PART ONE: CONTACT AND EXPLORATION, 1491-1607

1. The World Before 1492
2. First Encounters, First Conquests, 1492-1607


PART TWO: SETTLEMENTS OLD AND NEW, 1607-1754

3. Settlement, Alliances, and Resistance, 1607-1718
4. Creating the Culture of British North America, 1689-1754


PART THREE: A NEW BIRTH OF FREEDOM—CREATING THE UNITED STATES OF AMERICA, 1754-1800

5. The Making of a Revolution, 1754-1783
6. Creating a Nation, 1783-1789
7. Practicing Democracy, 1789-1800


PART FOUR: CRAFTING A NATION, PEOPLE, LAND, AND A NATIONAL IDENTITY, 1800-1848

8. Creating a New People, Expanding the Country, 1801-1823
9. New Industries, New Politics, 1815-1828
10. Democracy in the Age of Jackson, 1828-1844
11. Manifest Destiny—Expanding the Nation, 1836-1848


PART FIVE: EXPANSION, SEPARATION, AND A NEW UNION, 1844-1877

12. Living in a Nation Half Slave and Half Free, 1844-1857
13. The Politics of Separation, 1850-1861
California, Kansas, and the Congress, 1850-1858
14. And the War Came, 1861-1865
15. Reconstruction, 1865-1877


PART SIX: BECOMING AN INDUSTRIAL WORLD POWER—COSTS, BENEFITS, AND RESPONSES, 1865-1914

16. Conflict in the West, 1865-1890
17. The Gilded Age: Building a Technological and Industrial Giant and a New Social Order, 1870-1901
18. Responses to Industrialism, Responses to Change, 1877-1914
19. Progressive Movements, Progressive Politics, 1890-1914


PART SEVEN: WAR, PROSPERITY, AND DEPRESSION, 1890-1945

20. Foreign Policy and War in a Progressive Era, 1898-1920
21. Living in Good Times, 1919-1929
22. Living in Hard Times 1929-1939
23. Living in a World at War, 1939-1945


PART EIGHT: FEARS, JOYS, AND LIMITS, 1945-1980

24. The World the War Created, 1945-1952
25. Complacency and Change, 1952-1965
26. Lives Changed, 1961-1968
27. Rights, Reaction, and Limits, 1968-1980


PART NINE: CERTAINTY, UNCERTAINTY, AND NEW BEGINNINGS, 1980-

28. The Reagan Revolution, 1980-1989
29. A New World Order, 1989-2000
30. Entering a New Time, 2001-2012