-
Enlightenment
The Enlightenment, also known as the Age of Reason, was an intellectual and cultural movement in the eighteenth century that emphasized reason over superstition and science over blind faith. -
French and Indian War
The war provided Great Britain enormous territorial gains in North America, but disputes over subsequent frontier policy and paying the war's expenses led to colonial discontent, and ultimately to the American Revolution. -
Stamp Act of 1765
The act required the colonists to pay a tax, represented by a stamp, on various forms of papers, documents, and playing cards. -
Sons of Liberty
The Sons of Liberty were a grassroots group of instigators and provocateurs in colonial America who used an extreme form of civil disobedience threats, and in some cases actual violence to intimidate loyalists and outrage the British government. -
Townshend Act of 1767
To help pay the expenses involved in governing the American colonies, Parliament passed the Townshend Acts, which initiated taxes on glass, lead, paint, paper, and tea. -
Boston Massacre
The Boston Massacre was a street fight that occurred on March 5, 1770, between a patriot mob, throwing snowballs, stones, and sticks, and a squad of British soldiers. -
Boston Tea Party
It was an act of protest in which a group of 60 American colonists threw 342 chests of tea into Boston Harbor to agitate against both a tax on tea and the perceived monopoly of the East India Company. -
Battles of Lexington and Concord
The famous "shot heard 'round the world", marked the start of the American War of Independence. -
The Battle of Bunker Hill
The American patriots were defeated at the Battle of Bunker Hill, but they proved they could hold their own against the superior British Army. -
Battle of Yorktown
Supported by the French army and navy, Washington's forces defeated Lord Charles Cornwallis veteran army dug in at Yorktown, Virginia. Victory at Yorktown led directly to the peace negotiations that ended the war in 1783 and gave America its independence. -
Treaty of Paris signed
This treaty, signed on September 3, 1783, between the American colonies and Great Britain, ended the American Revolution and formally recognized the United States as an independent nation. -
Constitutional Convention
The Constitutional Convention in Philadelphia met between May and September of 1787 to address the problems of the weak central government that existed under the Articles of Confederation. -
3/5 Compromise
Three out of every five slaves was counted when determining a states total population for legislative representation and taxation. -
Great Compromise
The compromise provided for a bicameral federal legislature that used a dual system of representation: the upper house would have equal representation from each state, while the lower house would have proportional representation based on a state's population. -
Bill of Rights adopted
It spells out Americans rights in relation to their government.