Timeline
1849-1853: Working at Wheatland
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Timeline |
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1849-1853: Working at Wheatland |
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| 1849 | |
May - James Buchanan takes up residence at his Lancaster, PA estate, Wheatland; his niece, Harriet Lane, becomes hostess for all of Buchanan’s social activities. | |
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| June 15 - James Polk, 11th President of the US, dies in Nashville, Tennessee. | |||||
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Oct. 19 - Elizabeth Blackwell graduates from Geneva Medical College; she is the first woman to receive a medical degree in the US. | ||
| Dec. - James Buchanan supports Howell Cobb for Speaker of the House and John Forney for clerk. | |||||
| 1850 | James Buchanan Henry (nephew of James Buchanan) attends Princeton. | ||||
| James Buchanan exerts his influence in PA to prevent the passage of any resolutions in favor of the Wilmot Proviso. | |||||
| James Buchanan supports attempts to prevent the Virginia Legislature from issuing resolutions in favor of secession. | |||||
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Jan. 1850 - Senator Henry Clay of Kentucky introduces eight resolutions in the Senate regarding free or slave status for new states, known popularly as the Compromise of 1850. | ||
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Mar. 7 - Senator Daniel Webster delivers his famous "Seventh of March" speech urging sectional compromise on the issue of slavery. | ||
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Mar. 16 - Nathaniel Hawthorne's Scarlet Letter is published. | ||
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Mar. 18 - The American Express Company is founded. | ||
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Apr. 19 - The US and England sign the Clayton-Bulwer Treaty, providing for the neutrality of a canal to be built across Central America. | ||
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May 25 - New Mexico forms its own state government and applies for statehood. | ||
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July 1 - The first regular overland mail service west of the Missouri River begins, between Independence, Missouri, and Salt Lake City, Utah. | ||
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July 9 - Zachary Taylor, 12th President of the US, dies in office, in Washington, D.C. ; Millard Fillmore becomes the 13th President. | ||
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Sep. 9 - California becomes the 31st state in the Union. | ||
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Sep. 11 - Swedish soprano Jenny Lind, "the Swedish nightingale," makes her American debut at the Castle Garden Theatre in New York City. | ||
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Sep. 18 - Congress passes the Fugitive Slave Bill, requiring the return of runaway slaves to their owners. | ||
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Sep. 20 - Congress abolishes the slave trade in the District of Columbia as part of the legislative package called the Compromise of 1850. | ||
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Sep. 28 - Brigham Young is named governor of the Utah Territory by President Fillmore. | ||
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Sep. 29 - The US Navy and Merchant Marine bans flogging. | ||
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Oct. 10 - The Chesapeake & Ohio Canal is completed and opens for business along its entire 184.5 mile length from Washington, D.C. to Cumberland, Maryland. | ||
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Oct. 25 - The Southern Rights Association is established, with its goal being the end of slavery. | ||
| Nov. 19 - James Buchanan opens his bid for the presidential nomination in 1852 with a letter to Democrats regarding the Compromise of 1850. | |||||
| 1851 | James Buchanan sends nephew James Buchanan Henry to study law in Philadelphia with John Cadwalader. | ||||
| James Buchanan serves as mediator between Dickinson College students and administrators following the dismissal of the college's entire junior class. | |||||
| Jan. 11 - James Buchanan speaks at a festival celebrating the establishment of a regular steamship route between Philadelphia and Liverpool, England. | |||||
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Jan. 27 - John James Audubon, naturalist and artist famous for his drawings and paintings of North American birds, dies in New York City. | ||
| Apr. 10 - James Buchanan addresses a letter to the Central Southern Rights Association of Virginia, advocating the doctrine of States’ rights and a strict construction of the Constitution. | |||||
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May 6 - John Gorrie is awarded a patent for the first ice-making machine. | ||
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June 5 - Uncle Tom's Cabin; or, Life Among the Lowly begins to appear in serial form in the Washington National Era, an abolitionist weekly. Harriet Beecher Stowe's anti-slavery story is published in forty installments over the next ten months. For her story, Mrs. Stowe is paid $300. | ||
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July 23 - The Sioux Indians sign the Treaty of Traverse des Sioux, ceding their land in Iowa and Minnesota to the US. | ||
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Aug. 22 - The yacht America defeats 14 British ships to win the first America’s Cup. | ||
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Sep. 18 - The New York Daily Times, the forerunner of the New York Times, begins publication. | ||
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Nov. 14 - Herman Melville's Moby Dick is published. | ||
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Dec. 24 - Two-thirds of the books at the Library of Congress in Washington, D.C. are destroyed in a fire. | ||
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Dec. 29 - The first Young Men’s Christian Association is established, in Boston. | ||
| 1852 | Feb. 3 - James Buchanan writes to citizens of Baltimore, advocating a Democratic platform consisting of States’ rights, a strict construction of the Constitution, and the conservative expenditure of public funds. | ||||
| James Buchanan visits Richmond, Virginia to promote his candidacy for president. | |||||
| Mar. - John N. Lane (relative of James Buchanan) is born. | |||||
| Mar. 4 - James Buchanan is nominated for president by delegates to the Harrisburg State Convention in a vote of 103 to 30. | |||||
| Mar. 15 - Wells Fargo Company is founded. | |||||
| Mar. 20 - Uncle Tom's Cabin is first published in book form. | |||||
| June 1 - James Buchanan is considered as a presidential
candidate at the Democratic National Convention in Baltimore, but is not
nominated. |
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| June 4 - James Buchanan states that he would not be willing to accept the nomination for vice president. | |||||
| June 29 - Statesman Henry Clay, "the Great Compromiser", dies at the age of seventy-five at the National Hotel in Washington, D.C. | |||||
| Aug. 3 - A Harvard crew defeats Yale on Lake Winnepesaukee, New Hampshire, in the first intercollegiate sporting event in the US. | |||||
| Aug. 12 - Isaac Merrit Singer is awarded a patent for his continuous-stitching sewing machine. | |||||
| Sep. - James Buchanan presides over a Democratic Rally in Reading, PA. | |||||
| Oct. 7 - James Buchanan gives a speech in Greensburg, PA against Whig presidential candidate General Winfield Scott. | |||||
| 1853 | James Buchanan becomes president of the board of trustees of Franklin and Marshall College in Lancaster, PA. | ||||
| Feb. 21 - Congress passes the Coinage Act, authorizing the minting of three-dollar pieces. | |||||
| Mar. - James Buchanan is invited by Franklin Pierce to serve
as minister to Great Britain. |
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| Mar. 3 - Congress authorizes a survey to find the most practical route for a transcontinental railway. | |||||
| Mar. 4 - Franklin Pierce is sworn in as the 14th US President. | |||||