1838 in the United States

[edit] Events

January 6 - Samuel Morse first publicly demonstrates the telegraph.
January 8 - Alfred Vail demonstrates a telegraph using dots and dashes (this is the forerunner of Morse code)
January 12 - Mormonism: Joseph Smith, Jr. and Sidney Rigdon flee Ohio for Missouri
March 8 - The New Orleans Mint strikes its first coinage, 30 dimes.
May 26 - Trail of Tears begins - with the forced relocation of the Cherokee Native American tribe, which resulted in the deaths of an estimated 4,000 Cherokee Indians.
June 12 - Territory of Iowa established
September 3 - Dressed in a sailor's uniform and carrying identification papers provided by a free Black seaman, future abolitionist Frederick Douglass boards a train in Maryland on his way to freedom from slavery
October 16 - Hoax: Bill Stump's Stone allegedly discovered in Moundsville, West Virginia.
October 27 - Missouri governor Lilburn Boggs issues the Extermination Order, ordering the expulsion of all Mormons from the state.