Milestones: 1866–1898 - Office of the Historian (2024)

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What happened in 1866 in American history timeline? ›

13th AMENDMENT bans slavery in the U.S. Four million enslaved African Americans are freed. 1866 First successful transatlantic cable is completed (England to the United States). First refrigerated railroad car in America, with ice “bunkers” at each end, is constructed in Detroit.

The Spanish-American War of 1898 ended Spain's colonial empire in the Western Hemisphere and secured the position of the United States as a Pacific power.

During this period, U.S. economic power grew, driven by new inventions in communication and transportation that closed the distance from coast to coast, and by a massive influx of immigration that sparked an explosion of industrialization and urbanization throughout the country.

The fourteenth amendment to the U.S. Constitution is ratified. It gives all native born and naturalized persons citizenship and gives blacks equal protection under the law. Congress passes a fourth Reconstruction Act.

The mysterious destruction of the U.S. battleship Maine in Havana's harbour on February 15, 1898, led to a declaration of war against Spain two months later.

February 6 – Spanish–American War: A peace treaty between the United States and Spain is ratified by the United States Senate. February 10 – Spanish–American War: The U.S. receives the Philippines, Guam, and Puerto Rico as a result of the Treaty of Paris.

Pin from the Spanish American War period. On April 21, 1898, the United States declared war against Spain. It would be the first overseas conflict fought by the U.S. It involved major campaigns in both Cuba and the Philippine Islands.

What happened in the US from 1865 to 1898? ›

The period after the Civil War saw rapid westward expansion and increased immigration and industrialization as the United States emerged as a leading industrial power. Yet this economic growth was not evenly distributed, resulting in both great wealth and great poverty.

The civil rights movement (1865–1896) aimed to eliminate racial discrimination against African Americans, improve their educational and employment opportunities, and establish their electoral power, just after the abolition of slavery in the United States.

The Amnesty Act of 1872 gives back full civil rights, including the right to hold office, to most of the 150,000 former Confederate officials and leaders who fought to secede from the United States. On Tuesday, November 5, 1872, incumbent President Ulysses S. Grant wins reelection.

April 29 – After pursuing a policy of total war on the Plain Indians, General William Tec*mseh Sherman brokers the Treaty of Fort Laramie (1868). May 9 – The city of Reno, Nevada is founded. May 16 and 26 – President Andrew Johnson is acquitted during his impeachment trial by one vote in the United States Senate.

May 10 – The "golden spike" is driven marking the completion of the First transcontinental railroad in Promontory, Utah. May 15 – Woman's suffrage: In New York, Susan B. Anthony and Elizabeth Cady Stanton form the National Woman Suffrage Association.

American civil war: 1860 - 1866 - Oxford Reference.

It was in 1866 that the use of metric weights and measures became legal though not standard in the U.S. and, as TIME pointed out during a later debate over the metric system, some non-metric measurements are actually officially defined by the metric system (a yard, for example, being a specific percentage of a meter).

February 6–9 – Seattle riot of 1886: Anti-Chinese sentiments result in riots in Seattle, Washington. February 14 – The first train load of oranges leaves Los Angeles via the transcontinental railroad. March 17 – Carrollton Massacre: 20 African Americans are killed in Mississippi.

Seven Weeks' War, (1866), war between Prussia on the one side and Austria, Bavaria, Saxony, Hanover, and certain minor German states on the other. It ended in a Prussian victory, which meant the exclusion of Austria from Germany.