Key Events in American History: 1858

President: James Buchanan

VP: John Breckinridge

Date, Event

  • Apr 26th Congress passes a bill that prohibits the Chinese from landing any ships in California
  • May 11th Minnesota is admitted as the 32nd state
  • Jun 17th Abraham Lincoln accepts the Republican nomination for U.S. Senator
  • June Mormons are pardoned as long as they submit to the authority of the federal government
  • July "59ers" begin the Pike's Peak Gold Rush in Kansas Territory (lasts until 1861)
  • Aug 16th James Buchanan communicates with Queen Victoria via trans-Atlantic telegraph cable
  • Sep 14th Foryce Beals patents his six shooter known as the Remington Model 1858
  • Oct 9th The Overland Mail stagecoach from San Francisco reaches St. Louis after 23 days & 4 hours
  • Oct 27th R.H. Macy opens its first department store in New York City
  • Nov 17th Denver City is founded
  • Dec 6th President Buchanan asks Congress for permission to buy Cuba

    • Other

  • Panic of 1857
  • Bleeding Kansas continues (1854-1860)
  • George Pullman begins building sleeping cars for the railroads
  • 4,222 business fail due to the Panic of 1857
  • Religious revival sweeps the country
  • The glass Mason jar was patented

    • Births

  • 27-Oct Theodore Roosevelt (26th President)
  • Apr 23rd Max Planck (Physicist)
  • Dec 22nd Giacomo Puccini (Composer)

    • Deaths

  • Jun 16th John Snow (Physician/Father of Epidemiology)
  • Sep 17th Dred Scott (Slave)