1955-1975

By maliq_brock
  • Period: to

    Sen. Joseph R. McCarthy accuses army officials, members of the media, and other public figures of being Communists during highly publicized hearings

  • Brown v. Board of Education of Topeka, Kans.: Landmark Supreme Court decision

    Declares that racial segregation in schools is unconstitutional

  • Laika dies in space

  • Eisenhower's second inauguration

  • President sends federal troops to Central High School in Little Rock, Ark

  • Sputnik launched into orbit

  • Sputnik II launched

  • NASA began Mercury project using Atlas rocket

  • Explorer I launched

  • Cuba taken over by Fidel Castro

  • Khrushchev visits United States

  • Alaska becomes the 49th state

  • Hawaii becomes the 50th state.

  • Soviet Union reveals that U.S. spy plane was shot down over Soviet territory

  • U.S. severs diplomatic relations with Cuba

  • John F. Kennedy is inaugurated as the 35th president

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    Bay of Pigs invasion of Cuba fails

  • Lt. Col. John Glenn becomes first U.S. astronaut to orbit Earth

  • Period: to

    Cuban Missile Crisis

  • Rev. Martin Luther King, Jr., delivers his “I Have a Dream” speech

  • President Kennedy is assassinated in Dallas, Texas

    He is succeeded in office by his vice president, Lyndon B. Johnson

  • President Johnson signs the Civil Rights Act

  • North Vietnamese torpedo boats allegedly attack U.S. destroyer in Gulf of Tonkin off the coast of North Vietnam

  • U.S. planes begin bombing raids of North Vietnam

  • L. Johnson's second inauguration

  • State troopers attack peaceful demonstrators led by Rev. Martin Luther King, Jr., as they try to cross bridge in Selma, Ala.

  • First U.S. combat troops arrive in South Vietnam

  • President Johnson signs the Voting Rights Act

    Prohibits discriminatory voting practices

  • Miranda v. Arizona: Landmark Supreme Court decision

    Further defines due process clause of the Fourteenth Amendment and establishes Miranda rights

  • Twenty-Fifth Amendment to the Constitution is ratified

    Outlines the procedures for filling vacancies in the presidency and vice presidency
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    North Vietnamese army and Viet Cong launch Tet Offensive, attacking Saigon and other key cities in South Vietnam

  • American soldiers kill 300 Vietnamese villagers in My Lai massacre

  • Rev. Martin Luther King, Jr., is assassinated in Memphis, Tenn.

  • Sen. Robert F. Kennedy is assassinated in Los Angeles, Calif

  • Richard Nixon is inaugurated as the 37th president

  • Astronauts Neil Armstrong and Edwin Aldrin, Jr., become the first men to land on the Moon

  • U.S. troops invade Cambodia

  • Four students are shot to death by National Guardsmen during an antiwar protest at Kent State University

  • The Twenty-Sixth Amendment to the Constitution is ratified

    Lowered the voting age from 21 to 18
  • Period: to

    Nixon makes historic visit to Communist China

  • U.S. and Soviet Union sign strategic arms control agreement known as SALT I

  • Five men, all employees of Nixon's reelection campaign, are caught breaking into rival Democratic headquarters at the Watergate complex in Washington, DC

  • Nixon's second inauguration

  • Roe v. Wade: Landmark Supreme Court decision

    Legalized abortion in first trimester of pregnancy

  • Representatives of North and South Vietnam, the Viet Cong, and the U.S. sign a cease-fire agreement in Paris

  • Last U.S. troops leave Vietnam

  • Vice President Spiro T. Agnew resigns over charges of corruption and income tax evasion

  • Gerald R. Ford is confirmed by Congress and sworn in as VP

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    House Judiciary Committee recommends to full House that Nixon be impeached on grounds of obstruction of justice, abuse of power, and contempt of Congress

  • Ford is the first vice president to succeed to the office under the terms laid out by the Twenty-Fifth Amendment

  • Nixon is granted an unconditional pardon by President Ford

  • Nelson Rockefeller is confirmed and sworn in as vice president

  • South Vietnamese government surrenders to North Vietnam

    U.S. embassy Marine guards and last U.S. civilians are evacuated