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Cotton Gin
In 1794, inventor Eli Whitney patented the cotton gin, a machine that revolutionized the production of cotton by greatly speeding up the process of removing seeds from cotton fiber. -
XYZ Affair
The XYZ Affair was a political and diplomatic episode in 1797 and 1798, early in the administration of John Adams, involving a confrontation between the United States and Republican France that led to an undeclared war called the Quasi-War. -
Louisiana Purchase
The Louisiana Purchase in 1803, the United States purchased approximately 828,000,000 square miles of territory from France. What was known as Louisiana Territory stretched from the Mississippi River in the east to the Rocky Mountains in the west and from the Gulf of Mexico in the south to the Canadian border in the north. Part or all of 15 states were eventually created from the land deal. -
Agreement of 49th Parallel
This agreement set the boundary between the United States and Canada at the 49th parallel west of the Rocky Mountains, veering around Vancouver Island and then proceeding through the Strait of San Juan de Fuca. The Oregon Treaty settled the dispute between the United States and Great Britain over the area in Oregon located between the Columbia River and the 49th parallel. -
Adams-Onis Treaty
Also known as the Transcontinental Treaty, the Florida Purchase Treaty, or the Florida Treaty, was a treaty between the United States and Spain in 1819 that ceded Florida to the U.S. -
Missouri Compromise
the Missouri Compromise was passed in 1820 admitting Missouri as a slave state and Maine as a free state. In 1854, the Missouri Compromise was repealed by the Kansas-Nebraska Act. -
Monroe Doctrine
President James Monroe’s 1823 annual message to Congress contained the Monroe Doctrine, which warned European powers not to interfere in the affairs of the Western Hemisphere. -
Indian Removal Act/Trail of Tears
Andrew Jackson had long been an advocate of what he called “Indian removal.” Forcing Native Americans to vacate lands they had lived on for generations, in the winter of 1831, under threat of invasion by the U.S. Army, the Choctaw became the first nation to be expelled from its land altogether. They made the journey to Indian territory on foot. -
The Battle of the Alamo
The Battle of the Alamo was a important event in the Texas Revolution. -
Texas Claims Independence
During the Texas Revolution, a convention of American Texans meets at Washington and declares the independence of Texas from Mexico. -
Trail of Tears
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. The migrants faced hunger, disease, and exhaustion on the forced march. Over 4,000 out of 15,000 of the Cherokees died. -
Texas annexed to U.S.
During his presidency, U.S. President James K. Polk oversaw the greatest territorial expansion of the United States to date. President James Polk accomplished this through the annexation of Texas in 1845, the negotiation of the Oregon Treaty with Great Britain in 1846. -
Mexican-American War
The Mexican–American War, also known as the Mexican War, the U.S.–Mexican War or the Invasion of Mexico, was an armed conflict between the United States of America and the United Mexican States from 1846 to 1848 -
Treaty of Guadalupe Hidalgo
The Treaty of Guadalupe Hidalgo, signed on February 2, 1848, ended the Mexican-American War in favor of the United States. -
California becomes a state
Washington DC on Saturday, September 9th 1850, when the Bill which made California the thirty-first state of the United States. The area became a part of Mexico in 1821 following its successful war for independence, but was ceded to the United States in 1848 after the Mexican–American War. -
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 signed on December 30, 1853, by James Gadsden, U.S. ambassador to Mexico at that time. -
Kansas-Nebraska Act
It allowed people in the territories of Kansas and Nebraska to decide for themselves whether or not to allow slavery within their borders. The Act served to repeal the Missouri Compromise of 1820 which prohibited slavery.
