KIM'S TIMELINE OF
(MAINLY) AMERICAN HISTORY, Part 3: from 1941 to the present
WORLD WAR II to the present
(Click here for Part 1: 1000 to 1860)
(Click here for Part 2: 1861 to 1941)
1941................WWII:Greece capitulates to Germany; massive
Nazi attack on Russia; German Jews forced to wear
...................................identifying
Star of David on clothes; Japan attacks Pearl Harbor; Germany and Italy declare
war
...................................on the
US; British invade Abyssinia; Lend-Lease Bill signed in US; US freezes German
and Italian
...................................assets
in US; Churchill and Roosevelt sign Atlantic charter; Japan invades Philippines;
Hong Kong
...................................surrenders
to Japan
.......................US Representative Jeannette Rankin casts sole dissenting
vote in Congress against declaration of war on
...................................Japan
after Pearl Harbor attack
.......................US Supreme Court rules separate RR car facilities for
African Americans must be substantially equal
.......................FDR issues Executive Order 8802 prohibiting discrimination
in defense industries
.......................US Savings Bonds and Stamps go on sale
.......................Donald Bailey invents portable military bridge
.......................Manhattan Project for atomic research begins
.......................Hans Haas begins underwater photography
.......................1st hotel built on the Las Vegas strip, NV
.......................Les Paul develops 1st solid-body electric guitar
.......................National Gallery of Art opens in DC
.......................Mount Rushmore completed in the Black Hills, SD,designed
by Gutzon Borglum
.......................Leonard Bacon wins Pulitzer Prize in Poetry
.......................James Agee, Let Us Now Praise Famous Men; Eudora
Welty, Why I Live at the P.O.; Sterling Brown, ed., The
...................................Negro Caravan
1942................WWII: US interns more than 100,000 Japanese-Americans
in concentration camps; murder of millions of
...................................Jews
in Nazi gas chambers begins as Hitler institutes “"Final Solution" ;
sugar and gas rationing in
...................................US;
fierce fighting in Pacific with Japan; Allied force land in North Africa; Bataan
Death March
...................................forced
evacuation of American and Philippine prisoners by Japanese forces; US wins
Battle of
...................................Coral
Sea and Battle of Midway; FBI captures 8 German saboteurs in FL and NY; Germans
reach
...................................Stalingrad;
Battle of El Alamein; French navy scuttled at Toulon; British and Indian troops
advance
...................................in Burma
.......................425 Navaho soldiers trained as "code talkers"
to open lines of communication among troops that could not be
...................................intercepted
by Japan
.......................Manhattan Project: Enrico Fermi achieves 1st controlled
nuclear chain reaction
.......................Manzanar, 1st of 10 US "relocation centers,"
established for internment of Japanese Americans
.......................Congress of Racial Equality (CORE) founded in Chicago
to fight racism and discrimination through sit-ins and
...................................other
nonviolent direct action
.......................1st automated computer in US
.......................Fire at Coconut Grove nightclub in Boston; 487 die
.......................Gutzon Borglum completes carvings at Mt. Rushmore
.......................US Supreme Court rules Nevada divorces valid
.......................Edward Hopper, Nighthawks
.......................Anne Frank and her family move to the "Secret Annex"
where she writes her famous Diary (she is killed in
...................................1945
at Bergen-Belsen Concentration Camp); published in 1947 in Amsterdam
.......................William Rose Benet wins Pulitzer Prize in Poetry
.......................Langston Hughes, Shakespeare in Harlem; Margaret
Walker, For My People; Ellen Glasgow, In This Our Life;
...................................T.S.
Eliot, Four Quartets; Isak Dineson, Winter Tales; Albert Camus,
L'Etranger
1943................WWII: Warsaw ghetto massacre; Allied “"round
the clock" bombing of Germany; Roosevelt freezes wages,
...................................salaries
and prices to forestall inflation; rationing of shoes, meat, cheese, fats, and
canned goods
...................................in US;
Germany withdraws from Caucasus; Casablanca Conference between Churchill and
...................................Roosevelt;
British reach Tripoli; Hitler orders “"scorched earth " policy;
German army surrenders
...................................in Tunisia;
Italy declares war on Germany; Teheran Conference between Churchill, Roosevelt,
and
...................................Stalin;
Mussolini deposed
.......................Race riots in several cities whose labor population has
been bolstered by influx of Southern African
...................................Americans
.......................Penicillin used successfully in treatment of chronic
diseases
.......................Infantile paralysis epidemic kills 1,200 in US and cripples
thousands
.......................US Supreme Court rules that children can be exempt from
salute the flag in school if it is against their
...................................religion,
victory for Jehovah's Witnesses
.......................Jefferson Memorial completed, Washington, DC, designed
by John Russell Pope
.......................Pentagon completed, Arlington, VA
.......................1st aerosol spray cans developed by US Army researchers
Lyle Goodhue and William Sullivan
.......................Zoot suits and jitterbugging become popular
.......................Jacques Cousteau develops a self-contained underwater
breathing apparatus, or scuba gear
.......................Jackson Pollock exhibits in 1st one-man show
.......................Robert Frost, A Witness Tree (wins him his 4th
Pulitzer Prize in Poetry); T.S. Eliot, Four Quartets
1944................WWII: Gen. Douglas MacArthur begins drive
through Pacific Islands; heavy air raids on London;
...................................Sebastopol
liberated; US and Britain bomb Germany; Russian troops enter the Baltic states
on
...................................the
Eastern Front; D-Day landings in Normandy on June 6; Allies take Orvieto and
Cherbourg;
...................................US troops
take Saigon; Warsaw uprising; US captures Guam from Japan; Brussels liberated;
...................................Russians
and Yugoslavs enter Belgrade; Red Army occupies Hungary; Battle of the Bulge;
...................................Vietnam
declares independence from France
.......................G.I. Bill (The Serviceman's Readjustment Act) grants
veterans loans to buy homes, start businesses or farms,
...................................or for education
and vocational training. Number of degrees by colleges more than doubles by
1950;
...................................the Bill helps
create the US middle class
.......................US Supreme Court rules "white primaries" excluding
African Americans are unconstitutional
.......................1st eye bank in US, in NY
.......................1st successful heart operation on a newborn baby
.......................Ringling Bros. and Barnum & Bailey Circus fire in
CT; 165 killed
.......................Edward Hopper, Morning in a City
.......................Stephen Vincent Benet wins 2nd Pulitzer Prize in Poetry
.......................Marianne Moore, Nevertheless; T.S. Eliot, Four
Quartets
1945................d. Franklin D. Roosevelt
.......................Harry S. Truman inaugurated 33rd US President
.......................WWII: Auschwitz liberated; Allies meet at Yalta; Allies
bomb Dresden; Mussolini killed by Italian
...................................partisans;
Hitler commits suicide; V-E Day ends war in Europe May 8; Yalta Conference;
...................................US atomic
bombs dropped on Japan at Hiroshima and Nagasaki; Japan surrenders August 14;
...................................Nuremberg
war crimes trials begin
.......................1st atomic bomb detonated near Alamogordo NM
.......................Black Markets for food, clothing, and cigarettes develop
throughout Europe
.......................Formation of the United Nations
.......................International Monetary Fund and World Bank established
.......................US Air Force bomber crashes into the Empire State Blg.,
hits the 79th floor in heavy fog; 12 die
.......................1st use of pesticide DDT, used to control mosquitoes
and agricultural pests; later found to cause disease
...................................in humans
and species decline in birds and fish
.......................Michigan introduces fouridation in the public water supply
.......................American inventor Earl Tupper introduces Tupperware,
plastic containers for storing food
.......................Arab League founded to oppose creation of a Jewish state
.......................Woman's suffrage becomes law in France
.......................Ezra Pound placed under arrest by US Army, brought to
DC for trial, committed to St. Elizabeth's Hospital
.......................Karl Shapiro wins Pulitzer Prize in Poetry
.......................Gwendolyn Brooks, A Street in Bronzeville; George
Orwell, Animal Farm; Richard Wright, Black Boy
1946................d. Gertrude Stein
.......................Peace Conference of 21 nations held in Paris; 1st session
of UN General Assembly held in London
.......................Winston Churchill visits US; in a speech in Fulton MS
he uses the term "iron curtain" to describe
...................................the Communist
"spheres of influence," helping to usher in the Cold War
.......................John D. Rockefeller, Jr. donates $8.5 million to UN for
site of permanent headquarters in NY
.......................US tests atomic bomb at Bikini Islands
.......................Labor unrest: strikes in steel, coal, railroad, shipping
industries over wages and benefits
.......................US War Dept. uses ENIAC, new sophisticated calculator
powered by vacuum tubes, developed by John
...................................Eckert
and John Mauchly at the University of Pennsylvania, 1st successful all-purpose
computer
.......................Committee on Civil Rights formed by Pres. Truman
.......................Morgan v. VA: US Supreme Court bans segregation in interstate
bus travel
.......................Women's suffrage becomes law in Italy
.......................Albania, Hungary, Transjordan, Bulgaria become independent
.......................Canonization of 1st US saint, Mother Frances Cabrini
.......................Dr. Spock publishes Baby & Child Care, instructing
parents to hug their children and follow their instincts,
...................................rather
than imposing set routines and rigorous discipline. Transforms child care practices
.......................DuPont chemist Roy Plunkett develops Teflon, marketed
in nonstick cookware
.......................Gwendolyn Brooks wins grants from the National Institute
of Arts and Letters and the Guggenheim
...................................Foundation
.......................Elizabeth Bishop, North and South; William Carlos
Williams, Paterson; Carson McCullers, A Member
...................................of the
Wedding; Robert Penn Warren, All the King's Men; John Hersey,
Hiroshima; Philip
...................................Larkin,
The North Ship; Ann Petry, The Street; W.C. Williams, Paterson,
Book I
1947................Marshall Plan: European recovery program
.......................Peace Treaties signed in Paris
.......................Britain grants independence to India and Pakistan; mass
exodus and communal violence between two
...................................countries
during Partition
.......................Over a million war veterans enroll in college under US
GI Bill
.......................Air Force Captain Chuck Yeager breaks the sound barrier,
flying an experimental rocket-powered plane
...................................43,000
feet above CA's Mojave Desert
.......................Carbon dating developed by US chemist Willard Libby
.......................CORE stages the 1st Freedom Ride, called the "Journey
of Reconciliation"
.......................Jackie Robinson is 1st African American to sign a contract
with a major baseball club, the Brooklyn
...................................Dodgers
.......................1st commercial microwave ovens marketed by Raytheon
.......................Elizabeth Bishop wins Guggenheim Fellowship; G. Brooks
wins 2nd fellowship
.......................Robert Lowell wins Pulitzer Prize in Poetry
.......................Diary of Anne Frank; Robert Lowell, Lord
Weary's Castle (Pulitzer Prize in Poetry); Wallace Stevens,
...................................Transport
to Summer
1948................Pres. Truman calls for an end to “"Jim Crow,"
with anti-lynching laws, federal commission on civil rights
.......................Truman issues Executive Order 9981, mandating equal treatment
for minorities in the armed forces
.......................The US Supreme Court rules that covenants prohibiting
the sale of real estate to African Americans or
...................................members
of other racial groups is legally unenforceable
.......................House Un-American Activities Committee alleges communist
spy rings
.......................Selective Service Act passed; provides continued military
draft
.......................Mohandas K. Gandhi assassinated
.......................Formation of Israel, the 1st Jewish state in the Holy
Land since Roman times. The Arab League responds
...................................with
immediate attacks (from Egypt, Iraq, Jordan, Lebanon, and Syria) in a war that
lasts through
...................................1949
.......................Communist Party Chairman Mao Tse-tung establishes the
Chinese People's Republic
.......................Communists seize power in Czechoslovakia
.......................Dead Sea Scrolls discovered by 3 Bedouin shepherds near
Wadi Qumran, the oldest extant Biblical texts
.......................Formation of the UN World Health Organization to monitor
epidemiological and statistical information
...................................from
over 150 countries
.......................Electric appliances become widespread in American homes;
paper back books popularized
.......................1st televised presidential campaign ads
.......................Edwin Land markets 1st Polaroid camera, with one-step
developing and printing process
.......................Kinsey report on male sexuality published; reveals that
the vast majority of American men had sex before
............................marriage,
half had sex with someone other than their wife during marriage, 92%A masturbated,
............................59%
had performed oral sex; 69% had hired a prostitute, and 37% had homosexual sex
.......................Long-playing record invented by Peter Goldmark, plays
for 45 minutes
.......................Andrew Wyeth, Christina's World
.......................T.S. Eliot wins Nobel Prize in Literature; W.H. Auden
wins Pulitzer Prize in Poetry
.......................Theodore Roethke, The Lost Son and Other Poems;
Dorothy West, The Living is Easy; Alan Paton, Cry,
...................................The
Beloved Country; Norman Mailer, The Naked and the Dead; Alfred
Kinsey, Sexual Behavior
...................................of the
Human Male; Ezra Pound, Pisan Cantos
1949................Formation of NATO, the North Atlantic Treaty
Organization
.......................NAACP initiates a series of school desegregation cases
in DE, KS, SC, VA, and DC (through 1951)
.......................Apartheid established in South Africa
.......................USSR tests an atomic bomb
.......................Formation of Chinese Communist People's Republic by Mao
Zedong
.......................1st photocopiers developed by American inventor Chester
Carlson
.......................1st Emmy Awards for television
.......................1st atomic clock
......................Walter Gropius and the Architects' Collaborative construct
the Bauhaus-influenced Harvard Graduate Center;
...................................Philip
Johnson, Glass House, New Canaan, CT
.......................Peter Viereck wins Pulitzer Prize in Poetry; Pound awarded
Bollingen Prize while incarcerated at St. Elizabeth's
...................................Hospital,
creating great controversy
.......................Gwendolyn Brooks, Annie Allen; George Orwell,
1984; Arthur Miller, Death of a Salesman; Langston Hughes
...................................and
Arna Bontemps, eds., The Poetry of the Negro 1746-1949; Langston Hughes,
One Way Ticket; Ezra
...................................Pound, Pisan
Cantos
1950................d. Edna St .Vincent Millay
.......................Korean War begins when North Korean troops invade South
Korea
.......................McCarthy Trials against alleged Communists and Communist
sympathizers
.......................McCarran Act passes Congress over presidential veto;
calls for severe restrictions against Communists;
...................................registration
of all Communist organizations and individuals; forbids entry to US to aliens
who
...................................have
belonged to totalitarian organizations
.......................Truman instructs US Atomic Energy Commission to develop
hydrogen bomb
.......................US occupation of Korea (through 1953)
.......................McLauren v. OK Bd. of Regents: US Supreme Court requires
U of OK end the practice of providing separate
...................................facilities
for African American students on campus
.......................Henderson v. US: US Supreme Court rules if separate but
equal facilities on interstate transportation do not
...................................exist,
African Americans can not be kept from using the same facilities as whites
.......................Sweatt v. Painer: U of TX Law School required to integrate
on the grounds that the state had failed to provide
...................................separate
facilties that were equal
.......................Althea Gibson becomes 1st African American to compete
in the US tennis championships
.......................Antihistamines become popular remedy for colds and allergies
.......................UN Building completed in NY
.......................Sylvia Plath enters Smith College on full scholarship
.......................Ralphe Bunche is 1st African American to win Nobel Peace
Prize
.......................1st human kidney transplant performed, by Dr. R.H. Lawler
.......................1st telephone answering machine developed in Japan
.......................1st ballpoint pens
.......................Philip Johnson, The Glass House, New Canaan, CT
.......................Jackson Pollock, Autumn Rhythm: No 30
.......................Gwendolyn Brooks is 1st African American to win the Pulitzer
Prize for Poetry
.......................Langston Hughes, Simple Speaks His Mind
1951................22nd Amendment to the Constitution limits
Presidency to 2 terms
.......................US tests atomic bombs in NV
.......................Korean War: attempts to negotiate armistice fail; UN
forces capture Heartbreak Ridge
.......................Ralphe Bunche appointed undersecretary to the UN
.......................Julius and Ethel Rosenberg found guilty of wartime espionage;
get death penalty
.......................Mattachine Society founded, 1st gay group in US, dedicated
to "the protection and improvement
...........................of
Society's Androgynous Minority"
.......................1st transcontinental TV broadcast; color TV introduced
.......................Leo Fender's Telecaster becomes 1st solid-body electric
guitar to go into commercial production
.......................1st disposable diapers developed by NYC homemaker Mary
Donovan
.......................Mies Van der Rohe, Farnsworth House, Plano, IL
.......................Carl Sandburg wins Pulitzer Prize in Poetry
.......................Marianne Moore, Collected Poems; Adrienne Rich,
A Change of World (wins Yale Younger Poets
...................................Award);
Langston Hughes, Montage of a Dream Deferred; Robert Frost, Complete
Poems;
...................................Carl
Sandburg, Complete Poems; J.D. Salinger, The Catcher in the Rye
1952................Korean War: US bombs hydroelectric plants
in North Korea; UN General Assembly adopts plan for
...................................Korean
armistice; China rejects plan
.......................The White House renovation is completed after a literal
gutting and rebuilding
.......................1st H-bomb exploded at Aniwetok Atoll Nov. 6
.......................Tuskegee Report published; reports that no lynchings
of African Americans were reported in the US for
...................................the
first time in 71 years
.......................King George VI of England dies; succeeded by daughter
Queen Elizabeth II
.......................Britain conducts atomic tests in western Australia
.......................Contraceptive pill introduced
.......................1st mechanical heart implanted in a human, at Pennsylvania
Hospital
.......................Buckminster Fuller develops geodesic dome
.......................American Christine Jorgenson is 1st widely publicized
transsexual
.......................1st video recorder, developed by John Mullin and Wayne
Johnson
.......................Skidmore, Owings & Merrill, Lever House, NYC, masterpiece
of the International Style
.......................Willem De Kooning, Woman I; Helen Frankenthaler,
Mountains and Sea
.......................Marianne Moore wins Pulitzer Prize in Poetry
.......................Marianne Moore, Collected Poems; Ralph Ellison, Invisible
Man; Dylan Thomas, Collected Poems; Langston
...................................Hughes,
Laughing to Keep from Crying; Ernest Hemingway, The Old Man and
the Sea
1953...............Dwight D. Eisenhower inaugurated 34th US President;
1st televised inauguration
.......................Korean armistice signed, ends hostilities, but no peace
treaty is ever signed, so technically the war continues.
...................................At least
three million people die in the Korean War, including 58,220 Americans
.......................US Congress creates new cabinet post: Secretary of Health,
Education, and Welfare
.......................Dr. Jonas Salk develops polio vaccine
.......................James Watson and Frances Crick describe structure of
DNA as a double helix
.......................Gertrude Elion and George Hitchings of Glaxo-Wellcome
invent chemotherapy and successfully treat acute
...................................leukemia
by creating drugs that interfere with the way cancer cells metabolize nucleic
acids
.......................The Rosenbergs, sentenced as atomic spied in 1951, are
executed at Sing Sing Prison, NY
.......................Saran Wrap marketed to home cooks by Dow Chemical, developed
by Ralph Wiley
.......................Kinsey Report of female sexuality published; reveals
62% of American women masturbate, half had pre-marital
............................sex,
and 13% had lesbian sex
.......................1st wide-circulation, national gay periodical, One
Magazine: The Homosexual Viewpoint, published by the
............................Mattachine
Society
.......................Edmund Hilary of New Zealand and Tensing Norgay of Nepal
become 1st to scale Mt. Everest
.......................US Supreme Court bans segregation in Washington DC restaurants
.......................Gwendolyn Brooks, Maud Martha (novel); Ernest
Hemingway, The Old Man and the Sea (awarded
...................................Pulitzer
Prize); Archibald MacLeish, Collected Poems (wins his 2nd Pulitzer
Prize in Poetry); Langston
...................................Hughes,
Simple Takes a Wife; James Baldwin, Go Tell It On the Mountain;
Simone deBeauvoir, The
...................................Second Sex
1954...............US Supreme Court rules segregated schools
unconstitutional in Brown v. Board of Education
.......................Washington DC becomes 1st major city to integrate its
public schools
.......................Height of “"McCarthyism" trials; televised
hearing seeks to prove Communist infiltration in US Army;
...................................Senate
issues formal censure and condemnation of Sen. Joseph McCarthy
.......................Iwo Jima Memorial constructed in Arlington, VA. designed
by Felix deWeldon, based on a photograph
...................................by Joseph
Rosenthal; only major Ameircan monument inspired by a photo, honors US Marine
Corps
.......................US tests H-bomb at Marshall Islands
.......................1st atomic submarine, the Nautilus, launched
at Groton, CT
.......................Jonas Salk begins inoculations of Pittsburgh school children
with new antipolio serum
.......................1st White Citizens Council meeting held in MS
.......................1st mass produced transistor radios
.......................1st remote controls for television, developed by inventor
Robert Adler for Zenith
.......................1st modern stop signs; the red sign in an octagon shape becomes the standard throughout the US
.......................1st TV Dinners marketed by Swanson Co.
.......................1st Newport Jazz Festival held
.......................Elvis Presley cuts his 1st commercial sessions for Sun
Records
.......................Rev. Sun Myung Moon founds a new faith to establish a
kingdom of heaven on earth ("Moonies")
.......................Ernest Hemingway awarded Nobel Prize for Literature,
Wallace Stevens awarded Pulitzer Prize
.......................Theodore Roethke, The Waking (wins Pulitzer
Prize for Poetry); William Golding, Lord of the Flies;
...................................J.R.R.
Tolkien, Lord of the Rings; Wallace Stevens, Collected Poems
1955...............Interstate Commerce Commission bans segregation
in interstate travel
.......................Emmet Till lynched at age 14 for allegedly whistling
at a white woman in Money, MS
.......................US Supreme Court orders public school integration "with
all deliberate speed"
.......................Rosa Parks arrested for refusing to give up her seat
on a public bus in Montgomery, AL, triggering a
...................................382-day
bus boycott by African American citizens
.......................Pres. Eisenhower suffers heart attack
.......................Warsaw Pact unites Soviet Union and 7 Eastern bloc nations
.......................USSR tests one megaton hydrogen bomb
.......................Atomically generated power 1st used in US in Schenectady
NY
.......................1st nuclear submarine launched, the Nautilus,
at Groton Naval Base, CT
.......................AFL and CIO merge, 2 largest labor unions in the US
.......................Disneyland amusement park constructed at Anaheim, CA;
Mickey Mouse Club premiers on TV
.......................1st lesbian organization, the Daughters of Bilitis
.......................Marian Anderson debuts at the Metropolitan Opera House
....................... Jasper Johns, Target with Four Faces
.......................Wallace Stevens wins Pulitzer Prize in Poetry
.......................Adrienne Rich, The Diamond Cutters; Marianne
Moore, Predilections (essays and reviews); Elizabeth
...................................Bishop,
Poems: North and South - A Cold Spring; Flannery O'Connor, A Good
Man is Hard
...................................to Find;
Philip Larkin, The Less Deceived; Langston Hughes with photographer
Roy De Carava,
...................................Sweet
Flypaper of Life; James Baldwin, Notes of a Native Son
1956................Southern members of Congress pledge their
opposition to school desegregation, issuing a "Southern
...................................Manifesto"
....................... Autherine Lucy 1st African American to attend Univ.
of AL
.......................AL outlaws the NAACP
.......................Tallahassee Bus Boycott begins (through 1958)
.......................Martin Luther King, Jr.'s home is bombed in reaction
to his role in organizing the Montgomery Bus Boycott
.......................Rise of the suburbs in the US
.......................Soviets crush worker uprising in Poland and quash uprising
in Hungary
.......................Sudan gains independence from the UK and Egypt
.......................Elvis Presley appears on the Ed Sullivan Show on TV
.......................Actress Grace Kelly marries Prince Ranier of Monaco
.......................American Cemetery in Normandy, France dedicated, overlooked
Omaha Beach where D-Day invasions
...................................took
place in WWII
.......................Elizabeth Bishop awarded the Pulitzer Prize for Poetry
.......................Sylvia Plath marries Ted Hughes
.......................Allen Ginsberg, Howl; John Berryman, Homage
to Mistress Bradstreet; Langston Hughes, I Wonder As I
...................................Wander
1957................Troops sent to Little Rock, AR to assure
compliance in school desegregation and forestall violence after 9
....................................African-American
students are enrolled at Central HS
.......................Southern Christian Leadership Conference founded to fight
for civil rights
.......................US Justice Dept. establishes a US Commission on Civil
Rights
.......................Southern Christian Leadership Conference founded to fight
for Civil Rights
.......................Tidal wave following Hurricane Audrey leaves 530 dead
in TX
.......................Atomic missiles installed near major US cities by Army
Air Defense Command
.......................Eisenhower Doctrine formulated to protect Middle East
from Communist aggression
.......................Countries of western Europe form European Common Market
.......................Ghana gains independence from the UK
.......................USSR launches 1st man-made satellite into orbit around
earth, Sputnik
.......................Scientists confirm connection between cigarette smoking
and cancer
.......................Bubblewrap invented by American engineers Al Fielding
and Marc Chavannes
.......................1st AA-size alkaline batteries produced, used to power
radios
.......................Beginning of Beat poetry
.......................Lawrence Ferlinghetti is arrested on obscenity charges
after a second printing of Allen Ginsberg's Howl is
...................................seized
by US Customs. Eventually Ferlinghetti will be cleared of all charges after
a court rules that the
...................................book
has "redeeming social value"
.......................Richard Wilbur wins Pulitzer Prize for Poetry
.......................Elizabeth Bishop, The Diary of Helena Morely
(trans.); Jack Kerouac, On the Road; William Burroughs,
...................................Naked
Lunch; Langston Hughes, Simple Stakes a Claim; Richard Wilbur,
Things of This World
...................................(winner
of Pulitzer Prize in Poetry); Dr. Seuss, The Cat in the Hat
1958...............1st US satellite in orbit, Explorer I
.......................NASA established to explore space; forms the Advanced
Research Projects Agency
.......................Desegregation of schools attempted in South; Gov. Orval
Faubus of AR defies Supreme Court by closing
...................................schools
in Little Rock and reopening them as private segregated schools
.......................Cooper v. Aaron: US Supreme Court rules potential for
mob violence does not justify a school's refusal to
...................................desegregate
.......................Fidel Castro begins “total war” against the
Batista government in Cuba
.......................US nuclear sub Nautilus passes under North Pole
icecap
.......................12 men led by Vivian Fuchs make 1st overland crossing
of Antarctica on Sno-cats
.......................1st stereophonic recordings
.......................1st Hula Hoops and Frisbees marketed by Wham-o Toys
.......................1st skateboards, created by Bill and Mark Richards of
CA
.......................Frank Lloyd Wright's Guggenheim Museum opens in NY; Mies
Van der Rohe, Seagram Building, NYC
.......................Fire at Museum of Modern Art in NY causes $320,000 damage
.......................Morris Louis, Tet
.......................Ezra Pound released from St. Elizabeth's Hospital in
DC after 12 years; returns to Italy
.......................Robert Penn Warren wins Pulitzer Prize for Poetry
.......................Lorraine Hansberry, A Raisin in the Sun; Archibald
MacLeish, J.B.; Lawrence Ferlinghetti, A Coney Island
...................................of
the Mind; Chinua Achebe, Things Fall Apart; Robert Penn Warren,
Promises (wins Pulitzer Prize
...................................in
Poetry); Langston Hughes, The Langston Hughes Reader; Truman Capote,
Breakfast at Tiffany's
1959................AK admitted as 49th state
.......................HI admitted as 50th state
.......................Prince Edward County, VA closes down public schools for
5 years in massive resistance to forced
...................................school
desegregation
.......................Castro becomes Premier of Cuba
.......................The St. Lawrence Seaway completed, linking the Great
Lakes to the Atlantic
.......................International agreement by 12 nations preserves the Antarctic
continent for scientific research
.......................1st Int'l Congress of Oceanography in NY
.......................1st photographs of the far or dark side of the moon
.......................1st halogen light bulbs, developed by engineers at General
Electric
.......................1st Newport Folk Festival
.......................1st Grammy Awards for music
.......................Berry Gordy, Jr. establishes Motown Records
.......................Barbie Dolls 1st developed
by Ruth Handler for Mattel Toys
.......................1st skateboards marketed
.......................Guggenheim Museum opens in NYC; architect Frank Lloyd
Wright
.......................US Postmaster General bans Lady Chatterley's Lover
by D.H. Lawrence on grounds of obscenity (ruling
...................................reversed
in 1960)
.......................Beginnings of Confessional poetry
.......................Stanley Kunitz wins Pulitzer Prize for Poetry
.......................Robert Lowell, Life Studies; W.D. Snodgrass,
Heart's Needle; Stanley Kunitz, Selected Poems (wins Pulitzer
...................................Prize
in Poetry); Langston Hughes, Selected Poems; Lorraine Hansbury, A
Raisin in the Sun; Gunther
...................................Grass,
Tin Drum
1960................Lunch counter sit-ins to protest segregation
begin with 4 African American college students at a Woolworth's
....................................in Greensboro
NC and spread rapidly throughout the South
.......................Student Nonviolent Coordinating Committee founded by
Ella Baker to fight for civil rights
.......................Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr. meets with Pres. John F.
Kennedy
.......................1st televised debate among US Presidential candidates:
Kennedy vs. Nixon
.......................Theodore Roosevelt Memorial constructed in DC
.......................12 new independent African states formed from former
European colonies: Zaire, Somalia, Dahomey, Upper Volta,
...................................Ivory
Coast, Chad, Congo, Brazzaville, Gabon, Senegal, Mali, and Nigeria
.......................W.D. Snodgrass wins Pulitzer Prize for Poetry
.......................Gwendolyn Brooks, The Bean Eaters; Sylvia Plath,
The Colossus; Harper Lee, To Kill a Mockingbird; Waring
...................................Cuney,
Puzzles
1961................John F. Kennedy inaugurated 35th US President;
youngest person elected Pres. and youngest to die in office
.......................Bay of Pigs invasion fails to overthrow Castro regime
in Cuba; exiled rebels were trained and supplied by US
.......................Freedom Riders attacked by mobs in tests of integration
on interstate buses throughout the South
.......................Federal Court orders U of GA to admit 2 African American
students, Charlayne Hunter and Hamilton Holmes; a
...................................riot
follows
.......................Civil Rights organizations meet with Attorney General
Robert Kennedy to discuss voting rights
.......................Interstate Commerce Commission declares segregation in
interstate bus terminals illegal
.......................FDA approves sales of oral contraceptives in US
.......................23rd Amendment to Constitution ratified, giving DC residents
right to vote in presidential elections
.......................USSR puts 1st man in space, Yuri Gagarin
.......................Formation of the Peace Corps
.......................Berlin Wall constructed to halt exodus from East Germany
to the west
.......................UN General Assembly condemns apartheid
.......................Anthropologist Louis Leakey uncovers oldest humanoid
bones in Olduvai Gorge, Tanganyika
...................................Gov.
Barnett guilty of civil contempt; US marshals and 3,000 soldiers suppress riots
when
...................................Meredith
arrives on campus to begin classes
.......................Supreme Court bans prayer in schools
.......................Thalidomide use by pregnant women causes birth defects
.......................Rachel Carson publishes Silent Spring, 1st widely-read
eco-book
.......................Soft contact lenses created by chemist Otto Wichterle
.......................The Beatles release 1st album, self-produced
.......................Pop art launched in NY
.......................Eero Saarinen, TWA Terminal, NYC
.......................John Steinbeck awarded Nobel Prize for Literature; Langston
Hughes inducted into the National Institute of
...................................Arts
and Letters; Phillis McGinley wins Pulitzer Prize for Poetry
.......................Katherine Anne Porter, Ship of Fools, James
Baldwin, Another Country; Anthony Burgess, A Clockwork
...................................Orange;
Ken Kesey, One Flew Over the Cuckoo's Nest; Joseph Heller, Catch-22;
Leroi Jones, Preface
...................................to a
Twenty Volume Suicide Note; James Baldwin, Nobody Knows My Name
1962................Cuban Missile Crisis averted when USSR withdraws
missiles
....................... Pope John XXIII opens 2nd Vatican Council
.......................In Engel v. Vitale, US Supreme Court rules that
public schools cannot instutute a daily prayer even if it is
...................................voluntary
and nondenominational
.......................John Glenn orbits the earth in a spacecraft
.......................US Supreme Court rules that the University of Mississippi
must admit James Meredith, an African American
...................................student;
his enrollment leads to the most violent campus riot of the decade; US soldiers
brought to
...................................campus;
US Marshalls escort Meredith to classes
.......................JFK federalizes the MS National Guard and later deploys
the Army to U of MS
.......................JFK issues executive order barring discrimination in
federally-financed housing
.......................Jamaica, Trinidad and Tobago, and Uganda achieve independence
from the UK
.......................London Sunday Times publishes 1st color supplement
.......................Pearl Harbor Memorial dedicated in Hawaii
.......................The rock band The Rolling Stones formed
.......................Andy Warhol, 100 Cans
.......................Boston courts ban the US publication of Naked Lunch
by William S. Burroughs on charges of obscenity
.......................Alan Dugan wins Pulitzer Prize for Poetry
.......................Robert Frost, In the Clearing;W.C. Williams,
Pictures from Brueghel; James Baldwin, Another Country;
...................................Rachel
Carson, Silent Spring
1963................d. Sylvia Plath
.......................Pres. Kennedy assassinated by Lee Harvey Oswald
.......................Oswald shot by Jack Ruby
.......................Lyndon B. Johnson inaugurated 36th US President
.......................Civil Rights demonstrations in Birmingham; arrest of
Martin Luther King, Jr.; 200,000 Freedom
...................................Marchers
demonstrate in Washington DC; Police use dogs and water cannons on marchers,
many of them
...................................children,
in AL; forced .integration
of schools in the South; 4 girls killed in the bombing of the 16th Street
...................................Baptist
Church in Birmingham
.......................Martin Luther King, Jr. publishes "Letter from Birmingham
Jail"
.......................March on Washington culminates with speeches at the Lincoln
Memorial, including Martin Luther King, Jr.'s
..................................."I
Have a Dream" speech
.......................Medgar Evers, Field Sec'y for the NAACP, murdered in
MS
.......................US and USSR establish "hot line" phone from
White House to Kremlin
.......................US raises postage for 1st class letters to 5 cents; 1st
use of zip codes
.......................Elizabeth Seaton, 1st American-born Catholic to be beatified
.......................Archeologists find Viking ruins in Newfoundland
.......................USSR puts 1st woman in space, Valentina Tereshkova
.......................Kenya achieves independence from the UK
.......................Smiley face symbol developed by Harvey Ball, a graphic
artist from MA
.......................Guggenheim Museum exhibits Pop Art
.......................William Carlos Williams wins Pulitzer Prize for Poetry
.......................Sylvia Plath, The Bell Jar; Mary McCarthy, The
Group; Gwendolyn Brooks; Selected Poems; Adrienne
...................................Rich,
Snapshots of a Daughter-in-Law: WC Williams, Pictures from Brueghel
(wins Pulitzer
...................................Prize
for Poetry); Langston Hughes, Something in Common and Other Stories;
Langston Hughes, ed.,
...................................Poems from
Black Africa, Ethiopia, and Other Countries; Leroi Jones, Blues People
1964................24th Amendment abolishes the poll tax
.......................Warren Commission finds that Oswald acted alone in assassination
of Pres. Kennedy
.......................US destroyer allegedly attacked off North Vietnam; US
air attack as reprisal
.......................Race riots in Harlem and numerous other US cities
.......................Malcolm X splits from the Black Nationalist Muslim movement;
makes hajj to Mecca; founds Organization
...................................for
Afro-American Unity
.......................Civil Rights Act outlaws job discrimination on the basis
of race or gender; prohibits racial discrimination
...................................in
places of public accommodation, publicly owned facilities, union membership,
and federally
...................................funded
programs
.......................3 civil rights workers in MS murdered: James Chaney,
Andrew Goodman, and Michael Schwerner
......................Griffin et al. v. County School Bd. of Prince Edward County:
US Supreme Court rules that a school board
...................................may
not close a school to circumvent a desegregation order
.......................Margaret Chase Smith, 1st woman nominated for US President
in a major party convention
.......................NASA tests 1st successful electric rocket engine
.......................Earthquake in AK kills 114
.......................Verazzano-Narrow Bridge opens in NY; world's longest
suspension bridge
.......................The Vatican abolishes Latin as the official language
of Roman Catholic clergy, disassociates Jews from
...................................guilt
in crucifixion of Jesus, extends friendship to other major religions, and criticizes
anti-Semitism
.......................China tests its 1st atomic bomb
.......................German Geraldine Mock is 1st woman to complete solo round-the-world
flight
.......................South Africa barred from Tokyo Olympics due to their
apartheid policy
.......................Malawi and Zambia achieve independence from UK
.......................Martin Luther King, Jr. awarded Nobel Peace Prize
.......................Surgeon General Luther Terry links tobacco to cancer,
heart disease and other ailments for 1st time
.......................Capital Beltway completed: ring road around DC
.......................World's Fair in NYC held in conjunction with the city's
300th anniversary of English forces gaining
...................................control
of New Amsterdam in 1664
.......................Popular dances include the Watusi, Frug, Monkey, and
Funky Chicken: discotheques and go-go girls
.......................Cassius Clay (Mohammad Ali) wins world heavyweight boxing
championship
.......................Sidney Poitier becomes 1st African American to win the
Oscar for Best Actor, for movie “"Lilies of the
...................................Field"
.......................The Beatles initiate the "British Invasion"
by musical groups
.......................Andy Warhol, Marilyn
.......................Louis Simpson wins Pulitzer Prize for Poetry
.......................Denise Levertov, O Taste and See; Ernest Hemingway,
A Moveable Feast; Frank O'Hara, Lunch Poems;
...................................Langston Hughes, ed., New
Negro Poets: U.S.A.
1965...............Lyndon Baines Johnson inaugurated 36th US
Pres.
.......................Vietnam War: 1st US Marines arrive in Vietnam; American
planes drop 1,000 tons of napalm on a Viet Cong
...................................stronghold
in South Vietnam near the Cambodian border; the bombing represents a sharp increase
...................................in
American military involvement
...................... Malcolm X assassinated in NY
.......................Martin Luther King, Jr. leads voting rights march from
Selma to Montgomery AL on "Bloody Sunday,"
...................................marchers met
by police outside Montgomery with tear gas, clubs, and dogs: Unitarian Minister
...................................James Reeb dies
of wounds sustained in a brutal attack outside Selma; Viola Liuzza murdered
...................................by the KKK as
she drove marchers back from Montgomery to Selma
.......................Severe race riots in LA leave 35 dead; white rioting
in Cleveland against integration
.......................Voting Rights Act passed; prohibits use of poll taxes,
literacy tests, or other impediments which deny
...................................minorities
the right to vote
.......................Creation of the Dept. of Housing and Urban Development
.......................Equal Employment Opportunity Commission established
.......................US Supreme Court bars curbs on birth control
.......................Relay switch in Ontario malfunctions; blackout of entire
NE US and parts of Canada affects 30 million
.......................1st African American ambassador, Patricia Harris posted
to Luxembourg
.......................Soviet cosmonaut Aleksei A. Leonov becomes 1st man to
float outside a spacecraft
.......................The Global Positioning System developed by the US Navy
for use on nuclear submarines
.......................1st experimental computer link spans the nation between
MIT in Cambridge, MA and System Development
...................................Corp.
in Santa Monica, CA
.......................1st pull-tab aluminum cans developed by Erma Fraze
.......................Windsurfing developed by Americans Jim Drake and Hoyle
Schweitzer
.......................Hare Krishna faith founded by A.C. Bhaktivedanta
.......................Moog synthesizer invented by Robert Moog
.......................Black Arts Movement formed in Harlem
.......................John Berryman wins Pulitzer Prize in Poetry
.......................Elizabeth Bishop, Questions of Travel; May Sarton,
Mrs. Stevens Hears the Mermaids Singing; Sylvia Plath,
...................................Ariel;
Robert Lowell, For the Union Dead; John Berryman, 77 Dream Songs;
James Dickey,
...................................Buckdancer's Choice;
Langston Hughes, Simple's Uncle Sam; Malcolm X and Alex Haley, The
...................................Autobiography
of Malcolm X
1966................Vietnam War: Christmas truce observed
.......................Neil Armstrong becomes 1st man to walk on the moon
.......................Kennedy Memorial Grave constructed at Arlington National
Cemetery
.......................LBJ signs bill to construct Coulee Dam, world's largest
power plant
.......................Black Panthers founded to fight racism in northern cities,
defend African Americans against racist
...................................police officers,
and provide social services for inner-city African American communities
.......................National Organization for Women founded
.......................James Meredith shot and wounded soon after beginning
his "March Against Fear" from Memphis, TN
...................................to Jackson, MS
.......................Roman Catholic bishops in US rule against abstaining
from meat on Fridays except during Lent
.......................Metropolitan Opera House in Lincoln Center, NY, opens
.......................Uniform Time Act of 1966 recommends use of Daylight Savings
Time throughout the US. Only
...................................Arizona,
Hawaii, and parts of Indiana, Puerto Rico, the US Virgin Islands, and American
Samoa
...................................decline
to participate in the system
......................World Heavyweight Champion Muhammad Ali refuses to be
drafted into the US Army
.......................Floods in N. Italy ruin thousands of art treasures in
Venice and Florence
.......................Landslide in the mining village of Aberfan, Wales, kills
116 children and 28 adults
.......................Miniskirts come into fashion
.......................Color TV becomes popular
.......................Cigarettes required to have labels warning of health
risks
.......................Black Sparrow Press founded by John Martin in Santa Rosa,
CA
.......................Richard Eberhart wins Pulitzer Prize for Poetry
.......................Anne Sexton, Live or Die (winner of Pulitzer
Prize); Truman Capote, In Cold Blood; Flannery O'Connor,
...................................Everything
That Rises Must Converge
1967................d. Langston Hughes
...................... 50,000 protest Vietnam War at Lincoln Memorial in Washington
DC;ML King leads anti-war march in NY
.......................Race riots in Cleveland, Newark, Chicago, and Detroit
.......................Stokely Carmichael calls for an armed Black revolution
in US
.......................Gov. John Arthur of CO signs 1st US law legalizing abortion
.......................US Supreme Court rules states cannot ban interracial
marriages in Loving v. Virginia
.......................Thurgood Marshall becomes 1st African American Supreme
Court justice
.......................25th Amendment: Pres. can appoint a VP if that position
is vacated; VP can be appointed acting Pres. if Pres.
...................................is
unable to fulfill duties
.......................US bombs Hanoi
.......................Six Day War between Israel and Arab nations
.......................The People's Republic of China explodes its 1st hydrogen
bomb
.......................US space ship Apollo I burns on launch pad during
testing, killing 3
.......................Muhammad Ali stripped of his boxing title for refusing
to fight in Vietnam
.......................American Nazi Party leader G.L. Rockwell shot to death
in Arlington, VA
.......................1st heart transplant, by South African doctor Christiaan
Barnard
.......................1st portable electronic calculators marketed by Texas
Instruments
.......................10,000 hippies rally at NY “"Be-in"”
.......................Underground radio debuts on KMPX-FM in San Francisco;
1st hippie radio station is soon imitated
...................................across the US,
defining American counter-cultural rebellion
.......................Twiggy, British fashion model, becomes famous
.......................Theodore Roosevelt Memorial opens in Washington, DC
.......................Anne Sexton wins Pulitzer Prize for Poetry
.......................Marianne Moore, Complete Poems; Adrienne Rich,
Selected Poems; Langston Hughes, The Panther and
...................................the
Lash; William Styron, The Confessions of Nat Turner; Gabriel Garcia
Marquez, One Hundred
...................................Years
of Solitude; Chaim Potok, The Chosen; Robert Bly, The Light
Around the Body
1968................Assasination of Martin Luther King, Jr. in
Memphis; Scotland Yard arrests James Earl Ray in London; he is
...................................extradicted
to US to stand trial
.......................Assassination of Robert Kennedy in Los Angeles immediately
after winning CA Democratic primary; Sirhan
...................................Sirhan
of Jordan later arrested and convicted
.......................Vietnam War: Tet Offensive; 1st US troops withdraws from
Vietnam; Mylai Massacre
.......................Massive college anti-war protests
.......................Richard Milhous Nixon inaugurated 37th US President;
to become 1st Pres. to resign from office
.......................1st US astronauts land on moon: Neil Armstrong and Edwin
“"Buzz" Aldrin
.......................1st communication satellite launched, Intelsat 3A
.......................Shirley Chisholm becomes 1st African American woman elected
to US House of Representatives
.......................Democratic Convention in Chicago marked by riots and
police brutality
.......................Charles Manson indicted for murder of 5
.......................US Supreme Court orders desegregation at once, overturning
earlier ruling for desegregation “"with all
...................................deliberate
speed"
.......................Memorial Day declared a national annual holiday on the
last Monday of May
.......................Russia and Warsaw Pact nations invade Czechoslovakia
.......................Woodstock Music Festival draws audience of 300,000
.......................Harvard University opens program in Black Studies
.......................1st live color TV pictures of earth from space, sent
from Apollo 10
.......................1st automated teller machines (ATMs), inventeds by Don
Wetzel, and American businessman
.......................Canada legalizes abortion and homosexuality in omnibus
criminal code bill
.......................Violent fighting in Northern Ireland between Protestants
and Roman Catholics
......................."Sesame Street" begins broadcasting educational
TV for pre-school children
....................... Anthony Hecht wins Pulitzer Prize for Poetry
.......................Kurt Vonnegut, Slaughterhouse-Five; Ursula LeGuin,
The Left Hand of Darkness; John Berryman, The
...................................Dream
Songs
1969................1st US troops withdrawn from Vietnam (75,000
withdrawn by end of year)
........................Lt. William L. Calley Jr. stands trial for murder in
the My Lai Massacre in Vietnam (convicted 1971)
.......................Apollo 11 lands on the moon; Neil Armstrong
and Buzz Aldrin walk on the surface while a third astronaut,
...................................Michael
Collins, remains in orbit
.......................Alexander v. Holms Cty. Bd. of Ed.: US Supreme Court
rules that school districts must end segregation
...................................at once and must
operate only unitary school systems
.......................Woodstock Festival near Bethel, NY attracts an audience
of approx. 400,000 over 3 days; performances
...................................by
Joan Baez, Jimi Hendrix, Jefferson Airplane, others
.......................Stonewall Riots in NYC mark the beginning of the Gay
Liberation Movement
........................Trouser outfits become acceptable everyday wear for
women
........................Sen. Edward Kennedy plunges his car into a pond at Chappaquiddick
Island, MA, killing his passenger,
...................................Mary
Jo Kopechne
.......................1st major oil spill in US history covers a 200-mile stretch
of CA coastline; beginning of widespread
...................................environmental
movement
.......................Hurricane Camille devastates the Gulf Coast, the strongest
recorded hurricane to strike the continental
...................................US, with 190
mile per hour winds
.......................1st Automatic Teller Machines introduced, for 24 hour
banking
.......................The Pentagon develops the "Arpanet," precurser
to the internet
.......................Golda Meir of Israel, world's 1st female prime minister
.......................Small Press Distribution founded in Berkeley, CA, the
only wholesaler in the US dedicated exclusively to
...................................independently-published
literature
.......................George Oppen wins Pulitzer Prize for Poetry
.......................Philip Roth, Portnoy's Complaint; Mario Puzo,
The Godfather
1970................d. Louise Bogan
.......................Congressional Black Caucus created; originally called
the Democratic Select Committee
.......................US Census reveals that 53% of African Americans live
in the South, the result of a massive
...................................migration
north from 1910 to this time; approximately 7 million African Americans have
...................................left
Southern states
.......................Vietnam War: combat troops sent into Cambodia
.......................Killing of 4 students by National Guard at Kent State
University in OH in student protests against
...................................Vietnam
War
.......................448 US universities are closed or go on strike
.......................1st complete synthesis of a gene by scientists at Univ.
of WI
.......................Nixon lowers voting age from 21 to 18
.......................48,000 acres in NM returned to Taos Indians
.......................1st automobiles designed to run on unleaded fuel
.......................1st celebration of Earth Day; 20 million Americans participate
.......................Environmental Protection Agency created; Ntional Oceanic
and Atmospheric Administration created;
...................................Clean
Air Act becomes law
.......................Atomic leak at Nevada test site forces evacuation of
hundreds
.......................A MA grand jury chooses not to indict Sen. Edward Kennedy
in the death of Mary Jo Kopechne,
...................................who
drowned when Kennedy's car plunged into a tidal pool on Chappaquiddick Island
.......................Hughes Act: US Federal law recognizes drug and alcohol
addiction as a disease
.......................The Lutheran Church in America changes its bylaws to
allow the ordination of women; the 1st
...................................female
pastor in the Lutheran Ministry, Elizabeth Platz, is ordained
.......................Thor Heyerdahl sails from Morocco to Latin America in
Ra II, a papyrus boat, to prove Egyptians
...................................made
the same journey 4,000 years earlier
.......................Deadly cyclone in Bangladesh kills approx. 300,000 people
.......................Diane Crump, 1st woman jockey to ride in the Kentucky
Derby
.......................3 Canadian inventors introduce IMAX movies
.......................Paul McCartney leaves the Beatles, disbanding the most
successful pop group in history
.......................Robert Smithson, Spiral Jetty
.......................The Feminist Press founded, the oldest independent publisher
of women's writing in the world
.......................Elizabeth Bishop awarded the National Book Award for
Complete Poems; Richard Howard wins Pulitzer
...................................Prize
for Poetry
.......................Denise Levertov, Relearning the Alphabet; Maya
Angelou, I Know Why the Caged Bird Sings; Toni
...................................Morrison,
The Bluest Eye; James Dickey, Deliverance; W.S. Merwin, The
Carrier of Ladders
1971................Vietnam War: fighting spreads to Laos and
Cambodia; US conducts large-scale bombings raids
...................................against
North Vietnam; US air support allows South Vietnamese to invade Laos along the
...................................Ho
Chi Minh Trail
.......................Pentagon Papers published in the New York Times
and the Washington Post
.......................US Supreme Court orders busing to end segregation in
public schools
.......................People United to Serve Humanity (Operation PUSH) formed
by Jesse Jackson to call for economic
...................................equality
for African Americans
.......................26th Amendment lowers voting age from 21 to 18
.......................US explodes hydrogen bomb beneath Amchitka Island, AK
.......................US Supreme Court upholds death penalty
.......................US and USSR sign treaty banning nuclear weapons on the
ocean floor
.......................Convicts revolt at Attica Prison, hold 32 guards; 1,000
riot police sent in to quell violence; 37 killed
.......................London Bridge purchased by private investor, moved to
Lake Havasu City, AZ
.......................Nixon opens trade with China; China makes its formal
entry into United Nations
.......................Apollo 14 and 15 crews explore the moon's surface
.......................1st microprocessors developed by Intel
.......................Magnetic resonance imaging (MRI) developed by Raymond
Damadian, a trained violinist. Scans and
................................. analyzes any part
of the human body in minute detail; becomes widely used medical diagnostic
................................. tool
.......................Anglican Church ordains 1st women priests
.......................Switzerland gives women the vote in federal elections
.......................Cigarette ads banned from TV in US
.......................Amtrak begins to operate US passenger RRs
.......................1st road safety signs for schools: a yellow sign shaped like baseball home plates with two figures in
................................. black introduced for use throughout US
.......................Email developed by American iventor Ray Tomlinson
.......................John F. Kennedy Center for the Performing Arts opens
in Washington, DC
.......................Pablo Neruda of Chile wins Nobel Prize in Literature;
William S. Merwin wins Pulitzer Prize in Poetry
.......................Conceptual Art begins
.......................Sylvia Plath, The Bell Jar
1972................d. Marianne Moore; d. John Berryman
.......................Nixon's 8-point peace plan for Vietnam announced; US
asks POW release in exchange for withdrawal
...................................of
troops; massive B-52 bomb raids of North Vietnam
.......................Nixon meets with leaders from China and USSR
.......................Republic of China donates a pair of giant pandas to the
US; they are exhibited at the National Zoo in
...................................Washington,
DC
.......................Watergate break-in at Democratic National Committee Headquarters;
Watergate Trials of 5 defendants
...................................begin;
Post wins Pulitzer Prize in Journalism for coverage by Woodward and
Bernstein
.......................Pres. candidate George Wallace of AL shot and partially
paralyzed by Arthur Bremer
.......................Cesar Chavez signs FL's 1st contract for migrant farm
workers
.......................EPA bans use of DDT in the US; Clean Water Act and Pesticide
Control Act signed into law
.......................Syphilis scandal: Public Health Service reveals it has
studied syphilis in African American men in Macon
...................................County,
AL for 40 years without treating them
.......................Shirley Chisholm becomes 1st African-American woman to
run for US President
.......................Title VII of the Civil Rights Act of 1964, outlwing "practices
that are fair in form but discirminatory in
...................................operation"
is expanded to educational institutions
.......................Arab terrorists kill 2 Israeli Olympic athletes in Munich,
take 9 others hostage; all hostages and terrorists
...................................killed
in shoot-out with W. German police and soldiers
.......................American Psychiatric Assn. stops classifying homosexuality
as a mental illness
.......................1st CAT scans
.......................1st portable telephones
.......................Polaroid develops 1st instant camera
.......................1st liquid crystal display (LCD) digital watch, the Pulsar,
from Hamilton Watch Co.
.......................1st hand-held electronic calculator, created by Jack
S. Kilby, and American inventor
.......................1st computer game consolue, the Odyssey by Magnavox,
includes such games as shootout and pingpong
.......................Australia grants voting rights to Aborigines
.......................James Wright wins Pulitzer Prize in Poetry
.......................Adrienne Rich, Diving into the Wreck; Sylvia
Plath, Winter Trees
1973................d. W.H. Auden, d. Pablo Neruda
.......................Vietnam War cease fire agreement signed: total war losses
from 1965 - 1973 are 45,948 combat deaths,
...................................10,298
noncombat deaths, 202,640 wounded
.......................Roe v. Wade Supreme Court decision legalizes
abortion in US
.......................Watergate scandal: several top Nixon officials resign;
serious talk of impeachment begins; White House
...................................releases
tape recordings of conversations between the Pres. and aides with gaps; defendants
plead
...................................guilty;
John Dean implicates President Nixon
.......................VP Spiro Agnew resigns over tax evasion charges; Gerald
Ford named to replace him
.......................US Supreme Court rules individual states may not prohibit
abortions during 1st 6 mos. of pregnancy
.......................Native American activists occupy Wounded Knee, SD for
70 days
.......................National Black Feminist Organization founded
.......................Endangered Species Act signed into law: requires federal
authorities to identify threatened or endangered
...................................animal
and plant species and help them recover, often by restricting how their habitats
may be used
.......................Energy crisis: petroleum shortage, Arab oil embargo
.......................Billie Jean King defeats Bobby Riggs in "Battle
of the Sexes" tennis match
.......................Ethyl Payne of the Chicago Defender reports
from Vietnam; 1st African-American woman war correspondent
.......................1st annual Iditarod race in AK (Anchorage to Nome by
dog sled)
.......................US launches Skylab, 1st manned space station. 3 crews
of 3 atronauts worked for a total of 171 days,
...................................conducting
experiments in zero gravity. Skylab burned up and scattered in pieces over the
Indian
...................................Ocean
in July 1979
.......................1st cell phones, from Motorola
.......................1st plastic soda bottles, developed by chemist Nathaniel
Wyeth
.......................USSR agrees to abide by terms of the Universal Copyright
Convention
.......................Sydney Opera House opens in Syndey, Australia; architect
Jørn Utzon
.......................Maxine Kumin wins Pulitzer Prize in Poetry
.......................World Trade Center opens in NYC; architect Minoru Yamasaki
1974................d. Anne Sexton
.......................Nixon becomes 1st US Pres to resign from office, over
Watergate scandal
.......................Gerald Ford inaugurated 39th US President; only unelected
Pres.
.......................Nixon granted unconditional pardon for Federal crimes
.......................Watergate: House Judiciary Committee recommends impeachment
of Nixon
.......................Pres. Ford grants limited amnesty to Vietnam War draft
evaders and military deserters
.......................Ella Grasso elected Gov. of CT, 1st woman to become governor
in US through election rather than by
.................................succeeding her
husband
.......................Hawaii 1st state to require employers to provide health
insurance to all workers
.......................National speed limit of 55 mph enacted
.......................Gasoline shortage leads to rationing throughout the winter
months; year-round daylight-saving
...................................time
adopted to save fuel (later repealed)
.......................Safe Drinking Water Act signed into law
.......................Heiress Patricia Hearst is kidnapped by Symbionese Liberation
Army, joins captors
.......................11 women ordained as Episcopal priests by 4 US bishops,
acting in defiance of church law
.......................Largest private employer in US, AT&T, bans discrimination
against homosexuals
.......................India becomes 6th nation to explode a nuclear device;
Great Britain, France, and China conduct
.................................nuclear tests
.......................Isabel Peron of Argentina, world's 1st female president
.......................Frank Robinson becomes 1st major league baseball team
manager, of the Cleveland Indians
.......................1st statue of an American woman erected in DC: Mary McLeod
Bethune in Lincoln Park
.......................The Center for Book Arts founded in NYC, 1st nonprofit
dedicated to traditional crafts of bookmaking
.......................Robert Lowell wins 2nd Pulitzer Prize in Poetry
.......................Anne Sexton, The Death Notebooks; Gary Snyder,
Turtle Island (awarded Pulitzer Prize for
.................................Poetry); Ursula
K. LeGuin, The Dispossessed; Galway Kinnell, The Avenue Bearing
the
.................................Initial of Christ
into the New World
1975................US ends 2 decades of military involvement
in Vietnam: US shuts down embassy in Phnom Penh;
.................................Saigon surrenders
to Communists
.......................Congress extends Voting Rights Act and adds Latinos under
protection
.......................Indian Self-Determination and Education Act gives tribes
sovereignty, breaking the paternalistic
.................................grip that the Bureau
of Indian Affairs held over reservation life
.......................Dept. of Health, Education and Welfare releases new regulations
to equalize opportunities for
.................................women and girls
in schools and colleges
.......................Boston public schools begin court-ordered city-wide busing
program to integrate classrooms
.......................1st Rhodes Scholarships open to women
.......................1st personal computers, the Altair 800, created by H.
Edward Roberts, sold as a kit with assembly
.................................instructions
.......................Mother Elizabeth Ann Seton becomes 1st US-born saint
.......................International Woman's Year conference in Mexico City
adopts 10-year plan to improve status of
.................................women
.......................ME repeals sodomy laws and lowers the age of consent
between consenting adults to 14
.......................Gary Snyder, Turtle Island (wins Pulitzer Prize
in Poetry); Sterling Brown, The Last Ride of Wild Bill
1976................US Bicentennial Celebration
.......................Viking I lands on Mars
.......................US Supreme Court rules states may prosecute individuals
for homosexual acts
.......................US Supreme Court rules death penalty is not cruel or
unusual punishment; most states subsequently
................................reinstate capital
punishment
.......................Legionnaire's Disease: mysterious illness kills 29 at
Philadelphia American Legion Convention
.......................US Air Force Academy admits 1st 155 women students
.......................National Academy of Science reports gases from spray
cans can damage the atmosphere's ozone layer
.......................Apple I computer designed
.......................1st pop-top aluminum cans developed by Daniel Cudkzik
.......................National Air and Space Museum opens, Washington, DC
.......................Metro, DC subway system, begins operation
.......................Christo, “Running Fence in CA
.......................Pushcart Prizes 1st awarded; publishes annual anthology
of best creative writing from small presses and
...................................literary
journals
.......................Elizabeth Bishop, Geography III; Maxine Hong
Kingston, The Woman Warrior; Robert Creeley,
.................................Selected Poems;
John Ashbery, Self-Portrait in a Convex Mirror (wins Pulitzer Prize
and
.................................National Book Award)
1977 ..............James E. Carter inaugurated 39th US President
.......................Creation of Dept. of Energy
.......................Trans-Alaskan oil pipeline opens
.......................Pres. Carter pardons draft evaders of Vietnam War
.......................NYC Blackout: rampant looting, vandalism, and other criminal
activity leads to arrests of 3,300
.......................1,400 arrested at protest at Seabrook nuclear plant in
NH; starts national debate on safety of nuclear power
.......................1st female Episcopal priest, Rev. Jacqueline Means
.......................US tests neutron bomb
.......................15 nations sign nuclear Non-Proliferation Treaty
.......................Angioplasty developed by Zurich doctor Andreas Gruentizig
to open clogged arteries
.......................WY decriminalizes private consensual adult homosexual
acts
.......................Pompidou Center opens in Paris; architects Renzo Piano
and Richard Rogers
.......................Bette Davis becomes 1st women to get a Life Achievement
Award from the American Film Institute
.......................The Education of Little Tree published, the
supposedly autobiographical story of a half-Cherokee boy that
.................................becomes popular
among young adult readers. The author's real name is exposed, along with the
fact
.................................that the "memoir"
is fiction
.......................James Merrill wins Pulitzer Prize in Poetry
.......................Richard Eberhart, Collected Poems (wins National
Book Award)
1978................Canal zone ceded to Republic of Panama
.......................Camp David Accords: Middle East Peace Treaty
.......................Families evacuated from Love Canal, NY due to toxic waste
leakage
.......................US Congress passes the Foreign Intelligence Surveillance
Act, allowing a secret court to rule on
.................................requests by counter-intelligence
officers to put espionage and terrorist suspects under
.................................surveillance
.......................Regents of U. of CA v. Bakke: US Supreme Court rules
that race may be considerd as a factor in
..................................university
admission decisions, however such "affirmative action" programs can
not use quotas
.......................Betty Ford, former 1st Lady, goes public with her treatment
for alcohol and drug addiction, helping to
.................................diminish the stigma
long association with addiction and treatment
.......................1st test tube baby born in London, Louise Brown
.......................1st transatlantic balloon crossing, by 3 Americans
.......................917 Americans die in mass suicide at Peoples Temple in
Guyana, including leader Jim Jones
.......................Pope John Paul II of Poland becomes 1st non-Italian pope
in 456 years
......................."Treasures of Tutankhamen" exhibit tours the
US; 1st blockbuster art exhibition
.......................Allan Bakke sues U of CA Medical School for "reverse
discrimination"; US Supreme Court upholds a
.................................lower court decision
requiring the school to admit him
......................Harriet Tubman is 1st African American woman portrayed
on a US Postal Stamp
......................1st Ironman Triathalon competition held: athletes swim,
run, and bicycle
.......................Subway system in DC opens
.......................East Building of the National Gallery of Art opens, Washington,
DC
.......................Adrienne Rich, Dream of a Common Language; Howard
Nemerov, Collected Poems (wins Pulitzer
.................................and National Book
Award); David Ignatow, Tread the Dark
1979................d. Elizabeth Bishop
.......................Creation of Dept. of Education
.......................US recognition of People's Republic of China
.......................US Surgeon General reports smoking causes lung cancer
.......................US admits thousands of troops in Vietnam were exposed
to Agent Orange
.......................Worst nuclear accident in US history: atomic leak at
Three Mile Island reactor in PA
.......................In 1st court case in which a wife accuses her husband
of rape, John Rideout is exonerated by a jury
.......................US farmers demonstrate on the Mall in DC for farm relief
.......................Klansmen in AL march from Selma to Montgomery for “"white
rights"
.......................1st gay rights march on Washington, DC”
.......................US drops rule barring suspected homosexuals from entering
the country
.......................US and Russia sign SALT II agreement
.......................Soviet Union invades Afghanistan
.......................1st British woman Premier elected, Margaret Thatcher
.......................During Islamic revolution in Iran, the US-backed Shah
is overthrown and 52 Americans are taken
.................................hostage at the
US embassy
.......................Mother Teresa awarded Nobel Peace Prize
.......................C-SPAN begins broadcasting uncut, live hearings from
the US Senate
.......................1st portable personal music system, the Sony Walkman,
introduced
.......................Rap music 1st becomes a commercial success with the Sugarhill
Gang's hit "Rapper's Delight"
.......................1st laptop computer, invented for NASA's space shuttle
program
.......................Judy Chicago, The Dinner Party
.......................Albert Einstein Memorial opens in Washington, DC on the grounds of the National Academy of Sciences,
.................................with a sculpture by Robert Berks and design by James van Sweden
.......................Robert Penn Warren wins 2nd Pulitzer Prize in Poetry
1980................d. Muriel Rukeyser
.......................US boycotts Olympics in Moscow in protest of the Soviet
invasion of Afghanistan
.......................Mariel boatlift: influx of Cuban refugees to
US
.......................Attempted rescue of US hostages in Iran fails; 8 US servicemen
die
.......................Mount St. Helens erupts in OR, spewing ash 60,000 feet
in the air
.......................1st woman bishop of a US church: Methodist Marjorie Matthews
.......................World Health Org. announces the worldwide eradication
of smallpox
.......................Construction completed on the Very Large Array, 27 radio
wave receivers tuned to emanations from
...................................stars,
galaxies, and quasars, in Socorro, NM
.......................CNN, the 1st 24 hour TV news channel, begins broadcasting
.......................The World Wide Web developed by British inventor Tim
Berners-Lee
.......................MADD, Mothers Against Drunk Driving, founded
.......................Polish union Solidarity formed
.......................3M begins manufacturing a new office product, Post-It
Notes
.......................Sherry Lansing, 1st woman head of a major movie studio
.......................Martin Luther King Jr. National Historic Site dedicated
in Atlanta, GA
.......................Women's Rights National Historic Park opens in Seneca Falls, NY
.......................Murder of pop star John Lennon
.......................Donald Justice wins Pulitzer Prize in Poetry
.......................Eudora Welty, Collected Short Stories
1981...............Ronald Reagan inaugurated 40th US President;
only professional actor to become Pres.
.......................Reagon shot in assassination attempt at the Washington
Hilton hotel, Washington, DC, along
................................. with the White House Press Secretary, a DC policeman, and a secret service agent.
................................. The gunman, John Hinckley, Jr., is incarcerated at St. Elizabeth's Hospital
.......................Hostages in Iran returned to US after 444 days in captivity
.......................1st official notice of AIDS: Centers for Disease Control
report “"unusual" occurrence of deadly
.................................form of pneumonia
in 5 homosexual men in NY and LA
.......................1st female Supreme Court Justice appointed, Sandra Day
O'Connor
.......................12,000 striking aircraft controllers dismissed by Presidential
decree, breaking up the union in a
.................................devastating
blow to labor
.......................US Supreme Court requires parental consent for teen abortions
.......................US Supreme Court upholds law making statutory rape a
crime for men but not women
.......................Martial law declared in Poland, dozens killed; Solidarity
union banned
.......................Pope John Paul II wounded by Turkish assassin Mehmet
Ali Agca in St. Peter's Square
.......................1st cloned mammal: 3 mice created in a lab in Switzerland
.......................1st test tube baby born in the US; Elizabeth Carr born
by in vitro fertilization
.......................MTV broadcasts, 1st cable TV 24-hour music channel
.......................James Schyler, The Morning of the Poem, wins
Pulitzer Prize in Poetry
1982...............500,000 protestors in NYC against nuclear
arms
.......................Equal Rights Amendment is defeated after it fails to
gain ratification in the states
.......................Falklands War between Britain and Argentina
.......................Rev. Sun Myung Moon of the Unification Church marries
4,000 in mass ceremony in Madison Sq.
.................................Garden
.......................Jarvik, 1st permanent artificial heart, implanted in
patient Barney Clark
.......................Vietnam Veterans Memorial dedicated in Washington DC,
designed by Maya Lin
.......................1st digital film introduced by Eastman Kodak
.......................1st compact discs
.......................Michael Jackson releases the pop music album "Thriller"
.......................The Library of America begins republishing classic American
literature
.......................Sylvia Plath awarded posthumous Pulitzer Prize in Poetry
.......................Alice Walker, The Color Purple (wins Pulitzer
Prize for Fiction in 1983, making Walker the first
...................................African-American
woman to win the award for fiction)
1983...............Astronaut Sally Ride, 1st US woman in space
on shuttle Challenger
.......................US invades Grenada, overthrows Marxist leaders
.......................Bombing of US Embassy in Beirut kills 40; bombing of
Marine headquarters kills 241
.......................FDA approves new sponge contraceptive
.......................Martin Luther King, Jr.'s birthday becomes national holiday
.......................1st digital compact disc players
.......................1st video camera developed for home use, the Sony Betamovie
camcorder
.......................A German magazine publishes excerpts from what are said
to be the diary of Adolph Hitler,
.................................but are later revealed
to be fake
.......................Michael Graves, Portland Building, Portland OR
.......................Galway Kinnell wins Pulitzer Prize in Poetry
1984................Union Carbide plant in India releases toxic
fumes that kill over 3,000 people
.......................US and the Vatican establish full diplomatic ties for
1st time in 117 years
.......................Dept. of Housing and Urban Development begin to collect
statistics on homelessness
.......................Cause of AIDS discovered to be a virus
.......................Jesse Jackson wins more than 3.2 million votes in Democratic
Presidential primaries
.......................Apple Computers introduces MacIntosh, an affordable,
user-friendly small computer with
.................................a graphical user
interface and a mouse
.......................Surgeon General issues report on harmful effects of “"second-hand"”smoke
from cigarettes
.......................Beginning of rap music
.......................Indira Gandhi, Prime Minister of India, assassinated
.......................Bishop Desmond Tutu of South Africa wins Nobel Peace
Prize
.......................Maya Lin, Vietnam Veterans Memorial, Washington, DC
.......................Mary Oliver's American Primitive wins Pulitzer
Prize in Poetry; Sterling Brown named 1st
...................................Poet
Laureate of DC
.......................Louise Erdrich, Love Medicine
1985................Hole in the ozone layer over Antarctica reported
by British scientists
.......................Actor Rock Hudson dies of AIDS, forcing the new disease
into public consciousness
.......................Ryan White, a 7th grade boy from Indiana, contracts AIDS
from a blood infusion
.......................Pentagon begins testing all new recruits for AIDS
.......................1st reliable test for HIV becomes widely available in
US
.......................Philadelphia police fire bomb MOVE, an armed radical
group, killing 11 and destroying 61 homes
.......................US and USSR attend nuclear arms summit in Geneva, Switzerland
.......................Iran-Contra Affair: secret arms deals conducted between
US and Iran
.......................1st woman to win the Iditarod Trail Dog Sled Race in
AK: Libby Riddles
.......................Wreck of the Titanic discovered by American
oceanographer Robert Ballard
.......................Live Aid rock concert in PA raises over $50 million for
famine relief
.......................Carolyn Kizer's Yin wins Pulitzer Prize in Poetry
1986................Martin Luther King, Jr. Day 1st observed
.......................US Space Shuttle Challenger explodes on liftoff,
killing 6, including teacher Christa McAuliffe
.......................US bombs Libya
.......................Nuclear reactor at Chernobyl explodes in the USSR; not
acknowledged by Soviet government
.................................until high radiation
is reported in Scandinavia
.......................Rapid spread of crack cocaine use prompts Congress to
pass new anti-drug legislation
.......................Bible translated into Navajo
.......................Christian evangelical protesters begin mass protests
against abortion at doctor's offices in a
.................................movement that will
soon take the name Operation Rescue. Protest tactics include blocking
.................................entrances to medical
offices, massing at the homes of doctors known to provide abortion
.................................services, and posting
public signs and distributing brochures naming such doctors
.......................Passage of the Firearms Owners Protection Act gives legal standing to a new interpretation of the
................................Second Amendment to the US Constitution, to cover idividual citizens' rights to keep and bear
................................arms. The US has the highest rate of gun ownership in the world; in 1980, nealry one in three
................................Americans owns a gun
.......................US Justice Dept. rules AIDS patients entitled to protection
as disabled persons
.......................Student basketball star at the University of Maryland,
Len Bias, dies of cocaine overdose. This
.................................highly-publicized
death leads to passage of Federal law on mandatory minimum sentences
.................................for drug offenses,
which creates a 20-fold increase in the US prison population
.......................Ann Bancroft becomes 1st woman to reach the North Pole
by dogsled
.......................1st digital cameras invented by Kodak
.......................Jeff Koons, Rabbit
.......................1st US Poet Laureate, Robert Penn Warren
.......................Elie Wiesel wins Nobel Peace Prize; Henry Taylor's The
Flying Change wins Pulitzer Prize in
.................................Poetry; Elizabeth
Frank wins the Pulitzer Prize in Biography for Louise Bogan: A Portrait
.......................Allen Ginsberg, White Shroud; Margaret Atwood,
The Handmaid's Tale
1987...............Stock market crash: 22.6% plunge is the larges
one-day decline since 1914
.......................The Tower Commission report on the Iran-Contra Affair
rebukes Pres. Reagan for failing to
.................................control his national
security staff
.......................US Supreme Court upholds racial quotas for job promotions
.......................US Supreme Court upholds right to require leaves for
pregnant women
.......................Gary Hart drops out of race for US Presidency after news
team stakes out his house and reveals
.................................his mistress has
spent the night in his home while his wife was away. This highly-publicized
.................................news story redefines
how the media covers the personal lives of public figures
.......................Montreal Protocol: many nations--but not the US--agree
to phase out chlorofluorocarbons
.................................and other chemicals
that destroy the ozone layer
.......................FDA approves the drug AZT for treatment against HIV/AIDS,
eventually leading to the HAART
.................................treatment and thousands
of lives saved
.......................Prozac licensed by FDA, a drug to treat depression
.......................US Navy Memorial opens in Washington, DC
.......................Restoration of Michelangelo frescoes in Rome's Sistine
Chapel
.......................Rita Dove wins Pulitzer Prize in Poetry
.......................Toni Morrison, Beloved
1988................1.4 million illegal aliens in the US seek
amnesty under new immigration law
........................City of Richmond v. J.A. Crosson Co.: US Supreme Court
rules that setting aside a portion of
...................................public
contracts for minority contractors is unconstitutional
........................Jesse Jackson gains a significant percentage of the
vote in Democratic primaries for the
...................................presidential
nomination, appealing to white and Black voters alike
.......................Gen. Colin Powell becomes 1st African American appointed
as Chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff
.......................Terrorists bomb Pan Am Flight 103 over Lockerbie, Scotland
.......................Climate scientist James Hansen testifies to Congress
about Global Warning
.......................Matthew Henson, African American explorer who traveled
to the North Pole with Robert Peary,
..................................reinterred with
honors in Arlington National Cemetery
.......................Gertrude Elion and George Hitchings win Nobel Prize in
Medicine for developing drugs to treat
...................................cancer
and herpes, and anti-rejection drugs to for skin graft and kidney transplant
patients
.......................N.W.A.'s influential album "Straight Outa Compton"
changes the direction of rap music by
...................................incorporating
sampling techniques and sexualy violent lyrics
.......................Naguib Mahfouz becomes 1st Arab writer to win Nobel Prize
for Literature; William Meredith
...................................wins
Pulitzer Prize in Poetry
1989...............George Bush inaugurated 41st US President
.......................One of the worst oil spills in history: Exxon Valdez
in Prince William Sound, AK
.......................Supreme Court upholds Roe v. Wade but rules that states
can put new restraints on a woman's right
..................................to abortion
.......................Douglas Wilder becoms governor of VA; 1st African American
elected chief exec. of a state
.......................Earthquake in CA; 67 die
.......................1st live-donor liver transplant performed in IL
.......................Berlin Wall torn down as East Germany opens its borders
(originally built 1961; 192 people killed on
...................................Wall
trying to scape East Germany); Brandenburg Gate opened and Germany reunited
.......................US invades Panama; Gen. Noriega flees; new Pres. sworn
in as chaos consumes country
.......................Massacre of Chinese demonstrators in Tiananmen Square
.......................Culture Wars: National Endowment for the Arts grants
retroactively withdrawn from four visual artists
.......................Corcoran Museum in DC cancels photography exhibit by
Robert Mapplethorpe, is picketed by civil
.................................liberties activists,
loses large donor; museum director resigns
.......................Civil Rights Memorial opens in Montgomery, AL
.......................I.M. Pei, Pyramid, Louvre Museum, Paris
.......................Richard Wilbur wins Pulitzer Prize in Poetry
1990................War Against drugs: US makes agreements with
Peru, Bolivia,and Columbia for closer cooperation
.......................Americans with Disabilities Act passed
.......................After 1990 census, courts order US Congress to redraw
congressional districts to create more
...................................African
American majorities; as a result, a record 17 African Americans are elected
to the 103rd
...................................Congress,
several from the South for the 1st time since Reconstruction
.......................Gary Franks of CT is 1st African American Republican
elected to the House of Representatives in
...................................nearly
60 years
.......................Happy Land Social Club fire: arson claims the lives of
87, mostly Honduran immigrants, at an unlicensed
...................................bar in The Bronx,
NY
.......................Breakup of the Soviet Union; Germany reunified; Soviet
law allows religious freedom
.......................Nelson Mandela, leader of the African National Congress
in South Africa, freed from prison after
...................................25 years
.......................Frederick Gregory, 1st African American astronaut to
command a space flight, the Discovery; mission
...................................deploys
the Hubble Telescope 350 miles above the Earth
.......................Navy Memorial constructed in DC
.......................Mayor of Washington, DC, Marion Barry, caught smoking
crack cocaine, serves 6 months in prison
.......................British scientist Tim Berners-Lee creates HTML, Hyper
Text Markup Language, a computer program
...................................that
facilitates information sharing and births the World Wide Web
......................1st completely digital camera, Dycam Model 1
.......................Washington National Cathedral completed in Washington
DC (83 years after groundbreaking)
.......................Novelist Marita Golden forms the Zora Neale Hurston/Richard
Wright Foundation to support writers
...................................of
African descent
.......................Charles Simic wins Pulitzer Prize in Poetry
1991...............First .Gulf War: US sends troops after Iraq
invades Kuwait
.......................Warsaw Pact dissolved
.......................Civil Rights Act of 1991 aims to reduce gender discrimination
.......................Clarence Thomas appointed a Supreme Court judge, becoming
2nd African American in this position
.......................Lawyer Anita Hill testifies in Judge Thomas's nomination,
alleging sexual harassment
.......................US Supreme Court bans abortion counseling in federally-supported
health clinics
.......................Freddie Mercury, lead singer of rock band Queen, dies
of AIDS; basketball player Magic Johnson
..................................diagnosed with
AIDS
.......................Tailhook affair: Navy and Marine Corps fliers accused
of sexually assaulting 26 women
.......................8 people sealed inside Biosphere II for 2 years,
a giant greenhouse
.......................National Law Enforcement Officers' Memorial constructed
in DC
.......................Mount Pleasant Riots in DC last 3 days, ending when the
city government agrees to hire more bilingual
..................................cops and to form
a Mayor's Office of Latino Affairs
.......................Nadine Gordimer of South Africa wins Nobel Prize for
Literature; Mona Van Duyn wins Pultizer Prize for Poetry
1992................Jury acquits 4 LA policemen in beating of
Rodney King; 2 days of rioting leave 58 dead
........................Doctors announce that Legionaire's Disease can be spread
by drinking water as well as through AC
...................................systems
........................Great flood of Chicago: century's old
tunnel system and adjacent basements fill with Chicago River water
........................Carol Mosley Braun of IL is 1st African American woman
elected to US Senate
........................Manzanar National Historic Site dedicated in Independence,
CA to commemorate persons of Japanese
...................................ancestry
incarcerated during WWII
........................Salem Village Witchcraft Victims' Memorial opens in Danvers, MA
........................James Tate wins Pulitzer Prize in Poetry
........................Edward P. Jones, Lost in the City
1993...............Bill Clinton inaugurated 42nd US President
.......................Bomb built by Islamic extremists explodes in the parkinig
garage of the World Trade Center in NY;
.................................6 killed and more
than 1,000 injured
.......................US ends ban on women pilots in combat
.......................Internet expands with the World Wide Web
.......................US troops sent to Somalia
.......................US Bureau of Alcohol, Tobacco and Firearms firebombs
Branch Davidian cult compound in
..................................Waco, TX, killing
80
.......................The peak of number of new AIDS cases per year in the
US
.......................Dr. David Gunn murdered in front of the abortion clinic
where he works; 1st of 8 US doctors murdered
..................................by anti-abortion
extremists
.......................US Holocaust Museum opens in DC, building designed by James Ingo Freed
.......................Smithsonian Institution National Postal Museum opens,
Washington, DC
.......................Bill proposing statehood for DC defeated in Congress
.......................EPA publishes findings on the health hazards of secondhand
cigarette smoke
.......................1st commercial World Wide Web browners with graphical-user
interfaces revolutionize internet use
.......................Maastricht Treaty: formation of the European Union
.......................Czechoslovakia divides into two countries
.......................South African parliament dissolves
.......................1st use of DNA evidence to absolve death row prisoner;
Kirk Bloodsworth exonerated
.......................Toni Morrison becomes 1st African American winner of
Nobel Prize for Literature; Louise Gluck wins
..................................Pulitzer Prize
for Poetry
1994................North American Free Trade Agreement passed
.......................US sends troops to Haiti
.......................Brady Bill requires 5-day waiting period on handgun purchases
by individuals
.......................Pres. Clinton signs into law the Freedom of Access to
Clinic Entrances Act, Making blockading
.................................the entrance to
a facility in which abortions are performed a federal crime
.......................Byron De La Beckwith convicted in the 1963 murder of
Medgar Evers, the NAACP field secretary
.......................Burning of many African American churches throughout
the US (through 1996)
.......................FDA approves the sale of 1st genetically engineered tomato
.......................Nelson Mandela elected 1st Black President of South Africa
.......................Serbs begin campaign of "ethnic cleansing"
in Bosnia
.......................62 year old Italian becomes oldest woman on record to
give birth
.......................1st Palm Pilot handheld computer, created by Jeff Hawkins,
American inventor
.......................Yusef Komunyakaa wins Pulitzer Prize for Poetry; Dolores
Kendrick appointed 2nd Poet Laureate
...................................of
DC
1995...............Bombing of Alfred P. Murrah federal building
in OK by Timothy McVeigh; 168 killed
.......................Pennsylvania Ave. in front of the White House closed
to vehicular traffic, DC institutes anti-terror
.................................policies throughout
the city, errecting Jersey barriers, perimeter fences, bollards: an
................................."architecture
of fear"
.......................Trial of O.J. Simpson for murder of his ex-wife and her
male friend reveals continued racial
..................................divisions in the
US; Simpson is declared not guilty
.......................US Supreme Court rules new black-majority voting districts
in GA, NC, and LA unconstitional,
...................................as
they violate equal protection of white voters
.......................Balkans peace pact signed
.......................Massive earthquake in Japan kills 5,000 and affects more
than 4 million
.......................EBay founded by Pierre Omidyar and Jeff Skoll: on-line
auction site connects sellers and buyers
..................................but does not sell
anything itself
.......................Million Man March organized by the Nation of Islam in
Washington to promote unity and social
...................................justice
among Black men
.......................Korean War Veterans Memorial dedicated in Washington, DC with art by Frank Gaylord and Louis Nelson
.......................Marine Corps War Memorial (aka Iwo Jima Memorial) dedicated in Arlington, VA
with sculpture by
...................................Felix de Weldon
.......................1st digital video disks (DVDs), by Warner Advanced Media
Operations
.......................Sculpture of Arthur Ashe added to Monument Avenue in
Richmond, VA; all other statues
..................................commemorate
Civil War figures of the South, including Robert E. Lee and Jefferson Davis
.......................New England Holocuast Memorial opens in Boston, MA
.......................American Visionary Art Museum opens in Baltimore
.......................Christo and Jeanne-Claude wrap the Reichstag, Berlin
.......................Philip Levine wins Pulitzer Prize for Poetry
1996................US troops in Bosnia, part of NATO peacekeeping
force
.......................Welfare Reform bill passes
.......................Bombing of US military housing in Saudi Arabia kills
19
.......................Fox News launched, with new system of conservative argument
and punditry instead of
.................................traditional neutral
news reporting. The success of this format leads competitors to follow
.................................its approach, changing
the content and style of cable news coverage
.......................Effective HIV therapy is widely adopted, and the incidence
of AIDS begins to fall dramatically;
..................................after this time,
AIDS will cease to be like a plague and become more of a chronic but
..................................largely manageable
disease in the US, akin to diabetes
.......................1st cloned mammal: Dolly the Sheep
.......................Proposition 209 approved by CA voters; an anti-affirmative
action measure, it prohibits colleges
...................................and
universities in the state from considering criteria of race, sex, color, ethnicity,
or national
...................................origin
in admissions
.......................Henry Ossawa Tanner's "Sand Dunes at Sunset, Atlantic
City" is 1st painting by an African American
...................................artist
to be added to the White House permanent collection
.......................David S. Reynolds's Walt Whitman's America: A Cultural
Biography wins the Bancroft Prize
..................................from Columbia
University; Jorie Graham wins Pulitzer Prize for Poetry
1997................NASA spacecraft lands on Mars
........................Madeleine Albright, 1st woman Secretary of State
........................Abner Louima, a Haitian immigrant in custody in NYC,
tortured by white police officers
........................3 fossilized skulls found in Ethiopia are oldest known
remains of modern humans, approx.
..................................160,000 years
old. They end two major scientific debates, proving that Neanderthals are
..................................not related to
modern humans (but are a hominid offshoot that eventually became extinct),
..................................and that all modern
humans developed in Africa and migrated elsewhere (rather than
..................................humans developing
simultaneously in other regions of the world)
.......................Death of Deng Xiaoping, return of Hong Kong to China
.......................Franklin Delano Roosevelt Memorial dedicated in Washington,
DC, designed by Lawrence Halprin
.......................Oklahoma City National Memorial, designed by Torrey and
Hans Butzer, opens to public; becomes
...................................376th
US National Park; officilally dedicated 2000
.......................Frank O. Gehry, Guggenheim Museum, Bilbao; Richard Meier,
Getty Center, Los Angeles
.......................1st surviving septuplets born to Bobbi McCaughey of IA
.......................Lisel Mueller wins Pulitzer Prize for Poetry
1998................International Space Station begins construction
.......................Bombing of US embassies in Tanzania and Nairobi kill
225
.......................American computer scientists Larry Page and Sergey Brin
launch Google, a powerful search engine
..................................to organize content
on the world wide web
.......................Viagra, anti-impotence treatment, approved by FDA
.......................1st surviving octuplets born
.......................Jacob Joseph Chestnut, a US Capitol policeman
killed on duty, is 1st African American to be honored
..................................with a ceremonial
viewing of his body in the Rotunda of the US Capitol
.......................African American Civil War Memorial opens in DC
.......................Charles Wright wins Pulitzer Prize in Poetry
1999................US troops in Yugoslavia, part of NATO airstrikes
to halt ethnic cleansing in Kosovo
.......................2 students kill 15 at Columbine High School in CO
.......................Impeachment proceedings against Pres. Clinton end with
not guilty finding in obstruction
..................................of justice charges
.......................VT legislature enacts "civil unions," extending
benefits to same-sex couples
.......................Amadou Diallo, an unarmed West African immigrant, shot
41 times by 4 white NYC polic officers while
...................................standing
in the hallway of his apartment; all officers later acquitted of charges of
excessive force
.......................US hands over control of Panama Canal Zone to Panama
.......................cloning of 1st human embryo
.......................Dr. Jack Kevorkian, advocate of physician-assisted suicide,
convicted of second-degree murder in MI
.......................War erupts in Kosova; serbs agree to pull out; 1st war
to be won using air power alone
.......................African-American Civil War Memorial opens in Washington,
DC
.......................Blacklist Sculpture Garden opens in Los Angeles, CA
.......................Jewish Museum opens in Berlin, architect Daniel Libeskind
.......................Mark Strand wins Pulitzer Prize in Poetry
2000................Fears of world-wide computer failures, the
Y2K Bug, prove unfounded
.......................No clear winner emerges in the Presidential election
in November; the Supreme Court votes to
..................................halt ballot recounts
in FL and names Bush the next US President. This is the 4th time in
..................................US history that
the electoral college seated a candidate who won fewer popular votes
.......................In a widely-publicized case, Federal immigration agents
take a young Cuban boy, Elian Gonzalez,
..................................who arrived in
the US illiegally, from his Miami relatives
.......................Matthew Shepard murdered in WY for his sexual orientation,
sparking a national debate on "hate
...................................crimes"
.......................The Dow Jones industrial average closes at a record high
on January 14, the symbolic end of the 90's
..................................economic expansion.
Over the next 2 years, the market will lose more than a third of its
..................................value
.......................Working draft of the Human Genome completed, sequences
3.15 billion letter of the human DNA code
.......................Significant increases in HIV and AIDS cases among gay
men in the US tied to use of the drug crystal
..................................methamphetamine,
which lowers inhibitions and compromises the immune system
.......................Bombing of the USS Cole in Yemen kills 17
.......................Ruth J. Simmons elected president of Brown University,
1st African American Ivy League president
.......................Oklahoma City National Memorial dedicated in OK, commemorates
victims of the 1995 federal building
...................................bombing
that killed 168
.......................Beltway Poetry Quarterly begins publication;
C.K. Williams wins Pulitzer Prize for Poetry
2001................George Bush inaugurated 43rd US President, following one
of the most disputed elections in US
...................................history
.......................Colin Powell appointed 1st African American Sec'y of
State; Condoleeza Rice appointed 1st African
...................................American
National Security Advisor
.......................September 11: terrorists hijack 4 passenger jets and
use them as weapons, destroying the World Trade
..................................towers, damaging
the Pentagon, and killing 3,000 people in the largest single-day loss of life
..................................in US history.
The 19 hijackers are revealed to be Islamic extremists, linked to Osama bin
................................. Laden, a Saudi
fundamentalist and millionaire, whose terrorist network, al Quaeda, is believed
..................................to have operations
in over 60 countries
.......................Patriot Act: in the name of tighter security, civil liberties
are curtailed; law allows law officials to
.................................conduct
searches without warrants, monitor financial transactions, and detain and deport
.................................individuals
in secret
.......................Hundreds of foreigners in US indefinitely detained, most
on immigration charges
.......................Department of Homeland Security created
.......................Anthrax-contaminated mail sent to major newspapers, TV
networks, the White House,
..................................Congress, the
CIA, and the Supreme Court
......................Timothy McVeigh, OK City bomber, killed by lethal injection
in US prison
.......................US War in Afghanistan begins
.......................Apple Computer introduces the iPod, a digital personal
sound system
.......................Segway Human Transporter introduced by inventor Dean
Kamen
.......................National D-Day Memorial opensin Bedford, VA
.......................Sculpture by Robert Graham added to the Roosevelt Memorial
in DC, shows FDR in a wheelchair
.......................1st book ceremonially placed in the new Bibliotheca Alexandrina
in Egypt, located approximately on the
...................................site
of the ancient Library of Alexandria. Included among 1st volumes: a handwritten
17th c. Qur'an
...................................and
a Bible
.......................Stephen Dunn wins Pulitzer Prize for Poetry
2002................Post-9-11 security efforts in US reveal huge
intelligence gaps (the CIA, for instance,
..................................had only 40 agents
assigned to counter-terrorism), need for greater airport security,
..................................and an overhaul
to the Immigration and Naturalization Service (who actually
..................................approved student
visas for 2 of the hijackers after they destroyed the World Trade Center)
.......................US-led military effort in Afghanistan destroys al-Quaeda
headquarters and training camps,
..................................but fails to eliminate
the terrorist organization or locate its leader, Osama bin Laden
.......................Corporate scandals: Enron and WorldCom go bankrupt, several
other major companies are
..................................placed under Federal
investigation, for fraud and crooked accounting
.......................Sex abuse scandal in American Catholic Church: reveals
church systematically covered up
..................................abuse by clergy;
300 priests resign, another 2,000 accused of molesting children
.......................US and Russia agree to cut nuclear arsenals by up to
two-thirds over 10 years
.......................Complete mouse genome sequencing published
.......................1st synthetic virus created in lab at SUNY Stonybrook
.......................1st successful clone of an endangered animal in Italy,
a mouflon, a type of wild sheep
.......................11 new moons discovered orbiting Jupiter, bringing total
to 39 moons
.......................Snipers Lee Boyd Malvo and John Allen Muhammad terrorize
the Washington, DC region with 23
..................................random attacks
that kill 15
.......................Last girder from Ground Zero removed in a somber ceremony
marking the end of recovery efforts
.................................
at the World Trade Center site
.......................Temporary art project in Manhattan, Tribute in Light,
recreates World Trade Center with beams of
.................................
light to commemorate those killed in the 9-11 attacks
.......................Replica of the slave ship Amistad displayed
at Mystic Seaport, CT
.......................Irish Hunger Memorial dedicated in NYC, designed by Brian
Tolle
.......................Frank Bidart's Music Like Dirt becomes 1st chapbook
to become a finalist for the Pulitzer Prize; Carl
..................................Dennis wins Pulitzer
Prize in Poetry
2003................Iraq War: citing possession of weapons of
mass destruction, links to terrorism, and Saddam
...................................Hussein's despotism
as reasons for “"regime change," Pres. Bush launches the 1st
...................................pre-emptive war
in US history. The war is strongly criticized by the United Nations
...................................and world leaders
(in particular France, Germany, and Russia) for circumventing
...................................international
law and disregarding international consensus.
.......................SARS Epidemic: a new disease, Severe Acute Respiratory
Syndrome, originates in China
...................................and spreads world-wide,
causing 774 deaths. SARS is finally contained by
...................................quarantines and
vigorous infection control practices
.......................37 confirmed cases of Monkeypox, related to smallpox,
found in the American midwest;
...................................the disease was
imported from Africa in Gambian giant pouched rats, an exotic pet,
...................................and jumped to
humans
........................US space shuttle Columbia breaks up during
landing approach, killing 6 crew members
........................Canadian provinces of Ontario and British Columbia authorize
same-sex marriages
........................US Supreme Court overturns all sodomy laws in all states
........................US Supreme Courty upholds affirmative action in education
in Grutter v. Bollinger
........................Gov't-sponsored policy of genocide in Darfur region
of the Sudan begins; will evetually
...................................displace millions
of citizens, destroy villages, create widespread famine
........................Worst heat wave in Europe in hundreds of years; approximately
35,000 die heat-related deaths
........................Little Bighorn Battlefield National Monument dedicated
in Crow Agency, MT
........................National Constitution Center opens in Philadelphia, PA
........................World Trade Center Memorial Competition, the largest
design competition in history, generates
...................................5,201 submissions
from 63 nations
........................Paul Muldoon wins Pulitzer Prize in Poetry
2004................Iraq War: Photos published of US soldiers
abusing Iraqui prisoners at Abu Ghraib prison; US
....................................troops attach
Sunni insurgents at Fallujah
........................Nancy Pelosi of CA named the Democratic leader of the
House of Representatives, the 1st
....................................woman to lead
a major party in the US Congress
.........................MA becomes 1st state to legalize marriage between members
of the same sex. 35 states
...................................introduce legislation
in reaction, aimed at preserving the traditional definition of
...................................marriage as a
union between a man and a woman
........................Public officials in San Francisco, Portland OR, NY State,
and NJ grant marriage licenses to
...................................same sex couples;
4,037 well-publicized marriage licenses issued in San Francisco alone,
...................................although they
are later nullified by the CA State Supreme Court; Pres. Bush calls for a
...................................constitutional
amendment to protect a conservative definition of marriage as between
...................................one man and one
woman
........................1st US Senate race in which both major-party candidates
are Black: Barack Obama is elected in
...................................IL,
runs against Alan Keyes
........................Smithsonian National Museum of the American Indian opens
in DC
........................WWII Memorial opens in Washington DC, designed by Frederich
St. Florian with sculpture by
...................................Raymond
Kaskey
........................Terrorist attack in Madrid: 10 bombs explode simultaneously
on 4 subway trains, killing over
....................................180
........................Tsunami catastrophe in Asia
........................Continuing "War on Terror" keeps troops in
Iraq; Abu Ghraib scandal photos reveal systematic
....................................torture and
sexual humiliation of Iraqi prisoners by Americans
.......................The 9/11 Commission report released, blames terrorist
attacks on "deep institutional failings"
........................Los Angeles police seize 388 guns from a single man,
Wayne Wright, including rifles, shotguns,
....................................handguns, assault
weapons, a silencer, and thousands of rounds of ammunition, including
....................................armor-piercing
rounds
........................A bridge project (now abandoned) near Port Angeles,
WA reveals the largest prehistoric Indian
....................................village and
burial ground found in US, with approx. 1,085 human remains, and a huge
....................................trove of ritual
and ceremonial artifacts, some dating back 1,700 years. Mass graves from
....................................European-borne
infectious fevers that killed 90% of the Klallam tribe, dating from 1780
....................................and 1835, are
also part of the site
........................A Belgian woman is 1st to give birth after doctors transplant
frozen ovarian tissue; pieces of her
....................................ovaries had
been previously removed prior to chemotherapy
........................An earthquake measuring 9.0 off the coast of Sumatra
causes tsunamis that kill over 147,000 in
....................................Indonesia, India,
and Africa
........................Boston Red Sox win their 1st World Series in 86 years,
breaking the "Curse of the Bambino"
........................Simmie Knox paints Pres. Bill Clinton's official presidential
portrait; 1st African American artist to
...................................be
awarded a presidential portrait commission
........................Elfriede Jelinek of Austria wins Nobel Prize in Literature;
Franz Wright wins Pulitzer Prize in Poetry
2005................Iraq War: Iraq holds multi-party national
elections
........................Condoleeza Rice appointed 1st African-American Secretary
of State
........................US Senate issues formal apology for never having made
lynching a federal crime
........................Edgar Ray Killen convicted of manslaughter in the deaths
of 3 civil rights activists, James Chaney,
....................................Andrew Goodman,
and Michael Schwerner, who were working in MS in 1964 at the time of
....................................their murders
........................Hurricane Katrina devastates New Orleans and the Gulf
Coast; over 970 people die; shipping disrupted; gas
....................................prices soar;
more than half a million people are uprooted, causing the largest displacement
of
....................................Americans since
the Civil War
........................Reporters from the NY Times reveal that Pres.
Bush authorized the NSA to wiretap domestic calls in
....................................apparent defiance
of Congress and the Foreign Intelligence Surveillance Act
........................Pres. Bush nominates Harriet Miers to the Supreme Court;
amid criticism, she withdraws 3 weeks later
........................Rosa Parks's body lies in honor at the Rotunda of the
US Capital; 1st woman to be given this honor
........................Spain and South Africa legalize same-sex marriages
........................Terrorist attack in London: bombs explode on 3 crowded
commuter trains and one double-decker bus,
...................................wounding 700
and killing 52; attributed to Al-Queda
........................Scientists in South Korea create the 1st cloned dog,
an Afghan hound named Snuppy
........................Rice genome mapped: international team led by Japanese
scientists determine the complete genetic sequence
...................................of the dietary
staple, in hopes that this will lead to cheaper, more abundant crops to feed
the poorest
...................................populations
.......................PA judge rules that Intelligent Design is a religious
view, not a science, and cannot be taught in the Dover
...................................District public
school science classes as an alternative to evolution
.......................The Border Protection, Antiterrorism, and Illigal Immigraton
Control Act authroizes a 700 mile fence along
...................................the US-Mexico
border, requires state and local authoritoes to turn over undocumented immigrants
to
...................................federal agents,
and makes assisting such individual in any way a felony
.......................YouTube, a popular web site where users can view free
video clips, developed by Chad Hurle, Steven Chen,
...................................and Jawed Karim
.......................Ted Kooser awarded Pulitzer Prize in Poetry
2006................Study finds that African Americans and ethnic Hawaiians
are about 55 percent more likely than whites to
....................................develop lung
cancer from light to moderate smoking, and Japanese Americans and Latinos are
about
....................................50 percent less
likely than whites
.......................Military Commissions Act suspends habeas corpus rights
for so-called "enemy combatants" imprisoned since
................................... 9-11 at Guatanamo
Naval Base
.......................Iraq War: Continued fighting in Iraq and Afghanistan
kill 3,221 troops (880 in 2006); Nouri al-Maliki named
...................................Prime Minister
of Iraq, forms unity government with Sunnis and Kurds; Saddam Hussein hanged
in Baghdad
.......................Pres. Bush designates the Northwestern Hawaiian Islands
as the largest protected marine preserve in the world
.......................Nancy Pelosi becomes 1st woman to become US Speaker of
the House of Representatives
......................5 Amish girls killed and 5 seriously wounded by gunman
Charles Roberts at a PA schoolhouse
......................Medicare prescription drug program goes into effect; chaotic
program offers a choice of 1,429 plans across the US
.......................3 die and 200 are sickened from E. coli outbreak spread
through spinach
.......................Bishop Katharine Jefferts Schori becomes 1st woman to
lead the Episcopal Church in the US
.......................The International Astronomical Union downgrades Pluto,
voting to recognize only 8 planets
.......................North Korea tests a nuclear bomb, against United Nations
sanctions
.......................Ellen Johnson-Sirleaf of Liberia, 1st woman elected head
of an African nation
.......................WikiLeaks founded by Julian Assange to publish previously
classified media from anonymous news sources.
.................................Among other stories
the group breaks: extradjudicial killings in Kenya, toxic waste dumping in Cote
.................................d'Ivoire, US military
procedures at Guantanamo Bay prison, US airstrikes in Iraq
.......................The return of Big Urbanism: urban design and redevelopment
strategies on a grand scale in NYC (Atlantic Yards
...................................Project), Atlanta
(Bellwood Quarry), Denver (Denver Art Museum), LA (Frank Gehry Grand Avenue
project),
...................................and other cities
.......................US Air Forcce Memorial opens in Arlington, VA
.......................CBGB's, legendary punk rock club in NYC, closes
.......................Orhan Pamuk of Turkey awarded Nobel Prize in Literature;
Claudia Emerson wins Pulitzer Prize in Poetry
2007...............Deadliest
shooting rampage in US history: student at Virginia Tech University kills 32
and himself, injures 30
.......................Iraq War continues, despite widespread lack of citizen
support, with "troop surges" to control violence in Baghdad
...................... Drew Gilpin Faust, 1st woman appointed pres. of Harvard
Univ.
.......................US FDA approves a birth control pill,
Lybrel,that completely eliminates a woman's menstrual cycle
.......................Crisis in the subprime mortgage market
leads to defaults affecting over 2 million homeowners; home sales fall steeply
...................................nationwide and
prices plunge
.......................Prince William County, MD passes toughest
laws against undocumented immigrants in the US; approx. 8,000
.................................Latinos leave the
County
.......................Scientists transform human skin cells
into ones that mimic embryonic stem cells, allowing for research, currently
...................................hobbled by laws
that limit the use of stem cells, into the treatment of diseases
.......................China strengthens reinforcement of its
one-child policy, with birth control bureaucrats collecting fines from families
...................................with more than
one child. Local officials are accused of forcing women to submit to abortions
and sterilization
...................................to meet their
population quotas
.......................Pakistan imposes emergency rule, suspending
its constitution, delaying elections, and shutting down all independent
...................................media in what
it characterizes as a battle against "rising militancy" in the country
.......................Global warming continues to affect polar
regions; for the first time in recorded history, the Northwest Passage is
................... ...............completely free
of ice
.......................Former VP Al Gore awarded the Nobel Peace
Prize, as well as an Emmy and an Oscar Award for his efforts to stop
...................................global warming
.......................New York City, Philadelphia, and other
cities ban trans fats in restaurants to protect consumer health
.......................Normandy American Cemetery Visitor Center
dedicated in France
.......................Natasha Trethewey awarded Pulitzer Prize
in Poetry; Doris Lessing awarded Nobel Prize in Literature
2008..............Historic
Democratic Presidential race between woman candidate, Hilary Rodham Clinton,
and African American
...................................candidate, Barak
Obama; Obama is nominated as the Democratic Presidential candidate
.......................Republican nominee for US President, John
McCain, names a woman as VP running mate, Sarah Palin of AK
.......................Global economic crisis, worst since the
Great Depression: US Treasury takes over mortgage giants Fannie Mae and
...................................Freddie
Mac; Lehman Brothers investment bank files for bankruptcy; Federal Reserve extends
an $85 billion
...................................loan
to American International Group, the largest insurance company in the US; other
banks seek
...................................governmental
help for their most distressed mortgage assets
.......................Sub-prime mortgage crisis leads to massive
foreclosure of homes throughout US
.......................As of this date, 43 African Americans
serve in US Congress; this does not reflect the 13% total African American
...................................US
population (of the 42 African Americans in the House, 14 more would be needed
to reach 13%; of the
...................................1
Senator, 12 more would be needed to equal 13%), and 25 states (WA, OR, ID, NV,
AZ, UT, MT, WY, CO,
...................................NM,
ND, SD, NE, KS, IA, AR, KY, WV, VT, NH, ME, RI, DE, AK, and HI) have never elected
an African
...................................American
to Congress
.......................The World Bank announces 33 countries
are confronting food crises, as the prices of staples soar; the cost of
................................... rice, for example,
goes up 141% on the international market. Pakistan introduces ration cards,
Egypt begins
................................... distributing
bread through its Army reserves, and hunger riots in Haiti result in the ouster
of the Prime
....................................Minister. The
World Bank estimates that the crisis could push another hundred million people
deeper into
....................................poverty
.....................CA is 1st state to ban trans fats in restaurants and bakeries
.....................CA Supreme Court rules that same-sex couples have a constitutional
right to marriage but a subsequent state ballot
....................................vote changes
the California constitution to restrict the definition of marriage to a union
between a man and
....................................a woman. The
campaigns for anf against this proposition are the highest funded in US history
.....................Supreme Court overrules DC's Firearms Control Regulations Act in District of Columbia v. Heller, eliminating states' rights
....................................to regulate individual gun ownership
.....................Pentagon Memorial opens in Arlington, VA, designed
by Julie Beckman and Keith Kaseman, it commemorates the 184 people
....................................killed in the Pantagon in the 9-11 Attacks
.....................China hosts Olympics; US swimmer Michael Phelps wins record-breaking
8 gold medals
.....................US space probe Phoenix finds evidence of water on the surface
of Mars; India lands its first unmanned lunar space
....................................probe on the
moon; China conducts its first space walk
.....................Terrorists from the Pakistani militant group Lash-kar-e-Taiba
kill over 160 people in Mumbai in a three-day rampage
.....................Robert Hass and Philip Schultz are co-winners of the Pulitzer
Prize in Poetry
2009..............1st
African American president, Barak Obama, inaugurated 44th US President
.......................Eric H. Holder Jr. appointed 1st African American US
Attorney General
.......................Sonia Sotomayor appointed 1st Latina US Supreme Court
justice
.......................Iraq War: Iraqi military takes control of operations
.......................Bernard Madoff convicted of biggest Ponzi scheme in US
history; sentenced to 150 years in prison
.......................Epidemic of N1H1, or swine flu, leads to approx. 10,000
deaths in Mexico, US, and other countries
.......................Global warming allows for new trade route through the
Northeast Passage: two German vessels become 1st commercial
....................................ships to travel
from East Asia to Western Europe through Arctic waters
.......................Fossilized skeleton of oldest human ancestor found, 4.4
million year old Ardipithecus ramidus
.......................World Digital Library, operated by UNESCO with the Library
of Congress, formed to expand non-English, non-
...................................Western content
on the internet, and to contribute to scholarly research
.......................Typhoons in Taiwan and the Philippines, and a tsunami
in Samoa and American Samoa, cause massive death and
...................................destruction in
August and September
.......................United Nations Climate Change Conference held in Denmark
.......................Development of Twitter, an instant mini-blogging service
of 140 words or less
.......................W.S. Merwin awarded Pulitzer Prize in Poetry; Herta Muller
wins Nobel in Literature
2010............... Iraq
War: Last US combat brigades are pulled out of Iraq, leaving a training force
of approx. 50,000. The war, one of
...................................the longest in
US history, killed 4,400 and wounded approx. 32,000 US troops.
.......................Elena Kagan appointed US Supreme Court justice; 1st time
3 women are serving simultaneously
.......................US House of Representatives passes Health Care overhaul
bill
.......................After two decades of debate, Congress enacts the Matthew
Shepard and James Byrd Jr. Hate Crimes Prevention Act,
...................................which expands
the 1969 hate-crime law to include crimes motivated by a victim's actual or
perceived gender,
...................................sexual orientation,
gender identity, or disability.
.......................BP oil rig Deepwater Horizon explodes off Louisiana gulf
coast, killing 11 workers and spewing oil in the Gulf of Mexico
...................................for 3 months,
causing extensive damage to marine and wildlife habitats, as well as hurting
the fishing and tourist
...................................industries.
.......................An ash cloud from an erupting volcano, Eyiafiallojokull,
in Iceland, shuts down European air travel and forces hundreds
...................................of people to
flee rising floodwaters; global trade is affected
.......................Linguists discover a previously unknown language, Koro,
in NE India. It has no written form and is spoken by only
...................................approximately
800 people, who are rapdily aging
...................... New bridge opens a quarter-mile downstream from the Hoover
Dam, largest concrete-arch bridge in Western Hemisphere
......................Oldest person to date to climb Mt. Everest: Takao Arayama of Japan, age 74.
.......................Washington, DC legalizes gay marriage
.......................Electronic books get a huge boost with the improved third
version of the Kindle, a portable reader first developed by
...................................Amazon in 2007
.......................Mario Vargas Llosa wins Nobel Prize in Literature; Rae
Armantrout wins Pulitzer Prize in Poetry
2011...............Earthquake
measuring 9.0 and resulting tsunami in Japan are largest in recorded history;
15,800 people are estimated to
...................................have died; towns
all along the northern coast have disappeared, wiped clean by the force of the
water; the
...................................cooling systems
at 6 nuclear reactors at the Fukushima Daiichi Nuclear Plant fail; radiation
contaminates water
...................................and food supplies
.......................Tornado outbreak of 139 separate twisters kills 300 in
six southern US states, centered in AL
......................."Occupy Wall Street" protests in NYC spread
to other cities across US in response to economic injustice
......................."Arab Spring": Popular uprisings erupt throughout
the Arab world, in Tunisia, Egypt, Libya, Yemen, and Syria, leading
.................................to resignations
by Presidents, civil unrest, and general elections
......................European Union split over financial instability in member
countries Portugal and Greece
......................US Navy SEALS kill Osama bin Laden, mastermind of the
9-11 attacks, in a compound in Pakistan
......................Iraq War: US troops withdraw, ending the war of almost
9 years that resulted in almost 4,500 American deaths
......................US Space Shuttle program ends with the successful landing
of Atlantis at the Kennedy Space Center; 1st solar-powered
.................................spacecraft, Juno,
launched on mission to Jupiter
......................Martin Luther King, Jr. National Memorial opens in Washington,
DC
......................National September 11 Memorial opens in New York, NY
......................Tomas Transtromer wins Nobel Prize in Literature; Kay
Ryan wins Pulitzer Prize in Poetry
2012..............Encylopedia Brittanica discontinues its print edition after 244 years of publication; converts to digital format only
......................2012 Olympics held in London: 1st time boxing is
open to women; all sports are now open to women competitors.
James
...................................Pistorius of South Africa is 1st double amputee to compete in track and field
......................Tracy K. Smith wins Pulitzer Prize in Poetr; no Pulitzer awarded in fiction