Timeline of Early American History: Colonization to 1860

Posted on Feb 5, 2025 in History

Key Figures and Events in Early American History

Early Exploration and Colonization (Pre-17th Century)

  • First in America: Norse king Erik the Red (985)
  • Discovery of America: Christopher Columbus (1492)
  • Arrives to Newfoundland: John Cabot (1497)
  • Establishes first settlement in Florida: Juan Ponce de León (1513)
  • Lands in North Carolina/South-Washington and goes up to New York: Giovanni da Verrazano (1524)
  • Conquest of Mexico by the Spaniards (1522)
  • Explores Mississippi River: Hernando de Soto (1539)
  • Explores The Grand Canyon: Francisco Vazquez de Coronado (1540)
  • Intends to find a passage to Asia but finds Canada: Jacques Cartier (1530s)
  • Huguenots: French Protestants that were sent to America
  • Establishes the first permanent European settlement (San Agustin): Pedro Menendez (late 1500s)
  • Intended to establish a colony in America and got lost, half-brother of Sir Walter: Humphrey Gilbert (1578)
  • Explorer priced by the crown (Caribbean): Sir Walter Raleigh (1585)
  • Sir Francis Drake, pirate who would attack Spanish ships

17th Century: Colonization and Conflict

  • First British establishment in the US: Jamestown, VA (1607) (King James I)
  • Leader of the British establishment: John Smith (1607)
  • Mixes plants from the Caribbean with plants from Virginia to produce Tobacco: John Rolfe (1612)
  • First Africans in Virginia: 1619
  • Ship that took a group of Puritans to US: Mayflower (1620)
  • Party to celebrate the good relationship between natives and the settlers: Thanksgiving
  • Dutch settlement located where today is New York: New Amsterdam (1624)
  • Initiator of the idea of building a “city upon a hill”: John Winthrop (1630)
  • British colony with its own constitution: Maryland (1632)
  • Founder of colony in Rhode Island, Providence; Separation of church and state: Roger Williams (1636)
  • First university in the US: Harvard (1636)
  • Conflicts: Uprising in Virginia (1622), Pequot War Connecticut River (1637)
  • First printing press Harvard: 1638
  • A democrat (Quakers) founder of Province of Pennsylvania (English colony): William Penn (1681)
  • English Civil War (1642-1649)
  • Massachusetts Bay Colony Act 1647
  • Demand for plantation labor increased: 1660s
  • King Philip War(1675)
  • End 1600’s, two more universities open: College William and Mary (Virginia) and Yale (New Haven)

18th Century: Revolution and Independence

  • Establishes Georgia for strategic purposes: James Oglethorpe (1732)
  • The New York Weekly Journal editor: John Peter Zenger (1733)
  • UK needed money to support its empire: Molasses Act (1733)
  • Opened a building for his collection so everybody could have access: James Logan (1745)
  • Created the first subscription library: Benjamin Franklin
  • Best-selling author of the period (sermons): Cotton Mather
  • First newspaper in Cambridge, MA: 1704
  • First Great Awakening (1730s): George Whitefield and Jonathan Edwards
  • Free inhabitants can elect representatives to join governor of colony: Virginia Company (1618)
  • Principles of equality and self-government: Mayflower Compact (1620)
  • Conflict in Fort Duquesne (1754)(first conflict France-Britain)
  • Seven Years War (1754)
  • Peace of Paris (1763) France leaves Canada
  • Royal Proclamation (1763) King George III, acquisition of French territory in the US.
  • UK needed money to support its empire: Sugar Act (1764), Currency Act (1764), Quartering Act (1765), Stamp Act (1765-1766), Townshend Acts (1767)
  • Boston Massacre (March 5, 1770) > Townshend Acts repealed
  • Boston Tea Party (December 16, 1773) led by Samuel Adams
  • Coercive Acts (1774): Series of 4 laws to punish the colony of MA Bay for the BTP > The Boston Port Act, The MA Government Act, The Administration of Justice Act, and The Quartering Act. The Quebec Act is often included as a CA but is not related to BTP
  • 1st Continental Congress (September 5, 1774)
  • George III (1774): Had no intentions of making concessions
  • Lexington (April 19, 1775)
  • 2nd Continental Congress (May 11, 1775)
  • Olive Branch Petition: Drafted by John Dickinson to negotiate a road to independence, but George III declared rebellion in August 1775
  • Common Sense (January 1776) by Thomas Paine, a pamphlet attacking the idea of hereditary monarchy
  • The Declaration > Influenced by John Locke’s Second Treatise on Government
  • The Declaration of Independence > Thomas Jefferson (July 4, 1776)
  • Benjamin Franklin sent to Paris in 1776 to help the American cause
  • May 1776, France starts to provide help to the colonies
  • Treaty of Amity and Commerce and Treaty of Alliance (February 6, 1778) (America-France)
  • 1778 France/1779 Spain/1780 Netherlands
  • (October 19, 1788): Charles Cornwallis surrendered 8,000 men near Chesapeake Bay
  • Peace negotiations in Paris (1782) (Benjamin Franklin, John Adams, and John Jay)
  • (April 15, 1783): Congress approved the treaty
  • (September 3, 1783): The Treaty of Paris was signed > ends the American Revolutionary War between Great Britain and the USA
  • (May 10, 1776): Congress had passed a resolution advising the colonies to form new governments
  • The Glorious Revolution (1688-1689)
  • The Bill of Rights and Toleration Act (1689) > affirmed freedom of worship for Christians and enforced limits on the Crown
  • Second Treatise on Government (1690) by John Locke > theory of government based not on divine right, contended that the people had the right to rebel when governments violated natural rights.
  • (September 17, 1787): The Constitution was signed establishing America’s national government and fundamental laws and guaranteed certain basic rights.
  • Federal Convention (1787)
  • First Presidents: George Washington (1789), John Adams (1797) (Federalist), Thomas Jefferson (1801) (Republican)
  • 13 American colonies, they will agree to start a revolution: Virginia (1607), New Jersey (1618), Mayflower (1620), New Hampshire (1622), Maryland (1632), Connecticut (1635), Rhode Island (1636), Delaware (1638), North Carolina (1653), New York (1664), South Carolina (1670), Pennsylvania (1681) and Georgia (1732)

Early 19th Century: Expansion and Reform

  • War of 1812: Conflict fought between the US and its allies, and the UK and its dependent colonies in North America and Native American allies. The conflict began when the US declared war in June 1812, and ended in a restoration of the pre-war status quo when a peace treaty agreed to earlier was ratified by the US in February 1815.
  • Embargo Act (1807): Ban on all foreign commerce
  • Non-Intercourse Act (1809): Trade allowed with all countries except for France and UK
  • New states (1790s): Ohio, Vermont, Kentucky, and Tennessee
  • The Northwest Ordinance of 1787: Banned slavery in the Northwest Territory
  • 1808: The international slave trade was abolished
  • South became united for the institution of slavery (cotton, sugar cane, and tobacco)
  • 19th Century: Central and South America turned to revolution
  • Holy Alliance: Russia, Prussia, and Austria > To protect themselves against revolution
  • (December 1823): President Monroe (1817-1825) took the occasion of his annual message to Congress to pronounce what would become known as the Monroe Doctrine — the refusal to tolerate any further extension of European domination in the Americas
  • First Bank of the US (1791)
  • Second Bank of the US (1816)
  • Central Bank/Federal Reserve System (1913)
  • 1820s/30s: Universal white male suffrage
  • Nativist Organizations: Large numbers of Catholic immigrants (Irish, German, Italian). Strange customs and religious practices, competed for jobs.
  • The Order of the Star-Spangled Banner (1849): Secret society formed by members of the nativist organizations. When its members refused to identify themselves, they were swiftly labeled the “Know-Nothings.”
  • 1835: Labor forces in Philadelphia, Pennsylvania, succeeded in reducing the old “dark-to-dark” workday to a 10-hour day.
  • 1826: Boston ministers organized the Society for the Promotion of Temperance.
  • The awakening of women began with the visit to America of Frances Wright, who publicly promoted women’s rights throughout the United States during the 1820s.
  • Cady Stanton and Lucretia Mott (1848): Organized a women’s rights convention — the first in the history of the world, at Seneca Falls, New York.
  • 1848: Married Women’s Property Act
  • Elizabeth Cady Stanton and Susan B. Anthony (1869): Found the National Woman Suffrage Association (NWSA), which advocated a constitutional amendment for women’s right to the vote.
  • 1816 to 1821: six states were created > Indiana, Illinois, Maine, Mississippi, Alabama, and Missouri
  • Homestead Act (1862): Signed in 1862 by Abraham Lincoln, turned over vast amounts of the public domain to private citizens.
  • Indian Removal Act (1830): Providing funds to transport the eastern tribes beyond the Mississippi
  • The Trail of Tears (1838): Part of a series of forced relocations of Native Americans between known as the Indian removal
  • 1820s: Settlement of Texas
  • 1846: Clash of Mexican and U.S. the United States declared war in 1846. U.S. forces occupied the territory of New Mexico
  • Treaty of Guadalupe (1849) > Mexico ceded the Southwest region and California for $15 million (New Mexico, Nevada, California, Utah, Arizona, Colorado, Wyoming)
  • (January 1848): Gold in California
  • 300,000 copies in 1 year: Harriet Beecher Stowe “Uncle Tom’s Cabin” (1852)
  • Dred Scott Decision (1857) (slave-born)
  • (October 16, 1859): John Brown, an antislavery, led a band of followers in an attack on the federal arsenal at Harper’s Ferry. Brown’s goal was to use the weapons seized to lead a slave uprising. Brown and his surviving men were taken prisoner.