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1492
Columbian Exchange
Christopher Columbus introduced horses, sugar plants, and disease to the New World, while facilitating the introduction of New World commodities like sugar, tobacco, chocolate, and potatoes to the Old World. https://www.khanacademy.org/humanities/us-history/precontact-and-early-colonial-era/old-and-new-worlds-collide/a/the-columbian-exchange-ka -
The French and Indian War
In the early 1750s, France’s expansion into the Ohio River valley repeatedly brought the country into armed conflict with the British colonies. In 1756, the British formally declared war against France. The natives sided with France in the beginning, hence the name French and Indian War. https://www.history.com/this-day-in-history/the-french-and-indian-war-ends -
Boston Massacre
The Boston Massacre was a deadly riot that occurred on March 5, 1770, on King Street in Boston. It began as a street brawl between American colonists and a lone British soldier, but quickly escalated to a chaotic, bloody slaughter. The conflict energized anti-Britain sentiment and paved the way for the American Revolution. https://www.history.com/topics/american-revolution/boston-massacre -
Battle of Yorktown
On this day in 1781, General George Washington, commanding a force of 17,000 French and Continental troops, begins the siege known as the Battle of Yorktown against British General Lord Charles Cornwallis and a contingent of 9,000 British troops at Yorktown, Virginia, in the most important battle of the Revolutionary War. https://www.history.com/this-day-in-history/battle-of-yorktown-begins -
The Treaty of Paris
The Treaty of Paris of 1783 formally ended the American Revolutionary War. American statesmen Benjamin Franklin, John Adams and John Jay negotiated the peace treaty with Great Britain. In the Treaty of Paris, the British Crown formally recognized American independence and ceded most of its territory east of the Mississippi River to the United States, doubling the size of the new nation and paving the way for westward expansion. https://www.history.com/topics/american-revolution/treaty-of-paris -
Invention of the Bifocals
Bifocals are eyeglasses with an upper and lower half, the upper for distance, and the lower for reading. Bifocals are commonly prescribed to people with presbyopia, a condition that Franklin suffered. Franklin wrote, in August 1784 to his friend George Whatley, that he was "happy in the invention of double spectacles, which serving for distant objects as well as near ones, make my eyes as useful to me as ever they were." http://www.ushistory.org/franklin/science/bifocals.htm -
Invention of the Cotton Gin
Eli Whitney patents the cotton gin. https://www.thoughtco.com/18th-century-timeline-1992474 -
Invention of the Refrigerator
Oliver Evans invented the vapor-compression refrigeration machine in 1805 https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Timeline_of_United_States_inventions_(before_1890) -
Invention of the Typewriter
American, W.A. Burt invents a typewriter. http://theinventors.org/library/weekly/aa111100a.htm -
The Underground Railroad
The Underground Railroad was a network of people who offered shelter and aid to escaping slaves from the South. The exact dates of its existence are not known, but it operated from the late 18th century to the Civil War, at which point its efforts continued to undermine the Confederacy in a less-secretive fashion. -
Invention of the Reaper
American, Cyrus H. McCormick invents the first commercially successful reaper.
http://theinventors.org/library/weekly/aa111100a.htm -
Invention of Platform Scales
American, Thaddeus Fairbanks invents platform scales.
http://theinventors.org/library/weekly/aa111100a.htm -
Invention of Sewing Machine
American, Elias Howe invents a sewing machine. http://theinventors.org/library/weekly/aa111100a.htm -
Invention of the Minie Ball (Q2W3)
The French army officer Claude-Etienne Minié invented the bullet that would bear his name in 1849. The Minié bullet, a cylindrical bullet with a hollow base that expanded when fired, proved lethally accurate over relatively long distances...Union and Confederate soldiers used the “minnie” bullet (as they called it) in their muzzle-loading rifles.
https://www.history.com/topics/american-civil-war/minie-ball -
The Iron Horse
The transcontinental railroad connected the country and helped populate the west. It took 6 years to build, and most of the work was done by Chinese and Irish immigrants.
https://www.history.com/topics/inventions/transcontinental-railroad -
The Emancipation Proclamation
Lincoln issued a proclamation abolishing slavery
https://team.cleburne.k12.tx.us/apps/video/watch.jsp?v=179225 -
Gettysburg Address
For some time, Lincoln had been planning to make a public statement on the significance of the war and the struggle against slavery. In early November, he received an invitation to speak at the dedication of part of the Gettysburg battlefield, which was being transformed into a cemetery for the soldiers who had died in battle there from July 1 to July 3, 1863.
https://www.history.com/this-day-in-history/lincolns-gettysburg-address -
The KKK
Members of the best-known terror group, the Ku Klux Klan, had to swear that they were "opposed to negro equality, both social and political." These groups terrorized blacks and white Republicans to keep them from voting. Their tactics included the burning of African American schools, attacks on Freedmen's Bureau officials, and even outright murder. https://student.teachtci.com/shared/sections/8232?program_id=109 -
The Impeachment of Andrew Johnson
The impeachment of Andrew Johnson occurred in 1868, when the United States House of Representatives resolved to impeach U.S. President Andrew Johnson, adopting eleven articles of impeachment detailing his "high crimes and misdemeanors", in accordance with Article Two of the United States Constitution. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Impeachment_of_Andrew_Johnson -
Sharecropping
At first, sharecropping looked promising to both black and white landless farmers. They hoped that in time they would earn enough money to buy land for themselves. In reality, these farmers often experienced a new form of bondage: debt https://student.teachtci.com/shared/sections/8231?program_id=109 -
Invention of the Telephone
Alexander Graham Bell. Alexander Graham Bell is most well known for inventing the telephone. He came to the U.S as a teacher of the deaf, and conceived the idea of "electronic speech" while visiting his hearing-impaired mother in Canada. https://www.pbs.org/transistor/album1/addlbios/bellag.html -
Ellis Island
Ellis Island is a historical site that opened in 1892 as an immigration station, a purpose it served for more than 60 years until it closed in 1954. Located at the mouth of Hudson River between New York and New Jersey, Ellis Island saw millions of newly arrived immigrants pass through its doors–in fact, it has been estimated that close to 40 percent of all current U.S. citizens can trace at least one of their ancestors to Ellis Island. https://www.history.com/topics/immigration/ellis-island -
Launch of the Populist Party
By 1892, populism had broadened its appeal beyond farmers to include industrial workers. That year, farm and labor leaders met in Omaha, Nebraska, to launch the People's Party, also known as the Populist Party. https://student.teachtci.com/shared/sections/8241?program_id=109 -
Invention of the Zipper
The zipper is a popular device for temporarily joining two edges of fabric. Zippers are found on trousers, jeans, jackets, and luggage. Whitcomb L. Judson was an American mechanical engineer from Chicago who was the first to invent, conceive of the idea, and to construct a workable zipper.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Timeline_of_United_States_inventions_(1890%E2%80%931945) -
Model T
The “Tin Lizzie,” as the Model T was known, was an immediate success, and Ford soon had more orders than the company could satisfy. As a result, he put into practice techniques of mass production that would revolutionize American industry. Mass production significantly cut down on the time required to produce an automobile, which allowed costs to stay low. https://www.history.com/topics/inventions/henry-ford -
Invention of Portable X-Ray Machines
Sensing a need for immediate diagnoses, physicist and researcher Marie Curie led a charge to create smaller, portable units that could be driven directly onto the battlefield.
http://mentalfloss.com/article/82189/7-inventions-sprang-world-war-i -
Assassination of Archduke Franz Ferdinand
On June 28, 1914, the archduke of Austria, Franz Ferdinand, was assasinated
https://www.history.com/topics/world-war-i/world-war-i-history -
Roaring 20s
The Roaring Twenties refers to the decade of the 1920s in Western society and Western culture. It was a period of economic prosperity with a distinctive cultural edge in the United States and Western Europe, particularly in major cities such as Berlin, Chicago, London, Los Angeles, New York City, Paris, and Sydney.https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Roaring_Twenties -
Invention of the Television
The First Electronic Television was Invented in 1927. The world's first electronic television was created by a 21 year old inventor named Philo Taylor Farnsworth. That inventor lived in a house without electricity until he was age 14.
https://bebusinessed.com/history/history-of-the-television/ -
The Great Depression
The Great Depression was a severe worldwide economic depression that took place mostly during the 1930s, beginning in the United States. The timing of the Great Depression varied across nations; in most countries it started in 1929 and lasted until the late-1930s. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Great_Depression -
Invention of Monopoly
Charles Darrow patented and popularized the game Monopoly in the 1930s, but the original inventor of the game is now thought to be Lizzie Maggie, who came up with the concept under the title “The Landlord’s Game.” https://historycollection.co/top-5-american-inventions-come-great-depression/2/ -
Hitler Invades Poland
When Hitler invaded Poland in September 1939, France and Britain declared war on Germany. After conquering Poland, Germany attacked France. France fell in June 1940, and soon the Nazis overran most of the rest of Europe and North Africa. Only Britain, led by Winston Churchill, was not defeated.
http://www.solpass.org/7ss/standards/MajorEvents.htm -
Invention of the ATM
Inventor Luther Simjian emigrated to America from Armenia when he was 16. In 1939 Simjian started work on the world's first working ATM, but it wasn't until the 1960s that he managed to convince a New York City bank (today's Citicorp) to install several machines in one of their branches.
https://blog.findmypast.co.uk/10-everyday-inventions-you-owe-to-ww2-1434543995.html -
The Vietnam War
The Vietnam War, also known as the Second Indochina War, and in Vietnam as the Resistance War Against America or simply the American War, was a conflict that occurred in Vietnam, Laos, and Cambodia from 1 November 1955 to the fall of Saigon on 30 April 1975, with U.S. involvement ending in 1973 https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Vietnam_War -
Invention of the Hubble Telescope
In 1946, American theoretical astrophysicist Lyman Spitzer was proposed the idea of a telescope in outer space, a decade before the Soviet Union launched the first artificial satellite, Sputnik into orbit.After lobbying in the 1960s and 1970s for such a system to be built, Spitzer's vision ultimately materialized into the world's first space-based optical telescope, Hubble Space Telescope, which was launched on April 20, 1990 by the Space Shuttle Discovery wikepedia -
The Gulf of Tonkin Resolution
The Gulf of Tonkin Resolution or the Southeast Asia Resolution, Pub.L. 88–408, 78 Stat. 384, enacted August 10, 1964, was a joint resolution that the United States Congress passed on August 7, 1964, in response to the Gulf of Tonkin incident. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Gulf_of_Tonkin_Resolution -
Invention of Video Game Console
Known by fans as the Brown Box, this became commercially known as the Magnavox Odyssey when it hit the markets in 1972. "I came up with and worked on ideas using a TV set for playing games in 1966" explains Baer on his site RalphBaer.com. https://www.techradar.com/news/world-of-tech/6-technologies-to-thank-the-1960s-for-650980 -
Fall of Berlin Wall
On November 9, 1989, as the Cold War began to thaw across Eastern Europe, the spokesman for East Berlin's Communist Party announced a change in his city's relations with the West. Starting at midnight that day, he said, citizens of the GDR were free to cross the country's borders. https://www.history.com/topics/cold-war/berlin-wall -
9/11
The September 11 attacks were a series of four coordinated terrorist attacks by the Islamic terrorist group al-Qaeda against the United States on the morning of Tuesday, September 11, 2001 https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/September_11_attacks -
Invention of Department of Homeland Security
The United States Department of Homeland Security is a cabinet department of the U.S. federal government with responsibilities in public security, roughly comparable to the interior or home ministries of other countries. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/United_States_Department_of_Homeland_Security
