-
Period: to
1960s Timeline
-
Kennedy-Nixon Debate
John F. Kennedy took place in the first nationaly televised presidential debate. -
Freedom Rides
Nonviolent volunteers chose to ride interstate buses to South. They encountered police, protesters, and mobs that threw a firebomb at one bus in Alabama. Riders encountered more radical segregationists as they headed deeper into south. Kennedy creates the Interstate Commerce Commision to ban segregation in interstate travel. -
Albany Movement
Blacks at this point, wanted segregation to be banned from everything.Tensions between organizations like SNCC and SCLC. People begin utilizing the method of filling up jail cells. MLK gets arrested but a mysterious person bails him out. King left confused and did not know what to do- he left the town and after, his absence was less significant for the people. There was not real success because goals were too broad. -
Bay of Pigs Invasion
An atttempt to overthrow the Cuban government that had recently turned to communism. -
Slient Spring
Rachel Carson's Silent Spring and the Beginning of the Environmental movement. -
Cuban Missle Crisis
The United States sees Cuban missles in Cuba wihtout the letting the United Nations to know this. -
Birmingham Confrontation
SCLC tried to desegregate downtown stores- MLK led a demonstration that got him jailed for marching. Strategy was to use kids instead of adults to march. 700 children arrested, 16th St. Baptist Church was meeting spot. Eugene Bull Conor decided to get police to use water hoses and dogs to attack kids. Got (inter)national attention. JFK proposes Civil Rights bill, lacked mandate. First time blacks fought riots. -
March on Washington
20,000 people of all races marched to Lincoln memorial (symbolic of slavery ending). The goal was to influence Kennedy in passing the Civil Rights Bill by marching to support him. JFK was assassinated so bill was unable to be passed, but LBJ did afterwards. MLK gives his "I have a Dream" speech. -
Kennedy Assassination
JFK was assassinated during his campaign to run for another term as president. -
Johnson Sworn In
Lyndon B. Johnson is sworn into office shortly after JFK dying. -
Civil Rights Act of 1964
Federal courts have more power in enforcing the law, no longer only local courts with power. No more racial discrimination anywhere, whether public or private business. Act removes all obstacles from voting rights. Equal employment/treatment for everyone. -
Democratic National Convention
Held in AC, NJ. The Mississippi Freedom Democratic party showed up to the convention to try and represent MS to challenge the legitimacy of the white-only US Democratic Party. At convention Fannie Lou Hammer spoke for the MFDP and gained her a reputation as an electrifying speaker and constant activist of civil rights. Johnson saw the MFDP as bad for Democrat party as a whole. MFDP was offered 2 seats but turned it down. -
Freedom Summer
Took place in Philadelphia, MS. The problem was voting obstacles for blacks. They had to fill out questionaires and recite things in front of white voting registration people. All whites who registered passed. Youth of the north became active in civil rights movement by helping out the blacks: volunteers came down to provide adequate education, health clinics, etc. 60,000 blacks were able to register. 3 men went missing, got national attention: Andrew Goodman, James Chaney, Michael Schwerner. -
Gulf of Tonkin Resolution
Congress passed the Gulf of Tonkin Resolution, which gave President Lyndon Johnson the power to take whatever actions he saw necessary to defend Southeast Asia. -
Operation Rolling Thunder
President Johnson authorized the sustained bombing campaign of North Vietnam, known as Operation Rolling Thunder. The actual bombing runs began on March 2nd. The aim of Rolling Thunder was to force North Vietnam to stop supporting Viet Cong guerrillas in South Vietnam. -
Selma March
MLK joined fefforts to help the Selma people with rioting rights. Tensions between SNCC and SCLS. Malcolm X supported and warned King and if voting rights arent passed it will turn violent. Planned to march 54 miles to Montgomery, AL. 600 marched; Gov Wallace ordered march to be stopped, had police birgade at end of bridge with gas bombs, people were beaten. It was nationally televised leading to LBJ addressing to pass the voting rights bill. A second march held with 3200, had national guard. -
First American Ground Offensive in Vietnam
General William Westmoreland launched the first purely offensive operation by American ground forces in Vietnam, which swept into Viet Cong territory just northwest of Saigon. -
Watts Riots
Took place in LA, CA. 34 people died, caused much damage. Riots targeted businesses that were not treating blacks nicely. The riots were a wake up call for King, sending a message that other parts of the nation was struggling too. These urban riots became very dangerous. -
Unsafe at Any Speed
Ralph Nadar publishes a book talking about the dangers of vehicles. -
Betty Friedan’s Feminine Mystique
A leading figure in the Women's Movement in the United States, her 1963 book The Feminine Mystique is often credited with sparking the "second wave" of American feminism in the twentieth century. -
Congress Passes Clean Air Act
The first Clean Air Act was passed in 1963. It was amended first by the Clean Air Act Amendment in 1966, then by the Clean Air Act Extension of 1970 (84 Stat. 1676, Public Law 91-604). The 1970 extension is sometimes called the "Muskie Act" because of the central role Maine Senator Edmund Muskie played in drafting the content of the bill.[2] The Clean Air Act Amendments in 1977 further modified the law -
NOW is Founded
NOW is the largest and to this day one of the most well known organization for womens rights. -
UFW’s Nationwide Boycott of grapes picked on nonunion farms
was a series of strikes, mass pickets, boycotts, and secondary boycotts which began August 23, 1970, and led to the largest farm worker strike in U.S. history. -
U.S. Escalation
By the end of 1966, American forces in Vietnam reach 385,000 men, plus an additional 60,000 sailors stationed offshore. More than 6,000 Americans were killed in this year, and 30,000 were wounded. In comparison, an estimated 61,000 Vietcong were killed. -
Tet Offensive
Viet Cong units launched surprise attacks throughout South Vietnam. This became known as the Tet Offensive. Tet is the beginning of the lunar new year and a major national holiday in Vietnam. In previous years fighting decreased dramatically or even ceased altogether during the holiday. The 1968 Tet holiday was different. American and South Vietnamese forces spent the next month fighting to beat back the Viet Cong. By the end of the Tet Offensive, at least 37,000 Vietcong troops were killed. -
End of Operation Rolling Thunder
After three-and-a-half years, Operation Rolling Thunder came to an end. The campaign had cost more than 900 American aircrafts, 818 pilots died or missing, and hundreds wound up in captivity. According to U.S. estimates, 182,000 North Vietnamese civilians were killed. -
American Deaths in Vietnam Exceed Those in Korea
U.S. combat deaths in Vietnam exceeded the 33,629 men killed in the Korean War. -
First Earth Day Celebration
Earth Day is a day that is intended to inspire awareness and appreciation for the Earth's natural environment. -
The EPA is Established
Agency of the federal government of the United States charged with protecting human health and the environment, by writing and enforcing regulations based on laws passed by Congress -
Roe .v. Wade
was a landmark, controversial decision by the United States Supreme Court on the issue of abortion. The Court decided that a right to privacy under the due process clause in the Fourteenth Amendment to the United States Constitution extends to a woman's decision to have an abortion, but that right must be balanced against the state's two legitimate interests for regulating abortions: protecting prenatal life and protecting the mother's health.
