Timeline+of+important+hitorical+events

Timeline of important historical events in the USA **1492:**Christopher Columbus "discovered" America. When he came to America, he thought he had reached India. That's the reason why the native Americans are called Indians.

**1540:**By this time, the Spanish had taken control of over 100 Indian pueblos in the area that today is Arizona and New Mexico, using both the sword and the cross. They forced the Indians to work as slaves on their own lands and imposed foreign religious beliefs on them.

**1607:**First British settlement was established in Jamestown, Virginia.

**1620:**The most famous expedition to America is probably the so-called Pilgrim Fathers, who came with Mayflower, happened this year.

**1680:**Pueblo Indians successfully rose against the Spanish missionaries killing Spanish priests and over 400 Spaniards. This Pueblo Revolt was a short-lived victory as the Spanish regained control a dozen years later and the Pueblo Indians once again came under Spanish dominion.

**1700s:**Britain established 13 colonies in the USA:New Hampshire, New York, Maryland, Massachusetts, New Jersey, Virginia, Rhode Island, Pennsylvania, North Carolina, Connecticut, Delaware, South Carolina, Georgia.

**1775 – 1783:**War of Independence broke out in 1775 between the American Colonies and Britain. The War broke out, because they didn't want to be controlled by Britain. They didn't like that they had to pay taxes to England, they didn't get any representation in British parliament and they didn't want to give away their own natural resources.

In 1776 USA declared independence and wrote the Declaration of Independence.

**1789:**USA got their Constitution as well as their first President – George Washington. The Founding Fathers was the men who wrote the Constitution. These men are held in very high regard in the USA because they are believed to be the fathers of the nation.

**1838 – 1839:**Cherokee men, women and children were forcefully removed from their homes on the area of Georgia, Tennessee and North Carolina and located relocated in Oklahoma. This march has since come to be known as The Trail of Tears as it has been estimated that over 400 people died during this cruel and inhumane march.

**1861-65:** Lincoln started the Civil War to keep the USA together. The south had before this time, formed their own Confederacy, with a constitution that allowed slavery. The North wanted to make slavery illegal, so the war broke out. This war costed the lives of more than 600 000 Americans and opened up wounds that healed very slowly.

**1862:**The Homestead Act was written. The Homestead was one of the three United Stated federal laws which gave everyone who wanted to till the land more or less free access to 160 acres on the Great Plains.

**1876:**The Battle of Little Big Horn between the Native Americans and new American settlers broke out. The Native Americans won a crushing victory. It has been estimated that there were anywhere between ten and fifteen thousand Indians with over 2500 warriors present in the largest concentration of Indian tribes that history has ever recorded.

**1890:**The final defeat of the Indians occurred at the massacre of Wounded Knee in South Dakota. White officials had become alarmed at the spread of the Ghost Dance Religion. In an attempt to discourage the spread of this Indian belief, soldiers entered the Indian camp at Wounded Knee and tried to disarm the men. One gun went off and the shooting started. 150 Indians had been killed and more than 50 wounded, in the army casualties 25 were killed and 39 wounded.

**1924:**The Indians became American citizens.

<span style="display: block; font-family: Georgia,serif; font-size: 14pt; text-align: left;">**1930:**After the New York Stock Exchange crash in 1929, the USA was plunged into economic depression that lasted until the start of World War II. The politician initiatives of President Franklin D. Roosevelt's “New Deal” and the war economy of World War II put the USA back on track again.

<span style="display: block; font-family: Georgia,serif; font-size: 14pt; text-align: left;">**1940 – 1945:**During the World War II the USA emerged as the leading world power and assumed the international leadership and responsibility that previously had avoided.

<span style="display: block; font-family: Georgia,serif; font-size: 14pt; text-align: left;">**After World War II - 1980s:**The Cold War started after the second world war ended. The Cold War was a conflict between Soviet and USA. It wasn't really a war, but a conflict that could have ended in war.

<span style="display: block; font-family: Georgia,serif; font-size: 14pt; text-align: left;">**1963 – 1975:**The USA got involved in the Vietnam War because they wanted to stop the communism from spreading around the world.

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