TIMELINE

1893–1898: Panic of 1893, the worst economic collapse in American history prior to 1929.

1913: Henry Ford introduces the moving assembly line in production of his automobiles, pointing the way toward an economy of mass production that will require the stimulation of mass consumption.

1914–1918: World War I severely disrupts the international economy, distorts international trade, transforms the United States into the world's leading creditor nation, prompts overproduction in American agriculture, and leads to the development of techniques of mass persuasion that will be used in advertising in the 1920s.

1919: Versailles Peace Conference demands huge reparations from Germany.

1920–21: Severe postwar deflation and economic recession.

1923–24: Hyperinflation in Germany.

1925–26: Florida real estate bubble.

1928–29: Great Bull Market on Wall Street. Speculators push stock prices far above their realistic values.

November 6, 1928: Herbert Hoover is elected president of the United States.

October 24–29, 1928: Stock Market Crash, followed by continuing severe decline through mid-November.

1930: Grant Wood paints American Gothic.

1930: Repatriation programs begin to deport Mexican immigrants.

1930: Dashiell Hammett's The Maltese Falcon is published.

June 17, 1930: Hawley-Smoot Tariff is enacted, raising duties on products imported into the United States.

1931: Empire State Building in New York is completed.

January 1931: Gangster movie Little Caesar released.

March 25, 1931: Scottsboro Boys arrested. Nine black men are accused of raping two white women in Alabama, beginning a celebrated legal battle.

May 1931: Austrian Kreditanstalt collapses, precipitating a financial crisis in central Europe.

July 1931: Donatbank in Germany goes bankrupt, leading to closure of all German banks.

February 2, 1932: Reconstruction Finance Corporation established to provide loans to banks and other financial institutions.

March 23, 1932: Norris-LaGuardia Act prohibits injunctions against strikes and boycotts.

May–July 1932: "Bonus Army" of World War I veterans comes to Washington to demand immediate payment of a bonus Congress had enacted in 1924. Troops forcibly evict the group on July 28.

June 30, 1932: Franklin D. Roosevelt wins Democratic nomination for president.

July 2, 1932: Roosevelt accepts the Democratic nomination in a speech in which he pledges himself to a "new deal" for the American people.

October 1932: Recording of "Brother, Can You Spare a Dime?" The song became an anthem for Depression victims.

November 8, 1932: Franklin D. Roosevelt is elected president in a landslide over Herbert Hoover.

November 11, 1932: I Am a Fugitive from a Chain Gang released.

1933: Elaborate Busby Berkeley musicals score big at the box office.

January 30, 1933: Adolf Hitler becomes chancellor of Germany.

February–March 1933: Banking crisis in which runs on banks force bank failures and several states proclaim "bank holidays," closing the banks statewide. Almost all banks in the nation are closed by March 4.

March 4, 1933: Franklin D. Roosevelt inaugurated as president, asks for powers similar to those he would be given in a war.

March 9, 1933: Emergency Banking Act gives the government the power to reopen banks once they are declared secure.

March 12, 1933: Roosevelt addresses the nation by radio in his first "fireside chat."

March 31, 1933: Civilian Conservation Corps (CCC) established, providing reforestation and conservation work for unemployed young men.

April 19, 1933: United States officially abandons the gold standard.

May 12, 1933: Federal Emergency Relief Act (FERA) appropriates $500 million to aid states in providing relief payments.

May 12, 1933: Agricultural Adjustment Act enacted with the purpose of raising prices and farm income by cutting excess production.

May 18, 1933: Tennessee Valley Authority established to improve life in the impoverished region through planning, the provision of hydroelectric power, flood and erosion control, and other means.

May 27, 1933: Federal Securities Act requires full disclosures when new securities are issued.

June 12–July 27, 1933: London Economic Conference fails to agree on international approach to fighting the Depression.

June 13, 1933: Home Owners' Loan Act provides for federal refinancing of mortgages on homes.

June 16, 1933: National Industrial Recovery Act (NIRA) establishes the National Recovery Administration (NRA) to set up codes of fair competition in industries and establishes the Public Works Administration (PWA) to construct public buildings, roads, etc.

June 16, 1933: Glass-Steagall Banking Act separates investment banking from commercial banking and creates the Federal Deposit Insurance Corporation (FDIC) to guarantee bank deposits.

June 16, 1933: Farm Credit Act provides for the reorganization of credit for farmers.

September 30, 1933: Dr. Francis Townsend's letter outlining his proposal for an old-age pension system is published in the Long Beach Press-Telegram.

October 18, 1933: Commodity Credit Corporation (CCC) set up to make loans to farmers on their crops.

November 8, 1933: Civil Works Administration (CWA) established to provide work relief for millions of the unemployed.

January 1, 1934: Frank Capra's film It Happened One Night is released.

June 6, 1934: Securities Exchange Act establishes the Securities Exchange Commission (SEC) to regulate the operation of the stock market.

June 18, 1934: Wheeler-Howard (Indian Reorganization) Act is passed, starting the Indian New Deal.

June 19, 1934: Communications Act sets up the Federal Communications Commission (FCC) to regulate radio and other electronic communication.

June 19, 1934: National Labor Relations Board (NLRB) established.

June 28, 1934: National Housing Act creates the Federal Housing Administration (FHA) to insure loans for home building.

July 1934: Southern Tenant Farmers Union (STFU) formed.

July 16, 1934: San Francisco General Strike begins.

August 1934: American Liberty League formed to oppose the New Deal.

August 28, 1934: Upton Sinclair wins the Democratic nomination for governor of California on his socialist "End Poverty in California" platform.

November 6, 1934: Congressional elections give Democrats an additional nine seats in each house of Congress; Sinclair defeated in California.

March 19, 1935: Race riot is touched off in the Harlem area of New York City when false rumors spread that a policeman had killed an African-American boy.

April 8, 1935: Emergency Relief Appropriation Act provides $4.8 billion for relief, most of which goes to the new Works Progress Administration (WPA).

May 1, 1935: Resettlement Administration (RA) set up to assist impoverished families by resettling them on productive land.

May 11, 1935: Rural Electrification Administration (REA) established to provide electricity to rural areas on the nation.

May 27, 1935: In the case of Schecter Poultry Corp. v. U.S., the Supreme Court unanimously invalidates the National Recovery Administration (NRA).

June 19, 1935: Roosevelt sends "Wealth Tax" message to Congress calling for changes to reverse the concentration of wealth and economic power.

June 26, 1935: National Youth Administration (NYA) set up to assist people aged 16–25.

July 5, 1935: National Labor Relations Act (Wagner Act) provides protections for workers seeking to organize unions.

August 14, 1935: Social Security Act establishes a system of old-age pensions, unemployment compensation, and aid to dependent children.

August 28, 1935: Public Utility Holding Company Act (Wheeler-Rayburn Act) restricts the use of holding companies in the ownership of utilities.

September 8, 1935: Senator Huey P. Long assassinated in Baton Rouge.

November 9, 1935: Committee for Industrial Organization (CIO, later Congress of Industrial Organizations) is formed to promote unionization of mass production industries.

February 1936: John Maynard Keynes's General Theory of Employment, Interest, and Money is published.

February 5, 1936: Charlie Chaplin's film Modern Times is released.

June 27, 1936: In a speech accepting his renomination, Roosevelt attacks "economic royalists."

June 30, 1936: Margaret Mitchell's novel Gone with the Wind is published.

July 17, 1936: Spanish Civil War begins.

August 1936: African-American athlete Jesse Owens wins four gold medals at The Olympic Games in Berlin, confounding Hitler's racial views.

November 3, 1936: Roosevelt defeats Republican Alfred Landon by an extraordinary margin, winning all but two states.

December 30, 1936: Sit-down strike against General Motors begins in Flint, Michigan.

January 20, 1937: Roosevelt gives second inaugural address, in which he speaks of "one-third of a nation ill-housed, ill-clad, ill-nourished."

February 5, 1937: Roosevelt submits to Congress his plan to reorganize the judiciary, beginning the fight over court-packing.

February 10, 1937: General Motors agrees to a contract with the United Auto Workers (UAW), ending the sit-down strike.

March 2, 1937: U. S. Steel Corporation recognizes and signs an agreement with the Steel Workers' Organizing Committee (SWOC) without a strike.

May 30, 1937: Memorial Day Massacre of union members outside the Republic Steel plant in South Chicago.

July 2, 1937: Aviator Amelia Earhart disappears over the Pacific during attempted around-the-world flight.

July 22, 1937: Bankhead-Jones Farm Tenancy Act establishes the Farm Security Administration (FSA).

August 1937: "Roosevelt Recession" of 1937–38 begins.

September 1, 1937: National Housing Act (Wagner-Steagall Act) creates the U.S. Housing Authority to assist in providing housing for low-income people.

December 1937: Publication of report by La Follette Civil Liberties Committee in the Senate details tactics used by anti-union employers.

December 21, 1937: Walt Disney's Snow White is released.

February 16, 1938: Agricultural Adjustment Act of 1938 revived the AAA of 1933 in a form that avoided the problems that had led to the earlier act being declared unconstitutional.

June 1938: Superman comics begin.

June 16, 1938: Temporary National Economic Committee (TNEC) is formed to investigate concentration and monopoly in business.

June 25, 1938: Fair Labor Standards Act provides for a minimum wage and a maximum number of working hours and outlaws child labor.

October 31, 1938: Orson Welles radio broadcast of War of the Worlds touches off a panic about Martians landing in New Jersey.

November 7, 1938: Kristallnacht, the "Night of Broken Glass" in which Nazi thugs, encouraged by the government, looted and vandalized Jewish homes, businesses and synagogues across Germany.

November 8, 1938: Congressional elections bring significant gains for Republicans, but maintain large majorities in both houses.

1939: Film versions of Gone with the Wind and The Wizard of Oz are released.

1939: Frank Capra's Mr. Smith Goes to Washington and John Ford's Stagecoach present moviegoers with pre-capitalist values.

February 6, 1939: Raymond Chandler's The Big Sleep is published.

February 18, 1939: Golden Gate Exposition in San Francisco opens.

April 3, 1939: Administrative Reorganization Act rearranged and reorganized the units within the executive branch of government.

April 9, 1939: Marian Anderson gives free concert for seventy-five thousand at the Lincoln Memorial after the Daughters of the American Revolution deny her use of Constitution Hall.

April 14, 1939: John Steinbeck's The Grapes of Wrath is published.

April 30, 1939: New York World's Fair opens.

August 2, 1939: The Hatch Act prohibits federal officials from participating in political campaigns.

August 24, 1939: Nazi-Soviet nonaggression pact opens the way for World War II.

September 1, 1939: German invasion of Poland starts World War II.

1940: Richard Wright's Native Son is published.

January 1940: Frank Capra's film version of The Grapes of Wrath is released.

July 18, 1940: Franklin Roosevelt is nominated for a third term as president.

November 5, 1940: Roosevelt defeats Republican Wendell Willkie to win an unprecedented third term as president.

1941: Military production in preparation for World War II brings the Great Depression to an end.

May 1, 1941: Orson Welles' film Citizen Kane is released.