Basic American History Timeline Flashcards
~14,000 B.C.
Nomadic hunters from Siberia cross the Bering Strait into North America.
~1000 A.D.
Viking explorer Leif Erikson visits what is now Northeastern Canada.
Oct. 12, 1492
Christopher Columbus lands on an island in what is now the Bahamas, “discovering” the New World.
May 14, 1607
English settlers establish colony at Jamestown (1607-1699) located in what is today the state of Virginia.
Aug. 1619
A Dutch ship delivers 20 Africans as slaves to Jamestown.
Dec. 21, 1620
Puritan Separatists from England land in Plymouth (1620-1691) in what is today the state of MA, and begin settlement.
1754
The nine-year French and Indian War (1754-1763) begins. When it’s over, the English control much of North America.
Dec. 16, 1773
Boston Tea Party: Massachusetts colonists costumed as Indians dump tea into Boston Harbor to protest British taxes on it.
April 19, 1775
British soldiers and colonial militia exchange shots at Lexington and Concord, Mass., beginning the Revolutionary War (1775-1783).
July 4, 1776
The Continental Congress adopts the Declaration of Independence.
Oct. 17, 1777
A British army of nearly 6,000 surrenders near Saratoga, NY. The American victory helps convince France to enter the war on the side of the Americans.
Oct. 19, 1781
A large British army surrenders at Yorktown, VA, effectively ending the Revolutionary War.
Sep. 17, 1787
A convention of delegates in Philadelphia approves what will become the U.S. Constitution.
April 1789
George Washington is elected the first U.S. president.
March 4, 1801
Thomas Jefferson becomes the third U.S. president.
1803
The U.S. buys 828,000 miles west of the Mississippi River from France. The “Louisiana Purchase” costs about $15 million, or 3 cents an acre.
June 18, 1812
Congress declares war on Britain, beginning the War of 1812 (1812-1815).
Jan. 8, 1815
U.S. forces under Andrew Jackson rout a larger British force at New Orleans, two weeks after a peace treaty ending the War of 1812 was signed in Europe.
March 1820
Congress approves the “Missouri Compromise” designed to keep balance between free and slave states.
March 4, 1829
Andrew Jackson is inaugurated as the seventh U.S. president.
Jan. 26, 1830
Massachusetts Sen. Daniel Webster gives a speech in favor of preserving the Union that galvanizes support for keeping the U.S. in one piece.
March 24, 1844
The first telegraph message is sent between Washington and Baltimore.
April 24-26, 1846
The Mexican-American War (1846-1848) begins.
March 6, 1852
The U.S. Supreme Court hands down the Dred Scott decision, ruling that slaves are property and have no more rights than other property.
Nov. 6, 1860
Abraham Lincoln is elected the sixteenth U.S. president.
April 12, 1861
Southern forces fire on the federal Fort Sumter at Charleston, SC, beginning the Civil War (1861-1865).
July 2-4, 1863
In a massive battle near Gettysburg, PA, Union forces defeat a Confederate army in perhaps the most pivotal battle of the Civil War.
April 14, 1865
Abraham Lincoln shot while attending a play in Washington, D.C. He dies the next day.
May 16, 1868
The Senate votes 35-19 to remove President Andrew Johnson from office, one vote short of the two-thirds needed to do so.
July 1868
The Fourteenth Amendment to the U.S. Constitution is ratified, entitling all people born in the United States to U.S. citizenship and equal rights under the law.
June 25, 1876
A force of U.S. cavalry under Col. George A. Custer is wiped out by American Indian forces at the Little Big Horn River in Montana.
May 6, 1896
The U.S. Supreme Court, in Plessy v. Ferguson, rules that states have the right to legally segregate public facilities if they are “equal” in quality.
Feb. 15, 1898
The U.S. battleship Maine mysteriously explodes in Havana Harbor, triggering the Spanish-American War (1898).
Dec. 17, 1903
Wilbur and Orville Wright complete the first successful flights in a heavier-than-air machine at Kitty Hawk, NC.
April 6, 1917
The U.S. enters World War I (1914-1918).
1920
The first U.S. commercial radio station is established in Pittsburgh, PA.
Oct. 24, 1929
The New York Stock Exchange collapses on what becomes know as “Black Thursday”.
Aug. 14, 1935
Roosevelt signs the Social Security Act, creating a federal pension system.
Dec. 7, 1941
U.S. forces are attacked by a Japanese armada at Pearl Harbor, Hawaii, drawing the U.S. into World War II.
Aug. 6, 1945
A U.S. plane drops an atomic bomb on the city of Hiroshima, Japan, effectively ending World War II.
June 24, 1950
North Korean troops invade South Korea. Within a week, U.S. troops are involved in the fighting beginning the Korean War (1950-1953).
Nov. 22, 1963
President John F. Kennedy is assassinated while riding in a motorcade in Dallas.
April 4, 1968
Civil rights leader Martin Luther King, Jr., is assassinated while on a motel balcony in Memphis, TN.
1969
More than 500,000 U.S. military personnel stationed in Vietnam during the Vietnam War (~1954/1965-1973/1975). AND in July 1969 American astronauts Neil Armstrong and Apollo 11 Lunar Module pilot Buzz Aldrin performed the first manned Moon landing.
Aug. 8, 1974
President Richard M. Nixon resigns the presidency in the wake of the Watergate scandal.
Nov. 8, 1980
Ronald Reagan is elected the fortieth U.S. president.
Jan. 16, 1991
U.S. and called forces launch giant aerial attack on Iraq beginning the Gulf War (1990-1991), four months after Iraq invaded neighboring Kuwait.
Sep. 11, 2001
Terrorist airplane hijackers destroy the World Trade Center in New York City.
Oct. 7, 2001
U.S. invades Afghanistan in response to 9/11 beginning the Afghanistan War (2001-Present).
March 20, 2003
Second invasion of Iraq begins with the U.S. launching a “shock and awe” bombing campaign beginning the Iraq War (2003-2011).
Nov. 4, 2008
Barack Obama is elected the 44th U.S. president.
