1636—Harvard College (now University) becomes the first institution of higher learning in the American colonies.
1649—The first religious toleration act in America grants freedom of worship to both Protestants and Catholics in Maryland.
1692—A group of young girls initiate a savage witch hunt in Salem Village, Massachusetts. Twenty people are executed, and many more imprisoned. Pages: 229-46.
1702—Edward Hyde, Lord Cornbury, becomes the royal governor of New York and reportedly takes to dressing like the British monarch he represents—Queen Anne. Pages: 247-48.
1733—Benjamin Franklin’s Poor Richard’s Almanack is first published.
1763—Britain defeats France in the French and Indian War, gaining all French territory east of the Mississippi River except New Orleans. It is an expensive victory, with unexpected consequences in the relationship between Britain and her colonies. Historian Carl Van Doren later writes, “The French and Indian War, which made the British government think of the colonies as important enough to be taxed, had made the Americans think of themselves as important enough to say how they should be taxed.”
1765—The British Parliament passes the Stamp Act, imposing a tax on newspapers, legal documents, and other printed material. The act is bitterly opposed in the colonies, giving rise to organized resistance and the slogan, “No taxation without representation.” The act is repealed the following year, but Parliament reasserts its right to tax the colonies.
1770—British soldiers stationed in Boston fire into a crowd of agitated colonists, killing three and wounding eight (two of whom later succumb to their injuries). The event, which colonial leaders call the Boston Massacre, is used to rally Americans against oppressive British policies.
1771—Patrick Henry’s wife, Sarah, apparently suffering from extreme psychosis, is confined to the basement of the family home, sometimes in a straitjacket. Page: 249.
1773—Protesting the British importation of duty-free tea, American colonists dressed as Indians stage the Boston Tea Party, raiding three ships in Boston Harbor and dumping 342 chests of tea into the water.
1774—The First Continental Congress, a convention of delegates from all the American colonies (except Georgia), meets in Philadelphia to address British injustices. These include what became known as the Intolerable Acts, which Parliament imposed as punishment for the Boston Tea Party. The Congress adopts a Declaration of Rights, establishing the colonial position on taxation and trade. Britain ignores it.
1775—The Revolutionary War begins when British soldiers and Massachusetts minutemen clash at Lexington and Concord. The Second Continental Congress appoints George Washington as commander-in-chief of the colonial army, and makes a final, futile appeal to Britain to right matters without additional fighting.
1776—The United States of America becomes a new nation when the Second Continental Congress adopts the Declaration of Independence, written by Thomas Jefferson. Britain offers a reward to learn the names of the Declaration’s signers, asserting that the act constitutes high treason punishable by death.
1776—Benjamin Franklin arranges for the harsh imprisonment of his only son, William, in retaliation for his remaining loyal to Britain. Pages: 3-6.
1777—American forces defeat the British at Saratoga, New York, turning the tide of the Revolutionary War and convincing France to form a military alliance with the new nation.
1778—John Adams joins Ben Franklin in Paris, and develops an intense dislike for him. Pages: 39-41.
1779—Benedict Arnold turns traitor. Pages: 171-76.
1781—British forces are defeated at Yorktown, Virginia, in the last major battle of the Revolutionary War.
1781—Mary Ball Washington humiliates son George by complaining of his financial neglect to the Virginia House of Delegates. Pages: 7-8.
1783—In what has been called the greatest diplomatic feat in American history, the United States and Britain sign the Treaty of Paris, officially ending the war between them and establishing the new nation’s borders. U.S. territory is extended west to the Mississippi River, north to Canada, and south to Florida.
1787—The Founding Fathers write the Constitution, establishing a unique system of government that survives to this day. “Our Constitution is so simple and practical that it is possible to meet extraordinary needs by changes in emphasis and arrangement without loss of essential form,” Franklin D. Roosevelt later states at his first inauguration. “That is why our constitutional system has proved itself the most superbly enduring political mechanism the modern world has produced.”
1789—The Electoral College unanimously chooses George Washington to serve as the first president of the United States. Washington and his wife move into the first presidential home at No. 1 Cherry Street in New York City, the nation’s first capital.
1789—John Adams becomes George Washington’s vice president, taking a back seat, once again, to George Washington—and not liking it one bit. “I am vice president,” he says. “In this I am nothing.” Pages: 37-39.
1791—The Bill of Rights is added to the Constitution, guaranteeing freedom of speech, religion, the press, and the rights, among others, to trial by jury and peaceful assembly.
1793—Eli Whitney invents the cotton gin, allowing for a quicker, more economical means of separating cottonseeds from fiber. The invention helps make the fledgling United States the world’s leading cotton producer, but “King Cotton” also leads to a greater dependence on slavery in the South.
1794—President Washington sends in federal troops to quash the Whiskey Rebellion, a violent protest by whiskey producers in Pennsylvania against the federal tax on their product. The president’s action establishes the federal government’s authority to enforce its laws within the states.
1796—John Adams and Thomas Jefferson clash in the first real presidential campaign, and in the second, four years later. Pages: 41-46, 155-58.
1798—Congress passes the Alien and Sedition Acts, designed to silence opposition to an expected war with France. The widely unpopular measures, which, among other things, make it a crime to criticize the president, contribute to the eventual demise of the Federalist Party.
1798—Representative Matthew Lyon of Vermont spits in the face of Connecticut’s Roger Griswold, starting the first recorded congressional brawl. Page: 135.
1800—Washington, D.C., carved out of Maryland and Virginia, becomes the nation’s capital. First Lady Abigail Adams describes the mostly undeveloped federal city as “romantic but wild, a wilderness at present.”
1801—John Marshall is appointed chief justice of the U.S. Supreme Court by President John Adams. During his tenure of thirty-four years (the longest in court history), Marshall raises the Supreme Court to a level of importance equal to that of the executive and judicial branches of government. This is accomplished through such landmark decisions as Marbury v. Madison (1803), in which the court’s authority to declare laws unconstitutional is established.
1803—The Louisiana Purchase from France doubles the size of the United States, extending its western border to the Rocky Mountains. Part or all of fifteen states are later formed from the vast acquisition. In making the deal with Napoleon of France, President Jefferson later admits that he “stretched the Constitution until it cracked.”
1804—Meriwether Lewis and William Clark embark upon their epic trek across the continent to explore the lands recently acquired in the Louisiana Purchase and beyond to the Pacific Ocean. They are introduced to many Native American tribes, as well as to previously unknown plant and animal species. “It seemed,” Lewis wrote, “as if those seens [sic] of visionary enchantment would never have an end.”
1804 —Aaron Burr kills Alexander Hamilton in a duel, then embarks on his potentially treasonous trek through the American West a year later. Pages: 47-51, 175-82.
1806—Andrew Jackson kills Charles Dickinson in a duel, one of many in which the violent future president engaged. Pages: 58-63.
1807—Robert Fulton’s Clermont becomes the first financially successful steamboat, traveling up the Hudson River from New York City to Albany in about thirty hours. “Some imagined it to be a sea monster,” a witness of the first voyage later recalls, “while others did not hesitate to express their belief that it was a sign of the approaching judgement.”
1809—Famed explorer Meriwether Lewis kills himself in Tennessee. Pages: 250-53.
1809—Body of Revolutionary War hero “Mad” Anthony Wayne is exhumed; his corpse is boiled to separate flesh from bone. Pages: 273-74.
1811—A confederation of Indian tribes led by the charismatic Shawnee chief Tecumseh resists the westward movement of white settlers. Tecumseh’s brother Tenskwatawa leads an attack on the forces of William Henry Harrison, governor of the Indiana Territory, and is defeated in the Battle of Tippecanoe. “The implicit obedience and respect which the followers of Tecumseh pay to him is astonishing,” writes Harrison, “and more than any other circumstance bespeaks him one of those uncommon geniuses which spring up occasionally to produce revolutions, and overturn the established order of things.”
1811—Construction begins on what becomes known as the National Road, linking the East with the Midwest.
1812—The War of 1812 begins after years of British interference with American shipping and other degradations.
1814—British forces capture the nation’s capital, burning the President’s House, the U.S. Capitol, and other government buildings. “Few thought of going to bed,” a Washington resident later writes of the destruction. “They spent the night in gazing on the fires and lamenting the disgrace of the city.” The British are subsequently repelled after attacking Baltimore, prompting Francis Scott Key to compose “The Star-Spangled Banner.”
1817—Thomas Paine’s corpse is removed from its grave in the United States and taken on an unsuccessful tour of Britain. Pages: 275-77.
1819—Spain cedes Florida to the United States.
1820—With the issue of slavery creating deep divisions within the nation, the Missouri Compromise is reached. Under its terms, Missouri is admitted to the Union as a slave state and Maine as a free state, thus maintaining the balance of slave and free states in the U.S. Senate. The Compromise also bans slavery from the Louisiana Purchase north of the southern boundary of Missouri, except in Missouri itself. “If the Union must be dissolved, slavery is precisely the question upon which it ought to break,” writes John Quincy Adams. “For the present, however, this contest is laid asleep.”
1820 —James Barron kills Stephen Decatur in a duel, one of many that take place at the “Dark and Bloody Grounds” just outside Washington. Pages: 52-55.
1823—The Monroe Doctrine warns European nations against interfering in the affairs of the Western Hemisphere and declares that the North and South American continents are “henceforth not to be considered as subjects for future colonization by any European powers.”
1828—Andrew Jackson blames his political foes for the death of his beloved wife, Rachael. Pages: 159-61.
1828—“The Eaton Malaria” spreads across official Washington, resulting in mass resignations from President Andrew Jackson’s cabinet. Pages: 64-71.
1829—John Quincy Adams’s eldest son George hurls himself into Long Island Sound rather than face his father’s wrath. Pages: 9-11.
1829—Sam Houston and Eliza Allen marry, and immediately separate. Pages: 12-14.
1830—President Andrew Jackson signs the Indian Removal Act, requiring eastern Indians to be resettled west of the Mississippi River. During the forced exodus that follows, known as “The Trail of Tears,” thousands die. “At this very moment a low sound of distant thunder fell on my ear,” a witness to the first drive later recalls. “In almost an exact western direction a dark spiral cloud was rising above the horizon and sent forth a murmur I almost fancied a voice of divine indignation for the wrongs of my poor and unhappy countrymen, driven by brutal power from all they loved and cherished in the land of their fathers, to gratify the cravings of avarice.”
1831—Nat Turner, a black preacher in Virginia, leads a violent slave revolt in which fifty-four whites are killed. During the manhunt that follows, at least one hundred blacks are killed, while Turner and twenty others are later hanged.
1836—Three thousand Mexican troops under Santa Anna storm the Alamo, a fortified mission in San Antonio, Texas. It is defended by 182 Texans and Tennessean Davy Crockett, under the command of Colonels William B. Travis and James Bowie. The garrison is overpowered within an hour and all the defenders killed.
1844—On a test line of his telegraph between Washington, D.C., and Baltimore, Samuel F. B. Morse taps the famous line, “What hath God wrought!”
1845—The Republic of Texas becomes the nation’s twenty-eighth state.
1845—Frederick Douglass’s autobiography, Narrative of the Life of Frederick Douglass, is published.
1845—Edgar Allan Poe’s The Raven is published.
1846—At the request of President Polk, Congress declares war on Mexico. The United States quickly defeats its weaker southern neighbor and gains a vast stretch of territory, from Texas west to the Pacific Ocean and north to Oregon.
1846—Britain cedes the southern portion of its Oregon Territory below Vancouver to the United States.
1846—After Joseph Smith is killed by a mob, Brigham Young leads a mass exodus of Mormons from Illinois to Utah.
1848—Lucretia Mott and Elizabeth Cady Stanton organize the first U.S. women’s rights convention in Seneca Falls, New York. The convention adopts a Declaration of Sentiments, which calls for women to receive “all the rights and privileges which belong to them as citizens of the United States.” “The proceedings [of the convention] were extensively published, unsparingly ridiculed by the press, and denounced from the pulpit, much to the surprise and chagrin of the leaders,” the convention’s organizers later write. “Being deeply in earnest, and believing their demands preeminently wise and just, they were wholly unprepared to find themselves the target for the jibes and jeers of the nation.”
1848—James Marshall discovers gold at Sutter’s Mill in California, triggering the greatest gold rush in American history.
1850—The Compromise of 1850 temporarily simmers the growing strife over slavery by admitting California to the Union as a free state, and allowing the territories of New Mexico and Utah to decide the issue for themselves. The Compromise also abolishes the slave trade in the District of Columbia, while providing a stricter federal law for the return of runaway slaves.
1850—Nathaniel Hawthorne’s The Scarlet Letter is published.
1851—Isaac Singer devises the first continuous-stitch sewing machine, the first major home appliance.
1851—Herman Melville’s Moby-Dick is published.
1852—Harriet Beecher Stowe’s antislavery novel Uncle Tom’s Cabin becomes a best-seller and further inflames the agitation over slavery. When Stowe is introduced to President Lincoln a decade later during the Civil War, he greets her with the question, “Is this the little woman whose book made such a great war?”
1854—Congress passes the Kansas-Nebraska Act, allowing the people of the two territories to decide for themselves whether or not to allow slavery. President Franklin Pierce signs the bill into law, despite the fact that Kansas and Nebraska are in that part of the country where slavery had been “forever prohibited” under the Missouri Compromise of 1820. The bitter and violent reaction to the new law offers a preview of the Civil War to come.
1854—The Republican Party is formed in Ripon, Wisconsin, by antislavery groups opposed to the Kansas-Nebraska Act.
1854—Henry David Thoreau’s Walden is published.
1855—Walt Whitman publishes at his own expense his first volume of poetry, Leaves of Grass, prompting one reviewer to call him “the dirtiest beast of his age.”
1856—Charles Sumner, an abolitionist senator from Massachusetts, is beaten senseless by Representative Preston S. Brooks of
South Carolina after delivering his “Crimes Against Kansas” speech. Pages: 137-39.
1857—Elisha G. Otis installs the first passenger elevator, in New York City.
1857—Chief Justice Roger Taney delivers the infamous Dred Scott decision. Pages: 185-90.
1859—The first commercially productive oil well is drilled near Titusville, Pennsylvania.
1859—Representative Daniel Sickles of New York kills friend Philip Barton Key, son of “Star-Spangled Banner” composer Francis Scott Key, in front of the White House after discovering Key’s affair with his wife. Pages : 254-61.
1860—The Pony Express begins delivering mail from St. Louis, Missouri, then the western terminus of the American railroad system, to Sacramento, California. It closes the next year upon completion of the transcontinental telegraph.
1860—Abraham Lincoln is sharply abused and vilified in his quest for the presidency, and again four years later when he seeks reelection. Pages: 160-62.
1861—Ten Southern states follow South Carolina out of the Union and form the Confederate States of America. The Civil War begins on April 12, when Southern troops fire on Fort Sumter in Charleston Harbor.
1862—The Homestead Act grants free/cheap public land to frontier settlers.
1862—The nation’s first federal income tax is levied to help pay for the Civil War. It ends in 1872, but becomes a permanent fixture in American life in 1913.
1862—President Lincoln fires General George B. McClellan for, among other things, his chronic “slows.” Pages: 72-78.
1863—President Lincoln issues the Emancipation Proclamation, calling it “a fit and necessary war measure.” Although the Proclamation does not actually free a single slave (because it applies only to those areas under Confederate control), it does formally establish the abolition of slavery as a goal of the war, and strengthens the Northern war effort by providing for the incorporation of blacks into the Union army and navy.
A Treasury of Great American Scandals Page 28