Introduction:

*Early History and Colonization: The U.S history began with the first people's arrival in the Americas
around 15,000 BC. Native cultures developed, and Europeans started colonizing the Americas in the
late 15th C. By the 1760s, the thirteen British colonies, located along the Atlantic Coast, had 2.5 M
people. The Southern Colonies used African slaves for farming. After defeating France, the British
government-imposed taxes, leading to resistance and armed conflict in Massachusetts in 1775.
*Independence and Formation of Government: In 1776, the Second Continental Congress declared
the colonies' independence. Under General G.Washington, they won the Revolutionary War. The
peace treaty of 1783 set the new country's borders. The Articles of Confederation created a central
government, but it was weak. A new Constitution was adopted in 1789, and a Bill of Rights was
added in 1791. With Washington as the first president and Alexander Hamilton as his adviser, a
strong central government was created. The Louisiana Territory's purchase from France in 1803
doubled the U.S size.
*Expansion and Civil War: The U.S. expanded to the Pacific Coast, driven by manifest destiny. The
expansion of slavery led to political and constitutional battles, resolved by compromises. Slavery was
abolished in all states north of the Mason–Dixon line by 1804, but southern states continued it. The
election of Abraham Lincoln in 1860 led to the Civil War. The defeat of the Confederates in 1865
ended slavery. After the war, legal and voting rights were extended to freed male slaves.
*Post-Civil War Era : When white southern Democrats regained their political power in the South in
1877, they passed laws to maintain white supremacy and prevent most African Americans from
participating in public life.
*Industrialization and World War I: The U.S. became the world’s leading industrial power in the early
20thC due to new businesses, industrial growth, and immigrant workers. The national railroad
network was completed, and large mines and factories were established. Dissatisfaction with
corruption and inefficiency led to the Progressive movement from the 1890s to the 1920s, resulting
in reforms like the federal income tax, direct election of Senators, citizenship for many native people,
prohibition of alcohol, and women’s suffrage. The U.S. declared war on Germany in 1917 and helped
the Allies win World War I.
*Great Depression and World War II: The Wall Street Crash of 1929 initiated the Great Depression.
President Franklin D. Roosevelt’s New Deal programs provided help for the unemployed, support for
farmers, social security, and a minimum wage. After Japan attacked Pearl Harbor, the U.S. entered
World War II, financed the Allied war effort, and helped defeat Nazi Germany and Fascist Italy. The
U.S. ended the war by using nuclear weapons on Hiroshima and Nagasaki.
*Cold War and Civil Rights Movement: Post-World War II, the U.S. and the Soviet Union became rival
superpowers, competing in the arms race, the Space Race, propaganda campaigns, and proxy wars.
The 1960s civil rights movement led to social reforms enforcing voting rights and freedom of
movement for African Americans. The Cold War ended with the dissolution of the Soviet Union.
*Post-Cold War Era and Recent Challenges: Post-Cold War, U.S. foreign policy focused on Middle East
conflicts, especially after the September 11 attacks. In the early 21st century, the U.S. faced the Great
Recession and the COVID-19 pandemic.
Lecture 01: The First settlements
Spanish: Explorers, following Columbus’s 1492 expeditions, were the first Europeans to reach today’s
United States. They established territories in the Caribbean, including Puerto Rico and parts of the
U.S. Virgin Islands. In 1513, Juan Ponce de León landed in Florida. Spanish expeditions reached the
Appalachian Mountains, the Mississippi River, the Grand Canyon, and the Great Plains.
Columbus wrote a letter about his discovery of America to King Ferdinand and Queen Isabella of
Spain. In 1539, Hernando de Soto explored the Southeast extensively. In 1540 Francisco Coronado
searched for gold from Arizona to central Kansas. Horses from Coronado’s party escaped, spreading
over the Great Plains. Indians quickly became skilled horsemen. Small Spanish settlements grew into
major cities like San Antonio, Albuquerque, Tucson, Los Angeles, and San Francisco.
Dutch mid-Atlantic: In 1609, the Dutch West India Company sent Henry Hudson to find a Northwest
Passage to Asia. They established New Netherland in 1621 for the North American fur trade. Initial
growth was slow due to Dutch mismanagement and Native American conflicts. Manhattan Island was
bought from the natives for $24, renamed New Amsterdam, and became New Netherland’s capital. It
grew into a key trading center and port by the mid-1600s. The Dutch, despite being Calvinists, were
tolerant of diversity and traded with the Iroquois. The colony hindered British expansion from New
England, leading to wars. Britain took over in 1664, renaming it New York. New Netherland’s legacy
includes urban tolerance and trade, rural traditionalism (Rip Van Winkle), and notable Dutch-
descended Americans like the Roosevelts, Van Buren and Frelinghuysen.
Swedish settlements: In the Swedish Empire’s early years, the New Sweden Company was formed
by Swedish, Dutch, and German shareholders to trade furs and tobacco in North America. The
company’s first expedition, led by former New Netherland governor Peter Minuit, landed in Delaware
Bay in March 1638. They founded Fort Christina, now Wilmington, Delaware, and made land
ownership treaties with local indigenous groups.
Over the next 17 years, 12 expeditions brought settlers from the Swedish Empire, including Finland,
Estonia, parts of Latvia, Norway, Russia, Poland, and Germany, to New Sweden. The colony
established 19 settlements and many farms, extending into present-day Maryland, Pennsylvania, and
New Jersey. After a Dutch invasion from New Netherland during the Second Northern War, it became
part of New Netherland in 1655.
French and Spanish conflict: In 1524, Giovanni da Verrazzano was the first European to sail to New
York Harbor and Narragansett Bay. In 1534, Jacques Cartier laid foundation for the French
colonization of America, named New France. In the 1540s, French Huguenots settled at Fort Caroline
near Jacksonville, Florida, After the Quebec colony collapsed. in 1565, the first European settlement
was established in St. Augustine after Pedro Menéndez destroyed the French colony.
Afterwards, the French mostly remained in Quebec and Acadia. They maintained their trading
relationship with Native Americans. The French, living in small villages along the Mississippi and
Illinois rivers, spread their influence through trade. These farming communities served as a grain
source for Gulf Coast settlements. They also established plantations in Louisiana and settled in New
Orleans, Mobile, and Biloxi.
Lecture 02 : British Colonies
• The Mayflower, a ship carrying Pilgrims, left England in September 1620, and arrived in the
present-day United States in November 1620. Half of the Pilgrims died during the first winter. Earlier,
the English, drawn by Francis Drake’s raids on Spanish treasure ships, settled the east coast in the
1600s. The first British colony in North America was established at Roanoke by Walter Raleigh in
1585, but it failed. Jamestown Colony was successfully established twenty years later in 1607.

• The early British colonies were established by private groups seeking profit, and were marked by
starvation, disease, and Native American attacks. Many immigrants were people seeking religious
freedom or escaping political oppression, peasants displaced by the Industrial Revolution, or those
seeking adventure and opportunity.

• In some areas, Native Americans taught colonists how to plant and harvest the native crops. One
notable example is Squanto, a member of the Patuxet tribe, who played a crucial role in the survival
of the Pilgrims who arrived on the Mayflower. He acted as a liaison between the Pilgrims and the
local Native American tribes, facilitating communication and cooperation. In others, they attacked the
settlers. Virgin forests provided an ample supply of building material and firewood. Natural inlets and
harbors lined the coast, providing easy ports for essential trade with Europe. Settlements remained
close to the coast due to this as well as Native American resistance and the Appalachian Mountains
that were found in the interior.

First settlement in Jamestown: The first successful English colony, Jamestown, was established by
the Virginia Company in 1607 on the James River in Virginia. The colonists, focused on finding gold,
struggled to adapt to the New World. Captain John Smith kept Jamestown together in its first year,
but the colony nearly failed when he left for England two years later. In 1612, John Rolfe started
experimenting with West Indies tobacco, and by 1614, the first shipment reached London. Within a
decade, it became Virginia’s main source of income. In 1624, after years of disease and Native
American attacks, including the Powhatan attack of 1622, King James I revoked the Virginia
Company’s charter, making Virginia a royal colony.

New England Colonies: New England was first settled mainly by Puritans escaping religious
persecution. The Pilgrims sailed for Virginia on the Mayflower in 1620, but a storm diverted them to
Plymouth, where they agreed to the Mayflower Compact’s rules. Like Jamestown, Plymouth faced
disease and starvation, but local Wampanoag Indians taught the colonists maize farming.

• Plymouth was followed by the Puritans and Massachusetts Bay Colony in 1630. They maintained
a self-governance charter separate from England, and elected founder John Winthrop as governor
for most of its early years. Roger Williams, opposing Winthrop’s treatment of Native Americans and
religious intolerance, established Providence Plantations, later Rhode Island, based on religious
freedom in 1636. Other colonists established settlements in the Connecticut River Valley, and on the
coasts of present-day New Hampshire and Maine. Native American attacks continued, with
significant ones occurring in the 1637 Pequot War and the 1675 King Philip’s War.

• New England became a commerce and industry center due to the poor, mountainous soil making
farming difficult. Rivers powered grain mills and sawmills, and numerous harbors facilitated trade.
Villages developed around these industrial centers, and Boston became a key American port.
Lecture 04: Other Colonies
Middle Colonies: In the 1660s, the Middle Colonies (New York, New Jersey, Delaware) were set
up in the old Dutch area, New Netherland. They had many different ethnic groups and
religions. The Iroquois of New York, who had been trading fur with Europeans for years,
formed a strong group, the Iroquois Confederacy.
Pennsylvania was the last colony in this region, set up in 1681 by William Penn for people with
different religious beliefs. Its capital, Philadelphia, quickly became a major trade center.
Quakers, German immigrants, and Scots/Irish populated the city and the surrounding
Pennsylvania hills and forests.
Southern colonies: The Southern Colonies were mostly rural, different from the New England
and Middle Colonies. Maryland was the second British colony south of New England, set up in
1632 as a place for Catholics. The economy of Maryland and Virginia was based on farmers
and planters who set up large farms with slave labor.
In 1670, Carolina was set up, with Charleston as a major trading port. Carolina had a diverse
economy, exporting rice, indigo, and lumber. It was split into North and South Carolina in 1712.
Georgia, the last of the Thirteen Colonies, was set up by James Oglethorpe in 1732 as a border
to Spanish Florida and a place for former prisoners and the poor.
Lecture 5: Slavery and Independence
Servitude and slavery: Most of the European immigrants arrived in colonial America as
indentured servants, a form of unfree labor. In exchange for immigrating to America, they
would sign a contract committing to five to seven years of labor. In return, they would receive
a piece of land at the end of their servitude. In certain cases, ship captains were rewarded for
the delivery of poor migrants, leading to the use of overblown, illusory promises and even
kidnapping. Notable examples of this practice include the Virginia Company and
Massachusetts Bay, both of which used indentured servant labor.
12 years after the founding of Jamestown. The first African slaves were brought to Virginia in
1619. They were initially regarded as indentured servants who could buy their freedom, but
the demand for labor on plantations grew in 1660s, hardening the institution of slavery,
making it lifelong. Slavery was marked with brown skin seen as the black race. The children of
the slaves were born slaves. By 1770s, African slaves became or made-up the 5th of the
American population.
The colonies didn’t seek independence while needing British military aid against French and
Spanish. After these threats ended by 1765, Britain still saw the colonies as beneficial to itself,
a policy called mercantilism.
Colonial America faced a labor shortage, leading to slavery and indentured servitude. The
British colonies practiced salutary neglect, avoiding strict law enforcement, which fostered a
unique American spirit.
Road to independence An upper-class based on plantations and slave labor grew in South
Carolina and Virginia. In upstate New York, Dutch farmers rented land from rich Dutch owners
like the Van Rensselaer family. Other colonies, like Pennsylvania, were more equal. By the mid-
18th century, Pennsylvania was a middle-class colony.
The French and Indian War (1754–1763), part of the Seven Years’ War, was a key event for the
colonies. It reduced the influence of the French and Native Americans, the main rivals of the
British in the colonies and Canada. The Thirteen Colonies’ territory expanded into New France,
in Canada and Louisiana. The war led to more political unity among the colonies, shown in the
Albany Congress and Benjamin Franklin’s call for the colonies to “Join, or Die.” Franklin
invented the idea of a United States of America, which came about after 1765 and became
real a decade later.
American Revolution In December 1776, Washington’s army crossed the Delaware River, won
two battles, and took back New Jersey. On July 2, 1776, the Second Continental Congress
voted for independence. The Declaration of Independence, signed on July 4, argued for
citizens’ rights and listed complaints against the crown.
The American Revolutionary War started with the Battles of Lexington and Concord on April
19, 1775. Washington led the Continental Army. The first big campaign was in New York and
New Jersey in 1776. After winning at Saratoga in 1777, France, the Netherlands, and Spain
helped the Continental Army. Britain then focused on the south, starting with capturing
Savannah in 1778. The British Army was defeated in Yorktown on October 19, 1781.
King George III ended hostilities and recognized American independence on December 5,
1782. The Treaty of Paris, signed on September 3, 1783, set the terms of peace. Washington
resigned as army leader on December 23, 1783.