6. Key moments in american history

North: developed industrial production X South: agricultural, needed slaves for growing the

the cotton and tobacco

• In 1861 the southern states created the Confederacy (the North being called the Union) and they elected their own president Jefferson Davis

• In 1863 Lincoln abolished slavery by Emancipation Proclamation- the end of the Civil War (general Lee surrendered to general Grant)

• Lincoln assassinated in Ford´s theatre

• 1863 - Battle of Gettysburg, a bloody battle

The Period of Reconstruction, the end of the 19th Century

• Andrew Johnson – the new president

• the black people were given the right to vote

• Republican party (Idealistic wing – protecting the blacks x Realistic wing – seeking for their own profit, political power, land)

• 1866 – Ku Klux Klan: a secret organization founded by the defeated southern Planters terror against the newly freed blacks

• 1867 – USA bought Alaska from Russia

• during the period between 1870 – 1910 over 20 million immigrants entered the USA

The Beginning of 20th Century

• during the presidency of Theodore Roosevelt (1901-1909) there were many demands for social reform ; education was modernized and the labour movement grew stronger

• The USA joined the WWI as late as in 1917; over 100 000 Americans were killed

• WWI strenghtened the position of the United States in the world

• president Woodrow Wilson (1913- 21) played an active part in the peace process and in setting up the League of Nations (the forerunner of today´s United Nations)

• President Woodrow Wilson didn´t want to fight, but Germany wanted to connect Mexico against USA, so Wilson declared war to Germany.

• In the twenties there was prohibition, because organized crime was there. Black Thursday came October 24, 1929 when stock market crash in New York. After effects were catastrophic. Over 13 million people were without job. Country was in deep depression. Thanks to the president Franklin D. Roosevelt USA get out of it. Acts were passed that helped banks and farmers and ensured social support for citizens – New Deal.

20´s (Roaring twenties) – period of rapid economic growth, production boom (electric appliances, cars), the development of the entertainment industry (theatres, cinemas) at the same time – increase in crime (prohibition gangsterism)

• 1929 – the Great Depression started after the great crash on Wall Street

• Franklin Delano Roosevelt – elected in 1932

• WW II – the USA entered the war in Dec. 1941 after “Pearl Harbour“

• Japanese attack on Pearl harbor on December 7, 1941 – the USA entered the war on the side of the Allies

• Operation Overlord – general Dwight, D. Eisenhower (“ike”)

The cold war

After the war Truman Doctrine – a plan challenging the new revolutionary movements by giving aid to anti-socialist régimes

Marshall Plan (1948-1952) – a process that helped to reconstruct Western Europe and to push the Communists out of the post-war

• 1949 – North Atlantic Treaty Organization (NATO) was set up

John Fitzgerald Kennedy ( president during 1961-1963) – a liberal Democrat