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The California Gold Rush saw approximately 300,000 prospectors push west to get in on the gold discovered in California at the beginning of 1848. -
The 1862 Homestead act allowed for settlers to purchase up to 160 acres of land for effectively nothing to encourage Europeans to move out west. -
On December 6, 1865 the 13th amendment to the United States constitution was ratified, formally outlawing slavery. -
The 15th amendment prohibited the government from abridging a person right to vote "on account of race, color, or previous condition of servitude." -
The Sherman Antitrust Act was and still is a major piece of anti-monopoly legislation in the United States, it allows the Justice department to sue to breakup illegal monopolies.
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The Homestead Steel Strike was a major dispute between unionized laborers and the Carnegie Steel Company, that eventually escalated into armed conflict. -
The Spanish–American War was a short-lived but significant conflict between the United States and Spain, over several islands around the world, including Puerto Rico and Guam. -
In 1906 the Department of Justice sued the Standard Oil Company of New Jersey under the relatively new Sherman Antitrust Act for illegally monopolizing the US petroleum industry. The Supreme court ordered the breakup in 1911 and Standard Oil was split into 39 smaller companies. -
Archduke Franz Ferdinand and his wife Sophie, Duchess of Hohenberg were assassinated in June of 1914 by Gavrilo Princip, this was one of the events that led to the start of WWI in an already unstable Europe. -
The Great War or World War I, was the first truly global war in history and saw the rise of modern weapons and tactics. -
The Treaty of Versailles was the final peace treaty that brought World War I to an end. It was signed 5 years to the day of Archduke Franz Ferdinand's Assassination and demanded reparations and concessions from Germany. -
The 19th amendment to the US constitution was the culmination of the women's suffrage movement, and forbids the government from denying the right to vote based on sex. -
The Wall Street Crash of 1929 was one of the largest stock market downturns in history and is often considered the beginning of the Great Depression. -
On December 10th 1930, roughly 25,000 people attempted to withdraw their accounts from the banks Bronx branch, leading to its failure and collapse in the following weeks. -
Also known as the Glass–Steagall Act, it was one of the early parts of the New Deal even if initially resisted by Roosevelt, the act created the FDIC and bank deposit insurance in the recovery from the Great Depression.
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On September 1st, 1939, Germany invaded Poland with the goal of conquering the country and exterminating its citizens; this also marked the start of WWII. -
Japan attacked the Pearl Harbor naval base on December 7th 1941, sinking 4 battleships and killing 2,403 people; this is the event that triggered US entry into WWII. -
On April 12th, 1945, President Roosevelt suffered an intracerebral hemorrhage and died at the age of 63 after over 12 years in office, the longest presidential tenure in history. -
On August 6th and 9th, 1945, the United States dropped atomic bombs on the cities of Hiroshima and Nagasaki, resulting in the death of nearly 200,000 people, and ending WWII.
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On August 28th, 1963, Martin Luther King Jr. delivered his most famous speech, known as "I have a dream," to a crowd of over 250,000 people in Washington DC.