A Historical Timeline: Key National Events
| Date | Event | Resource(s) |
|---|---|---|
| January 1, 1863 | President Abraham Lincoln issued the Emancipation Proclamation. | National Archives
and Records Administration Online Exhibit Hall: The Emancipation Proclamation http://www.nara.gov/exhall/featured-document/eman/emanproc.html |
|
January 31, 1865 |
The Thirteenth Amendment is passed in Congress outlawing slavery in the United States. | National Archives
and Records Administration: Amendments 11-27 to the Constitution
of the United States http://www.nara.gov/exhall/charters/constitution/amendments.html |
|
December 6, 1865 |
The Thirteenth Amendment is ratified in Congress. | National Archives
and Records Administration: Amendments 11-27 to the Constitution
of the United States http://www.nara.gov/exhall/charters/constitution/amendments.html |
|
1900 |
The Nobel Foundation, which administers the Nobel prizes, is established. | The
Nobel Foundation official website http://www.nobel.se/nobel/Nobel-foundation/index.html |
| 1904 | Bethune-Cookman College is founded. | Bethune-Cookman
College website http://www.cookman.edu/Information/information.html |
|
February 12, 1909 |
The National Association for the Advancement of Colored People (NAACP) is founded. | NAACP official
website: NAACP Timeline http://www.naacp.org/past_future/naacptimeline.shtml |
| August 26, 1920 | Ratification of the Nineteenth Amendment to the United States' Constitution. Women in the United States of America get the vote. | American
History. Women's Suffrage Movement http://americanhistory.about.com/cs/womenssuffrage/ |
| May 20, 1927 | Charles Lindbergh takes off on his historical solo Trans-Atlantic flight. 33 hours and 30 minutes later, he lands in Paris. Start of a new era in aviation. | P.B.S. The American
Experience: Lindbergh - Timeline of Aviation Milestones http://www.pbs.org/wgbh/amex/lindbergh/timeline/index.html |
| October 29, 1929 | Black Tuesday. U.S. Stock Market crash is cited as the start of the Great Depression. | The Crash of 1929, by R. Richard Saville http://mypage.direct.ca/r/rsavill/Thecrash.html |
| September 1931 | Mukden Incident: Japan invades Manchuria. | North Park University.
World History Chronology: The Second World War: 1931 - 1945 http://campus.northpark.edu/history/WebChron/World/WWII.html |
| December 13, 1937 | Six-week stretch of atrocities by Japanese ground forces
against the civilian population of Nanking, China, began. This event
is referred to as the massacre and rape of Nanking. 300,000 civilians
killed. |
Bergen County Technical
Schools. Japan Invades China http://www.bergen.org/AAST/Projects/ChinaHistory/background.htm |
| September 1, 1939 | Germany invades Poland. War in Europe - World War II
and the Holocaust. The war in Asia had been underway since 1931. |
Yad Vashem
The Holocaust Martyrs' and Heroes' Remembrance Authority. Chronology
of the Holocaust 1939 - 1941. http://www.yad-vashem.org.il/about_holocaust/chronology/1939-1941/1939/chronology_1939_7.html |
| September 3, 1939 | France and Great Britain declare war on Germany, but
take no military measures on Poland's behalf. |
Yad Vashem
The Holocaust Martyrs' and Heroes' Remembrance Authority. Chronology
of the Holocaust 1939 - 1941. http://www.yad-vashem.org.il/about_holocaust/chronology/1939-1941/1939/chronology_1939_7.html |
| December 7, 1941 | Japanese launch attack on Pearl Harbor. |
National
Geographic: Remembering Pearl Harbor http://plasma.nationalgeographic.com/pearlharbor/ |
| February 19, 1942 | Executive Order 9066 issued by President
Franklin Roosevelt. Approximately 120,000 Japanese Americans forced
to sell their property, leave their homes and move into detention
camps. |
Smithsonian
National Museum of American History. A More Perfect Union:
Japanese Americans and the US Constitution http://www.americanhistory.si.edu/youmus/ex04unio.htm |
| August 6, 1945 | US drops atomic bomb on Hiroshima, Japan. |
National
Geographic: Remembering Pearl Harbor http://plasma.nationalgeographic.com/pearlharbor/ |
| August 9, 1945 | US drops atomic bomb on Nagasaki, Japan. At least 100,000
people died in the two atomic bombings. |
National
Geographic: Remembering Pearl Harbor http://plasma.nationalgeographic.com/pearlharbor/ |
| August 14, 1945 | Japan surrenders. |
National
Geographic: Remembering Pearl Harbor http://plasma.nationalgeographic.com/pearlharbor/ |
| September 2, 1945 | Japanese officials sign the surrender document on the
U.S.S. Missouri in Tokyo Harbor. |
National
Geographic: Remembering Pearl Harbor http://plasma.nationalgeographic.com/pearlharbor/ |
| June 5, 1947 | Secretary of State George C. Marshall spoke at Harvard University and "outlined what would become known as the Marshall Plan." | US Department
of State. Congressional Record, 30 June 1947. The Marshall Plan (1947) http://usinfo.state.gov/usa/infousa/facts/democrac/57.htm |
| December 1, 1955 | Rosa Parks refuses to give up her seat in a segregated
bus. This act of civil disobedience is a milestone in the Civil Rights
movement. |
Scholastic:
Rosa Parks: How I Fought for Civil Rights http://teacher.scholastic.com/rosa/ |
| November, 1956 | US Supreme court declared that segregation on public buses was unconstitutional |
The Montgomery Bus Boycott Page (Department of Sociology, University
of Colorado at Boulder) North Park University http://www.campus.northpark.edu/history/WebChron/USA/MontBus.html Gilliam, Thomas J. "The Montgomery Bus Boycott of 1955-56." in: The Walking City: The Montgomery Bus Boycott. David J. Garrow, ed (Brooklyn; Carlson Publishing, 1989), p. 191-301. Morris, Aldon D. The Orgins of the Civil Rights Movement: Black Communities Organizing for Change. (New York; The Free Press, 1986)
|
| August 28, 1963 | Martin Luther King, Jr., delivers his "I Have A
Dream" address on the steps of the Lincoln Memorial in Washington,
D.C. |
National
Civil Rights Museum: Martin Luther King, Jr. http://www.mecca.org/~crights/mlk.html |
| 1964 | Passage of Civil Rights Act. Discrimination on the basis of sex as well as race in hiring, promoting, and firing was forbidden. | National Archives
and Records Administration: The Constitution Community. The
Civil Rights Act of 1964 and the Equal Employment Opportunity Commission
http://www.nara.gov/education/cc/eeoc.html |
| 1972 | Passage of Title IX. Discrimination on the basis of sex prohibited in federally-funded educational programs. | Feminist Majority
Foundation: Empowering Women in Sports http://www.feminist.org/research/sports12.html |
| August 2, 1990 | Start of Gulf War |
National Gulf War Resource Center, Inc. The History
Guy: The Persian Gulf War (1990-1991) BBCi Radio 4 webpage |
| March 3, 1991 | End of Gulf War |
National Gulf War Resource Center, Inc. The History
Guy: The Persian Gulf War (1990-1991) BBCi website |
| September 11, 2001 | Terrorist attacks on the US begins the War on Terror | Fox
News http://www.foxnews.com/story/0,2933,34229,00.html |
This timeline was created in part by the students from the Ann Arbor Girls Middle School. For more information about their contributions, please see the About the Project page.
