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Oil!
Standard Oil Company is incorporated by John D. Rockefeller. -
Representation
The first African-American to be sworn into office in the United States Congress, Hiram Rhodes Revels, a Republican from Missouri takes his place in the United States Senate. -
15th Amendment
The 15th Amendment to the Constitution is declared ratified by the Secretary of State. It gave the right to vote to black Americans. Race would officially no longer be a ban to voting rights. -
Amnsety Act
Civil rights are restored to citizens of the South, except for five hundred Confederate leaders, with the passage of the Amnesty Act of 1872 and its signing by President Ulysses S. Grant. -
Economics
An economic depression begins when the New York stock market crashed, setting off a financial panic that caused bank failures. The impact of the depression would continue for five years. -
Women's Rights
The Women's Crusade of 1873-74 is started when women in Fredonia, New York march against retail liquor dealers, leading to the creation of the Woman's Christian Temperance Union. In 1917, this movement would culminate in the the 18th Amendment, prohibiting the sale of liquor in the United States, a ban that would last for sixteen years. -
Politics
The U.S. Greenback Party is organized as a political organization by farmers who had been hurt financially in the Panic of 1873. -
Civil Rights
The Civil Rights Act, giving equal rights to blacks in jury duty and accommodation is passed by the United States Congress. It would be overturned in 1883 by the U.S. Supreme Court. -
Native AmericanRelations
Reporting on the Indian Wars, inspector E.C. Watkins pronounces that hundreds of Sioux and Cheyenne under Indian leaders Sitting Bull and Crazy Horse are openly hostile against the United States government, forming U.S. policy over the next year that would lead to battles such as Little Big Horn. -
Native American Relations?
The United States government issues a decree ordering all Native Americans onto a system of reservations throughout the western lands of the United States. -
Native American Relations
The Battle of Little Big Horn occurs when Lt. Colonel George Custer and his 7th U.S. Cavalry engage the Sioux and Cheyenne Indians on the bluffs above the Little Big Horn River. All 264 members of the 7th Cavalry and Custer perish in the battle, the most complete rout in American military history. -
Native American Relations
Indian leader of the Oglala Sioux, Crazy Horse, surrenders to the United States Army in Nebraska. His people had been weakended by cold and hunger. -
West
The Lincoln County War begins in New Mexico between two group of wealthy businessmen, the ranchers and the Lincoln County general store. William Bonney, aka Billy the Kid, fought alongside the ranchers in a dispute over seizure of horses as a payment of an outstanding debt. -
Vanderbuilt etc.
The Gilmores Garden in New York City is renamed Madison Square Garden by William Henry Vanderbilt and opens to the public at 26th Street and Madison Avenue. Henry George advocates a single tax on land in his publication, "Progress and Poverty." -
Elections and population
James A. Garfield, Republican is elected president over Winfield S. Hancock, the Democratic candidate. Garfield receives 214 Electoral College votes to 155 for Hancock, but barely wins the popular vote with a majority of only 7,023 voters. The national population in the 1880 reached 50,189,209 people, an increase of 30.2% over the 1870 census. The geographic center of the U.S. population now reaches west/southwest of Cincinnati, Ohio in Kentucky. Five states now have more than two million i -
Tuskegee Institute
The Tuskegee Institute for black students training to be teachers was opened under the tutelage of Booker T. Washington as instructor in Tuskegee, Alabama. -
West
The gunfight at the O.K. Corral in Tombstone, Arizona occurs in a livery stable lot between some of the famous characters of the American west; Sheriff Wyatt Earp, his brother Virgil, and Doc Holliday against Billy Claiborne, Frank and Tom McLaury and the Clanton brothers Billy and Ike. Although only thirty seconds long, the battle would live in western lore for more than one hundred years. The McLaury brothers and Billy Clanton would perish in the fight. -
Oil
The Standard Oil Company trust of John D. Rockefeller is begun when Rockefeller places his oil holdings inside it. -
Liberty
The Statue of Liberty arrived for the first time in New York harbor. -
Unions
The Haymarket riot and bombing occurs in Chicago, Illinois, three days after the start of a general strike in the United States that pushed for an eight hour workday. This act would be followed by additional labor battles for that worker right favored by unions. Later this year, on December 8, the American Federation of Labor (AFL) was formed by twenty-five craft unions.