Yearly Dates
1900 - 1910
1905 - Howard Hughes reclusive billionaire born (Hughes Aircraft)/inventor
1905 - Cornhill Insurance is founded by directors of Willis Faber as a Fire insurance company.
1906 - San Fransico Earthquake - ( 4/18/06 ) The most disastrous earthquake in America 's history hit San Francisco on April 18th. The earthquake, whose worst damage was caused by the fire that raged in its aftermath, killed over 1,000 people; 250,000 thousand people were made homeless, and property damage was said to be $250 million.
1906 - Cornhill Balance has 7500 shares £10 shares. Turnover = £9,397
1907 - First Helicopter Flies - On November 13, 1907 , Paul Cornu flew the first helicopter. It flew for only twenty seconds and got five feet up in the air. The copter had severe control and stability difficulties.
1907 - Turnover = £15,202
1908 - Robert Perry Arrives at The North Pole - ( 4/6/09 ) After a month on the Arctic ice, Robert Peary became the first man to reach the North Pole. The only other American to reach the pole with Peary was an Afro-American named Matthew Henson. Four of the seven Eskimos who started the trip arrived with Perry, as well.
1908 - First True Skyscraper Built -In 1908, the Singer Building , in lower Manhattan , was completed. It was the first true skyscraper, reaching 47 stories. Later the same year, the 50-story Metropolitan Life Building was finished.
1908 - Turnover = £15,696
1909 - First Newsreel Shown in Theater - The first newsreel was shown in a Paris theater by Charles Pathe. The next year, newsreels were introduced into US theaters, where they became very popular
1909 - English Channel Is Crossed - ( 7/25/09 ) On July 25th, Louis Bleriot became the first person to fly across the English Channel . Bleriot thus claimed the prize of 1,000 pounds sterling offered by the Daily Mail. He flew a Type XI Monoplane. The flight took 37 minutes. Bleriot took off from Les Barraques at 4:35AM . Winds pushed him off course; but, flying at a height of over 150 feet, Bleroit managed to follow ships back toward Dover , where he landed.
1910 - 1920
1910 - Union of South Africa Founded -( 5/31/10 ) On May 31st, the Union of South Africa was established. The Union was between Transvaal , the Orange Free State , the Cape Colony and Natal . In the first elections held, the South African Party, led by Louis Botha, defeated the Unionist Party.
1910 - Mother Teresa of Calcutta , Albanian-born missionary dedicated to the care of the poor and sick, particularly in India .
1911 - Norwegian polar explorer Roald Amundsen and a team of four, become the first people to reach the South Pole
1911 - Greenwich Mean Time Adopted
1911 - Mona Lisa is Stolen
1912 - Parachutes Invented
1912 - Piltdown Man, the "Missing Link," Discovered (Fraud)
1912 - Parachutes Invented
1913 - Suffragettes In England - ( 4/3/13 ) Suffragette Emily Davisons dashed onto a track at the running of The Derby; and was killed by a horse as she protested, in the line of duty.
1913 - Ford Begins First Moving Assembly Line - ( 10/7/13 ) The Ford Motor Company began the first moving assembly line in the world. The line assembled Ford "Model–T" cars.
1913 - First Home Electric Refrigerator - The first home electric refrigerator was put on the market. It was called "The Domelre" and it was put on the market in Chicago for $900.
1914 - Germany Declares War -( 8/1/14 )When the Russians came to the defense of the Serbs, the Germans had no choice but to go to war to defend their Austrian allies. Their strategy for war against Russia was the Schefffein Plan which called for an initial attack against France, Russia 's ally. So, even though Germany had no dispute with France at the time, it still declared war against France .
1914 - Panama Canal Opened -( 6/7/14 ) After 10 years of work, and at a cost of $366 million, the Panama Canal was completed. The canal decreased the length of the sea voyage between the east and west coasts of the United States by 7,000 miles. Six thousand workers died over the course of the construction of the canal.
1915 - Lusitania Sunk -( 5/12/15 ) Some 128 American citizens were among the 1,200 passengers of the liner Lusitania , sunk by a German submarine. The sinking of the Lusitania poisoned relations between the United States and Germany , but did not immediately result in US intervention in the war.
1915 - First Transcontinental Telephone Conversation - ( 1/25/15 ) Alexander Graham Bell recreated his first telephone conversation in a call between New York and San Francisco .
1916 - Battle of the Somme
1916 – Easter Rising in Ireland
1917 - First Pulitzer Prizes Awarded
1917 - Russian Revolution
1918 - Armistice Signed In Europe -( 11/11/18 ) On November 11th, an armistice was signed, bringing the war in Europe to a conclusion. Five million allies and 3.4 million members of the central powers were killed in the conflict. Of that total, 50,585 Americans were killed in the war.
1919 - Treaty of Versailles Ends World War I
1920 - 1930
1920 - Gandhi Leader of Indian Independence Movement -Gandhi began a nationwide speaking campaign to enlist support for the non-cooperation movement. Indians were urged to boycott foreign goods, schools, law courts, official functions and the military. The Congress organization approved Gandhi's program and converted the movement into one whose official goal was the attainment of self-rule for India by peaceful and legitimate methods.
1920 - Prohibition Begun -( 1/16/20 ) The Senate and House overrode the veto of President Wilson and enacted into law a bill outlawing the production, sale and transportation of all forms of liquor.
1921 - Lie Detector Invented
1922 - Qantus Introduces Air Service -( 11/2/22 )On November 2nd, QANTAS began Australia 's first schelduled air service. The service began from Charleville and terminated in Cloncurry, 557 miles away. QANTAS was able to institute the service after receiving an air mail contract for northeastern Australia .
1922 - King Tut's Tomb Discovered
After working for five years in the Valley of the Kings and finding almost nothing, Howard Carter was progressing on his final season when he made the discovery. On November 4, 1922 , while clearing away some ancient huts, one of Howard Carter's workmen found a hidden step near the base of the tomb of Rameses VI.
Though he hoped it led to an ancient, royal tomb, it could just as easily have been a royal cache or, much worse, empty - pilfered in antiquity. But that was not to be. Carter had discovered not just an unknown ancient Egyptian tomb, but one that had lain nearly undisturbed for over 3,000 years. Pharoah Tutankhamun, the boy king, was found within his nearly intact tomb.
Because of the very detailed work of documenting and preserving the artifacts, it took Howard Carter and his colleagues ten years to clear out Tutankhamun's tomb.
1923 - Talking Movies Invented
1924 - First Olympic Winter Games
1925 - John Logie Baird (b. August 14, 1888, d. June 14, 1946) of Helensburgh, Scotland. Educated at the University of Glasgow, he was the first to invent a working system of television capable of showing moving images with shades of grey.
Baird experimented with Nipkov disk. After many accidents, he finally succeeded.
A semi-mechanical analogue television system was first demonstrated in London in February 1924 with an image of Felix the Cat and later a moving picture on 30 October1925.
1926 - A.A. Milne Publishes Winnie-the-Pooh
1926 - Houdini Dies After Being Punched
1927 - Television Invented - The first public demonstration of television was given when a speech of Commerce Secretary Hoover, given in Washington , was shown simultaneously to a group of investors in New York . The medium would eventually change the world.
1928 - First Academy Awards
1928 - First Oxford English Dictionary Published
1929 - Stock Market Crash -( 10/29/29 ) The 1920's had been years of speculation on Wall Street. This all came to an end, however, on October 29th, on what became known as "Black Tuesday." By November 13th, the stock market had lost $30 billion in its market value -- a total of 40% of its value. The stock market crash was the first event of the Great Depression.
1930 - 1940
1930 - Cyclotron Invented - The Cyclotron, otherwise known as the atom smasher, was invented by Ernest Lawrence, an American physicist at the University of California at Berkely. The particle accelerator, as it was also known, allowed advanced research in the areas of biology and physics. In 1939, Lawrence received the Nobel Prize for Physics for his work.
1931 - Empire State Building Opened - ( 5/1/31 )The Empire State building in New York , the largest building in the world, opened for the public. The building is 102 stories and 1,250 feet high.
1932 - Electric dishwasher
1932 - Atom split by John Cockcroft and Ernest Walton
1932 - Air Conditioning Invented
1933 - Prohibition Repealed -One of the first acts of the Roosevelt Administration was the repeal of Prohibition. This was done in a two-step process. The first step was the "Beer Revenue Act," which legalized beer and wine with an alcohol content of up to 3.2%. The second step was the passage of the 21st Amendment to the Constitution, which legalized liquor once again.
1933 - Hoover Dam Completed -The Hoover Dam was completed in Nevada . Its was 276 feet tall and 1,242 feet wide. It spanned the Colorado River .
1933 - Loch Ness Monster First Spotted
1934 - Cheeseburger Created
1934 - Parker Brothers Sells the Game "Monopoly"
1935 - The next stage of development came almost fifty years after Loud’s patent, with an improved version invented in Hungary in 1935 by Ladislas Biro and his brother, Georg. Ladislas Biro was very talented and confident of his abilities, but he had never had a pursuit that kept his interest and earned him a good living. He had studied medicine, art, and hypnotism, and in 1935 he was editing a small newspaper-where he was frustrated by the amount of time he wasted filling fountain pens and cleaning up ink smudges. Besides that, the sharp tip of his fountain pen often scratched or tore through the newsprint (paper). Determined to develop a better pen, Ladislas and Georg (who was a chemist) set about making models of new designs and formulating better inks to use in them.
1936 - Oil Found in Saudi Arabia - In 1936, Standard Oil of California discovered oil under the Saudi desert. The discovery of oil tranformed the Kingdom of Saudi Arabia into one of the richest nations on earth.
1937 - Electron microscope
1937 - Golden Gate Bridge Opened
1937 – Jack Nicholson, Dustin Hoffman, Robert Redford and Anthony Hopkins were all born this year.
1938 - Boeing Unveils Its Stratoliner - ( 12/31/38 ) On December 31st, Boeing Aircraft flight-tested its newest aircraft– "The Stratoliner." The aircraft, the first to have a pressurized cabin, could fly higher than any other passenger aircraft. Its cruising altitude was between 14,000 and 20,000 feet. TWA placed initial orders for the planes, and was the only airline to fly them before the war.
1939 - Germany Invades Poland -( 9/1/39 ) The German-Polish Crisis began in March, when the German government demanded that Danzig be turned over to Germany . In addition, the Germans demanded the right to construct an extra-territorial railroad across the corridor. The Poles refused, and the French and British pledged to aid the Poles. After the signing of the Non-Aggression Pact, all attempts at negotiations failed and the Germans and Poles mobilized for war. The British and the French did the same, reasserting that they would come to the defense of Poland .
On September 1st, the Germans attacked, and on September 3rd, Great Britain and France declared war on Germany .
1940 - 1950
1940 - Dunkirk Evacuated - The British successfully extricated 200,000 British and 100,000 French troops from the beaches of Dunkirk . The troops were stranded in Northern France , cut off by the sweeping German victories. The British and French troops were forced to abandon their equipment, but their soldiers were available to fight another day.
1940 - Battle of Britain - The Germans attempted to subdue Great Britain by utilizing air attacks. Germany attacked all major cities and military installations. Britain 's preparedness, combined with the valor of its pilots and a new weapon called "radar," forced the Germans to pay a heavy price for their bombing. By the end of October, when the winter weather made the threat of invasion unlikely, the Germans had lost 2,375 planes, compared to 800 British planes lost.
1940 - First Xerographic Machine Designed - Charles Carlson patented the first xerographic machine. The machine made copies using electric charges. Carlson sold the patent to the Haloid Company, which later changed its name to the Xerox Company.
1941 - Pearl Harbor - The American decision to impose sanctions on Japan , in response to the Japanese invasion of Indo-China, convinced Japanese leaders that war with the United States was inevitable.
While the Japanese continued to negotiate in Washington, plans went ahead for military action. The Japanese were convinced that they could not win a war of attrition with the United States, so they planned a surprise attack on Pearl Harbor, hoping that a decisive victory would be achieved, which would force the United States to negotiate. The Japanese attack was executed with precision and, despite having broken the Japanese code, the Americans at Pearl Harbor were caught unprepared, and the attack was successful.
1941 - Penicillin Used To Treat a Human -( 2/12/41 ) For the first time, penicillin was used to treat a human patient. Penicillin treated infections, and was widely used during World War II
1942 - Nuclear Chain Reaction - ( 12/2/42 ) For the first time, a nuclear chain reaction was achieved in an atomic pile. The chain reaction occurred at the University of Chicago , under the direction of Enrico Fermi.
1943 – the aqualung is invented in France by Jacques-Yves Cousteau and Emile Gagnan
1944 - D-Day- On June 6, 1944, 45 Allied divisions, with almost 3 million men led by General Eisenhower, began landing on Normandy Beach in France. Within three weeks, Allied troops had captured all of the Normandy peninsula and port of Cherbourg . By the end of August, Paris was liberated, and Allied forces continued toward Germany .
1945 - Auschwitz Liberated - Soviet forces liberated the largest German concentration/death camp, Auschwitz . 2,500,000 people had been killed at Auschwitz , the great majority of which were Jews. By April, the full horrow of the Holocaust had become clear when US forces liberated the concentration camps of Bergen-Belsen and Dachau .
1945 - Atomic Bomb Dropped on Hiroshima -On August 6, the US Airforce dropped an atomic bomb on the Japanese city of Hiroshima . The city was destroyed and over 70,000 were killed immediately from the effects of the blast. Three days later, a second bomb destroyed Nagasaki .
1946 - First Meeting of UN General Assembly- ( 1/10/46 ) The first meeting of the UN General Assembly took place in London . Trygve Lie, a Norwegian diplomat, was elected the first Secretary General of the UN.
1946 - First Electronic Computer - The first all-electronic computer was designed by John William Mauchly. The computer, called the ENIAC, weighed 30 tons.
1946 - Microwave oven, Percy L. Spencer
1947 - Yaeger Breaks Sound Barrier -( 10/14/47 ) American test pilot Captain Charles Yaeger broke the sound barrier on October 14. He flew a Bell X-1 test plane, that was dropped from a specially modified B-29. Yaeger reached a speed of 670 miles per hour, at an altitude of 42,000 feet.
1948 - South Africa Embraces Apartheid - (5/26/48)In a general election, the coalition of United and Labor Parties, under Prime Minister Smuts, was defeated by a Nationalist Afrikaaner bloc, led by Daniel Malan. Malan's new government had been elected on a platform of racial segregation (apartheid), and soon this policy was implemented. The government outlawed marriages between whites and non-whites. It also passed the Group Areas Bill that divided the country into zones for separate ethnic groups.
1948 - Polaroid Camera On Sale - Edwin Land developed the first instant camera that developed photos on the spot. The camera became known as the Polaroid Land Camera.
1949 - NATO Founded -(4/4/49) The Berlin Blockade provided compelling evidence that, in order to deter the Soviets from further aggression, an alliance was necessary between nations of Western Europe and the United States. On April 4, 1949 , the foreign ministers of Belgium , Canada , Denmark , France , Great Britain , Iceland , Italy , Luxembourg , the Netherlands , Norway , Portugal and the United States formally signed the North Atlantic Treaty. The key paragraph was Article 5. It stated that "an armed attack against one or more of the European signatories or the North American signatories would be considered an attack against all of them."
1950 - 1960
1950 - First Modern Credit Card Introduced
1950 - First Organ Transplant
1951 - Color TV Introduced
1952 - King George VI Dies, Elizabeth crowned Queen King George of England died on February 6. He had come to the throne following the abdication of his brother Edward VIII. George was succeeded by his daughter, Elizabeth.
1952 - Polio Vaccine Invented A vaccine that prevented polio was developed in 1952 by Jonas Salk.
1953 - DNA is renowned in science as being the blueprint for life. Two researchers, Watson and Crick, discovered the chemical structure of DNA and started a whole new area of science. Every cell in your body contains DNA and every cell needs to copy its DNA each time it divides. Watson and Crick examined the structure of DNA through looking at X-ray diffraction photographs. What they found is that DNA shows the same characteristic shape as a helix. They worked on using helixs and created a double helix - the structure that is almost always shown to depict the structure of DNA.
1954 - SEATO Formed In an additional collective security alliance, modeled on N.A.T.O., eight nations formed the South East Asia Treaty Organization. The nations were: the United States , Britain , France , Australia , New Zealand , the Philippines , Pakistan and Thailand . Members of S.E.A.T.O. are pledged to their mutual defense.
1954 - First kidney Transplant A team from Harvard Medical School successfully completed the first kidney transplant operation.
1955 - Disneyland Opens
1955 - McDonald's Corporation Founded
1956 - Suez Crisis
1956 - Velcro Introduced
1957 - Sputnick Launched by Russians On October 4, the Soviet Union launched the first satellite into space. The satellite, with a diameter of 22 inches, marked the beginning of the Space Age.
1958 – Ultrasound
1958 - Hula Hoops Become Popular
1958 - Lego Toy Bricks First Introduced
1958 - NASA Founded
1959 - Alaska Admitted to the Union On January 3, 1959 , Alaska became the 49th state admitted to the Union . On August 21, Hawaii , the " Aloha State ," joined the Union making the 50 th state of America .
1959 - Castro Seizes Power in Cuba On January 1st, Fidel Castro marched into Havana after Cuban dictator Batista had fled. Castro, who had led the successful revolution against Batista, was widely welcomed-- even by the U.S. Castro soon signed a friendship treaty with the Soviet Union . He also confiscated large agrarian holdings. As far as the United States was concerned, these two actions transformed Castro from a freedom fighter into a Communist.
1960 - 1970
1960 - Lasers Invented
1960 - Alfred Hitchcock's Psycho Released
1961 - Kennedy Inaugurated The morning of the inauguration was cold, but beautiful. Snow had fallen on Washington , and President-Elect Kennedy prepared for the exciting experience. He began the day in church. Then he went to have coffee with the Eisenhowers at the White House and accompany them to the inauguration. After being sworn in, President Kennedy gave a breif but stirring speech that signified the birth of a new era.
1961 - Berlin Crisis-builidng of the Wall- From the time of the Vienna summit, East German exodus to West Germany began to skyrocket. The Soviets began to talk about war and, in July, the Soviets detonated the largest atomic bomb ever exploded, weighing in at 60 megatons. On August 13, the Berlin Wall went up, dividing East and West Berlin and ending the flow of refugees out of East Germany .
1962 - Environment Movement Launched Rachel Carson's book, Silent Spring, was published in September 1962. By describing the effects of the use of pesticides and other chemicals on the enviroment, Carson launched the enviromental movement.
1962 - Cuban Missile Crisis In late August, 1962, American spy planes detected the building of missile sights in Cuba . Initially the government believed that these sites were defensive in nature. In fact, the Soviets, under Khrushchev, had decided to redress the strategic gap between the two world powers in one quick swoop by placing missiles in Cuba , thus providing the US with a very limited warning if attacked.
On October 15th, US intelligence brought the President conclusive proof that the Soviets were installing medium-range ballistic missiles in Cuba . After much discussion with his advisors, Kennedy ruled out an early air-strike as too risky, and instead decided on a blockade of Cuba .
On the evening of October 22nd President Kennedy addressed the nation, announcing the discovery of missiles in Cuba and the imposition of a blockade on all Soviet ships attempting to deliver weapons to Cuba . The US made it clear that it would fire on Soviet ships which did not observe the "quarantine."
Many felt that nuclear war was imminent. Suddenly, those Soviet ships en route to Cuba reversed course.
The affair was officially resolved when the United States agreed not to invade Cuba , and the Soviets agreed to withdraw their forces and missiles from Cuba . The event was a serious setback for the Soviets. Their strategic weakness forced them to withdraw from what had been a very risky venture.
1963 - President Kennedy Assassinated On November 22, while visiting Dallas , Texas , President Kennedy was assassinated by Lee Harvey Oswald. The assassination shocked the world and marked the end of an era in American history.
1963 - Vaccine Against Measles Approval was given for a vaccine against measles. John Enders developed the vaccine in 1963.
1964 - The Beatles In America On February 9, 1964 , the British rock group the Beatles appeared on the Ed Sullivan Show, introducing their unique sound and stylish appearance to millions of American teenagers. By the week of April 4, the Beatles held the top five slots on the American pop charts.
1964 - Dr. King Receives Nobel Prize Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr. became the second African-American to win the Nobel Peace Prize, the first having been Ralph Bunche. King, who was 35 years of age when he received the prize in Oslo , Norway , was the youngest recepient of the prize in history
1964 - Verrazano Bridge Opened The Verrazano Bridge, linking Brooklyn and Staten Island , was completed. It was the longest suspension bridge in the world when it was opened.
1965 - Great Blackout The Great Blackout of 1965 caused the power sytems throughout the Northeast to fail, thus plunging New York , Boston and other cities into darkess during the evening rush hour. The blackout originated at a power plant along the Canadian border, but the failure cascaded through the system.
1966 - First Direct Dial Phones The world became appreciably smaller when the first direct-dial international call was made. Previously all international calls required the assistance of operators. Today, the globe is linked by a network of phones that allow instant communications worldwide.
1967 - Che Guevera Killed in Bolivia Ernesto "Che" Guevera was killed by Bolivian troops hunting down Bolivian rebels. Guevera, who was Argentinean by birth, was a close aide to Fidel Castro, and was responsible for exporting the revolution to countries in South America .
1968 - Martin Luther King, Jr. Assassinated On April 4, a lone assassin killed Dr. Martin Luther King, America's leading civil rights activist. Dr. King had been on the forefront of the non-violent struggle to obtain civil rights for Blacks. James Earl Ray was later convicted of the assassination.
1968 – Klyie Minogue born
1969 - First 747 Flight On February 9, the first test flight of a Boeing 747 was flown. The plane was 231 feet long and weighed 710,000 pounds. The initial version of the plane was designed to carry 374 passengers over 5,700 miles. The plane launched the age of the Jumbo Jet.
1969 - Concorde Airborne On March 2, the first prototype of the Concorde made its maiden flight. The Concorde was the product of a joint venture of the British and French Aerospace industries. It took over 20 years to bring the plane from the drawing boards to commercial flight. The Concorde entered commercial service in 1975. The Concorde is configured to carry 128 passengers, and is flown daily by Air France and British Airways on TransAtlantic flights.
1969 - Woodstock The Woodstock Music and Art Festival was held at Max Yasgur's dairy farm in Bethel , New York , near Woodstock . Although 10,000 or 20,000 people were expected, over 400,000 attended. Among the many artists who performed were Jimi Hendrix, Joan Baez, Joe Crocker, The Who and the Grateful Dead. The weekend was rainy, the facilities were overcrowded, and attendees shared food, alcohol, and drugs, although no violence was reported. The Woodstock Festival represented the culmination of the counterculture of the 1960's and the high point of the "hippie era."
1969 - Apollo 11 Apollo 11, with Neil Armstrong, Michael Collins and Edwin Aldrin, Jr., lifted off for the moon on July 16. On July 20t, while on the far side of the moon, the lunar module, called "Eagle," separated from the " Columbia ." After a careful visual inspection, Eagle fired its engine and began its descent. Despite four-alarm bells and a descent that took the lunar module to a boulder-strewn area, Armstong landed the Eagle on Tranquilty Base. Six and a half hours after landing, Armstrong made his descent to the moon surface and made the famous statement: "That's one small step for man, one giant leap for mankind." After 21 hours and 36 minutes, Eagle fired its ascent engines and rendezvoused with the Columbia for the return flight. The astronauts returned to earth on July 24, welcomed as heroes.
1970 - 1980
1970 - Aswan Dam finished The Aswan Dam was completed in Egypt in 1970. The dam is 364 feet high and 121,565 feet long. It dammed the Nile River on Upper Colorado .
1971 - Intel introduces its popular 4004 4-bit microprocessor, starting the evolution of Intel's famous line of 386, 486, and Pentium processors
1971 - London Bridge Brought to the U.S.
1971 - United Kingdom Changes to Decimal System for Currency
1971 - VCRs Introduced
1972 - Arab Terrorists Murder 11 Athletes at the Olympic Games Palestinian terrorists who were members of the Black September Organization attacked the Israeli team at the 1972 Summer Olympics. Two Israelis were murdered immediately, and nine were taken hostage. The hostages were killed when German troops attempted to capture the terrorists at Munich Airport .
1973 - Cat Scan Developed The CAT Scan, which stands for Computerized Axial Tomography, was introduced to the medical world. The CAT Scan produces three-dimensional images of internal organs of the body.( 8/25/73 ) The CAT Scan, which stands for Computerized Axial Tomography, was introduced to the medical world. The CAT Scan produces three-dimensional images of internal organs of the body.
1973 - Sears Tower Completed The Sears Tower in Chicago was completed. It became the tallest building in the world. It topped out at 1,445 feet.
1974 - President Nixon Resigns On August 8, 1974 , President Nixon became the first President in US history to resign. Nixon resigned as the House of Representatives was poised to vote on the articles of impeachment against him.
1975 - Arthur Ashe First Black Man to Win Wimbledon
1975 - Microsoft Founded
1976 - Apple II Introduced Apple Computer, a newly formed computer company, introduced the Apple II personal computer. Apple II was the first serious home computer, and would result in a desktop computer revolution throughout the world.
1977 - Elvis Found Dead
1977 - Star Wars Movie Released
1978 - First Test-Tube Baby Born
1978 - John Paul II Becomes Pope
1979 - A nuclear accident occured at the Three Mile Island nuclear facility near Harrisburg , Pennsylvania . The accident, which was contained, raised fears of nuclear accidents. In its aftermath, the building of almost all nuclear power plants in the US came to a halt.
1980 - 1990
1980 - Bjorn Borg's fifth straight Wimbledon championship, earned in five sets against John McEnroe, 1980.
1980 - John Lennon Assassinated
1980 - Rubik's Cube Popular
1981 - Pope John Paul II Shot Twice Pope John Paul II was wounded in an assassination attempt. The assassin was Turkish-born Mehmet Ali Agca. There have been many reports indicating that the assassination attempt was the work of the Eastern bloc's intelligence community.
1981 – Justin Timberlake, Beyonce Knowles and Britney Spears all born this year.
1982 - War in the Falkland islands On April 2, the Argentinean military seized the Falkland Islands off the coast of Argentina . The islands had been administered by Great Britain . The Argentineans claimed the islands were part of Argentina and renamed them "The Malvinas." The British government announced that they would send a task force to recapture the islands.
On May 4, the British sank the Argentinean cruiser General Belgrano. The British destroyer Sheffield was subsequently sunk by an Exocet missile. On May 21, the first British troops landed on the Falklands and rapidly defeated the Argentinean forces. The British lost 225 servicemen and the Argentineans lost 712.
1982 - William C. DeVries surgically implants a permanent artificial heart designed by Robert Jarvik
1983 - Cabbage Patch Kids are Popular
1983 - Reagan Announces Defense Plan Called Star Wars
1984 - AIDS Breaks Out French scientists reported isolating the virus that caused Acquired Immune Deficiency Syndrome (AIDS). In 1984, 7,000 cases of AIDS had been reported in the United States ; 3,300 of its victims were dead by the end of the year.
1985 - Rainbow Warrior Sunk The Rainbow Warrior, owned by Greenpeace, was sunk in the Auckland harbor. The ship was preparing to protest French nuclear tests. The French government admitted blowing up the ship. The French defense minister was forced to resign.
1986 - Soviets Nuclear Disaster At Chernobyl A Soviet nuclear reactor at the Chernobyl nuclear plant in the Ukraine , not far from Kiev , exploded, releasing fatal radiation to the surrounding areas. The disaster at Chernobyl was important, not just to the over 100,000 that would eventually be affected by the radiation, but for its overall impact on Soviet citizens. The initial explosion was ignored both locally and in Moscow . Only when Scandinavian monitors noticed the high level of radiation did Soviet officials admit what had happened and begin evacuating residents from the affected areas.
The disaster and the belated reaction of the government further undermined the already diminished confidence the people of the Soviet Union had in their government.
1986 - Shuttle Challenger Explodes Seventy–three seconds after blast-off, the shuttle Challenger exploded and killed all seven astronauts on board. The explosion was the greatest loss ever for the American Space Program. The tragedy was later blamed on faulty o-rings in the booster rocket.
The crew members were: Gregory B. Jarvis, Christa McAuliffe, Dr. Ronald E. McNair, Dr. Judith Resnick, Col. Ellison S. Onizuka, Commander Francis "Dick" Scobee and Commander Michael J. Smith.
1987 - West German Pilot Lands Unchallenged in Russia 's Red Square
1988 - Longest Underseas Tunnel Opens A railroad tunnel opened between Aomori on the Honshu Island and Hakidate in Hokkaido , Japan . The tunnel, called "Seikan," was 33.44 miles long and was as deep as 787 feet below water at one point.
1989 - Berlin Wall Comes Down On October 18, the regime of Erich Hoenecker, the Communist leader of East Germany , fell. It succumbed to increasing riots, as well as a flood of East Germans leaving via the open borders of Hungary . On November 10, the new government announced the end of all travel restrictions, and soon thousands of Berliners took part in taking down the Berlin Wall that had divided the city for 27 years.
1989 - Exxon Valdez Runs Aground The worst oil spill in US history occurred when the super-tanker Exxon Valdez ran aground in Prince Willliam Sound , Alaska . About 730 miles of coastline were affected by the oil spill, and Exxon spent over $1 billion in trying to clean up the damage.
1989 - The first Liver Transplant The first liver transplant, using a live donor, took place at the Chicago Medical Center .
1990 - 2000
1990 - Germany United On October 3, East and West Germany formally reunited. The newly-reunited Germany ended the division of Germany created with the end of World War II.
1990 - Nelson mandela Freed Nelson Mandela, leader of the African National Congress, was released after spending 27 years behind prison walls. Mandela was released by President F.W. DeKlerk, as the first step in the creation of a multi-racial democracy.
1991 - Hubble Telescope Launched The space shuttle Discovery launched the Hubble Telescope -- seven years behind schedule. The telescope was defective and it required a later repair mission to fix it.
1991 - U.S.S.R. Comes to a formal End On December 21 representatives of 11 former Soviet Republics met in Alma Ata and signed the founding "Declaration of the Commonwealth of Independant States" – a loose confederation of the former Republics. Four days later, Gorbachev announced his resignation and the Soviet Union ceased to exist.
1992 - The World Wide Web is born, introduced by Tim Berners-Lee. The first audio and video multicasts are broadcast over the Internet.
1992 - Official End of the Cold War
1993 - World Trade Center Bombed
1994 - Nelson Mandela is Elected President of South Africa Nelson Mandela was elected the first black leader of South Africa , after the country had its first free multiracial election. F.W. De Klerk became one of the Deputy Premiers.
1995 - O.J. Simpson- " Not- Guilty" O.J. Simpson, the football superstar, was found "not-guilty" of killing his ex-wife Nicole Brown Simpson and Ronald Goldman. The trial, which was televised, gripped the nation.
1996 - Mad Cow Disease Hits Britain
1997 - Britain Turns Over Hong Kong to China The long rule of Britain over Hong Kong came to an end on July 1, 1997 . On that day, the sovereignty of the colony was turned over to China . China had agreed to maintain greater freedom in Hong Kong than was allowed in China itself.
1998 - Viagra on the Market
1999 - President Clinton Impeached President Clinton was impeached by the House of Representatives in a straight party-line vote. The President was accused of lying to a Grand Jury and giving false testimony in his deposition in the Paula Jones lawsuit. Paula Jones accused the President of improper advances while he was governor of Arkansas , and the President was accused of lying about his affair with Monica Lewinsky. When the case went to the Senate, the Senate voted to acquit on a vote of 50 to 50; 66 votes were needed to find the President guilty.