250 Most Impactful Moments in American History

125: Lt. Col. George Armstrong Custer is killed by Native American forces led by Sitting Bull and Crazy Horse at the Battle of Little Bighorn ft. Author of Vengeance: The Last Stands of Custer, Crazy Horse, and Sitting Bull, Tom Clavin.    

124: President Lincoln signs the National Banking Act into law establishing plan for a national currency backed by securities

 

123: The United States military and a coalition of allies invades Iraq to disarm the country of weapons of mass destruction they believed Iraq to possess.

 

122: President Nixon is the first US president to visit the People's Republic of China

 

121: The Statue of Liberty is dedicated in New York Harbor ft. Professor of History and Director of the NYU Institute of French Studies, Edward Berenson. 
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130: The 18th Amendment authorizing Prohibition is passed. Prohibition would be repealed in 1933 with the passage of the 21st Amendment 

129: Gangland: A shootout between policemen led by Texas Ranger Frank Hamer and Bonnie Parker and Clyde Barrow end in the deaths of the bank robbers. Gangster and Public Enemy No. 1 John Dillinger is killed by FBI agents outside the Biograph Theater in Chicago. Bank robber Charles Arthur "Pretty Boy" Floyd is shot and killed by FBI agents in East Liverpool, Ohio. A shootout between FBI agents and George "Baby Face" Nelson ends with the death of Nelson and FBI Special Agent Samuel P. Cowley
ft. Author of Texas Ranger: The Epic Life of Frank Hamer, the Man Who Killed Bonnie and Clyde, John Boessenecker. 

128: Tulsa Race Massacre: A mob attacks Black owned businesses in Tulsa, Oklahoma killing between 100-300, destroying 1,250 homes and imprisoning 6,000 African Americans 

127: The US begins a final drawdown of forces in Afghanistan. In the chaotic withdrawal 13 American service members are killed in a terror attack carried out by ISIS-K $7B in military equipment is captured by the Taliban ft. FOX News Chief Foreign Correspondent Trey Yingst.  

126: Alan Shepard becomes the first American in space
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135: The Tomb of the Unknown Soldier is dedicated at Arlington National Cemetery

 

134: Four Black students in Greensboro, NC begin a sit in at a segregated Woolworth's lunch counter

 

133: America's fourth largest bank Lehman Brothers files for Chapter 11, kicking off a month of possible worldwide economic collapse ft Former US Attorney, Senior Partner at Jenner & Block, & Court-Appointed Bankruptcy Examiner in the Lehman Brothers Bankruptcy, Anton Valukas. 

 

132: The first case of COVID-19 is confirmed in the United States. President Trump declares a national emergency in response to the COVID-19 outbreak freeing up $50B in emergency funding as schools and businesses begin closing across the country ft Clinical Professor of Medicine at NYU Langone Medical Center & FOX News Senior Medical Analyst, Dr. Marc Siegel. 

 

131: President Johnson announces his Great Society during his State of the Union
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140: Jesse James and his gang commit the first train robbery in the American West in Adair, Iowa. In 1876 Lawman Wyatt Earp begins work as a peace officer in Dodge City, KS. The same year outlaw Wild Bill Hickok is shot dead during a poker game in Deadwood, Dakota. In 1881 Tombstone, AZ is sight of the gunfight at the OK Corral. And in 1882 the legendary Jesse James is killed by fellow outlaw Robert Ford in his home in St. Joseph, MO. ft. Author of Bandit Heaven: The Hole-in-the-Wall Gangs and the Final Chapter of the Wild West, Tom Clavin.  

139: The first major wagon trail heads west on the Oregon Trail with over a thousand pioneers from Missouri  138: African American teenager Emmett Till is lynched in Money, Mississippi 

138: African American teenager Emmett Till is lynched in Money, Mississippi

137: President Reagan announces SDI a missile defense program intended to intercept enemy missiles ft. Senior Fellow at the American Enterprise Institute & author of Ronald Reagan and His Quest to Abolish Nuclear Weapons, Paul Lettow.  

136: The Spanish Flu Pandemic hits the US
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145: Vietnam War: The U.S. involvement in the Vietnam war ends 

144: President Eisenhower sends federal troops to Arkansas to escort Black students into a newly integrated Little Rock Central High School. Three years later in 1960 Ruby Bridges becomes the first Black child to attend an all white elementary school. ft. Distinguished Professor of History at the University of Arkansas at Little Rock and author of Beyond Little Rock: The Origins and Legacies of the Central High Crisis, John A. Kirk 

143: The Brooklyn Bridge is open to traffic in New York City 142: The Senate rejects joining the League of Nations and refuses to ratify the Treaty of Versailles

141: President Johnson announces he will not seek re-election ft. Distinguished Professor of History at the University of Arkansas and author of LBJ: Architect of American Ambition, Randall B. Woods 
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