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Francis Scott Key Fitzgerald was born in St. Paul, Minnesota, on September 24, 1896. His father, Edward was from Maryland, while his mother, Mary, was an immigrant from Ireland.
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The first Assembly Line was used in 1901 by Ransome Eli Olds (1864-1950). Henry Ford (1863-1947) used the first conveyor belt-based assembly-line in his car factory in 1913-14 in Ford's Highland Park, Michigan plant.
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On September 6, 1901, anarchist Leon Czolgosz walked up to U.S. President William McKinley at the Pan-American Exposition in New York and shot McKinley at point-blank range and died later on September 14 from gangrene.
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The Wright Brothers built and flew the Flyer for 12 seconds over 120 feet. This flight conducted on Kill Devil Hill outside of Kitty Hawk, North Carolina, was the first flight of a manned airplane.
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The first movie theatre in Pittsburgh, Pennslvania, US.
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The sinking of SS Titanic, 14 April 1912
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A global conflict that errupted in Europe after the assassination of Franz Ferdinand of Austria-Hungary. The conflict lasted from July 28, 1914 to November 11, 1919.
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The Panama Canal is a man-made waterway that connects from the Atlantic to the Pacific Ocean. This is the largest project the US has ever constructed.
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The Lusitania was a Britsh ocean liner that transported goods and people across the Atlantic between the US and Great Britain. The ship was torpedoed by a German U-boat, killing 1,198 out of 1,959 passengers aboard and led to the US declaring war on Germany
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The US joins the Allies to fight in World War I. More than 2 million soldiers fought on the battlefields of France.
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Fitzgerald joined the army in 1917 due to academic probation and close to flunking, was commissioned a second lieutenant in the infantry. Convinced that he would die in the war, he rapidly wrote a novel, “The Romantic Egotist”.
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Fitzgerald and Zelda both meet at a country club dance in Montgomery, Alabama.
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The peace agreement between Germany and the Allies officially ended the war, however, many Germans found the treaty very unfair and unjust.
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After leaving the army, Fitzgerald, hoping to marry Zelda, takes an advertising job in New York. Due to his lack of fame and wealth Zelda breaks the marriage and Fitzgerald rewrites The Romantic Egoitst into The Side of Paradise.
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A period of nearly 14 years in the US where achol manufacturing, sale and transportation of intoxicating liquor was illegal. The Volstead Act clarified the law.
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The Side of Paradise is published and a week later Zelda and Fitzgerald get married at St. Patrick's Cathedral in New York.
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Congress and in state legislatures, the Nineteenth Amendment became part of the U.S. Constitution on August 26, 1920. It states, "The right of citizens of the United States to vote shall not be denied or abridged by the United States or by any State on account of sex."
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The Fitzgeralds first and only child, Frances Scott "Scottie" Fitzgerald, is born.
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Fitzgerald publishes his next book, The Beautiful and Damned.
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The Fitzgeralds rented a house in Great Neck, Long Island and stay until April 1924. Fitzgerald interaction with society in Long Island provides the setting and mood for The Great Gatsby.
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The Fitzgeralds spend the next seven years mostly in Paris, France.
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The Great Gatsby is published.
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The US stock market crashes, triggering the Great Depression.
