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Outbreak of the French and Indian War
This manuscript pen-and-ink map shows the disposition of troops at the beginning of the Battle of Monongahela, which took place on July 9, 1755, in the second year of the French and Indian War. -
The Boston Massacre
In Boston in the late 1760s, the stirrings of what became the American Revolution began as residents grew angry about the heavy taxation to which they were subjected. -
Congress adopts the Articles of Confederation
On June 11, 1776, the Second Continental Congress appointed three committees in response to the Lee Resolution proposing independence for the American colonies. -
Declaration of Independence
John Dunlap, official printer to the Continental Congress, produced the first printed versions of the American Declaration of Independence in his Philadelphia shop on the night of July 4, 1776. -
Treaty of Paris establishes American independence
This treaty, sent to Congress by the American negotiators John Adams, Benjamin Franklin, and John Jay, formally ended the Revolutionary War. -
George Washington chairs Constitutional Convention, meeting in Philadelphia
In 1787, the confederation of the 13 American states was descending into disarray. -
Bill of Rights passed by Congress and sent to the states for ratification
During the debates on the adoption of the U.S. Constitution, its opponents charged that the Constitution as drafted would open the way to tyranny by the central government. -
Kentucky becomes the 15th state
David H. Burr (1803–75) was a surveyor and cartographer, who served as topographer to the United States Post Office Department in 1832–38 and as geographer to the House of Representatives in 1838–47. -
Construction of the U.S. Capitol begins
Construction of the Capitol, the building that houses the U.S. Congress, began in 1793 and was largely completed by 1865, when the Capitol’s second dome was finished. -
Thomas Jefferson elected third president of the United States
Thomas Jefferson was the third president of the United States of America and one of the founding fathers of the republic. -
Ohio becomes the 17th state
David H. Burr (1803–75) was a surveyor and cartographer, who served as topographer to the United States Post Office Department in 1832–38 and as geographer to the House of Representatives in 1838–47. -
Lewis and Clark set out from Saint Louis for the Pacific
This account of the Lewis and Clark Expedition, published in 1814, is based on the detailed journals kept by Captains Meriwether Lewis and William Clark, the leaders of expedition. -
First continental map of the United States
This 1816 map by John Melish (1771–1822) is the first to show the United States as a continental state, stretching from the Atlantic Ocean to the Pacific. -
First book printed in New Mexico, a Spanish-language spelling book
This Spanish-language schoolbook on the use and pronunciation of the letters of the alphabet and the rules of punctuation is the first book printed in New Mexico. -
Osceola, leader of the Seminole struggle against U.S. troops, dies
Osceola was a Seminole war chief who led the resistance to the campaign by U.S. federal troops to forcibly resettle his tribe to territory west of the Mississippi River.
