2nd Millennium America - Major Events

Graphic Millennium of

Source: The History Place

1000s

1000s 1000 A.D. - Leif Ericson, a Norse seaman, explores the east coast of North America and sights Newfoundland, establishing a short-lived settlement there.	1100s
1200s 1215 - The Magna Carta document is adopted in England, guaranteeing liberties to the English people, and proclaiming basic rights and procedures which later become the foundation stone of modern democracy.	1300s Portuguese sailors visited the Madeira and Azores islands in the Atlantic Ocean
1400s 1419 - The Portuguese claimed Madeira; Prince Henry (the Navigator) founded an observatory and navigation school on the southern Portuguese coast at Sagres. 1460 - Portuguese sailors reached Sierra Leone; death of Henry the Navigator. 1488 - Bartolomeu Dias sails round the Cape of Good Hope 1492 - Christopher Columbus makes the first of four voyages to the New World, funded by the Spanish Crown, seeking a western sea route to Asia. On October 12, sailing the Santa Maria, he lands in the Bahamas, thinking it is an outlying Japanese island. 1494 - Pope Alexander VI divides the New World between Spain and Portugal, Treaty of Tordesillas. 1497 - John Cabot of England explores the Atlantic coast of Canada, claiming the area for the English King, Henry VII. Cabot is the first of many European explorers to seek a Northwest Passage (northern water route) to Asia. 1498 - Columbus discovers Trinidad and South America. 1499 - Italian navigator, Amerigo Vespucci, sights the coast of South America during a voyage of discovery for Spain.	1500s 1507 - The name "America" is first used in a geography book referring to the New World, correctly crediting Amerigo Vespucci as being the first to realize that a new continent, rather than a route to Asia, had been discovered. 1519-21 - Hernando Cortés conquers the Aztec empire. 1519-1522 - Fernando Magellan is the first person to sail around the world. 1541 - Hernando de Soto of Spain discovers the Mississippi River. 1565 - The first permanent European colony in North America is founded at St. Augustine (Florida) by the Spanish. 1584 - Sir Walter Raleigh lands on Roanoke Island and names the surrounding area Virginia, in honor of Queen Elizabeth I of England. 1588 - In Europe, the defeat of the Spanish Armada by the English results in Great Britain replacing Spain as the dominant world power and leads to a gradual decline of Spanish influence in the New World and the widening of English imperial interests.
1600s 1607 - Jamestown is founded in Virginia by the colonists of the London Company. 1609 - Native tobacco is first planted and harvested in Virginia by colonists. 1613 - A Dutch trading post is set up on lower Manhattan island. 1620 - The Mayflower ship lands at Cape Cod, Massachusetts, with 101 colonists. 1621 - One of the first treaties between colonists and Native Americans is signed as the Plymouth Pilgrims enact a peace pact with the Wampanoag Tribe, with the aid of Squanto, an English speaking Native American. 1626 - Manhattan island purchased from Native Americans for 60 guilders(about $24). 1630 - In March, John Winthrop leads a Puritan migration of 900 colonists to Massachusetts Bay, where he will serve as the first governor. 1634 - First settlement in Maryland as 200 settlers, many of them Catholic, arrive in the lands granted to Roman Catholic Lord Baltimore by King Charles I. 1636 - In June, Roger Williams founds Providence and Rhode Island. Providence then becomes a haven for colonists fleeing religious intolerance. 1640-1659 - English Civil War erupts between the Royalists of King Charles I and the Parliamentary army, eventually resulting in defeat for the Royalists and the downfall of the monarchy. On January 30, 1649, Kings Charles I is beheaded. England then becomes a Commonwealth and Protectorate ruled by Oliver Cromwell. 1652 - Rhode Island enacts the first law in the colonies declaring slavery illegal. 1660 - The restored English Crown approves a Navigation Act requiring the exclusive use of English ships for trade in the English Colonies and limits exports of tobacco and sugar and other commodities to England or its colonies. 1663 - King Charles II establishes the colony of Carolina and grants the territory to eight loyal supporters. 1664 - Maryland passes a law making lifelong servitude for black slaves mandatory. Similar laws are later passed in New York, New Jersey, the Carolinas and Virginia. 1674 - The Treaty of Westminster ends hostilities between the English and Dutch and Dutch New Netherland colony becomes English New York. 1675-1676 - King Philip's War erupts in New England between colonists and Native Americans. 1681 - Pennsylvania is founded. 1682 - French explorer La Salle claims Louisiana for France. 1688 - Quakers in Pennsylvania issue a formal protest against slavery in America. 1690 - The beginning of King William's War as hostilities in Europe between the French and English spill over to the colonies. In February, Schenectady, New York is burned by the French with the aid of their Native American allies. 1691 - In New York, the newly appointed Governor of New England, Henry Sloughter, arrives from England and institutes royally sanctioned representative government. In October, Massachusetts gets a new royal charter which includes government by a royal governor and a governor's council. 1692 - Salem witch trials 1696 - The Royal African Trade Company loses its slave trade monopoly, spurring colonists in New England to engage in slave trading for profit. In April, the Navigation Act of 1696 is passed by the English Parliament requiring colonial trade to be done exclusively via English built ships. The Act also expands the powers of colonial custom commissioners, including rights of forcible entry, and requires the posting of bonds on certain goods. 1699 - The English Parliament passes the Wool Act, protecting its own wool industry by limiting wool production in Ireland and forbidding the export of wool from the American colonies.	1700s 1700 - In June, Massachusetts passes a law ordering all Roman Catholic priests to leave the colony within three months, upon penalty of life imprisonment or execution. New York then passes a similar law. 1702 -Queen Anne's War, the English and American colonists will battle the French, their Native American allies, and the Spanish for the next eleven years. 1705 - In Virginia, slaves are assigned the status of real estate by the Virginia Black Code of 1705. Massachusetts declares marriage between African Americans and whites to be illegal. 1711 - Hostilities break out between Native Americans and settlers in North Carolina after the massacre of settlers there. The conflict, known as the Tuscarora Indian War will last two years. 1712 - In May, the Carolina colony is officially divided into North Carolina and South Carolina. In June, the Pennsylvania assembly bans the import of slaves into that colony. In Massachusetts, the first sperm whale is captured at sea by an American from Nantucket. 1726 - Riots occur in Philadelphia as poor people tear down the pillories and stocks and burn them. 1732 - In June, Georgia, the 13th English colony, is founded. 1733 - The Molasses Act, passed by the English Parliament, imposes heavy duties on molasses, rum and sugar imported from non-British islands in the Caribbean to protect the English planters there from French and Dutch competition. 1739 - England declares war on Spain. As a result, in America, hostilities break out between Florida Spaniards and Georgia and South Carolina colonists. Also in 1739, three separate violent uprisings by black slaves in South Carolina. 1740 - Fifty black slaves are hanged in Charleston, South Carolina, after plans for another revolt are revealed. Also in 1740, in Europe, the War of the Austrian Succession begins after the death of Emperor Charles VI and eventually results in France and Spain allied against England. The conflict is known in the American colonies as King George's War and lasts until 1748. 1750 - The Iron Act is passed by the English Parliament, limiting the growth of the iron industry in the American colonies to protect the English Iron industry. 1751- The Currency Act is passed by the English Parliament, banning the issuing of paper money by the New England colonies. 1754 - The French and Indian War erupts as a result of disputes over land in the Ohio River Valley. 1755 - In February, English General Edward Braddock arrives in Virginia with two regiments of English troops. In July, a force of about 900 French and Indians defeat those English forces. 1758 - In July, a devastating defeat occurs for English forces at Fort Ticonderoga. In November, the French abandon Fort Duquesne in the Ohio territory. Settlers then rush into the territory to establish homes. Also in 1758, the first Indian reservation in America is founded, in New Jersey, on 3000 acres. 1759 - French Fort Niagara is captured by the English. Also in 1759, war erupts between Cherokee Indians and southern colonists. 1760 - In September, Quebec surrenders to the English. In October, George III becomes the new English King. 1762 - England declares war on Spain, which had been planning to ally itself with France and Austria. The British then successfully attack Spanish outposts in the West Indies and Cuba. 1763 - The French and Indian War, known in Europe as the Seven Year's War, ends with the Treaty of Paris. Under the treaty, France gives England all French territory east of the Mississippi River, except New Orleans. The Spanish give up east and west Florida to the English in return for Cuba. 1763 - In May, the Ottawa Native Americans under Chief Pontiac begin all-out warfare against the British west of Niagara.
1800s	1900s

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