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Comparative Timelines
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1520
(no entry for this year)
Slave Revolt: the Caribbean Slaves rebel on the Caribbean island of Hispaniola, which now comprises Haiti and the Dominican Republic.
1522
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1524
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1525
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1526
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1527
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1528
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1529
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1530
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Sebastian Münster publishes Horologiographia, a treatise on the construction of sun dials.
1531
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Francisco Pizarro leads the Spanish conquest of the Inca Empire.
Sugarcane is first grown in Brazil.
1532
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1534
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1535
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Niccolò Tartaglia publishes Nova Scientia, a treatise on gunnery science. This was Tartaglia's first published work and was described by Matteo Valleriani as: ... one of the most fundamental works on mechanics of the Renaissance, indeed, the first to transform aspects of practical knowledge accumulated by the early modern artillerists into a theoretical and mathematical framework. Then dominant Aristotelian physics preferred categories like "heavy" and "natural" and "violent" to describe motion, generally eschewing mathematical explanations. Tartaglia brought mathematical models to the fore. One of his findings was that the maximum range of a projectile was achieved by directing the cannon at a 45-degree angle to the horizon.
William Tyndale's partial translation of the Bible into English is published, which would eventually be incorporated into the King James Bible.
1537
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1538
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Spain annexes Cuba.
1539
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Hernando de Alarcón sets sail to explore the Baja California peninsula; on September 26 he enters the Colorado River.
The Society of Jesus, or the Jesuits, is founded by Ignatius of Loyola and six companions with the approval of Pope Paul III.
1540
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The western headwaters of the Amazon River are encountered and explored by Francisco de Orellana.
Spanish explorer Hernando de Soto reaches the Mississippi River, naming it Rio de Espiritu Santo.
1541
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Juan Rodr guez Cabrillo explores the coast of California.
Pope Paul III establishes the Inquisition in Rome.
War resumes between Francis I of France and Emperor Charles V. This time Henry VIII is allied with the Emperor, while James V of Scotland and Sultan Suleiman I are allied with the French.
1542
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1543
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1544
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1545
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1546
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Edward VI becomes King of England and Ireland on 28 January and is crowned on 20 February at the age of 9. The son of Henry VIII and Jane Seymour, Edward was England's first monarch to be raised as a Protestant. During his reign, the realm was governed by a Regency Council because he never reached his majority.
Grand Prince Ivan the Terrible is crowned tsar of (All)Russia, thenceforth becoming the first Russian tsar.
1547
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Battle of Uedahara: Firearms are used for the first time on the battlefield in Japan.
1548
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1549
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1550
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1551
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1552
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Mary Tudor becomes the first queen regnant of England and restores the Church of England under Papal authority.
1553
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1554
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1555
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Pomponio Algerio, 25-year-old radical theologian, is executed by boiling in oil as part of the Roman inquisition. After refusing to conform to Church doctrine, he was sentenced to prison and asked to reconsider his Lutheran beliefs. After a year behind bars, he still refused to reconsider. Because Venetian authorities would not consent to an execution, Pope Paul IV sent officials to extradite Pomponio to Rome. In Rome, on 21 August 1555, a monk from the brotherhood of St John the Beheaded visited Pomponio in his cell urging him to repent. If he repented, he would be strangled before burning. The 24-year-old student refused. One year later, on 22 August 1556, he was executed by civil authorities in the Piazza Navona, Rome. Maintaining his composure while he was boiled in oil, he stayed alive for 15 minutes before dying.
The Shaanxi earthquake in China, during the Ming Dynasty, is history's deadliest known earthquake, killing approximately 830,000 people.
1556
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German adventurer Hans Staden publishes an account of his detention by the Tup people of Brazil, Warhaftige Historia und beschreibung eyner Landtschafft der Wilden Nacketen, Grimmigen Menschfresser-Leuthen in der Newenwelt America gelegen ("True Story and Description of a Country of Wild, Naked, Grim, Man-eating People in the New World, America"), in Marburg.
1557
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Elizabeth Tudor becomes Queen Elizabeth I at age 25. Sometimes called The Virgin Queen, Gloriana or Good Queen Bess, the childless Elizabeth was the last monarch of the Tudor dynasty. Elizabeth was the daughter of Henry VIII and Anne Boleyn, his second wife, who was executed two-and-a-half years after Elizabeth's birth. Anne's marriage to Henry VIII was annulled, and Elizabeth was declared illegitimate. Elizabeth's reign is known as the Elizabethan era. The period is famous for the flourishing of English drama, led by playwrights such as William Shakespeare and Christopher Marlowe, and for the seafaring prowess of English adventurers such as Francis Drake.
Thomas Gresham states Gresham's Law — a monetary principle stating that "bad money drives out good". For example, if there are two forms of commodity money in circulation, which are accepted by law as having similar face value, the more valuable commodity will disappear from circulation. When silver was removed from US coins as a result of the Coinage Act of 1965, the effect of Gresham's Law was immediately obvious, as many retail clerks kept silver coins for themselves, replacing them in the till with newer, non-silver versions. In a short period of time, silver coins virtually disappeared from circulation.
1558
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Led by Don Trist n de Luna y Arellano, a Spanish missionary colony of 1500 men on thirteen ships arrives from Vera Cruz at Pensacola Bay, founding the first European settlement on the mainland United States. On September 19, the colony is decimated by a hurricane.
1559
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By winning the Battle of Okehazama, Oda Nobunaga becomes one of the pre-eminent warlords of Japan.
1560
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1561
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Britain Joins Slave Trade. John Hawkins, the first Briton to take part in the slave trade, makes a huge profit hauling human cargo from Africa to Hispaniola.
1562
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1563
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1564
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Roger Taverner writes his Arte of Surveyinge.
1565
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1566
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Mary, Queen of Scots, is imprisoned by Elizabeth I. Mary, the only surviving legitimate child of James V of Scotland, was six days old when her father died and she acceded to the throne. Mary had previously claimed Elizabeth's throne as her own and was considered the legitimate sovereign of England by many English Catholics, including participants in a rebellion known as the Rising of the North. Perceiving her as a threat, Elizabeth had her confined in various castles and manor houses in the interior of England. After eighteen and a half years in custody, Mary was found guilty of plotting to assassinate Elizabeth in 1586. She was beheaded the following year.
1567
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The Transylvanian Diet, under the patronage of the prince John Sigismund Z polya, the former King of Hungary, inspired by the teachings of Ferenc D vid, the founder of the Unitarian Church of Transylvania, promulgates the Edict of Torda, the first law of Freedom of religion and of conscience in the World.
1568
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1569
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Giovanni Padovani publishes a detailed treatise on the construction of sundials, Opus de compositione et usu multiformium horologiorum solarium, in Venice.
Pope Pius V issues Regnans in Excelsis, a papal bull excommunicating all who obeyed Elizabeth I and calling on all Roman Catholics to rebel against her.
1570
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1571
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The last Inca leader Tupak Amaru apprehended by Spanish conquistadores at Vilcabamba, Peru, and executed in Cuzco.
1572
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1573
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1574
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1575
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English navigator Martin Frobisher sights Greenland.
1576
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1577
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English seaman William Bourne publishes a manual, Inventions or Devises, Very Necessary for all Generalles and Captaines, as wel by Sea as by Land, including an early theoretical description of a submarine.
1578
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Francis Drake, during his circumnavigation of the world, lands in what is now California, which he claims for Queen Elizabeth I of England as Nova Albion.
1579
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Francis Drake in the Golden Hind sails into Plymouth having completed the second circumnavigation of the world, westabout, begun in 1577.
Spain unifies with Portugal under Philip II. The struggle for the throne of Portugal ends the Portuguese Empire. The Spanish and Portuguese crowns are united for 60 years, i.e. until 1640.
1580
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Slaves in Florida Spanish residents in St. Augustine, the first permanent settlement in Florida, import African slaves.
1581
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Pope Gregory XIII issues papal bull Inter Gravissimas, thereby establishing the The Gregorian Calendar. The last day of the Julian calendar was Thursday, 4 October 1582 and this was followed by the first day of the Gregorian calendar, Friday, 15 October 1582.
1582
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1583
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Walter Ralegh sends Philip Amadas and Arthur Barlowe to explore the Outer Banks of Virginia (now North Carolina), with a view to establishing an English colony; they locate Roanoke Island.
1584
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1585
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1586
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Mary, Queen of Scots is executed by Elizabeth I.
1587
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1588
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1589
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At the Siege of Odawara the Go-Hojo clan surrendered to Toyotomi Hideyoshi, unifying Japan.
1590
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1591
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1592
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1593
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Bevis Bulmer sets up a system at Blackfriars, London, for pumping a public water supply.
1594
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A Spanish expedition led by lvaro de Menda a de Neira makes the first European landing in Polynesia, on the Marquesas Islands.
1595
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1596
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1597
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1598
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1599
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1600
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1601
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The Dutch East India Company (VOC) is established by merging competing Dutch trading companies.[4] Its success contributes to the Dutch Golden Age.
1602
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Tokugawa Ieyasu takes the title of Shogun, establishing the Tokugawa Shogunate. This begins the Edo period, which will last until 1869.
1603
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1604
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Johann Carolus of Germany publishes the 'Relation', the first newspaper.
Tokugawa Ieyasu passes the title of Shogun to his son, Tokugawa Hidetada, and "retires" to Sunpu.
1605
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Captain Willem Janszoon and his crew aboard the Dutch East India Company ship Duyfken becomes the first recorded Europeans to sight and make landfall in Australia.
1606
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Jamestown, Virginia, is settled as what would become the first permanent English colony in North America.
1607
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Quebec City founded by Samuel de Champlain in New France (present-day Canada).
1608
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1609
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1610
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King James Bible is first published. The KJV is an English translation of the Christian Bible for the Church of England begun in 1604 and completed in 1611. The books of the King James Version include the 39 books of the Old Testament, an intertestamental section containing 14 books of the Apocrypha (most of which correspond to books in the Vulgate Deuterocanon adhered to by Roman Catholics), and the 27 books of the New Testament. It was first printed by the King's Printer Robert Barker and was the third translation into English approved by the English Church authorities.
1611
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The first commercial tobacco crop is raised in Jamestown, Virginia.
The first flintlock musket likely created for Louis XIII of France by gunsmith Marin Bourgeois.
1612
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Richard Braithwaite coined the phrase computer.
1613
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1614
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1615
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Death of retired Shogun Tokugawa Ieyasu.
1616
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Nikko Tosho-gu Shrine, dedicated to Tokugawa Ieyasu, the founder of the Tokugawa shogunate, is built. Ieyasu is enshrined there, where his remains are also entombed. During the Edo period, the Tokugawa shogunate carried out stately processions from Edo to the Nikko Tosho-gu. The shrine's annual spring and autumn festivals reenact these occasions, and are known as processions of a thousand warriors. Five structures at Nikko Tosho-gu are categorized as National Treasures of Japan, and three more as Important Cultural Properties. The stable of the shrine's sacred horses bears a carving of the three wise monkeys, who hear, speak and see no evil, a traditional symbol in Chinese and Japanese culture.
1617
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Beginning of the Thirty Years War..
The Manchus start invading China. Their conquest eventually topples the Ming Dynasty.
1618
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Twenty slaves in Virginia Africans brought to Jamestown are the first slaves imported into Britains North American colonies. Like indentured servants, they were probably freed after a fixed period of service.
1619
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1621
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Slide Rule invented by William Oughtred
Jamestown massacre: Algonquian natives kill 347 English settlers outside Jamestown, Virginia (one-third of the colony's population) and burn the Henricus settlement.
1622
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Francis Bacon develops a method of steganography that used an underlying binary code for the letters of the alphabet.
1623
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1624
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English settlers occupy the islands of Barbados and St. Kitts.
1625
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Pieter Jansz Schaghen writes to the States General of the Dutch Republic announcing the purchase of Manhattan from the Native Americans.
The Dutch West India Company imports 11 black male slaves into the New Netherlands.
1626
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1627
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1628
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English troops capture Québec.
1629
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1630
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Charles I of England grants a charter to Cecilius Calvert, second Lord Baltimore, for colony in Maryland
1632
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1633
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1634
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1635
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Harvard College is established.
Colonial North America's slave trade begins when the first American slave carrier, Desire, is built and launched in Massachusetts.
Harvard University is founded in Cambridge, Massachusetts.
1636
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1637
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1638
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1639
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John Punch, a runaway black servant, is sentenced to servitude for life. His two white companions are given extended terms of servitude. Punch is the first documented slave for life.
New Netherlands law forbids residents from harboring or feeding runaway slaves.
1640
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Massachusetts is the first colony to legalize slavery.
The D'Angola marriage is the first recorded marriage between blacks in New Amsterdam.
The Tokugawa Shogunate institutes Sakoku — foreigners are expelled and no one is allowed to enter or leave Japan.
1641
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The city of Montréal is founded in what will become Canada.
Pascal's calculator or the Pascaline constructed
The mezzotint printmaking method was invented by the German amateur artist Ludwig von Siegen. Mezzotint is a printmaking process of the intaglio family, technically a drypoint method. It was the first tonal method to be used, enabling half-tones to be produced without using line- or dot-based techniques like hatching, cross-hatching or stipple. Mezzotint achieves tonality by roughening the plate with thousands of little dots made by a metal tool with small teeth, called a "rocker." In printing, the tiny pits in the plate hold the ink when the face of the plate is wiped clean. A high level of quality and richness in the print can be achieved.
1642
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The New England Confederation of Plymouth, Massachusetts, Connecticut, and New Haven adopts a fugitive slave law.
1643
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Manchu dynasty established in China; end of the Ming line.
The Manchu conquer China ending the Ming Dynasty. The subsequent Qing Dynasty rules until 1912.
1644
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1645
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1646
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Peter Stuyvesant appointed governor of New Amsterdam.
George Fox founds the Society of Friends, or Quakers, in England.
1647
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The Peace of Westphalia ends the Thirty Years' War and the Eighty Years' War and marks the ends of Spain and the Holy Roman Empire as major European powers.
The Peace of Westphalia brings an end to the Thiry Years War.
1648
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King Charles I is executed for High treason, the first and only English king to be subjected to legal proceedings in a High Court of Justice and put to death.
George Fox, the founder of the Society of Friends, is imprisoned at Nottingham.
1649
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Connecticut legalizes slavery.
1650
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1651
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Massachusetts requires all black and Indian servants to receive military training.
Rhode Island passes laws restricting slavery and forbidding enslavement for more than 10 years.
1652
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Oliver Cromwell dissolves the Rump Parliament and replaces it with the Nominated Assembly (also called the Assembly of Saints or Barebones Parliament.) After three months, the Nominated Assembly passes a motion to dissolve itself and Cromwell establishes the Protectorate.
1653
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A Virginia court grants blacks the right to hold slaves.
Scotland incorporated with the English Commonwealth.
1654
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The island of Jamaica is captured from the Spaniards by the English.
1655
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The first persecution of Quakers occurs in Massachusetts.
1656
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Virginia passes a fugitive slave law.
1657
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Cromwell dies and his son Richard becomes Lord Protector.
1658
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Richard Cromwell is pressured into dissolving the Protectorate; the Rump Parliament is restored.
1659
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Charles II, King of England, orders the Council of Foreign Plantations to devise strategies for converting slaves and servants to Christianity.
End of Puritan rule in England; restoration of the Stuarts.
The Commonwealth of England ends and the monarchy is brought back during the English Restoration.
1660
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1661
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Hereditary slavery is established, when Virginia law decrees that children of black mothers shall be bond or free according to the condition of the mother.
Massachusetts reverses a ruling dating back to 1652, which allowed blacks to train in arms. New York, Connecticut, and New Hampshire pass similar laws restricting the bearing of arms.
1662
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Charles II, King of England, gives the Carolinas to proprietors. Until the 1680s, most settlers in the region are small landowners from Barbados.
In Gloucester County, Virginia the first documented slave rebellion in the colonies takes place.
Maryland legalizes slavery.
1663
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Maryland is the first colony to take legal action against marriages between white women and black men.
New York and New Jersey legalize slavery.
The State of Maryland mandates lifelong servitude for all black slaves. New York, New Jersey, the Carolinas, and Virginia all pass similar laws.
1664
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Great Plague occurs in London.
1665
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Maryland passes a fugitive slave law.
Samuel Morland builds a mechanical calculator that will add and subtract
1666
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Virginia declares that Christian baptism will not alter a person's status as a slave.
Treaty of Breda; peace established among England, Holland, France, Denmark.
1667
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The Mission of Sault Ste. Marie, in what will become Michigan, is founded by Father Marquette.
New Jersey passes a fugitive slave law.
1668
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1669
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The Hudson Bay Company is incorporated.
The State of Virginia prohibits free blacks and Indians from keeping Christian (i.e. white) servants.
1670
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1671
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Gottfried Wilhelm von Leibniz invents the Staffelwalze (stepped drum, or stepped reckoner), the first mechanical calculator that could perform all four mathematical operations. Its intricate precision gearwork, however, was somewhat beyond the fabrication technology of the time; mechanical problems, in addition to a design flaw in the carry mechanism, prevented the machines from working reliably. Despite the mechanical flaws, it suggested possibilities to future calculator builders. The operating mechanism, invented by Leibniz, called the stepped cylinder or Leibniz wheel, was used in many calculating machines for 200 years, and into the 1970s with the Curta hand calculator. In discussing his invention, Leibniz wrote Indignum enim est excellentium virorum horas servii calculandi labore perire, qui Machina adhibita vilissimo cuique secure transcribi posset — For it is unworthy of distinguished men to waste their time with slavish calculations, which can be done safely with the use of this machine by anyone else.
1672
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The Mississippi River is discovered.
1673
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New York declares that blacks who convert to Christianity after their enslavement will not be freed.
1674
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King Philip's War (sometimes called the First Indian War, Metacom's War, Metacomet's War, or Metacom's Rebellion) begins in New England. The war was an armed conflict between American Indian inhabitants of present-day New England and English colonists and their Indian allies in 167578. The war is named for Metacomet, the Wampanoag chief who adopted the English name Philip due to the friendly relations between his father and the Mayflower Pilgrims. The war continued in the most northern reaches of New England until the signing of the Treaty of Casco Bay in April 1678. The war was the single greatest calamity to occur in seventeenth century Puritan New England and is considered by many to be the deadliest war in the history of European settlement in North America in proportion to the population. In the space of little more than a year, twelve of the region's towns were destroyed and many more damaged, the colony's economy was all but ruined, and its population was decimated, losing one-tenth of all men available for military service. More than half of New England's towns were attacked by Indians. By early July, over 400 had surrendered to the colonists, and Metacomet took refuge in the Assowamset Swamp below Providence, close to where the war had started. The colonists formed raiding parties of militia and Indians. They were allowed to keep the possessions of warring Indians and received a bounty on all captives. Metacomet was killed by one of these teams when he was tracked down by Captain Benjamin Church and Captain Josiah Standish of the Plymouth Colony militia at Mount Hope in Bristol, Rhode Island. He was shot and killed by an Indian named John Alderman on August 12, 1676. After his death, his wife and nine-year-old son were captured and sold as slaves in Bermuda. Philip's head was mounted on a pike at the entrance to Fort Plymouth, where it remained for more than two decades. His body was cut into quarters and hung in trees. Alderman was given Metacomet's right hand as a reward.
1675
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In Virginia, black slaves and black and white indentured servants band together to participate in Bacon's Rebellion.
1676
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1677
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The Treaty of Nijmegen ends various interconnected wars among France, the Dutch Republic, Spain, Brandenburg, Sweden, Denmark, the Prince-Bishopric of Münster, and the Holy Roman Empire.
1678
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The habeas corpus act is passed in England.
1679
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The State of Virginia forbids blacks and slaves from bearing arms, prohibits blacks from congregating in large numbers, and mandates harsh punishment for slaves who assault Christians or attempt escape.
The Pueblo Revolt drives the Spanish out of New Mexico until 1692.
1680
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1681
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What will become Pennsylvania is colonized by William Penn. Penn founds Philadelphia. Also, with other Friends, Penn purchases East Jersey.
New York makes it illegal for slaves to sell goods.
Virginia declares that all imported black servants are slaves for life.
La Salle (René-Robert Cavelier, Sieur de La Salle) explores the length of the Mississippi River and claims Louisiana for France.
Peter the Great becomes joint ruler of Russia (sole tsar in 1696).
1682
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The Ottoman Empire is defeated in the second Siege of Vienna.
1683
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1684
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Edict of Fontainebleau outlaws Protestantism in France. King Charles II dies.
1685
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1686
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1687
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The Pennsylvania Quakers pass the first formal antislavery resolution.
1688
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William III ascends to the throne over England, Scotland, and Ireland.
1689
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1690
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South Carolina passes the first comprehensive slave codes.
Virginia passes the first anti-miscegenation law, forbidding marriages between whites and blacks or whites and Native Americans.
Virginia prohibits the manumission of slaves within its borders. Manumitted slaves are forced to leave the colony.
1691
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The colonies of Plymouth and Massachusetts are united.
Witchcraft mania begins to take over new England.
1692
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The College of William and Mary is founded in Williamsburg, Virginia, by a royal charter.
1693
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Rice cultivation is introduced into Carolina. Slave importation increases dramatically.
The Bank of England is established.
1694
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(no entry for this year)
1695
(no entry for this year)
The Royal African Trade Company loses its monopoly and New England colonists enter the slave trade.
1696
(no entry for this year)
(no entry for this year)
1697
(no entry for this year)
Calcutta is founded by the English.
1698
(no entry for this year)
(no entry for this year)
1699
(no entry for this year)
Samuel Sewall (1652-1730) publishes The Selling of Joseph — the first American protest against slavery.
Pennsylvania legalizes slavery.
1700
(no entry for this year)
(no entry for this year)
1701
(no entry for this year)
New York passes An Act for Regulating Slaves. Among the prohibitions of this act are meetings of more than three slaves, trading by slaves, and testimony by slaves in court.
1702
(no entry for this year)
Delaware separates from Pennsylvania and becomes an independent colony.
Connecticut assigns the punishment of whipping to any slaves who disturb the peace or assault whites.
Massachusetts requires those masters who liberate slaves to provide a bond of 50 pounds or more in the event that the freedman becomes a public charge.
Rhode Island makes it illegal for blacks and Indians to walk at night without passes.
Gottfried Wilhelm Leibniz invents the Binary System
1703
(no entry for this year)
(no entry for this year)
1704
(no entry for this year)
Massachusetts makes marriage and sexual relations between blacks and whites illegal.
New York declares that punishment by execution will be applied to certain runaway slaves.
The Virginia Slave Code codifies slave status, declaring all non- Christian servants entering the colony to be slaves. It defines all slaves as real estate, acquits masters who kill slaves during punishment, forbids slaves and free colored peoples from physically assaulting white persons, and denies slaves the right to bear arms or move abroad without written permission.
1705
(no entry for this year)
Connecticut requires that Indians, mulattos, and black servants gain permission from their masters to engage in trade.
New York declares blacks, Indians, and slaves who kill white people to be subject to the death penalty.
1706
(no entry for this year)
(no entry for this year)
1707
(no entry for this year)
Africans in the colony of South Carolina outnumber Europeans, making it the first English colony with a black majority.
Blacks outnumber whites in South Carolina.
Rhode Island requires that slaves be accompanied by their masters when visiting the homes of free persons.
The Southern colonies require militia captains to enlist and train one slave for every white soldier.
1708
(no entry for this year)
(no entry for this year)
1709
(no entry for this year)
New York forbids blacks, Indians, and mulattos from walking at night without lighted lanterns.
Jakob Christoph Le Blon, an engraver, invents three-color printing.
1710
(no entry for this year)
Great Britain's Queen Anne overrules a Pennsylvania colonial law prohibiting slavery.
Pennsylvania prohibits the importation of blacks and Indians.
Rhode Island prohibits the clandestine importation of black and Indian slaves.
Rio de Janeiro is captured by the French.
1711
(no entry for this year)
In Charleston, South Carolina slaves are forbidden from hiring themselves out.
New York declares it illegal for blacks, Indians, and slaves to murder other blacks, Indians, and slaves.
New York forbids freed blacks, Indians, and mulatto slaves from owning real estate and holding property.
Pennsylvania prohibits the importation of slaves.
Slave Revolt: New York Slaves in New York City kill whites during an uprising, later squelched by the militia. Nineteen rebels are executed.
1712
(no entry for this year)
England secures the exclusive right to transport slaves to the Spanish colonies in America.
1713
(no entry for this year)
Daniel Gabriel Fahrenheit constructs a mercury thermometer with a temperature scale.
1714
(no entry for this year)
Maryland declares all slaves entering the province and their descendants to be slaves for life.
Rhode Island legalizes slavery.
1715
(no entry for this year)
(no entry for this year)
1716
(no entry for this year)
New York enacts a fugitive slave law.
Johann Heinrich Schulze makes fleeting sun prints of words by using stencils, sunlight, and a bottled mixture of chalk and silver nitrate in nitric acid, simply as an interesting way to demonstrate that the substance inside the bottle darkens where it is exposed to light.
1717
(no entry for this year)
Porcelain is first manufactured in Vienna.
1718
(no entry for this year)
(no entry for this year)
1719
(no entry for this year)
(no entry for this year)
1720
(no entry for this year)
(no entry for this year)
1721
(no entry for this year)
(no entry for this year)
1722
(no entry for this year)
Virginia abolishes manumissions.
1723
(no entry for this year)
Louisiana's Code Noir is enacted in New Orleans to regulate black slavery and to banish Jews from the colony
French Louisiana prohibits slaves from marrying without the permission of their owners.
1724
(no entry for this year)
(no entry for this year)
1725
(no entry for this year)
(no entry for this year)
1726
(no entry for this year)
Johann Heinrich Schulze discovered that silver nitrate darkened upon exposure to light.
1727
(no entry for this year)
(no entry for this year)
1728
(no entry for this year)
The Qing Dynasty Emperor Yongzheng prohibits opium smoking in China. British refusal to comply with these anti-narcotics laws will ultimately lead to two wars (the Opium Wars) and the subjugation of China to Britain (and other western powers).
1729
(no entry for this year)
The number of male and female slaves imported to the North American British colonies balances out for the first time.
1730
(no entry for this year)
The Spanish reverse a 1730 decision and declare that slaves fleeing to Florida from Carolina will not be sold or returned.
1731
(no entry for this year)
Slaves aboard the ship of New Hampshire Captain John Major kill both captain and crew, seizing the vessel and its cargo.
1732
(no entry for this year)
Quaker Elihu Coleman's A Testimony against That Anti-Christian Practice of Maling Slaves of Men is published.
1733
(no entry for this year)
(no entry for this year)
1734
(no entry for this year)
Georgia petitions Britain for the legalization of slavery.
Louis XV, King of France, declares that when an enslaved woman gives birth to the child of a free man, neither mother nor child can be sold. Further, after a certain time, mother and child will be freed.
Under an English law Georgia prohibits the importation and use of black slaves.
1735
(no entry for this year)
(no entry for this year)
1736
(no entry for this year)
An indentured black servant petitions a Massachusetts court and wins his freedom after the death of his master.
1737
(no entry for this year)
Georgia's trustees permit the importation of black slaves.
Spanish Florida promises freedom and land to runaway slaves.
1738
(no entry for this year)
Slaves in Stono, South Carolina rebel, sacking and burning an armory and killing whites. Some 75 slaves in South Carolina steal weapons and flee toward freedom in Florida (then under Spanish rule). Crushed by the South Carolina militia, the revolt results in the deaths of 40 blacks and 20 whiteThe colonial militia puts an end to the rebellion before slaves are able to reach freedom in Florida.
1739
(no entry for this year)
Georgia and Carolina attempt to invade Florida in retaliation for the territory's policy toward runaways.
South Carolina passes the comprehensive Negro Act, making it illegal for slaves to move abroad, assemble in groups, raise food, earn money, and learn to read English. Owners are permitted to kill rebellious slaves if necessary.
1740
(no entry for this year)
(no entry for this year)
1741
(no entry for this year)
The Microscope Made Easy, by Henry Baker, introduces the construction and use of the microscope to the layman.
1742
(no entry for this year)
(no entry for this year)
1743
(no entry for this year)
(no entry for this year)
1744
(no entry for this year)
(no entry for this year)
1745
(no entry for this year)
(no entry for this year)
1746
(no entry for this year)
(no entry for this year)
1747
(no entry for this year)
(no entry for this year)
1748
(no entry for this year)
Georgia repeals its prohibition and permits the importation of black slaves.
1749
(no entry for this year)
(no entry for this year)
1750
(no entry for this year)
Colonial South Carolina prohibits slaves from learning about or practicing medicine.
George II repeals the 1705 act, making slaves real estate in Virginia.
1751
(no entry for this year)
(no entry for this year)
1752
(no entry for this year)
(no entry for this year)
1753
(no entry for this year)
The French and Indian War breaks out on the North American continent between the European powers Britain and France.
1754
(no entry for this year)
The Great Lisbon Earthquake occurs, killing more than 60,000 people. The huge earthquake (estimated at 9.0 on the modern Richter scale) strikes Lisbon, Portugal, at 9:40 am, on 1 November, during church services for All Saint's Day. Because the earthquake hits on an important church holiday and destroys almost every important church in the city, much anxiety and confusion is generated amongst the citizens of this staunch and devout Roman Catholic city and country, which had been a major patron of the Church. Theologians speculate on the religious cause and message, seeing the earthquake as a manifestation of the anger of God. Some philosophers struggle to reconcile the event with the concept that humanity lives in the best of all possible worlds — a world closely supervised by a benevolent deity.
1755
(no entry for this year)
(no entry for this year)
1756
(no entry for this year)
(no entry for this year)
1757
(no entry for this year)
Pennsylvania Quakers forbid their members from owning slaves or participating in the slave trade.
1758
(no entry for this year)
The British capture Québec from the French.
1759
(no entry for this year)
Jupiter Hammon of Long Island, New York, publishes a book of poetry. This is believed to be the first volume written and published by an African-American
New Jersey prohibits the enlistment of slaves in the militia without their master's permission.
King George III ascends the English throne.
1760
(no entry for this year)
(no entry for this year)
1761
(no entry for this year)
Virginia restricts voting rights to white men.
Catherine the Great becomes Empress of all the Russias after death of her husband.
1762
(no entry for this year)
Charles Mason and Jeremiah Dixon begin surveying Mason-Dixon Line between Pennsylvania and Maryland.
Chief Pontiac leads a Native American rebellion against British settlers in and around Detroit.
The French Indian War ends with the Treaty of Paris surrendering Canada to England.
1763
(no entry for this year)
(no entry for this year)
1764
(no entry for this year)
Britain enacts Quartering Act, requiring colonists to provide temporary housing to British soldiers.
Stamp Act passed; this is the first direct British tax on colonists.
1765
(no entry for this year)
Bifocal spectacles are invented by Benjamin Franklin.
First fire escape patented, consisting of a wicker basket on a pulley and chain.
Britain repeals the Stamp Act.
1766
(no entry for this year)
Britain passes Townshend Revenue Act levying taxes on America.
The Virginia House of Burgess boycotts the British slave trade in protest of the Townsend Acts. Georgia and the Carolinas follow suit.
1767
(no entry for this year)
Britain's Capt. James Cook begins exploring the Pacific, putting ashore in such places as New Zealand and Australia.
1768
(no entry for this year)
Father Junipero Serra founds Mission San Diego, first mission in California.
James Watt patents the modern steam engine, which finds wide use in manufacturing. It is an early milestone of the Industrial Revolution.
1769
(no entry for this year)
Crispus Attucks, an escaped slave, becomes the first colonial resident to die for American independence when he is killed by the British in the Boston massacre.
Around 1770, the European slave trade with Africa reaches its peak, transporting nearly 80,000 enslaved Africans across the Atlantic annually.
Escaped slave, Crispus Attucks, is killed by British forces in Boston, Massachusetts. He is one of the first colonists to die in the war for independence.
1770
(no entry for this year)
On June 22, Lord Chief Mansfield rules in the James Somerset case that an enslaved person brought to England becomes free and cannot be returned to slavery. His ruling establishes the legal basis for the freeing of England's fifteen thousand slaves.
James Albert Ukawsaw Gronniosaw's writes the first autobiographical slave narrative.
1772
(no entry for this year)
Jean Baptiste Point du Sable is the first settler in the community now known as Chicago. Point du Sable described himself as "a free mulatto man." He was married to a Potawatomi woman named Catherine some time in the 1770s.
Phillis Wheatley of Boston publishes Poems on Various Subjects, Religious and Moral. This is the first book of poetry published by an African-American woman.
Phillis Wheatley becomes the first published African-American poet when a London publishing company releases a collection of her verse.
Slaves in Massachusetts unsuccessfully petition the government for their freedom.
The first separate black church in America is founded in South Carolina.
The "Boston Tea Party" occurs as a protest against British taxation policies.
1773
(no entry for this year)
Rhode Island becomes first colony to prohibit importation of slaves.
Connecticut, Rhode Island, and Georgia prohibit the importation of slaves.
The First Continental Congress bans trade with Britain and vows to discontinue the slave trade after the 1st of December.
Virginia takes action against slave importation.
1774
(no entry for this year)
Lord Dunmore, promises freedom to male slaves who join British army.
General Washington forbids recruiting officers enlisting blacks to fight in defense of American freedom.
The first Spanish ship, the San Carlos, commanded by Juan Manuel de Ayala, enters San Francisco Bay.
The Grand Union flag is adopted by the American colonies in rebellion against England.
Abolitionist Society Anthony Benezet of Philadelphia founds the worlds first abolitionist society. Benjamin Franklin becomes its president in 1787.
In April, the first battles of the Revolutionary war are waged between the British and Colonial armies at Lexington and Concord, Massachusetts. Black Minutemen participate in the fighting.
In July, George Washington announces a ban on the enlistment of free blacks and slaves in the colonial army. By the end of the year, he reverses the ban, ordering the Continental Army to accept the service of free blacks.
In November, Virginia Governor John Murray, Lord Dunmore, issues a proclamation announcing that any slave fighting on the side of the British will be liberated.
The slave population in the colonies is nearly 500,000. In Virginia, the ratio of free colonists to slaves is nearly 1:1. In South Carolina it is approximately 1:2. 1775 Georgia takes action against slave importation.
Benjamin Franklin and Benjamin Rush form an anti-slavery group in Philadelphia.
The American Revolution begins with fighting at Lexington and Concord, Massachusetts.
The Continental Congress appoints George Washington head of the Continental Army.
1775
(no entry for this year)
Presidio of San Francisco forms as a Spanish fort.
Continental Congress approves enlistment of free blacks .
Delaware prohibits the importation of African slaves.
In Philadelphia, Pennsylvania, members of the Continental Congress sign the Declaration of Independence.
In Philadelphia, Pennsylvania, the Society of Friends, also known as the Quakers, forbids its members from holding slaves.
Declaration of Independence published. The Declaration of Independence is the statement adopted by the Second Continental Congress meeting at the Pennsylvania State House (Independence Hall) in Philadelphia on July 4, 1776, which announced that the thirteen American colonies, then at war with the Kingdom of Great Britain, regarded themselves as thirteen newly independent sovereign states, and no longer under British rule. Instead they formed a new nation — the United States of America. John Adams was a leader in pushing for independence, which was passed on July 2 with no opposing vote cast. A committee of five had already drafted the formal declaration, to be ready when Congress voted on independence. The term "Declaration of Independence" is not used in the document itself. Although Americans generally regard themselves as having been independent since July 4, 1776, in fact true, legal independence was not achieved until the Treaty of Paris was signed in 1783 and ratified by the Congress of the Confederation on January 14, 1784.
Adam Smith publishes The Wealth of Nations, which lays the foundation for free-market capitalism.
Washington leads the Continental Army in a crossing of the Delaware River, beginning on Christmas Day. The crossing catches the British army unaware, resulting in a victory for the rebel forces.
1776
(no entry for this year)
San Jose, California, is founded on orders from Antonio Mar a de Bucareli y Urs a, Spanish Viceroy of New Spain, thus providing an answer to the not-yet-asked question, Do you know the way to San Jose?
Continental Congress adopts the Stars and Stripes replacing the Grand Union flag. The new flag has thirteen stars and thirteen stripes, representing the thirteen original states: Delaware, Pennsylvania, New Jersey, Georgia, Connecticut, Massachusetts, Maryland, South Carolina, New Hampshire, Virginia, New York, North Carolina, and Rhode Island.
Vermont amends its constitution to ban slavery. Over the next 25 years, other Northern states emancipate their slaves and ban the institution: Pennsylvania, 1780; Massachusetts and New Hampshire, 1783; Connecticut and Rhode Island, 1784; New York, 1799; and New Jersey, 1804. Some of the state laws stipulate gradual emancipation.
New York enfranchises all free propertied men regardless of color or prior servitude.
Vermont is the first of the thirteen colonies to abolish slavery and enfranchise all adult males.
1777
(no entry for this year)
Rhode Island forbids the removal of slaves from the state.
Virginia prohibits the importation of slaves.
1778
(no entry for this year)
Capt. James Cook dies during a skirmish in Hawaii.
1779
(no entry for this year)
Massachusetts abolishes slavery and grants African-American men the right to vote.
A freedom clause in the Massachusetts constitution is interpreted as an abolishment of slavery. Massachusetts enfranchises all men regardless of race.
Delaware makes it illegal to enslave imported Africans.
Pennsylvania begins gradual emancipation.
Great Hurricane of 1780 — the deadliest Atlantic hurricane on record — kills 20,000 to 30,000 in Caribbean.
1780
(no entry for this year)
Los Angeles, California, is founded by 54 settlers, including 26 of African ancestry.
Immanuel Kant publishes Critique of Pure Reason, a fundamental work of modern philosophy.
1781
(no entry for this year)
Britain signs agreement recognizing U.S. independence.
Congress approves Great Seal of U.S. and the eagle as its symbol.
1782
(no entry for this year)
American Revolution Ends Britain and the infant United States sign the Peace of Paris treaty.
Joseph and Jacques Montgolfier make first public balloon flight.
Earthquakes ravage Calabria in Italy, killing 30,000.
1783
(no entry for this year)
John Jay becomes first U.S. Secretary of State.
Russian trappers established a colony on Kodiak Island, Alaska.
Congress narrowly defeats Thomas Jeffersons proposal to ban slavery in new territories after 1800.
Treaty of Paris ratified, officially ending the American Revolutionary War
Congress of the Confederation ratifies the Treaty of Paris on January 14, 1784, formally ending the Revolutionary War.
John Wesley charters Methodist Church.
1784
(no entry for this year)
New York frees all slaves who served in the Revolutionary Army.
First balloon flight across English Channel (Jean-Pierre Blanchard and John Jeffries).
French balloonists Jean-François Pilatre de Rozier and Jules Romain are killed when their Royal Balloon crashes near Boulogne, France, June 15, 1785, in what is considered the first aerial disaster.
Napoleon Bonaparte (16) graduates from the military academy in Paris (42nd in a class of 51).
1785
(no entry for this year)
Frederick the Great, King of Prussia, dies.
1786
(no entry for this year)
Federalist Papers published, calls for ratification of Constitution. The Federalist (later known as The Federalist Papers) is a collection of 85 articles and essays written (under the pseudonym Publius) by Alexander Hamilton, James Madison, and John Jay promoting the ratification of the United States Constitution. Seventy-seven were published serially in the Independent Journal and the New York Packet between October 1787 and August 1788. A compilation of these and eight others, called The Federalist: A Collection of Essays, Written in Favour of the New Constitution, as Agreed upon by the Federal Convention, September 17, 1787, was published in two volumes in 1788 by J. and A. McLean. The collection's original title was The Federalist; the title The Federalist Papers did not emerge until the 20th century. This book should be carefully read by anyone with an interest in American democracy.
Constitutional convention opens at Philadelphia, George Washington presiding.
The Northwest Ordinance bans slavery in the Northwest Territory (what becomes the states of Ohio, Indiana, Illinois, Michigan, and Wisconsin). The ordinance together with state emancipation laws create a free North.
Austrian emperor Jozef II bans children under 8 from labor.
1787
(no entry for this year)
Maryland votes (December 23) to cede a ten-square-mile area for District of Columbia.
New York City becomes first capital of US.
The Massachusetts General Court (legislature), following an incident in which free blacks were kidnapped and transported to the island of Martinique, declares the slave trade illegal and provides monetary damages to victims of kidnappings.
Captain Arthur Phillip forms English colony at Sydney, Botany Bay, New South Wales, Australia.
Kant publishes Critique of Practical Reason.
1788
(no entry for this year)
US Congress passes Federal Judiciary Act, creating a six-person Supreme Court.
Bourbon Whiskey is first created by Elijah Craig in Bourbon, Kentucky.
George Washington becomes the first president of the United States.
Fletcher Christian leads Mutiny on HMS Bounty and Captain William Bligh. Mutineers from the Bounty settle on Pitcairn Island.
Former slave Olaudah Equiano publishes his memoirs, and he travels in Britain lecturing against slavery.
The fall of the Bastille marks the beginning of the French Revolution.
1789
(no entry for this year)
First U.S. census is conducted, showing a population of 3,939,214.
Society of Friends petitions Congress for abolition of slavery.
The first ten amendments to the US Constitution — The Bill of Rights — are ratified.
Washington, D.C., founded as the capitol of the United States.
1790
(no entry for this year)
Vermont admitted as 14th state (first addition to the original thirteen colonies).
Charles Babbage is Born
John Stone, Concord, Massachusetts, patents a pile driver.
New York City traffic regulation creates first one-way street.
1791
(no entry for this year)
U.S. authorizes $10 Eagle, $5 half-Eagle and 2.50 quarter-Eagle gold coins and silver dollar, dollar, quarter, dime and half-dime. (In today's dollars, the $10 coin would be worth $231.00 and the half-dime would be worth $1.16.)
U.S. postal service created; postage 6-12 cents, depending on distance. (In today's dollars, that would be somewhere between $1.40 and $3.00.)
Guillotine first used (to execute highwayman Nicolas J. Pelletier).
Captain George Vancouver claims Puget Sound for Britain.
France declares war on Austria, starting French Revolutionary Wars.
The dollar is approved as the currency of the United States. The first dollar coin is minted in 1794.
The French Republic is proclaimed.
Twenty-four merchants form New York Stock Exchange at 70 Wall Street.
1792
(no entry for this year)
To enforce Article IV, Section 2, the U.S. Congress enacts the Fugitive Slave Law. It allows slaveowners to cross state lines to recapture their slaves. They must then prove ownership in a court of law. In reaction, some Northern states pass personal liberty laws, granting the alleged fugitive slaves the rights to habeas corpus, jury trials, and testimony on their own behalf. These Northern state legislatures also pass anti-kidnapping laws to punish slave-catchers who kidnap free blacks, instead of fugitive slaves.
France becomes first country to use the metric system.
Eli Whitney invents the cotton gin (cotton enGINe), a machine that quickly and easily separates cotton fibers from their seeds, allowing for much greater productivity than manual cotton separation. By reducing the labor of removing seeds, the cotton gin made cotton growing more profitable, thereby raising demand for slave labor. The first federal census of 1790 counted 697,897 slaves; by 1810, there were 1.2 million slaves, a 70 percent increase. Slavery spread from the seaboard to some of the new western territories and states as new cotton fields were planted, and by 1830 it thrived in more than half the continent. Within 10 years after the cotton gin was put into use, the value of the total United States crop leaped from $150,000 to more than $8 million.
King Louis XVI of France is executed.
1793
(no entry for this year)
Slavery abolished in the French colonies.
1794
(no entry for this year)
The US flag is modified to have fifteen stars and fifteen stripes, reflecting the addition of two new states: Vermont and Kentucky. This is the only US flag to have other than thirteen stripes.
1795
(no entry for this year)
George Washington declines a third term as President, gives his Farewell Address.
1796
(no entry for this year)
Napoleon invades Egypt and defeats the Egyptians at the Battle of the Pyramids.
1798
(no entry for this year)
The Rosetta Stone is discovered in Egypt. The stone is a fragment of an Egyptian stele with the same inscription in three texts: ancient Egyptian hieroglyphs, Egyptian demotic script, and Greek. This side-by-side translation allows historians to translate ancient Egyptian hieroglyphs for the first time.
Napoleon Bonaparte becomes First Consul and seizes power in France.
1799
(no entry for this year)
Thomas Wedgwood conceives of making permanent pictures of camera images by using a durable surface coated with a light-sensitive chemical. He succeeds only in producing silhouettes and other shadow images, and is unable to make them permanent.
1800
(no entry for this year)
Thomas Jefferson becomes the third president of the United States.
Ireland and Great Britain, England and Scotland, form United Kingdom.
1801
(no entry for this year)
The Ohio Constitution outlaws slavery. It also prohibits free blacks from voting.
1802
(no entry for this year)
U.S. President Thomas Jefferson appoints Meriwether Lewis and William Clark to explore the uncharted West. Among the marvels Lewis and Clark are expected to find are erupting volcanoes, mountains of salt, unicorns, living mastodons and seven-foot-tall beavers. They will find none of these, but will find fossils.
US buys large tract of land from France — The Louisiana Purchase.
1803
(no entry for this year)
Meriwether Lewis and William Clark begin their exploration of the Louisiana territory.
1804
(no entry for this year)
Britain's Lord Nelson defeats the Franco-Spanish fleet at the Battle of Trafalgar. Lord Nelson is killed, but his victory ends Napoleons power at sea and makes a French invasion of Britain impossible.
1805
(no entry for this year)
(no entry for this year)
1806
(no entry for this year)
The Slave Trade Act 1807 or the Abolition of the Slave Trade Act 1807, was an Act of the Parliament of the United Kingdom passed on 25 March 1807, with the title of "An Act for the Abolition of the Slave Trade". The original act is in the Parliamentary Archives. The act abolished the slave trade in the British Empire, in particular the Atlantic slave trade, and also encouraged British action to press other European states to abolish their slave trades, but it did not abolish slavery itself.
Robert Fulton develops the first practical steamboat, the Clermont, which sails from New York City to Albany and back.
1807
(no entry for this year)
United States Bans Slave Trade Importing African slaves is outlawed, but smuggling continues.
The US prohibits the importation of new slaves from Africa (but the holding of existing slaves and their descendents remains legal).
1808
(no entry for this year)
12 Feb 1809
Abraham Lincoln is born
James Madison becomes the fourth president of the United States.
1809
(no entry for this year)
(no entry for this year)
1810
(no entry for this year)
"Luddites" destroy industrial machines in North England, in protest over too rapid modernization.
1811
(no entry for this year)
Between 1812 and 1815, the United States and Great Britain fight the War of 1812.
Napoleon invades Russia; he captures Moscow, but unable to spend the winter there when the city catches fire, he marches his army back to France, experiencing tremendous losses along the way.
US declares war on Britain — War of 1812 begins.
1812
(no entry for this year)
(no entry for this year)
1813
(no entry for this year)
The British army burns down the White House in Washington DC.
The defeat of the Creeks by Andrew Jackson begins the forced departure of Indian peoples from the South.
1814
(no entry for this year)
Three thousand troops of the United States Army, led by General Andrew Jackson, defeat the British at the Battle of New Orleans. Six hundred of the US troops are African-American.
Ada, Lady Lovelace, is Born
An Allied army, led by Britain's Duke of Wellington, defeats Napoleon at the Battle of Waterloo.
1815
(no entry for this year)
Nicéphore Niépce succeeds in making negative photographs of camera images on paper coated with silver chloride, but cannot adequately "fix" them to stop them from darkening all over when exposed to light for viewing.
Shaka becomes ruler of the Zulu Kingdom; his disciplined and mobile army conquers many peoples of southeastern Africa.
1816
(no entry for this year)
The US flag is modified to have twenty stars, reflecting the addition of five new states: Indiana, Louisiana, Mississippi, Ohio, and Tennessee. The number of stripes is returned to thirteen (both to symbolize the original thirteen states and to avoid having the number of stripes get so large that the flag would seem pink). From this point on, the US flag will have the same overall design, with changes in the number of stars used to denote the addition of new states.
1818
(no entry for this year)
The US flag is modified to have twenty-one stars, reflecting the addition of one new state: Illinois.
The Canadian government refuses to cooperate with the American government in the apprehension of fugitive slaves living in Canada. Consequently Canada becomes the destination for 40,000 fugitive slaves from United States between 1819 in 1861.
The SS Savannah was an American hybrid sailing ship/side-wheel steamer built in 1818. She becomes the first steamship to cross the Atlantic Ocean, a feat accomplished during May–June, 1819. The Savannah was converted back into a sailing ship after returning from Europe. She was wrecked of Long Island in 1821.
The United States purchases Florida from Spain.
1819
(no entry for this year)
The US flag is modified to have twenty-three stars, reflecting the addition of two new states: Alabama and Maine.
Debate over slavery in the US heats up; The Missouri Compromise admits Maine into the Union as a free state, with Missouri to enter the next year as a slave state. Slavery is banned north of the 36 30' line of latitude in the Louisiana Territory.
Missouri Compromise Missouri is admitted to the Union as a slave state, Maine as a free state. Slavery is forbidden in any subsequent territories north of latitude .
The Arithmometer was the first commercially successful mechanical calculator patented
The first Christian missionaries arrived in the Hawaiian Islands.
1820
(no entry for this year)
Michael Faraday invents the electric motor and generator.
1821
(no entry for this year)
The US flag is modified to have twenty-four stars, reflecting the addition of one new state: Missouri.
Slave Revolt: South Carolina Freed slave Denmark Vesey attempts a rebellion in Charleston. Thirty-five participants in the ill-fated uprising are hanged.
Charles Babbage takes first steps in the construction of machines that would compute numbers
Nicéphore Niépce abandons silver halide photography as hopelessly impermanent and tries using thin coatings of Bitumen of Judea on metal and glass. He creates the first fixed, permanent photograph, a copy of an engraving of Pope Pius VII, by contact printing in direct sunlight without a camera or lens. It is later destroyed; the earliest surviving example of his "heliographic process" is from 1825.
1822
(no entry for this year)
Slavery is abolished in Chile.
Physicist Michael Faraday (1791-1867) describes the liquification of chlorine in On fluid chlorine. Faraday finds that gasses of certain kinds, when kept under constant pressure, will condense until they cool. This latter discovery ushers in the beginning of mechanical methods of refrigeration.
Small-scale drilling for oil begins at Baku, a Russian port city on the west coast of the Caspian Sea, now the capital of Azerbaijan. The drilling marks the beginning of the modern petroleum industry, and by 1900 nearly half the world's oil will come from the Baku oil fields.
1823
(no entry for this year)
Mexico outlaws slavery. This decision creates the incentive for Anglo Texans to fight for independence in 1835-1836.
Nicéphore Niépce makes the first durable, light-fast camera photograph, similar to his surviving 1826-1827 photograph on pewter but created on the surface of a lithographic stone. It is destroyed in the course of subsequent experiments.
Mexico becomes a republic, three years after declaring independence from Spain.
1824
(no entry for this year)
The Erie Canal (from Albany to Buffalo, New York) opens on October 26, connecting the Midwestern U.S. with the Atlantic Ocean, via the Great Lakes, and stimulating the development of Fort Dearborn (know today as Chicago), Cleveland and Columbus Ohio, and upstate New York cities like Rochester, Syracuse and Little Falls.
The first passenger steam railway opens, between Stockton and Darlington, England.
John Quincy Adams becomes the sixth president of the United States.
1825
(no entry for this year)
Photograph by Joseph Ni pce: View from the Window at Le Gras, the world's first permanent photograph.
The first photographic images produced by Joseph-Nicéphore Ni pce
1826
The Last of the Mohicans, by James Fenimore Cooper, is published.
(no entry for this year)
1827
(no entry for this year)
(no entry for this year)
1828
(no entry for this year)
The first steam locomotive to operate on a U.S. railroad begins service between Carbondale and Honesdale, Pennsylvania. The engine, "The Stourbridge Lion", has been imported from the Stephenson Engine Works in London.
Andrew Jackson becomes the seventh president of the United States.
Slavery abolished in Mexico.
1829
(no entry for this year)
On April 6, the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-Day Saints is founded by Joseph Smith Jr. (1805-1844), in Fayette, New York. In Palmyra, New York, The Book of Mormon is published for the first time; Smith has translated it, he says, from golden tablets he found buried near Palmyra.
The first wagon trains to cross the Rocky Mountains arrived in California.
The U.S. Congress passes the Indian Removal Act.
The world's population tops 1,000,000,000 (it had been roughly 750 million only 50 years earlier).
1830
(no entry for this year)
Nat Turner leads a slave rebellion in Southampton, Virginia, killing at least 57 whites. Hundreds of black slaves are killed in retaliation.
Alabama makes it illegal for enslaved or free blacks to preach.
In Boston, William Lloyd Garrison founds the abolitionist newspaper, The Liberator, signaling a dramatic shift in the antislavery movement. In the previous decades, it had centered in the South and favored a combination of compensated emancipation and colonization of freed slaves back to Africa. In the 1830s, the abolitionist movement becomes the dominant voice among antislavery advocates. Abolitionists demand the immediate end to slavery, which they consider to be a moral evil, without compensation to slaveowners.
Nat Turner, a literate slave who believes he is chosen to be the Moses of his people, instigates a slave revolt in Virginia. He and his followers kill 57 whites, but the revolt is unsuccessful and up to 200 slaves are killed. After an intense debate, the Virginia legislature narrowly rejects a bill to emancipate Virginia's slaves. The widespread fear of slave revolts, compounded by the rise of abolitionism, leads legislatures across the South to increase the harshness of their slave codes. Also, expressions of anti-slavery sentiment are suppressed throughout the South through state and private censorship.
North Carolina enacts a statute that bans teaching enslaved people to read and write.
Slave Revolt: Virginia Slave preacher Nat Turner leads a two-day uprising against whites, killing about 60. Militiamen crush the revolt then spend two months searching for Turner, who is eventually caught and hanged. Enraged Southerners impose harsher restrictions on their slaves.
1831
(no entry for this year)
Oberlin College is founded in Ohio. It admits African-Americans. By 1860, one third of its students are black.
In November, the New York and Harlem Railroad begins service, and heralds the start of rapid mass transit in New York City. Two horse-drawn rail cars operate every 15 minutes between 14th Street and Prince Street, along the Bowery. The fare is 25 cents.
Electric telegraph invented by Samuel Morse.
1832
(no entry for this year)
The American Anti-Slavery Society is established in Philadelphia.
The British Parliament abolishes slavery in the entire British Empire.
Ada Lovelace Meets Charles Babbage
1833
(no entry for this year)
South Carolina bans the teaching of blacks, and slave or free, in its borders.
Hércules Florence, a French-Brazilian painter and the isolate inventor of photography in Brazil, coined the word photographie for his technique, at least four years before John Herschel coined the English word photography.
Charles Babbage invents the "analytical engine" — the forerunner of the modern computer.
Federal troops are ordered to put down a riot by workers along the Chesapeake and Ohio Canal. It is the first time federal troops have been used to settle a labor battle in the United States.
1834
(no entry for this year)
Texas declares its independence from Mexico. In its constitution as an independent nation, Texas recognizes slavery and makes it difficult for free blacks to remain there.
Southern states expel abolitionists and forbid the mailing of antislavery propaganda.
Henry Fox Talbot produces durable silver chloride camera negatives on paper and conceives the two-step negative-positive procedure used in most non-electronic photography up to the present.
The first volume of La Dèmocracie en Amèrique (Democracy in America), by Alexis de Tocqueville (1805-1859), is published in France. Tocqueville, a historian and politician and member of the French aristocracy, writes about the American people and their institutions, based on his 9 months of travels through the United States and eastern Canada in 1831-1832.
1835
(no entry for this year)
The US flag is modified to have twenty-five stars, reflecting the addition of one new state: Arkansas.
Alonzo D. Phillips, a shoemaker from Springfield, Massachusetts, patents the phosphorous match.
Davy Crockett killed, as Texans are defeated by the Mexican army at the Alamo.
In Paris, the Arc de Triomphe is completed. The arch was ordered built by Napoleon in 1806.
Texas gains independence from Mexico after winning the battle of San Jacinto.
1836
(no entry for this year)
The US flag is modified to have twenty-six stars, reflecting the addition of one new state: Michigan.
Charles Babbage published a paper describing a mechanical computer that is now known as the Analytical Engine
Samuel F. B. Morse sends his first message by electric telegraph — "What hath God wrought!" — on an experimental line between Washington DC and Baltimore, Maryland.
Martin Van Buren becomes eighth president of the United States.
William IV, King of Great Britain, dies.
1837
Twice-told Tales, by Nathaniel Hawthorne, is published and is an immediate best-seller.
The S.S. Sirius and the S. S. Great Western are the first ships powered entirely by steam to cross the Atlantic. Both ships are designed by engineer Isambard Kingdom Brunel (1806-1859).
Coronation of Victoria as queen of Great Britain.
1838
(no entry for this year)
La Amistad was a 19th-century two-masted schooner, owned by a Spaniard living in Cuba. It became renowned in July 1839 for a slave revolt by Mende captives, who had been enslaved in Sierra Leone, and were being transported from Havana, Cuba to their purchasers' plantations. The African captives took control of the ship, killing some of the crew and ordering the survivors to sail the ship to Africa. The Spanish survivors secretly maneuvered the ship north, and La Amistad was captured off the coast of Long Island by the brig USS Washington. The Mende and La Amistad were interned in Connecticut while federal court proceedings were undertaken for their disposition. The owners of the ship and Spanish government claimed the slaves as property; but the US had banned the African trade and argued that the Mende were legally free. Because of issues of ownership and jurisdiction, the case gained international attention. Former president John Quincy Adams argued on behalf of the slaves when the appeal was brought before the U.S. Supreme Court, which eventually determined the Africans to be free men. The case became a symbol in the United States in the movement to abolish slavery.
Louis-Jacques-Mand Daguerre perfects and presents the daguerreotype process as the first publicly available photographic process (which for nearly twenty years was also the one most commonly used). To make the image, a daguerreotypist would polish a sheet of silver-plated copper to a mirror finish, treat it with fumes that made its surface light sensitive, expose it in a camera for as long as was judged to be necessary, which could be as little as a few seconds for brightly sunlit subjects or much longer with less intense lighting; make the resulting latent image on it visible by fuming it with mercury vapor; remove its sensitivity to light by liquid chemical treatment, rinse and dry it, then seal the easily marred result behind glass in a protective enclosure.
Henry Fox Talbot publicly introduces the paper-based process he worked out in 1835, calling it "photogenic drawing", but it requires much longer exposures than the daguerreotype and the results are not as clear and detailed.
John Herschel introduces hyposulfite of soda (now known as sodium thiosulfate but still nicknamed "hypo") as a highly effective fixer for all silver-based processes. He also makes the first glass negative.
Sarah Anne Bright creates a series of photograms, six of which are known to still exist. These are the earliest surviving photographic images created by a woman.
Although a bicycle consisting of a frame and wheels has existed for years, blacksmith Kirkpatrick MacMillan (1813-1878), introduces the first bicycle in its modern form, with brakes and pedals. The bike has iron tires and weighs nearly 60 pounds.
Inventor Erastus Brigham Bigelow (1814-1879) introduces the power loom in Massachusetts.
The first electric clock is built by physicist Carl August Steinheil (1801-1870).
In response to the British opium trade, Lin Zexu wrote a letter to Queen Victoria, urging her to end the opium trade: We find that your country is sixty or seventy thousand li from China. Yet there are barbarian ships that strive to come here for trade for the purpose of making a great profit. The wealth of China is used to profit the barbarians. That is to say, the great profit made by barbarians is all taken from the rightful share of China. By what right do they then in return use the poisonous drug to injure the Chinese people? Even though the barbarians may not necessarily intend to do us harm, yet in coveting profit to an extreme, they have no regard for injuring others. Let us ask, where is your conscience? The letter to the Queen never reached her. Belatedly, it was delivered and published in The Times of London.
Lin Zexu was a Chinese scholar-official of the Qing dynasty best known for his role in the First Opium War of 1839 42. In March 1839, Lin arrived in Guangdong Province to take measures that would eliminate the opium trade. He was a formidable bureaucrat known for his competence and high moral standards, with an imperial commission from the Daoguang Emperor to halt the illegal importation of opium by the British. Upon arrival, he made changes within a matter of months. He arrested more than 1,700 Chinese opium dealers and confiscated over 70,000 opium pipes. He initially attempted to get foreign companies to forfeit their opium stores in exchange for tea, but this ultimately failed. Lin resorted to using force in the western merchants' enclave. A month and a half later, the merchants gave up nearly 1.2 million kg (2.6 million pounds) of opium. Beginning 3 June 1839, 500 workers laboured for 23 days to destroy it, mixing the opium with lime and salt and throwing it into the sea outside of Humen Town. Lin composed an elegy apologising to the gods of the sea for polluting their realm.
The First Opium War between Britain and China occurs between 1839 and 1842, triggered when Chinese officials attempt to prevent the sale of narcotics (opium) to the Chinese people by the British East India trading Company. The British respond by bringing in gunboats and shelling Chinese coastal cities.
The process of vulcanization, developed by Charles Goodyear, makes possible the commercial use of rubber.
1839
Voices of the Night, the first book of poems by Henry Wadsworth Longfellow (1807-1882), is published.
First American patent issued in photography to Alexander Wolcott for his camera.
The first postage stamp, called the "Penny Black" and bearing the image of Queen Victoria, is issued in England.
The oil-immersion microscope is invented by Giovanni Battista Amici (1786-1863), a former professor of mathematics who is now the director of the observatory at the Royal Museum in Florence, and an astronomer to the Grand Duke of Tuscany. The objective lens of this microscope is immersed in a drop of oil which sits on top of the object under study; this helps to minimize aberrations caused by the light source.
1840
(no entry for this year)
The U.S.S. Creole, a ship carrying slaves from Virginia to Louisiana, is seized by the slaves on board and taken to Nassau, where they are free.
William Henry Talbot patents the Calotype process, the first negative-positive process making possible the first multiple copies.
Henry Fox Talbot introduces his patented calotype (or "talbotype") paper negative process, an improved version of his earlier process that greatly reduces the required exposure time.
In Paris, street lights made from arc lamps are demonstrated.
John Tyler becomes tenth president of the United States.
The first centralized government bureau of statistics is founded in Belgium by the mathematician Lambert Adolphe Jacques Quetelet (1781-1840).
1841
Self-Reliance, by Ralph Waldo Emerson (1803-1882) [essay II in Essays: First Series] is published.
The first novel in the series called "Leatherstocking Tales", The Deerslayer, by James Fennimore Cooper (1789-1851), is published
Frederick Douglass leads a successful campaign against Rhode Island's proposed Dorr Constitution, which would have continued the prohibition on black male voting rights.
In Prigg v. Pennsylvania, the U.S. Supreme Court upholds the Fugitive Slave Law of 1793, stating that slaveowners have a right to retrievetheir "property." In so doing, the court rules that Pennsylvania's anti-kidnapping law is unconstitutional. At the same time, the Supreme Court declares that enforcement of the Fugitive Slave Lawis a federal responsibility in which states are not compelled to participate. Between 1842 and 1850, nine Northern states pass new personal liberty laws which forbid state officials from cooperating in the return of alleged fugitive slaves and bar the use of state facilities for that purpose.
Slavery is abolished in Uruguay.
The Virginia Legislature votes against abolishing slavery.
In Commonwealth v. Hunt, a case involving the Boston Journeyman Bootmakers Society, the Chief Justice of the Massachusetts Supreme Court ruled that trade unions are legal. The ruling revises the common law that treated such unions as criminal conspiracies.
The Massachusetts State Legislature enacts a child labor law that limits the working hours of children under 12 years-old to 10 hours per day.
P. T. Barnum lures crowds of thousands to see his "Feejee Mermaid."
1842
In May, Edgar Allan Poe's (1809-1849) story "The Masque of the Red Death" appears in Graham's Magazine.
Jerome Increase Case, a 24 year-old farmer from Oswego County, New York, introduces the J. I. Case Threshing Machine. The J. I. Case Company will manufacture farm equipment and will become the largest thresher producer in the world.
The first tunnel under the Thames opens on March 25, built by Isambard Kingdom Brunel (1806-1859). {a]The Thames Tunnel{/a} connects Rotherhithe and Wapping, London. Although it was a triumph of civil engineering, the Thames Tunnel was not a financial success. It had cost a fortune to build — £454,000 to dig and another £180,000 to fit out — far exceeding its initial cost estimates. Proposals to extend the entrance to accommodate wheeled vehicles failed owing to cost, and it was only used by pedestrians. It became a major tourist attraction, attracting about two million people a year, each paying a penny to pass through.
Congress grants S. F. B. Morse $30,000 to build the first telegraph line (Washington to Baltimore).
1843
(no entry for this year)
In Hartford, Connecticut, dentist Horace Wells (1815-1848) uses nitrous oxide as an anesthetic; he is the first to do so.
1844
(no entry for this year)
The US flag is modified to have twenty-seven stars, reflecting the addition of one new state: Florida.
Frederick Douglass publishes his autobiography, The Life and Times of Frederick Douglass.
Francis Ronalds invents the first successful camera for continuous recording (the first "movie camera") of the variations in meteorological and geomagnetic parameters over time. A copy of Ronalds' paper describing describing his device maybe obtained HERE.
The bridge spanning the Allegheny River, at Pittsburgh, designed by engineer John Augustus Roebling (1806-1869), opens in May. It is the first wire cable suspension aqueduct bridge in the world.
James K. Polk becomes eleventh president of the United States.
Texas is annexed by the United States.
The Irish potato famine begins, one of the century's worst natural disasters. One million citizens starve to death, and one million others emigrate, mostly to the United States
1845
Edgar Allan Poe's "The Raven" appears in the New York Evening Mirror. Poe's collection The Raven and Other Poems is published.
The US flag is modified to have twenty-eight stars, reflecting the addition of one new state: Texas.
Mexican-American War Defeated, Mexico yields an enormous amount of territory to the United States. Americans then wrestle with a controversial topic: Is slavery permitted in the new lands?
Nitroglycerine is discovered by chemist Ascanio Sobrero (1811-1870), although he uses to term "pyroglycerine". Because of the risks involved in its production, it will not be manufactured commercially for more than a decade.
The lock-stitch sewing machine is patented by Elias Howe (1819-1867).
The first professional baseball game is played, in Hoboken, New Jersey.
The Mexican War (1846-48) between the United States and Mexico results in the United States taking possession of California and much of the Southwest, which had been Mexican territory.
The Oregon Treaty delineates border between the United States and Canada.
1846
(no entry for this year)
The US flag is modified to have twenty-nine stars, reflecting the addition of one new state: Iowa.
The North Star, an abolitionist newspaper, begins publication in Rochester, New York. The paper is founded by escaped slave Frederick Douglass (1817-1895), with money he earned as a result of his autobiography.
Liberia is formed as a home for released American slaves.
Missouri bans the education of free blacks.
The Istanbul slave market is abolished.
The rotary, or "lightning" printing press is patented by Richard March Hoe (1812-1886). It is used first by the Philadelphia Public Ledger.
The Factory Act is passed in Britain. It forbids women and children between the ages of 13 and 18 to work more than 10 hours per day.
The first United States postage stamps are issued
1847
(no entry for this year)
The US flag is modified to have thirty stars, reflecting the addition of one new state: Wisconsin.
Slavery is abolished in old French and Danish colonies.
Edmond Becquerel makes the first full-color photographs, but they are only laboratory curiosities: an exposure lasting hours or days is required and the colors are so light-sensitive that they sometimes fade right before the viewer's eyes while being examined.
Karl Marx publishes The Communist Manifesto, which asserts that revolution by the working classes will ultimately destroy capitalism.
Revolution breaks out across much of Europe; the Second Republic is proclaimed in France.
1848
(no entry for this year)
Charles Lewis Reason becomes the first African-American college instructor when he is hired at predominantly white Free Mission College (later New York Central College) to teach Greek, Latin, French, and mathematics.
Harriet Tubman escapes from slavery and goes on to lead more than 300 slaves to freedom on the underground railroad.
A unmanned Montgolfier balloon is used to drop bombs on Venice. This is the first time a bombing has been conducted from the air.
Zachary Taylor becomes twelfth president of the United States.
The California gold rush begins as more than 100,000 people swarm to California to make their fortunes after gold is found there in 1848.
Showmen Moses Kimball and P. T. Barnum purchase the contents of the Peale Museum (established in 1784).
1849
Henry David Thoreau's A week on the Concord and Merrimack Rivers and "Resistance to Civil Government" (often referred to as "Civil Disobedience") are published.
The Compromise of 1850 is introduced into Congress by Henry Clay as an omnibus bill designed to settle disputes arising from the conclusion of the Mexican War. It passes after Stephen Douglas divides the bill into several parts: California enters the Union as a free state; the slave trade (but not slavery) is abolished in Washington D.C.; the fugitive slave law is strengthened; and the Utah and New Mexico Territories are opened to slavery on the basis of popular sovereignty (allowing territorial voters to decide the issue without federa linterference).
"Bibless overalls" made of canvas are sold by the 20 year-old Levi Strauss in San Francisco. Within three years he will switch to denim and dye his pants indigo blue.
1850
(no entry for this year)
The US flag is modified to have thirty-one stars, reflecting the addition of one new state: California.
Arithmometer: first commercially successful mechanical calculator launched
The fast-acting Collodion process invented by Frederick Scott Archer. Images require only two or three seconds of light exposure. Collodion process, mostly synonymous with the "collodion wet plate process", requires the photographic material to be coated, sensitized, exposed and developed within the span of about fifteen minutes, necessitating a portable darkroom for use in the field. Collodion is normally used in its wet form, but can also be used in humid ("preserved") or dry form, at the cost of greatly increased exposure time. The latter made the dry form unsuitable for the usual portraiture work of most professional photographers of the 19th century. The use of the dry form was therefore mostly confined to landscape photography and other special applications where minutes-long exposure times were tolerable.
Isaac Singer patents the continuous-stitch sewing machine.
The Erie Railroad, now controlled by Daniel Drew, becomes the first rail line connecting the Great Lakes with New York City, and begins to compete with the Erie Canal as a transportation route.
1851
Nathaniel Hawthorne's The House of the Seven Gables and The Snow Image and Other Twice-Told Tales both appear.
Moby Dick, by Herman Melville, is published.
In South Bend, Indiana, Clement and Henry Studebaker found Studebaker Brothers. Joined by a third brother, John, in 1858, the company will become the world's largest maker of wagons and carriages.
In Sweden, safety matches are patented by J. E. Lundstrom.
The brown paper bag is invented.
The elevator is invented, facilitating the future development of skyscrapers.
The U.S. state of Pennsylvania adopts a non-standard railroad gauge in order to prevent New York's Erie Railroad from establishing a route, through Pennsylvania, to Ohio.
The French Republic falls; Louis Napoleon (Napoleon III) is crowned Emperor.
The U.S. state of Massachusetts adopts a compulsory school-attendance law, the first effective example of such a law in the nation.
1852
Harriet Beecher Stowe publishes her anti-slavery novel, Uncle Tom's Cabin.
Commodore Matthew Perry sails into Japan's Edo Bay with his black ships (four modern, steam-powered warships), urging Japan to open trade policies with the United States.
Franklin Pierce becomes fourteenth president of the United States.
1853
(no entry for this year)
Kansas-Nebraska Act: In an attempt to spur population growth in the western territories in advance of a transcontinental railroad, Stephen Douglas introduces a bill to establish the territories of Kansas and Nebraska. In order to gain Southern support, the bill stipulates that slavery in the territories will be decided by popular sovereignty. Thus the Kansas-Nebraska Act repeals the Missouri Compromise ban on slavery north of 36 30' in the lands of the Louisiana Purchase.
Ostend Manifesto: The U.S. ministers to Britain, France, and Spain meet in Ostend, Belgium. They draft a policy recommendation to President Pierce, urging him to attempt again to purchase Cuba from Spain and, if Spain refuses, to take the island by force. When the secret proposal, called the Ostend Manifesto, is leaked to the press, it creates an uproar since Cuba would likely become another slave state.
On May 24, Virginia fugitive slave Anthony Burns is captured in Boston and returned to slavery under the provisions of the Fugitive Slave Act. Fifty thousand Boston residents watch his transport through the streets of the city in shackles. A Boston church raises $1500 to purchase his freedom and Burns returns to the city in 1855, a free man.
On May 30, the Kansas-Nebraska act is passed by Congress. The act repeals the Missouri Compromise and permits the admission of Kansas and Nebraska territories to the Union after their white male voters decide the fate of slavery in those territories.
Slavery is abolished in Peru and Venezuela.
The Republican Party is formed in the summer in opposition to the extension of slavery into the western territories.
André-Adolphe-Eugène Disdéri credited with introduction of the carte de visite (English: visiting card or calling card) format for portraiture. Disdéri uses a camera with multiple lenses that can photograph eight different poses on one large negative. After printing on albumen paper, the images are cut apart and glued to calling-card-size mounts. Photographs had previously served as calling cards, but Disdéri's invention of the paper carte de visite (i.e. "visiting card") enabled the mass production of photographs. On 27 November 1854 he patented the system of printing ten photographs on a single sheet (although there is no evidence that a system printing more than eight actually materialized). Disdéri's's cartes de visite were 6×9 cm, about the size of conventional (nonphotographic) visiting cards of the time, and were made by a camera with four lenses and a sliding plate holder; a design inspired by the stereoscopic cameras. The novelty quickly spread throughout the world. According to a German visitor, Disdéri's studio became "really the Temple of Photography - a place unique in its luxury and elegance. Daily he sells three to four thousand francs worth of portraits". The fact that these photos could be reproduced inexpensively and in great quantity brought about the decline of the daguerreotype and ushered in a carte de visite craze as they became enormously popular throughout Europe and the United States. Disdéri also invented the twin-lens reflex camera.
1854
Henry David Thoreau's Walden, or Life in the Woods is published.
The Massachusetts Legislature outlaws racially segregated schools.
A mercury pump is developed by inventor Heinrich Geissler, to produce vacuum tubes. The first cathode rays will be observed in these tubes, after they are modified and improved by Sir William Crookes.
Engineer Frederick Taylor carries out "time-motion" studies of workers with the idea of making their labor more efficient. He will pioneer the "scientific management" of the workplace.
1855
Henry Wadsworth Longfellow's "Song of Hiawatha" appears.
Poet Walt Whitman publishes a volume of twelve poems, Leaves of Grass, at his own expense, and meets with no commercial success.
The Caning of Charles Sumner: Senator Charles Sumner delivers a stinging speech in the U.S. Senate, "The Crime against Kansas," in which he attacks slavery, the South, and singles out his Senate colleague, Andrew Butler of South Carolina, for criticism. In retaliation, Butler's nephew, Congressman Preston Brooks of South Carolina, attacks Sumner with a cane while the Massachusetts senator is seated at his desk on the floor of the Senate. The injuries he sustains cause Sumner to be absent from the Senate for four years. The episode revealed the polarization in America, as Sumner became a martyr in the North and Brooks a hero in the South. Northerners were outraged. Southerners sent Brooks hundreds of new canes in endorsement of his assault. One was inscribed "Hit him again." Brooks claimed that he had not intended to kill Sumner, or else he would have used a different weapon. In a speech to the House defending his actions, Brooks stated that he "meant no disrespect to the Senate of the United States" or the House by his attack on Sumner. He was tried in a District of Columbia court, convicted for assault, and fined $300 ($8,000 in today's dollars), but received no prison sentence.
A railway bridge spanning the Mississippi opens between Rockville, Illinois, and Davenport, Iowa. Abraham Lincoln, a lawyer, will defend the legality of the bridge before the Supreme Court, in response to a "right of way" suit brought by a steamship company.
During Easter vacation from London's Royal College of Chemistry, 18-year-old William Henry Perkin synthesized mauve, or aniline purple — the first synthetic dyestuff — from chemicals derived from coal tar. Mauve was enthusiastically adopted by the fashion industry in England and synthetic dyes quickly destroyed the market for natural substances derived from plants like indigo and madder. Perkin's creation was an accident — he was trying to synthesize quinine.
The "Bessemer process" for making inexpensive steel, which involves using blasts of cold air to decarbonize melted pig iron, is developed by inventor Henry Bessemer.
The 458-mile Wabash and Erie Canal opens after 24 years, and is the largest canal ever dug in the U.S. By 1860, however, sections will begin to be close, and, unable to compete for railroads, the entire Canal will be closed by 1874.
In South Africa, Boers establish the South African Republic (Transvaal), with Pretoria as its capital. Marthinus Wessels Pretorius, 37, is named the first president.
The Second Opium War (1856-1860) between Britain and China leads to further erosion of Chinese sovereignty.
1856
(no entry for this year)
Farmer Hinton Rowan Helper publishes The Impending Crisis of the South, and How to Meet It, in which he argues that slavery in economically unwise, and particularly devastating to small farmers who do not own slaves. He writes that slavery is "the root of all the shame, poverty, ignorance, tyranny and imbecility" in the South. He also argues that slavery foolishly ties up economic resources in human beings when it might be spent on labor-saving improvements.
The African slave trade is prohibited in the Ottoman Empire
The Dred Scott Decision makes the Missouri Compromise unconstitutional and increases tension between North and South over slavery in the United States. Writing for the majority, Chief Justice Roger B. Taney asserted that blacks were "beings of an inferior order, and altogether unfit to associate with the white race, either in social or political relations, and so far inferior that they had no rights which the white man was bound to respect." This embarrassing decision represents a low point in the history of the United States Supreme Court.
In Burrville, Connecticut, commercial production of Gail Borden's patented "condensed milk" begins. The product is made from skim milk, without any fat and without a number of nutrients found in cow's milk.
In California, Tokay, Zinfandel, and Shiraz grapes (all from Hungary) are first planted, and Italian honeybees are introduced. This is the beginning of the U.S. wine and honey industries. In North America, honey bees are an artificially introduced and invasive species.
Robert Wilhelm von Bunsen (along with Henry Roscoe) publish a design for a laboratory burner in Poggendorff's Annalen der Physik und Chemie, 100:84-85.
James Buchanan becomes fifteenth president of the United States.
Giuseppe Garibaldi, who returned to Italy in 1854 after several years working at Staten Island, New York, founds the Italian National Association. The organization is designed to promote the unification of Italy.
1857
(no entry for this year)
The US flag is modified to have thirty-two stars, reflecting the addition of one new state: Minnesota.
J. Schweppe & Co. Ltd. patents a quinine tonic water that they will begin selling in 1880.
John Landis Mason patents a reusable glass jar.
Abraham Lincoln, running for the United States Senate, declares "A house divided against itself cannot stand." He loses the race to Stephen Douglas, but his performance in there now-legendary debates leads to his nomination as the Republican candidate for president in 1860.
In Ireland, the group Sein Fein is founded.
1858
(no entry for this year)
The US flag is modified to have thirty-three stars, reflecting the addition of one new state: Oregon.
Harriet Wilson of Milford, New Hampshire, publishes Our Nig; or Sketches from the Life of a Free Black, the first novel by an African-American woman.
On October 16, John Brown leads 20 men, including five African-Americans, in an unsuccessful attempt to seize the Federal Armory at Harper's ferry, Virginia, with the goal of inspiring a slave insurrection. He was captured by US troops under the command of Colonel Robert E. Lee, tried, and hanged on December 2.
In Titusville, Pennsylvania, commercial production of petroleum begins, with drilling of the first well by Edwin Laurentine Drake. The well will produce approximately 400 gallons/day.
The first internal combustion engine is developed by Jean-Joseph-Etienne Lenoir. The engine uses coal gas.
1859
(no entry for this year)
On December 20, South Carolina secedes from the union, setting in motion the forces leading to the US Civil war.
Southern Secession South Carolina secedes in December. More states follow the next year.
Herman Hollerith was born 29th February 1860
Emil Erlenmeyer invents the flask.
The Pony Express begins cross-country mail delivery.
1860
(no entry for this year)
Abraham Lincoln becomes sixteenth president of the United States.
Fort Sumter shelled, American Civil War begins.
The First Battle of Bull Run, also known as the First Battle of Manassas (the name used by Confederate forces and still often used in the Southern United States), is fought on July 21, 1861, near Manassas, Virginia. It is the first major land battle of the American Civil War. Neither Confederate nor Union troops were ready for battle. Union troops advanced on Confederate troops, almost breaking through, but at the last moment, Confederate reinforcements arrived on the battlefield and carried the day. Union troops were routed. Union civilian spectators, who had come to watch the expected Confederate defeat as entertainment, were forced to run for their lives.
The US flag is modified to have thirty-four stars, reflecting the addition of one new state: Kansas.
United States Civil War Four years of brutal conflict claim 623,000 lives.
Oliver Wendell Holmes invents stereoscope viewer
James Clerk Maxwell presents a projected additive color image of a multicolored ribbon, the first demonstration of color photography by the three-color method he suggested in 1855. It uses three separate black-and-white photographs taken and projected through red, green and blue color filters. The projected image is temporary but the set of three "color separations" is the first durable color photograph.
Congress passes the First Confiscation Act, which prevents Confederate slave owners from re-enslaving runaways.
1861
(no entry for this year)
On April 16, Congress abolishes slavery in the District of Columbia.
Otto von Bismarck is appointed Prime Minister of Prussia.
The Battle of Fort Donelson (11-16 Feb) is an early Union victory in the American Civil War, which opened the Cumberland River as an avenue for the invasion of the South. The success elevated Brig. Gen. Ulysses S. Grant from an obscure and largely unproven leader to the rank of major general.
The Battle of Shiloh (6-7 Apr). Although the Confederates swept the field on the first day, Union troops under U. S. Grant retook the field on the second day. Combined Union and Confederate casualties (23,746 killed, wounded, or missing) represented more than the total American battle-related casualties of the American Revolutionary War, the War of 1812, and the Mexican-American War combined.
1862
(no entry for this year)
The US flag is modified to have thirty-five stars, reflecting the addition of one new state: West Virginia. This new state was created when Union sympathizers in the western portion of Virginia seceded from Virginia (then in secession from the US) and rejoined the Union.
Abraham Lincoln's Emancipation Proclamation takes effect on January 1, legally freeing slaves in areas of the South still in rebellion against the United States.
The Battle of Gettysburg (1-3 Jul) was the battle with the largest number of casualties in the American Civil War. Union Maj. Gen. George Gordon Meade's Army of the Potomac defeated attacks by Confederate Gen. Robert E. Lee's Army of Northern Virginia, ending Lee's invasion of the North.
The Siege of Vicksburg was the final major military action in the Vicksburg Campaign of the American Civil War. Union Maj. Gen. Ulysses S. Grant crossed the Mississippi River and drove the Confederate army of Lt. Gen. John C. Pemberton into the fortress city of Vicksburg, Mississippi, and placed the city under siege. After more than forty days, with no re-enforcement and supplies nearly gone, the garrison surrendered on July 4. This surrender, combined with Lee's defeat at Gettysburg the previous day, represents the turning point of the war. From then on, military victory for the Confederacy was impossible.
1863
(no entry for this year)
After the Confederate defeat at Chattanooga, President Lincoln promoted Grant to a special regular army rank, Lieutenant General, authorized by Congress on March 2, 1864. This rank had previously been awarded two other times, a full rank to George Washington and a Brevet rank to Winfield Scott. Lincoln then places Grant in charges of all Union forces.
Sherman captures Atlanta, marches to Savannah. Through a series of bloody battles, Grant forces Lee back to Petersburg, Virginia, and then lays siege to the city. Lincoln is reelected, destroying the South's hope for a political settlement to the war.
1864
(no entry for this year)
On February 1, Abraham Lincoln signs the 13th Amendment to the United States Constitution outlawing slavery throughout the United States.
The Thirteenth Amendment to the United States Constitution officially abolished slavery and involuntary servitude, except as punishment for a crime. It was passed by the Senate on April 8, 1864, passed by the House on January 21, 1865, and adopted on December 6, 1865.
Lee surrenders, US Civil war ends, Lincoln assassinated.
Andrew Johnson becomes seventeenth president of the United States.
The US flag is modified to have thirty-six stars, reflecting the addition of one new state: Nevada.
The Ku Klux Klan is formed on December 24 in Polanski, Tennessee, by six Confederate veterans. Nathan Bedford Forrest, a former Confederate cavalry general and slave trader, serves as the Klan's first grand wizard or leader-in-chief.
1865
(no entry for this year)
On June 13, Congress approves the Fourteenth Amendment to the Constitution, guaranteeing due process and equal protection under the law to all citizens. The amendment also grants citizenship to African-Americans.
1866
(no entry for this year)
The US flag is modified to have thirty-seven stars, reflecting the addition of one new state: Nebraska.
The Alaska Purchase resulted in the transfer of Alaska to the United States from the Russian Empire for a total price of $ 7,000,000. The purchase, made at the initiative of United States Secretary of State William H. Seward, gained 586,412 square miles of new United States territory.
1867
(no entry for this year)
Louis Ducos du Hauron patents his numerous ideas for color photography based on the three-color principle, including procedures for making subtractive color prints on paper. They are published the following year. Their implementation is not technologically practical at that time, but they anticipate most of the color processes that are later introduced.
Wallace Clement Ware Sabine becomes the first acoustical engineer and uses acoustic principles to design Boston's Symphony Hall.
The Meiji Restoration in Japan (led by samurai from the western clans of Satsuma, Choshu, Tosa, and Hizen) overthrows the feudal shogunate system and initiates Japan's participation in the modern world.
The Impeachment of Andrew Johnson, 17th President of the United States, was one of the most dramatic events in the political life of the United States during Reconstruction, and the first impeachment in history of a sitting United States president.
1868
Louisa May Alcott publishes Little Women.
On February 26, Congress sends the Fifteenth Amendment to the Constitution to the states for approval. The amendment guarantees African-American males the right to vote.
Transcontinental Rail Service Begun in the United States On May 10th, at Promontory Point, Utah, a golden rail spike was struck, completing the first transcontinental railroad line.
Ulysses S. Grant becomes eighteenth president of the United States.
Japan colonizes Hokkaido as part of its new nation state.
The Suez Canal opened to traffic on 17 November. The canal linked the Mediterranean and the Red Sea. It was 103 miles long and it brought Oriental ports 5,000 miles closer to Europe. Work had begun on the canal in 1859, financed primarily by French investors. The canal increased the strategic importance of Egypt to European powers.
1869
(no entry for this year)
Standard Oil Formed On January 10th, 1870, John D Rockefeller and four partners incorporate the Standard Oil Company. The company gains control of nearly 95% of the oil refining industry in the United States.
The First Vatican Council of the Roman Catholic Church proclaims the dogma of the infallibility of the Pope.
The Franco-Prussian war (1870-71) leads to the formation of the German Empire.
1870
(no entry for this year)
On October 8th, a fire broke out in the west side of Chicago. The Great Chicago Fire lasted two days, killing 300 people, and destroying most of Chicago. Property damages were estimated at 200 million dollars.
On October 8th, a fire broke out in the village of Peshtigo, Wisconsin. The Peshtigo Fire caused more deaths than any other fire in the history of the United States. By the time it was over, 1,875 square miles (1.2 million acres) of forest had been consumed, an area approximately twice the size of the state of Rhode Island. Some sources list as much as 1.5 million acres burned. Twelve communities were destroyed. An accurate death toll has never been determined since local population records were destroyed in the fire. Between 1,200 and 2,500 people are thought to have lost their lives.
The occurrence of this fire, and several other smaller fires, on the same day as the Great Chicago fire has lead some to speculate that all of the fires may have had a common cause: multiple impacts from fragments of a disintegrating comet.
Richard Leach Maddox invents the gelatin dry plate silver bromide process. Negatives no longer had to be developed immediately. Long before his discovery of the dry gelatin photographic emulsion, Maddox was prominent in what was called photomicrography - photographing minute organisms under the microscope. The eminent photomicrographer of the day, Lionel S. Beale, included as a frontispiece images made by Maddox in his manual 'How to work with the Microscope'.
Henry Morton Stanley finds David Livingstone in Africa, greeting the Scotsman with the famous words, "Dr. Livingstone, I presume."
The Second Reich proclaimed With the German victory in France complete, the German Reichstag(parliament) proclaimed the creation of the Second Reich. The Reichstag approved with minor modification the constitution of the Northern German Federation. William I became King of Germany with Otto Bismarck the first chancellor.
1871
(no entry for this year)
(no entry for this year)
1872
(no entry for this year)
Slavery is abolished in Puerto Rico.
Spain decrees the end of slavery in Cuba, still a Spanish colony.
QWERTY keyboard invented
Hermann Wilhelm Vogel discovers dye sensitization, allowing the blue-sensitive but otherwise color-blind photographic emulsions then in use to be made sensitive to green, yellow and red light. Technical problems delay the first use of dye sensitization in a commercial product until the mid-1880s; fully panchromatic emulsions are not in common use until the mid-20th century.
1873
(no entry for this year)
Thomas J. Watson Sr. is born
The first electric tram operates in New York City.
1874
(no entry for this year)
(no entry for this year)
1875
(no entry for this year)
Ferdinand Hurter and Vero Charles Driffield begin systematic evaluation of sensitivity characteristics of photographic emulsions the science of sensitometry. They also invent a photographic exposure estimation device known as an actinograph. In 1920, William Bates Ferguson edits a memorial volume: The Photographic Researches of Ferdinand Hurter & Vero C. Driffield: Being a Reprint of Their Published Papers, Together With a History of Their Early Work & a Bibliography of Later Work on the Same Subject.
Custer Killed at Little Bighorn On June 25th, in Dakota territory, at the Little Big Horn, General George Armstrong Custer (who graduated from West Point in 1861, last in his class) and all 256 troops were killed. The defeat of Custer in the Battle of the Little Big Horn was the last Indian victory.
Alexander Graham Bell patents the telephone.
1876
Mark Twain publishes Tom Sawyer.
The Compromise of 1877 ends Reconstruction and gives the Presidency to Rutherford B. Hayes. Although Democratic presidential candidate Samuel Tilden won the popular vote, Southern Democratic leaders agreed to support Rutherford Hayes' efforts to obtain the disputed electoral votes of Florida, Louisiana, and South Carolina in exchange for the withdrawal of the last federal troops from the South and the end of federal efforts to protect the civil rights of African Americans.
Rutherford B. Hayes becomes nineteenth president of the United States.
The US flag is modified to have thirty-eight stars, reflecting the addition of one new state: Colorado.
Frederick Douglass becomes US Marshal for the District of Columbia.
Phonograph Invented by Edison On December 15th, Thomas Edison applied for a patent for his phonograph. Edison initially believed it would be used to record business sessions, or family voices. Edison became famous with this invention and was invited to the White House for a demonstration.
1877
(no entry for this year)
Thomas Edison and Joseph Wilson Swan produce first successful incandescent electric light.
Willgodt T. Odhner granted a patent for a calculating machine
Eadweard Muybridge uses a row of cameras with trip-wires to make a high-speed photographic analysis of a galloping horse. Each picture is taken in less than the two-thousandth part of a second, and they are taken in sufficiently rapid sequence (about 25 per second) that they constitute a brief real-time "movie" that can be viewed by using a device such as a zoetrope, a photographic "first".
Heat ripening of gelatin emulsions is discovered. This greatly increases sensitivity and makes possible very short "snapshot" exposures.
The world's first oil tanker — the Zoroaster — is launched, in the Caspian Sea. The ship was designed by Ludvig Nobel, the brother of Alfred Nobel.
The first electric street lighting appears, in London.
1878
(no entry for this year)
F. W. Woolworth opens his first "five and dime store".
1879
(no entry for this year)
(no entry for this year)
1880
(no entry for this year)
James A Garfield becomes twentieth president of the United States.
Six months after taking office, Garfield becomes the second US President to be assassinated, when he was shot by Charles J. Guiteau — a disgruntled and impoverished would-be office holder. When he purchased the pistol used in the assassination, he chose to buy one with an ivory handle because he thought it would look good as a museum exhibit after the assassination.
In January, the Tennessee State Legislature votes to segregate railroad passenger cars.
On the Fourth of July, Booker T. Washington opens Tuskegee Institute in central Alabama.
Chester A. Arthur becomes twenty-first president of the United States.
Clara Barton founds the American Red Cross.
1881
(no entry for this year)
The first hydro-electric plant opens, in Wisconsin.
Britain Invades Egypt The British invaded Egypt in response to anti foreign riots. The British defeated the army of Arabi Pasha at Al Tell. On September 15th they captured Cairo. Arabi pasha the nationalist leader was deported to Ceylon.
1882
(no entry for this year)
On October 16, the United States Supreme Court declares invalid the Civil Rights Act of 1875, stating that the federal government cannot bar corporations or individuals from discriminating on the basis of race.
Scheutz invents the first printing calculator
German engineer Gottlieb Daimler creates a portable engine that leads to the age of the automobile.
On May 25, the New York boroughs of Manhattan and Brooklyn were linked with the opening of the Brooklyn Bridge. The bridge was the first steel suspension bridge erected in the United States. It was built at a cost of $16 million and 26 lives. When it opened, the Brooklyn Bridge was the longest suspension bridge in the world.
1883
(no entry for this year)
James Dewar invents a thermos bottle in which heat is prevented from leaking via vacuum between two glass walls. The model becomes known as the Dewar Flask.
The world's first skyscraper, the Home Insurance Company Building, is erected in Chicago.
Grover Cleveland becomes twenty-second president of the United States.
1885
(no entry for this year)
Slavery is abolished in Cuba.
Daimler produces his first car.
1886
(no entry for this year)
African-American players are banned from major league baseball.
Slavery is abolished in Brazil
Dorr E. Felt was granted a patent for the Comptometer.
Introduction of the Comptometer by Felt & Tarrant Co
Celluloid film base introduced.
Interstate Commerce Act Passed On February 4, President Cleveland signed into law the first bill regulating the railroads. The act, which called for just and equal rates, also limited pooling (secret pacts between railroads). This measure received broad support in the Congress.
The United States acquires Pearl Harbor, Hawaii, as a coaling station and future naval base.
1887
(no entry for this year)
Babbage's Analytical Engine Operates For The First Time
Burroughs Receives Patent for Calculating Machine
Introduction of its adder-lister by William Seward Burroughs
Eastman patents Kodak roll-film camera.
Louis Le Prince makes Roundhay Garden Scene. It is believed to be the first-ever motion picture on film.
John Boyd Dunlop, trained as a veterinary surgeon, devises the first practical pneumatic tire in response to a request from his son for a more comfortable tricycle. His first effort involved an inflated section of garden hose, fitted to the rear wheels of the tricycle. Although born in Scotland, Dunlop spent most of his life in Northern Ireland, where his image occurs on the current £10 note, issued by the Northern Bank.
George Eastman Patents Camera George Eastman patents the hand held camera.
Slavery is abolished in Brazil, bringing to an end of the legal sanction of slavery in the Americas.
1888
(no entry for this year)
Florida becomes the first state to use the poll tax to disenfranchise black voters.
Frederick Douglass is appointed minister to Haiti.
Herman Hollerith lodges patent for Punch Card technology
Nintendo is founded
The first commercially available transparent celluloid roll film is introduced by the Eastman Company, later renamed the Eastman Kodak Company and commonly known as Kodak.
Benjamin Harrison becomes twenty-third president of the United States.
Oklahoma Land Rush The last major unsettled territory in the United States (which had been exclusively Indian) is opened for settlement. Over 200,000 settlers gather at the borders of the territory awaiting the opportunity to seize land. On the first day the territory was opened, 12,000 settlers arrived in Guthrie, Oklahoma.
1889
(no entry for this year)
About 60 common starlings are released into New York's Central Park by Eugene Schieffelin, as part of an effort to introduce every bird species mentioned in the works of William Shakespeare into North America. The original 60 birds have since swelled in number to 150 million, occupying an area extending from southern Canada and Alaska to Central America.
The US flag is modified to have forty-three stars, reflecting the addition of five new states: Idaho, Montana, North Dakota, South Dakota, and Washington.
Herman Hollerith designs tabulating machines for 1890 U.S. Census
Hypertext Pioneer Vannevar Bush Is Born
US Census Bureau announces results using Herman Hollerith's machine
The United States Army massacres 200 Indians at Wounded Knee in South Dakota, ending the Indian wars of resistance.
1890
(no entry for this year)
The US flag is modified to have forty-four stars, reflecting the addition of one new state: Wyoming.
Gabriel Lippmann announces a "method of reproducing colors photographically based on the phenomenon of interference".
William Kennedy Laurie Dickson develops the "kinetoscopic" motion picture camera while working for Thomas Edison.
The first basketball game is played, in Springfield, Massachusetts.
1891
(no entry for this year)
A record 230 people are lynched in the United States this year; 161 are black and 69 white.
1892
(no entry for this year)
1893
(no entry for this year)
(no entry for this year)
1894
(no entry for this year)
Auguste and Louis Lumière invent the cinématographe.
Cornflakes are invented in Battle Creek, Michigan, by John Harvey Kellogg — the chief medical officer of the Battle Creek sanitarium.
The Lumiere Brothers introduce moving pictures.
The Sino-Japanese War ends and Japan gains dominance over Korea and Taiwan.
1895
(no entry for this year)
The US flag is modified to have forty-five stars, reflecting the addition of one new state: Utah.
In Plessy vs. Ferguson, the United States Supreme Court declares legalized segregation in the United States to be constitutional.
The will of Alfred Nobel establishes annual prizes for peace, science, and literature.
1896
(no entry for this year)
America's first subway opens, in Boston.
Russian physicist Alexander Popov uses an antenna to transmit radio waves over a distance of 5 km.
William McKinley becomes twenty-fifth president of the United States. McKinley was the last veteran of the Civil war to serve as President. He enlisted as a private in the 23rd Ohio Infantry, and by the end of the war he had been promoted several times, finally leaving the service with the rank of Captain.
Zionist activity begins in the Middle East, under the World Zionist Congress called by Theodore Herzl.
1897
(no entry for this year)
The United States Supreme Court, in Williams vs. Mississippi, rules that poll taxes and literacy tests do not violate the Constitution.
Kodak introduces the Folding Pocket Kodak.
United States invades Cuba and defeats Spain in the Spanish-American War.
1898
(no entry for this year)
The Boer war breaks out between Afrikaners and the British in southern Africa.
1899
(no entry for this year)
Booker T. Washington publishes Up from Slavery, his autobiography.
Kodak introduces their first Brownie, a very inexpensive user-reloadable point-and-shoot box camera.
1900
(no entry for this year)
Herman Hollerith patents Apperatus For Punching Record Cards
Kodak introduces the 120 film format.
The Metro subway opens in Paris.
Theodore Roosevelt becomes twenty-sixth president of the United States.
Queen Victoria dies and is succeeded by her son, Edward VII.
1901
(no entry for this year)
Arthur Korn devises practical telephotography technology (reduction of photographic images to signals that can be transmitted by wire to other locations).Wire-Photos are in wide use in Europe by 1910, and transmitted to other continents by 1922.
1902
(no entry for this year)
W. E. B. Du Bois' The Souls of Black Folk is published on April 27. Du Bois rejects the gradualism of Booker T. Washington and calls for agitation on behalf of African-American rights.
The first motor taxis appear in London
Orville and Wilbur Wright succeed with the first controlled flight in a heavier-than-air machine.
1903
(no entry for this year)
The Rolls-Royce company is founded in Britain.
The Russo-Japanese war begins with a surprise attack by the Imperial Japanese Navy against the Russian far East Fleet, while it was at anchor at Port Arthur.
1904
(no entry for this year)
The first motorized buses operate in London.
The first neon signs appear.
An obscure Swiss patent clerk, Albert Einstein, formulates the special theory of relativity and ushers in the atomic age.
The National Forest Service is established in the United States by Gifford Pinchot.
1905
(no entry for this year)
Computer Pioneer Grace Hopper is Born
An All-India Muslim League is founded by Sultan Mahommed Shah, Aga Khan III.
Mount Vesuvius erupts, devastating the town of Ottaiano, Italy
The Great San Francisco Earthquake kills seven hundred people and causes more than $400 million in property losses.
The world's largest battleship — the Satsuma — is launched in Japan.
1906
Upton Sinclair publishes The Jungle.
Alain Locke of Philadelphia, a Harvard graduate, becomes the first African-American Rhodes scholar to study at Oxford University in England.
The Autochrome plate is introduced. It becomes the first commercially successful color photography product.
Robert Baden-Powell founds the Boy Scout movement, in Britain.
1907
(no entry for this year)
The US flag is modified to have forty-six stars, reflecting the addition of one new state: Oklahoma.
Kinemacolor, a two-color process known as the first commercial "natural color" system for movies, is introduced.
General Motors Corporation is formed.
The Ford Motor Company produces the first Model T. Ultimately, more than 15 million will be produced.
The Young Turk revolution restores the Constitution and parliamentary government in the Ottoman Empire.
1908
(no entry for this year)
The National Association for the Advancement of Colored People (NAACP) is formed on February 12 in New York City.
Kodak announces a 35 mm "safety" motion picture film on an acetate base as an alternative to the highly flammable nitrate base. The motion picture industry discontinues its use after 1911 due to technical imperfections.
The plastic age begins with the first commercial manufacture of Bakelite.
William Howard Taft becomes twenty-seventh president of the United States.
Tel Aviv, the first Jewish town in modern Palestine, is founded.
United States explorer Commander Robert E. Peary, accompanied by Matthew Henson, is the first person to reach North Pole.
1909
(no entry for this year)
On July 4, boxer Jack Johnson defeats Jim Jeffries in Reno, Nevada, to become the first African-American world heavyweight champion.
Three companies merge to become C-T-R
1910
(no entry for this year)
A fire inside the Triangle Shirtwaist Company factory in New York City's garment district kills 146 workers, mostly immigrant Jewish and Italian women in their teens and early 20s. Most women could not escape the burning building because the doors to the stairwells and exits were locked to keep the workers from stealing linen from the factory. It is the deadliest workplace incident in the city's history until 9/11.
Winston Churchill is appointed First Lord of the Admiralty.
1911
(no entry for this year)
The US flag is modified to have forty-eight stars, reflecting the addition of two new states: Arizona and New Mexico.
Thomas Edison introduces a short-lived 22 mm home motion picture format using acetate "safety" film manufactured by Kodak.
Vest Pocket Kodak using 127 film.
On April 10, the RMS Titanic — the largest, most advanced, and most luxurious passenger ship in the world — set off on her maiden voyage from Southampton, England to New York City. Four days later, this unsinkable marvel of modern engineering rammed an iceberg and sank in the North Atlantic, resulting in the deaths of 1,517 people.
The Republic of China is a nationally proclaimed with Sun Yat-sen as president. He appoints Chiang Kai-shek as his military advisor.
1912
(no entry for this year)
Woodrow Wilson becomes twenty-eighth president of the United States.
On April 11, President Woodrow Wilson initiates the racial segregation of workplaces, restaurants, and lunchrooms and all federal offices across the nation.
Roland Garros, a French aviator, becomes the first person to fly across the Mediterranean. Garros' original plan was to fly from St. Raphael in France to Bizerta, Tunisia, with the possibility of a fueling stop on Sardinia. En route, the trip seemed to be going well, so he skipped the refueling stop and flew directly to Bizerta, where he arrived at 1:45pm, with about five liters of fuel left in his tank.
Oskar Barnack develops a prototype camera for testing 35mm movie film. This device, now often referred to as an UR-Leica, was quickly recognized as a miniature camera for producing still images. A dozen years later, the first commercially available 35mm still camera was marketed as the Leica I.
Kodak makes 35 mm panchromatic motion picture film available on a bulk special order basis.
Hans Geiger unveils his radiation detector.
The federal income tax is introduced in the United States with the 16th amendment.
1913
(no entry for this year)
Thomas J. Watson Sr. joins C-T-R
Kodak introduces the Autographic film system.
The World, the Flesh and the Devil, made in Kinemacolor, is the first dramatic feature film in color released.
World War I begins after Archduke Francis Ferdinand, heir to the Austrian throne, and his wife are assassinated in Sarajevo, Bosnia, on June 28 by a Serbian nationalist.
1914
(no entry for this year)
(no entry for this year)
1915
(no entry for this year)
The Sykes–Picot Agreement (a secret agreement between the governments of the UK and France defining their respective spheres of influence and control in the Middle East after the expected downfall of the Ottoman Empire during World War I) is drawn up and signed by Sir Mark Sykes and Fran ois Georges-Picot.
1916
(no entry for this year)
Lucy Diggs Slowe wins the championship in the first national tennis tournament sponsored by the American Tennis Association. With her victory she becomes the first African-American woman to win a major sports title.
The Balfour Declaration (dated 2 November 1917) — a formal statement of policy by the British government, written by Arthur Balfour, stating that "His Majesty's government view with favour the establishment in Palestine of a national home for the Jewish people, and will use their best endeavours to facilitate the achievement of this object" — is issued. The anniversary of the declaration, 2 November, is widely commemorated in Israel and among Jews in the Jewish diaspora as Balfour Day. This day is also observed as a day of mourning in Arab countries still today.
The October Revolution occurs in Russia, followed by the Russian Civil War.
The United States enters World War I; Gen. Pershing goes to Paris to lead American forces.
1917
(no entry for this year)
Core memory inventor Jay Forrester is born
A worldwide influenza epidemic strikes. By 1920, 50 to 100 millions are dead, including Mark Sykes, the author of the British half of the Sykes-Picot Treaty.
1918
(no entry for this year)
By the beginning of 1919, the Ku Klux Klan (revived in 1915 at Stone Mountain, Georgia) operates in 27 states. Eighty-three African Americans are lynched during the year, among them a number of returning soldiers still in uniform.
ENIAC Designer Presper Eckert Is Born
1919
(no entry for this year)
Women gain the right to vote in the United States.
The Russian Civil War ends in victory for the Bolsheviks.
1920
(no entry for this year)
The Dyer Anti-Lynching Bill (first introduced by St. Louis congressman Leonidas Dyer in 1918), making lynching a federal offense, passes the US House of Representatives but fails in the US Senate.
Kodak makes 35 mm panchromatic motion picture film available as a regular stock.
1922
(no entry for this year)
Harding dies in office.
Calvin Coolidge becomes thirtieth president of the United States.
Integrated Circuit Co-Inventor Jack Kilby is Born
Harold Edgerton invents the xenon flash lamp for strobe photography.
The 16 mm amateur motion picture format is introduced by Kodak. Their Cine-Kodak camera uses reversal film and all 16 mm is on an acetate (safety) base.
Adolf Hitler's attempted coup d'état (the Beer Hall Putsch) in Munich fails. Hitler is imprisoned for eight months
1923
(no entry for this year)
C-T-R becomes IBM
Gandhi undertakes his 21-day fast to protest feuds between Hindus and Muslims in India.
1924
(no entry for this year)
On September 9, Ossian Sweet, a Detroit physician, is arrested for murder after he and his family kill a member of a white mob while defending their home. The Sweet family is represented by Clarence Darrow and they are acquitted of the charge.
First patent for a transistor in Canada lodged
January 1925 Douglas Engelbart is Born
Supercomputer Pioneer Seymour Cray is Born
The Leica I 35mm still camera was introduced at the Leipzig Spring Fair in Germany, thereby launching the 35mm format for portable photography.
Hitler reorganizes the Nazi party and publishes volume one of Mein Kampf.
Ibn Saud of Najd conquers Hijaz and forms Saudi Arabia.
1925
(no entry for this year)
Kodak introduces its 35 mm Motion Picture Duplicating Film for duplicate negatives. Previously, motion picture studios used a second camera alongside the primary camera to create a duplicate negative.
Hirohito takes over the Japanese throne upon the death of his father, Yoshihito.
Mussolini takes total control in Italy, banning all opposition.
1926
(no entry for this year)
(no entry for this year)
1927
(no entry for this year)
Introduction of 80-columns card format
1928
(no entry for this year)
Herman Hollerith Died
Herbert Hoover becomes thirty-first president of the United States.
Black Tuesday in New York signals the beginning of a worldwide economic crisis and the beginning of the Great Depression, when the US stock exchange collapses, losing $26 billion in value.
1929
(no entry for this year)
(no entry for this year)
1930
(no entry for this year)
1931
(no entry for this year)
"Flowers and Trees", the first full-color cartoon, is made in Technicolor by Disney.
Kodak introduces the first 8 mm amateur motion picture film, cameras, and projectors.
1932
(no entry for this year)
Franklin D. Roosevelt becomes thirty-second president of the United States.
Adolf Hitler is appointed German Chancellor; later the same year he is granted dictatorial powers. Events are in motion that will lead to World War II — the greatest military struggle of all time.
1933
(no entry for this year)
In Herndon vs Georgia, the United States Supreme Court sets aside the death sentence of black communist Angelo Herndon, who was convicted under a pre-Civil War slave insurrection statute for passing out leaflets in Atlanta.
IBM 405 Alphabetical Accounting Machine introduced
The 135 film cartridge is introduced, making 35 mm easy to use for still photography.
1934
(no entry for this year)
Becky Sharp, the first feature film made in the full-color "three-strip" version of Technicolor, is released.
Introduction of Kodachrome multi-layered color reversal film (16 mm only; 8 mm and 35 mm follow in 1936, sheet film in 1938).
1935
(no entry for this year)
Track star Jesse Owens wins four gold medals at the Berlin Olympics between August 3 and August 9.
At Cambridge Alan Turing invented the principle of the modern computer
Konrad Zuse Files For Patent
Agfacolor Neu (English: New Agfacolor) color reversal film for home movies and slides.
Introduction by IHAGEE of the Ihagee Kine Exakta 1, the first 35 mm SLR (Single Lens Reflex) camera.
German troops occupy the Rhineland in defiance of the treaties of Locarno and Versailles.
1936
Alan Turing Defines the Universal Machine
ILLIAC IV Designer Slotnick is born
The AtanasoffBerry Computer first conceived
1937
(no entry for this year)
Zuse Z1 built by Konrad Zuse
1938
(no entry for this year)
September 1, Germany invades Poland; Britain and France declare war on Germany on September 3. Soviet troops invade Poland. World War II begins.
September 1, George C. Marshall is sworn in as Chief of Staff of the US Army. After the war, Churchill refers to Marshall (the only military leader to serve through the entirety of WW II) as the Architect of Victory for his crucial role in ensuring the defeat of the Axis Powers.
Hewlett Packard Founded
Agfacolor negative and positive 35 mm color film stock for professional motion picture use (not for making paper prints).
The View-Master 3-D viewer and its "reels" of seven small stereoscopic image pairs on Kodachrome film are introduced.
1939
(no entry for this year)
(no entry for this year)
1940
(no entry for this year)
Between 1941 and 1945, the desperate need for labor in US defense plants and shipyards leads to the migration of 1.2 million African-Americans from the South to the North and West. This migration transforms American politics as blacks increasingly vote in their new homes and put pressure on Congress to protect civil rights throughout the nation. Their activism lays much of the foundation for the national civil rights movement a decade later.
On June 25, Pres. Franklin Roosevelt issues Executive Order 8802, which desegregates US defense plants and shipyards and creates the Fair Employment Practices Committee.
The US Army creates the Tuskegee Air Squadron (the 99th Pursuit Squadron) — an all African-American flying unit.
Zuse Z3 machine completed
07 DEC 1941: Pearl Harbor bombed by Japanese The US immediately declares war on Japan. Germany quickly declares war on the United States. The US is now a full participant in World War II.
08 DEC 1941: The US responds to Pearl Harbor. President to address joint session of Congress. Declaration of War expected.
09 DEC 1941: The United States formally declares War on Japan.
1941
(no entry for this year)
The Atanasoff-Berry Computer is completed
Kodacolor, the first color film that yields negatives for making chromogenic color prints on paper. Roll films for snapshot cameras only, 35 mm not available until 1958.
4-7 JUN 1942: The Battle of Midway occurs. Less than six months after Pearl Harbor the Japanese navy attempts to lure the remnants of the US Navy into a decisive battle at Midway Island. The Japanese plan backfires, as the battle proves to be a huge victory for US forces and the turning point in the war in the Pacific.
1942
(no entry for this year)
The Colossus Mark 1 computer is delivered to Bletchley Park
The First Computing Journal
Work begins on ENIAC
1943
(no entry for this year)
On April 3, the United States Supreme Court in Smith vs. Allright declares white-only political primaries unconstitutional.
First Harvard Mark 1 shipped
D-Day landing On June 6th, the largest amphibious force ever assembled, led by General Dwight D. Eisenhower, successfully attacks and establishes a landing on the coast of France at Normandy.
1944
(no entry for this year)
13 APR 1945: President Roosevelt dies in office.
Harry S. Truman becomes thirty-third president of the United States.
28 APR 1945: US and Russian troops meet. Germany split in two.
30 APR 1945: Press reports Mussolini killed by Italian partisans, his body abused. Hitler commits suicide by gunshot while hiding in his Führerbunker, but news of his death will not surface for a few days.
02 MAY 1945: Hitler reported dead..
08 MAY 1945: Germany surrenders unconditionally. The war in Europe is over.
22 JUN 1945: Okinawa falls after 82 days of fierce fighting.
16 JUL 1945: The Manhattan Project yields results — the world's first atomic bomb is secretly tested in New Mexico.
27 JUL 1945: Churchill is defeated in British elections. Potsdam Declaration is reported, calling for Japan to surrender unconditionally or face "prompt and utter destruction."
06 AUG 1945: the first atomic bomb used in combat is dropped on Hiroshima, Japan.
07 AUG 1945: The world learns about the atomic bomb. President Truman announces "The force from which the sun draws its power has been loosed against those who brought war to the Far East" and he calls upon Japan to immediately accept the terms of the Potsdam Declaration or expect a rain of ruin from the air, the like of which has never been seen on this earth."
09 AUG 1945: The second atomic bomb used in combat is dropped on Nagasaki, Japan. The primary target for this mission was actually the city of Kokura, but the bomber crew moved on to the secondary target of Nagasaki when Kokura proved to be too obscured by smoke to get a clear view for the bombsight. Russia declares war on japan.
15 AUG 1945: In the afternoon of August 15th (Japanese time), Japan announces its unconditional surrender. World War II is finally over. More than 60 million people have died as a result of the conflict.
Col. Benjamin O. Davis, Jr, is named commander of Godman Field, Kentucky. He is the first African-American to command a United States military base.
Grace Hopper recorded the first actual computer "bug"
Patent is Filed for the Harvard Mark I
Vannevar Bush publishes his ideas for MEMEX, a proto-hypertext system and forerunner to the World Wide Web
1945
(no entry for this year)
The United States Supreme Court, in Morgan vs Virginia, rules that segregation in interstate bus travel is unconstitutional.
Alan Turing Proposal For 'ACE' Automatic Computing Engine
ENIAC Unveiled
ENIAC, short for Electronic Numerical Integrator And Computer was announced
Frederick Williams Receives Patent for RAM device
1946
(no entry for this year)
On April 10, Jackie Robinson of the Brooklyn Dodgers becomes the first African-American to play major league baseball in the 20th century.
J Lyons executives report on the potential of computers to automate clerical work
The Williams tube won the race for a practical random-access memory
Dennis Gabor invents holography.
Harold Edgerton develops the Rapatronic camera for the U.S. government.
1947
(no entry for this year)
On July 26, Pres. Harry Truman issues Executive Order 9981, directing the desegregation of the armed forces.
The United States Supreme Court, in Shelley vs Kraemer, rules that racially restrictive covenants are legally unenforceable.
IBM´s Selective Sequence Electronic Calculator was built
The Manchester Baby, the world's first stored program computer, ran its first program
Edwin H. Land introduces the first Polaroid instant camera.
1948
(no entry for this year)
EDSAC performed its first calculations
EDSAC ran its first programs
EDVAC goes onlline
Jay Forrester Records "Core Memory" Idea
Professor Bill Phillips unveils Phillips Hydraulic Economic Modelling Computer at the LSE
The Contax S camera is introduced, the first 35 mm SLR camera with a pentaprism eye-level viewfinder.
1949
The first Elliott 152 computer appeared
Zuse sold first Z4 computer
1950
(no entry for this year)
On May 24, a mob of 3500 whites attempt to prevent a black family from moving into an apartment in Cicero, Illinois. Illinois Gov. Adlai Stevenson calls out the Illinois National Guard to protect the family and restore order.
On May 24, the United States Supreme Court rules that racial segregation in District of Columbia restaurants is unconstitutional.
Ferranti Mark 1 delivered to Manchester University
LEO I computer became operational
The first UNIVAC was delivered
UNIVAC-1 goes online
1951
(no entry for this year)
CBS News Uses UNIVAC Computer to Predict Election
Grace Hopper completes the A-0 Compiler
Heinz Nixdorf founded Nixdorf Computer
Bwana Devil, a low-budget polarized 3-D film, premieres in late November and starts a brief 3-D craze that begins in earnest in 1953 and fades away during 1954.
1952
Ralph Ellison publishes Invisible Man.
IBM announces the Model 650 computer
Jay Forrester installed magnetic core memory at MIT
Dwight D. Eisenhower becomes thirty-fourth president of the United States.
1953
(no entry for this year)
On May 17, the United States Supreme Court, in Brown vs the Board of Education, declares segregation in all public schools in the United States unconstitutional, nullifying the earlier judicial doctrine of "separate but equal."
20th September First FORTRAN Program Runs
IBM Announces Model 705 Computer
Jack Tramiel starts Commodore
Leica M Introduced
1954
Rosa Parks refuses to relinquish her bus seat to a white man on December 1, initiating the Montgomery bus boycott. Soon afterward, Martin Luther King, Jr., becomes the leader of the boycott.
Fourteen-year-old Chicago resident Emmett Till is lynched in Money, Mississippi, on August 28.
Apple Co-Founder Steve Jobs is Born
Bill Gates, cofounder of Microsoft Corporation, was born
English Electric Deuce Computers introduced
ENIAC is retired
1955
(no entry for this year)
First keyboard used to input data
IBM brings out the Magnetic Disk Memory
IBM introduces the IBM 350
Jay Forrester Receives Patent on "Core" Memory
Pegasus, produced by Ferranti Ltd., went into service in March 1956
Wang Sells Core Memory Patent to IBM
1956
(no entry for this year)
Congress passes the Civil Rights Act of 1957, the first legislation protecting black rights since Reconstruction.
In September, Pres. Dwight D. Eisenhower sends federal troops to Little Rock, Arkansas, to ensure the enforcement of a federal court order to desegregate Central High School and to protect nine African-American students enrolled as part of the order.
BCS - British Computer Society is Founded
CDC Introduces 1604 Computer
DEC is founded
Ferranti Mercury Introduced
FORTRAN-1 is formally published
May 1957 LEO II Installed
First Asahi Pentax SLR introduced.
First digital computer acquisition of scanned photographs, by Russell Kirsch et al. at the U.S. National Bureau of Standards (now the NIST).
1957
(no entry for this year)
Jack Kilby created the first integrated circuit
1958
(no entry for this year)
The US flag is modified to have forty-nine stars, reflecting the addition of one new state: Alaska.
COBOL is introduced
The Xerox 914 is the first office copier for sale
AGFA introduces the first fully automatic camera, the Optima.
Nikon F introduced.
1959
(no entry for this year)
The US flag is modified to have fifty stars, reflecting the addition of one new state: Hawaii.
The Civil Rights Act of 1960 is signed into law by Pres. Dwight D. Eisenhower on May 6. The act establishes federal inspection of local voter registration rolls and introduces penalties for anyone who obstructs a citizens attempt to register to vote or to cast a ballot.
DEC released its first mini computer: PDP-1
1960
(no entry for this year)
The Congress of Racial Equality organizes Freedom Rides through the Deep South.
Clive Sinclair founds Sinclair Radionics
Computerized spreadsheets for use in business accounting developed
LEO III completed in 1961
Minivac 601 Computer Launched
Robert Noyce Awarded Patent for "Integrated Circuit"
John F. Kennedy becomes thirty-fifth president of the United States.
1961
(no entry for this year)
On October 1, James Meredith becomes the first black student to enroll at the University of Mississippi.
"Music from Mathematics" LP was created using an IBM 7090 computer
The first commercial Modem manufactured
The Machester Atlas was inaugurated on 7th December 1962
1962
(no entry for this year)
Martin Luther King Jr. writes his "Letter from Birmingham Jail" on April 16.
Kennedy assassinated.
Lyndon Johnson becomes thirty-sixth president of the United States.
Martin Luther King Jr. is named Time magazine's Man of the Year.
On June 12, Mississippi NAACP field secretary Medgar Evers is assassinated outside his home in Jackson.
Douglas Engelbart Invents the Mouse
First edition of the ASCII standard was published.
Theodore H (Ted) Nelson coins the word Hypertext
Kodak introduces the Instamatic.
1963
(no entry for this year)
Congress passes the Civil Rights Act of 1964. The act and this discrimination in all public accommodations and by employers. It also establishes the Equal Opportunity Employment Commission (EEOC) to monitor compliance with the law.
On June 21, civil rights workers James Chaney, Andrew Goodman, and Michael Schwerner are abducted and killed by terrorists in Mississippi.
The 24th amendment to the Constitution, which abolishes the poll tax, is ratified.
BASIC language developed
First operation of BASIC
First operation of Ferranti Atlas
Graphic tablet developed
IBM releases the System 360 range of commercial computers
Introduction of CDC 6600
Introduction of DEC PDP-7 18-bits minicomputer
First Pentax Spotmatic SLR introduced.
1964
(no entry for this year)
Malcolm X is assassinated at the Audubon Ballroom in Harlem on February 21.
The Watts Uprising occurs on August 11-16th. Thirty-four people are killed and 1000 are injured in the five-day confrontation.
Commodore Business Machines (CBM) is founded.
DEC unveils the PDP-8,
Introduction of Wang 300 electronic calculator
Moore's Law coined
1965
(no entry for this year)
On June 5, James Meredith begins a solitary March Against Fear for 220 miles from Memphis, Tennessee, to Jackson, Mississippi, to protest racial discrimination. Meredith is shot by a sniper soon after crossing into Mississippi.
On November 8, Edward Brooke of Massachusetts becomes the first African-American to be elected to the United States Senate since Reconstruction.
On September 15, the Black Panther Party is formed in Oakland, California, by Bobby Seale and Huey P. Newton.
Introduction of DEC PDP-9
The hand-held pocket calculator was invented at Texas Instruments in 1966
1966
(no entry for this year)
On July 13, Thurgood Marshall takes his seat as the first African-American justice on the United States Supreme Court.
On June 12, the United States Supreme Court, in Loving vs Virginia, strikes down state interracial marriage bans.
The six-day Newark Riot begins on July 12.
Barclays Bank in the UK claims to have installed the first cash dispenser
Elliott Automation merged with English Electric
Introduction of DEC PDP-10
First MOS 10 by 10 active pixel array shown by Noble
1967
(no entry for this year)
On April 4, Martin Luther King, Jr., is assassinated in Memphis, Tennessee. In the wake of the assassination, 125 cities in 29 states experience uprisings.
On June 5, New York Senator and presidential candidate Robert F. Kennedy is assassinated in Los Angeles.
CDC Introduces the 7600 Supercomputer
Douglas C. Engelbart publicly demonstrates the mouse
IBM tests a 8in floppy disc
Integrated Circuits First Used in Apollo Moon shot
Introduction of HP-9100 desk calculator
Robert Noyce and Gordon Moore found Intel Corporation
T J Watson and IBM granted patent for the DRAM
1968
(no entry for this year)
AMD Advanced Micro Devices is founded
ARPANET launch the world's first successful packet-switched wide area computer network
DEC PDP-15 Introduced
First flight to Moon of Apollo XI with Raytheon Apollo Guidance Computer
Honeywell releases the H316 "Kitchen Computer",
Intel announces a 1 kilobit RAM chip
Plessey buys out Ferranti's numerical Control Interests
Richard M. Nixon becomes thirty-seventh president of the United States.
1969
(no entry for this year)
Dr. Clifton Wharton Junior is named president of Michigan State University on January 2. He is the first African-American to lead a major, predominantly white university in the 20th century.
5200 computers installed in Britain
Computer terminals in homes predicted for 1980
DEC introduces the PDP-8/E
IBM 370/145 introduced
Open University to install ICL 32K 1902A computer
Univac 1110 is introduced
UNIX is developed
Xerox opens the Palo Alto Research Center (PARC)
1970
(no entry for this year)
On January 12, the Congressional Black Caucus is formed in Washington DC.
Burroughs introduces L500 Visible Record Model
DEC launches Giant Mini PDP-11/45
DEC launches PDP-11/03
Decsystem 10 introduced
First Network Email sent by Ray Tomlinson
IBM's Thomas J Watson retires
Intel Introduces the World's First EPROM
Intel Launches the First Microprocessor - The 4004
Nixdorf merge with AEG-Telefunken
Olivetti launches P602 "minicomputer"
1971
(no entry for this year)
In November, Barbara Jordan of Houston and Andrew Young of Atlanta become the first black Congressional representatives elected from the US South since 1898.
£1.3m RAF order for Cossor Terminals
370/125 and OCR reader from IBM
ARPA Network - UK gets link to major US network
ASC developed by Texas Instruments
Atanasoff Official "Inventor" of Computer
Atari Introduces Pong
Burroughs Launch L8000 Range of Computers
Burroughs launches L7000 range on UK market
C programming language developed
Clive Sinclair introduces the first pocket calculator
Development of standard OS to be halted
First e-mail program developed
First Infra-red Data Link transmission in the UK
Flat screen terminal introduced by Burroughs
Foundation of Cray Research Inc by Seymour Cray
Fujitsu and Hitachi in joint deal
GE Time Sharing Service
Hewlett-Packard introduces the HP-35
Honeywell's 700 range comes to the UK
IBM's DOS/VS
NCR 399
Problems with IBM 370/155 and 370/165
Sigma 6
SITA Network
Space Craft Pioneer 10 & 11 use Custom CPU in TTL
Terminal range boosted by Burroughs TC 3500
The Future of ICL as a British-controlled going concern
The Intel 8008 was introduced
The Magnavox Odyssey, the first video game console, is released
UK launch for Burroughs L8000 range
Worlds first IBM 370/135 installed in Britain
Integrated Photomatrix (Noble) demonstrates for 64 by 64 MOS active pixel array
1972
(no entry for this year)
In the late summer of 1973, Republican Vice President Spiro Agnew was under investigation by the United States Attorney's office in Baltimore, Maryland, on charges of extortion, tax fraud, bribery and conspiracy. In October, he was formally charged with having accepted bribes totaling more than $100,000, while holding office as Baltimore County Executive, Governor of Maryland, and as Vice President of the United States. On October 10, 1973, Agnew was allowed to plead no contest to a single charge that he had failed to report $29,500 of income received in 1967, with the condition that he resign the office of Vice President. Agnew is the only Vice President in U.S. history to resign because of criminal charges.
Thomas Bradley is elected the first black mayor of Los Angeles in the modern era. He is reelected four times and thus holds the mayor's office for 20 years.
8" floppy & first "Hard Drive introduced by IBM
Bob Metcalfe invents Ethernet
Britain exports more computing equipment than it imports
Gary Kildall writes CP/M
IBM 370/145 product range released
IBM in Nigeria
IMSAI is founded. In 1973
The Micral was the earliest commercial, non-kit personal computer
Xerox Alto personal computer was developed at Xerox PARC
Fairchild Semiconductor releases the first large image forming CCD chip: 100 rows and 100 columns of pixels.
1973
(no entry for this year)
Under mounting impeachment pressure resulting from the Watergate break-in, Nixon becomes the first president ever to resign from presidency.
Gerald Ford becomes thirty-eighth president of the United States.
GA LSI 12/16 and LSI16
introduction of Intel 8080 2MHz microprocessor
MITS completes the first prototype Altair 8800 microcomputer
NCR 250-6000
Philips P852M
The Z-80, 8 bit processor is designed by Zilog Corp
Xerox Palo Alto Research Center designed the Alto
1974
(no entry for this year)
Bill Gates and Paul Allen sign a licensing agreement with MITS
CP/M operating system finished
Cray 1A announced
First meeting of the Homebrew Club
Microsoft Founded
MITS Altair launched on the cover of Popular Electronics magazine
Bryce Bayer of Kodak develops the Bayer filter mosaic pattern for CCD color image sensors.
1975
(no entry for this year)
Apple 1 Released
Burroughs introduce the large B7700 series
Dec System 20 introduced
Intel introduce SBC-80/10 "computer on a card"
Last slide rule manufactured today
Seymour Cray demonstrates CRAY-1 - The first vector-processor supercomputer
Steve Wozniak, Steve Jobs and Ronald Wayne Found Apple Computer Inc.
The 5 1/4" flexible disk drive was introduced
Steadicam becomes available.
1976
(no entry for this year)
The eighth and final night for the televised miniseries based on Alex Haley's Roots is shown on February 3. This final episode achieves the highest ratings to that point for a single television program.
Commodore International shows its Commodore PET 2001
Radio Shack announces TRS-80 computer
Science of Cambridge Ltd Formed
The Apple II launched
The MK14 was introduced by Science of Cambridge
The RCA CDP1802 microprocessor was used in the Galileo spacecraft
Jimmy Carter becomes thirty-ninth president of the United States.
1977
(no entry for this year)
Acorn Computers Ltd formed in Cambridge, UK
Texas Instruments introduced Speak & Spell
VisiCalc Spreadsheet is born
1978
(no entry for this year)
"VisiCalc" introduced
Acorn System 1 Launched
Apple II+ Launched
Microsoft moves from Albuquerque, New Mexico to Bellevue, Washington
On March 28, a partial core meltdown occurred in Unit 2 of the Three Mile Island Nuclear Generating Station in Dauphin County, Pennsylvania near Harrisburg.
1979
(no entry for this year)
Acorn Atom Launched
Apple Computers Initial Share Offering
Microsoft Signs Contract with IBM to Create Operating System
Sinclair ZX80 Launched
The Apple III was announced
1980
(no entry for this year)
Acorn BBC Micro Launched
HP-41 calculator Used In Space Shuttle
IBM announced that it was launching a personal computer using an Intel 8088
IBM introduces personal computer with Microsoft's 16-bit operating system, MS-DOS 1.0
Introduction of Osborne portable computer in a suitcase
Microsoft incorporates
Sinclair ZX81 Computer Launched
Space Shuttle uses Intel 8086 and RCA 1802
The first portable computer is launched
VIC-20 Released in Europe & US
Ronald Reagan becomes fortieth president of the United States.
1981
(no entry for this year)
Commodore 64 Released
Dragon 32 Released
Introduction of Cray X-MP supercomputer
Introduction of Intel 80286 at 6 MHz, with 134,000 transistors
Sinclair launches the ZX Spectrum computer
Sinclair ZX Spectrum Launched
1982
(no entry for this year)
On November 2, Pres. Ronald Reagan signs into law a bill making the third Monday in January a federal holiday honoring the life of Martin Luther King Jr.
Apple Lisa Launched
Introduction of spreadsheet program 1-2-3 by Lotus,
Microsoft Introduced 2-button Mouse
Microsoft Introduces Windows
The famicom is released in Japan
1983
(no entry for this year)
Apple launches Macintosh 128K
Creation of Dell Computer Corporation by Michael Dell
First ARM Processors Powered Up
IBM and Compaq introduce the IDE interface
IBMs new 3480 cartridge tape system introduced
Introduction of IBM PC/AT based on Intel 80286
Macintosh 512K Launched
Novelist William Gibson coins the term cyberspace
1984
(no entry for this year)
United States Rep. William H. Gray III (Pennsylvania), becomes the first African-American congressmen to chair the House Budget Committee.
Commodore 128 Released
Cray X-MP Supercomputer Begins Operation
First Commodore Amiga Released
Introduction of Intel 386
Microsoft Windows Launched
Olivetti buy 49% of Acorn Computers
Steve Jobs founds NeXT Computers Inc.
1985
(no entry for this year)
On September 8, The Oprah Winfrey Show from Chicago becomes nationally syndicated.
Acorn BBC Master Compact Launched
Acorn BBC Master Launched
Apple Macintosh Plus launched
First PC virus is released with "Brain"
Microsoft moves to corporate campus in Redmond, Washington
Microsoft stock goes public
Nintendo NES released
Kodak scientists invent the world's first megapixel sensor.
On April 26, the Chernobyl Nuclear Disaster occurred in the Soviet Union, when reactor 4 of the Chernobyl Nuclear Power Plant suffered a catastrophic power increase, leading to explosions in the core. This dispersed large quantities of radioactive fuel and core materials into the atmosphere and ignited the combustible graphite moderator. The burning graphite moderator increased the emission of radioactive particles, carried by the smoke, as the reactor had not been contained by any kind of hard containment vessel (unlike all Western plants). The accident occurred during an experiment scheduled to test a potential safety emergency core cooling feature. Large areas in Ukraine, Belarus, and Russia had to be evacuated, with over 336,000 people resettled.
1986
(no entry for this year)
Dr. Clifton R. Wharton Jr. is appointed chairman and CEO of TIAA-CREF, the 19th largest US Fortune 500 company. He becomes the first black chairman and CEO of a major US corporation.
Kurt Schmoke becomes the first African-American elected mayor of Baltimore.
Commodore release the Amiga 500 and the Amiga 2000
Macintosh II released
Windows 2 was launched
1987
(no entry for this year)
IBM announces 3 millionth PS/2 personal computer
RISC OS is released
The first worm experience appears
The NeXT (68030 CPU) computer is introduced after two years of research
Unisys takes over Convergent Technologies
1988
(no entry for this year)
Douglas Wilder wins the governorship of Virginia, make him the first African-American to be popularly elected to that office.
Gen. Colin L. Powell is named chief of the United States Joint Chiefs of Staff, the first African-American in the youngest person (52) to hold the post.
In March, Frederick Andrew Gregory becomes the first African-American to command a space shuttle when he leads the crew of the Discovery.
Apple introduces the Macintosh SE/30
Apple Macintosh Portable Released
ICL introduces DRS model 40 and 45
Tim Berners-Lee toyed with the idea of web pages and hyperlinks
George Bush becomes forty-first president of the United States.
1989
(no entry for this year)
Nelson Mandela, South African black nationalist, is freed after 27 years in prison.
Commodore releases the Amiga 3000
Hubble Space Telescope uses 386 processor
Introduction of IBM RS/6000
Microsoft launches Windows 3.0
1990
(no entry for this year)
Apple releases the PowerBook 100
First E-mail From Space Is Sent from a Mac Portable
Linus Torvalds from Finland releases Linux version 0.02
Silicon & Synapse founded
Sun Microsystems Starts Java Technology
The Soviet Union ends, and so does the Cold War.
1991
(no entry for this year)
Commodore releases the the Amiga 500+
Internet freed from Government control
Microsoft Releases Windows 3.1
Photo CD created by Kodak.
1992
(no entry for this year)
Apple Newton Message Pad announced
Commodore released the CD32 model
Compaq Introduces Presario
Foundation of Nvidia
IBM Announces a loss of $4.97m for 1992
Intel Ships "Pentium" Chip"
Introduction of Apple Newton PDA
The Jet Propulsion Laboratory begins work on image-capturing devices using CMOS or active pixel sensors.
William (Bill) Clinton becomes forty-second president of the United States.
1993
On April 27, Nelson Mandela is elected President of South Africa in that nation's first election giving black voters full enfranchisement. The land of apartheid is now led by a black activist.
Netscape Communications Corporation is founded
Silicon & Synapse changes its name to Blizzard Entertainment
Yahoo founded January 1994
Nikon introduces the first optical-stabilized lens.
1994
(no entry for this year)
Microsoft launches Windows 95
Nvidia's NV1 launched
"Kodak DC40 and the Apple QuickTake 100 become the first digital cameras marketed for consumers."
1995
(no entry for this year)
Apple Computer buys NeXT
eBay is founded by Jeff Skoll and Pierre Omidyar
Eastman Kodak, FujiFilm, AgfaPhoto, and Konica introduce the Advanced Photo System (APS).
1996
(no entry for this year)
IBM's Deep Blue Beats Gary Kasparov at Chess
IBM announces RS/6000 SP Deep Blue
zon.com, an online bookseller, goes public
first known publicly shared picture via a cell phone, by Philippe Kahn.
1997
(no entry for this year)
Apple Release the iMac
Foundation of Google by Larry Page and Sergey Brin
Introduction of Apple iMac
Microsoft launches Windows 98
1998
(no entry for this year)
Napster the first file sharing program introduced
Nvidia releases GeForce 256
The Millennium bug is taken seriously
1999
(no entry for this year)
Intel ES7000 server from Unisys introduced
Microsoft launches Windows 2000
J-SH04 introduced by J-Phone, the first commercially available mobile phone with a camera that can take and share still pictures.[13]
2000
(no entry for this year)
Apple Launches a New Music Device - The iPod
Microsoft Releases Windows XP
George W. Bush becomes forty-third president of the United States.
2001
(no entry for this year)
Microsoft and partners launch Tablet PC
2002
(no entry for this year)
Microsoft launches Windows Server 2003
2003
(no entry for this year)
Barack Obama is elected to the United States Senate from Illinois. He becomes the second African-American elected to the Senate from that state, and only the fifth black US senator in history.
Firefox 1.0 Introduced
First Ubuntu Linux operating system Released
Microsoft returns $75 billion to shareholders
2004
(no entry for this year)
Google now indexes over 8 billion pages
AgfaPhoto files for bankruptcy. The production of Agfa brand consumer films ends.
2005
(no entry for this year)
Microsoft announces Bill Gates transition
Dalsa produces a 111 megapixel CCD sensor, the highest resolution at that time.
2006
(no entry for this year)
iPhone introduced
Microsoft launches Windows Vista and Office 2007
2007
(no entry for this year)
On August 27, Illinois Sen. Barack Obama becomes the first African-American to attain the Democratic Party nomination for president of the United States when he is chosen at the party's national convention in Denver.
Android operating system released
The HD player war comes to an end
Virus Found On Computer In Space Station
Polaroid announces it is discontinuing the production of all instant film products, citing the rise of digital imaging technology.
2008
(no entry for this year)
FujiFilm launches world's first digital 3D camera with 3D printing capabilities.
Kodak announces the discontinuance of Kodachrome film.
Barack Obama becomes forty-fourth president of the United States.
2009
(no entry for this year)
Apple iPad Launched in the UK
Apple Surpasses Microsoft as Most Valuable Technology Company
First Tweet sent to Twitter on VIC-20
2010
(no entry for this year)
Steve Jobs retires as CEO of Apple
Steve Jobs, co-founder of Apple, dies age 56
Lytro releases the first pocket-sized consumer light-field camera, capable of refocusing images after being taken.
2011
(no entry for this year)
Google Brain watches Youtube, recognises cats.
Wii U released
Wikipedia and others Go Dark in protest anti-piracy law
2012
(no entry for this year)
Edward Snowden Leaks Top Secret Documents
PlayStation 4 released
Suicide of Aaron Swartz
Xbox One released
2013
(no entry for this year)
Amazon buys Twitch for £585m
Android watches go up for preorder
Bill Gates returns to Microsoft as Technology Adviser
Bletchley park officially opens to the public
Facebook buys Oculus
Facebook buys WhatsApp
Nvidia at GPU Technology Conference
The Queen opens a new 'Information Age' Gallery at the Science Museum
2014
(no entry for this year)
Apple posts biggest quarterly profit in history
Apple reveals Apple Watch
Microsoft reveals HoloLens headset
2015
(no entry for this year)
(no entry for this year)
2016
(no entry for this year)
Donald Trump becomes forty-fifth president of the United States. A Berlusconi-like event visits America.
2017
(no entry for this year)
(no entry for this year)
2018
(no entry for this year)
(no entry for this year)
2019
(no entry for this year)
(no entry for this year)
2020
(no entry for this year)
(no entry for this year)
2021
(no entry for this year)
(no entry for this year)
2022
(no entry for this year)
(no entry for this year)
2023
(no entry for this year)
(no entry for this year)
2024
(no entry for this year)
(no entry for this year)
2025
(no entry for this year)
(no entry for this year)
2026
(no entry for this year)
(no entry for this year)
2027
(no entry for this year)
(no entry for this year)
2028
(no entry for this year)
(no entry for this year)
2029
(no entry for this year)
ESP Quick Facts
ESP Origins
In the early 1990's, Robert Robbins was a faculty member at Johns Hopkins, where he directed the informatics core of GDB — the human gene-mapping database of the international human genome project. To share papers with colleagues around the world, he set up a small paper-sharing section on his personal web page. This small project evolved into The Electronic Scholarly Publishing Project.
ESP Support
In 1995, Robbins became the VP/IT of the Fred Hutchinson Cancer Research Center in Seattle, WA. Soon after arriving in Seattle, Robbins secured funding, through the ELSI component of the US Human Genome Project, to create the original ESP.ORG web site, with the formal goal of providing free, world-wide access to the literature of classical genetics.
ESP Rationale
Although the methods of molecular biology can seem almost magical to the uninitiated, the original techniques of classical genetics are readily appreciated by one and all: cross individuals that differ in some inherited trait, collect all of the progeny, score their attributes, and propose mechanisms to explain the patterns of inheritance observed.
ESP Goal
In reading the early works of classical genetics, one is drawn, almost inexorably, into ever more complex models, until molecular explanations begin to seem both necessary and natural. At that point, the tools for understanding genome research are at hand. Assisting readers reach this point was the original goal of The Electronic Scholarly Publishing Project.
ESP Usage
Usage of the site grew rapidly and has remained high. Faculty began to use the site for their assigned readings. Other on-line publishers, ranging from The New York Times to Nature referenced ESP materials in their own publications. Nobel laureates (e.g., Joshua Lederberg) regularly used the site and even wrote to suggest changes and improvements.
ESP Content
When the site began, no journals were making their early content available in digital format. As a result, ESP was obliged to digitize classic literature before it could be made available. For many important papers — such as Mendel's original paper or the first genetic map — ESP had to produce entirely new typeset versions of the works, if they were to be available in a high-quality format.
ESP Help
Early support from the DOE component of the Human Genome Project was critically important for getting the ESP project on a firm foundation. Since that funding ended (nearly 20 years ago), the project has been operated as a purely volunteer effort. Anyone wishing to assist in these efforts should send an email to Robbins.
ESP Plans
With the development of methods for adding typeset side notes to PDF files, the ESP project now plans to add annotated versions of some classical papers to its holdings. We also plan to add new reference and pedagogical material. We have already started providing regularly updated, comprehensive bibliographies to the ESP.ORG site.
ESP Picks from Around the Web (updated 06 MAR 2017 )
Old Science
Weird Science
Treating Disease with Fecal Transplantation
Fossils of miniature humans (hobbits) discovered in Indonesia
Dinosaur tail, complete with feathers, found preserved in amber.
Astronomy
Mysterious fast radio burst (FRB) detected in the distant universe.