]
• March 2 – Washington Territory is created from Oregon Territory.
• March 4 – Franklin Pierce becomes the 14th president of the United States, affirming the oath of office, and William R. King becomes the 13th vice president.
• March 5 – Steinway & Sons, a piano maker, is founded in Manhattan by the German immigrant Henry E. Steinway (Heinrich E. Steinweg) and his family.^[2]

April–June

• April 4 – Regular operation of the St. Lawrence and Atlantic Railroad begins between Montreal and Portland, Maine.
• April 18 – Vice President William R. King dies of tuberculosis in Selma, Alabama, without having carried out any duties of the office.
• May – The 1853 yellow fever epidemic begins along the Gulf Coast, ultimately killing more than 10,000 people.^[3]
• May 6 – Norwalk rail accident: A train runs off an open swing bridge into a river in Norwalk, Connecticut, killing 56.^[4]
• May 11 – Shimer College is founded in Mount Carroll, Illinois, with 11 students.^[5]
• May 23 – The first plat for Seattle, Washington, is laid out.

July–September

• July 1 – The Latting Observatory is opened for selected guests in New York City as part of the Exhibition of the Industry of All Nations. It is the tallest structure in the city at the time.
• July 2 – Koszta Affair: American Captain Duncan Ingraham commanding the USS St. Louis threatens to open fire upon an Austrian ship holding Martin Koszta as a prisoner. Koszta, who is in the process of obtaining American citizenship, is later returned to the U.S.
• July 8 – U.S. Commodore Matthew Perry arrives in Edo Bay with a request for a trade treaty.
• July 14 – The Exhibition of the Industry of All Nations world's fair begins in New York City.
• July 25 – Outlaw and bandit Joaquin Murrieta is killed in California.
• August 24 – Potato chips are traditionally said to have been invented on this date by George Crum in Saratoga Springs, New York.

October–December

• October 4 – The Great Republic, the largest wooden clipper ship ever constructed, is launched in Boston by Donald McKay.
• October 15 – William Walker sets out with 45 men to conquer the Mexican territories of Baja California and Sonora.
• November 11 – Voters in Massachusetts reject all eight proposals from the state's Constitutional Convention that was held from May 4 to August 2.
• December 7 – Erie Gauge War: Citizens of the Erie, Pennsylvania, area act to stop new track being laid to resolve rail gauge differences coming from neighboring Ohio and New York.
• December 25 – Cincinnati riot of 1853: Cardinal Gaetano Bedini's visit to Cincinnati, Ohio, sparks a Christmas Day protest that leads to the death of a protester in brawl with police.
• December 30 – Gadsden Purchase: U.S. Ambassador James Gadsden signs a treaty to buy approximately 29,600 sq mi (77,000 km²) of land south of the Gila River and west of the Rio Grande from Mexico to facilitate railroad building in the Southwest.

Undated

• Yontoket massacre: More than 450 Tolowa people are killed at Yontocket, California, by a citizen militia from Crescent City.
• The high school known as the Wheaton Academy is founded in West Chicago, Illinois.^[6]

Ongoing

• California Gold Rush (1848–1855)