America250 — 250 years since 1776. Explore two and a half centuries of American history. Start the tour
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#Economy

147 entries

People (22)
Alexander Hamilton
Founding Father, first Secretary of the Treasury, and architect of American capitalism
Andrew Carnegie
Scottish-born steel magnate and America's greatest philanthropist
Bill Clinton
42nd President of the United States, 1993–2001
Calvin Coolidge
30th President of the United States, 1923–1929
Cornelius Vanderbilt
The railroad and shipping baron who built the template for American monopoly capitalism
Dorothea Lange
Documentary Photographer Who Gave the Depression a Human Face, 1895–1965
Eli Whitney
Inventor of the cotton gin who accidentally expanded slavery and deliberately built American mass production
Franklin D. Roosevelt
Four-term president who led America through the Great Depression and World War II
Grover Cleveland
22nd and 24th President of the United States
Henry Clay
The Great Compromiser who held the Union together — and delayed its reckoning
Henry Ford
Industrialist who put the automobile within reach of ordinary Americans
Herbert Hoover
31st President of the United States, 1929–1933
J.P. Morgan
Banker, Financier, and Architect of American Industrial Power
John D. Rockefeller
Founder of Standard Oil and the wealthiest private citizen in American history
Lyndon B. Johnson
The Texas dealmaker who built the Great Society and broke himself on Vietnam
Madam C.J. Walker
The washerwoman who built a beauty empire and a Black fortune
Martin Van Buren
8th President of the United States, 1837–1841
Ronald Reagan
40th President of the United States, 1981–1989
Samuel Gompers
Founder of the American Federation of Labor and father of the U.S. labor movement
Thomas Edison
Inventor of the phonograph, the practical light bulb, and the modern research laboratory
William Jennings Bryan
The Great Commoner — three-time presidential candidate and prairie populist
William McKinley
25th President of the United States, who led America into empire and was killed for it
Places (14)
California
The state that absorbed the Gold Rush, built Hollywood, and became America's largest economy
Erie Canal
The 363-mile engineering marvel that connected the Atlantic to the Great Lakes and made New York supreme
Hollywood
The Los Angeles district that became the capital of American film
Mississippi River
The continent's central artery — highway, boundary, and the most mythologized river in American history
New York
The empire state — gateway, financial capital, and engine of American ambition
New York City
America's largest city and the commercial, cultural, and immigrant capital of the nation
Panama Canal
The 51-mile waterway that united two oceans and announced American power to the world
Promontory Summit
The Utah meeting point where two railroads joined and a continent was crossed
Route 66
The "Main Street of America" that carried a nation west
Silicon Valley
How a stretch of California orchards became the engine of the digital age
St. Louis
Gateway to the West and crossroads of American expansion
Texas
Republic, Confederate state, and the empire that shaped American identity
The Interstate Highway System
The largest public works project in American history
William J. Clinton Presidential Library
The cantilevered "bridge to the 21st century" over the Arkansas River
Eras (6)
Age of Exploration and Contact
The 115 years of European arrival that reshaped two continents, 1492–1607
The Antebellum Period
The decades of deepening crisis that made the Civil War inevitable, 1848–1861
The Gilded Age
The era of industrialists, immigrants, and inequality that remade America, 1877–1900
The Great Depression
The economic catastrophe of 1929–1941 that reshaped American life and government
The Progressive Era
The reform movement that used government to rein in the Gilded Age's excesses, 1900–1920
The Roaring Twenties
The decade of prosperity, prohibition, and cultural upheaval that ended in catastrophe, 1920–1929
Events (25)
1906 San Francisco Earthquake
The quake and fire that destroyed a great American city
California Gold Rush
The 1848–1855 mass migration that transformed California and accelerated the sectional crisis
COVID-19 Pandemic
The 2020–2023 public health crisis that killed over a million Americans and transformed national life
Election of 1896
McKinley vs. Bryan — gold, silver, and the soul of American capitalism
Election of 1932
FDR's landslide gives the New Deal its mandate
Great Recession of 2008
The worst financial crisis since the Great Depression — and the collapse that remade American politics
Louisiana Purchase
The 1803 land acquisition that doubled the size of the United States
NAFTA
The 1994 trade pact that bound North America together
Occupy Wall Street
The 2011 protest that put economic inequality on the agenda
Panic of 1837
The financial collapse that destroyed Martin Van Buren's presidency and lasted seven years
Panic of 1873
The railroad collapse that triggered the Long Depression and ended Reconstruction
Panic of 1893
The worst depression before the 1930s — and the crisis that made William Jennings Bryan
Shays' Rebellion
The 1786 Uprising That Made the Constitution Necessary
Spindletop
The 1901 gusher that launched the American oil age
Stock Market Crash of 1929
The financial collapse that triggered the Great Depression
Teapot Dome Scandal
The 1920s bribery scheme that sent a Cabinet secretary to prison and defined political corruption for a generation
Tennessee Valley Authority
The New Deal's most ambitious experiment — electrifying Appalachia and remaking a region
The Bonus Army March
The WWI veterans' encampment that Hoover destroyed — and Roosevelt studied carefully
The Dust Bowl
The ecological catastrophe that stripped the Great Plains bare, 1930–1940
The Great Chicago Fire
The 1871 blaze that destroyed a city — and rebuilt it greater
The Great Depression
The worst economic catastrophe in American history
The Panic of 1907
The banking crisis that one man stopped — and that created the Fed
The Pullman Strike
The 1894 railroad shutdown that sent a labor leader to prison — and radicalized him
Transcontinental Railroad
The 1869 rail line that stitched the continent together — and transformed everything it touched
Whiskey Rebellion
The 1794 tax revolt that tested federal authority under the new Constitution
Documents (16)
FDR's First Inaugural Address
Franklin Roosevelt declares war on the Great Depression, March 4, 1933
GI Bill
The Servicemen's Readjustment Act of 1944 — the law that built the American middle class
Gibbons v. Ogden
The 1824 ruling that gave Congress the power to regulate the national economy
Homestead Act
The 1862 law that gave 160 acres to settlers and reshaped the American interior
Interstate Commerce Act
The 1887 Law That First Subjected American Business to Federal Regulation
Marshall Plan
The American Program That Rebuilt Western Europe After World War II
McCulloch v. Maryland
The 1819 ruling that established the doctrine of implied federal powers
Medicare and Medicaid Act
The 1965 Law That Created Health Coverage for the Elderly and the Poor
Morrill Act
The 1862 land-grant law that democratized higher education and created America's state universities
Pacific Railway Act
The 1862 legislation that authorized the transcontinental railroad and opened the continent
Sherman Antitrust Act
The 1890 law that gave the federal government its first tool against monopoly power
Sixteenth Amendment
The Amendment That Created the Federal Income Tax, 1913
Social Security Act
The 1935 law that created the American social safety net
Stamp Act
The 1765 British tax that turned colonial discontent into revolutionary purpose
Tea Act
The 1773 law that provoked the Boston Tea Party and made revolution inevitable
The Lend-Lease Act
The law that made America the Arsenal of Democracy before it entered World War II
Concepts (20)
American Dream
The belief that effort and merit guarantee opportunity in America
American Innovation
How a culture of invention turned the United States into the engine of the modern world
Capitalism
The economic system that built American prosperity — and its persistent contradictions
Dollar Diplomacy
Taft's strategy of substituting American investment for military force — with mixed results
Financial Panics and Crashes
The recurring booms and busts that have shaped the American economy
Immigration
The continuous movement of people that built, transformed, and defined the United States
Keynesian Economics
The Theory That Government Spending Could Save a Failing Economy
Military-Industrial Complex
Eisenhower's Warning About the Alliance Between Defense Industry and Government Power
Populism
The agrarian movement that challenged corporate power and reshaped American democracy
Social Darwinism
The Gilded Age ideology that dressed inequality in the language of natural law
Suburbanization
How Postwar America Built a New Geography — and Who It Left Out
The Great Society
Lyndon Johnson's legislative program to end poverty and expand opportunity
The Industrial Revolution
The transformation of American labor, production, and daily life, 1820–1900
The Labor Movement
The century-long fight by American workers for fair wages, safe conditions, and human dignity
The Middle Passage
The brutal Atlantic crossing that carried millions into American slavery
The New Deal
Franklin Roosevelt's 1933–1939 legislative program to combat the Great Depression
The Open Door Policy
America's turn-of-the-century bid for equal access to China
Trust-Busting
The Progressive Era campaign to break up industrial monopolies and restore competition
Urbanization
The great demographic transformation that moved America from a rural to an urban nation
Westward Expansion
The century-long process by which the United States spread from the Atlantic to the Pacific
Organizations (39)
AARP
The seniors' lobby that became a political heavyweight, founded 1958
Amazon
The online bookstore that became the everything store, founded 1994
Apple
The company that made the computer personal — and beautiful, founded 1976
Coca-Cola
The Atlanta soda that became a global symbol of America, 1886
General Electric
The Edison company that grew into an industrial empire, founded 1892
General Motors
The automaker founded in 1908 that overtook Ford, armed democracy in WWII, and ruled the American road
Google
The search engine that organized the web — and its advertising, founded 1998
IBM
The company that ran on data, from punch cards to the computer age
Microsoft
The software giant that put a computer on every desk, founded 1975
Sears, Roebuck and Company
The mail-order catalog that outfitted a nation, 1893
Standard Oil
Rockefeller's oil empire — the monopoly that remade American business, 1870–1911
The American Federation of Labor (AFL-CIO)
The federation that has spoken for organized American labor since 1886
The Bell System (AT&T)
The telephone monopoly that wired America, 1877–1984
The Brookings Institution
The century-old think tank at the center of American policy, 1916
The Federal Reserve
The central bank created in 1913 to tame the financial panics that had wrecked the economy for a century
The Federal Trade Commission
The Progressive-era regulator created to police unfair competition, 1914
The First Bank of the United States
Hamilton's 1791 experiment in national finance — and the fight it started
The Ford Foundation
The philanthropy that spread American ideas at home and abroad, 1936
The Ford Motor Company
The company that put America on wheels, founded 1903
The Heritage Foundation
The conservative think tank that shaped the Reagan revolution, 1973
The Industrial Workers of the World
The radical "Wobblies" who dreamed of One Big Union, founded 1905
The Knights of Labor
The first mass American labor union, which surged in the 1880s — then collapsed almost overnight
The National Grange
The farmers' fraternal order that fought the railroads, founded 1867
The NCAA
The body that governs — and profits from — college sports, 1906
The Pennsylvania Railroad
The "Standard Railroad of the World" and once America's largest corporation, 1846
The Rockefeller Foundation
The oil fortune turned to fighting disease and funding science, 1913
The Second Bank of the United States
The national bank Andrew Jackson set out to destroy, 1816–1836
The Securities and Exchange Commission
The New Deal watchdog created to police Wall Street, 1934
The SEIU (Service Employees)
The service-sector union that became labor's fastest-growing giant, 1921
The Teamsters
The powerful trucking union dogged by clout and corruption, founded 1903
The U.S. Chamber of Commerce
The business lobby that speaks for American enterprise, founded 1912
The United Auto Workers
The union that organized Detroit and helped build the American middle class, founded 1935
The United Mine Workers
The coal miners' union at the storm center of American labor, 1890
The United States Postal Service
The mail system older than the nation, founded 1775
The Virginia Company
The joint-stock venture that founded Jamestown — and seeded corporate America
The World Bank and IMF
The Bretton Woods twins America built to run the global economy, 1944
The World Trade Organization
The referee of global trade, from GATT in 1947 to the WTO in 1995
U.S. Steel
The 1901 merger that made the world's first billion-dollar corporation
Walmart
The discount retailer that became the world's largest company, founded 1962
Technology (5)
The Automobile
How the car became the machine that reshaped American life
The Ford Model T
The car — and the assembly line — that put America on wheels
The Internet
The network that gave everyone a printing press — and remade media
The Moving Assembly Line
The 1913 innovation that made mass production — and the modern economy
The Transistor
The tiny 1947 device that made the digital age possible
All Tags
Politics 169 Economy 147 Military 115 Presidency 113 Civil Rights 112 Reform 111 Law & Justice 99 Founding Era 95 Foreign Policy 90 Race 82 Constitution 74 Industry 71 Science & Technology 71 Cold War 62 Civil War 61 Protest 58 Westward Expansion 57 Arts & Culture 56 Revolution 55 Slavery 54 Women 51 War 49 Modern America 46 Indigenous 42 Diplomacy 41 Media & Press 38 Labor 33 Immigration 31 Supreme Court 30 Religion 29 Environment 28 Congress 28 World War II 28 Exploration 24 Disaster 22 Reconstruction 22 Abolition 21 Progressive Era 21 Finance 20 Democracy 19 Assassination 15 Education 14 Colonial America 13 Gilded Age 12 Public Health 12 Suffrage 11 World War I 8 Sports 8 Corruption 8 Prohibition 1