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Iron Curtain
Iron Curtain, the political, military, and ideological barrier erected by the Soviet Union after World War II to seal off itself and its dependent eastern and central European allies from open contact with the West and other noncommunist areas. The term Iron Curtain had been in occasional and varied use as a metaphor since the 19th century, but it came to prominence only after it was used by the former British prime minister Winston Churchill. -
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Cold War
The Cold War is the name given to the relationship that developed primarily between the USA and the USSR after World War Two. A clash of very different beliefs and ideology – capitalism versus communism. The Cold War was to dominate international affairs for decades and many major crises occurred – the Cuban Missile Crisis, Vietnam, Hungary and the Berlin Wall being just some. For many, the growth in weapons of mass destruction was the most worrying issue. -
Truman Doctrine
The Truman Doctrine was the name given to a policy announced by US President Harry Truman, which stated that the United States would provide political, military and economic assistance to all democratic nations under threat from external or internal authoritarian forces. The Truman Doctrine effectively reoriented U.S. foreign policy, away from its usual stance of withdrawal from regional conflicts not directly involving the United States, to one of possible intervention in far away conflicts. -
Marshall Plan
In the immediate post-World War II period, Europe remained ravaged by war and thus susceptible to exploitation by an internal and external Communist threat. In a June 5, 1947, speech to the graduating class at Harvard University, Secretary of State George C. Marshall issued a call for a comprehensive program to rebuild Europe. President Harry S. Truman promised military and economic aid to nations threatened by armed minorities or outside groups. -
Berlin Airlift
In June 1948, the Russians closed all highways, railroads and canals from western, occupied Germany into western-occupied Berlin. They believed this would make it impossible for the people who lived there to get food or any other supplies and would drive Britain, France and the U.S. out of the city for good. The U.S. and its allies decided to supply their sectors of the city from the air. This effort lasted for more than a year and carried more than 2.3 million tons of cargo into West Berlin. -
Beat Generation
The Beat Generation was a literary movement started by a group of authors whose work explored and influenced American culture and politics in the post-World War II era. Central elements of Beat culture are rejection of standard narrative values, spiritual quest, exploration of American and Eastern religions, rejection of materialism, explicit portrayals of the human condition, experimentation with psychedelic drugs, and sexual liberation and exploration. -
G.I. Bill
The G.I. Bill was created to help veterans of World War II. It established hospitals, made low-interest mortgages available and granted stipends covering tuition and expenses for veterans attending college or trade schools. The education and training provisions existed until 1956, while the Veterans’ Administration offered insured loans until 1962. The Readjustment Benefits Act of 1966 extended these benefits to all veterans of the armed forces, including those who had served during peacetime. -
Fair Deal
The Fair Deal was the name given to Harry Truman's domestic program put forward by U.S. President Harry S. Truman to Congress in his January 1949 State of the Union address. Building on Roosevelt's New Deal, Truman believed that the federal government should guarantee economic opportunity and social stability, and he struggled to achieve those ends in the face of fierce political opposition from conservative legislators determined to reduce the role of government. -
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1950s
During the 1950s, the United States was the world’s strongest military power. Its economy was booming, and the fruits of this prosperity–new cars, suburban houses and other consumer goods–were available to more people than ever before. However, the 1950s were also an era of great conflict. For example, the nascent civil rights movement and the crusade against communism at home and abroad exposed the underlying divisions in American society. -
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Civil Rights
The civil rights movement was a struggle for social justice that took place mainly during the 1950s and 1960s for blacks to gain equal rights under the law in the United States. The Civil War had officially abolished slavery, but it didn’t end discrimination against blacks—they continued to endure the devastating effects of racism, especially in the South. African American, along with many whites, mobilized and began an unprecedented fight for equality that spanned two decades. -
Korean War (The Forgotten War)
On June 25, 1950, the Korean War began when 75,000 soldiers from the North Korean People’s Army poured across the 38th parallel, the boundary between the Soviet-backed Democratic People’s Republic of Korea to the north and the pro-Western Republic of Korea to the south. This invasion was the first military action of the Cold War. In July 1953, the Korean War came to an end. In all, some 5 million soldiers and civilians lost their lives during the war. The Korean peninsula is still divided today. -
Bill Haley and the Comets
Bill Haley & His Comets were an American rock and roll band, founded in 1952 and continued until Haley's death in 1981. From late 1954 to late 1956, the group placed nine singles in the Top 20, one of those a number one and three more in the Top Ten. Although several members of the Comets became famous, Bill Haley remained the star. With their energetic stage behavior, many fans consider them to be as revolutionary in their time as the Beatles were a decade later. -
Brown v. Board of Education
Brown v. Board of Education of Topeka was a landmark 1954 Supreme Court case in which the justices ruled unanimously that racial segregation of children in public schools was unconstitutional. Brown v. Board of Education was one of the cornerstones of the civil rights movement, and helped establish the precedent that “separate-but-equal” education and other services were not, in fact, equal at all.The people who make up this story were ordinary people. -
Dr. Jonas Salk
Jonas Salk was born October 28, 1914, in New York City. In 1942 at the University of Michigan School of Public Health he became part of a group that was working to develop a vaccine against the flu. In 1947 he became head of the Virus Research Lab at the University of Pittsburgh. At Pittsburgh he began research on polio. On April 12, 1955, the vaccine was released for use in the United States. He established the Salk Institute for Biological Studies in 1963. Salk died in 1995. -
Albert Sabin
Albert Bruce Sabin was born on August 26, 1906 – March 3, 1993. He Albert Sabin was born in Poland in 1906. His family fled to the United States in 1921 to escape anti-Semitism. Sabin attended New York University and graduated with a medical degree. He was a Polish American medical researcher who conducted research into numerous viruses and diseases, including pneumonia, cancer, encephalitis, and numerous other illnesses. His most important work involved poliomyelitis. -
Polio Vaccine
On March 26, 1953, American medical researcher Dr. Jonas Salk announces on a national radio show that he has successfully tested a vaccine against poliomyelitis, the virus that causes the crippling disease of polio. In 1952–an epidemic year for polio–there were 58,000 new cases reported in the United States, and more than 3,000 died from the disease. For promising eventually to eradicate the disease, Dr. Salk was celebrated as the great doctor-benefactor of his time. -
Elvis Presley
Born on January 8, 1935, in Tupelo, Mississippi, Elvis Presley came from very humble beginnings and grew up to become one of the biggest names in rock 'n' roll. By the mid-1950s, he appeared on the radio, television and the silver screen. On August 16, 1977, at age 42, he died of heart failure, which was related to his drug addiction. Since his death, Presley has remained one of the world's most popular music icons. -
Little Richard
Born on December 5, 1932, in Macon, Georgia, Little Richard helped define the early rock ‘n’ roll era of the 1950s with his driving, flamboyant sound. With his croons, wails and screams, he turned songs like “Tutti-Frutti” and “Long Tall Sally” into huge hits and influenced such bands as the Beatles.Besides his music, Little Richard has been known for something else throughout his expansive career: his complicated relationship with his sexual orientation, and his faith's effect on it. -
Emmett Till Tragedy
While visiting family in Money, Mississippi, 14-year-old Emmett Till, an African American from Chicago, is brutally murdered for allegedly flirting with a white woman four days earlier. His assailants made Emmett carry a 75-pound cotton-gin fan to the bank of the Tallahatchie River and ordered him to take off his clothes. The two men then beat him nearly to death, gouged out his eye, shot him in the head and then threw his body, tied to the cotton-gin fan with barbed wire, into the river. -
Montgomery Bus Boycott
The Montgomery Bus Boycott was a civil-rights protest during which African Americans refused to ride city buses in Montgomery, Alabama, to protest segregated seating. Four days before the boycott began, Rosa Parks, an African-American woman, was arrested and fined for refusing to yield her bus seat to a white man. The U.S. Supreme Court ultimately ordered Montgomery to integrate its bus system, and one of the leaders of the boycott was a young pastor named Martin Luther King, Jr. -
Space Race
After World War II drew to a close in the mid-20th century, a new conflict began. Known as the Cold War, this battle pitted the world’s two great powers–the democratic, capitalist United States and the communist Soviet Union–against each other. Beginning in the late 1950s, space would become another dramatic arena for this competition, as each side sought to prove the superiority of its technology, its military firepower and–by extension–its political-economic system. -
Civil Rights Act of 1957
The act was introduced in Eisenhower’s presidency and was the act that kick-started the civil rights legislative program that was to include the 1964 Civil Rights Act and the 1965 Voting Rights Act.The act aimed to ensure that all African Americans could exercise their right to vote. It wanted a new division within the federal Justice Department to monitor civil rights abuses and a joint report to be done by representatives of both major political parties on the issue of race relations. -
Ike Turner
R&B legend Ike Turner was born on November 5, 1931, in Clarksdale, Mississippi, and grew up playing the blues. In 1956, he met a teenager and singer named Anna Mae Bullock. He married her and helped create her stage persona, Tina Turner. The two became the Ike & Tina Turner Revue and created several R&B hits. Their duo's cover earned them their first and only Grammy Award together in 1971. Turner died of a cocaine overdose on December 12, 2007, in San Marcos, California. -
Domino Theory
The domino theory was a Cold War policy that suggested a communist government in one nation would quickly lead to communist takeovers in neighboring states. In Southeast Asia, the U.S. government used the now-discredited domino theory to justify its involvement in the Vietnam War and its support for a non-communist dictator in South Vietnam. In fact, the American failure to prevent a communist victory in Vietnam had much less of an impact than had been assumed by proponents of the domino theory. -
Earl Warren Supreme Court
Earl Warren was a prominent 20th century leader of American politics and law. Elected California governor in 1942, Warren secured major reform legislation during his three terms in office. After failing to claim the Republican nomination for the presidency, he was appointed the 14th chief justice of the U.S. Supreme Court in 1953. The landmark case of his tenure was Brown v. Board of Education of Topeka, in which the Court unanimously determined the segregation of schools to be unconstitutional. -
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1960s
At the beginning of the 1960s, many Americans believed they were standing at the dawn of a golden age. On January 20, 1961, John F. Kennedy became president of the United States. His confidence that, as one historian put it, “the government possessed big answers to big problems” seemed to set the tone for the rest of the decade. However, that golden age never materialized. On the contrary, by the end of the 1960s it seemed that the nation was falling apart. -
Peace Corps
The Peace Corps is a volunteer program run by the United States government. The stated mission of the Peace Corps includes providing technical assistance, helping people outside the United States to understand American culture, and helping Americans to understand the cultures of other countries. The work is generally related to social and economic development. Each program participant, a Peace Corps Volunteer, is an American citizen, typically with a college degree. -
Cuban Missile Crisis
During the Cuban Missile Crisis, leaders of the U.S. and the Soviet Union engaged in a tense, 13 day political and military standoff in October 1962 over the installation of nuclear armed Soviet missiles on Cuba, just 90 miles from U.S. shores. In a TV address, President John Kennedy explained his decision to enact a naval blockade around Cuba and made it clear the U.S. was prepared to use military force if necessary to neutralize this perceived threat to national security. -
Lee Harvey Oswald
Born on October 18, 1939, in New Orleans, Louisiana, Lee Harvey Oswald eventually joined the U.S. Marines and later defected to the Soviet Union for a period of time. He returned to America with a family, and eventually acquired firearms. Oswald allegedly assassinated President John. F. Kennedy on November 22, 1963, in Dallas, Texas. While being taken to county jail, on November 24, 1963, Oswald was killed by Jack Ruby. -
Birmingham March
The Birmingham campaign was a movement organized by the Southern Christian Leadership Conference to bring attention to the integration efforts of African Americans in Birmingham, Alabama. Led by Martin Luther King Jr., James Bevel, Fred Shuttlesworth and others, the campaign of nonviolent direct action culminated in widely publicized confrontations between young black students and white civic authorities, and eventually led the municipal government to change the city's discrimination laws. -
Birmingham Bombing
The Birmingham church bombing occurred on September 15, 1963, when a bomb exploded before Sunday morning services at the 16th Street Baptist Church in Birmingham, Alabama, a church with a predominantly black congregation that also served as a meeting place for civil rights leaders. Four young girls were killed and many other people injured. Outrage over the incident and the violent clash between protesters and police that followed helped draw national attention to the hard-fought. -
Assassination of JFK
Assassination of John F. Kennedy, mortal shooting of John F. Kennedy, the 35th president of the United States, as he rode in a motorcade in Dallas, Texas, on November 22, 1963. His accused killer was Lee Harvey Oswald, a former U.S. Marine who had embraced Marxism and defected for a time to the Soviet Union. Oswald never stood trial for murder, because, while being transferred after having been taken into custody, he was shot and killed by Jack Ruby, a distraught Dallas nightclub owner. -
Ascendancy of Lyndon Johnson
Upon taking office, Johnson launched an ambitious slate of progressive reforms aimed at creating a “Great Society” for all Americans. Many of the programs he championed-Medicare, Head Start, the Voting Rights Act and the Civil Rights Act-had a profound and lasting impact in health, education and civil rights. Despite his impressive achievements, however, Johnson’s legacy was marred by his failure to lead the nation out of the quagmire of the Vietnam War. -
Warren Commission
A week after President John F. Kennedy was assassinated in Dallas, Texas, on November 22, 1963, his successor, Lyndon Johnson , established a commission to investigate Kennedy’s death. After a nearly yearlong investigation, the commission, led by Chief Justice Earl Warren, concluded that alleged gunman Lee Harvey Oswald had acted alone in assassinating America’s 35th president, and that there was no conspiracy, either domestic or international, involved. -
Daisy Girl Ad
The Daisy Girl Ad was a controversial political advertisement aired on television during the 1964 United States presidential election by incumbent president Lyndon B. Johnson's campaign.For nearly 30 seconds, a little girl counts as she plucks petals from a daisy on an idyllic. When she gets to 10, a chilling voice-over countdown begins. The frame freezes and the camera zooms into, as the countdown hits zero, a nuclear bomb detonates with a mushroom cloud. -
Civil Rights Act of 1964
The Civil Rights Act of 1964, which ended segregation in public places and banned employment discrimination on the basis of race, color, religion, sex or national origin, is considered one of the crowning legislative achievements of the civil rights movement. First proposed by President John F. Kennedy, it survived strong opposition from southern members of Congress and was then signed into law by Kennedy’s successor, Lyndon B. Johnson. -
Black Power Movement
The Black Power movement grew out of the civil rights movement that had steadily gained momentum through the 1950s and 1960s. Although not a formal movement, the Black Power movement marked a turning point in black-white relations in the United States and also in how blacks saw themselves. The movement was hailed by some as a positive and proactive force aimed at helping blacks achieve full equality with whites, but it was reviled by others as a militant -
Anti-War Movement
The antiwar movement actually consisted of a number of independent interests, often only vaguely allied and contesting each other on many issues, united only in opposition to the Vietnam War. Attracting members from college campuses, middle-class suburbs, labor unions, and government institutions, the movement gained national prominence in 1965, peaked in 1968, and remained powerful throughout the duration of the conflict. This movement encompassed political, racial, and cultural spheres. -
Voting Rights Act of 1965
The Voting Rights Act of 1965, signed into law by President Lyndon B. Johnson, aimed to overcome legal barriers at the state and local levels that prevented African Americans from exercising their right to vote as guaranteed under the 15th Amendment to the U.S. Constitution. The Act has undergone several changes and additions since its passage, but the U.S. Supreme Court found a key provision of the Act unconstitutional in 2013. -
Jack Ruby
On November 24, 1963, Jack Ruby (1911-1967), a 52-year-old Dallas nightclub operator, stunned America when he shot and killed Lee Harvey Oswald (1939-1963), the accused assassin of President John Kennedy (1917-1963). Two days earlier, on November 22, Kennedy was fatally shot while riding in a motorcade in Dallas. Oswald, a 24-year-old warehouse worker, was soon arrested for the president’s murder. -
LSD
LSD, or lysergic acid diethylamide, is a hallucinogenic drug that was first synthesized a Swiss scientist in the 1930s. During the Cold War, the CIA conducted clandestine experiments with LSD (and other drugs) for mind control, information gathering and other purposes. Over time, the drug became a symbol of the 1960s counterculture, eventually joining other hallucinogenic and recreational drugs at rave parties. -
Stonewall Riot
In the early hours of June 28, 1969, New York City police raided the Stonewall Inn, a gay club located in Greenwich Village in New York City. The raid sparked a riot among bar patrons and neighborhood residents as police roughly hauled employees and patrons out of the bar, leading to six days of protests and violent clashes with law enforcement outside the bar on Christopher Street, in neighboring streets and in nearby Christopher Park. -
OPEC (Organization of Petroleum Exporting Countries)
The Organization of Petroleum Exporting Countries (OPEC) is a group consisting of 12 of the world's major oil-exporting nations. OPEC was founded in 1960 to coordinate the petroleum policies of its members, and to provide member states with technical and economic aid. OPEC is a cartel that aims to manage the supply of oil in an effort to set the price of oil on the world market, in order to avoid fluctuations that might affect the economies of both producing and purchasing countries. -
Nixon’s Presidency
The 37th U.S. president, is best remembered as the only president ever to resign from office. Nixon stepped down in 1974, halfway through his second term, rather than face impeachment over his efforts to cover up illegal activities by members of his administration in the Watergate scandal. As president, Nixon’s achievements included forging diplomatic ties with China and the Soviet Union, and withdrawing U.S. troops from an unpopular war in Vietnam. -
Warren Burger Supreme Court
In 1969, President Richard Nixon named Warren Burger chief justice of the Supreme Court. He didn't fulfill Nixon's desire to reverse Warren Court decisions (1953-1969). Burger's court upheld the 1966 Miranda decision, and Burger voted with the majority in the court's landmark 1973 decision, Roe v. Wade, establishing women's constitutional right to have abortions. He was awarded the Presidential Medal of Freedom in 1988. -
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1970s
The 1970s was a continuation of the 1960s. Women, African Americans, Native Americans, gays and lesbians and other marginalized people continued their fight for equality, and many Americans joined the protest against the ongoing war in Vietnam. A “New Right” mobilized in defense of political conservatism and traditional family roles, and the behavior of President Richard Nixon undermined many people’s faith in the good intentions of the federal government. -
Environmental Protection Agency (EPA)
The Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) was established in December 1970 by an executive order of United States President Richard Nixon. The EPA is an agency of the United States federal government whose mission is to protect human and environmental health. Headquartered in Washington, D.C., the EPA is resposible for creating standards and laws that promoting the health of individuals and the environment. -
Watergate
The Watergate scandal began early in the morning of June 17, 1972, when several burglars were arrested in the office of the Democratic National Committee, located in the Watergate complex of buildings in Washington, D.C. The prowlers were connected to President Richard Nixon’s reelection campaign, and they had been caught wiretapping phones and stealing documents. Nixon took aggressive steps to cover up the crime, and in August 1974, after his role in the conspiracy was revealed, Nixon resigned. -
Endangered Species Act
The Endangered Species Act (ESA) of 1973 aims to provide a framework to conserve and protect endangered and threatened species and their habitats. By providing States with financial assistance to develop and maintain conservation programs the Act serves as a method to meet many of the United States’ international responsibilities to treaties and conventions such as the Convention on International Trade of Endangered Species of Wild Fauna and Flora (CITES) and the Western Hemisphere Convention. -
Gerald Ford’s Presidency
America’s 38th president, Gerald Ford took office on August 9, 1974, following the resignation of President Nixon, who left the White House in disgrace over the Watergate scandal. Ford became the first unelected president in the nation’s history. A longtime Republican congressman from Michigan, Ford had been appointed vice president less than a year earlier by President Nixon. He is credited with helping to restore public confidence in government after the disillusionment of the Watergate era. -
Federal Election Commission (FEC)
The Federal Election Commission (FEC) is an independent regulatory agency created by Congress in 1975 to administer and enforce the Federal Elections Campaign Act. The FEC is responsible for disclosing campaign finance information, enforcing limits and prohibitions on contributions, and the overseeing the public funding of presidential elections. The commission is led by six members. The six members are appointed by the president and confirmed by the Senate. -
Vietnam War
The Vietnam War was a long, costly and divisive conflict that pitted the communist government of North Vietnam against South Vietnam and its principal ally, the United States. The conflict was intensified by the ongoing Cold War between the United States and the Soviet Union. More than 3 million people (including over 58,000 Americans) were killed in the Vietnam War, and more than half of the dead were Vietnamese civilians. Opposition to the war in the United States bitterly divided Americans. -
Jimmy Carter’s Presidency
As the 39th president of the United States, Jimmy Carter struggled to respond to formidable challenges, including a major energy crisis as well as high inflation and unemployment. In the foreign affairs arena, he reopened U.S. relations with China and made headway with efforts to broker peace in the historic Arab-Israeli conflict, but was damaged late in his term by a hostage crisis in Iran. Over the next decades, Carter built a distinguished career as a diplomat, humanitarian and author. -
Iran Hostage Crisis
The Iran Hostage Crisis was a major international crisis caused by the seizure of the U.S. Embassy in Tehran and its employees by revolutionary Iranian students, who then held the Embassy employees as hostages, in direct violation of international law. The revolutionary government of Iran, under the Ayatollah Khomeini, supported the hostage undertaking. The crisis ended with the release of the hostages after a captivity of 444 days, from November 4, 1979 to January 20, 1981. -
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1980s
Many Americans embraced a new conservatism in social, economic and political life during the 1980s, characterized by the policies of President Ronald Reagan. Often remembered for its materialism and consumerism, the decade also saw the rise of the “yuppie,” an explosion of blockbuster movies and the emergence of cable networks like MTV, which introduced the music video and launched the careers of many iconic artists. -
Election of 1980
The United States presidential election of 1980 featured a contest between incumbent Democrat Jimmy Carter and his Republican opponent, Ronald Reagan, as well as Republican Congressman John B. Anderson, who ran as an independent. Reagan, aided by the Iran hostage crisis and a worsening economy at home, won the election in a landslide. Carter, after defeating Ted Kennedy for the Democratic nomination, attacked Reagan as a dangerous right-wing radical. -
Sandra Day O’Connor
Born in El Paso, Texas, on March 26, 1930, Sandra Day O'Connor was elected to two terms in the Arizona state senate. In 1981 Ronald Reagan nominated her to the U.S. Supreme Court. She received unanimous Senate approval, and made history as the first woman justice to serve on the nation's highest court. O'Connor was a key swing vote in many important cases, including the upholding of Roe v. Wade. She retired in 2006 after serving for 24 years. -
Reagonomics
Reaganomics is a popular term used to refer to the economic policies of Ronald Reagan, the 40th U.S. president (1981–1989), which called for widespread tax cuts, decreased social spending, increased military spending and the deregulation of domestic markets. These economic policies were introduced in response to a prolonged period of economic stagflation that began under President Gerald Ford in 1976. -
Reagan Presidency
Ronald Reagan was a former actor and California governor, served as the 40th U.S. president from 1981 to 1989. Raised in a small-town Illinois, the affable Reagan became a popular two-term president. He cut taxes, increased defense spending, negotiated a nuclear arms reduction agreement with the Soviets and is credited with helping to bring a quicker end to the Cold War. Reagan, who survived a 1981 assassination attempt, died at age 93 after battling Alzheimer’s disease. -
Space Shuttle Program
Conceived as a means to reduce the cost of space flights, NASA's Shuttle Program originally was supposed to produce completely reusable vehicles, which would make launches routine and relatively cheap. Owing to the challenges posed by that scheme, the shuttle was later redesigned as semi-reusable. NASA’s previous space vehicles were costly because they were designed with the expendable launch-system technology, whereby each vehicle was launched, then discarded after one use. -
A.I.D.S. Crisis
Though HIV arrived in the United States around 1970, it didn’t come to the public’s attention until the early 1980s. The disease was first noticed by doctors who treated gay men in Southern California, San Francisco, and New York City in 1981. Prejudice and misinformation were rife during the 1980s AIDs crisis. When cases of AIDS first emerged in the U.S., they tended to originate among either men who had sex with other men, hemophiliacs, and heroin users. -
Strategic Defense Initiative (SDI) “Star Wars”
The Strategic Defense Initiative (SDI), also known as Star Wars, was a program first initiated on March 23, 1983 under President Ronald Reagan. The intent of this program was to develop a sophisticated anti-ballistic missile system in order to prevent missile attacks from other countries, specifically the Soviet Union. With the tension of the Cold War looming overhead, the Strategic Defense Initiative was the United States’ response to possible nuclear attacks from afar. -
Reagan Doctrine
The Reagan Doctrine, enunciated in the 1985 State of the Union addresses and declares, American support for anticommunist revolution "on every continent from Afghanistan to Nicaragua." It constitutes our third reformulation since Vietnam of the policy of containment. First came the Nixon doctrine, which relied on regional proxies and sank with the shah. Then came the Carter doctrine, which promised the unilateral projection of American power and disappeared with the Rapid Deployment Force. -
Iran Contra Affair
The Iran-Contra Affair was a clandestine action not approved of by the United States Congress. It began in 1985, when President Ronald Reagan's administration supplied weapons to Iran, a sworn enemy, in hopes of securing the release of American hostages held in Lebanon by Hezbollah terrorists loyal to the Ayatollah Khomeini, Iran's leader. The controversial deal making and the ensuing political scandal threatened to bring down the presidency of Ronald Reagan. -
Challenger Explosion
The NASA space shuttle Challenger exploded on January 28, 1986, just 73 seconds after liftoff, bringing a devastating end to the spacecraft’s 10th mission. The disaster claimed the lives of all seven astronauts aboard. It was later determined that two rubber O-rings, which had been designed to separate the sections of the rocket booster, had failed due to cold temperatures on the morning of the launch. The tragedy and its aftermath prompted NASA to temporarily suspend all shuttle missions. -
Fall of the Berlin Wall
On 9 November 1989, TV viewers through Europe watched the good news in disbelief. For nearly 30 years, the Berlin Wall had divided off Berlin's West German enclave from Communist East Germany. And now here were thousands of ordinary Germans, cheering and celebrating as they crossed it unchecked, ceremonially hacking out chunks. It was the culmination of weeks - perhaps years - of popular discontent in the East, which its leadership had not known how to deal with. -
Rodney King Incident
Rodney King was caught by the Los Angeles police after a high-speed chase. The officers pulled him out of the car and beat him brutally, while amateur cameraman George Holliday caught it all on videotape. The four L.A.P.D. officers involved were indicted on charges of assault with a deadly weapon and excessive use of force by a police officer. However, after a three-month trial, a predominantly white jury acquitted the officers, inflaming citizens and sparking the violent 1992 Los Angeles riots. -
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1990s
The last decade of the 20th century was a good one for the United States. Employment, financial markets, GDP, and the government's surplus all improved throughout the '90s. The amount of trade between countries rapidly increased. Technology boom exploded in the 90's with inventions like laptops, cell phones and Internet, and the ranks of billionaires grew fast. But the Columbine massacre, al-Qaida threat, and Clinton scandals also happened. -
Persian Gulf War / 1st Iraq War
The Gulf War began when Saddam Hussein's Iraq invaded Kuwait on August 2, 1990. Immediately condemned by the international community, Iraq was sanctioned by the United Nations and given an ultimatum to withdraw by January 15, 1991. As the fall passed, a multi-national force assembled in Saudi Arabia to defend that nation and to prepare for the liberation of Kuwait. On January 17, coalition aircraft began an intense aerial campaign against Iraqi targets. -
Election of 1992
The United States presidential election of 1992 had three major candidates: Incumbent Republican President George H. W. Bush; Democrat Arkansas Governor Bill Clinton, and independent Texas businessman Ross Perot. Bush had alienated much of his conservative base by breaking his 1988 campaign pledge against raising taxes, the economy was in a recession, and Bush's perceived greatest strength. Clinton won a plurality in the popular vote, and a wide Electoral College margin. -
Hillary Clinton
Hillary Clinton was one of the most accomplished first ladies in American history. A trained lawyer, she built a thriving career in the public and private sector, which she balanced with family life following her 1975 marriage to Bill Clinton. She was one of her husband’s closest advisors throughout his political career, which culminated in his election as president in 1992. As first lady, she focused on her lifelong interest in children’s issues and, more controversially, health care. -
Bill Clinton Presidency
During Clinton’s time in the White House, America enjoyed an era of peace and prosperity, marked by low unemployment, declining crime rates and a budget surplus. Clinton appointed a number of women and minorities to top government posts, including Janet Reno, the first female U.S. attorney general.. In 1998, the House of Representatives impeached Clinton on charges related to a sexual relationship he had with a White House intern. He was acquitted by the Senate. -
World Trade Center Attack - 1993
On February 26, 1993, terrorists drove a rental van into a parking garage under the World Trade Center’s twin towers and lit the fuses on a homemade bomb stuffed inside. Six people died and more than 1,000 were injured in the massive explosion, which carved out a crater several stories deep and propelled smoke into the upper reaches of the skyscrapers. Until the terrorist attacks of September 11, 2001, it was one of the worst terrorist attacks ever to occur on U.S. soil. -
North American Free Trade Agreement (NAFTA)
NAFTA is a trade agreement between the US, Mexico, and Canada that virtually eliminated all tariffs between the countries, as well as other trade barriers, such as setting higher regulatory standards for foreign goods than for those produced locally. It was first negotiated under Republican US president George H.W. Bush’s administration, and implemented by president Bill Clinton, a Democrat, in 1994. It mainly concerns itself with the free trade of goods and services. -
Don’t Ask, Don’t Tell Policy
"Don't ask, don't tell" (DADT) was the official United States policy on military service by gays, bisexuals, and lesbians, instituted by the Clinton Administration on February 28, 1994 lasting until September 20, 2011. The policy prohibited military personnel from discriminating against or harassing closeted homosexual or bisexual service members or applicants, while barring openly gay, lesbian, or bisexual persons from military service. -
Defense of Marriage Act (DOMA)
The Defense of Marriage Act (DOMA) was passed in 1996 by Congress and signed into law by President Bill Clinton. A a law that prohibited married same-sex couples from collecting federal benefits. It was overruled on June 26, 2015 by the U.S. Supreme Court decision in Obergefell v. Hodges. This ruling cited the Fourteenth Amendment's equal protection clause, concluding that a denial of marriage rights to same-sex couples is unconstitutional. -
Lewinsky Affair
The scandal is a political sex scandal involving President Bill Clinton and Monica Lewinsky, a White House intern in her early 20s. In 1995, the two began a sexual relationship until 1997. In 1998, when news of his extramarital affair became public, Clinton denied the relationship before later admitting to “inappropriate intimate physical contact” with Lewinsky. The House of Representatives impeached the president for perjury and obstruction of justice, but he was acquitted by the Senate. -
Bush v. Gore (SCOTUS case)
The 2000 presidential election pitted U.S. Vice President Al Gore, against Texas Governor George W. Bush. Bush was initially declared the winner by just a few hundred votes However, reports of widespread problems with ballots soon called the results into question. Gore's supporters sued the state of Florida for a recount. Bush's supporters sued to prevent it. When the Florida Supreme Court decided in favor of Gore, and ordered the recount to be completed, Bush appealed to the U.S. Supreme Court. -
Period: to
Contemporary
The final section covers the 20th and 21st centuries. Marked as one of the bloodiest centuries in history, the presentation and discussion on the 20th century uncovers the major wars and their justifications, as well as their connections to the development of the canon. This section concludes with a preview into the 21st century and the rise of globalization, inequalities, and cultural conflicts surrounding power, economics, social status, politics, and religious fundamentalism. -
Election of 2000
The United States presidential election of 2000 was a contest between Republican candidate George W. Bush, then-governor of Texas and son of former president George H. W. Bush (1989–1993), and Democratic candidate Al Gore, then-Vice President. Bill Clinton, the incumbent President, was vacating the position after serving the maximum two terms allowed by the Twenty-second Amendment. Bush narrowly won the November 7 election, with 271 electoral votes to Gore's 266. -
9/11 Attacks
On September 11, 2001, 19 militants associated with the Islamic extremist group al-Qaeda hijacked four airplanes and carried out suicide attacks against targets in the United States. Two of the planes were flown into the twin towers of the World Trade Center in New York City, a third plane hit the Pentagon just outside Washington, D.C., and the fourth plane crashed in a field in Pennsylvania. Almost 3,000 people were killed during the 9/11 terrorist attacks. -
PATRIOT ACT
The act was passed in the wake of the September 11, 2001 terrorist attacks. Its goals are to strengthen domestic security and broaden the powers of law-enforcement agencies with regards to identifying and stopping terrorists. The passing and renewal of the Patriot Act has been extremely controversial. Instrumental in a number of investigations and arrests of terrorists, while critics counter the act gives the government too much power, and undermines the very democracy it seeks to protect. -
No Child Left Behind Education Act
The No Child Left Behind Act authorizes several federal education programs that are administered by the states. Under the law, states are required to test students in reading and math in grades 3-8 and once in high school. All students are expected to meet or exceed state standards in reading and math by 2014. The major focus of No Child Left Behind is to close student achievement gaps by providing all children with a fair, equal, and significant opportunity to obtain a high-quality education. -
Hurricane Katrina Disaster
On August 29, 2005, Hurricane Katrina struck the Gulf Coast of the United States. When the storm made landfall, it had a Category 3 rating and brought sustained winds of 100–140 miles per hour, and stretched some 400 miles across. The storm did a great deal of damage and its aftermath was catastrophic. Hundreds of thousands of people in Louisiana, Mississippi and Alabama were displaced from their homes, and experts estimate that Katrina caused more than $100 billion in damage. -
The Great Recession
The Great Recession, which officially lasted from December 2007 to June 2009, began with the bursting of an 8 trillion dollar housing bubble. The resulting loss of wealth led to sharp cutbacks in consumer spending. This loss of consumption, combined with the financial market chaos triggered by the bursting of the bubble, also led to a collapse in business investment. As consumer spending and business investment dried up, massive job loss followed. -
Election of 2008
The 56th quadrennial United States presidential election was held on November 4, 2008.Democrat Barack Obama, then junior United States Senator from Illinois, defeated Republican John McCain. The selected electors from each of the 50 states and the District of Columbia voted for President and Vice President of the United States on December 15, 2008. Those votes were tallied before a joint session of Congress on January 8, 2009. Obama received 365 electoral votes, and McCain 173. -
American Recovery and Reinvestment Act
The American Recovery and Reinvestment Act of 2009 (ARRA) is an economic stimulus bill created to help the United States economy recover from an economic downturn that began in late 2007. Congress enacted ARRA February 17, 2009. ARRA allocates $787 billion to fund tax cuts and supplements to social welfare programs as well as increased spending for education, health care, infrastructure and the energy sector. -
Affordable Care Act (ACA) “Obamacare”
The landmark health reform legislation passed by the 111th Congress and signed into law by President Barack Obama in March 2010. Key provisions are intended to extend coverage to millions of uninsured Americans, to implement measures that will lower health care costs and improve system efficiency, and to eliminate industry practices that include rescission and denial of coverage due to pre-existing conditions.
