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G.I. Bill
The G.I. Bill, which was also called Servicemen's Readjustment Act, was a U.S. legislation that was passed in 1944. The Bill was created to help veterans of World War II. The act provided for college or vocational education for returning World War II veterans. The act also gave veterans one year of unemployment compensation. It also provided loans for returning veterans to buy homes and start businesses. -
Period: to
1950's
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Period: to
Cold War
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Truman Doctrine
The Truman Doctrine was an American foreign policy with a purpose to counter the Soviet geopolitical expansion during the Cold War. It was first announced by President Harry S. Truman on March 12, 1947 and later developed on July 12, 1948 when he pledged to contain threats to Greece and Turkey. The Doctrine established that the U.S. would provide political, military and economic assistance to all democratic nations under threat from external or internal authoritarian forces. -
Marshall Plan
The Marshall Plan, also known as the European Recovery Program, was a response for the United States to the European financial crisis of 1947. With this plan, America aided Western Europe. The United States gave over $13 billion in assistance to help rebuild Western European economies after the end of World War II. The plan was named after the Secretary of State, George C. Marshall, who announced it on June 5, 1947 in an opening speech at Harvard University -
Berlin Airlift
On June 24, 1948, the Soviet Union blocked all road and rail travel to and from West Berlin. This action was in response to the refusal of American and British officials giving Russia more say in the economic future of Germany. In response to the Soviet blockade, the United States began a massive airlift of food, water, and medicine to help citizens of the blockaded city, Berlin. For almost a year, supplies from American planes supported over 2 million people in West Berlin. -
Fair Deal
The Fair Deal was a set of ideas set by the U.S. President, Harry S. Truman to Congress in his 1949 state of the Union address. The Deal offered new ideas to continue New Deal liberalism, but because of the Congress, only a few of the major initiatives became law. The Fair Deal recommended that all Americans have health insurance, that the minimum wage be increased, and that by law, all Americans be guaranteed equal rights. The Deal was a mixed success. -
Beat Generation
The Beat Generation was a literary movement that was started by a group of authors whose work explored and influenced American culture and politics in the WWII era. Their work was published and popularized throughout the 1950's. Central elements of Beat culture were rejection of standard narrative values, spiritual quest, experimentation with psychedelic drugs, and sexual liberation and exploration, etc. Allen Ginsberg's Howl is one of the best known examples of Beat literature. -
Elvis Presley
Elvis Presley was born on January 8, 1935 to a poor family in East Tupelo, Mississippi. As a teenager, he moved to Memphis , graduated from high school, and took a job as a truck driver. As a teen, he played guitar and sang country and hillbilly tunes. He loved music and was entirely self taught. When he was 19, Elvis began attracting attention with his music in 1954. He animated Black rhythm-and-blues songs with his own style It included dance moves that were considered sexually at the time. -
Ike Turner
Ike Turner was born on November 5, 1931 in Clarksdale, Mississippi. Growing up he played the blues. In the late 1940s, Turner started a group called the Kings of Rhythm. In 1956, he met a teenage singer named Anna Mae Bullock. He married her and helped her create her stage name, Tina Turner. They both became "Ike & Tina Turner Revue" and created several R&B hits. Turner later died from a cocaine overdose on December 12, 2007 in San Marcos, California. -
Little Richard
Richard Wayne Penniman was born December 5, 1932 in Macon Georgia. Little Richard was one of the few that helped define the early rock 'n' roll era in the 1950's. He turned songs like "Tutti-Frutti" and "Long Tall Sally" into big hits with his croons, wails and screams. He also influenced big bands like the Beatles. In September, Little Richard stepped into a recording studio and pumped up "Tutti-Frutti" which became an instant Billboard hit and reached number 17. -
Korean War
The Korean War took place from June 25, 1950 to July 27, 1953. It began when North Korea invaded South Korea. Korea was ruled by Imperial Japan. This invasion was the first action of the Cold War, leading to Korea being split into two regions with separate governments. The Soviet Union declared war on Imperial Japan, as a result of an agreement with the US, and ended Japanese rule north of the 38th parallel. The Korean War ended with about 5 million soldiers and civilians losing their lives. -
Brown v. Board of Education
The Brown v. Board of Education of Topeka was a 1954 Supreme Court case in which justices ruled that racial segregation of children in public school was unconstitutional. The Brown v. Board of education helped establish the precedent that “separate-but-equal” education and other services were still not equal. The ruling permitted that laws excluded African Americans from sharing the same buses, schools and other public facilities as whites. -
Polio Vaccine
The first polio vaccine was the inactivated polio vaccine. It was developed by Jonas Salk. In 1952, Jonas Salk and his team at the University of Pittsburgh created the first effective polio vaccine. By 1954, the Salk vaccine was tested widely. Thomas Francis Jr. at the University of Michigan led the nationwide test. The vaccine came into use in 1955. The oral polio vaccine was developed by Albert Sabin and came into commercial use in 1961. -
Albert Sabin
Albert Sabin was born in Poland on August 26, 1906. In 1939, Sabin accepted a position at Cincinnati Children's Hospital, in Cincinnati, Ohio. He remained at this hospital until 1969.Sabin conducted research into numerous viruses and diseases, including pneumonia, cancer, encephalitis, and numerous other illnesses. During the late 1940s and 1950s, he tried to determine how the polio virus infected its victims. By 1957, Sabin had developed a live vaccine. -
Dr. Jonas Salk
Jonas Edward Salk was born October 28, 1914. He was an American medical researcher and virologist. On March 26, 1953, he announced on a national radio show that he had successfully tested a vaccine against poliomyelitis, the virus that causes the disease of polio. In 1952, an epidemic year for polio, there were 58,000 new cases reported in the US, and more than 3,000 died from the disease. In April 1955, it was announced that the vaccine was effective and safe. He died in La Jolla in 1995. -
Rock 'n' Roll
Rock and Roll was a style of popular music that originated in the United States in the mid 1950s and evolved in the 1960s into a more encompassing international style known as rock music. Rock and roll was described as a mix of country music and rhythm and blues. William Allen created rock-and-roll radio by playing hard-driving rhythm-and-blues and raunchy blues records. It introduced white teenagers to a culture that sounded more exotic, thrilling, and illicit. The term rock n roll meant sex. -
Period: to
Civil Rights
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Vietnam War
The Vietnam War went on from November 1, 1955 to April 30, 1975. The war was a conflict between communist government of North Vietnam and South Vietnam and its ally, the United States. The fight was over reunifying the country. More than 3 million people were killed in the Vietnam War, and more than half were Vietnamese civilians. Communist's ended the war by taking control over South Vietnam in 1975. The country was unified as the Socialist Republic of Vietnam the following year. -
Montgomery Bus Boycott
The Montgomery Bus Boycott was a civil-rights protest. African Americans refused to ride city buses in Montgomery, Alabama, to protest segregated seating. It took place from December 5, 1955, to December 20, 1956. It began when Rosa Parks was arrested and fined for refusing to give up her bus seat to a white man. The U.S. Supreme Court ultimately ordered Montgomery to integrate its bus system. Martin Luther King, Jr. emerged as a prominent leader of the American civil rights movement. -
Little Rock 9
Little Rock Nine were a group of nine black students who enrolled at an all-white Central High School in Little Rock, Arkansas, on September 1957 as a test of the Brown v. Board of Education, which banned segregation in public schools. On the first day of classes at Governor Orval Faubus called in the Arkansas National Guard to block the black students’ entry into the high school. Later that month, President Eisenhower sent in federal troops to escort the Little Rock Nine into the school. -
Civil Rights Act of 1957
The Civil Rights Act of 1957 was enacted on September 9. 1957 and was a federal voting rights bill. It was the first federal civil rights legislation passed by the United States Congress since the Civil Rights Act of 1875. It's purpose was to show the federal government's support for racial equality after the US Supreme Court's 1954 decision in Brown v. Board of Education of Topeka.The goal of the 1957 Civil Rights Act was to ensure that all Americans could exercise their right to vote. -
Hippies
The term "hippie" was taken from the word "Hipster". The word was used to describe "children of the road who believed they should make love, not war." Their counter culture involved wearing psychedelic floral clothing and growing long beards. This also became a era of fashion, film, and literature. In the mid 1960s they made a movement called the Flower power. The concept of the Flower Power movement emerged as a resistance to the Vietnam War. They wanted people to turn war into peace. -
New Frontier
The New Frontier was used by democratic presidential candidate, John F. Kennedy, in his acceptance speech in the 1960 United States election. It was used to get Americans to support him. The New Frontier was a slogan used by Kennedy as a way to describe his goals and policies for America in contrast to Eisenhower's conservative views. Kennedy wanted to raise minimum wage, wanted to cut business taxes, and wanted to land a man on the moon. -
Earl Warren Supreme Court
Earl Warren was an American jurist and politician who served as the 30th Governor of California. From 1953 to 1969, Warren became the 14th Chief Justice of the United States. The Warren Court expanded individual freedom for unpopular groups or behaviors at expense of accepted social norms. It criticized for "loose interpretation" of the Bill of Rights. The decisions of the court expanded civil rights and changed how we interpret our civil liberties. -
Counter Culture
The counterculture was an anti establishment cultural event that was started in the United Kingdom and the United States. It was then spread throughout the Western world in the 1960's and mid 1970's. The movement gained momentum as the Civil Rights Movement continued growing. Many men and women became political activists and were the main force behind the civil rights movement. Women and homosexuals demanded equality. -
Period: to
1960's
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Peace Corps
In 1960, John F. Kennedy suggested to the University of Michigan to help the new countries by advocating peace. The force was made up of civilians who volunteered their time and skills to travel to underdeveloped nations. He encouraged students to go to the countries in need and give them financial, educational, and physical aid. It was proved to be one of the most innovative and highly publicized Cold War programs made by the United States. -
Bay of Pigs
The invasion of the Bay of Pigs began when a trained group of Cuban refugees financed by the CIA attempted to overthrow the communist government of Fidel Castro. IN March of 1960, President Eisenhower ordered the CIA to train a group of Cuban exiles for an armed attack on Cuba. In 1961, Kennedy took over this program when he became president. On April 17, 1961, about 1,200 exiles, armed with American weapons and landing craft, waded ashore at the Bay of Pigs in Cuba. The attack ended a failure. -
Freedom Rides
Freedom Riders were groups of white and African American civil rights activists who participated in Freedom Rides, bus trips through the American South in 1961 to protest segregated bus terminals. Freedom Riders tried to use “whites-only” restrooms and lunch counters at bus stations in Alabama, South Carolina and other Southern states. The groups were confronted by arresting police officers, and violence from white protesters, but they also drew international attention to their cause. -
NASA
The Lyndon B. Johnson Space Center (JSC) known as that National Aeronautics and Space Administration, or NASA, is a spacecraft center where people train for human space lift, research, and flights control are conducted. It was renamed in honor of president Lyndon B. Johnson in February 19, 1973. The JSC originated in NASA's Space Task Group on November 5, 1958. In 1961, President Kennedy set a goal to put a man on the moon by the end of the decade. -
Birmingham March
The Birmingham movement, was a movement organized in early 1963 by the Southern Christian Leadership Conference to bring attention to the integration of African Americans in Birmingham, Alabama. It was led by MLK Jr., James Bevel, Fred Shuttlesworth and others, the campaign of nonviolent direct action culminated in widely publicized confrontations between young black students and white civic authorities, and eventually led the municipal government to change the city's discrimination laws. -
Birmingham Bombing
The Birmingham Church Bombing happened on September 15, 1963. A bomb was exploded before a Sunday morning Service at the 16th Street Baptist Church in Birmingham, Alabama. It was a church with a predominantly black audience that also served as a meeting place for civil rights leaders. In the bombing, four girls were killed and many others were injured. The girls were Cynthia Wesley, Carole Robertson and Addie Mae Collins who were all 14 years old, and Denise McNair, who was 11 years old. -
Assassination of JFK
John F. Kennedy was assassinated on November 23, 1963 in Dallas, TX by Lee Harvey Oswald. Kennedy was on a visit to Dallas to gather support for the presidential election of 1964. As the vehicle that Kennedy was shot in passed by a school building, Oswald fired three shots from the sixth floor JFK. President Kennedy was fatally wounded and Governor Connally was seriously injured. Kennedy was pronounced dead 30 minutes later at Parkland Hospital at the age of 46. -
Warren Commission
The Warren Commission was established by President Lyndon B. Johnson through Executive Order 11130, on November 29, 1963. It was also known as The President's Commission on the Assassination of President Kennedy. The Commission was established to investigate John F. Kennedy's death, a week after his assassination. After almost a year, it was concluded that Oswald had acted alone in the assassination. Other investigations still call into question this report. -
Freedom Summer
Freedom Summer was a 1964 voter registration drive, sponsored by civil rights organizations. It was aimed at increasing black voter registration in Mississippi. The Freedom Summer workers included black Mississippians and more than 1,000 out-of-state, predominately white volunteers. The KKK, police and state and local authorities carried out a series of violent attacks against the activists and the murder of at least three people. -
Great Society
The Great Society was an aggressive series of policy actions, legislation and programs initiated by President Lyndon B. Johnson. Its main goals were to end poverty, reduce crime, abolishing inequality and improving the environment. In 1964, Johnson laid out for his agenda for "great society" during a speech he gave at the University of Michigan. It was the largest social reform plan in history. -
Daisy Girl Ad
"Daisy", "Daisy Girl", or "Peace Little Girl" was a controversial political advertisement that was aired on television during the presidential election of 1964. It was aired by the president Lyndon B. Johnson's campaign. "Daisy" was aired only once during September 7, 1964 on the NBC Monday Movie. The campaign was widely criticized for using the idea of nuclear war just like Goldwater did. -
Civil Rights Act of 1964
The Civil Rights Act of 1964 ended segregation in public places and banned employment discrimination based on race, color, religion, sex, or national origin. It is considered one of the crowning legislative achievements of the civil rights movement. The Act was first proposed by President John F. Kennedy. It survived strong opposition from southern members of Congress and was then signed into law by Lyndon B. Johnson. -
Anti-war Movement
The Anti-War movement is a social movement, usually in opposition to a particular nation's decision to start or carry on an armed conflict. The term also refers to pacifism, opposing all use of military force during conflicts. The protests were part of a movement in opposition to the Vietnam War and took place mainly in the United States. The movement alarmed many citizens in the U.S. government. -
Voting Rights Act of 1965
The Voting Rights Act of 1965, which was signed into law by President Lyndon B. Johnson, aimed to overcome legal barriers at the state and local levels that prevented African Americans from exercising their right to vote as guaranteed under the 15th Amendment to the U.S. Constitution. The Act significantly widened the franchise and is considered among the most far-reaching pieces of civil rights legislation in U.S. history. -
My Lai Massacre
The My Lai Massacre was commited against unarmed civilians during the Vietnam War. On March 16, in the village of My Lai, American soldiers killed lots of people including women, old men, and children. More than 500 people were slaughtered in the massacre, including young girls and women who were raped and disfigured before being killed. This was covered up for a year before it was reported leading into a international outrage. The killings divided the US over the Vietnam War. -
Apollo 11
Apollo 11 was the spaceflight which landed the first two human beings on the moon. Mission commander Neil Armstrong and pilot Buzz Aldrin, landed the lunar module Eagle spacecraft on July 20, 1969, at 8:18 pm. Armstrong became known as the first human to step foot onto the moon's surface 6 hour after landing. After 20 minutes, Aldrin joined him and they both spent about 30 minutes outside the spacecraft. In that time they collected about 47.5 lbs of lunar material taking it back to planet Earth. -
Organization of Petroleum Exporting Countries (OPEC)
The Organization of the Petroleum Exporting Countries (OPEC) is a permanent, intergovernmental Organization, created at the Baghdad Conference on September 10 through 14 of 1960, by Iran, Iraq, Kuwait, Saudi Arabia and Venezuela. In the 1970s, OPEC rose to international prominence as its Member Countries took control of their domestic petroleum industries and acquired a major say in the pricing of crude oil on world markets. -
Period: to
1970s
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Environmental Protection Agency (EPA)
The Environmental Protection Agency is an administrative agency created by Congress in 1970 to coordinate the implementation and enforcement of the federal environmental protection laws.The monitoring of pollution emissions, the enforcement of various regulations, and the interpretation of environmental laws falls under the responsibility of the EPA. It controlled pollution in the areas of air, water, solid waste, pesticides, radiation, and toxic substances -
Equal Rights Amendment
The Equal Rights Amendment was passed by the U.S. Senate and sent to the states for ratification, on March 22, 1972. The amendment was first proposed by the National Woman’s political party in 1923. The Equal Rights Amendment was to provide for the legal equality of the sexes and prohibit discrimination on the basis of sex. It won the requisite two-thirds vote from the U.S. House of Representatives in October 1971, and in March 1972, it was approved by the U.S. Senate and sent to the states. -
Watergate
The Watergate scandal began when several burglars were arrested in the office of the Democratic National Committee. The prowlers were connected to President Richard Nixon’s reelection campaign, and they had been caught wiretapping phones and stealing documents. Nixon took aggressive steps to cover up the crime afterwards, and in August 1974, after his role in the conspiracy was revealed, Nixon resigned. -
Title IX
Title IX was passed as part of the Education Amendments of 1972. It was co-authored and introduced by Senator Birch Bayh in the U.S. Senate and later renamed the Patsy Mink Equal Opportunity in Education Act in 2002 after Patsy Mink, its late U.S. House co-author and sponsor. It said that no person in the US shall, on the basis of sex, be excluded from participation, be denied the benefits, or be subjected to discrimination under any education program or activity receiving Federal financial aid. -
Roe v. Wade
Roe v. Wade was a landmark 1973 Supreme Court decision that established a woman’s legal right to an abortion. The Court ruled in a 7-2 decision that a woman’s right to choose an abortion was protected by the privacy rights guaranteed by the Fourteenth Amendment to the U.S. Constitution. The legal decision was rooted in the 1965 case of Griswold v. Connecticut that established the right to privacy involving medical procedures. Women in the 1700s often took drugs to end their unwanted pregnancies. -
Heritage Foundation
The Heritage Foundation is an American conservative public policy think tank based in Washington, D.C. The foundation took a leading role in the conservative movement during the presidency of Ronald Reagan, whose policies were taken from Heritage's policy study Mandate for Leadership. Its stated mission is to formulate and promote public policies based on the principles of "free enterprise, limited government, individual freedom, traditional American values, and a strong national defense." -
War Powers Resolution Act
The War Powers Resolution or War Powers Act, is a federal law designed to limit the United States president's ability to initiate or escalate military actions. The law requires the president to notify U.S. congress after positioning the armed forces. It also limits how long units can remain engaged without approval of the congress. The Act was passed in 1973 as a result of the Vietnam War. They hoped to avoid long wars. -
Endangered Species Act
The Endangered Species Act of 1973, is one of the few dozens of US environmental laws passed in the 1970s. It carries out the provisions outlined in The Convention on International Trade in Endangered Species of Wild Fauna and Flora. It is designed to protect critically imperiled species from extinction as a "consequence of economic growth and development untempered by adequate concern and conservation", the ESA was signed into law by President Richard Nixon on December 28, 1973. -
FEC (Federal Election Commission)
The federal Election Commission is an independent regulatory agency whose purpose is to enforce campaign finance law in United States federal elections. It was created in 1974 through amendments to the Federal Election Campaign Act. The commission describes its duties as "to disclose campaign finance information, to enforce the provisions of the law such as the limits and prohibitions on contributions, and to oversee the public funding of Presidential elections." -
Iran Hostage Crisis
The Iran Crisis was a group of Iranian students who stormed the U.S. Embassy in Tehran, taking more than 60 American hostages. The cause of this action was President Jimmy Carter’s decision to allow Iran’s deposed Shah, a pro-Western autocrat who had been expelled from his country some months before, to come to the United States for cancer treatment. The students set their hostages free on Jan. 21, 1981, 444 days after the crisis began. and hours after Reagan delivered his inaugural address. -
Home Video Game Systems
A video game console is an electronic, digital or computer device that outputs a video signal or visual image to display a video game that one or more people can play. A "video game console" is primarily used to distinguish a console machine primarily designed for consumers to use for playing video games. The first video games appeared in the 1960s. They were played on massive computers connected to vector displays. Ralph H. Baer conceived the idea of a home video game in 1951. -
Rap Music
Rap is a musical form of vocal delivery that incorporates rhyme, rhythmic speech, and street vernacular, which is performed or chanted in a variety of ways, usually over a back beat or musical accompaniment. The components of rap include content, flow, and delivery. Rap was used to describe talking on records as early as 1971, on Isaac Hayes' album Black Moses with track names such as "Ike's Rap". Hayes', husky-voiced sexy spoken 'raps', became key components in his signature sound". -
Video Head System (VHS)
The Video Home System (VHS) is a standard for consumer-level analog video recording on tape cassettes. They were developed by Victor Company of Japan (JVC) in the early 1970s. It was released in Japan in late 1976 and in the United States in early 1977. In the 1970s and early 1980s, there was a format war in the home video industry. VHS and Betamax, received the most media exposure. VHS won and emerged as the dominant home video format throughout the tape media period. -
Period: to
1980's
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Election of 1980
The Election of 1980, was an American presidential election held on Nov. 4, 1980, in which Republican Ronald Reagan defeated incumbent Democratic Pres. Jimmy Carter. The election was the 49th quadrennial presidential election. Ronald Reagan defeated incumbent Democrat Jimmy Carter. Due to the rise of conservativism following Reagan's victory, some historians consider the election to be a realigning election that marked the start of the "Reagan Era". -
Space Shuttle Program
The Space Shuttle program was the fourth human spaceflight program carried out by NASA, which accomplished routine transportation for Earth-to-orbit crew and cargo from 1981 to 2011. Its was officially named the Space Transportation System, or STS. It was taken from a 1969 plan for a system of reusable spacecraft of which it was the only item funded for development. All Space Shuttle missions were launched from the Kennedy Space Center. -
A.I.D.S. Crisis
The AIDS epidemic, caused by HIV, found its way to the United States in the 1960s but was first noticed after doctors discovered clusters of Kaposi's sarcoma and pneumocystis pneumonia in young gay men in Los Angeles, New York City, and San Francisco in 1981. Treatment of HIV/AIDS was through "drug cocktail" of protease inhibitors, and education programs to help people avoid infection.Gay and bisexual men, African Americans, and Latinos remain disproportionately affected by AIDS in the US. -
Strategic Defense Initiative
Strategic Defense Initiativ, also called Star Wars, proposed U.S. strategic defensive system against potential nuclear attacks, which were originally conceived, from the Soviet Union. The SDI was first proposed by President Ronald Reagan in a nationwide television address on March 23, 1983. Because parts of the defensive system that Reagan advocated would be based in space, the proposed system was dubbed “Star Wars,” after the space weaponry of a popular motion picture of the same name. -
Reagan Doctrine
President Ronald Reagan defined some of the key concepts of his foreign policy, establishing what comes to be known as the “Reagan Doctrine.” The doctrine served as the foundation for the Reagan administration’s support of “freedom fighters” around the globe.The Reagan Doctrine was a strategy orchestrated and implemented by the United States under the Reagan Administration to overwhelm the global influence of the Soviet Union in an attempt to end the Cold War. -
Iran–Contra affair
The Iran-Contra Affair was a secret U.S. government arms deal that freed some American hostages held in Lebanon but also funded armed conflict in Central America. The controversial dealmaking threatened to bring down the presidency of Ronald Reagan and occurred during his second presidency. The scandal began as an operation to free seven American hostages being held in Lebanon by Hezbollah. Israel would ship weapons to Iran, and then the US would resupply Israel and receive the Israeli payment. -
Challenger Explosion
The NASA space shuttle Challenger exploded on January 28, 1986, 73 seconds after it was liftoff. The disaster ended the lives of all seven astronauts aboard, including Christa McAuliffe, a teacher who would have been the first civilian in space. It was later determined that two rubber O-rings, which had been designed to separate the sections of the rocket booster, had failed due to cold temperatures on the morning of the launch. NASA was caused to temporarily suspend all shuttle missions. -
Black Entertainment Television
Black Entertainment Television (BET) is a Viacom–owned cable network based in Washington, D.C. The network first aired on January 25, 1980. Robert L. Johnson, the founder, was a former lobbyist for the cable television industry in the late 1970s. In that capacity, Johnson quickly recognized the dearth of television programming. It was designed for the African American public and created BET to reach that demographic audience. -
Oprah Winfrey
Oprah Gail Winfrey was born January 29, 1954. She is an American media proprietor, talk show host, actress, producer, and philanthropist. She is best known for her talk show The Oprah Winfrey Show, which was the highest-rated television program of its kind in history and was nationally syndicated from 1986 to 2011 in Chicago, Illinois. By the mid-1990s, she had reinvented her show with a focus on literature, self-improvement, and spirituality & was criticized for unleashing a confession culture. -
Internet
Nikola Tesla toyed with the idea of a “world wireless system” in the early 1900s, and visionary thinkers like Paul Otlet and Vannevar Bush conceived of mechanized, searchable storage systems of books and media in the 1930s and 1940s. Still, the first practical schematics for the Internet did not arrive until the early 1960s, when the first workable prototype of the Internet came with the creation the Advanced Research Projects Agency Network, originally funded by the U.S. Department of Defense -
Period: to
1990s
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Persian Gulf War
Iraqi leader Saddam Hussein ordered the invasion and occupation of neighboring Kuwait in early August 1990. Arab powers such as Saudi Arabia and Egypt called on the United States and other Western nations to intervene. Hussein defied UN Security Council demands to withdraw from Kuwait by mid-January 1991, and the Persian Gulf War began with a massive U.S. offensive, Operation Desert Storm. After 42 days, U.S. President George H.W. Bush declared a cease-fire on Feb. 28, & was considered a fail. -
Election of 1992
The United States presidential election of 1992 was the 52nd quadrennial presidential election. It was held on November 3, 1992. Governor Bill Clinton of Arkansas (Democratic) defeated President George H. W. Bush (Republican), independent businessman Ross Perot of Texas, and a number of minor candidates. Bush won by breaking his 1988 campaign pledge against raising taxes, but he fended off a primary challenge from conservative commentator Pat Buchanan. -
World Trade Center Attack
The 1993 World Trade Center bombing was a terrorist attack on the World Trade Center on February 26, 1993. It happened when a truck bomb detonated below the North Tower of the World Trade Center in New York City. The 1,336 pounds urea nitrate, hydrogen gas enhanced device, was intended to send the North Tower crashing into the South Tower bringing both towers down and killing tens of thousands of people. It failed to do so but killed six people and injured over a thousand. -
North American Free Trade Agreement
The North American Free Trade Agreement (NAFTA), is an agreement signed by Canada, Mexico, and the United States, creating a trilateral trade bloc in North America. The agreement came into force on January 1, 1994. It superseded the United States Free Trade Agreement between the U.S. and Canada. NAFTA had two supplements, the North American Agreement on Environmental Cooperation (NAAEC) and the North American Agreement on Labor Cooperation (NAALC). -
Don't Ask Don't Tell Policy
The "Don't ask, don't tell" was the official United States policy on military service by gays, bisexuals, and lesbians, instituted by the Clinton Administration on February 28, 1994. It was issued on December 21, 1993, took effect lasting until September 20, 2011. The policy prohibited military personnel from discriminating against or harassing closeted homosexual or bisexual service members or applicants, while barring openly gay, lesbian, or bisexual persons from military service. -
Welfare Reform
Welfare reforms are changes in the operation of a given welfare system, with goals of reducing the number of individuals dependent on government assistance, keeping the welfare systems affordable, and assisting recipients become self-sufficient.The bill was authored b President Bill Clinton signed PRWORA into law on August 22, 1996, fulfilling his 1992 campaign promise to "end welfare as we have come to know it". -
Defense of Marriage Act (DOMA)
The Defense of Marriage Act is a law that prohibited married same sex couples from collecting federal benefits. It was overruled on June 26, 2015 by the U.S. Supreme Court decision in Obergefell v. Hodge. It was enacted September 21, 1996, and initially introduced in May 1996. DOMA passed both houses of Congress by large, veto-proof majorities and was signed into law by President Bill Clinton in September 1996. -
Period: to
Contemporary
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Election of 2000
The United States presidential election of 2000 was the 54th quadrennial presidential election. It was held on November 7, 2000. Republican candidate George W. Bush and the eldest son of the 41st President George H. W. Bush, narrowly defeated Democratic nominee Al Gore, the incumbent vice president. It was the fourth of five presidential elections in which the winning candidate lost the popular vote. President Bill Clinton was ineligible to serve a third term due to the term limits -
9/11 Attacks
On September 11, 2001, 19 militants associated with the Islamic extremist group al-Qaeda hijacked four airplanes and carried out suicide attacks against targets in the United States. Two of the planes were flown into the twin towers of the World Trade Center in New York City, a third plane hit the Pentagon just outside Washington, D.C., and the fourth plane crashed in a field in Pennsylvania. Almost 3,000 people were killed during the 9/11 terrorist attacks. -
War on Terror
The war on terror is an international military campaign that was launched by the U.S. government after the September 11 attacks in the U.S. in 2001.The term "war on terror" was originally used with a particular focus on countries associated with al-Qaeda, and was criticized by such people as Richard B. Myers, chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff, and more nuanced ones subsequently came to be used by the Bush administration to publicly define the international campaign led by the U.S. -
USA PATRIOT Act
The USA PATRIOT Act is an Act of Congress that was signed into law by President George W. Bush on October 26, 2001. The full title is “Uniting and Strengthening America by Providing Appropriate Tools Required to Intercept and Obstruct Terrorism Act of 2001” The abbreviation, as well as the full title, have been attributed to Chris Kyle, a former staffer on the House Judiciary Committee. It was passed in response to the terrorist attacks on September 11 of that same year -
No Child Left Behind Education Act
The No Child Left Behind Act authorizes several federal education programs that are administered by the states. The law is a re authorization of the Elementary and Secondary Education Act. Under the law, states are required to test students in reading and math in grades 3–8 and once in high school. The Act is a law that provides money for extra educational assistance for poor children in return for improvements in their academic progress. -
Hurricane Katrina Disaster
Hurricane Katrina struck the Gulf Coast of the United States. The storm had a Category 3 rating on the Saffir-Simpson Hurricane Scale, it brought sustained winds of 100–140 miles per hour and stretched some 400 miles across. The storm did a great deal of damage and was catastrophic. There was massive flooding, and many people charged that the federal government was slow to meet the needs of the people affected by the storm. Its estimated that Katrina caused more than $100 billion in damage. -
The Great Recession
The Great Recession was a global economic downturn that devastated world financial markets as well as the banking and real estate industries. The crisis led to increases in home mortgage foreclosures worldwide and caused millions of people to lose their life savings, their jobs and their homes. It’s generally considered to be the longest period of economic decline since the Great Depression of the 1930s. -
Election of 2008
The United States presidential election of 2008 was the 56th quadrennial presidential election. It took place on November 4, 2008. The candidates were Barack Obama, a Senator from Illinois, and Joe Biden, a long-time Senator from Delaware, defeated the Republican ticket of Senator John McCain of Arizona and Governor Sarah Palin of Alaska. Obama was the first African American ever to be elected as president, and Joe Biden became the first Catholic to ever be elected as vice president. -
American Recovery and Reinvestment Act
The American Recovery and Reinvestment Act of 2009 was a stimulus package enacted by the 111th U.S. Congress and signed into law by President Barack Obama in February 2009. It was developed in response to the Great Recession. The ARRA was made primarily to save existing jobs and create new ones as soon as possible. It was also made to provide temporary relief programs for those most affected by the recession and invest in infrastructure, education, health, and renewable energy. -
Affordable Care Act
The Affordable Care Act, also called Obamacare, was enacted in March 2010. The law has 3 primary goals, to support innovative medical care delivery methods designed to lower the costs of health care generally, make affordable health insurance available to more people, and to expand the Medicaid program to cover all adults with income below 138% of the federal poverty level. The ACA's major provisions came into force in 2014.
