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Establishment of Mount Holyoke
On November 8th, 1837, Mary Lyons Founded the Mount Holyoke Female Seminary in Massachusetts. Mount Holyoke was the first female college for women established in the United States. Mary Lyons is considered by many scholars to be an innovator in the area of women's education. Her establishment of Mount Holyoke Female Seminary was part of a larger movement dedicated to the creation of institutions promoting higher education for young women during the early half of the 19th century. -
Immigration of Miners to California
During 1848, in California men came for an opportunity to strike it rich. Few would find the riches they were looking for. By its end, some 300,000 immigrants moved to California. When San Francisco became over populated with miners, men were forced to look elsewhere for mining jobs. Mining could be a profitable job, though short lived, between the 1840’s though the 1890’s. The mining during this time frame had a huge impact on migration in California. -
Lay the Transatlantic Cable
Cyrus West field, an American businessman and financer along with Peter Cooper, Abram Stevens, Moss Taylor and Samuel F. B Morse created the Atlantic Telegraph Company; and laid the first telegraph cable across the Atlantic Ocean in 1858. It took many episodes of trial and error for Fields to successfully lay the first telegraph across the Atlantic. Fields first attempt to lay down the cable occurred in 1857, the first cable had been constructed and loaded on the U.S.S. Niagara and the H.M.S. Ag -
Homestead Act
President Abraham Lincoln signed the Homestead Act into law on May 20 1862. This Act was intended to promote migration west, into undeveloped land. This law gave U.S citizens the right to own a portion of undeveloped federal land west of the Mississippi River. Eventually six million homesteads were granted through this Act at 160 acres a piece. The Act was eventually discontinued in 1976. -
Contract Labor Law
During the late 1800’s, the need for cheap labor in the United States began to decrease; as a result the government began enacting laws prohibiting the importation of immigrant laborers. In effort to employ the use of skilled laborers through groups such as the Knights of Labor, and prohibit contracting immigrants from being employed upon their arrival in the United States; congress established the Contract Labor Law. The law was officially created on February 26th 1864. The laws aimed at reduci -
Alexander Gram Bell, Telephone
Bell succeeded in getting the first telephone to work. This invention would change the future of communication forever. Born on March 3, 1847, in Edinburgh, Scotland, Alexander Graham Bell was the son and grandson of authorities in education and the correction of speech. Educated to pursue a career in the same specialty, his knowledge of the nature of sound led him not only to teach the deaf, but also to invent the telephone. It would take 50 year for the phone to beat out his previous invention -
Chinese Exclusion Act
In 1848, Chinese immigrants began crossing the pacific in hopes for a better life. These immigrants were enticed by the California gold rush, in 1848; among other things. As time went on, white Americans began to fear the Chinese workers because they were highly industrious, and would work for cheap. At one point the Chinese workers made up 90% of the labor force at the Central Pacific Railroad. Distain and fear forced Congress to pass the Chinese Exclusion Act of 1882. This ban was originally i -
Jane Addams opens Hull House
Towards the end of the 1800’s America began to gain a sense of the settlement movement. The settlement movement was a reformist social movement, beginning in the 1880s and peaking around the 1920s. Its main objective was the establishment of "settlement houses" in poor urban areas, in which volunteer middle-class "settlement workers" would live, hoping to share knowledge and culture with, and alleviate the poverty of their low- income immigrant neighbors. Women primarily led the houses, and some -
The Mckinley tariff enacted
The Tariff Act of 1890, more commonly known as the McKinley Tariff, was an act written by Representative William McKinley of Ohio that became a law on October 1, 1890. The tax raised the average price on imports to almost fifty percent. It was created to protect domestic industries from foreign competition. It has been partially blamed for causing the panic of 1893. -
The Panic of 1893
On February 23, 1893 Philadelphia Reading Railroad filed for bankruptcy. This bankruptcy would lead to the collapse of an already shaky railroad financing system which set off a series of bank failures. The Panic of 1893 was a somber economic depression in the United States. A main factor for failure was a rush on the gold supply. America had an established system of bimetallism, which employed both gold and silver as currency. Gold having a ration of 16:1 the US Dollar, it became more valued an -
The Pullman Strike
The Pullman Strike was a disturbing event in Illinois history. George Mortimer Pullman, founder and president of the Pullman Palace Car Place created Pullman City to house his employees. His workers were required to live in Pullman City, and were expected under all circumstance to accept cuts in pay and not criticize workloads. These stipulations directly led to the Pullman strike between labor unions and railroads, that occurred in the United States during the economic panic of 1893. Anger er -
US annexes Puerto Rico and Hawaii
After William McKinley won the presidential election of 1896, Hawaii's annexation of the United States was once again brought up. McKinley’s predecessor, Grover Cleveland, was a friend of Queen Liliuokalani, the reigning monarch of Hawaii, and did not support annexation. McKinley, however, was open to theories by U.S. expansionists and by annexationists from Hawaii. He met with three annexationists from Hawaii: Lorrain Thurston, Francis March Hatch and William Ansell Kinney. After negotiations, -
Gold Standard Act
The Gold Standard Act of the United States was passed on March 14, 1900. It established gold as the only standard for redeeming paper money, putting an end to bimetallism (which played a significant role in the Panic of 1893). It was signed by President William McKinley. The Act fixed the value of the dollar at 25 8⁄10 grains of gold at 90% purity, equivalent to 23.22 grains (1.5046 grams) of pure gold. The Gold Standard Act confirmed the nation's commitment to the gold standard by assigning gol -
President Mckinley Assassinated
President William McKinley was assassinated on September 6, 1901, inside the Temple of Music on the grounds of the 1901 Pan-American Exposition in Buffalo, New York. He was socializing with other patrons of the expo when he was shot twice by Leon Czolgosz, a radical anarchist. One bullet deflected off his ribs, making only a superficial wound. However, the second bullet hit McKinley in the abdomen, passed completely through his stomach, hit his kidney, damaged his pancreas, and lodged somewhere -
The Great War
The Great War Began on July 28th, 1914 and lasted until 11 November 1918. The Great War or later call World War I would span 14 years and take more the 9 million lives. It would pit two sides against each other. On one side include the Allied Powers of Britain, France and Russia (America would finally join the Allied Powers along with Italy). Opposing side include the Central Powers, which consisted of Germany and Austria-Hungary (Italy would be on Axis side until actual war started). The was st -
Volstead Act
Working class wives and mothers hoped through temperance to reform male behavior and thus improve women’s lives. Shortly after it started the “Noble Experiment” (as it was called by its defenders) started to break down. Within a year it was as easy to buy illegal alcohol, as it had been to buy legal alcohol the previous year. Prohibition spawned gangsters and bootleggers, with dozens of killers and warehouses full of boozes. Al Capon in Chicago, Enoch Johnson in Atlantic City, Lucky Luciano in N -
The establishment of the Kellogg Briand Pact
The Kellogg Briand Pact is also commonly known as the General Treaty for the Renunciation of the World Peace Act. In August of 1947, the French foreign minister, Aristide Briand asked the United States to join their alliance against Germany. However, the United States was reluctant to become involved in the European alliance system. As a result the secretary of state, Frank Kellogg proposed the Kellogg Briand Pact. The pact is a treaty in which war will be outlawed as an instrument of national p -
The popular protest
The Great Depression took an immense toll on citizens in the United States; those of which included many war veterans that had been out of work since the very beginning of the Great Depression. Government sought to resolve this by instating The World War Adjusted Compensation in 1942. This act awarded veterans bonuses in the form of a certificate. However, certificates could not be redeemed until 1945. Veterans, dissatisfied with the stipulations placed on the certificate decided to organize a p -
Hitler launches the invasion of Poland
The invasion of Poland also referred to, as the 1939 Defensive war in Poland, was the German and Soviet Union invasion of Poland. The invasion began on September 1st 1939, one week after the signing of the Moloto- Ribbentrop Pact. Under this pact, the Soviet Union and Germany pledged to remain neutral in the event that either nation were to be attacked by a third party. The invasion lasted a total of 5 days, coming to an end on October 6th, 1939 with Germany and the Soviet Union successfully d -
The Japanese attack on Pearl Harbor:
Japanese Attack on Pearl Harbor In morning of December 7th, 1941 the imperial Japanese navy launched a surprise attack on the American Naval Base, Pearl Harbor in Hawaii. The attack on Pearl Harbor was intended to protect the Japan’s Empire’s advancement into Malaya and the Dutch Indies. Just before 8 am on December 7th, 1941, Japanese aircraft bomb carriers secretly flew across Pearl Harbor, attacking and ultimately sinking four batt -
The Battle of Midway
Approximately six months after the Japanese attack on Pearl Harbor, the Imperial Japanese fleet encountered its first major defeat of the war against the United States, in the Battle of Midway. The intent of Imperial Japanese navy was to destroy the U.S Pacific Fleet and capture Midway, in hopes of establishing an advance base. The Combined Fleet commander of the Imperial Japanese Navy, Admiral Isoroku Yamamoto, devised a plan of attack on Midway. Fortunately, American code breakers were able t -
Battle of Normandy
The Battle of Normandy was fought during the summer of 1944, between the Allied nations and German forces occupying Western Europe. The battle of Normandy brought together the land, air and sea forces of allied armies and became known as the largest invasion force in human history. The invasion, code-named, “operation overload” took place on the five beaches of Normandy, France. The invasion involved American, British, Canadian, Polish, and Free French Armies under command of General Dwight D. -
The Liberation of Paris:
The Liberation of Paris, also referred to as the Battle for Paris, took place during World War II from August 19th, 1944 until August 25th, 1944. After the Normandy invasion, Paris waited for liberation after four long years under Nazi control. In Late July, in the Battle of Saint- Lo, General Omar Bradey made way through German Lines in England. Following behind was George S. Patton’s Third Army, equipped with heavy tank attacks. Patton’s army progressed through England and made way to the hea -
The surrender of Germany, 1945
Nazi Germany Surrender to the Allies The curtain on the Third Reich came to an end on April 30th, 1945, with the suicide of German dictator Adolph Hitler. Days before his death, Adolph Hitler appointed Admiral Karl Donitz as his successor in hopes he would continue his reign of fight in the war. Hitler was unaware that the German surrender had already begun. One day prior to his death German forces began to lay down their -
America Bombed Hiroshima
Since 1940 the United States began working on the development of the atomic weapon. In July of 1945, the United States conducted its first test, an atomic bomb successfully exploded in the desert of New Mexico. Shortly after, On July 26th, 1945 The United States along with the United Kingdom, and the Republic of China called for the surrender of Japan in the Potsdam Declaration. However, the Japanese ignored this request. U.S President, Harry S. Truman, made the decision to use the atom bomb t -
Japanese surrender
Events leading up to the awaited surrender of Japan were destructive and devastating. Actions enticing the surrender began on August 8th, 1945 when the Soviet Union declared war on Japan. One day later the Soviet Union conducted the invasion of the Japanese Puppet State of Manchuko. Later that day Japan endured another devastation from American dropping of an atomic bomb on Hiroshima and Nagasaki. The combined shock of these events led to Japanese Emperor Hirohito to intervene the state of the w -
Formation of McDonald’s Corporation
In 1961, he bought the company for $2.7 million (enough to pay each brother $1 million each after taxes), plus an overriding royalty of 1.9% on gross sales to the MacDonalds. (When negotiating the contract the McDonald brothers said that 2% sounded greedy; 1.9% was more attractive. American fast food businessman who took over the small-scale McDonald's Corporation franchise in 1954 and built it into the most successful fast food operation in the world. $31.9 billion in Assets. Number of Locati -
Cuban Missile Crisis
U.S. photoreconnaissance plane captures pictures of Soviet missile base under construction in Cuban. The ensuing events would later come to be known as the Cuban Missile Crisis. Soviet Missiles in Cuba could easily be lunched to strike anywhere in the United States. This caused wide spread panic in the form of school missile drills and people buying and building bunkers for a fall out. President Kennedy opted for quarantine vise an invasion of Cuba, which could have possibly spurred the Soviet -
Assassination of JFK
JFK Assassination By the fall of 1963, President John F. Kennedy, the thirty fifth president of the United States, and his political advisors were preparing for his next presidential campaign. However the president would never receive this opportunity, President John F. Kennedy was tragically murdered in Dealey plaza in Dallas, Texas at 12:30 pm on Friday, November 22, 1963. President Kennedy was shot while traveling in a presidential -
Passing of Civil Rights Act
The Civil Rights Act of 1964, is the policy, enacted by the United States, in which discrimination on the ground of race, color, or national origin shall not occur in connection with programs and activities receiving Federal financial assistance and authorizes and directs the appropriate Federal departments and agencies to take action to carry out this policy. This title is not intended to apply to foreign assistance programs. Section 601 – This section states the general principle that no per -
Assassination of MLK
An African-American civil rights Leader, and Nobel Peace Prize winner, Martin Luther King was assassinated on 4 April 1969. He was shot and killed while in Memphis, Tennessee by James Earl Ray. Martin Luther King was a prolific figure in U.S. History and preached for a non-violent movement to civil rights. He spoke openly about the injustices and the lack of equality in America. Martin Luther King was respected by many, and the assassination left may americans devestated. -
Moon Landing
The United States, Apollo 11 was the first manned mission to land on the Moon. The expensive effort devoted in the 1960’s to achieving manned moon landing. U.S. President John F. Kennedy looked for an American project that would capture the public imagination. He asked Vice President Lyndon Johnson to make recommendations on a scientific endeavor that would prove U.S. world leadership. N.A.S.A also had a department for generating counter-propaganda to show to other countries that American techn -
A music festival called Woodstock
Woodstock took place near Bethel New York. It was part of a growing Peace movement of the 1960’s. The movement progressed from college campuses to middle-class suburbs, government institutions, and labor unions. In 1965, the movement began to gain national prominence. Interaction by police and by protesters turned anti-war demonstrations in Chicago at the 1968 Democratic National Convention. The late 1960’s became a time of youth rebellion, mass gatherings and riots, which ignited in an atmosphe -
Roe v. Wade
This was a landmark controversial decision by the United States Supreme Court on the issue of abortion. The Court decided that a right to privacy under the due process clause in the Fourteenth Amendment to the United States Constitution extends to a woman's decision to have an abortion, but that right must be balanced against the state's two legitimate interests for regulating abortions: protecting prenatal life and protecting the mother's health. Stating, that these state interests become stro -
Nixon Impeached/Resigns
Nixon resigned the office of the presidency on August 9, 1974, after addressing the nation on television the previous evening. The resignation speech was delivered from the Oval Office and was carried live on radio and television. Nixon stated that he was resigning for the good of the country and asked the nation to support the new president, Gerald Ford. Nixon went on to review the accomplishments of his presidency, especially in foreign policy. “I was wrong in not acting more decisively and mo
