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Cotton Gin invented
Eli Whitney's patent[edit] Eli Whitney's original cotton gin patent, dated March 14, 1794. The modern mechanical cotton gin was invented in the United States of America in 1793 by Eli Whitney (1765–1825). -
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 (1803) was a land deal between the United States and France, in which the U.S. acquired approximately 827,000 square miles of land west of the Mississippi River for $15 million. -
Agreement of 49th Parallel
The Convention of 1818, aka the Convention of Commerce, was a meeting held in October 1818 to negotiate a treaty between the Monroe administration and the British. The aim of the Convention of 1818 was to settle outstanding boundary issues and disputes between the US and British North America following the War of 1812. The Treaty of 1818 set the 49th parallel as the border with Canada from Rupert's Land west to the Rocky Mountains. The treaty and Convention of 1818 also established a joint occu -
Adams-Onis Treaty
The Adams-Onís Treaty between the United States and Spain was negotiated by Secretary of State John Quincy Adams and the Spanish Minister to the United States, Don Luis de Onís, and signed in February 1819. -
Missouri Compromise
The Missouri Compromise was an effort by Congress to defuse the sectional and political rivalries triggered by the request of Missouri late in 1819 for admission as a state in which slavery would be permitted. At the time, the United States contained twenty-two states, evenly divided between slave and free. -
Monroe Doctrine
The Monroe Doctrine was a U.S. foreign policy regarding domination of the American continent in 1823. It stated that further efforts by European nations to colonize land or interfere with states in North or South America would be viewed as acts of aggression, requiring U.S. intervention. -
Indian Removal Act/Trail of Tears
The Indian Removal Act was signed into law by President Andrew Jackson on May 28, 1830, authorizing the president to grant unsettled lands west of the Mississippi in exchange for Indian lands within existing state borders. A few tribes went peacefully, but many resisted the relocation policy. -
The Battle of the Alamo (Beginning)
For the site of this battle, see Alamo Mission in San Antonio. For other uses, see Alamo (disambiguation). The Battle of the Alamo (February 23 – March 6, 1836) was a pivotal event in the Texas Revolution. -
Texas Claims Independence
Texas Independence Day is the celebration of the adoption of the Texas Declaration of Independence on March 2, 1836. With this document signed by 59 people, settlers in Mexican Texas officially declared independence from Mexico and created the Republic of Texas. -
The Battle of the Alamo (End)
This was the ending date -
Trail of Tears
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. -
Texas annexed to U.S.
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. -
Mexican-American War (starts)
A war between the U.S. and Mexico spanned the period from spring 1846 to fall 1847. The war was initiated by Mexico and resulted in Mexico's defeat and the loss of approximately half of its national territory in the north. -
Treaty of Guadalupe Hidalgo
The Treaty of Guadalupe Hidalgo (Tratado de Guadalupe Hidalgo in Spanish), officially entitled the Treaty of Peace, Friendship, Limits and Settlement between the United States of America and the Mexican Republic, is the peace treaty signed on February 2, 1848 -
California becomes a state
Alta California 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. The western portion of Alta California was organized as the State of California, which was admitted as the 31st state on September 9, 1850. -
Gadsden Purchase
It was the Gadsden Purchase that settled the main boundaries of the United States of America (though Alaska was added in 1867). The Louisiana Purchase of fifty years earlier, the biggest land sale in history, had transferred an area of 827,000 square miles between the Mississippi and the Rocky Mountains from theoretical French sovereignty to the United States. -
Kansas-Nebraska Act
The Kansas–Nebraska Act of 1854 (10 Stat. 277) created the territories of Kansas and Nebraska by Democratic Senator Stephen A. Douglas of Illinois.
