• 1877 - Rutherford B. Hayes becomes President and Reconstruction ends with the Compromise of 1877
• 1877 - Nez Percé Indian War
• 1878 - Bland-Allison Act
• 1878 - Morgan silver dollars first minted
• 1879 - Thomas Edison invents light bulb
• 1879 - Knights of Labor go public

1880s

• 1880s - Dust Bowl begins
• 1880 - U.S. population exceeds 50 million for first time
• 1881 - James Garfield inaugurated as President
• 1881 - James Garfield assassinated
• 1881 - Chester A. Arthur inaugurated as President
• 1881 - Clara Barton creates Red Cross
• 1881 - Tuskegee Institute founded
• 1881 - A Century of Dishonor written by Helen Hunt Jackson
• 1882 - Chinese Exclusion Act and European Restriction Act
• 1883 - Civil Rights Cases 109 US 3 1883 legalizes doctrine of segregation
• 1883 - Pendleton Civil Service Reform Act
• 1883 - Brooklyn Bridge opens
• 1885 - Grover Cleveland inaugurated as President
• 1885 - Washington monument completed
• 1885 - Stanford University founded
• 1886 - Haymarket Riot
• 1886 - American Federation of Labor founded in Columbus, Ohio
• 1887 - Congress creates Interstate Commerce Commission
• 1887 - Dawes Act
• 1887 - Hatch Act
• 1888 - Publication of Looking Backward by Edward Bellamy
• 1888 - National Geographic Society founded
• 1889 - Benjamin Harrison becomes President
• 1889 - North Dakota, South Dakota, Montana and Washington become states
• 1889 - Johnstown flood in Pennsylvania
• 1889 - Jane Addams founds Hull House

1890s

• 1890 - Sherman Antitrust Act
• 1890 - Sherman Silver Purchase Act
• 1890 - McKinley tariff
• 1890 - Yosemite National Park created
• 1890 - Idaho and Wyoming become states
• 1890 - Wounded Knee Massacre
• 1890 - North American Women's Suffrage Association founded
• 1891 - Basketball invented
• 1891 - Baltimore Crisis
• 1892 - Homestead Strike
• 1892 - General Electric Company founded
• 1893 - Grover Cleveland inaugurated President for second term
• 1893 - Panic of 1893
• 1893 - Sherman Silver Purchase Act repealed
• 1894 - Coxey's Army
• 1894 - Pullman strike
• 1894 - Wilson-Gorman tariff, including Income Tax
• 1895 - Pollock v. Farmers' Loan and Trust Company strikes down part of Wilson-Gorman Tariff
• 1896 - Plessy v. Ferguson 163 US 537 1896 legalizes segregation in railway cars
• 1896 - William Jennings Bryan delivers his Cross of Gold speech
• 1896 - Gold discovered in Alaska's Klondike
• 1896 - Utah becomes a state
• 1897 - William McKinley becomes President
• 1897 - Boston subway completed
• 1897 - Dingley tariff
• 1898 - USS Maine explodes in Havana, Cuba harbor, precipitating the Spanish-American War
• 1898 - DeLome Letter
• 1898 - Treaty of Paris (1898) ends Spanish-American War
• 1899 - Teller Amendment
• 1899 - Open Door Notes

1930s

• 1930 - Hawley-Smoot tariff
• 1931 - Empire State Building opens
• 1931 - Japan invades Manchuria
• 1932 - Stimson Doctrine
• 1932 - Norris-Laguardia Act
• 1932 - Bonus Army marches on DC
• 1932 - Amelia Earhart flies across Atlantic Ocean
• 1932 - Norris LaGuardia Anti Injunction Bill
• 1932 - Reconstruction Finance Corporation
• 1933 - 20th Amendment
• 1933 - Franklin Delano Roosevelt becomes President
• 1933 - Agricultural Adjustment Act
• 1933 - Civil Works Administration
• 1933 - Civilian Conservation Corps
• 1933 - Farm Credit Administration
• 1933 - Home Owners Loan Corporation
• 1933 - Tennessee Valley Authority
• 1933 - Public Works Administration
• 1933 - National (Industrial) Recovery Act
• 1933 - Giuseppe Zangara kills Anton Cermak
• 1933 - Frances Perkins appointed United States Secretary of Labor
• 1933 - Montevideo Conference
• 1933 - 21st Amendment
• 1933 - Japan and Germany withdraw from League of Nations
• 1933 - Good Neighbor Policy announced
• 1934 - Glass-Steagal Act
• 1934 - Securities and Exchange Commission
• 1934 - Federal Housing Administration
• 1934 - Johnson Act
• 1934 - Reciprocal Trade Agreements Act
• 1934 - Tydings-McDuffie Act
• 1934 - John Dillinger killed
• 1934 - Indian Reorganization Act
• 1934 - Share the Wealth society founded by Huey Long
• 1935 - Works Progress Administration
• 1935 - Neutrality Act
• 1935 - Motor Carrier Act
• 1935 - Social Security Act
• 1935 - Schechter Poultry Corporation v. US
• 1935 - National Labor Relations Act
• 1935 - Huey Long assassinated
• 1935 - Congress of Industrial Organizations formed
• 1935 - Alcoholics Anonymous founded
• 1935 - Fair Labor Standard Act - sets minimum wage and hours
• 1935 - Revenue Act
• 1936 - Robinson Patman Act
• 1936 - Life Magazine begins
• 1936 - Butler v. US
• 1936 - London Conference on disarmament
• 1937 - Neutrality Acts
• 1937 - Hindenburg disaster
• 1937 - Japanese planes sink Panay in China
• 1937 - Golden Gate bridge completed
• 1938 - Wheeler Lea Act
• 1938 - Fair Labor Standards Act
• 1939 - Hatch Act
• 1938 - Orson Welles' War of the Worlds broadcast
• 1939 - Germany invades Poland; World War Two begins
• 1939 - Cash and Carry

1940s

• 1940 - Selective Service Act
• 1940 - Alien Registration (Smith) Act
• 1941 - Lend Lease Act
• 1941 - Attack on Pearl Harbor
• 1941 - U.S. enters World War II
• 1941 - Atlantic Charter
• 1941 - Japanese internment begins
• 1942 - Office of Price Administration
• 1942 - Cocoanut Grove fire
• 1942 - Congress of Racial Equality
• 1942 - Revenue Act of 1942
• 1943 - Office of Price Administration established
• 1943 - Detroit, Michigan race riots
• 1943 - Cairo Conference
• 1943 - Casablanca Conference
• 1943 - Tehran Conference
• 1944 - Bretton Woods Conference
• 1944 - Dumbarton Oaks Conference
• 1944 - GI Bill of Rights
• 1944 - D-Day
• 1945 - Yalta Conference
• 1945 - Battle of Bulge
• 1945 - U.S. takes Okinawa
• 1945 - U.S. joins the United Nations
• 1945 - Nationwide labor strikes due to inflation; OPA disbanded
• 1945 - atomic bomb dropped on Hiroshima and Nagasaki
• 1945 - Germany and Japan surrender, ending World War II
• 1945 - Potsdam Conference
• 1945 - Franklin Delano Roosevelt dies
• 1945 - Harry S. Truman becomes President
• 1946 - Winston Churchill's Iron Curtain speech
• 1946 - Benjamin Spock's Child Care book published
• 1946 - Employment Act
• 1946 - Atomic Energy Act
• 1946 - President's commission on Civil Rights
• 1946 - Philippines regain their independence from the U.S.
• 1947 - Presidential Succession Act
• 1947 - Taft Hartley Act
• 1947 - National Security Act
• 1947 - General Agreement on Tariffs and Trade
• 1947 - The Marshall Plan
• 1947 - Truman Doctrine
• 1947 - Federal Employee Loyalty Program
• 1947 - Jackie Robinson breaks color barrier in baseball
• 1948 - Berlin Blockade
• 1948 - Election of 1948: Truman defeats Dewey
• 1948 - Truman desegregates armed forces
• 1948 - Organization of American States: Alliance of North America and South America
• 1948 - Alger Hiss Case
• 1948 - Nuremberg trials
• 1949 - North Atlantic Treaty Organization (NATO) formed
• 1949 - In China, Communists under Mao Zedong force Chiang Kai-shek's KMT government to retreat to Taiwan
• 1949 - Russia tests first atomic bomb
• 1949 - Department of War becomes Department of Defense
• 1949 - Germany divided into East and West
• 1949 - Truman attempts to continue FDR's legacy with his Fair Deal, but most acts don't pass
• 1949 - Dystopian future novel Nineteen Eighty-Four published by George Orwell

1950s

• 1950 - Senator Joseph McCarthy gains power, and McCarthyism (1950-1954) begins
• 1950 - McCarran Internal Security Act
• 1950 - Korean War begins
• 1950 - National Security Council Memo 68
• 1951 - 22nd Amendment
• 1951 - Mutual Security Act
• 1951 - General Douglas MacArthur fired by Truman for invading China
• 1952 - ANZUS Treaty
• 1952 - Immigration and Naturalization Act
• 1953 - Dwight D. Eisenhower becomes President
• 1953 - Rosenbergs executed
• 1953 - Armistice in Korea
• 1953 - Shah of Iran returns to power in CIA-orchestrated coup known as Operation Ajax
• 1954 - Joseph McCarthy discredited in Army-McCarthy hearings
• 1954 - Saint Lawrence Seaway Act
• 1954 - Baghdad Pact
• 1954 - Brown v. Board of Education
• 1954 - SEATO alliance
• 1954 - Fall of Dien Bien Phu; French lose control of Vietnam
• 1954 - Geneva Conference (1954)
• 1954 - The People's Republic of China lays siege on Quemoy and Matsu Islands; Eisenhower sends in navy
• 1955 - Rosa Parks incites Montgomery bus boycott
• 1955 - AFL and CIO merge in America's largest labor union
• 1955 - Warsaw Pact
• 1956 - Interstate Highway Act
• 1956 - US refuses to support the Hungarian Revolution
• 1956 - US installs Diem as leader of South Vietnam
• 1957 - Eisenhower Doctrine
• 1957 - Civil Rights Act of 1957
• 1957 - Russians launch Sputnik; "space race" begins
• 1957 - First nuclear power plant goes into service
• 1957 - Little Rock, Arkansas school desegregation
• 1958 - National Defense Education Act
• 1958 - NASA formed
• 1959 - Cuban Revolution
• 1959 - Landrum-Griffin Act
• 1959 - Alaska and Hawaii become states

1960s

• 1960 - U-2 incident
• 1960 - Greensboro sit-in
• 1960 - Civil Rights Act of 1960
• 1960 - National Front for the Liberation of Vietnam formed
• 1961 - John F. Kennedy becomes President
• 1961 - 23rd Amendment
• 1961 - Peace Corps
• 1961 - Alliance for Progress
• 1961 - Bay of Pigs
• 1961 - Trade embargo on Cuba
• 1961 - Berlin Crisis
• 1961 - Diem assassinated
• 1961 - OPEC formed
• 1962 - Trade Expansion Act
• 1962 - Cuban Missile Crisis
• 1962 - Baker v. Carr
• 1962 - Engel v. Vitale
• 1962 - Students for a Democratic Society (SDS)
• 1963 - John F. Kennedy assassinated
• 1963 - Lyndon Johnson becomes President
• 1963 - Atomic Test Ban Treaty
• 1963 - March on Washington; Martin Luther King, Jr. "I have a dream" speech
• 1964 - Tonkin Gulf incident; Gulf of Tonkin Resolution
• 1964 - 24th Amendment
• 1964 - Great Society proposed
• 1964 - Economic Opportunity Act
• 1964 - Civil Rights Act of 1964
• 1964 - Full Employment Act
• 1965 - Immigration Act of 1965
• 1965 - Voting Rights Act
• 1965 - Medicaid and Medicare enacted
• 1965 - Higher Education Act - Federal Scholarships
• 1965 - Watts Riot; Detroit race riot; "long hot summer"
• 1966 - Department of Housing and Urban Development (HUD) established
• 1966 - Department of Transportation created
• 1966 - National Traffic and Motor Vehicle Safety Act
• 1966 - Miranda v. Arizona establishes "Miranda rights"
• 1966 - Feminist group National Organization for Women (NOW) formed
• 1967 - 25th Amendment
• 1968 - Presidential candidate Robert F. Kennedy assassinated
• 1968 - The National Front for the Liberation of Vietnam launches the Tet Offensive
• 1968 - Civil Rights Act of 1968
• 1969 - Richard Nixon becomes President
• 1969 - "Vietnamization" begins
• 1969 - Neil Armstrong walks on the moon, Earth's only natural satellite
• 1969 - Conservative Warren E. Burger appointed Chief Justice of the Supreme Court to replace Earl Warren
• 1969 - U.S. bombs North Vietnamese positions in Cambodia and Laos

1970s

• 1970 - Environmental Protection Agency enacted
• 1971 - 26th Amendment ratified
• 1972 - U.S. presidential election, 1972 (including Watergate burglary)
• 1973 - Roe v. Wade Supreme Court ruling over-turns state laws against abortion
• 1973 - Skylab, USA's first space station launched
• 1974 - Richard Nixon resigns Presidency over Watergate
• 1974 - Gerald R. Ford becomes President (by succession rather than election)
• 1976 - U.S. presidential election, 1976
• 1977 - Jimmy Carter becomes President
• 1978 - Humphrey Hawkins Full Employment Act
• 1978 - Camp David Accords (1978)
• 1979 - Three Mile Island nuclear accident
• 1979 - Iran hostage crisis begins

1980s

• 1980 - Refugee Act
• 1980 - Mount St. Helens eruption in Washington kills 57
• 1980 - U.S. boycotts Summer Olympics in Moscow to protest 1979 Soviet invasion of Afghanistan
• 1980 - U.S. presidential election, 1980
• 1981 - Ronald Reagan becomes President (Iran releases hostages)
• 1981 - Kemp-Roth Tax Cut
• 1983 - 241 U.S. Marines killed by suicide bomb in Lebanon
• 1983 - United States invades Grenada
• 1984 - Most of Eastern Bloc boycotts Summer Olympics in Los Angeles
• 1984 - U.S. presidential election, 1984 (Ronald Reagan is re-elected)
• 1986 - Space Shuttle Challenger accident
• 1986 - Tax Reform Act of 1986
• 1986 - Gramm Rudman Hollings Balanced Budget Act
• 1987 - Dow Jones Industrial Average falls 22.6% in single session on Black Monday
• 1988 - Discovery launched as first post-Challenger space shuttle flight
• 1988 - U.S. presidential election, 1988
• 1989 - George H. W. Bush becomes President
• 1989 - Exxon Valdez oil spill in Alaska's Prince William Sound

1990s

• 1990 - Hubble Space Telescope placed in orbit
• 1990 - Iraq invades Kuwait leading to 1991 Gulf War
• 1990 - Loma Prieta earthquake kills 63 in greater San Francisco Bay Area
• 1991 - Gulf War
• 1991 - Oakland Hills firestorm kills 25 and destroys 3469 homes and apartments
• 1992 - Los Angeles Riots kill 50-60 people and causes nearly $1 billion damage
• 1992 - 27th Amendment ratified
• 1992 - Hurricane Andrew kills 23 and causes $26.5 billion in damage as it strikes Florida and later Louisiana
• 1992 - U.S. presidential election, 1992
• 1993 - Bill Clinton becomes President
• 1993 - World Trade Center bombing kills 6 and injures at least 1040
• 1993 - Branch Davidians standoff and fire in Waco, Texas
• 1994 - Northridge earthquake kills 57 in Los Angeles area
• 1995 - Following the