Timeline of the history of the United States (1860–1899)



This section of the timeline of United States history concerns events from 1860 to 1899.

Presidency of James Buchanan

 * April 3, 1860 – Pony Express begins.
 * November 6 – 1860 United States presidential election: Abraham Lincoln elected president and Hannibal Hamlin vice president with only 39% of the vote in a four-man race.
 * December 18 – Crittenden Compromise fails.
 * December 20 – President Buchanan fires his cabinet.
 * December 20 – South Carolina secedes from the Union
 * January 9, 1861 – Secessionist forces in South Carolina fire at the USS Star of the West, forcing it to withdraw.
 * January 9 – Mississippi secedes from the Union
 * January 10 – Florida secedes from the Union
 * January 11 – Alabama secedes from the Union
 * January 19 – Georgia secedes from the Union
 * January 26 – Louisiana secedes from the Union
 * February 1 – Texas secedes from the Union
 * February 4 – Secessionist states establish the Confederate States of America
 * February 9 – Jefferson Davis elected provisional president of the Confederacy. Alexander H. Stephens elected provisional vice president of the Confederacy.
 * February 11 – Stephens becomes provisional vice president of the Confederate States.
 * February 18 – Davis becomes provisional president of the Confederate States.
 * March 2 – The Corwin Amendment to enshrine slavery forever is passed by Congress. It is not ratified.

Presidency of Abraham Lincoln

 * March 4, 1861 – Lincoln becomes the 16th president and Hamlin becomes the 15th vice president
 * 1861 – American Civil War begins at Fort Sumter
 * 1861 – First Battle of Bull Run (First Battle of Manassas)
 * 1861 – Davis unanimously elected to full term as Confederate president, Stephen unanimously elected to full term as Confederate vice president.
 * February 22, 1862 – Davis becomes Confederate president, Stephens become Confederate vice president.
 * 1862 – Battle of Hampton Roads (Battle of the Monitor and Merrimack; first ever naval battle between iron-sided ships)
 * 1862 – Homestead Act
 * 1862 – Morrill Land-Grant Colleges Act
 * 1862 – Gen. Robert E. Lee placed in command of the Army of Northern Virginia
 * 1862 – Second Battle of Bull Run (Second Battle of Manassas)
 * 1862 – Battle of Antietam (Battle of Sharpsburg)
 * 1862 – Dakota War of 1862 begins
 * 1862–1863 – Lincoln issues Emancipation Proclamation
 * 1863 – Battle of Gettysburg
 * 1863 – The Siege of Vicksburg ends
 * 1863 – New York City draft riots
 * 1863 – Pro-Union Virginia counties become separate state of West Virginia
 * 1863 - Lincoln announces the 10% Plan
 * 1864 – Gen. Ulysses S. Grant put in command of all Union forces
 * 1864 – Wade–Davis Bill
 * 1864 – Sand Creek massacre
 * 1864 – Nevada becomes a state
 * 1864 – U.S. presidential election, 1864; Abraham Lincoln is reelected president and Andrew Johnson elected vice president on the "fusion" Union Party ticket.
 * 1864 – Sherman's March to the Sea
 * 1865 – Robert E. Lee made commander-in-chief of all Confederate forces
 * March 4, 1865 – President Lincoln begins second term; Johnson becomes the 16th vice president
 * 1865 – Richmond, Virginia, the Confederate capital, captured by a corps of black Union troops
 * 1865 – Lee surrenders to Grant at Appomattox Court House
 * 1865 – Freedmen's Bureau
 * 1865 - the 13th Amendment was adopted, setting slaves free forever.

Presidency of Andrew Johnson

 * April 15, 1865 – President Lincoln assassinated; Vice President Johnson becomes the 17th president
 * April–June 1865 – American Civil War ends as the last elements of the Confederacy surrender
 * 1865 – Ku Klux Klan founded
 * 1865 – Slavery abolished by the Thirteenth Amendment.
 * 1866 – Civil Rights Act of 1866
 * 1866 - Tennessee becomes the first Confederate state readmitted to the union
 * 1867 – Tenure of Office Act enacted
 * 1867 – Territory of Alaska purchased from the Russian Empire
 * 1867 - The US Annexes the Midway Islands in the Pacific
 * 1867 – Nebraska becomes a state
 * 1867 - Congress passes a series of Reconstruction acts and the period of Radical Reconstruction begins
 * 1868 – Impeachment of Andrew Johnson, acquitted by the Senate by one vote.
 * 1868 – Fourteenth Amendment is ratified; second of Reconstruction Amendments.
 * 1868 – The Copperheads are dissolved.
 * 1868 – Ulysses S. Grant is elected president and Schuyler Colfax is elected vice president.
 * 1868 - Arkansas, Louisiana, Florida, North Carolina, South Carolina, and Alabama are admitted back into the union.
 * 1868 - Boss Tweed gained control of Tammany Hall.

Presidency of Ulysses S. Grant

 * March 4, 1869 – Grant becomes the 18th president and Colfax becomes the 17th vice president.
 * 1869 – The First transcontinental railroad is completed at Promontory Summit, Utah Territory.
 * 1869 – Texas v. White upholds Radical Reconstruction and states that once Texas joins the Union, its union was indissoluble.

1870s

 * 1870 – 15th Amendment
 * 1870 – First graduate programs (at Yale and Harvard)
 * 1870 – Black Codes
 * 1870 - Virginia, Mississippi, Texas, and Georgia are readmitted to the union
 * 1871 – Great Chicago Fire
 * 1871 – Treaty of Washington with the British Empire regarding Canada
 * 1871 - The New York Times published evidence of Tweed's rampant greed.
 * 1871 - Civil Service Reform Act passes
 * 1871 - Ku Klux Klan Act
 * 1872 – Yellowstone National Park created
 * 1872 – Crédit Mobilier scandal
 * 1872 – Amnesty Act
 * 1872 – Alabama Claims
 * 1872 – U.S. presidential election, 1872: Ulysses S. Grant reelected president; Henry Wilson elected vice president
 * 1872 - Victoria Claflin Woodhull, first woman presidential candidate, enters presidential race.
 * 1873 – Panic of 1873
 * March 4, 1873 – President Grant begins second term; Wilson becomes the 18th vice president
 * 1873 – Virginius Affair
 * 1873 - One of the first schools of nursing opens at Bellevue Hospital in New York
 * 1874 – Red River Indian War
 * 1874 - National Woman's Christian Temperance Union formed in Cleveland
 * 1875 – Aristides (horse) wins first Kentucky Derby
 * 1875 – Resumption Act
 * 1875 – Civil Rights Act of 1875
 * 1875 – The Art Students League of New York is founded
 * November 22, 1875 – Vice President Wilson dies
 * 1875 - Whiskey Ring Scandal
 * 1876 – National League of baseball founded
 * 1876 – Centennial Exposition in Philadelphia
 * 1876 – Munn v. Illinois establishes public regulation of utilities
 * 1876 – Colorado becomes a state
 * 1876 – Battle of Little Bighorn
 * 1876 - Central Park opens in New York City
 * 1876 – Wild Bill Hickok is killed by a shot to the back of his head by Jack McCall while playing poker in Deadwood, South Dakota. He held aces and eights, now known as the Dead man's hand.
 * 1876 – U.S. presidential election, 1876 seemingly elects Samuel J. Tilden president and Thomas A. Hendricks vice president, but results are disputed with 20 Electoral College votes allegedly in doubt.
 * 1877 – The Electoral Commission awards Rutherford B. Hayes the presidency and William A. Wheeler the vice presidency in return for ending the military occupation of the South.
 * 1877 – Great Railroad Strike of 1877

Presidency of Rutherford B. Hayes

 * March 4, 1877 – After only two days as president-elect and vice president-elect, Hayes becomes the 19th president and Wheeler becomes the 19th vice president
 * 1877 – Reconstruction ends
 * 1877 – Nez Perce War
 * 1878 – Bland–Allison Act
 * 1878 – Morgan silver dollars first minted
 * 1879 – Thomas Edison creates first commercially viable light bulb
 * 1879 – Knights of Labor go public

1880s

 * 1880 – University of Southern California founded
 * 1880 – U.S. population exceeds 50 million
 * 1880 – U.S. presidential election, 1880: James A. Garfield elected president and Chester A. Arthur vice president. Their popular margin is less than 2,000 votes.

Presidency of James A. Garfield

 * March 4, 1881 – Garfield becomes the 20th president; Arthur becomes the 20th vice president.
 * July 2, 1881 – President Garfield is shot by a deranged gunman on a train platform.

Presidency of Chester A. Arthur

 * September 19, 1881 – President Garfield dies, Vice President Arthur becomes the 21st president
 * 1881 – The Gunfight at the O.K. Corral in Tombstone, Arizona Territory
 * 1881 – Clara Barton creates the American Red Cross
 * 1881 – Tuskegee Institute founded
 * 1881 – Billy the Kid is shot and killed by Sheriff Pat Garrett near Fort Sumner
 * 1881 – A Century of Dishonor written by Helen Hunt Jackson
 * 1882 – Chinese Exclusion Act
 * 1882 – Jesse James was shot and killed by Robert and Charlie Ford
 * 1883 - The Southern section of the second transcontinental railroad line is completed.
 * 1883 – Buffalo Bill's Wild West show founded. participants include: Sitting Bull, Geronimo, Calamity Jane, and Annie Oakley.
 * 1883 – Civil Rights Cases 109 US 3 1883 legalizes doctrine of segregation
 * 1883 – Pendleton Civil Service Reform Act
 * 1883 – Brooklyn Bridge opens
 * 1883 - Joseph Pulitzer buys the New York World
 * 1884 – U.S. presidential election, 1884: Grover Cleveland elected president and Thomas A. Hendricks elected vice president
 * 1884 – Washington Monument completed

First presidency of Grover Cleveland

 * March 4, 1885 – Cleveland becomes the 22nd president; Hendricks becomes the 21st vice president
 * November 25, 1885 – Vice President Hendricks dies
 * 1886 – Haymarket Square Riot
 * 1886 – American Federation of Labor founded in Columbus, Ohio
 * 1886 – Statue of Liberty (Liberty Enlightening the World) dedicated
 * 1887 – The United States Congress creates Interstate Commerce Commission
 * 1887 – Dawes Act
 * 1887 – Hatch Act
 * 1888 – Publication of Looking Backward by Edward Bellamy
 * 1888 – National Geographic Society founded
 * 1888 – U.S. presidential election, 1888: Benjamin Harrison elected president and Levi P. Morton vice president despite coming in second in the popular vote.

Presidency of Benjamin Harrison

 * March 4, 1889 – Harrison becomes the 23rd president and Morton becomes the 22nd vice president
 * 1889 – Oklahoma Land Rush (April 22, 1889)
 * 1889 – Centennial of the Constitution celebrated.
 * 1889 – North Dakota, South Dakota, Montana and Washington become states
 * 1889 – Johnstown Flood in Pennsylvania
 * 1889 – Jane Addams founds Hull House
 * December 6, 1889 – Former Confederate president Jefferson Davis dies.
 * 1889 - During a speech given by Benjamin Harrison, he becomes the first U.S. president in history to have a voice recording.

1890s

 * 1890 – Sherman Antitrust Act
 * 1890 – Jacob Riis published "How the Other Half Lives"
 * 1890 – Sherman Silver Purchase Act
 * 1890 – McKinley Tariff
 * 1890 – Yosemite National Park created
 * 1890 – Idaho and Wyoming become states
 * 1890 – Wounded Knee Massacre
 * 1890 – National American Woman Suffrage Association founded
 * 1890 - Reporter Nelly Bly circles globe by train and steamship in 72 days
 * 1891 – Baltimore crisis
 * 1891 – James Naismith invents basketball
 * 1891 - Hamlin Garland publishes Main-Travelled Roads
 * 1892 – Homestead Strike
 * 1892 – General Electric Company founded
 * 1892 – Sierra Club founded by John Muir
 * 1892 - Populist national convention held in Omaha
 * 1892 – U.S. presidential election, 1892: Grover Cleveland elected president and Adlai E. Stevenson, vice president

Second presidency of Grover Cleveland

 * March 4, 1893 – Cleveland becomes the 24th president; Stevenson becomes the 23rd vice president
 * 1893 – Panic of 1893
 * 1893 – Sherman Silver Purchase Act repealed
 * 1893 - Columbian Exposition opens in Chicago
 * 1894 – Coxey's Army
 * 1894 – Pullman Strike
 * 1894 – Wilson–Gorman Tariff Act, including income tax
 * 1894 – Sunset Limited service opened on the second transcontinental route by Southern Pacific Railroad
 * 1895 – Lee Shelton shoots Billy Lyons, spawning countless ballads.
 * 1895 – Pollock v. Farmers' Loan & Trust Co. strikes down part of Wilson-Gorman Tariff
 * 1895 - William Randolph Hearst purchases the New York Morning Journal
 * 1896 – Plessy v. Ferguson 163 US 537 1896 affirms the idea of "separate but equal"
 * 1896 – William Jennings Bryan delivers his Cross of Gold speech
 * 1896 – Gold discovered in the Yukon's Klondike
 * 1896 – Utah becomes a state
 * 1896 - Henry Ford builds his first automobile
 * 1896 – U.S. presidential election, 1896: William McKinley elected president and Garret A. Hobart vice president

Presidency of William McKinley

 * March 4, 1897 – McKinley becomes the 25th president; and Hobart becomes the 24th vice president
 * 1897 – Boston subway completed
 * 1897 – Dingley tariff
 * 1898 – The City of Greater New York is created through the annexation of Brooklyn, Western Queens County, and Staten Island into New York City
 * 1898 – USS Maine explodes in Havana, Cuba harbor, precipitating the Spanish–American War
 * 1898 – De Lôme Letter
 * 1898 – Treaty of Paris (1898) ends Spanish–American War; Philippine–American War begins
 * 1898 – Hawaii annexed
 * 1898 – Newlands Resolution
 * 1898 – American Anti-Imperialist League organized
 * 1899 – Teller Amendment
 * 1899 – Newsboys' strike of 1899
 * 1899 – American Samoa occupied
 * 1899 – Open Door Notes
 * November 21, 1899 – Vice President Garret Hobart dies