1910-1914 1910 Return of Halley's Comet (sale of anti-comet pills); Land speed record established (133 mph); 1911 Chili con carne and tamales first canned; Stainless steel patented; First trans-continental plane flight (82 hours); 1912 Titanic disaster in the North Atlantic; Cellophane perfected; First self-service grocery stores (California); Vitamin A discovered; Girl Guides (later Girl Scouts) founded; 1913 Cork bottle cap seals improved; 1914 Panama Canal opened; George Washington Carver's peanut experiments; Commercial frozen fish process developed; Passenger pigeon exterminated; Railroad tank trucks used to transport milk; World War I begins in Europe. 1915-1919 1915 Processed cheese introduced; Pyrex glass developed; First successful commercial motion picture (Birth of a Nation).; 1916 Fortune cookie invented (Los Angeles, California); Mechanical home refrigerator marketed; 1917 United States enters World War I; Bolshevik Revolution (Russia); 1918 Canned tomato sauce introduced; Electric food mixing machine patented; Pop-up toaster patented; World War I ends (11th hour of the 11th day of the 11th month); French-dip sandwich invented; Spanish influenza epidemic (500,000 deaths in U.S.); 1919 League of Nations formed; Homogenized milk sold commercially; 18th Amendment (Prohibition) adopted. 1920-1924 1920 Prohibition implemented; Automatic doughnut-making machine developed; Boysenberry developed; 1921 Processed cheese introduced in foil-wrapped loaves; Iodized salt introduced; Stainless-steel flatware introduced; 1922 19th Amendment passed (voting rights for women); Insulin developed; 1923 First commercial sale of tomato juice; Milky Way candy bar introduced; First American supermarkets (California; New York); 1924 Caesar salad created (Tijuana, Mexico); First effective chemical pesticide introduced. |
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1925-1929 1925 Automatic potato-peeling machine developed; Scopes Monkey trial (Dayton, Tennessee); 1926 Daily dining car service implemented on the Santa Fe railroad; First successful flight over the North Pole; 1927 First solo flight across the Atlantic (Charles Lindbergh); Wonder Bread introduced; Kool-Aid invented; First successful demonstration of television; 1928 Commercial bread slicer perfected; First woman to fly across the Atlantic Amelia Earhart); Mickey Mouse introduced (Walt Disney); First scheduled television program; 1929 Stock Market crash; Milk in paraffin-lined paper cartons introduced; Coin-operated vending machine patented. 1930-1934 1930 Unprecedented drought (South and Midwest states); Sliced bread introduced commercially; Breadlines in major U.S. cities; Empire State Building completed; Bank panic (hundreds of American banks close); First successful round the world flight; 1932 Corn chips introduced; Route 66 completed (Chicago to Los Angeles); 1933 Prohibition repealed; Vitamin D fortified milk introduced; Tennessee Valley Authority Act (TVA) passed by Congress; Farm Credit Act passed by Congress; Roosevelt elected President; Civilian Conservation Corps (CCC) inaugurated; 1934 Terrible dust storms; Taylor Grazing Act passed to prevent soil erosion. 1935-1941 1935 Terrible dust storms continue; Works Progress Administration (WPA) instituted; Social Security Act; Pan American Clipper flights serve first hot meals to passengers; 1936 Boulder Dam (Hoover Dam) completed; Kitchen blender invented; Supermarket shopping cart developed; Spam introduced nationally; Golden Gate Bridge completed (San Francisco, California); Spanish Civil War; 1938 First drive-in hamburger stand; Teflon discovered; First sales of Girl Scout cookies; 1939 Pre-cooked frozen foods introduced; First widespread agricultural use of DDT; Discovery of Rh factor in human blood; Inauguration of trans-Atlantic commercial airline flights (Pan American); World War II begins in Europe; Nylon stockings first sold in United States; 1940 Bottle glass (Duraglas) developed; Freeze-drying process for food preservation developed; 40 hour work week implemented; McDonald brothers open drive in hamburger stand (southern California); 1941 United States enters World War II. |
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