For Junior English

A Short History of the World

As we read our way through American Literature this year, it’s important to understand what was happening while the authors were writing.

This presentation will give you an overview of major events and help you put things into perspective.

Why, Ms. Hall?

1492: Christopher Columbus

Columbus sailed the ocean blue in 1492, but Amerigo Vespuci discovered America.

1503: Leonardo da Vinci painted the Mona Lisa

1520: Chocolate was introduced to Europe

1558-1603Queen Elizabeth I rules England

1564-1616: William Shakespeare

1610: King James BibleSee Psalm 46

1585: Roanoke Colony Vanishes!117 people, including 1st British child born in

America: Virginia Dare.

1607: Jamestown Settlement

1620: The MayflowerTransported the Pilgrims from Plymouth, England to Plymouth, Massachusetts

Descendents of the Mayflower voyagers became leading families in the new colonies.

1636: Harvard University is built in Cambridge, Massachusetts

1692: Salem Witchcraft Trials

1749: Sign Language was invented1752: Benjamin Franklin’s kite experiment

1776: American Revolution(fighting the British for control of

the American colonies)

(We won…)

(They helped us fight the British, and then thought that what we’d done was a pretty neato thing, so they had a revolution of their own—common people versus royalty/aristocracy…)

1789: The French Revolution

Washington Irving: Sleepy HollowNathanial Hawthorne: The Scarlet LetterHerman Melville: Moby DickEdgar Allen Poe: The Raven and scary storiesRalph Waldo Emerson: NatureHenry David Thoreau: Waldon

Late 1700’s-early 1800’sAwesome American Authors:

1832: The Oregon Trail and westward expansion

1836: The Alamo—Texas wins independence from Mexico

1845: Texas becomes a state

Yee-Haw!

1838: The Underground Railroad begins, ushering slaves to freedom in the northern states

1860-1865: Civil War

Late 1800’s: Immigration and the Industrial Revolution

1914-1918: World War I

1920’s: The Roaring 20’s

October 1929: Stock Market Crash leads to Great Depression

What leads a country out of depression?

War.December 7,

1941: “A date which

will live in infamy.” The Japanese attack Pearl

Harbor and America enters WWII.

1945: WWII ends

1957: Korea

1961-1970:Vietnam

Allen GinsbergThe BeatlesLed ZeppelinPeter, Paul & MaryJanis JoplinThe DoorsThe Rolling StonesThe Beach BoysJack KerouacHunter S. ThompsonTom Wolfe

1960’s: Poets of a Generation

1969: The Summer of LoveWoodstock

1960: John Fitzgerald Kennedy1963: Lyndon Baynes Johnson1968: Richard Millhouse Nixon1973: Gerald R. Ford1976: James Earl (Jimmy) Carter1980: Ronald Reagan1988: George Herbert Walker Bush1992: William Jefferson (Bill) Clinton2000: George Walker Bush2008: Barack Hussein Obama

Know Your Presidents:

September 11, 2001

War Global Warming Recession

Unemployment Loss of natural resources

Overpopulation Drought Famine Disease Contamination

Is there a bright lining to these dark clouds?

The 2000’s and beyond…

What does the future hold?

How will you:Feed yourself?Clothe yourself?Provide shelter for yourself?Support yourself?Educate yourself?Participate in the world around you?Sustain democracy?Find happiness?

What do you think? Where’s the hope?

We can draw lessons from the past, but we cannot live in it.

Lyndon B. Johnson

As human beings, our greatness lies not so much in being able to remake the world - that is the myth

of the atomic age - as in being able to remake ourselves.

-Mahatma Gandhi

Be the change you wish to see in the world.-Mahatma Gandhi

Deep thoughts:

The End!