The year marking the start of the Panic of 1873 was 1873.
The Panic of 1873 began with financial failures in Europe and the United States, including the collapse of the investment firm Jay Cooke & Company in September. The firm had helped finance the Northern Pacific Railway, and doubts about railroad investment spread through credit markets. The New York Stock Exchange temporarily closed for the first time in its history, from September 20 to September 29, 1873.
The panic contributed to a prolonged economic downturn often called the Long Depression. Falling investment, business failures, unemployment, and declining prices affected several industrial economies. Railroad overbuilding and speculative financing were important parts of the U.S. story, while financial disruptions in Europe had preceded the American crisis.
The episode is sometimes called the Great Depression of the nineteenth century, but that name can cause confusion with the 1930s Great Depression. The two events were separated by more than half a century and had different economic conditions.