Alabama Timeline

6000 BC Cliff Dwelling Indians lived in the Alabama region.
1519 AD Alonso Alvarez de Pineda, a Spanish explorer, sailed into Mobile Bay.
1528 Panfilo de Narvaez led an expedition which passed through the coastal waters of Alabama.
1540 Hernando de Soto led an expedition through Alabama. He was the first white person to explore the interior of Alabama.
1540 De Soto and his men were defeated by Chief Tuscaloosa in the battle of Mabila.
1559 Tristan de Luna searched for gold in Alabama. He set up small settlements in Mobile Bay and Clairborne.
1561 De Luna was removed from his command and forced to return to Mexico.
1699 The first permanent white settlement was established by Pierre Le Moyne, Sieur d'Iberville, and Jean Baptiste Le Moyne, Sieur de Bienville.
1702 The Moyne brothers founded Fort Louis. This French colony later became known as Louisiana.
1711 Huge floods forced the French to move 27 miles south to the present site of Mobile. It was also called Fort Louis.
1720 Fort Louis renamed Fort Conde.
1763 Most of the French colony of Louisiana was given to the United Kingdom in the Treaty of Paris. Mobile became a part of west Florida. Northern Alabama was included in the Illinois Territory.
1779 Spain declared war on the United Kingdom.
1780 Mobile was captured by Bernanrdo de Galvez.
1783 The Mobile region was given to Spain in the Treaty of Paris.
1795 The Treaty of San Lorenzo was made with the help of Thomas Pinckney. The Treaty was also known as the Pinckney Treaty. The Treaty fixed the southern border of the United States at the 31st parallel of north latitude. All of present-day Alabama except the Mobile region became a part of the United States.
1798 The Alabama region became a part of the Mississippi Territory.
1812 The United States seized the Mobile region from Spain.
15 April 1813 The United States flag flew over the entire region of Alabama for the first time.
1813 The Creek Indians massacred hundreds of settlers at Fort Mims.
1814 The Creek Indians were defeated by General Andrew Jackson in the Battle of Horseshoe Bend.
1817 The Alabama Territory was established. St. Stephens became the capital.
1819 The territory's first constitution was established.
14 December 1819 Alabama became the 22nd state. William Wyatt Bibb was the first state governor.
1825 Huge floods from the Alabama river caused great damage to the state.
1826 The capital was moved to Tuscaloosa.
1838 Federal troops forced all the remaining Indians to move west out of Alabama.
1848 The "Alabama Platform" was introduced. It states that the federal government did not have the right to ban slaves from the territories.
11 January 1861 Alabama seceded from the union. They declared themselves the Republic of Alabama.
8 February 1861 Alabama became part of the Confederate States of America. Montgomery became its capital.
May 1861 The Confederate capital moved from Montgomery to Richmond, Virginia.
1863 Confederate General Nathan Bedford Forrest captured Union raiders at Cedar Bluffs.
1864 The Battle of Mobile Bay took place in Alabama. The Union forces won the battle.
1865 Union General James H. Wilson won victories at Selma and Montgomery.
1866-1873 Alabama increased their state debt from $8 million to $32 million during the Reconstruction.
25 June 1868 Alabama was readmitted to the Union.
1875 A new state constitution as adopted.
1880 Alabama's first blast furnace began operating in Birmingham. This was important for their economy. The area became a great iron and steel center.
1890 Iron and steel making became Alabama's most important manufacturing industry.
1917 After the United States entered World War I, shipbuilding became important in Mobile.
1929 The Alabama-Tombigbee river system flooded causing $6 million damage.
1929-1931 More than 60 Alabama banks failed. More than $16 million was lost.
1932 Alabama passed a state income tax law and the Budget Control Act. It helped to save the state from bankruptcy.
1933 The Tennessee Valley Authority (TVA) was created by the federal government. It was given the responsibility of building flood-control and electric-power projects on the Tennessee River.
1939-1945 During World War I I Alabama's industrial and agricultural production increased.
1941 The Redstone Arsenal was established by the government in Huntsville. The arsenal developed rockets, satellites and spacecrafts.
1950s Many Alabamians left the state to find jobs in the North and the West
1954 The United States Supreme Court ruled that segregation of public schools was unconstitutional.
1955-1956 Martin Luther King, Jr. directed the Montgomery bus boycott.
1956 A federal court ordered Montgomery to desegregate its buses.
1960 George C. Marshall Space Flight Center at Huntsville was established.
1960s Most of the iron ore mines in Alabama had been closed.
1963 Governor George C. Wallace tried to halt the integration of Alabama's public schools.
June 1963 Wallace stood in the doorway of Foster Auditorium at the University of Alabama. He refused to admit two blacks. John F. Kennedy called in the National Guard to enforce the law.
9 September 1963 Alabama Gov George Wallace served a federal injunction to stop orders of state police to bar black students from enrolling in white schools.
1 February 1965 In Selma, Alabama, Reverend Martin Luther King Jr. and 770 of his followers were arrested on their civil rights march. They protested against voter discrimination in Alabama.
March 1965 King led a march from Selma to Montgomery to protest discrimination of voters rights.
24 March 1965 The Freedom Marchers reached Montgomery, Ala.
August 1965 The Voting Right Act was passed by Congress insuring the right of blacks to vote.
1980 The state legislature increased taxes on cigarettes and alcohol to pay for government services.
1986 Guy Hunt became the first Republican to be elected governor since the Reconstruction.
1993 Hunt was removed from office. He was convicted for felony ethics violations.
1998 Hunt was pardoned by the state parole board.

Works Cited
David C. Weaver and William D. Barnard. "Alabama." Worldbookonline.com.
Ratnikas, Algis. Today in History. Online. http://timelines.ws/TODAY.HTML.

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