| A United States Historical Timeline 1492 - 1981
1509-1547
Henry VII rules England - Protestant reformation begins in England 1558-1603
Reign of Queen Elizabeth I - Ireland conquered by England. 1607
Jamestown founded 1612
Tobacco made a profitable crop by John Rolfe 1619
First group of blacks brought to Virginia - First legislative assembly meets in
Virginia 1620
First Pilgrims in Plymouth 1622
Indian attacks in Virginia end hopes of becoming a bi-racial society 1629
Great Puritan migration to Massachusetts Bay 1636
Harvard founded 1676
Bacon's Rebellion 1686
Creation of Dominion of New England 1688
Glorious Revolution in England 1700
250,000 settlers in English colonies 1704
First colonial newspaper 1720s
Colonial economic life quickens 1739-1744
Great Awakening 1756-1763
French and Indian War 1763
Proclamation Line established 1763-1764
Pontiac's Rebellion 1764-1765
Sugar Act and Stamp Act Controversies 1766
Declaratory Act 1767
Townshend Act - New York Assembly suspended 1770
Boston Massacre 1772
Committees of Correspondence formed 1773
Boston Tea Party 1774
Coercive Acts - First Continental Congress convenes 1775
Revolution begins with fighting at Lexington and Concord 1776
Declaration of Independence 1777
British defeated at Saratoga 1778
French join the war against the British 1781
Battle of Yorktown - Articles of Confederation ratified 1783
Peace signed in Paris 1784-1787
Northwest Ordinance of 1784, 1785, and 1787 1786
Annapolis Convention 1787
Shays' Rebellion - Constitutional Convention 1788
Federalist Papers written - Constitution ratified 1789
George Washington inaugurated as President of the United States - French Revolution
begins 1790
Capital placed on the Potomac River 1793
Citizen Genet 1794
Whiskey Rebellion - Indians defeated at Fallen Timbers 1795
Jay Treaty - Pinckney Treaty 1798
Un-declared war with France - Alien and Sedition Acts - Kentucky and Virginia
Resolutions 1800
Jefferson elected 1803
Louisiana Purchase 1807-1809
Embargo in effect 1808
Slave trade ended 1809
Non-intercourse Act 1812
War with England 1814 Treaty of Ghent 1820
Missouri Compromise 1820s
First labor unions formed - Romanticism flourished in America 1823
Monroe Doctrine 1828
Andrew Jackson elected 1830s
Railroad era begins 1831
Nat Turner's rebellion - Liberator founded 1832
Nullification crisis 1834
Whig party formed 1835 Texas Revolution - Republic of Texas established 1840s
Manifest Destiny - Telegraph and railroads create a communications revolution
1846
Mexican War begins 1848
Treaty of Guadeloupe Hidalgo ended Mexican War. U. S. acquires California and
territory of New Mexico which includes present-day Nevada, Utah, Arizona, new
Mexico, and part of Colorado. 1849
Gold discovered in California 1850
Compromise of 1850 - California admitted to the union - Fugitive Slave Law strengthened
1853
Gadsden Purchase 1854
Kansas-Nebraska Act - Republican Party formed 1856
Violence in Kansas - Senator Sumner attacked in the Senate 1858
Lincoln-Douglas Debates 1859
John Brown's raid on Harper's Ferry 1860
Democratic Party splits apart - Abraham Lincoln elected 16th President of the
United States - Lower South secedes 1861
Confederate States of America formed - Civil War begins at Fort Sumter - Upper
South secedes - North is defeated at the first battle of Bull Run 1862
Battle of Antietam - Morill Tariff, Homestead Act - Emancipation Proclamation
issued (effective January 1, 1863) 1864
Grant's wilderness campaign - Sherman takes Atlanta - Sherman's "March to
the Sea" 1865
Sherman takes South and North Carolina - Lee surrenders at Appomattox Court House
- Thirteenth Amendment abolishes slavery - Lincoln assassinated - Andrew Johnson
becomes President - KKK formed 1867
First Reconstruction Act launches Radical Reconstruction - Alaska purchased 1868
Fourteenth Amendment guarantees Civil Rights - Johnson impeached 1870
Fifteenth Amendment forbids denial of vote on racial grounds 1870s
Terrorism against blacks in South, flourishing of Darwinism and ideas of racial
inferiority 1876
End of Reconstruction - Battle of Little Big Horn 1877
Munn v. Illinois: Court rules states may regulate warehouse rates 1879
Stand Oil Trust formed 1880s
Big Business emerge 1883
Railroad companies divide nation into four time zones - Pendleton Civil Service
Act 1886
Haymarket Riots 1887
Interstate Commerce Commission - Davies Act 1890
Sherman Anti-Trust Act - Massacre at Wounded Knee - Sherman Silver Purchase Act
1890-1920
Fifteen million "new" immigrants 1893
Repeal of Sherman Silver Purchase Act 1895
Pollock v Farmers - Court strikes down income tax 1898
War with Spain - Hawaii annexed 1899
Peace with Spain, U. S. receives Philippines, Samoa, Guam, and Puerto Rico 1900
Gold Standard 1901
Theodore Roosevelt becomes President 1904
Roosevelt Corollary to Monroe Doctrine 1904-1914
Panama Canal built 1906
Hepburn Act, Pure Food and Drug Act - The Jungle 1912
Election of Woodrow Wilson 1913
Sixteen Amendment authorizing income tax ratified Seventeenth Amendment providing
for direct elections of Senators ratified - Federal Reserve System begun - Wilson
broadens segregation in civil service 1914
World War 1 begins - U. S. troops occupy Vera Cruz 1915
U. S. troops sent to Haiti - Lusitania sunk, U. S. intervened - KKK revived 1916
Germany issues Sussex pledge 1917
Russian Revolution - U. S. enters WW1 1918
WW1 ends - Treaty of Versailles 1919
Eighteenth Amendment prohibits alcoholic beverages - Red Scare 1920
Nineteenth Amendment gives women the right to vote - First radio station KDKA
in Pittsburgh 1921
Washington Naval Conference 1924
Revenue Act slashes income tax on wealthy and corporations 1927
Lindbergh crosses the Atlantic 1929
Stock market crashes 1932
Franklin Roosevelt elected 1933
Bank holiday, "Hundred Days" - NRA, AAA, FDIC, TVA, FERA, CCC - Twentieth
Amendment changes inauguration day to January - Twenty-first Amendment repeals
prohibition - Hitler comes to power in Germany 1934
Gold standard terminated - SEC 1935
Social Security Act, WP, NLRA - CIO formed - U. S. Begins neutrality legislation
1936
FDR re-elected 1937
FDR attempts to pack Supreme Court - Japan invades China 1938
United States Housing Authority - Fair labor Standards Act - Hitler takes Austria,
Munich Agreement 1939
World War 2 begins 1940
Roosevelt makes destroyers-for-bases deal with the British - Fall of France -
First peacetime U.S. draft 1941
Lend-Lease, Battle of Britain, Hitler attacks USSR - Atlantic Charter - Japan
attacks Pearl Harbor 1942
Allied year of disaster - U. S. interns Japanese - U. S. halts Japanese at Coral
Sea and Midway 1943
Tide turns against Axis - Russia wins at Stalingrad, unconditional surrender demanded 1944
France invaded - Bombing of Japan begins - Russia sweeps through Eastern Europe 1945
Yalta - FDR dies - Germany surrenders - Atom bombs - End of WW 2 1946
U. S. - USSR relations worsen - "Iron Curtain" speech 1947
Cold War begins - Marshall Plan -Containment 1948-1949
Berlin Airlift - Taft-Hartley - Military integrated 1949
NATO - Russia explodes the bomb - Communists control China 1950
Korean War - Joseph McCarthy 1951
Twenty-second Amendment limits the President to two terms 1952
Dwight Eisenhower elected President 1953
Industries agree on guaranteed annual wage 1954
Brown v. Board of Education, Supreme Court strikes down "separate but equal." 1955
Montgomery Bus Boycott, emergence of Martin Luther King, Jr. 1957
Sputnik - Eisenhower Doctrine - Little rock Crisis - Civil Rights Act 1958
First U. S. satellite and ICBM - NASA - U. S. occupies Lebanon 1960
U-2 shot down over Russia - Soviet and Chinese split - John F. Kennedy elected
President 1961
Freedom rides - Twenty-third Amendment gives District of Columbia the right to
vote for President - Berlin crisis - Peace Corps - Bay of Pigs - 16,000 in Vietnam
1962
University of Mississippi integrated - Cuban Missile Crisis 1963
Civil Rights march on Washington - JFK assassinated - Feminine Mystique 1964
Free speech movement at Berkeley - Beatles - Twenty-fourth Amendment outlaws the
poll tax - War on poverty - Gulf of Tonkin 1965
Great Society - Operation Rolling Thunder in Vietnam - Malcolm X assassinated
1966
Black Power - France withdraws from NATO - N. O. W. formed 1967
Detroit Riot - Peace movement in the U. S. 1968
Robert Kennedy and Martin Luther Kin murdered - Tet Offensive - Johnson won't
seek re-election - Richard Nixon elected President 1969
Vietnamization - First man on the moon - Nixon proposed New Federalism 1970
Massacre at Kent State - EPA established - Cambodian invasion creates anti-war
turbulence - SALT talks begin 1971
Nixon opens talks with China - Wage-price controls - My Lai massacre revealed
- Pentagon Papers published 1972
Intensive bombing of North Vietnam - Watergate - Nixon re-elected - GNP over 1
trillion 1973
Cease-fire in Vietnam - U. S. forces withdraw - Spiro Agnew resigns 1974
Watergate tapes - Nixon resigns, Ford's pardon - Serious inflation and recession
1975
Vietnam falls - 44% of married women employed 1976
Bicentennial - Jimmy Carter elected President 1977
Human rights 1978
Camp David Accords - Panama Canal treaties ratified 1979
SALT 2 completed - U. S. recognizes china - American Embassy in Iran occupied
- USSR invaded Afghanistan 1980
U. S. boycotts Olympics, withdraws from SALT 2- Reagan elected President 1981
American hostages held in Iran freed on Reagan's inauguration day
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