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Homestead Act
The Homestead Act contributed to the westward expansion of the US by granting 160 acres of free land to small farmers. Because of this, it allowed men and women a "fair chance". For the next five years after it being established, they say it has "improved" since the beginning. But this act did not provide advantages for urban slums like some would have hoped. In concluded to many landless farmers, former slaves, and even single women. -
Red River War
This war took place in Oklahoma, Texas in 1874 between the Southern Plain Indians and the whites. What started the Red River War was because of the Southern Plain Indians becoming upset over the illegal white settlements, as well as buffalo devastation. The Indians began to attack the settlements then were crushed by 1875. This is because of the native residence being wiped out on the southern plains. -
Exodusters
Exodusters were former slaves that migrated west and they named themselves after Exodus, a part of the Bible. While migrating west, some were successful in doing, some not so much. Because some decided to settle on bad land, and lacked money. So their only solution was to go and relocate to the South. And to those that have succeeded, they continued to travel onward to the west. -
Chinese Exclusion Act
The Chinese during this time were wage workers that were always blamed by white men and women for their problems. It had gotten worse over time when they soon faced racism and violence which caused the establishment for this act. The significance of this act was to ban Chinese from further immigrating to the US. With this act being established, this protected white workers. -
Klondike Gold Rush
The Klondike Gold Rush started in 1896 in the region of northwestern Canada. It was a migration that resulted in an estimate of 100,000 people came to Yukon, Canada, but only 30,000 succeeded on completing the trip. Soon enough, there was gold discovered there by miners, and by the year of 1898, an estimate of over one billion dollars of gold was found. Because of the huge discovery, many people have benefited from it. -
Sarah Winnemucca
Sarah Winnemucca was the daughter of the chief of her tribe, of the Northern Paiute, and was originally named Thocmetony. Her grandfather Chief Truckee taught her white customs he learned when accompaining in the Mexican-American Wart. She attended a white school in California as well. Unfortunately she faced racial discrimination at the school, and as an interpreter for the Bureau of Indian Affairs. Later on, she wrote a book to support her cause of racial discrimination towards her tribe. -
Dawes Severalty Act of 1887
The Dawes Severalty Act was a federal law that was passed to try to assimilate Native Americans into the white society and culture. This law was also enforced to make it easier to take reservation lands away from Native Americans. The act took the land given to the tribes and began splitting them up to individual members. In a way, this was meant to push these Indians into having their own land and to become farmers. -
Buffalo Bill's Wild West Show
William F. Cody, also known as, "Buffalo Bill" opened this show in Omaha, Nebraska in May 1883. As the show became a huge success, Cody began to realize that he could involce the West more effectively if he moved everything into outdoor exhibitions. The next four years became a huge ordeal for Cody, he performed his show all over the nation to crowards numbering in about 20,000 people. In his shows, there were frontier reenactments such as Custer's Last Stand at the Little Big Horn, etc. -
Robber Barons
Robber Barons were greedy capitalists that grew rich because of their involvement in shady business practices. In their practices, they included political manipulation and worker exploitation. Some people that are Robber Barons include: Carnegie, who brought in the idea of steel, Rockefeller, who had the idea of oil. Not only were they Robber Barons, but Vanderbilt was also a part of the Robber Barons as well as he brought in ideas of railroads into the community. -
Invention of the Light Bulb
In 1878, Thomas Edison began serious research into developing a practical incandescent lamp and on October 14, 1878, Edison filed his first patent application for "Improvement In Electric Lights" However, he wanted to continue to explore the other several types of materials that can be used for metal filaments to improve his lightbulb design further. Soon later, Edison and his team found out that carbonized bamboo filament helped lightbulbs last longer, and as long as over 1200 hours. -
Invention of the Telephone
Alexander Graham Bell was a Scottish-American scientist who was also the inventor of the telephone. Bell was granted the first official patent for his telephone in March 1876, though he would later face years of legal challenges to his claim that he was its sole inventor, resulting in one of history’s longest patent battles. Bell continued his scientific work for the rest of his life, and used his success and wealth to establish various research centers nationwde. -
The Great Upheaval of 1886
This was a wave of labor protests and strikes that affected all of the nation. An example of a labor protest was six months before unveiling of the Statue of LIberty where police killed four workers who were striking and who were attempting to keep strikebreakers out of a factory in Chicago. As a result, this event was America's first nationwide railroad strike. -
Invention of the Motion Picture Camera
Edison's laboratory was responsible for the invention of the Kinetograph (a motion picture camera) and the Kinetoscope (a peep-hole motion picture viewer). The Edison Manufacturing Co. (later known as Thomas A. Edison, Inc.) not only built the apparatus for filming and projecting motion pictures, but also produced films for public consumption. Most early examples were actualities showing famous people, news events, disasters, people at work, new modes of travel and technology, etc. -
John Deere
John Deere was born in February 1804. A blacksmith by trade, Deere determined that the wood and cast-iron plow in use at the time was ill suited to the challenges presented by prairie soil, so after some experimentation he crafted a new kind of plow and sold his first one in 1838. He had devised 10 improved plows by the following year, and 40 more the year after that. By 1857, his annual output of plows was 10,000. Deere died on May 17, 1886. -
John Rockefeller
John D. Rockefeller (1839-1937), founder of the Standard Oil Company, became one of the world’s wealthiest men and a major philanthropist. Born into modest circumstances in upstate New York, he entered the then-fledgling oil business in 1863 by investing in a Cleveland, Ohio, refinery. In 1911, the U.S. Supreme Court found Standard Oil in violation of anti-trust laws and ordered it to dissolve. During his life Rockefeller donated more than $500 million to various philanthropic causes. -
Sherman Anti-Trust Act
The first legislation enacted by the United States Congress (1890) to curb concentrations of power that interfere with trade and reduce economic competition. It was named for U.S. Senator John Sherman of Ohio, who was an expert on the regulation of commerce. One of the act’s main provisions outlaws all combinations that restrain trade between states or with foreign nations. This prohibition applies not only to formal cartels but also to any agreement to fix prices, limit industrial output, etc. -
Tenements
A typical tenement building had five to seven stories and occupied nearly all of the lot upon which it was built. Many tenements began as single-family dwellings, and many older structures were converted into tenements by adding floors on top or by building more space in rear-yard areas. With less than a foot of space between buildings, little air and light could get in. In many tenements, only the rooms on the street got any light, and the interior rooms had no ventilation. -
Election of 1896
The Election of 1896 was between Republic competitor, William McKinley and Democratic competitor, Wilson Jennings Bryan where McKinley won. The 1896 campaign is often considered by political scientists to be a realigning election that ended the old Third Party System and began the Fourth Party System. McKinley forged a coalition in which businessmen, professionals, skilled factory workers and prosperous farmers were heavily represented. -
William Jennings Bryan
He became a Nebraska congressman in 1890. He starred at the 1896 Democratic convention with his Cross of Gold speech that favored free silver, but was defeated in his bid to become U.S. president by William McKinley. Bryan lost his subsequent bids for the presidency in 1900 and 1908, using the years between to run a newspaper and tour as a public speaker. In his later years, Bryan campaigned for peace, prohibition and suffrage, and increasingly criticized the teaching of evolution. -
The Pullman Strike
This was a widespread railroad strike and boycott that severely disrupted rail traffic in the Midwest of the United States in June–July 1894. The federal government’s response to the unrest marked the first time that an injunction was used to break a strike. Amid the crisis, on June 28, President Grover Cleveland and Congress created a national holiday, Labor Day, as a conciliatory gesture toward the American labour movement. -
Woodrow Wilson
Woodrow Wilson served in office from 1913 to 1921 and led America through World War I. Wilson was a Democratic governor of New Jersey before winning the White House in 1912. He then pursued an agenda of progressive reform that included the establishment of the Federal Reserve and Federal Trade Commission. Wilson tried to keep the United States calm during World War I but called on Congress to declare war on Germany in 1917. Soon later, Wilson received the Nobel Prize for his peacemaking efforts. -
Square Deal
Teddy Roosevelt's personal approach to current social problems and the individual. It embraced Roosevelt’s idealistic view of labour, citizenship, parenthood, and Christian ethics. Roosevelt first used the term following the settlement of a mining strike in 1902 to describe the ideal of peaceful coexistence between big business and labour unions. The Square Deal concept was later largely incorporated into the platform of the Bull Moose Party when Roosevelt was its candidate in the 1912 election. -
18th Amendment
By the late 1800s, prohibition movements had sprung up across the United States, driven by religious groups who considered alcohol, specifically drunkenness, a threat to the nation. The movement reached its apex in 1920 when Congress ratified the 18th Amendment, prohibiting the manufacture, transportation and sale of intoxicating liquors. Prohibition proved difficult to enforce and failed to have the intended effect of eliminating crime and other social problems. -
Meat Inspection Act
Teddy Roosevelt in 1906, that prohibited the sale of misbranded livestock and derived products as food and ensured that livestock were slaughtered and processed under sanitary conditions. The law reformed the meatpacking industry, mandating that the U.S. Department of Agriculture inspect cattle, pigs, sheep, goats, etc before and after they were slaughtered and processed for our consumption. The law also applied to imported products, which were treated under similar foreign inspection standards. -
Pure Food and Drug Act
This act passed in the U.S. House of Representatives, 240 to 17. Muckraker journalists had long reported on the unsanitary conditions of the country’s manufacturing plants, especially those in Chicago’s meat-packing industry. But it wasn’t until the public outcry following the publication of Upton Sinclair’s The Jungle that Congress moved on legislation that would prevent “the manufacture, sale, or transportation of poisonous or deleterious foods, drugs or medicines, and liquors.” -
Carrie A Nation
Carrie A. Nation was involved with the Women’s Christian Temperance Union also known as the, WCTU. The WCTU was founded in 1874 by women “concerned about the problems alcohol was causing their families and society.” At the time, women lacked many of the same rights as men and their lives could be ruined if their husbands drank too much. SHe was known for smashing up bars for selling alcohol. -
Henry Cabot Lodge
Henry Cabot Lodge began his political career in 1880 when he was elected to the Massachusetts legislature for a single term. He failed his first attempt for a seat in Congress, but succeeded in 1886 and was recognized for his efforts to support civil service reform and the protection of voting rights in the South. In 1893, Lodge entered the Senate, where he would remain for the remainder of his life. His support of a strong navy resulted in a close relationship with Theodore Roosevelt. -
George Dewey
George Dewey was born on December 26, 1837 in Montpelier, Vermont. Upon his graduation from the Naval Academy in 1857, he was commissioned as a lieutenant in 1861. During the Civil War he served with Admiral Farragut during the Battle of New Orleans and as part of the Atlantic blockade. From 1871 until 1896, Dewey held a variety of positions in the Navy. In 1897 he was named commander thanks to the help of strong political allies, including Assistant Secretary of the Navy, Theodore Roosevelt. -
Panama Canal
The United States commenced building a canal across a 50-mile stretch of the Panama isthmus in 1904. The project was helped by the elimination of disease-carrying mosquitoes, while chief engineer John Stevens devised innovative techniques and spurred the crucial redesign from a sea-level to a lock canal. Opened in 1914, oversight of the world-famous Panama Canal was transferred from the U.S. to Panama in 1999, thanks to President Theordore Roosevelt for the push of effort. -
Treaty of Paris 1898
The treaty concluding the Spanish-American War. It was signed by representatives of Spain and the United States in Paris on Dec.10, 1898. Armistice negotiations conducted in Washington, D.C., ended with the signing of a protocol on Aug. 12, 1898, which, besides ending hostilities, provided that a peace conference be held in Paris by October, that Spain relinquish Cuba and cede Puerto Rico and one of the Mariana Islands to the United States. -
Archduke Franz Ferdinand
Franz Ferdinand, who is the archduke of Austria-Este, German Franz Ferdinand, who was also the eldest son out of all the other children in his family, erzherzog von Österreich-Este, also called Francis Ferdinand (born December 18, 1863, Graz, Austria—died June 28, 1914, Sarajevo, Bosnia and Herzegovina, Austria-Hungary [now in Bosnia and Herzogovina]), Austrian archduke whose assassination by the Bosnian Serb nationalist Gavrilo Princip was the immediate cause of World War I. -
Gavrilo Princip
Gavrilo Princip was a South Slav nationalist who assassinated Archduke Franz Ferdinand, heir to the Austro-Hungarian throne, and his consort, Sophie, Duchess von Hohenberg (née Chotek), at Sarajevo, Bosnia, on June 28, 1914. Princip’s act gave Austria-Hungary the excuse that it had sought for opening hostilities against Serbia and thus precipitated World War I. In Yugoslavia—the South Slav state that he had envisioned—Princip came to be regarded as a national hero. -
Zimmerman Telegram
The Zimmermann Telegram (or Zimmermann Note or Zimmerman Cable) was a secret diplomatic communication issued from the German Foreign Office in January 1917 that proposed a military alliance between Germany and Mexico in the prior event of the United States entering World War I against Germany. The decryption was described as the most significant intelligence triumph for Britain during World War I, and one of the earliest occasions on which a piece of signals intelligence influenced world events. -
Vladimir Lenin
Lenin was the founder of the Russian Communist Party, leader of the 1917 Bolshevik Revolution, and the architect, builder, and first head of the Soviet Union. Lenin spent years leading up to the 1917 revolution in exile, within Russia and abroad. The Bolshevik’s consolidated power; privatizing aspects of the Soviet economy, cracking down dissent through the secret police and instituting the Red Terror, aimed at destroying monarchist and anti-Bolshevik symapthizers in the Russian Civil War. -
Sedition Act
Along with the Espionage Act of the previous year, the Sedition Act was orchestrated largely by A. Mitchell Palmer, the United States attorney general under President Woodrow Wilson. The Espionage Act, passed shortly after the U.S. entrance into the war in early April 1917, made it a crime for any person to convey information intended to interfere with the U.S. armed forces’ prosecution of the war effort or to promote the success of the country’s enemies. -
14 Points
The Fourteen Points speech of President Woodrow Wilson was an address delivered before a joint meeting of Congress on January 8, 1918, during which Wilson outlined his vision for a stable, long-lasting peace in Europe, the Americas and the rest of the world following World War I. Wilson’s proposal called for the victorious Allies to set unselfish peace terms with the vanquished Central Powers of World War I, including freedom of the seas, the restoration of territories conquered during the war. -
Barbed Wire
As the trench system finally stabilized, they stretched from the coast of France all the way to Switzerland. The trenches reached a length of over 645 kilometers. Methods to protect the trenches from the enemy were always sought. Thus both sides looked at using barbed wire to slow enemy soldiers from getting into the trench.As the world became more industrialized before World War One.The military use of barbwire was quickly adapted, by making the barbs longer and sharper. -
Treaty of Versailles
World War I officially ended thanks to the signing of the Treaty of Versailles on June 28, 1919. The treaty was negotiated in Paris, and was written by the Allies without help from Germans. After 5 long years, the French assented to the modification of important provisions. Germany agreed to pay reparations under the Dawes Plan, but those plans were cancelled in 1932, and Hitler’s rise to power and actions rendered the remaining terms of the treaty. -
Albert Fall
Albert Bacon Fall, U.S. secretary of the interior under President Warren G. Harding; he was the first American to be convicted of a felony committed while holding a Cabinet post. Fall had little formal schooling but studied law and, after moving to New Mexico Territory, began to practice in 1889. After a political career in New Mexico, he was elected to the U.S. Senate in 1912, serving until his appointment as secretary of the interior in 1921. He then resigned from the Cabinet two years later. -
John Scopes
John Scopes was a teacher in Tennessee who became famous for going on trial for teaching evolution. Scopes was part of an American Civil Liberties Union attempt to challenge a state law prohibiting the teaching of evolution. Scopes's trial became a national sensation, with celebrity lawyers like Clarence Darrow and William Jennings Bryan involved in the case. Scopes was found guilty, but his story remains famous. -
Ku Klux Klan
Ku Klux Klan (KKK) extended into almost every southern state by 1870 and became a vehicle for white southern resistance to the Republican Party’s Reconstruction-era policies aimed at establishing political and economic equality for blacks. Its members waged an underground campaign of intimidation and violence directed at white and black leaders. After a period of decline, white nativist groups revived the Klan in the early 20th century, burning crosses and staging rallies, parades and marches. -
Warren Harding
The 29th U.S. president, Warren Harding served in office from 1921 to 1923 before he died. Harding’s presidency was overshadowed by the criminal activities of some of his cabinet members and other government officials, although he himself was not involved in any wrongdoing. Also, Harding was a successful newspaper publisher who served in the Ohio legislature and the U.S. Senate. In 1920, he won the general election, promising a “return to normalcy” after the hardships of World War I. -
Universal Negro Improvement Association
Marcus Garvey and his organization, the Universal Negro Improvement Association (UNIA), represent the largest mass movement in African-American history. Proclaiming a black nationalist "Back to Africa" message, Garvey and the UNIA established 700 branches in thirty-eight states by the early 1920s. His philosophy and organization had a rich religious component that he blended with the political and economic aspects. -
Magaret Sanger
Sanger started her campaign to educate women about sex in 1912. She also worked as a nurse on the Lower East Side, at the time a predominantly poor immigrant neighborhood. Through her work, Sanger treated a number of women who had undergone back-alley abortions or tried to abort their pregnancies. Sanger objected to the unnecessary suffering endured by women, and she fought to make birth control information available. She also began dreaming of a "magic pill" to be used to control pregnancy. -
Hoovervilles
As the Depression worsened in the 1930s, causing severe hardships for millions of Americans, many looked to the federal government for assistance. When the government failed to provide relief, President Herbert Hoover (1874-1964) was blamed for the intolerable economic and social conditions, and the shantytowns that cropped up across the nation, primarily on the outskirts of major cities, became known as Hoovervilles. -
The Bonus March
The demonstration that drew the most national attention was the Bonus Army March of 1932. In 1924, Congress rewarded Veterans of World War I with certificates redeemable in 1945 for $1,000 each. By 1932, many of these former servicemen had lost their jobs and fortunes in the early days of the Depression. They asked Congress to redeem their bonus certificates early. The Bonus March was soon led by Walter Waters of Oregon, the so-called Bonus Expeditionary Force. -
Eleanor Roosevelt
Roosevelt was the niece of one U.S. president, Theodore Roosevelt, and married a man who would become another, Franklin D. Roosevelt. Redefining the role of the first lady, she advocated for human and women's rights, held press conferences and penned her own column. After leaving the White House in 1945, Eleanor became chair of the U.N.'s Human Rights Commission. The groundbreaking first lady died in 1962 in New York City. -
Glass-Stegall Act
The Glass–Steagall legislation describes four provisions of the U.S. Banking Act of 1933 separating commercial and investment banking. The emergency legislation that was passed within days of President Franklin Roosevelt taking office in March 1933 was just the start of the process to restore confidence in the banking system. Congress saw the need for substantial reform of the banking system, which eventually came in the Banking Act of 1933, or the Glass-Steagall Act. -
Wounded Knee Massacre
In 1890, a battle was taken place at the Wounded Knee Creek in South Dakota. This was between the US military troops and the Sioux Indians, and it has resulted in the US military winning. This major battle started because of two conflicts between the US and Sioux Indians. The number of deaths were at least 300 Sioux men, women, and children. -
Battle of Little Big Horn
During the year of 1876, George Custer, a US Army officer and lieutenant, led his troopers near the Little Bighorn River. Custer, before going out into war, underestimated to the number of Indians they were going to go to war with. There were as many as 3,000 Native Americans against 200 of his men. Within the hour of them fighting, Custer, along with his soldiers, were dead. -
Invention of the Kodak Camera
In 1885, George Eastman headed to the patent office with a roll-holder device that he and camera inventor William Hall Walker had developed. This allowed cameras to be smaller and cheaper. Eastman also came up with the name Kodak, because he believed products should have their own identity, free from association with anything else. So in 1888, he launched the first Kodak camera (a few years later, he amended the company name to Eastman Kodak). -
Horizontal Integration
A technique used by John D. Rockefeller. Horizontal integration is an act of joining or consolidating with ones competitors to create a monopoly. Rockefeller was excellent with using this technique to monopolize certain markets. It is responsible for the majority of his wealth. Therefore, the use of horizontal integration was very beneficial for him. -
The Great Migration
The migration of African Americans in the south to go north or mid west in the years, 1910-1960. Some factors on why they decide to migrate is to escape discrimination, segregation, and the Jim Crow Laws. There were also pull factors, because of WWI there were less factory workers north, labor agents offered train tickets to strong men, black newspapers showed wages in north, success stories about migrants, and letters from family with $ in them, and migration clubs. -
Jane Addams
Jane Addams was one of the most distinguished of the first generation of college-educated women, rejecting marriage and motherhood in favor of a lifetime commitment to the poor and social reform. Addams, along with a college friend, Ellen Starr, moved in 1889 into an old mansion, Hull-House, which remained Addams’s home for the rest of her life and became the center of an experiment in philanthropy, political action, and social science research, was a model for settlement work among the poor. -
William McKinley
McKinley served in the U.S. Congress and governor of Ohio before running for the presidency in 1896. The Republican McKinley ran on a platform of promoting American prosperity and won a victory over Democrat William Jennings Bryan to become the president of the United States. In general, McKinley’s foreign policy opened the doors for the United States to play an active role in world affairs. Reelected in 1900, McKinley was assassinated by an anarchist in Buffalo, New York, in September 1901. -
Hull House
The Hull House was one of the first social settlements in North America. It was founded in Chicago in 1889 when Jane Addams and Ellen Gates Starr rented an abandoned residence at 800 South Halsted Street that had been built by Charles G. Hull in 1856. Twelve large buildings were added from year to year until Hull House covered half a city block and included a nearby playground and a large camp in Wisconsin.It was visited by Jane Addams, while traveling in Europe. -
The World's Exposition of 1893
It was a fair held in 1893 in Chicago, Illinois, to celebrate the 400th anniversary of Christopher Columbus’s voyage to America.This was going to spread over 686 acres along the city’s south lakefront area; part of this location is now Jackson Park in Chicago. The chief planner was the Chicago architect Daniel H. Burnham; Charles B. Atwood was designer in chief; and Frederick Law Olmsted was entrusted with landscaping. -
Assassination of President Garfield
On July 2nd, 1881, Garfield’s carriage pulled up outside the Baltimore and Potomac, Charles Guiteau paced the waiting room inside, ready to fulfill what he believed was a mission from God. For weeks, the 39-year-old had stalked the president across Washington, patiently waiting for a chance to gun him down.As the men strode through the waiting room, Guiteau snuck up behind them and drew his pistol. He was shot in the lower back that knocked him over instantly. -
Teddy Roosevelt
Teddy Roosevelt won a second term on his own merits in 1904. Roosevelt became known as the great “trust buster” for his efforts to break up industrial combinations under the Sherman Antitrust Act. Also, Roosevelt won a Nobel Peace Prize for his negotiations to end the Russo-Japanese War and spearheaded the beginning of construction on the Panama Canal. After leaving the White House, he returned to politics in 1912, mounting a failed run for president at the head of a new Progressive Party. -
William Howard Taft
William Howard Taft worked as a judge in Ohio Superior Court and in the U.S. Sixth Circuit Court of Appeals before accepting a post as the first civilian governor of the Philippines in 1900. In 1904, Taft took on the role of secretary of war in the administration of Theodore Roosevelt, who threw his support to the Ohioan as his successor in 1908. Taft unfortunately lacked his expansive view of presidential power, and was generally a more successful administrator than politician. -
Henry Ford
Henry Ford built his first gasoline-powered horseless carriage, the Quadricycle, in the shed behind his home. In 1903, he established the Ford Motor Company, and five years later the company rolled out the first Model T. In order to meet overwhelming demand for the revolutionary vehicle, Ford introduced revolutionary new mass-production methods, including large production plants, the use of standardized, interchangeable parts and, in 1913, the world’s first moving assembly line for cars. -
19th Amendment
The 19th Amendment to the U.S. Constitution granted American women the right to vote, a right known as women’s suffrage, and was ratified on August 18, 1920, ending almost a century of protest. In 1848 the movement for women’s rights launched on a national level with the Seneca Falls Convention organized by Elizabeth Cady Stanton, as well as, Lucretia Mott. Following the convention, the demand for the vote became a huge part of the women’s rights movement. -
Big Stick Policy
The policy involves the quote, “Speak softly and carry a big stick; you will go far.” The quote was gotten from a letter that was sent to a friend. The phrase was also used later by Roosevelt to explain his relations with domestic political leaders and his approach to such issues as the regulation of monopolies and the demands of trade unions. It means to use diplomacy and be ready to use forceful actions. -
Election of 1900
The United States presidential election of 1900 was held on November 6, 1900. It was a rematch of the 1896 race between Republican President William McKinley and his Democratic challenger, William Jennings Bryan. The return of economic prosperity and recent victory in the Spanish-American War helped McKinley to score a decisive victory. President McKinley chose New York Governor Theodore Roosevelt as his running mate as Vice President Garret Hobart had died from heart failure in 1899. -
The Great White Fleet
The "Great White Fleet" sent around the world by President Theodore Roosevelt from 16 December 1907 to 22 February 1909 consisted of sixteen new battleships of the Atlantic Fleet. The battleships were painted white except for gilded scrollwork on their bows. The Atlantic Fleet battleships only later came to be known as the "Great White Fleet." The fourteen-month long voyage was a grand pageant of American sea power. The squadrons were manned by 14,000 sailors. -
Yellow Journalism
Yellow journalism was a style of newspaper reporting that emphasized sensationalism over facts. During the late 19th century, it was one of many factors that helped push the United States and Spain into war in Cuba and the Philippines, leading to the acquisition of overseas territory by the United States. As a result, that is how the World War 1 started. Yellow journalism helped to create a climate conducive to the outbreak of international conflict and expansion of U.S. influence overseas. -
U.S.S Maine Incident
At 9:40pm on February 15, 1898, the battleship U.S.S. Maine exploded in Havana Harbor, killing 268 men and shocking the American populace. Of the two-thirds of the crew who perished, only 200 bodies were recovered and 76 identified.The sinking of the Maine, which had been in Havana since February 15, 1898, on an official observation visit, was a climax in pre-war tension between the United States and Spain. Many Americans assumed the Spanish were responsible for the Maine's destruction. -
Platt Amendment
Army appropriations bill of March 1901, stipulating the conditions for withdrawal of U.S. troops remaining in Cuba since the Spanish–American War, and molding fundamental Cuban, U.S. relations until 1934. Elihu Root formulated the amendment was presented to the Orville H. Platt of Connecticut. By its terms, Cuba would not transfer Cuban land to any power other than the United States, Cuba’s right to negotiate treaties was limited, rights to a naval base in Cuba were ceded to the United States. -
Espionage Act
The Espionage Act essentially made it a crime for any person to convey information intended to interfere with the U.S. armed forces prosecution of the war effort or to promote the success of the country’s enemies. Anyone found guilty of such acts would be subject to a fine of $10,000 and a prison sentence of 20 years.The Espionage Act was reinforced by the Sedition Act of the following year, which imposed similarly harsh penalties on anyone found guilty of making false statements. -
No Man's Land
It is a term used by soldiers to describe the ground between the two opposing trenches.The average distance in most sectors was about 250 yards. However, at Guillemont it was only 50 yards whereas at Cambrai it was over 500 yards. The narrowest gap was at Zonnebeke where British and German soldiers were only about seven yards apart. No Man's Land contained a good amount of barbed wire. In the areas most likely to be attacked, there were ten belts of barbed wire just before the front trenches. -
Spanish Flu
The Spanish flu pandemic of 1918, the deadliest in history, infected about 500 million people worldwide (about one-third of the planet’s population) and killed an estimated 20 million to 50 million victims, including some other Americans. The 1918 flu was first observed in Europe, the United States and parts of Asia before spreading around the world. Citizens were ordered to wear masks, schools, theaters and businesses shut down and bodies piled up in makeshift morgues . -
Paris Peace Conference
In Paris, France, some of the most powerful people in the world meet to begin the long, complicated negotiations that would officially mark the end of WWI. Leaders of the victorious Allied powers: France, Great Britain, the United States, etc. Most of the conference, President Woodrow Wilson struggled to support his idea of a “peace without victory” and make sure that Germany, the leader of the Central Powers and the major loser of the war, was not treated too harshly. -
Charles Lindbergh
On May 20, Lindbergh took off in the Spirit of St. Louis from Roosevelt Field, near New York City. He landed at Le Bourget Field, near Paris, on May 21st. Thousands of cheering people had gathered to meet him. He had flown more than 3,600 miles in 33 1/2 hours. Lindbergh's heroic flight thrilled people throughout the world. He was honored with awards, celebrations, and parades. President Calvin Coolidge gave Lindbergh the Congressional Medal of Honor and the Distinguished Flying Cross. -
Tea Pot Dome Scandal
The Teapot Dome Scandal was a bribery incident that had tooken place in the United States from 1921 to 1922. The Teapot Dome was then, regarded as the greatest and most sensational scandal in American politics. The scandal damaged the public reputation of the Harding administration, which was already severely diminished by its controversial handling of the Great Railroad Strike of 1922. -
First Red Scare
An anti-communist movement known as the First Red Scare began to spread across the United States of America. In 1917 Russia had undergone the Bolshevik Revolution. The Bolsheviks established a communist government that withdrew Russian troops from the war effort. Americans believed that Russia had let down its allies, including the United States, by pulling out of the war. In addition, communism was, in theory, an expansionist ideology spread through revolution. -
Clarence Darrow
He was a lawyer whose work as defense counsel in many dramatic criminal trials earned him a place in American legal history. He was also well known as a public speaker, debater, and miscellaneous writer. Darrow attended law school for only one year before being admitted to the Ohio bar in 1878. Darrow was then appointed Chicago city corporation counsel in 1890, and then he became general attorney for the Chicago and North Western Railway. -
Marcus Garvey
Born in Jamaica, Marcus Garvey (1887-1940) became a leader in the black nationalist movement by applying the economic ideas of Pan-Africanists to the immense resources available in urban centers. After arriving in New York in 1916, he founded the Negro World newspaper, an international shipping company called Black Star Line and the Negro Factories Corporation. During the 1920s, his Universal Negro Improvement Association was the largest secular organization in African-American history. -
Reconstruction Finance Corporation
Reconstruction Finance Corporation, U.S. government agency established by Congress on January 22, 1932, to provide financial aid to railroads, financial institutions, and business corporations. With the passage of the Emergency Relief Act in July 1932, its scope was broadened to include aid to agriculture and financing for state and local public works.The RFC made little use of its powers under the Herbert Hoover administration but was more vigorously utilized. -
Tennessee Valley Authority
The Tennessee Valley Authority (TVA) was established in 1933 as one of President Roosevelt’s Depression-era New Deal programs, providing jobs and electricity to the rural Tennesee River Valley—an area that spans seven states in the South. The TVA was envisioned as a federally-owned electric utility and regional economic development agency. It still exists today as the nation’s largest public power provider. -
20th Amendment
The 20th Amendment to the Constitution, known as the "Lame-Duck Amendment," was ratified in 1933. The 20th Amendment shortened the period of time Members of Congress could stay in office after an election had been held, from 13 months to 2 months. It was a simple amendment that sets the dates at which federal (United States) government elected offices end. In also defines who succeeds the president if the president dies. -
21st Amendment
The 21st Amendment was ratified on December 5th, 1933 and was the only Amendment to be ratified by state ratifying conventions rather by state legislature, which would mark the prohibition repeal. This allows the banning against alcohol to be lifted, and legal to those thata drink alcohol. It is clear that the 21st Amendment was a result of the failed prohibition of alcohol in the United States. -
D-Day
The battle began on June 6, 1944, also known as D-Day, when some 156,000 American, British and Canadian forces landed on five beaches along a 50-mile stretch of the heavily fortified coast of France’s Normandy region. The invasion was one of the largest amphibious military assaults in history and required extensive planning. Prior to D-Day, the Allies conducted a large-scale deception campaign designed to mislead the Germans about the intended invasion target. -
Death of FDR
Roosevelt sat in the living room with Lucy Mercer (with whom he had resumed an extramarital affair), two cousins and his dog Fala, while the artist Elizabeth Shoumatoff painted his portrait. The president suddenly complained of a terrific pain in the back of my head and collapsed unconscious. One of the women summoned a doctor, who immediately recognized the symptoms of a massive cerebral hemorrhage and gave the president a shot of adrenaline into the heart in a vain attempt to revive him. -
Benjamin Davis
Davis was a pilot, officer, and administrator who became the first African American general in the U.S. Air Force. His father, Benjamin O. Davis, Sr., was the first African American to become a general in any branch of the U.S. military. After graduating in 1936 he was commissioned in the infantry and in 1941 was among the first group of African Americans admitted to the Army Air Corps and to pilot training. -
National Recovery Administration
National Recovery Administration, U.S. government agency established by President Franklin D. Roosevelt to stimulate business recovery through fair-practice codes during the Great Depression. The NRA was an essential element in the National Industrial Recovery Act, which authorized the president to institute industry-wide codes intended to eliminate unfair trade practices, reduce unemployment, establish minimum wages and maximum hours, and guarantee the right of labour to bargain collectively. -
The Dust Bowl
The Dust Bowl refers to the drought-stricken Southern Plains region of the United States, which suffered severe dust storms during a dry period in the 1930s. As high winds and choking dust swept the region from Texas to Nebraska, people and livestock were killed and crops failed across the entire region. The Dust Bowl intensified the crushing economic impacts of the Great Depression and drove many farming families on a desperate migration in search of work and better living conditions. -
Dwight D. Eisenhower
Dwight D. Eisenhower led the massive invasion of Nazi-occupied Europe that began on D-Day (June 6, 1944). In 1952, leading Republicans convinced Eisenhower (then in command of NATO forces in Europe) to run for president; he won a convincing victory over Democrat Adlai Stevenson and would serve two terms in the White House (1953-1961). During his presidency, Eisenhower managed Cold War-era tensions with the Soviet Union under the looming threat of nuclear weapons, ended the war in Korea, etc. -
Pearl Harbor
Pearl Harbor is a U.S. naval base near Honolulu, Hawaii, and was the scene of a devastating surprise attack by Japanese forces on December 7, 1941. Just before 8 a.m. on that Sunday morning, hundreds of Japanese fighter planes descended on the base, where they managed to destroy or damage nearly 20 American naval vessels, including eight enormous battleships, and over 300 airplanes. More than 2,400 Americans died in the attack, including civilians, and another 1,000 people were wounded. -
Executive Order 9066
Ten weeks after the Japanese bombed Pearl Harbor, U.S. President Franklin D. Roosevelt signs Executive Order 9066, authorizing the removal of any or all people from military areas “as deemed necessary or desirable.” The military in turn defined the entire West Coast, home to the majority of Americans of Japanese ancestry or citizenship, as a military area. By June, more than 110,000 Japanese Americans were relocated to remote internment camps built by the U.S. military. -
Navajo Code Talkers
Code talkers are people in the 20th century who used obscure languages as a means of secret communication during wartime. The term is now usually associated with the United States service members during the world wars who used their knowledge of Native American languages as a basis to transmit coded messages. In particular, there were approximately 400–500 Native Americans in the United States Marine Corps whose primary job was the transmission of secret tactical messages. -
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Transforming the West
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Becoming an Industrial Power
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The Gilded Age
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Progressive Era
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Imperialism
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The Great Depression
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World War II
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World War I
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1920s
