• 1762  Jean Jacques Rousseau writes 'The Social Contract'

• 1764  Mozart writes first symphony

• 1769  Watt patents first practical steam engine

• 1776  US Declaration of Independence

• 1787  US Constitution signed

• 1789  French Revolution begins

• 1792  Wollstonecraft's 'Vindication of the Rights of Women'

• 1796  Jenner discovers Smallpox Vaccine

• 1852  Harriet Beecher Stowe's Uncle Tom's Cabin

• 1853  Crimean War begins as Turkey declares war on Russia

• 1854  Japanese allow American trade; anti-slavery men form Republican Party in US

• 1856  Flaubert's Madame Bovary

• 1858  First trans-Atlantic telegraph cable by Cyrus Field

• 1859  Darwin's Origin of Species; Lenoir builds first internal-combustion engine

• 1861  US Civil War begins; Pasteur's theory of germs

• 1863  French capture rich Mexico City; Battle of Gettysburg

• 1865  US Civil War ends; Lincoln killed by Booth; Lister begins antiseptic surgery

• 1866  Alfred Nobel invents dynamite

• 1867  Dominion of Canada established; US buys Alaska from Russia; South African diamond field discovered

• 1868  Revolution in Spain, Queen Isabella deposed

• 1869  Suez Canal opens; Fisk/Gould try to control gold market - Black Friday panic

• 1871  Stanley meets Livingstone in Africa; The Chicago Fire

• 1872  Jules Verne's Around the World in 80 Days

• 1873  Economic crises in Europe; US establishes Gold Standard

• 1875  First Kentucky Derby

• 1876  Alex. Graham Bell patents telephone; Sioux kill Custer at Little Big Horn River

• 1877  Thomas Edison patents phonograph; Tchaikovsky's Swan Lake

• 1878  First commercial telephone exchange opened in New Haven, Conn.

• 1879  Edison invents electric light

• 1882  Rockerfeller's Standard Oil first monopoly; Koch discovers tuberculosis germ

• 1883  Brooklyn Bridge and Metropolitan Opera House completed

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• 1885  Europe colonizes African continent; World's first skyscraper built in Chicago

• 1886  Statue of Liberty dedicated; Apache Indian chief Geronimo surrenders

• 1887  Sir Arthur Conan Doyle's first Sherlock Holms story 'A Study in Scarlet'

• 1888  Jack the Ripper murders in London; J.B. Dunlop invents pneumatic tire

• 1889  Eiffel Tower built for exposition

• 1890  Battle of Wounded Knee

• 1892  Diesel Engine patented

• 1893  New Zealand is first country to grant women the vote

• 1895  Lumiére introduces motion pictures; X-Rays discovered by German physicist Roengten

• 1896  Alfred Nobel establishes prizes for peace, science and literature; Marconi gets first wireless patent

• 1898  Pierre and Madame Curie discover radium and polonium

• 1900  Freud's "Interpretation of Dreams"; Hurricane ravages Galveston-thousands die

• 1902  Enrico Caruso's first gramophone recording; Aswan Dam completed

• 1903  Wright brothers first motorized air plane; Du Bois 'The Souls of Black Folk'

• 1904  New York City subway opens

• 1905  Einstein announces Theory of Relativity

• 1906  San Francisco earthquake: Norwegian 'Amundsen' fixes magnetic North Pole

• 1907  Hague Peace Conference of 46 nations adopt 10 conventions on rules of war

• 1908  Model T produced by Ford; Earthquake kills 150,000 in Italy

• 1909  North Pole reached by Americans: Peary and Hendersen

• 1910  Boys Scouts of America incorporated

• 1911  Rutherford discovers structure of atom; 'Amundsen' reaches South Pole

• 1912  Territorial disputes result in Balkan War; Titanic sinks on maiden voyage

• 1913  Ford develops first moving assembly line; Income Tax becomes permanent

• 1914  WW I begins (Austrian Duke Ferdinand assassinated); Panama Canal opens

• 1915  Carver first crop of peanuts for farmers; Einstein's General Theory of Relativity

• 1916  Margaret Sanger first Birth Control Clinic; US buys Virgin Islands from Denmark

• 1917  Lenin leads Bolshevik Revolt; Balfour promises Jews homeland in Palestine

• 1918  Global Spanish flu epidemic; Russian revolutionaries execute Czar and family

• 1919  Paris peace conference (Versailles Treaty)

• 1920  Women's Suffrage 19th amendment ratified; First Agatha Christie mystery novel

• 1921  Major treaties signed at Washington Disarmament Conference

• 1922  Ireland becomes a self-governing dominion of the British Empire

• 1923  Bessie Smith, known as 'The Empress of the Blues' makes first record

• 1924  Robert Frost wins Pulitzer; Teapot Dome scandal (fraudulent naval oil leases)

• 1925  Nellie Ross elected governor of Wyoming (first woman governor in US)

• 1926  Gertrude Ederle (American) is first woman to swim English Channel

• 1927  Farnsworth first Television; Lindbergh flies solo New York to Paris

• 1928  Fleming discovers Penicillin; Oxford English Dictionary published

• 1929  US Stock Market crashes; Hubble proposes theory of expanding universe

• 1930  Pluto discovered by astronomers

• 1931  Al Capone goes to prison for tax evasion

• 1932  Amelia Earhart first woman to fly Atlantic solo; Nazi's lead in German elections

• 1933  Hitler elected Chancellor; Germany & Japan withdraw from League of Nations

• 1934  Hitler becomes Fuhrer; Dionne sisters, first quintuplets to survive infancy

• 1935   Roosevelt's New Deal for social security, better housing, and farm assistance

• 1936  Spanish Civil War begins; war between China and Japan begins

• 1937  Amelia Earhart lost somewhere in the Pacific

• 1938  Hitler takes Austria; Oil Strike in Kuwait; Orson Wells 'War of the Worlds'

• 1939  Hitler invades Poland - WW II begins; 'Gone with the Wind' premiers

• 1940  Hitler invades Norway, Denmark, Netherlands, Belgium, Luxembourg, France

• 1941  Japanese attack Pearl Harbour; Manhattan Project (atomic bomb research)

• 1942  Enrico Fermi achieves nuclear chain reaction

• 1943  Mussolini deposed; US freezes prices/wages; Income Tax introduced

• 1944  Allies invade Normandy (D-Day); Woods Conference creates World Bank

• 1945  Atomic bombs on Hiroshima/Nagasaki; first computer ENIAC; WW II ends

• 1946  First UN General Assembly; Churchill's Iron Curtain speech starts Cold War

• 1947  Gandhi's movement leads to an independent India; Chuck Yeager breaks sound barrier; Anne Frank's 'The Diary of a Young Girl' is published

• 1948  Gandhi assassinated; Nation of Israel proclaimed; Independent Republic of Korea is proclaimed

• 1949  Communist victory in China (Mao Zedong); NATO treaty signed by 12 nations

• 1950  Korean War begins; Truman orders development of hydrogen bomb; Brinks robbery in Boston

• 1951  Colour Television introduced in US; Libya gains independence

• 1952  George VI dies, his daughter becomes Queen Elizabeth II

• 1953  Watson, Crick & Franklin discover DNA structure: Hillary climbs Mt Everest; Elvis Presley

• 1954  First atomic submarine 'Nautilus'; Jonas Salk inoculates children against Polio

• 1955  Rosa Parks refuses to sit at back of bus

• 1971  'All in the Family' debuts, Mariner IX orbits Mars; US lowers voting age to 18

• 1972  Nixon goes to China; Watergate scandal; Britain takes over direct rule of Ireland in bid for peace

• 1973  Egypt and US sign cease fire accord

• 1974  Patricia Hearst kidnapping; Nixon charged with obstruction of justice & resigns

• 1975  Apollo and Soyuz spacecraft take off for U.S.-Soviet link-up in space

• 1976  Supreme Court rules death penalty is constitutionally acceptable punishment

• 1977  Legionnaires disease; Carter pardons Vietnam draft evaders

• 1978  Karol Wojtyla of Poland becomes 'Pope John Paul II'; Jim Jones followers commit mass suicide

• 1979  Shaw of Iran goes into hiding; Soviet invasion of Afghanistan

• 1980  Smallpox eradicated; Canadians help free American hostages from Teheran; Ronald Reagan elected US President; US breaks diplomatic ties with Iran

• 1981  Scientist identify AIDS virus; Reagan nominates Judge Sandra Day O'Connor as first woman on Supreme Court

• 1982  British win Falklands war; Princess Grace dies in car accident; First artificial heart implant

• 1983  Challenger Shuttle maiden voyage carries first woman astronaut Sally K. Ride