American History

Timeline:1860-1940Timeline Project

Nicole Koleczek

1860’s

1861• Abraham Lincoln (1861-1865) serves as President • The Civil War (1861-1865)

1862• The Homestead Act is passed to offer free land to

anyone who agrees to live on and improve it for five years

1865• The Civil War (1861-1865) ends; The

Union is restored • The Thirteenth Amendment ends slavery

1867• Christopher Latham Sholes invents the

first practical typewriter

1868• The Fourteenth Amendment makes

African Americans equal citizens

1869• The Transcontinental Railroad is

completed

1870’s

1870• The Fifteenth Amendment guarantees African

Americans the right to vote

1876• The Battle of the Little Bighorn kills an entire

force of U.S. troops causing the government to step up military action against Native Americans

• Alexander Graham Bell invents the telephone

1880’s

1882• The Chinese Exclusion Act is passed

to ban Chinese immigration

1884• Alaska is annexed

1887• The Dawes Act is passed to distribute land to

individual Native American owners

1889• Fenced fields replace the open frontier as a

result of the Oklahoma Land Rush • The Hull House is established by Jane Addams

to help the poor as well as immigrants

1890• The Wounded Knee Massacre becomes

the last armed conflict with Native Americans in the West

1897• William McKinley (1897-1901) serves

as President

1898• Hawaii is annexed

1900’s

1901• Theodore Roosevelt (1901-1909) serves

as President

1903• Wisconsin becomes the first state to have

a direct primary

1904• The Roosevelt Corollary is established to allow U.S.

interference in Latin American domestic affairs

1906• The Pure Food and Drug Act is passed to ban the

sale of impure foods and medicines • The Meat Inspection Act is passed to create a

government meat inspection program

1909• The National Association for the Advancement of

Colored People (NAACP) is founded to protect the rights of African Americans

• William H. Taft (1909-1913) serves as President

1910• The Immigration Center on Angel Island opens• The Great Migration increases opportunity for African

Americans in the North

1913• The Federal Reserve Act is passed to create the modern

banking system• The Seventeenth Amendment establishes direct election of

United States senators by popular vote• The Sixteenth Amendment establishes federal income tax • Woodrow Wilson (1913-1921) serves as President

1914• The Panama Canal opens• World War I (1914-1918)

1917• America enters World War I• The War Industries Board is established to manage the buying and

distributing of war materials, set goals for production, order construction of new factories, and set prices

1918• Alvin York becomes an American hero for his action during the war• The Second Battle of the Marne becomes the turning point of the war• World War I (1914-1918) ends; Social conflict begins• The Fourteen Points are established by President Woodrow Wilson as

goals for peace after World War I

1919• The Eighteenth Amendment

establishes prohibition of the manufacture, sale, or transport of alcohol

• The Treaty of Versailles is signed to end World War I

1920’s

1920• The Nineteenth Amendment

establishes woman suffrage

1921• Warren G. Harding (1921-1923)

serves as President

1923• Calvin Coolidge (1923-1929) serves as

President

1925• Laissez-faire economics are established by

President Calvin Coolidge to benefit the nation• The Jazz Age and Harlem Renaissance change

American culture

1929• Herbert C. Hoover (1929-1933)

serves as President • The Stock Market Crash of 1929

marks the beginning of the Great Depression

1930’s

1933• Franklin Delano Roosevelt (1933-1945) serves

as President• The First New Deal (1933-1935)

1935• The Second New Deal (1935-1937)• The Social Security Act is passed to assist

retired workers and the unemployed

1936• The Boulder Dam is completed

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