| The Civil War, the battle between Northern and Southern states, begins in South Carolina | — | 1861 |
| President Abraham Lincoln is killed | — | 1865 |
| Passage of the Fifteenth Amendment to the Constitution gives African Americans the right to vote | — | 1870 |
| Thomas Edison receives a patent for the lightbulb | — | 1880 |
| Mark Twain publishes Adventures of Huckleberry Finn | — | 1884 |
| German inventor Karl Benz receives a patent for the automobile | — | 1886 |
| X-rays are discovered and soon used in medicine | — | 1895 |
| The United States officially takes control of Hawaii | — | 1898 |
| Queen Victoria of England dies after leading the country for almost sixty-four years | — | 1901 |
| The Wright brothers fly the first airplane | — | 1903 |
| World War I begins | — | 1914 |
| A flu epidemic spreads around the world, killing tens of millions of people | — | 1918 |
| World War I ends | — | 1919 |