23 Star Flag
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Flown from July 4, 1820 to July 3, 1822
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US President: James Monroe (1817-1825)
Politics and Government
July 4, 1820: President James Monroe signs the Missouri Compromise, admitting Missouri as a slave state and Maine as a free state.
November 6, 1820: James Monroe is re-elected as President of the United States.
March 6, 1820: The U.S. Congress passes the Missouri Compromise to address slavery expansion.
March 30, 1822: The U.S. Congress officially establishes The Florida Territory.
Science, Technology and Medicine
July 16, 1821: Dr. John Collins Warren performs the first successful surgery using ether
August 1, 1821: Astronomer Maria Mitchell, the first American woman astronomer, is born in Nantucket, Massachusetts anesthesia at Massachusetts General Hospital.
December 20, 1821: First publication of the "New England Journal of Medicine and Surgery."
April 25, 1820: The U.S. government approves the establishment of the U.S. Geological Survey.
October 25, 1821: Boston's Tremont Theatre becomes the first American theater to be lit by gas lighting.
July 4, 1822: Charles Babbage proposes the concept of a mechanical computer.
Education
October 17, 1820: The American Society for the Promotion of Temperance is founded in Boston.
April 27, 1822: Rensselaer Polytechnic Institute, the first engineering school in the U.S., is founded.
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November 4, 1822: The world's first patent for false teeth is granted to Charles Graham of New York.
Arts, Culture and Literature
December 8, 1820: Suffragist and social reformer Mary Livermore is born.
November 24, 1820: Nathaniel Hawthorne publishes his first novel, "Fanshawe."
November 25, 1820: The whaling ship Essex is sunk by a sperm whale, inspiring "Moby-Dick."
September 4, 1821: The New York Stock Exchange is officially founded on Wall Street.
October 13, 1821: The first edition of the "Saturday Evening Post" is published in Philadelphia.
January 29, 1822: Poet and essayist James Russell Lowell is born in Cambridge, Massachusetts.
Sports
November 9, 1820: Tom Cribb defeats Tom Molineaux in a boxing match in Virginia.
October 14, 1821: The first recorded women's golf competition is held at the Musselburgh Links in South Carolina.
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International Events
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July 21, 1820: Union of Sweden and Norway under a single monarch.
November 28, 1820: Argentina's independence is recognized by the United Kingdom.
April 21, 1821: John Keats dies of tuberculosis in Rome, Italy.
June 24, 1821: The Dominican Republic declares independence from Spain.
September 1, 1820: Antarctica is sighted for the first time by Russian expedition led by Fabian Gottlieb von Bellingshausen.
November 29, 1820: Captain Nathaniel Palmer becomes the first American to sight Antarctica.
December 31, 1821: The Austrian Empire issues the first adhesive postage stamp.
June 17, 1820: The University of Prussia is founded in Berlin, Germany.
August 1, 1820: University College London is founded in England.
July 26, 1822: Alexander Mackenzie completes the first recorded east-to-west crossing of North America.
February 11, 1821: Mary Shelley publishes her novel "Frankenstein" in London, England.
October 27, 1822: Wolfgang Amadeus Mozart's opera "Die Zauberflöte" (The Magic Flute) premieres in Vienna, Austria.
July 29, 1820: George IV is crowned as King of the United Kingdom.
December 19, 1820: Friedrich Hölderlin, German lyric poet, dies in Germany.
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Major Armed Conflicts
The United States was not involved in any major armed conflicts between July 1820 and July 1822.
Other international wars and conflicts taking place between 1820-1822 include:
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Ottoman-Persian War of 1821-1823
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Spanish attempts to conquer Mexico begin in 1821 thru 1829
National Historical Events
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Colonel Robert Gibbon Johnson proves that tomatoes are not poisonous by eating one in public on September 28, 1820 in Salem, New Jersey.​​
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On November 20, 1820, the Nantucket, MA, whaling ship Essex sinks after being attacked by a sperm whale. The event inspires Herman Melville's 1851 novel, Moby Dick.
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The Adams-Onís Treaty is ratified in 1821, in which Spain ceded Florida to the United States in exchange for America's renunciation of any claims on Texas following the Louisiana Purchase and $15 million.
The Saturday Evening Post is published for the first time as a weekly newspaper on August 4, 1821