If you are looking for an idea for a specific day of the year, here are our free unit studies arranged by date. You can also view our units by most recently added, in chronological order and by subject.
You may also be interested in our Holiday Helps.
January
- 3 – Alaska became a state
- 6 – New Mexico became a state
- 9 – Connecticut became a state
- 17 – Operation Desert Storm began
- 18 – A. A. Milne born (Winnie-the-Pooh)
- 23 – Trieste sets record manned ocean decent (the ocean)
- 26 – Australia Day commemorating first ship landing to colonize Australia
- 27 – Incandescent light bulb patented by Thomas Edison
- 29 – Kansas becomes a state
February
- 2 – Groundhog Day
- 3 – Horace Greeley born (westward expansion)
- 6 – Massachusetts becomes a state
- 7 – Laura Ingalls Wilder born (Little House on the Prairie series)
- 8 – Jules Verne born
- 10 – Charles Lamb born (Shakespeare introduction)
- 12 – Abraham Lincoln born
- 17 – First ship makes transit of the Suez Canal
- 20 – Postal Service Act signed into law
- 24 – Gregorian calendar declared official by Pope Gregory XIII
- 29 – Leap Day
March
- 1st Saturday — Iditarod
- 3 – Mt. Rushmore Memorial Commission authorized
- 5 – Gerardus Mercator born (maps)
- 6 – The periodic table of elements presented to the world
- 7 – Amundsen announced he had reached the South Pole
- 10 – Alexander Graham Bell transmitted first words over a telephone
- 15 – Maine became a state
- 16 – James Madison born
- 17 – First Vanguard satellite launched
- 19 – Robert La Salle dies (The Great Lakes)
- 20 – The spring equinox
- 21 – Johann Sebastian Bach born
- 24 – Fanny Crosby born
- 26 – West Virginia ratifies a new state constitution
- 29 – Edwin Drake born (oil well)
- 31 – Eiffel Tower dedicated
April
- 3 – The beginning of the Pony Express
- 7 – Domino Theory articulated in a speech by Eisenhower
- 11 – German astronomer Samuel Heinrich Schwabe died (solar cycles)
- 14 – American Dictionary of the English Language completed by Webster
- 18 – Great San Fransisco earthquake
- 20 – Sun dogs seen (and recorded) in Stockholm, Sweden, in 1535
- 21 – Spanish-American war
- 22 – First Oklahoma land rush
- 23 – Sergei Prokofiev born (Peter and the Wolf)
- 26 – John James Audubon born (birds)
- 28 – Treaty of San Fransisco ends World War II
- 30 – Louisiana Purchase treaty signed
May
- 2 – Leonardo da Vinci dies
- 5 – Napoleon dies
- 8 – Harry S. Truman born
- 10 – Golden Spike ceremony for the first transcontinental railroad
- 12 – Edward Lear born (limericks)
- 14 – Jamestown settlement established
- 16 – Irving Washington Colburn born (glass)
- 18 – Mount St. Helens erupts (volcanoes)
- 19 – Earth passes through the tail of Halley’s comet
- 22 – Mary Cassatt born
- 24 – First Morse code telegraph message sent
- 25 – F5 tornado touches down in Udall, Kansas (Tornadoes)
- 26 – Territory of Montana created
- 30 – Territory of Nebraska established by the Kansas-Nebraska act
June
- 2 – Queen Elizabeth II coronation
- 9 – Cartier discovers the St. Lawrence River
- 10 – The Gateway Arch opened to the public
- 12 – Virginia adopts a Declaration of Rights
- 14 – Flag Day
- 16 – U. S. Army Corps of Engineers established
- 18 – Madison signs declaration of war (War of 1812)
- 19 – Blaise Pascal born
- 20 – Charter of Maryland granted
- 25 – The Battle of Little Bighorn
- 28 – The Beginning of World War I
- 30 – Indian Intercourse Act passed creating Indian Territory
July
- 4 – Stephen Meek born (Oregon Trail)
- 5 – The Secret Service created
- 7 – Sliced bread sold for the first time
- 11 – E.B. White born
- 13 – Marconi receives U.S. Patent for wireless telegraphy
- 17 – “Wrong Way” Corrigan takes off … in the wrong direction (compasses)
- 20 – Men first land on the moon
- 22 – Archibald Spooner born (wordplay)
- 25 – George Stephenson completes the Blucher (steam locomotives)
- 27 – Insulin first extracted as a treatment for diabetes
August
- 7 – Lincoln Memorial penny goes into circulation (coinage)
- 8 – World’s biggest jackfruit harvested (fruits & veggies)
- 9 – Smokey Bear created (fire & fire safety)
- 22 – Nazi SS attempt to capture the Bayeux Tapestry
- 24 – Latest known inscription written in Egyptian hieroglyphics
September
- 3 – Heaviest hailstone of the 20th century falls (hail)
- 4 – Daniel Burnham born (Chicago World’s Fair)
- 5 – First gas pump sold (gasoline)
- 7 – Grandma Moses born
- 13 – DNA Identification Act established (DNA & genetics)
- 17 – Constitution Day
- 18 – CIA established
- 19 – Orville Redenbacher dies (popcorn)
- 20 – State Constitution of Delaware adopted and put into effect
October
- 2nd Monday in October – Columbus Day
- 3 – George Brayton born (internal combustion engine)
- 17 – Einstein arrives in the United States
- 20 – First triode vacuum tube demonstrated
- 23 – First Crayola crayon sold
- 24 – Anton van Leeuwenhoek born (microscopes)
- 31 – Nevada becomes a state
November
- First Tuesday (every four years) – Presidential election
- 1 – First hydrogen bomb detonated
- 6 – John Philip Sousa born
- 14 – Robert Fulton born
- 15 – Pike first sights Pike’s Peak
- 20 –Edwin Hubble born (telescopes)
- 23 – Elbridge Gerry dies (gerrymander)
December
- 4 – Woodrow Wilson sets sail for France (France)
- 6 – President Harry Truman dedicates Everglades National Park
- 17 – Dickens’ A Christmas Carol published
- 22 – Phileas Fogg realizes it is December 21 and completes his journey “Around the World in 80 Days”
- 24 – “Silent Night, Holy Night” first performed
Units not tied to a date
- Child’s Own Book of Great Musicians (music studies)
- Cedric the Forester (book study/knights and castles)
- The Century Book for Young Americans (civics studies)
- Fox and the Grapes
- Gardening
- Great Inventors and Their Inventions (science studies)
- The Horse
- Little Red Hen (book study)
- Our Wonderful World (nature studies)
- Stories of Great Americans (history studies)
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