You Pick BestYouPickBest

The 16 Most Important Moments in American History

By YPB Team

A river crossing in the dark, a signature on parchment, a footprint on the Moon. Which one changed the country most?

The Apollo 11 Moon Landing — ranked #11
The Apollo 11 Moon Landing
July 1969, and the first footprints left on another world.
1000pts
Signing the Declaration of Independence — ranked #22
Signing the Declaration of Independence
Philadelphia, July 1776, and the sentence that a country has been arguing about ever since.
647pts
The Homestead Act — ranked #33
The Homestead Act
The 1862 law that handed 160-acre plots to anyone willing to farm them for five years.
560pts
Women Winning the Vote — ranked #44
Women Winning the Vote
The 19th Amendment's ratification in August 1920, after seventy years of campaigning.
548pts
The Civil Rights Act of 1964 — ranked #55
The Civil Rights Act of 1964
The law that ended legal segregation in public accommodation and employment.
548pts
The March on Washington — ranked #66
The March on Washington
A quarter of a million people at the Lincoln Memorial in August 1963.
388pts
The Gettysburg Address — ranked #77
The Gettysburg Address
Two minutes in November 1863 that redefined what the war was being fought for.
388pts
The Lewis and Clark Expedition — ranked #88
The Lewis and Clark Expedition
The 1804–06 journey that mapped a route from the Missouri to the Pacific.
388pts
The Transcontinental Railroad — ranked #99
The Transcontinental Railroad
The golden spike at Promontory Summit in 1869 joined the coasts by rail.
388pts
The Emancipation Proclamation — ranked #1010
The Emancipation Proclamation
Lincoln's order of 1 January 1863 declaring enslaved people in the rebelling states free.
388pts
Washington Crossing the Delaware — ranked #1111
Washington Crossing the Delaware
The night march of 25 December 1776 that turned a losing revolution around at Trenton.
320pts
The Constitutional Convention — ranked #1212
The Constitutional Convention
A summer of closed-door arguments in 1787 that produced the framework still in use.
241pts
The Wright Brothers' First Flight — ranked #1313
The Wright Brothers' First Flight
Twelve seconds over Kitty Hawk in December 1903.
241pts
The Boston Tea Party — ranked #1414
The Boston Tea Party
December 1773, when a cargo of tea went into the harbour and the argument stopped being polite.
149pts
The Erie Canal Opening — ranked #1515
The Erie Canal Opening
The 1825 waterway that connected the Great Lakes to the Atlantic and made New York a port.
149pts
The Louisiana Purchase — ranked #1616
The Louisiana Purchase
The 1803 deal with France that doubled the size of the United States overnight.
41pts
#usa#milestones

Comments

No comments yet. Be the first!

0/1000