“Cold War Showdowns”
Congress passed this 18th Amendment in 1919 hoping Americans would stop drinking alcohol. Americans responded by inventing speakeasies and organized crime empires.
What is Prohibition?
This battle marked the first military conflict of the Civil War.
What is Fort Sumter?
This 1776 document, written by Thomas Jefferson, becomes the inspiration (according to Mr. J) for a modern day global superstar to write about never, ever, ever getting back together.
What is the Declaration of Independence.
After finally making it back home to Mount Vernon, this Revolutionary War hero discovered that America had one more group project for him to lead.
Who is George Washington
This 1803 land deal nearly doubled the size of the United States, proving that even strict constitutionalists occasionally enjoy a bargain sale.
What is the Louisiana Purchase?
This 1854 idea allowed settlers to vote on slavery in the territories and somehow resulted in armed mobs burning towns instead.
What is popular sovereignty?
This battle is often called the turning point of the Civil War because it stopped Lee’s invasion of the North.
What is Gettysburg?
Fear during this post–World War II period became so intense that blacklists ruined careers and the Rosenbergs were executed for passing atomic secrets to the Soviet Union.
What is the Second Red Scare?
President Abraham Lincoln quickly discovered that being elected in 1860 came with a complimentary parting gift: this conflict between the Union and the Confederacy.
What is the Civil War?
Completed in 1869, this railroad connected the East and West coasts of the United States and finally allowed Americans to complain about cross-country travel much faster.
What is the Transcontinental Railroad?
Neville Chamberlain returned from Munich in 1938 claiming he had achieved “peace for our time” through this policy toward Hitler.
What is appeasement?
This treaty ending World War I placed blame and harsh reparations on Germany, contributing to future instability in Europe.
What is the Treaty of Versailles?
During this 1692 Massachusetts panic, colonists would bake special cakes made with rye meal and the urine of afflicted girls in an attempt to identify the source of the affliction tormenting the town.
What are the Salem Witch Trials?
President Woodrow Wilson’s “we’re staying neutral” strategy became significantly more awkward after Germany sank this British passenger liner carrying 128 Americans in 1915.
What is the Lusitania?
This 1896 Supreme Court decision argued that segregation was completely acceptable, provided everyone pretended things were “equal."
What is Plessy v. Ferguson?
American leaders embraced this Cold War theory arguing that if one country in Southeast Asia fell to communism, the neighboring nations would start dropping one after another like a row of game pieces on your grandma’s coffee table.
What is the domino theory?
Francis Marion, a Brigadier General during the American Revolutionary War, got this clever nickname for his unusual war tactics while defending South Carolina from the British.
What is the Swamp Fox
After Congress introduced (pop-sov) popular sovereignty, violent clashes between pro-slavery “border ruffians” and antislavery settlers earned this territory this nickname before the Civil War.
What is Bleeding Kansas?
President George Washington quickly learned that this ambitious Treasury Secretary was “not throwing away his shot” when it came to creating a national bank and expanding federal power.
Who is Alexander Hamilton?
This 1920 amendment permanently changed American elections by doubling the number of people politicians suddenly had to pretend to listen to.
What is the 19th Amendment?
Congress passed this 1930 tariff hoping to protect American businesses during the Great Depression; other nations retaliated, and world trade collapsed even further.
What is the Smoot-Hawley Tariff?
This Vietnam War event became infamous after news reached America that American soldiers had killed hundreds of unarmed villagers 4 years before.
What is the Mai Lai massacre?
In 1957, federal troops were sent to this Arkansas city to enforce school integration after angry crowds tried to block nine Black students from entering Central High School.
What is Little Rock?
Under President Andrew Jackson, thousands of Cherokee died during this forced relocation from the southeastern United States to present-day Oklahoma in the 1830s.
What is the Trail of Tears?
After 146 garment workers died because factory doors had been locked during this 1911 disaster in New York City, Americans suddenly became much more interested in workplace safety laws.
What is the Triangle Shirtwaist Factory fire?