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Second Great Awakening Began
The Second Great Awakening was a Protestant religious revival during the early 19th century in the United States. The movement began around 1790, gained momentum by 1800 and, after 1820, membership rose rapidly among Baptist and Methodist congregations whose preachers led the movement. -
Eli Whitney Patented the Cotton Gin
In 1794, U.S.-born inventor Eli Whitney (1765-1825) patented the cotton gin, a machine that revolutionized the production of cotton by greatly speeding up the process of removing seeds from cotton fiber. -
Thomas Jefferson Elected President
It was significant, because he was the third president of the United States and was a founding father who also wrote the document that gained our independence, so he had a background in leadership. -
Gabriel Prosser Slave Revolt
Gabriel, today commonly—if incorrectly—known as Gabriel Prosser, was a literate enslaved blacksmith who planned a large slave rebellion in the Richmond area in the summer of 1800. -
Louisiana Purchase
The Louisiana Purchase was the acquisition of French land by the United States, in which we purchased the Louisiana territory from France. -
Marbury v. Madison
Was the case that established the principle of judicial review in the United States. -
Beginning of the Lewis and Clark Expedition
Lewis and Clark explored the territory that was bought by the Louisiana Purchase. -
Embargo Act
The Embargo Act of 1807 was a law passed by the United State Congress and signed by President Thomas Jefferson on December 22, 1807. It prohibited American ships from trading in all foreign ports -
Chesapeake-Leopard Affair
The Chesapeake–Leopard affair was a naval engagement that occurred off the coast of Norfolk, Virginia, on June 22, 1807, between the British warship HMS Leopard and the American frigate USS Chesapeake. The crew of Leopard pursued, attacked, and boarded the American frigate, looking for deserters from the Royal Navy. -
James Madison Elected President
James Madison Jr. was an American statesman and Founding Father who served as the fourth President of the United States from 1809 to 1817. He is hailed as the "Father of the Constitution" for his pivotal role in drafting and promoting the United States Constitution and the Bill of Rights -
Non-Intercourse Act
In the last sixteen days of President Thomas Jefferson's presidency, the Congress replaced the Embargo Act of 1807 with the almost unenforceable Non-Intercourse Act of March 1809. This Act lifted all embargoes on American shipping except for those bound for British or French ports. -
Francis Cabot Lowell Smuggled Memorized Textile Mill Plans From Manchester, England
Francis Cabot Lowell went over to Great Britain and memorized the plans for the automated power loom, which then helped the booming of the textile industry in America. -
Beginning of Manifest Destiny
The phrase "manifest destiny" is most often associated with the territorial expansion of the United States from 1812 to 1860. This era, from the end of the War of 1812 to the beginning of the American Civil War, has been called the "age of manifest destiny" -
The British Burn Washington DC
The Burning of Washington was a British invasion of Washington, D.C., the capital of the United States, during the War of 1812. -
Hartford Convention
The Hartford Convention was a series of meetings from December 15, 1814 – January 5, 1815, in Hartford, Connecticut, United States, in which the New England Federalist Party met to discuss their grievances concerning the ongoing War of 1812 -
End of the War of 1812
Was the end of the war between Great Britain and the United States over maritime laws and trading between the two countries. -
Battle of New Orleans
The final major conflict during the War of 1812. This is when the United States beat Great Britain in the War of 1812 -
Death of Tecumseh
Was a military leader who advocated for intertribal Indian alliances during the War of 1812 -
Treaty of Ghent Ratified
It was the treaty that ended the War of 1812, and was written in 1814. The United States Senate unanimously ratified the treaty in 1815 -
James Monroe Elected President
James Monroe was an American statesman and Founding Father who served as the fifth President of the United States from 1817 to 1825. Monroe was the last president of the Virginia dynasty, and his presidency ushered in what is known as the Era of Good Feelings. -
Era of Good Feeling Began
Era of Good Feelings, also called Era of Good Feeling, national mood of the United States from 1815 to 1825, as first described by the Boston Columbian Centinel on July 12, 1817. -
Rush-Bagot Treaty
The Rush–Bagot Treaty or Rush–Bagot Disarmament was a treaty between the United States and the United Kingdom limiting naval armaments on the Great Lakes and Lake Champlain, following the War of 1812. -
Anglo-American Convention
The Convention respecting fisheries, boundary and the restoration of slaves between the United States of America and the United Kingdom of Great Britain and Ireland, also known as the London Convention, Anglo-American Convention of 1818, Convention of 1818, or simply the Treaty of 1818, was an international treaty. -
Adams-Onis Treaty
This was the treaty that ceded Florida from Spain to the United States. -
McCulloch v. Maryland
McCulloch v. Maryland, 17 U.S. 316, was a U.S. Supreme Court decision that established that the "Necessary and Proper" Clause of the U.S. Constitution gives the federal U.S. government certain implied powers that are not explicitly enumerated in the Constitution. -
Missouri Comprise
The Missouri Compromise was the legislation that provided for the admission to the United States of Maine as a free state along with Missouri as a slave state, thus maintaining the balance of power between North and South in the United States Senate. -
Panic of 1819
The Panic of 1819 was the first major peacetime financial crisis in the United States. It was followed by a general collapse of the American economy that persisted through 1821. -
Dartmouth College V. Woodward
U.S. Supreme Court case in which the court held that the charter of Dartmouth College granted in 1769 by King George III of England was a contract and, as such, could not be impaired. The charter vested control of the college in a self-perpetuating board of trustees, which, as a result of a religious controversy, removed John Wheelock as college president in 1815. The trustees then sued William H. Woodward, college secretary and ally of Wheelock, but lost in the state courts. -
Charles B. Finney Lead Religious Revivals in Western New York
Charles Grandison Finney is credited with being one of the most forceful American evangelists, one who was greatly responsible for the rise of religious fervor in western New York from the 1820s to the 1850s. -
Denmark Vesey Slave Revolt
Denmark Vesey was a literate, skilled carpenter and leader among African Americans in Charleston, South Carolina. He was accused and convicted of being the ringleader of "the rising," a major potential slave revolt planned for the city in June 1822; he was executed. -
Monroe Doctrine
The Monroe Doctrine was a United States policy of opposing European colonialism in the Americas beginning in 1823. -
John Quincy Adams Elected President (Corrupt Bargain)
Andrew Jackson and John Quincy Adams had one of the closest presidential elections in history. Both did not meet the requirement of the electoral college, so the American people had a re-vote. Another presidential candidate, Henry Clay, gave his endorsement to John Quincy Adams, and as a result Adams won the election. After Adams was elected into office, he made Clay his Secretary of State. This was called the Corrupt Bargain, because Adams bargained with Clay to get the endorsement. -
Gibbons V. Ogden
Gibbons v. Ogden was a landmark decision in which the Supreme Court of the United States held that the power to regulate interstate commerce, granted to Congress by the Commerce Clause of the United States Constitution, encompassed the power to regulate navigation. -
Erie Canal Completed
The Erie Canal was built to create a navigable water route from New York City and the Atlantic Ocean to the Great Lakes. -
Robert Owen Founded the New Harmony Community
The settlement of Harmonie was founded in 1814–15 by George Rapp, a German Pietist preacher who had first gone to Pennsylvania in 1803 with his followers from Württemberg, Germany. When they later moved west, a prosperous Indiana colony evolved, but unrest brought on by hostile neighbours spurred the Rappite leaders to sell their holdings in 1825 to Robert Owen, who renamed the town New Harmony. -
Lyman Beecher Delivered His "Six Sermons on Intemperance"
The excessive use of alcohol, known as "intemperance," was a source of concern in New England as in the rest of the United States. In 1826 he delivered and published six sermons on intemperance. They were sent throughout the United States, ran rapidly through many editions in England, and were translated into several languages on the European continent, and had a large sale even after the lapse of 50 years -
Tariff of Abominations
The Tariff of Abominations was a protective tariff passed by the Congress of the United States on May 19, 1828, designed to protect industry in the northern United States -
Andrew Jackson Elected President
Andrew Jackson was an American soldier and statesman who served as the seventh President of the United States from 1829 to 1837. Before being elected to the presidency, Jackson gained fame as a general in the United States Army and served in both houses of Congress. -
Indian Removal Act
The Indian Removal Act was signed by President Andrew Jackson on May 28, 1830. The law authorized the president to negotiate with southern Native American tribes for their removal to federal territory west of the Mississippi River in exchange for their lands. -
Joseph Smith Founded the Church of Jesus Christ of the Latter-Day Saints
Members of the church were later called "Latter Day Saints" or "Mormons", and Smith announced a revelation in 1838 which renamed the church as the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter Day Saints. In 1831, Smith and his followers moved west, planning to build a communalistic American Zion. -
Worcester v. Georgia
Worcester V. Georgia was a case in which the United States Supreme Court vacated the conviction of Samuel Worcester and held that the Georgia criminal statute that prohibited non-Native Americans from being present on Native American lands without a license from the state was unconstitutional. -
Andrew Jackson Vetoed the Re-Charter of the Second Bank of the United States
Jackson Vetoes Re-Charter of the Second Bank of the US. Andrew Jackson vetoed the bill re-chartering the Second Bank in July 1832 by arguing that in the form presented to him it was incompatible with “justice,” “sound policy” and the Constitution. -
Black Hawk War
The Black Hawk War was a brief conflict between the United States and Native Americans led by Black Hawk, a Sauk leader. -
Nullification Crisis Began
In November 1832 the Nullification Convention met. The convention declared that the tariffs of 1828 and 1832 were unconstitutional and unenforceable within the state of South Carolina after February 1, 1833. They said that attempts to use force to collect the taxes would lead to the state's secession. -
Creation of the Whig Party in the U.S.
The Whig Party was a political party active in the middle of the 19th century in the United States. -
Treaty of New Echota
The Treaty of New Echota was a treaty signed on December 29, 1835, in New Echota, Georgia by officials of the United States government and representatives of a minority Cherokee political faction, the Treaty Party. -
Catherine Beecher Published Essays on the Education of Female Teachers
These essays were written to describe the details of what happens in the eyes of female teachers. -
First McGuffey Reader Published
A traditional reader including stories, poems, and new word drills. This was important in spreading information and also increasing literacy rates in the United States. -
Texas Declared Independence from Mexico
The Texas Declaration of Independence was the formal declaration of independence of the Republic of Texas from Mexico in the Texas Revolution. It was adopted at the Convention of 1836 at Washington-on-the-Brazos on March 2, 1836, and formally signed the next day after mistakes were noted in the text. -
Battle of the Alamo
The Battle of the Alamo was a pivotal event in the Texas Revolution. Following a 13-day siege, Mexican troops under President General Antonio López de Santa Anna launched an assault on the Alamo Mission near San Antonio de Béxar, killing the Texian defenders. -
Transcendental Club's First Meeting
Frederic Henry Hedge, Ralph Waldo Emerson, George Ripley, and George Putnam (1807–1878; the Unitarian minister in Roxbury) met in Cambridge, Massachusetts on September 8, 1836, to discuss the formation of a new club; their first official meeting was held eleven days later at Ripley's house in Boston. -
Andrew Jackson Issued Specie Circular
The Specie Circular is a United States presidential executive order issued by President Andrew Jackson in 1836 pursuant to the Coinage Act and carried out by his successor, President Martin Van Buren. It required payment for government land to be in gold and silver. -
Panic on 1837
The Panic of 1837 was a financial crisis in the United States that touched off a major recession that lasted until the mid-1840s. Profits, prices, and wages went down while unemployment went up. Pessimism abounded during the time. -
Martin Van Buren Elected President
Martin Van Buren was the eighth President of the United States from 1837 to 1841. A founder of the Democratic Party, he previously served as the ninth Governor of New York, the tenth U.S. Secretary of State, and the eighth Vice President of the United States -
Horace Mann Elected Secretary of the Massachusetts Board of Education
Horace Mann was the first secretary of education of the United States after elected the secretary of the Massachusetts board of education. -
Ralph Waldo Emerson gave the "Divinity School Address"
The "Divinity School Address" is the common name for the speech Ralph Waldo Emerson gave to the graduating class of Harvard Divinity School on July 15, 1838. -
Trail of Tears Began
In 1838 and 1839, as part of Andrew Jackson's Indian removal policy, the Cherokee nation was forced to give up its lands east of the Mississippi River and to migrate to an area in present-day Oklahoma. The Cherokee people called this journey the "Trail of Tears," because of its devastating effects. -
John Humphrey Noyes Founded the Oneida Community
John Humphrey Noyes was an American preacher, radical religious philosopher, and utopian socialist. He founded the Putney, Oneida, and Wallingford Communities, and is credited with coining the term "complex marriage" -
Webster-Ashburton Treaty
The Webster–Ashburton Treaty, signed August 9, 1842, was a treaty that resolved several border issues between the United States and the British North American colonies. Signed under John Tyler's presidency, it resolved the Aroostook War, a nonviolent dispute over the location of the Maine–New Brunswick border. -
Treaty of Wanghia with China
The Treaty of Wanghia was a diplomatic agreement between Qing-dynasty China and the United States, signed on July 3, 1844 in the Kun Iam Temple. Its official title name is the Treaty of peace, amity, and commerce, between the United States of America and the Chinese Empire. -
James Polk Elected President
The United States presidential election of 1844 was the 15th quadrennial presidential election, held from November 1, to December 4, 1844. Democrat James K. Polk defeated Whig Henry Clay in a close contest that turned on the controversial issues of slavery and the annexation of the Republic of Texas. -
U.S. Annexation of Texas
The Annexation of Texas, the Mexican-American War, and the Treaty of Guadalupe-Hidalgo, 1845–1848. During his tenure, U.S. President James K. Polk oversaw the greatest territorial expansion of the United States to date. -
Start of Mexican War
The Mexican–American War, also known in the United States as the Mexican War and in Mexico as the American intervention in Mexico, was an armed conflict between the United States of America and the United Mexican States from 1846 to 1848 -
Bear Flag Revolt
During the Bear Flag Revolt, from June to July 1846, a small group of American settlers in California rebelled against the Mexican government and proclaimed California an independent republic. -
Treaty of Guadalupe Hidalgo
Treaty of Guadalupe Hidalgo, (Feb. 2, 1848), treaty between the United States and Mexico that ended the Mexican War. -
Gold Rush Began in California
The California Gold Rush (1848–1855) began on January 24, 1848, when gold was found by James W. Marshall at Sutter's Mill in Coloma, California. -
Commodore Matthew Perry Entered Tokyo Harbor Opening Japan to the U.S.
On July 8, 1853, American Commodore Matthew Perry led his four ships into the harbor at Tokyo Bay, seeking to re-establish for the first time in over 200 years regular trade and discourse between Japan and the western world. -
Henry David Thoreau Published Civil Disobedience
Fictional book written about the time period of the 1800's. Was influential to the average person in the United States. -
Gadsden Purchase
The Gadsden Purchase is a 29,670-square-mile region of present-day southern Arizona and southwestern New Mexico that the United States purchased via a treaty that took effect on June 8, 1854 -
Kanagawa Treaty
In Tokyo, Commodore Matthew Calbraith Perry, representing the U.S. government, signs the Treaty of Kanagawa with the Japanese government, opening the ports of Shimoda and Hakodate to American trade and permitting the establishment of a U.S. consulate in Japan.
