(Photograph taken of Queen Victoria taken on the occasion of her Diamond Jubilee, 1897)
10 April Aston Villa F.C. win the FA Cup with a 3–2 win over Everton in the final at Crystal Palace.
28 April Boxted Bridge, built by George Double, opens for traffic.
13 May Guglielmo Marconi sends the first ever wireless communication over open sea when the message "Are you ready" is transmitted across the Bristol Channel from Lavernock Point in South Wales to Flat Holm Island, a distance of 3.7 miles.
26 May 1897 Bram Stoker's novel Dracula published.
22 June Queen Victoria's Diamond Jubilee
21 July Tate Gallery opens in London
19 August Bersey electric cabs, the first horseless taxicabs, begin operating in London.
August 31 Thomas Edison is granted a patent for the Kinetoscope, a precursor of the movie projector.
The Weaver building, a mill at Swansea, becomes the first building in the UK to be constructed in 1897 from reinforced concrete, by L. G. Mouchel to Hennebique patents.