1. Major Historical Events That Influenced American Literature
This information will be on your quiz on Friday!! Take notes if necessary.

2. 1400s and 1500s 1492: Columbus lands in the Bahamas.
1499: 20,000 in England die in plague.
1513: Juan Ponce de Leon lands on the FL peninsula.
1565: St Augustine, FL – First permanent settlement in the U.S.
1590: Iroquois Confederacy established to stop warfare among the Five Nations.
Events in red don’t seem to relate to American history/literature. Ask students why they think this event is being included.

3. 1600s 1607: First permanent English settlement at Jamestown, VA.
1620: Pilgrims land at Plymouth, MA.
1630: Japan – All Europeans expelled.
1639: First printing press in English-speaking North America arrives in MA.
1642: England – Civil War Begins
1647: MA establishes free public schools.
1650: Anne Bradstreet publishes a collection of poems in England.

4. 1600s (Cont.) 1652: South Africa – First Dutch settlers arrive.
1667: England – Milton publishes Paradise Lost
1675: King Philip, chief of the Wampanoags, begins raiding New England Frontier towns.
1683: China – All ports opened to foreign trade.
1692: Salem witchcraft trials result in the execution of twenty people.

5. 1700s (Before Revolution)
1702: England – First daily newspaper published
1735: John Peter Zenger acquitted of libel, furthering freedom of the press. (libel: a false, published statement that makes someone look bad)
1741: Great Awakening, a series of religious revivals, begins to sweep the colonies.
1741: Edwards gives his sermon Sinners in the Hands of an Angry God.

6. 1700s (Events Surrounding the Revolution)
1752: Ben Franklin conducts kite-and-key experiment.
1753: African American Ben Banneker makes first clock with all American-made parts.
1755: England – Sam Johnson publishes Dictionary of the English Language
: France gives up claim to North American territory.
1765: Stamp Act passed by British Parliament (taxes)
1767: Townshend Act imposes new taxes on colonists.

7. 1700s (Cont.)
1769: Scotland – James Watt invents an improved steam engine.
1773: Boston Tea Party
1773: African American Phillis Wheatley publishes collection of poems in England.
1775: Revolution Begins
1776: Congress adopts Declaration of Independence
1783: Webster’s Spelling Book first appears.
1783: Revolutionary War ends.
1787: Meeting in Philadelphia to draft Constitution
1793: Eli Whitney invents cotton gin.

8. 1800s (Before Civil War) 1803: Louisiana Purchase
1804: Lewis and Clark explore the West
1817: William Cullen Bryant publishes “Thanatopsis”
1818: England – Shelley publishes Frankenstein.
1820: Missouri Compromise bans slavery in parts of new territories.
1827: Poe publishes his first collection of poems.
1838: Cherokees march on “Trail of Tears” to OK.
1848: CA gold rush begins.
1848: Women’s rights convention held in NY.
: Scarlett Letter, Moby Dick, and Uncle Tom’s Cabin published.

9. 1800s (Civil War – end) 1855: Whitman publishes Leaves of Grass
1859: England – Darwin publishes The Origin of Species
1860: SC secedes from the Union.
1863: Emancipation Proclamation issued.
1865: Robert E. Lee surrenders to Ulysses S. Grant.
1876: Twain publishes Tom Sawyer
1876: Baseball’s National League founded.
1885: France – Louis Pasteur administers first rabies vaccine.
1890: Last major battle between US troops and Native Americans.

10. 1900-1930 1903: Wright Brothers fly airplane.
1908: Ford builds first Model T.
1917: US enters WWI.
1918: Worldwide flu epidemic kills about 20 million people (not Edward, though – he becomes a vampire.)
1920: Women gain right to vote.
1925: F. Scott Fitzgerald publishes Great Gatsby.
1929: Stock market crash.

11. 1930-1945 1933: Germany – Hitler becomes German chancellor.
1933: Roosevelt (and Congress) pass New Deal laws.
1939: Wizard of Oz and Gone With the Wind appear in movie theaters.
1939: WWII begins in Poland.
1941: US joins WWII after bombing of Pearl Harbor.
1945: Atom bombs dropped on Hiroshima and Nagasaki.
1945: WWII ends.

12. 1945-Now 1948: UN establishes state of Israel.
1954: Supreme Court rules public school segregation unconstitutional.
1963: JFK assassinated.
1968: MLK Jr. murdered in Memphis, TN.
1972: Last US troops leave Vietnam.
1987: Reagan signs INF treaty, banning short- and medium- range nuclear missiles.
1990: Congress passes Americans with Disabilities Act.
1991: Gulf War
2001: September 11, 2001