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Napoleon invades german lands
e sent troops to occupy Germany. Napoleon takes the German king out of power. -
Otto Von Bismarck birth
Otto Eduard Leopold, Prince of Bismarck, Duke of Lauenburg, known as Otto von Bismarck, was a conservative Prussian statesman who dominated German and European affairs from the 1860s until 1890. -
Congress of Vienna
Napoleon wanted to establish a new balance of power. He wanted to prevent imperialism within Europe -
Zollverein
German Customs Union was a coalition of German states formed to manage tariffs and economic policies within their territories -
House of Krupp
launched the family's metal-based activities, building a pioneering steel foundry in Essen in 1810. His son Alfred (1812–87), known as "the Cannon King" or as "Alfred the Great” -
Frankfurt assembly demands unity
On May 18, 1848, about 600 delegates met in Frankfurt to begin drafting a constitution for a unified Germany that would replace the German Confederation that had resulted from the Congress of Vienna in 1815. -
Frederick William IV is offered the throne 1849
Frederick William refused the crown of a united Germany offered him (1849) by the Frankfurt Parliament on the grounds that a monarch by divine right could not receive authority from an elected assembly. -
William I of Prussia becomes emperor
Under the leadership of William and his Minister President Otto von Bismarck, Prussia achieved the unification of Germany and the establishment of the German Empire. -
Bismarck becomes primes minister
Bismarck was a towering figure who put his stamp on his age, as Luther and Metternich had done earlier. When Bismarck became prime minister of Prussia in 1862, the kingdom was universally considered the weakest of the five European powers. -
Blood and iron speech
title of a speech by German Chancellor Otto von Bismarck given in 1862 about the unification of the German territories. It is also a transposed phrase that Bismarck uttered near the end of the speech that has become one of his most widely known quotations. -
Bismarck declares war on Austria
In 1866 Germany was divided into several dozen mini-states, of which Prussia was the largest. Prussia's Chancellor Otto von Bismarck (1862-1890) sought to unify Germany under Prussian leadership. -
Bismarck declares war on Denmark
fought in 1866 between the German Confederation under the leadership of the Austrian Empire and its German allies on one side and the Kingdom of Prussia with its German allies and Italy on the other, that resulted in Prussian dominance over the German states -
Constitution drafted by Bismarck
On 16 April it accepted the constitution, which was essentially written by Otto von Bismarck, the Prussian minister-president and first Bundeskanzler (the sole minister) of the confederation. -
Franco Prussian war
was a conflict between the Second French Empire and the German states of the North German Confederation led by the Kingdom of Prussia. The conflict emerged from tensions caused by German unificatio -
Bismarck becomes chancellor
In 1871 he formed the German Empire with himself as Chancellor, while retaining control of Prussia. His diplomacy of realpolitik and powerful rule at home gained him the nickname the "Iron Chancellor”. -
Campaign against the church (Kulturekampf)
refers to German policies in relation to secularity and reducing the role and power of the Roman Catholic Church in Prussia, enacted from 1871 to 1878 by the Prime Minister of Prussia, Otto von Bismarck. -
Campaign against the socialists
"Law against the public danger of Social Democratic endeavours") were a series of acts, the first of which was passed on October 19, 1878 -
William II becomes Kaiser
He gained a reputation as a swaggering militarist through his speeches and ill-advised newspaper interviews. -
Population growth
German society grew and changed dramatically in the last quarter of the nineteenth century. In the twenty years prior to the First World War, the rate of population growth averaged 1.34 percent, as compared to .47 percent annual growth in 1871 -
Bismarck resigns
Bismarck was awoken at 9 a.m. with the news that the Kaiser wished to see him in the Foreign Office in half an hour’s time. At last, the break between the two men could no longer be postponed, and a rancorous, awkward scene resulted, leaving Bismarck no choice but to offer his resignation -
Second reich is created
On November 9, 1918 Germany was declared a republic, and Wilhelm II was forced to flee to the Netherlands. And so the curtain closes on the Second Reich and opens on the Weimar Republic. -
Economic development
Economic development originated in the post war period of reconstruction initiated by the US. In 1949, during his inaugural speech, President Harry Truman identified the development of undeveloped areas as a priority for the west
