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Too Much Cotton
Cotton prices at New Orleans peak at 42 cents a pound, prompting Southern farmers to plant the largest crop. The resulting overproduction causes a collapse in prices, with cotton falling less then 10 cents a pound by early 1921. Cotton farmers will toil in near-depression conditions throughout most of the 1920 and 30's. -
Garvey Conference
Charismatic Black nationalist leader Marcus Garvey, a Jamaican immigrant, convenes the first International Convention of the Negro Peoples of the World in New York's Madison Square Garden. -
Immigration Quota Established
Congress passes immigration restrictions, for the first time creating a quota for European immigration to the United States. Targeted at "undesirable" immigrants from Southern and Eastern Europe, the act sharply curtails the quota for those areas while retaining a generous allowance for migrants from Northern and Western Europe. -
Tariffs Up
Congress passed the Fordney-McCumber Tariff, sharply raising tariff duties to protect the American market for American manufactures. The tariff boosts the domestic economy of Roaring '20's, but it also worsens the crisis for struggling European economies like Germany's, helping to enable Adolf Hitler's rise to power there on a platform of economic grievance. -
Stock Market Skyrockets
The stock market beings a spectacular rise, however, bears little resemblance to the rest of the economy, meanwhile, Americas middle class shrink as the lower class grows. -
Scopes Violates Ban on Teaching Evolution
Tennessee schoolteacher John Scopes is arrested for teaching evolution, in violation of new state law banning the teaching of Darwin. The ensuing "Scopes Monkey Trial," pitting defense attorney Clarence Darrow against three-time presidential candidate William Jennings Bryan in a proxy debate of modernity versus fundamentalism, captivates the nation. Scopes is eventually found guilty. -
Hoover Elected as President
Herbert Hoover, running on a slogan of "A chicken in every pot, a car in every garage," is elected to the presidency, crushing Catholic Democrat Al Smith to maintain Republican dominance of the Oval Office. -
Stock Market Collapse
The American stock market collapse, signaling the onset of the Great Depression. The Dow Jones Industrial Average peaks in September 1929 at 381.17, a level that it won't reach again until 1954. The Dow will bottom out at a a Depression-era low of just 41.22 in 1932. -
Chicago Mob
In the "Saint Valentine's Day Massacre," the single bloodiest incident in a decade-long turf war between rival Chicago mobsters fighting to control the lucrative bootlegging trade, members of Al Capone's gang murder six followers of rival Bugs Moran. -
Smoot-Hawley Tariff
Congress passes the Smoot-Hawley Tariff, steeply raising import duties in an attempt to protect American manufactures from foreign competition. The tariff increase has little impact on the American economy, but plunges Europe farther into crisis. -
Reconstruction Finance Cooperation
The Corperation aimed to loan money to banks and rail roads to keep them from going bankrupt, unfortunately, this had little effect on the great depression as a whole, and didnt help to turn the economy around. -
New Deal Begins1
President Roosevelt begins to implement the new deal, this began to help the economy, it implemented things like minimum wage and maximum work week, and child labor laws, and unemployment compensation. As well as agricultural loans, civilian constervation corps were formed, and bank reform was put into action. -
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Under German Pressure
The Slovaks declare their independence and form a Slovak Republic. The Germans occupy the rump Czech lands in violation of the Munich agreement, forming a Protectorate of Bohemia and Moravia. -
Munich Agreement
Germany, Italy, Great Britain, and France sign the Munich agreement which forces the Czechoslovak Republic to cede the Sudetenland, including the key Czechoslovak military defense positions, to Nazi Germany. -
Nonaggression Agreement
Nazi Germany and the Soviet Union sign a nonaggression agreement and a secret codicil dividing eastern Europe into spheres of influence. -
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The Soviet Union Invades Finland
The Finns sue for an armistice and have to cede the northern shores of Lake Lagoda and the small Finnish coastline on the Arctic Sea to the Soviet Union -
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Germany attacks western Europe
France and the neutral Low Countries. Luxembourg is occupied on May 10; the Netherlands surrenders on May 14; and Belgium surrenders on May 28. On June 22, France signs an armistice agreement by which the Germans occupy the northern half of the country and the entire Atlantic coastline. In southern France, a collaborationist regime with its capital in Vichy is established -
Second Vienna Award
Germany and Italy arbitrate a decision on the division of the disputed province of Transylvania between Romania and Hungary. The loss of northern Transylvania forces Romanian King Carol to abdicate in favor of his son, Michael, and brings to power a dictatorship under General Ion Antonescu. -
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Nazi Germany and its Axis partners invade the Soviet Union
Finland, seeking redress for the territorial losses in the armistice concluding the Winter War, joins the Axis just before the invasion. The Germans quickly overrun the Baltic States and, joined by the Finns, lay siege to Leningrad by September. In the center, the Germans capture Smolensk in early August and drive on Moscow by October. In the south, German and Romanian troops capture Kiev in September and capture Rostov on the Don River in November. -
United States declares war on Japan
Japanese troops land in the Philippines, French Indochina (Vietnam, Laos, Cambodia), and British Singapore. By April 1942, the Philippines, Indochina, and Singapore are under Japanese occupation. -
Badoglio government surrenders to the Allies
The Germans immediately seize control of Rome and northern Italy, establishing a puppet Fascist regime under Mussolini, who is freed from imprisonment by German commandos on September 12. -
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Home Army
The non-communist underground Home Army rises up against the Germans in an effort to liberate Warsaw before the arrival of Soviet troops. The Soviet advance halts on the east bank of the Vistula. On October 5, the Germans accept the surrender of the remnants of the Home Army forces fighting in Warsaw. -
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Allied Troops Finally Reach Paris.
On August 25, Free French forces, supported by Allied troops, enter the French capital. By September, the Allies reach the German border; by December, virtually all of France, most of Belgium, and part of the southern Netherlands are liberated. -
Soviet Troops
The appearance of Soviet troops on the Prut River induces the Romanian opposition to overthrow the Antonescu regime. The new government concludes an armistice and immediately switches sides in the war. The Romanian turnaround compels Bulgaria to surrender on September 8, and the Germans to evacuate Greece, Albania, and southern Yugoslavia in October. -
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Slovak National Council
Under the leadership of the Slovak National Council, consisting of both Communists and non-Communists, underground Slovak resistance units rise against the Germans and the indigenous fascist Slovak regime. In late October, the Germans capture Banská Bystrica, the headquarters of the uprising, and put an end to organized resistance