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← 1886 1885 1884 1887 in Australia → 1888 1889 1890
Decades:	1860s 1870s 1880s 1890s 1900s
See also:	Other events of 1887 Timeline of Australian history

The following lists events that happened during 1887 in Australia.

• Premier of New South Wales – Patrick Jenning (until 19 January), then Henry Parkes
• Premier of South Australia – John Downer (until 11 June), then Thomas Playford II
• Premier of Queensland – Samuel Griffith
• Premier of Tasmania – James Agnew (until 29 March), then Philip Fysh
• Premier of Victoria – Duncan Gillies
• Governor of the Crown Colony of Western Australia – Sir Frederick Broome

• 1 January – Clement Wragge is appointed Government Meteorologist for Queensland
• 21 January – Brisbane receives a daily rainfall of 465 millimetres (18.3 inches), a record for any Australian capital city.
• 23 March – 81 miners are killed during a coal gas explosion at Bulli, New South Wales
• 22 April – A cyclone hits a pearling fleet off Eighty Mile Beach, 120 men drown.
• 11 May – Ship Darling Downs with 7725 bales of Australian wool sinks at Nore after collision with Britannia^[1]
• 22 June – The Fremantle Town Hall is opened.
• 26 Sept – The Celtic Club Melbourne is formed and remains today as Australia's oldest Irish Club
• 19 October – The Sydney-bound steamer SS Cheviot is wrecked near Point Nepean, Victoria, claiming 35 lives.

• Construction of Goulburn Weir commenced, one of Australia's earliest irrigation schemes.^[2]

• Dunlop wins the Melbourne Cup

• 2 February – Pat Sullivan, film director (died 1933)
• 16 April – Henry Gordon Bennett, soldier (died 1962)
• 6 July – Annette Kellerman, swimming celebrity (died 1975)
• 28 October – Herb Byrne, Australian rules footballer (died 1959)
• 30 November – Beatrice Kerr, swimmer, diver, and aquatic performer (died 1971)

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