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Financed by Spain, makes the first of four voyages to the New World. He lands in the Bahamas.
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Saint Augustine, Florida, settled by the Spanish, becomes the first permanent European colony in North America.
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Final conflict in the ongoing struggle between the British and French for control of eastern North America. The British win a decisive victory over the French on the Plains of Abraham outside Quebec.
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War of independence fought between Great Britain and the 13 British colonies on the eastern seaboard of North America. Battles of Lexington and Concord, Mass., between the British Army and colonial minutemen, mark the beginning of the war.
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Continental Congress adopts the Declaration of Independence in Philadelphia. The author was Thomas Jefferson.
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Continental Congress approves the first official flag of the United States.
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Continental Congress adopts the Articles of Confederation, the first U.S. constitution.
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George Washington is unanimously elected president of the United States in a vote by state electors.
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John Adams is inaugurated as the second president in Philadelphia.
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The U.S. capital is moved from Philadelphia to Washington, DC.
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Thomas Jefferson is inaugurated as the third president in Washington, DC.
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James Madison is inaugurated as the fourth president.
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U.S. declares war on Britain over British interference with American maritime shipping and westward expansion.
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Treaty of Ghent is signed, officially ending the war.
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James Monroe is inaugurated as the fifth president.
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John Quincy Adams is inaugurated as the sixth president.
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Andrew Jackson is inaugurated as seventh president.
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President Jackson signs the Indian Removal Act, which authorizes the forced removal of Native Americans living in the eastern part of the country to lands west of the Mississippi River.
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Martin Van Buren is inaugurated as the eighth president.
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William Henry Harrison is inaugurated as the ninth president.
He dies one month later and is succeeded in office by his vice president, John Tyler. -
James Polk is inaugurated as the 11th president
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U.S. declares war on Mexico in effort to gain California and other territory in Southwest.
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War concludes with signing of Treaty of Guadalupe Hidalgo.
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Women's rights convention is held at Seneca Falls, N.Y.
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Zachary Taylor is inaugurated as the 12th president.
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Millard Fillmore is inaugurated as the 13th president.
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Franklin Pierce is inaugurated as the 14th president.
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James Buchanan is inaugurated as the 15th president.
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Conflict between the North (the Union) and the South (the Confederacy) over the expansion of slavery into western states.
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Abraham Lincoln is inaugurated as the 16th president.
Lincoln is assassinated by John Wilkes Booth in Washington, DC, and is succeeded by his vice president, Andrew Johnson. -
Andrew Johson is inaugurated as the 17th president
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Ulysses Simpson Grant is inaugurated as the 18th president.
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Rutherford Birchard Hayes is inaugurated as the 19th president.
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James Abram Garfield is inaugurated as the 20th president.
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Chester Alan Arthur is inaugurated as the 21st president.
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Stephen Grover Cleveland is inaugurated as the 22nd president.
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Benjamin Harrison is inaugurated as the 23rd president.
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National American Woman Suffrage Association is founded, with Elizabeth Cady Stanton as president.
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Stephen Grover Cleveland is inaugurated as the 24th president.
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William McKinley is inaugurated as the 25th president.
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USS Maine is blown up in Havana harbor.
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Treaty of Paris is signed, ending the Spanish-American War.
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Theodore Roosevelt is inaugurated as the 26th president.
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William Howard Taft is inaugurated as the 27th president.
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Thomas Woodrow Wilson is inaugurated as the 28th president.
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U.S. enters World War I, declaring war on Germany (April 6, 1917) and Austria-Hungary (Dec. 7, 1917) three years after conflict began in 1914.
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Armistice ending World War I is signed.
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Warren Gamaliel Harding is inaugurated as the 29th president.
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John Calvin Coolidge, Jr. is inaugurated as the 30th president.
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Herbert Clark Hoover is inaugurated as the 31st president.
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Franklin Delano Roosevelt is inaugurated as the 32nd president.
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U.S. declares its neutrality in European conflict.
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Harry S. Truman is inaugurated as the 33rd president.
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Prolonged conflict between Communist forces of North Vietnam, backed by China and the USSR, and non-Communist forces of South Vietnam, backed by the United States. President Truman authorizes $15 million in economic and military aid to the French, who are fighting to retain control of French Indochina, including Vietnam. As part of the aid package, Truman also sends 35 military advisers.
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Cold war conflict between Communist and non-Communist forces on Korean Peninsula.
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Dwight David Eisenhower is inaugurated as the 34th president.
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Armistice agreement is signed.
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John (Jack) Fitzgerald Kennedy is inaugurated as the 35th president.
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Rev. Martin Luther King, Jr., delivers his “I Have a Dream” speech before a crowd of 200,000 during the civil rights march on Washington, DC.
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Lyndon Baines Johnson is inaugurated as the 36th president.
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President Johnson signs the Voting Rights Act, which prohibits discriminatory voting practices.
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Richard Milhous Nixon is inaugurated as the 36th president.
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Astronauts Neil Armstrong and Edwin Aldrin, Jr., become the first men to land on the Moon.
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Gerald Rudolph Ford, Jr. is inaugurated as the 38th president.
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James Earl 'Jimmy' Carter, Jr. is inaugurated as the 39th president.
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Ronald Wilson Reagan is inaugurated as the 40th president.
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George Herbert Walker Bush is inaugurated as the 41st president.
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William Jefferson Clinton is inaugurated as the 42nd president.
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George Walker Bush is inaugurated as the 43rd president.
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Two hijacked jetliners ram twin towers of World Trade Center in worst terrorist attack against U.S.; a third hijacked plane flies into the Pentagon, and a fourth crashes in rural Pennsylvania. More than 3,000 people die in the attacks.
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Barack Hussein Obama Jr. is inaugurated as the 44th president.
