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President Franklin D. Roosevelt asks the U.S. Congress for a defense budget hike.
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The United States declares its neutrality in the European war after Germany invaded Poland, effectively beginning World War II after a year of European attempts to appease Hitler and the aims of expansionist Nazi Germany.
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Japanese fighter planes attack the American base at Pearl Harbor destroying U.S. aircraft and naval vessels, and killing 2,355 U.S. servicemen and 68 civilians.
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Germany and Italy, Japan's axis partners, declare war on the United States. The United States declares war on Germany, Italy, and Japan.
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A second atomic bomb is dropped in Nagasaki.
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A formal surrender ceremony is conducted in Tokyo Bay on the U.S. battleship Missouri. World War II officially ends
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- Korean War begins
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Dwight D. Eisenhower inaugurated as President
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Disneyland opens at Anaheim, California
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Actor James Dean is killed in a highway accident
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Vietnam War officially begins with 900 military advisors landing in Saigon
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Rosa Parks incites the Montgomery Bus Boycott
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Civil Rights Act of 1964, outlawing major forms of discrimination against blacks and women, and ended racial segregation in the United States
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United States presidential election,
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Voting Rights Act
