| 15,000 BC ? | First immigrants from Asia cross the Bering Straits, at that time a land bridge. |
| 1000 | Leif Ericsson the Viking discovers North America. |
| 1200-1300 | Anasazi culture at Mesa Verde etc at its height. |
| 1492 | Christopher Columbus discovers the West Indies. |
| 1497 | John Cabot discovers Newfoundland. |
| 1540 | Francisco de Coronado begins explorations in North America. |
| 1585 | Raleigh claims the East Coast from Cape Cod to Florida for England; "The Lost Colony". |
| 1595 ? | Birth of Pocahontas |
| 1607 | Virginia colonised, Jamestown founded. |
| 1608 | Quebec founded. |
| 1614 | New York settled by the Dutch as the New Netherlands. |
| 1620 | The Pilgrim Fathers land at Plymouth, Massachusetts. |
| 1632 | Maryland colonised by England. |
| 1639 | Connecticut breaks away from Massachusetts. |
| 1644 | Rhode Island breaks away from Massachusetts. |
| 1663 | Founding of the North and South Carolina English colonies. |
| 1664 | New York taken by the English from the Dutch. |
| 1664 | Colonising of New Jersey by England. |
| 1672 | Joliet and Marquette explore the upper Mississippi. |
| Early 1670's | La Salle explores the Ohio River. |
| 1681 | Founding of the Pennsylvania colony. |
| 1704 | Delaware breaks away from Pennsylvania (but does not become a separate state until after Independence). |
| 1713 | The King of Spain grants monopoly of the American slave trade to England. |
| 1733 | Commencement of the settling of Georgia as a military buffer between the English colonies and those of France and Spain. |
| 1750 | French fur trade at its height, extending in a V-shape across eastern and central Canada through the Ohio and Mississippi valleys to present-day Louisiana. |
| 1750 | English colonies hemmed in by the Appalachian Mountains and the French. |
| 1750 | Start of the war between the French and English colonies. |
| 1759 | Quebec captured by the English from the French. |
| 1763 | Pontiac's Conspiracy; failure of the Native Americans to destroy British power. |
| 1763 | The Treaty of Paris: Canada and French territory east of the Mississippi is ceded from France to Britain; Florida is ceded from Spain to Britain; Louisiana (in its old sense, meaning most of the west) is sold by France to Spain. |
| 1773 | The Boston Tea Party. |
| 1775 | Daniel Boone creates the Wilderness Road into Kentucky. |
| 1775 | First action in the War of Independence. |
| 1776 | American Declaration of Independence. |
| 1783 | Britain recognises American Independence. |
| 1789 | George Washington is elected as the first president of the USA. |
| 1793 | Invention of the cotton gin by Eli Whitney; allows one slave to pick fifty pounds of cotton per day compared with one pound previously. |
| 1803 | Louisiana Purchase (purchase of most of the West from France). |
| 1803-1806 | Lewis and Clark Expedition. |
| 1812-1815 | War of 1812 between US and Britain. |
| 1819-1821 | Acquisition of Florida from Spain. |
| 1836 | Texas achieves independence from Mexico; Battle of the Alamo. |
| 1846 | Acquisition of Oregon Territory (present-day Oregon, Washington State and Idaho) from Britain. |
| 1847 | Acquisition of California. |
| 1848 | US makes significant territorial gains from Mexico. |
| 24-Jan-1848 | Gold discovered in California at Sutter's Mill near Sacramento. |
| 1851 | Cotton now accounts for 60% of all US exports (by value). |
| 1859 | Harper's Ferry raid; John Brown hanged. |
| 1861 | Abraham Lincoln becomes President of the USA. |
| 1861 | American Civil War begins. |
| 21-Jul-1861 | Battle of Bull Run/Manassas. |
| 1-Jan-1863 | Homestead Act becomes effective. |
| 1-Jul-1863 | Battle of Gettysburg. |
| 2-Sep-1864 | Federal army enters Atlanta. |
| 22-Dec-1864 | General Sherman captures Savannah. |
| 9-Apr-1865 | General Lee surrenders to Grant; American Civil War ends. |
| 14-Apr-1865 | Lincoln assassinated by John Wilkes Booth at Ford's Theatre, Washington DC. |
| 18-Oct-1865 | Slavery abolished. |
| 1867 | Dominion of Canada established. |
| 1867 | Russia sells Alaska to the US for $7 million. |
| 1869 | Grant becomes President of the USA. |
| 1869 | An expedition led by John Wesley Powell completes the first passage of the Grand Canyon. |
| 10-May-1869 | Transcontinental railroad completed - Golden Spike ceremony at Promontory, Utah. |
| 1871 | The Great Fire of Chicago burns for three and a half days, destroys 15,000 buildings. |
| 1872 | Yellowstone, the first National Park, is established. |
| 1876 | Alexander Graham Bell invents the telephone. |
| 1876 | Custer's Last Stand - defeat of General George Armstrong Custer at the Battle of the Little Big Horn. |
| 1878 | Edison invents incandescent electric lighting. |
| 1886 | All Native Americans now in reservations. |
| 1886 | Completion of the Canadian Pacific Railroad. |
| 1886/87 | Extremely harsh winter in the West; causes the death of thousands of cattle and sheep and leads ranchers to change from longhorns to Herefords and from open range ranching to fences. |
| 29-Dec-1890 | Wounded Knee Massacre - last major conflict between Native Americans and Europeans. |
| 1896 | Gold discovered in the Klondike, Yukon Territory. |
| 1897 | Hawaii annexed by the US. |
| 1898 | Spanish-American war. |
| 17-Dec-1903 | Wright brothers' first powered flight at Kitty Hawk. |
| 18-Apr-1906 | San Francisco earthquake and subsequent fire destroys 28,000 buildings and kills over 600 people. |
| 1909 | Henry Ford's Model T starts production. |
| 6-Apr-1917 | US enters the First World War. |
| 1919 | First direct flight across the Atlantic. |
| 1919 | Destruction of the cotton industry by the boll weevil infestation. |
| 1920 | Prohibition introduced. |
| 1929 | Wall Street Crash; start of the Great Depression. |
| 1933 | Prohibition ends. |
| 1933 | The Tennessee Valley Authority is established. |
| 1937 | Golden Gate Bridge completed. |
| Late 1930's | The Dustbowl era. |
| 6-Dec-1941 | Pearl Harbour. |
| 1949 | Extremely harsh winter in the West. |
| 1-Apr-1949 | Newfoundland becomes part of Canada. |
| 1950 | Korean War starts. |
| 25-Sep-1956 | First telephone cable across the Atlantic Ocean comes into use. |
| 10-Oct-1957 | US abolishes fingerprinting for foreign visitors. |
| 31-Jan-1958 | First US artificial Earth satellite is launched. |
| 3-Jan-1959 | Alaska becomes the 49th state of the US. |
| 26-Jun-1959 | St Lawrence Seaway opened. |
| 21-Aug-1959 | Hawaii becomes the 50th states of the US. |
| 1960's | Development of ARPANET, the forerunner of the Internet. |
| 5-May-1961 | First US manned spaceflight. |
| 18-Jul-1962 | First communications satellite (Telstar) launched. |
| 3-Sep-1962 | Opening of the Trans-Canada Highway. |
| Oct-1962 | Cuban missile crisis. |
| 1963 | Beginnings of the Civil Rights Movement. |
| 22-Nov-1963 | Assassination of JF Kennedy. |
| 21-Nov-1964 | Opening of the Verrazano Narrows Bridge. |
| 7-Feb-1965 | First attacks on Northern Vietnam. |
| Oct-1965 | Beginnings of protests against the Vietnam War. |
| 18-Nov-1967 | Sterling devalued to £1 = $2.40. |
| 4-Apr-1968 | Assassination of Martin Luther King. |
| 13-Mar-1969 | Oil discovered in Alaska. |
| 14-Jul-1969 | Vietnam withdrawal starts. |
| 21-Jul-1969 | First manned lunar landing. |
| 16-Jun-1972 | Watergate burglars caught. |
| 29-Mar-1973 | Last US troops leave Vietnam. |
| 8-Aug-1974 | Nixon "resigns". |
| 18-May-1988 | Mount St Helens erupts. |
| 17-Oct-1989 | Significant earthquake in San Francisco area causes extensive damage and loss of life. |
| Summer-1993 | Severe flooding of the Mississippi River causes $10 billion damage and leaves tens of thousands of people homeless. |
| Jan-1994 | Significant earthquake in Los Angeles area causes extensive damage and kills 57 people. |