Fingerprint Timeline

Requires fingerprint and signatures on civil contract

1858

Sir William Herschel (British Administrator in District in India) requires that.

Producing a formula used to classify individuals

1882

Alphonse Bertillion (French Anthropologist) devised a method or formula that involves taking a person's body parts. This method of classifying and identifying people became known as Bertillion System

Initiated the fingerprinting of criminals

1891

Juan Vucetich (Argentine Police) used in Rojas Homicide in 1892, in which a woman murdered her two sons and cut her own throat so she could put a blame on another person.

Published the book on fingerprints

1892

Sir Francis Galton (British Anthropologist and a cousin to Charles Darwin) identifies the individuality and uniqueness of fingerprints

Develops the first system of classifying fingerprints

1901

Sir Edward Henry (Inspector General of Police in Bengal, India) developed and was first adopted as the official system in England, and eventually spread throughout.

Adopts the use of fingerprints

1905

US Military adopts the use of fingerprints including police agencies

The first official fingerprint card was developed

1908

First palm print identification is made in Nevada

1917

The bloody palm print, found on a letter left at a scene of a stage coach robbery and murder of its driver, was identified to Ben Kuhl.

Formation of ID Division of FBI

1924

First computer data base of fingerprints was developed

1980

Automated Fingerprint Identification System (AFIS), nearly 700 million individual fingerprints were created.