General Knowledge: June 2009

HISTORICAL EVENTS BY COUNTRY :: BRAZIL

Brazil, History 0 comments

Brazil: Historical Dates

AD 1500	The Portuguese explorer Pedro Álvares Cabral landed in eastern Brazil and claimed the land for Portugal.
1530s	Successful settlements developed at Recife and Salvador. Portuguese colonists used Native American and African slaves to work huge sugar plantations.
1763	The capital moved from Salvador to Rio de Janeiro, which had become Brazil's largest city and main port.
1822	Pedro I declared Brazil's independence from Portugal.
1888	Slavery was abolished in Brazil.
1889	Pedro II was forced to abdicate, despite Brazil's many advances during his reign. Brazil became a republic.
1930	Military forces overthrew the republic and named Getúlio Vargas as president.
1937	President Vargas was granted dictatorial authority in an attempt to help Brazil out of the Great Depression.
1945	Vargas was forced from office. The next year, Brazil returned to constitutional government.
1960	The capital of Brazil moved from Rio de Janeiro to the newly built city of Brasília in the country's interior.
1964	Seeking to prevent a Communist takeover of Brazil, military forces again seized power. The military rigged elections and curbed civil rights.
1985	Brazil regained a civilian government.
1988	A new constitution providing for a directly elected president was enacted.
1992	Facing impeachment proceedings in the Senate for corruption charges, President Fernando Collor de Mello resigned.
1995	Brazil joined Argentina, Paraguay, and Uruguay in forming the Southern Cone Common Market, a free-trade organization also known by its Spanish acronym, MERCOSUR.
1996	President Fernando Henrique Cardoso issued a controversial presidential decree allowing non-Native American individuals, regional governments, and private companies to appeal land allocation decisions made by Brazil's Indian Affairs Bureau.

HISTORICAL EVENTS BY COUNTRY :: BELGIUM

Belgium, History 0 comments

Belgium: Historical Dates

AD 768-814	Belgium was an important part of Charlemagne's empire.
1384-1477	Belgium was under the control of the House of Burgundy.
1516	Belgium and the Netherlands came under Spanish control.
1581	Belgium remained under Spanish rule, but the Netherlands declared independence. The Belgian economy was hurt by lost trade with the Netherlands.
1713	Austria assumed control of Belgium after the War of the Spanish Succession.
1794	French troops drove the Austrians from Belgium. Austria formally ceded Belgium to France in 1797.
1815	Napoleon I of France met his final defeat at Waterloo in central Belgium. Belgium became part of the Kingdom of the Netherlands.
1830	Belgium declared its independence from the Netherlands.
1885	King Leopold II established the Congo Free State. The colony supplied Belgium with raw materials for its growing industrial sector.
1914	Germany violated Belgium's neutrality by invading at the start of World War I. Many battles of the war were later fought in Belgium.
1940	Belgium was again invaded and defeated by Germany during World War II. It was liberated in 1944.
1952	Belgium was a founding member of the European Coal and Steel Community, which became the European Economic Community in 1957, with headquarters in Brussels.
1971	A new constitution formally recognized Belgium's French-, Dutch-, and German-speaking communities.
1993	A constitutional revision made Belgium a federal state. Flanders, Wallonia, and Brussels each became semi-autonomous regions.

HISTORICAL EVENTS BY COUNTRY :: AUSTRIA

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Austria: Historical Dates

15 BC	The Roman Empire controlled Austria south of the Danube.
AD 166	Northern tribes began invading Austria.
955	Austria came under the rule of Otto I of Germany.
1278	Holy Roman emperor Rudolf I, a member of the Habsburg family, began acquiring Austrian lands.
1438	The Habsburg Archduke of Austria assumed the title of Holy Roman Emperor. The Austrian Habsburgs held the title of emperor almost continuously until 1806.
1683	Invading Ottomans were stopped short of Vienna for the second and final time.
1713	Charles VI declared the Pragmatic Sanction, allowing his daughter Maria Theresa to inherit the throne.
1806	The Holy Roman Empire was dissolved after Napoleon I conquered much of the empire.
1815	Prince Klemens von Metternich represented the Austrian Empire at the Congress of Vienna. Metternich dominated Austrian politics until 1848.
1866	Italy and Prussia defeated Austria in the Seven Weeks' War, weakening the empire. The next year, the Dual Monarchy of Austria-Hungary was declared.
1914	Archduke Francis Ferdinand was assassinated, triggering World War I.
1918	Following defeat in World War I, the last Habsburg emperor was overthrown. Austria became a republic.
1938	German troops seized Austria. Germany announced the Anschluss, or union, of Austria and Germany.
1945	Austria was occupied by the Allied powers following World War II.
1955	Austria regained its independence, but declared its permanent neutrality in foreign affairs.
1976	The Winter Olympic Games were held in Innsbruck.
1986	Kurt Waldheim was elected president despite allegations of involvement in Nazi war crimes during World War II.
1995	Austria became a member of the European Union.

HISTORICAL EVENTS BY COUNTRY :: AUSTRALIA

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Australia: Historical Dates

50,000 BC	The first Aborigines probably began arriving in Australia from Southeast Asia around this time.
AD 1606	Willem Jansz, a Dutch captain, became the first European to explore the Australian coast.
1770	Captain James Cook, an English explorer, claimed eastern Australia for Great Britain.
1788	The First Fleet arrived at Botany Bay and established a penal colony near modern-day Sydney.
1829	The colony of Western Australia was founded at Perth, giving Great Britain control of the entire Australian continent.
1850	Transportation of British convicts to Sydney was abolished. However, it continued to Hobart, on the island of Tasmania, and to Western Australia for several years, allowing those colonies to grow quickly.
1851	Gold was discovered in New South Wales and Victoria, and a new wave of immigrants soon moved to Australia. Melbourne and other cities prospered in the following decades.
1901	The Commonwealth of Australia was proclaimed. The same year, the White Australia Policy was implemented.
1914	Many Australians enlisted for service in World War I. However, enthusiasm for the war waned as the Australian economy suffered.
1931	The Great Depression was made worse in much of Australia by deflationary government policies.
1942	Darwin was bombed repeatedly until Australian forces helped stop the Japanese advance in the Pacific during World War II.
1951	Australia signed the ANZUS defense treaty with New Zealand and the United States.
1956	Melbourne hosted the first Olympic Games held in the southern hemisphere.
1964	The military draft was introduced in Australia for the first time. Australian troops were sent to Vietnam the next year.
1967	The Australian government granted Aborigines the right to vote.
1972	The Labor Party took power for the first time since 1949. It soon abolished the draft and withdrew Australian forces from Vietnam.
1993	Sydney was chosen as the site of the 2000 Summer Olympic Games.
1996	A coalition of Liberal Party and National Party candidates gained a majority in both houses of parliament, ending 13 years of consecutive Labor rule.

HISTORICAL EVENTS BY COUNTRY :: ARGENTINA

Argentina, History 0 comments

Argentina: Historical Dates

1516	Juan Díaz de Solís landed on the shores of the Río de la Plata.
1776	Buenos Aires thrived as the capital and trade center of the newly declared Spanish Viceroyalty of Río de la Plata.
1816	Argentina declared its independence from Spain.
1817	José de San Martín secured Argentina's independence by defeating Spanish forces in neighboring Chile.
1853	The Constitution of 1853 proclaimed a confederation of Argentine states, but Buenos Aires did not join until 1862.
1877	Argentina began exporting farm products to Europe. The money from these exports made Argentina one of the world's richest countries by the 1920s, and attracted many immigrants.
1946	Promising higher wages for workers, Colonel Juan Perón was elected president.
1955	Perón fled to Spain as the military took power.
1973	Perón was returned to power in the hopes of reviving Argentina's economy. He died the next year and was succeeded by his wife, Isabel, who was vice president.
1976-1983	The military again seized power. Thousands of leftist opposition supporters were illegally imprisoned, tortured, and executed in what became known as the Dirty War.
1982	In April, Argentina invaded the British-held Falkland Islands (Islas Malvinas). Great Britain recaptured the islands a few weeks later.
1983	Argentina returned to civilian rule. Over the next few years many former military officers were convicted of involvement in the Dirty War.
1989	Rising inflation forced newly elected President Carlos Saúl Menem to adopt emergency economic measures
1995	With inflation under control and the economy growing, Argentina joined Brazil, Paraguay, and Uruguay in founding the Southern Cone Common Market, a free-trade organization.
1996	Budgetary shortfalls induced Congress to grant President Menem emergency economic powers allowing him to raise and impose taxes without congressional approval

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