"There were formerly horizons within which people lived and thought and mythologized. There are now no more horizons. ... It is an inevitable, altogether natural thing that when [peoples] that have never met before come into collision -- each bearing its own pride -- there should be a turbulence. That is just what we are experiencing; and we are riding it ... to a totally new condition of mankind -- to which no one anywhere alive today can say that he has the key, the answer, the prophecy, to its dawn." -- Joseph Campbell [Author's Note: this history is told from the point of view of Otis Bunker, the narrator. Because of his prejudices, he is an extremely unreliable narrator. The opinions expressed herein are *NOT* my own. - Paul Madison]
Welcome new students,
Often when students arrive in these halls, they first want to know "Who were the Ancients?" and "What happened to them?" Our ancestors, the Ancients, once inhabited the great steel towers that surround our city, and they dominated the planet. Their unquenchable thirst for knowledge revealed the inner workings of creation and harnessed the very essence of matter. Their fate may have been avoidable, or it may have been predestined. In either case, their story embodies valuable lessons in perserverance and vigilance.
Much was lost during the Shadow Years and the Apocalypse, but many books that record their history, technology and understanding have been found and preserved here. The timeline that follows will give you a general perspective of their tempestous history and dizzying technologies.
Otis Bunker - Dean of History
University of New Hampshire
September 3, 2812
| 3400 B.C. | The Dawn of History - the first written languages were developed along the Tigris and Euphrates rivers |
| 3000 B.C. | The Bronze Age - bronze tools and weapons gave cultures that had them a powerful advantage over those with stone and wood |
| 1450 B.C. | Moses led the Jews out of Egypt and into Jerusalem, which would eventually become the capital of the state of Israel in A.D. 1948 |
| 1200 B.C. | The Iron Age - iron tools and weapons gave cultures that had them a powerful advantage over those with bronze |
| 479-323 B.C. | The Golden Age of Greece - art, literature, science, philosophy and politics were developed and refined |
| 49 B.C. | Julius Caesar, a popular Senator, Governor and General in the Roman Republic was given a choice by his jealous peers: retire, or become an enemy of the State; Caesar chose to invade the Capitol with his legions and plunged Rome into a civil war; from the ashes emerged the Roman Empire which would rule all of the Mediterranean world more or less peacefully for nearly 500 years in what became known as the Pax Romana |
| 1 | Jesus Christ was born |
| 70-135 | The Jews, rebelling against Roman rule, were driven from their ancient homeland; in the year 70 their temple was burned and destroyed and most Jews were forced to leave; further rebellions provoked a more final and complete exile in 135 |
| 313 | The Roman Emperor Constantine legalized Christianity and would later declare it to be the official religion of Rome, replacing paganism; the Christian church, powerful and united, would soon become the Catholic Church |
| 476 | Indolent and beset by barbarians that the empire hadn't the skill or stomache to crush, The Roman Empire collapsed; the Mediterranean world was left without a functioning civil administration; the Catholic Church, centered in Rome, filled the void in Central Europe; world population approximately 200 million |
| 476-1400 | The Dark Ages - in Europe, knowledge that didn't agree with the authority of the Church was forgotten; society was structured into three segments: the Church clergy, who alone were allowed to be educated, the kings who ruled, but did so at the pleasure of the Church, and the serfs who farmed the king's land |
| 622 | Islam was founded on the Arabian Peninsula, a region isolated culturally and politically by her geographical location and the inhospitable nature of the land; over the next century, Muslim armies conquered north Africa, the mideast and Jerusalem - a city holy to Muslims, Jews and Christians; their conquests became known as the Arab world |
| 1095-1274 | The Crusades - the Pope, leader of the Church, sought to conquer Jerusalem from the Muslims; although Christian troops managed to occupy the city, their attempts ultimately failed |
| 1233 | Coal mining began in England; although at first its use was limited, as industry developed and demand increased, the burning of carbon compounds like coal and oil would eventually alter the composition of the atmosphere and begin a period of global warming |
| 1450 | The Renaissance (Rebirth) - all books had to be hand written before the invention of the printing press in 1450 made books plentiful and cheap; scientific inquiry increased in Europe despite the Church's protestations |
| 1492 | European kingdoms began to colonize north and south America |
| 1500 | Hand-held firearms were invented in Europe |
| 1517 | The Protestant Reformation - Church dissenters started their own protestant churches; the Church responded by condemning many protestants to death |
| 1543 | Nicolaus Copernicus, a Catholic cleric in Poland, published his first and last book, On the Revolutions of the Heavenly Spheres, in which he proposed that the Earth revolved around our sun, Sol; the Church, which taught that the Earth was the center of the universe, branded helio-centricism a heresy, and put to death those that believed in it; hoping to save his life and good name, Copernicus apologized to Pope Paul III in the preface claiming that he didn't believe in it himself, but that by acting as if it were true the math required to calculate the position of the planets would be greatly simplified, but illness took his life just as it was published, thus placing him beyond the jurisdiction of the Church |
| 1590 | The invention of the microscope made incredibly small things visible |
| 1600 | World population 500 million |
| 1620 | Seeking freedom from religious persecution, English protestants landed in America and founded the English colonies at a place just a few days travel to the southwest of where our school is today |
| 1633 | Galileo Galiei invented the telescope and made the first detailed observations of our moon, Luna, and the planets of the Solar-system; his findings supported the idea that the Earth moved with the other planets around our sun; in Rome, the Capitol of the Church, a Court of Inquisition made Galileo swear, under threat of torture, that he "cursed, and detested the error and heresy that the sun is fixed and the Earth moves" and that he would no longer support this idea in any way; condemned to spend the rest of his life under house arrest, Galileo was made to recite seven penitential psalms weekly, his health quickly declined, he lost his eyesight and his daughter, his only companion, and died after ten years of imprisonment |
| 1760 | The Industrial Revolution - machines were invented that were powered by steam created by burning coal or wood |
| 1776 | The American Revolution - The English colonies in America fought for and won their independence from England; the resulting nation, the United States of America (US), was founded on ideals of liberty and religious freedom |
| 1783 | Men learned to fly in giant balloons |
| 1837 | World naval powers began to replace their wooden ships with steam powered ships |
| 1850 | World population 1 billion |
| 1859 | Oil was pumped from the ground and refined for the first time; Charles Darwin published The Origin of Species in which he proposed that evolution was responsible for life on Earth |
| 1869 | Steam powered trains crossed the American continent; transportation between distant coasts became quick and inexpensive |
| 1876 | Telephones allowed people to speak to one another through a wire over great distances |
| 1893 | The automatic pistol was invented |
| 1896 | Cars, machines on wheels powered by explosively burning oil, were invented |
| 1903 | Airplanes, oil powered machines that flew, were invented |
| 1912 | World naval powers began to replace their steam powered ships with oil powered ships |
| 1914-1918 | World War I - The Great War - technology had closely connected the world, horizons that once separated communities by months of travel had vanished and a political conflict in Europe became a bloody war the scale of which the world had not yet seen; machine guns capable of firing hundreds of bullets a minute were invented; airplanes and tanks were first used in combat; kingdoms toppled and empires collapsed; the US proved herself as a world power |
| 1917 | England promised the Jews a homeland in Jerusalem before capturing Jerusalem from the Arabs |
| 1925 | The spectacular Scopes Monkey Trial revealed the depths to which evolution had spread its roots into American culture; evolution would soon completely replace the Bible's teaching of the origin of life in public schools |
| 1930 | World population 2 billion |
| 1939-1945 | World War II - burdened by blame and reparations for causing World War I, the German people allowed themselves to be led into a second, bloodier war by Adolph Hitler, an idealogue who wanted to rid the world of Jews and created nazism, a philosphy which became synonymous with evil; the US became the world's mightiest power |
| 1945 | The US ended World War II by using atomic weapons in Japan, unleashing power from the very essence of matter, the atom, to destroy cities |
| 1946 | The first computer was invented |
| 1948 | The Israeli War of Independence - surrounded by aggressive Arab nations unhappy about the Jewish occupation of Jerusalem, Israel fought a brief war to become an independent Jewish state; the US strongly supported Israel's emerging democracy |
| 1949 | The newly formed United Nations (UN) moved into their world headquarters in New York; as the world's wealthiest and most powerful nation, the US would be an important leader in the UN, but she valued her independence and only supported those UN projects that coincided with America's national interests until the events of 2247 subjugated the US to the will of the world |
| 1953 | To protest Western involvement in Jerusalem, Iran initiated an oil embargo and nationalized foreign oil companies in Iran; Western nations supported a coup that replaced Iran's Prime Minister and restored the Iranian oil trade |
| 1957 | Sputnik I, a Russian satellite, was the first man made object to be launched into orbit around the Earth; the US felt threatened by its lagging space technology and the first space-race began |
| 1960 | The OPEC cartel was formed, primarily of Arab nations, in order to limit oil production and increase profits |
| 1961 | Vostok I, launched by Russia, was the first spacecraft to take a man into space |
| 1964 | The Birth of Terrorism - border skirmishes with Arab neighbors became terrorist attacks against Isreali citizens; the PLO (Palestine Liberation Organization) was founded to destroy Israel |
| 1969 |
US astronauts landed on Luna
|
| 1974 | World population 4 billion |
| 1975 | First desktop, personal computers were invented |
| 1981 | The space shuttle, capable of being relaunched, began service in the US |
| 1983 | Terrorists began to bomb US targets in the mideast; Galileo Galilei was cleared of any wrongdoing by the Catholic Church which admitted that the Earth 'might' orbit our sun |
| 1985 | The University of New Hampshire was established in Manchester |
| 1990 | The first telescope in space, Hubble, orbited the Earth |
| 1991 | The Persian Gulf War - Iraq invaded Kuwait; US troops drove the Iraqi invasion force out and proved the unprecedented effectiveness of her military; satellite systems delivered bombs to precise targets and gave troops their exact locations; thermal imaging allowed troops to see in the dark; resentment grew in the Arab world towards the US and the West in general |
| 1993 | Terrorists detonated a bomb in New York, the first such terrorist attack on US soil |
| 1994 | The International Conference on Population and Development was boycotted by Catholic and Muslim clergy, "The world's food resources theoretically could feed 40 billion people." |
| 2000 | World population 6 billion |
| 2001 | The First Terror War - terrorists destroyed the World Trade Center in New York and attacked the US military headquarters in Washington, the Capitol; the US forced the Islamic Afghan government from power |
| 2002 | The Human Genome Project, a blueprint detailing all human genes, was completed; it would be used not only to treat otherwise untreatable diseases, but also to recreate man in his own image |
| 2007 | The International Space Station was completed in Earth orbit as a research station |
| 2012 | The first human clone was born; the process was expensive and considered unethical in nearly all nations of the world |
| 2024 | The Birth of Nano-Technology - construction at the atomic level became possible; scientists created bacteria from scratch with genes that were programmed to perform useful functions such as destroying harmful substances in the body; these bacteria, and their inorganic descendents, were called 'nano-bots' |
| 2025 | The Second Terror War - a terrorist bomb dispersed radioactive material in the US capital, Washington, D.C.; the US forced the Islamic Sudanese government from power |
| 2027 | High-powered microwave and laser weapons were installed on US jets, combat airplanes capable of flying many times faster than the speed of sound |
| 2028 | World population 8 billion |
| 2035 | Human genetic manipulation, or 'geneering', became commonplace among new parents in industrial nations; the most common requests were for immunities to specific diseases |
| 2041 | The effects of global warming were not felt until 2041; a severe drought began that continued for several years and crippled global agriculture; hundreds of millions died of starvation and thirst; the US made research into possible remedies for global warming a top priority |
| 2048 | Gene Printing - a persons genetic code would become an important tool in law enforcement and identification; US courts allowed employers to only hire employees whose gene print indicated that their health would not be adversely affected by their duties |
| 2049 | Terrorists released nerve gas in Los Angeles, killing thousands; to try and stop further attacks, all US residents were required to carry a national identity card |
| 2052 | Genetically altered crops that resisted drought and disease became widespread and saved millions of lives during the droughts that continued to reoccur |
| 2055 | World population 10 billion |
| 2059 | For the fifth year in a row, OPEC refused to increase oil production to meet rising demand, citing concerns about diminishing reserves; Western nations began to remove oil from places that had previously been protected, such as the Baltic Sea, California and Alaska |
| 2060 | Plant and animal genes were first used by geneers to create human infants - those who were born like this were called mutants (Genetically Manipulated Organisms (GMO's) or hybrids as they called themselves); those whose genes had not been tampered with were called pure-strain-humans (or randoms as the mutants called us) |
| 2062 | Holographic devices that used light to store computer data were invented |
| 2069 | A nano-bot that effectively eliminated cancerous cells was invented; it was custom made to match a patient's gene print |
| 2079 | Atlantis, the first colony beneath the ocean, was built under the Atlantic by Europe for the purposes of agriculture; the success of 'aquaculture' led to similar colonies being built; vast quantities of food were grown under the ocean and exported all over the world |
| 2081 | Protein disrupting weapons capable of melting tissue and bone were invented |
| 2084 | The Third Terror War - Pakistan and the Republic of Georgia were overthrown by Islamic extremists; Russia and the US quickly invaded, supported by the UN; Pakistan's nuclear weapons were dismantled |
| 2086 | Bacterial nano-bots were invented that could build structures with inorganic materials; previous nano-bots could only manipulate proteins |
| 2089 | The citizens of Ushuaia, Argentina were relocated due to intolerable radiation levels caused by the widespread, global use of toxic substances that had depleted the atmosphere's ozone layer |
| 2090 | Artificial Intelligence was achieved; robots had previously been only useful in industry, but now robots and androids that looked like humans became plentiful |
| 2091 | Geneering companies registered for the first patents of completely new human genes; new traits became available to parents with enough money; life expectancy in industrial nations exceeded 100 years, mutants lived much longer |
| 2093 | Massive hurricanes hit the east coast of the Americas; previous hurricanes had been growing in intensity, but the damage during this year was so great that most insurance underwriters finally went out of business; the US government ended the crisis by using federal money to nationalize the insurance industry |
| 2094 | Many airports, military bases and other public places installed artificial intelligence units called 'Cybernetic Installations', or simply CI's, in an attempt to eliminate human error in the Terror Wars |
| 2095 | Inexpensive cloning services were offered by Family Planning organizations in the US; world population 15 billion |
| 2096 | Moral corruption had reached unprecedented depths in the US; acts of suicide, murder and fornication were watched in family rooms across the country on giant color monitors called tele-visions, mothers murdered their unborn children or left them to die in garbage cans, most children that survived lived in broken families with only one parent or none at all, children raped and murdered their classmates, drug abuse and crime increased, more and more prisons were built to create new and larger generations of hopeless young men, the ideals of liberty and religious freedom on which America had been founded was perverted into, "Do what thou wilt shall be the whole of the law!"; in response, the Reconstruction Party was born; it was founded by Gary North, whose family had for three generations rejected popular American culture, educated their children at home and sent them to conservative protestant colleges that were not accredited by the liberal US education system; Reconstructionism was founded on conservative, Christian principles, placed blame for the US's problems squarely on the shoulders of immorality and unrepentance, and vowed to restore America to her Christian roots and former glory |
| 2097 | The first of a series of satellites known as Aeolus were launched; although unable to completely control weather or reverse the effects of global warming they would have limited, but profound, effects on wind and rain and mitigate weather that would otherwise have had devastating consequences |
| 2099 | Terrorists destroyed the seat of government in Xinjiang; China arrested tens of thousands of Arabs, deported thousands more, and closely observed those that remained |
| 2101 | An outbreak of a mutated Hepatitis virus, resistant to drug treatment, spread globally; nearly three billion people died before a vaccine was finally discovered |
| 2105 | Global sea level had noticably risen, not significantly, but some low lying islands and coastal areas were either abandoned or required significant development to remain habitable; sea level continued to rise over the next two centuries |
| 2106 | The largest telescope ever built, Sagan, was completed far out in space, built by the United Western Space Association, a private organization founded by wealthy US geneticist Roger Raupp; the aim of the UWSA was to advance space exploration beyond the plateau that it had reached after the completion of the International Space Station and to establish human colonies beyond the Earth |
| 2115 | The first atomic fusion power plant was switched on in upstate New York |
| 2118 | Sagan detected the first extra-Solar, Earth-like planet orbiting Tau Ceti |
| 2119 | The Oil Riots - oil production became increasingly costly as world-wide reserves dried up; economies that had become dependent on oil for the transportation of people and goods saw their profits disappear as oil prices soared; the incredible disparity in the US between the increasingly insular wealthy minority and the swelling ranks of the 'working' poor reached the boiling point and spilled violently into the streets; hard pressed by the economic crisis, the US reformed the Federal Reserve Board; inflation increased dramatically as the federal government minted money to support itself; the search for an alternative energy source became the US's top priority |
| 2120 | Americans, having lost faith in the ability of self-serving politicians to create profound reforms, elected the first Reconstruction party President, R. Rushdoony, with a clear mandate to clean up America; in his first year in office, human geneering, cloning and abortions were outlawed by the US Congress |
| 2121 | The royal family of Saudi Arabia fled into Western exile when Islamic extremists took control of the country and renamed it Arabia; US troops established a permanent camp in Israel |
| 2122-2129 |
World War III - The Fourth Terror War -
terrorists detonated nuclear weapons in New York and San Francisco,
tens of millions died and
radiation made the cities uninhabitable;
as President Rushdoony vowed to, "end the Islamic threat once and for all," Arab nations invaded
Israel seeking to finally drive the Jews out of 'their' holy land;
Western allies, Russia, China and those aligned against the Arab world repulsed the invaders, but at a
terrible price - more than 18 million Israeli citizens died, roughly %80 of the nation's entire population;
hand-held laser rifles were first used in combat;
top secret research began in the industrial nations of the world
to build nano-bots that behaved like viruses, destroying or transforming human tissue
|
| 2124 | A means of converting hydrogen into energy was invented - a development which ultimately led to an Allied victory; world powers quickly began to replace their oil powered ships, land vehicles, and airplanes with hydrogen powered models |
| 2129-2314 | The Social Wars - US and UN troops defeated Arabia and the belligerent Arab nations after a long siege of Mecca in Arabia; a process of cultural engineering and democratization began in the occupied territories; Islamic theocracies, with the exception of the city-state of Mecca, were dismantled and a liberal education was provided to all Arab children |
| 2130 | A bacterial nano-bot constructed the first inorganic nano-bot; it could receive instructions from a computer with a transmitter and build anything out of any material, including an identical copy of itself; black boxes were invented that could produce any object given the right programming |
| 2131 | A method of making desert soil suitable for crops was invented |
| 2134 | An Asian Coalition, led by China, established a permanent base on Luna; a second space-race began |
| 2136 | US astronauts established Tycho Base on Luna |
| 2137 | Thorium fusion propulsion was invented; spacecraft were able to travel much faster with less fuel |
| 2138 | The US began work on Elmore Station, the first orbital shipyard |
| 2140 | Chinese astronauts landed on Mars |
| 2141 | US population 1 billion |
| 2142 | The UWSA established a base on the Martian moon Phobos (Greek for 'fear'); 27 kilometers in diameter, Phobos orbits Mars every eight hours and is so close to Mars (only one percent of the distance from the Earth to Luna) that in a few million years Phobos will smash into Mars; from this unique vantage point, the UWSA began their preparations for terraforming Mars; the UWSA launched probes from the Earth destined for the precious few Earth-like planets that Sagan had detected around other stars: Tau Ceti, 70 Ophiuchi, 82 Eridani, Beta Hydri and Xi Ursae Majoris |
| 2144 | The US completed construction on a space elevator based on a giant floating platform in the Pacific Ocean near the equator; it greatly reduced the cost of getting men and materials into orbit |
| 2145 | The liberal education system in the US was dismantled in favor of publicly funded private schools; religious schools flourished while enrollment in atheistic, secular schools diminished as they became more and more expensive to maintain |
| 2147 | The Plague - a new strain proved resistant to every known drug; over seven billion people died before a vaccine was found |
| 2149 | Project Genesis - paleontologists, geologists, astronomers and the US were enraged when the UWSA released trillions of nano-bots on the surface of Mars programmed to penetrate the Martian surface to release oxygen and water into the atmosphere and prepare the soil for crops; the nano-bots were designed to be destroyed when the atmosphere became more Earth-like or be deactivated remotely from Phobos; the entire project lasted less than a year; Roger Raupp was arrested by US officials when he returned to the Earth three years later and was convicted of the willful destruction of a planet by the UN court; he served one year in a European prison |
| 2150 | When the last of the Martian nano-bots were confirmed destroyed, UWSA astronauts landed on Mars and established a base at Barsoom; giant mirrors in space were soon built to provide more sunlight and heat the surface; additional water was brought to Mars in the form of small ice asteroids that were redirected to hit the planet |
| 2151 | Work on Elmore Station was completed; construction began on ships that were capable of carrying enough materials to Mars to start colonies; construction secretly began on small gunships - lightly armed space craft with a small crew of Marines; ships were built by nano-bots using materials launched from US mining installations near Tycho Base and from the US space elevator |
| 2152 | Russia, Europe and China completed work on a second space elevator in the Atlantic; a US constitutional amendment was passed acknowledging the nation's Christian heritage |
| 2153 | A process for thawing lifeforms frozen in cryo-stasis was invented; necessary supplies were reduced and the psychological concerns of extended voyages were eliminated by 'freezing' crew members; since even relatively short distances, such as between the Earth and Mars, took several months, this became the standard method for civilian and military spaceship crews to travel |
| 2154 | The Chinese completed construction on Li Shimin Station in Earth orbit |
| 2155 | Small, self-contained atomic cells were invented |
| 2158 | US colony ships arrived at Mars and established a colony at New Eden; gunships arrived and US troops established Moab Air Force Base; US troops nationalized UWSA bases on Phobos, at Barsoom and Sagan, concerned that the later was being used for espionage; the UWSA, badly beaten, struggled to survive |
| 2159 | In the 300 years since evolution was first proposed, new species had still not developed; on the contrary - a massive extinction had occurred; less than ten percent of the millions of species alive in the 19th century were still around by the middle of the 22nd century; evolution, completely devoid of scientific merit and without a shred of evidence to support it, was forbidden in all US schools |
| 2160 | Europe and Russia, in a joint effort, completed construction on Easley Station in Earth orbit |
| 2161 | World population 20 billion |
| 2162 | Chinese colony ships arrived at Mars and were at first turned back and then held at Moab by US forces when it was discovered that the Chinese did not have enough supplies to survive a return trip; negotiations back on Earth stretched on for the next few years, but eventually led to an agreement to allow the Chinese to settle at Tharsis, the Russians at Arcadia, and the Europeans at Elysium |
| 2163 | Roger Raupp was released from prison in 2154 and returned to his duties as President of the UWSA where his chief goal was to raise funds to revive the ailing organization; in 2163, he was charged with geneering the mutant birth of his first and only child; he was sentenced to spend the rest of his life under house arrest and died ten years later |
| 2165 | Powered, or mechanized armor gave soldiers superhuman strength and improved skills |
| 2170 | The Social Wars intensified as terrorist attacks continued, especially in Arabia, a proud nation unaccustomed to the yoke of foreign sovereignty - teachers and missionaries in the occupied territories were the most common targets; Muslim temples and schools in the US were closed by an act of Congress; the UN began deliberations on how to federalize all nations of the Earth, but negotiations dragged on for decades because the US still valued her independence |
| 2171 | Vast deposits of diamonds were discovered on Mars in US territories; they were immediately nationalized in order to relieve the US government's growing debt |
| 2172 | The US offered rewards to anyone who would move to Mars; Martian settlers and Cybernetic Installations quickly spread out into mineral rich areas |
| 2173 | The League of Free Men was established in the US by lawyer Tom Wham to demand freedom from religion and unconditional submission to the UN's new federal government; he was killed by an assassin in 2192 near his hotel in Chicago while on the way to a conference; the assassin was a member of the Autonomist Society - an organization that opposed UN interference in US affairs; the assassin was captured but escaped from authorities and was never brought to justice |
| 2177 | Metal disrupting weapons were invented that could melt metals but left flesh untouched |
| 2180 | The US prison system was dismantled; prison sentences were still an option but most convictions resulted in corporal or capital punishments; adultery, fornication and homosexuality were outlawed |
| 2184 | A new US mining Installation on Mars at Thaumasia met with hostility from the Chinese at Tharsis; the US team abandoned the region but border incursions continued |
| 2187 | Large force-field generators were invented that could protect a building or a ship from projectiles |
| 2189 | Additional cities in Argentina and Chili were abandoned because of intolerable radiation levels caused by ozone depletion |
| 2190 | New Eden became a state |
| 2192 | The US began construction on the first heavily armed space battleship, the John Paul Jones at Elmore Station; due to the enormous size of the project and the fact that it had to be built in open space, it was not long before news of its construction reached the other world powers; the Russians soon began designing their own battleship - the Potemkin, the Chinese - the Sun Yat-sen, and the Europeans - the LaForce |
| 2200 | Because of the unfamiliar conditions on Mars (despite the terraforming) and the illegality of human geneering, the US colonists in New Eden went to their neighbors in Tharsis and Elysium to provide their children with genes to make life on Mars more comfortable; Martian attempts to decriminalize human geneering were overturned by the US Supreme Court; back in the US, high paying jobs were going to those whose parents could afford illegal geneering because they were able to perform at inhuman levels; US ID cards were required to state whether their bearer was a pure-strain-human or a mutant; US employers were forbidden from hiring mutants |
| 2201 | Amidst numerous concessions, the United Earth Confederation (UEC) was born |
| 2202 | The UEC's first crisis was resolving the border disputes on Mars; negotiations began between the US, Russia, China and Europe but dragged out over the next decades because of disagreements over mineral rights and were never resolved |
| 2205 | Anti-matter spacecraft propulsion was invented |
| 2206 | The Plague - another mutated strain epidemic; ten billion people died before a cure was found |
| 2209 | The Fifth Terror War - terrorists had gained access to nano-weapons and in 2209 they released a deossifying nano-virus in Seattle - millions died painfully as their bones slowly turned to jelly; the UEC, led by the US, had their own nano response - computerized weapons dispersed nano-bots into hostile territory that 'neutralized' the enemy, completely eliminating their will to fight; entire terrorist strongholds were thus dismantled peacefully without resistance, but many large caches of nuclear, nano and conventional weapons continued to be concealed by terrorists for later use |
| 2210 | The US space battleship John Paul Jones was completed; work began on a second battleship, the Holloway, with anti-matter engines |
| 2212 | The Domar was instituted as the main currency of the UEC; trade in any other currency or commodity was forbidden; the US refused to comply |
| 2213 | The UWSA had finally recovered from its losses; under the leadership of Roger Raupp's mutant daughter, Katherine Raupp, now 51 years old, the organization had moved to Europe and changed its name to the United Western Starship Cartel; the newly renamed UWSC completed construction of the Trans-Plutonian Spaceyards on Pluto in 2213; the human crew lived below ground, crops and livestock were bred there, and the entire city was powered by fusion power plants |
| 2214 | Self repairing materials were invented that resisted cracking and punctures |
| 2215 | The Chinese space battleship Sun Yat-sen was completed |
| 2216 | Small, easily portable force-field generators were invented |
| 2219 | A mining team on Mars discovered evidence of single-celled life that had long since died out |
| 2223 | A transmission from the first UWSA probe launched back in 2142 arrived from Tau Ceti; the planet there was not only colonizable, it was teeming with life, the first such discovery beyond the Earth; "The absence of intelligent life on Tau Ceti," said US President Gary DeMar, "proves that man is unique in the universe, and underscores our obligation to God to hold dominion over all things."; preparations began in the US for colonization of Tau Ceti |
| 2224 | World population 25 billion |
| 2225 | The first interstellar colony ship, the Pekul, was launched by the UWSC destined for Tau Ceti with a crew comprised of citizens of many nations; in the years leading up to the Apocalyse, 6 additional UWSC ships left for Tau Ceti; Katherine Raupp left with the last of those ships, the Darlene, in 2310 at the age of 148 (the average life expectancy in the 23rd century among industrial nations was 150, mutants often lived well into their 200's); in 2231 the US Colony Ship Pilgrim left Elmore Station for Tau Ceti with a crew of several hundred Americans led by the Reverend William Sizemore; 3 additional US ships left for Tau Ceti in the next few decades; China launched the first of 3 colony ships to Tau Ceti in 2245 |
| 2227 | The US space battleship Holloway was completed and soon headed for Mars with a host of gunships; work began on a third battleship, the Roslof, which was never completed |
| 2229 | The European and Russian space battleships La Force and Potemkin were completed |
| 2230 | All UEC residents were required to carry government issued ID cards; the US refused to submit and withdrew from the UEC |
| 2235 | The New Eden Massacre - the US colony on Mars had become a hotbed of liberalism because of their distance from Washington; the colonists protested a series of attempts by the federal government back on Earth to normalize Martian law enforcement; a general strike was brutally ended by US troops; the strike instigators were given military trials at Moab and executed; David Chilton, the US general that led the assault, radioed back to the Earth the infamous phrase that got him into trouble later, "God rejoices at the death of these heathens." |
| 2238 | Instantaneous mass transporters that could transfer matter from one place directly to another were invented; it was never perfected for use with living beings |
| 2244 | Nano-bots revolutionized the construction industry by using carbon to create diamonds; these diamondoids could be made to be indistinguishable from the gemstone or be used to construct super-strong structures |
| 2245 | A portable med-kit that used nano-bots to cure disease and repair tissue was invented |
| 2247 | Astronomical expenditures to deal with such dire crises as global warming, alternative fuel research, terrorism, social problems, the space race and the cost of supporting the greatest army the world had ever seen overwhelmed the US with debt; crisis spending had been supported by an unrivalled gross national product, incrementally increasing taxes and diamond exports from Mars, but a steady decline in productivity, the loss of technical jobs to other nations and the invention of synthetic diamonds put the US in a real bind and the administration was seduced into minting fresh money to keep it afloat; in the Summer of 2247, the devastating effects of runaway inflation were first felt - the price of necessities, like bread, doubled every few days and attempts to fix prices lower drove many merchants out of business; to end weeks of rioting that unpaid law enforcement officers were unable, or unwilling, to prevent, the US Congress voted to rejoin the UEC and seek remediation from the World Bank; the Domar was instituted in the US making it truly global for the first time; the fallout from the US economic collapse was disastrous for the Reconstructionists - although they did not entirely deserve the blame, the Reconstruction party was ruined; however, the reforms that they instituted in the 127 years in which they dominated US politics outlived them by centuries - our own government in Manchester today owes much to their traditions, their respect for God's law, and the institutions that they began |
| 2249 | The UWSC regained control of Sagan; the US had used Sagan to study global warming on Earth and Mars; the UWSC redirected her away from the Solar system and began to find more Earth-like planets; a second wave of interstellar probes were soon launched from Pluto to scout out recently discovered Earth-like worlds; no one knows if they were successful because no radio telescopes were operational if and when they finally reached their destinations |
| 2251 | Artificial gravity and anti-grav technology were invented |
| 2252 | A means of broadcasting power to a remote receiver was invented; US population 2 billion |
| 2253 | A new federal constitution for the UEC was ratified by all members; the UEC became the United Earth Federation (UEF); all armies of the world were subordinated to the UEF |
| 2254 | Yoyo-Dyne Enterprises in Europe invented the first anti-grav tank for the UEF; Yoyo-Dyne's chief engineer and CEO, David Trampier, a mutant, was only 12 years old |
| 2255 | Nano-bots that were capable of transmitting images and sound revolutionized intelligence gathering; eavesdropping robots that were invisible and could go almost anywhere were a valuable tool in the UEF's efforts to eliminate terrorism |
| 2256 | The greatest army that the world had ever known passed into history as it merged with the UEF; only the Autonomist Society resisted the US Army's subjugation; in 2256 the last brave enclaves of the Autonomists were 'neutralized' by US troops wearing the new UEF uniform |
| 2257 | A transmission from the second UWSA probe arrived from 70 Ophiuchi; it was a candidate for immediate colonization and teeming with life; the US launched the first of 2 colony ships to 70 Ophiuchi in 2258; the UWSC launched the first of 4 colony ships to 70 Ophiuchi in 2260; China launched the first of 3 colony ships to 70 Ophiuchi in 2265 |
| 2258 | UEF courts sentenced David Chilton to life in prison for crimes against humanity for his involvement in the New Eden Massacre |
| 2259 | Anti-grav 'Bubble Cars' capable of travelling to and from orbit were invented |
| 2260 | Tycho base, now known as Tycho Center, became the regional Capitol of Luna; most Lunar citizens moved to Tycho Center and the day-to-day control of outlying bases was delegated to the local Cybernetic Installations |
| 2261 | An accident in Albuquerque, New Mexico killed 5 million people in a nuclear explosion |
| 2263 | The UEF had used its federal powers to reform various American civil institutions to make them more worldly, but in 2263 the US successfully defeated an attempt to reintroduce evolution into American classrooms |
| 2264-2266 | The Sixth Terror War - terrorists managed to smuggle a nuclear weapon onboard the US elevator platform and detonated it several miles up, sending the elevator crashing into the Pacific ocean; the Pacific elevator was never rebuilt; the UEF re-took control of Singapore, Syria, Lebanon, Iran and Arabia; to rebuild a world economy that had been struggling for decades and was further distressed by the cost of the war, the UEF forcibly opened the Arab world to foreign markets |
| 2265 | New Eden became the regional Capitol for all of Mars |
| 2266 | World population 35 billion |
| 2267 | Warp-pulse communication was invented; signals could be sent four times faster than the speed of light, potentially improving communications with the interstellar colonies, none of which had yet arrived; the technology required the construction of a central communication station that was built out near Pluto by UEF and UWSC engineers; details of how to use the new technology were sent to the colony ships enroute to Tau Ceti and 70 Ophiuchi - broadcast via conventional radio transmissions that regularly relayed news, entertainment and technological breakthroughs that were not the property of private corporations |
| 2271 | At Tycho Center, scientists studying the effect of reduced gravity on metal invented duralloy which was an even better construction material than diamondoids in some ways |
| 2277 | Construction began at the Trans-Plutonian Spaceyards on the Warden, the largest colony ship ever to leave the Solar system and the first colony ship, interstellar or otherwise, to contain a self-sustaining environment and enough supplies so that the colonists did not have to be frozen during the journey |
| 2278 | A bloody, coordinated uprising in Saudi Arabia and elsewhere in the occupied territories, resulted in tens of thousands of arrests; the UEF put the entire Arab world under curfew and restricted movement between cities |
| 2281 | A transmission from the third UWSA probe arrived from 82 Eridani; it was a candidate for immediate colonization and teeming with life; the first of 3 UWSC colony ships left for 82 Eridani in 2284; China launched their first and only colony ship to 82 Eridani in 2289; the US launched their first and only colony ship to 82 Eridani in 2290 |
| 2288 | Construction on the Warden was completed |
| 2289 | Work began at the Trans-Plutonian Spaceyards on a second giant colony ship, the Morden |
| 2290 | The Warden left the Solar system with 1.55 million colonists and crew |
| 2296 | The Plague - another mutated strain arose, but a cure was never discovered; best estimates suggest that somewhere between 15 and 25 billion people died of this Plague |
| 2297 | News reached the Earth via warp-pulse communications that the Pekul had arrived safely in orbit around Tau Ceti after travelling 11.4 light years at an average speed of 95,000 kilometers a second; the first extra-Solar human colony was founded; native plants were edible, native livestock was plentiful and crops and livestock brought from the Earth flourished; although it took the colonists 4 years to complete construction on their warp-pulse comm station, its first message reached the Earth 3 years earlier than the first conventional message which was sent when the colonists first arrived |
| 2298 | Construction began in Earth orbit on the Event Horizon, a spacecraft that used newly invented dimension-warp technology that would have allowed faster than light travel between stars |
| 2301 | US population 3 billion |
| 2307 | The UWSC Colony Ship Canopus returned to the Earth under robot control after an unlikely and unexplained collision with an asteroid occurred nearly a quarter of the way to her destination - Tau Ceti; the hibernating crew was infected with what came to be known as the "Canopus Plague", an excruciating disease which dissolved the skin into a black, pudding-like substance and destroyed the mind; the disease never reached the Earth, but the space battleship LaForce and Elmore Station were infected and had to be destroyed |
| 2308 | The Event Horizon was destroyed, but the exact details were never discovered - it may have been an accident or a terrorist attack; the Earth and Luna were pummeled with radiation and falling, irradiated duralloy; refugees abandoned their communities because of the radiation; the Sun Yat-sen and dozens of gunships were destroyed in the blast and fell to the Earth; the Potemkin arrived shortly after the blast to investigate but was damaged by radiation; the survivors abandoned the Potemkin and her onboard Cybernetic Installation was left in control; the John Paul Jones left Mars to protect the Earth, leaving Mars in the care of the troops at Moab |
| 2309 | An angry mob, displaced by the falling radiation from the Event Horizon, burned Oxford University to the ground after several nights of rioting; Paul Jaquays, a science professor at Oxford, was said to have held back the mob by giving an eloquent speech in which he said, "In order to make progress, one must leave the door to the unknown ajar," before being crushed to death; over the next decade, similar incidents occurred around the world at universities, news media offices, geneering facilities and civil institutions - sparked by anger over falling radiation, rumors that the Plague was man-made, rumors that scientists were withholding a cure, and a general sense that government and science were to blame for the growing crises |
| 2309-2322 | The Shadow Years - an era of sparse and contradictory historical records; paper had been almost completely replaced by the ease of use and reliability of electronic media, and much was lost in the riots that characterized the Shadow Years; the last known census showed world population approaching 40 billion |
| 2313 | A transmission from the fourth UWSA probe arrived from Beta Hydri; the planet there was terraformable but not immediately colonizable; no colony ships ever left for Beta Hydri |
| 2314-2322 | The Seventh Terror War - occupied Arab nations took advantage of the global crisis by striking at any and all targets of opportunity; terrorists used stolen 'neutralizing' weapons and barbarically slaughtered their victims as they watched helplessly; the worst atrocities occurred in Jerusalem, where it is not known if any citizens survived |
| 2316 | The space telescope Hubble fell from Earth orbit into the Atlantic |
| 2319 | The Trans-Plutonian Spaceyards reported that they were being attacked by terrorists shortly before transmissions abruptly ended - transmissions from the warp-pulse communication station near Pluto ceased soon after |
| 2320 | Fragmentary transmissions from the Warden were received - the ship had apparently entered a radiation cloud and the crew was lost; Observatories in Alaska and Australia noted the appearance of an asteroid on a collision course with the Earth - the news was never acted upon |
| 2321 | An outbreak of Plague in New Eden spread to the rest of the planet; terrorists on Mars took advantage of the confusion and destroyed Moab Air Force Base; these events were communicated back to the Earth by the Phobos Cybernetic Installation before it abruptly went offline; several lightly armed gunships left the Earth to protect Mars but the John Paul Jones remained to protect the Earth; no signals have been detected from Mars since then and her fate is still unknown |
| 2322 | (April 17) The Apocalypse - 'The Thumb of God' asteroid struck the Earth, leaving an enormous crater where Jerusalem had been; the mideast and much of Asia were incinerated by the impact; massive earthquakes shook cities on the other side of the world; tsunamis caused coastal flooding; fine silt and dirt choked the atmosphere along with radioactive materials and nano-tech weapons that had been stockpiled in the region; a global night covered the world that lasted over a year; many Lunar citizens returned to the Earth in bubble cars hoping to save family and friends but only a few returned to Tycho Center, and those that did returned with unknown and infectious diseases |
| 2322 | (April 24) Bill Willingham, a software engineer that had lived his entire life at Tycho Center, survived the Tycho outbreak by barricading himself in the Cybernetic lab and shutting off the air circulation; Bill reprogrammed the Tycho Cybernetic Installation to be self-sustaining, and provided enough nano-bots for it to protect the Center for millenia before he ran out of air and suffocated; TCI regularly broadcast brief transmissions indicating her status; by 2360 mutated plant life had taken control of the hydroponic research labs; by 2400 the plants had spread into vital areas of Tycho Center; unprepared by Willingham's programming to stave off the invasion, TCI used its resources to keep pathways clear for her robots to perform their duties; TCI's transmissions ceased without warning in 2440 |
| 2322 | (May 2) Jeff Dee, the Captain of the John Paul Jones, sent landing parties down to Earth to offer assistance; some returned and brought infectious diseases with them that went unnoticed in the crisis; the ship was soon ordered abandoned and still orbits the Earth today under cybernetic control |
| 2323 | Most remaining global plant life died; people that survived the Apocalyse, and the radiation and nano-viruses that rained on the Earth in the following week, faced starvation in the years that followed; average estimates indicate that not more than a million humans survived by the end of 2323 |
| 2323-2350 | Years Without Summer - an unnatural winter descended upon the Earth and the sun was scarcely seen; the sea, which had previously engulfed many communities near its edge, now receded below its original borders |
| 2324 | David Barton, a baptist minister, witnessed the death of his entire congregation; he fasted and sought forgiveness from God; he stumbled through the perpetual twilight that still existed even then until one night, on the outskirts of Manchester, an enormous cross appeared in the sky and the voice of God spoke to him, "By my name thou shalt conquer"; on his knees and close to despair, he discovered edible plants that miraculously still lived; others arrived and a permanent settlement was established amidst the ruins; survivors that made it to Manchester reported being attacked by animals, humans and deadly plants that had been horribly mutated by the radioactive fallout; it was not long before barricades were built and the residents of Manchester learned a new and deeper fear of this new breed of mutants |
| 2336-2340 | Occasional transmissions were received from routine systems aboard the Warden; they ended as abruptly as they began |
| 2420 | Unintelligible transmissions were received from the Warden's last known position |
| 2449 | The Potemkin was boarded by mutants who had gained access to military passcodes and identity badges; the Potemkin's security robots defended the ship after the invasion was discovered but ultimately lost and the Cybernetic Installation was destroyed; within a few weeks the ship plunged into the Pacific Ocean |
| 2462 | A scout ship from Tau Ceti, the Bigby, arrived seeking to explain the profound silence that had overcome the Earth; the Bigby's Cybernetic Installation lost communication with her landing party shortly before being boarded and dismantled by unknown assailants |
| 2476 | The citizens of Manchester had previously believed that a war had destroyed New England and that they had been forgotten, but in 2476 a Cybernetic Installation was discovered in the ruins of Boston that had been in contact with other Installations on Earth and elsewhere; the citizens of Manchester discovered from it what had happened - they also learned that other isolated pockets of humanity existed around the world, more often than not ruled by warlords using what remained of ancient technologies to wield power over their neighbors |
| 2477 | Explorer David Sutherland left Manchester in search of other survivors |
| 2479 | The population of Manchester reached one thousand |
| 2480 | Sutherland returned to Manchester with a small convoy from the city of Augusta; trade and friendship between the two cities led to the creation of the Restoration Alliance with the aim of restoring America's lost glory |
| 2484 | Sutherland returned from a second expedition having discovered survivors in the southern city of Providence which soon joined the Alliance |
| 2486 | Sutherland left on a third journey westward, but never returned |
| 2590 | Manchester's fusion power plant was restored |
| 2630 | The New Hampshire University in Manchester was reopened |
| 2786 | A census in the three city-states of the Restoration Alliance listed 43,975 citizens |
| 2788 |
An expedition of professors and graduates from the University of New Hampshire led by Timothy Truman
left Providence;
they journeyed as far south as Philadelphia when they discovered portions of the ruins populated
by heavily armed androids;
Truman and a few other members of the expedition returned safely
|
| 2790 | The present |
This timeline is based on the Gamma World timeline written by James Ward and Roger Moore in 1984. The following historical 'heros', if you will, are artists that have created artwork for roleplaying games published by TSR:
Roger Raupp
Larry Elmore
Jeff Easley
Tom Wham
Jim Holloway
Darlene Pekul
Jim Roslof
David Trampier
Paul Jaquays
Bill Willingham
Jeff Dee
Bigby - a wizard character played by Gary Gygax
David C. Sutherland III
Timothy Truman
David S. "Diesel" LaForce
The 'Villains' of this history are ideologues who espouse the tenets of dominion theonomy, or Christian Reconstructionism. Their unexpurgated drivel is exhibited at www.hisglory.us (the Institute for Theonomic Reformation.)
Gary North - Rousas John Rushdoony - Gary DeMar - David Chilton - David BartonReal historical figures:
Li Shimin - (aka Taizong 'Supreme Ancestor') Emperor of the Tang dynasty who ruled China from 626 to 649 in a era of peace and prosperity
John Paul Jones - Founder of the US Navy and the only American commander to invade Britain during the American Revolution
Grigori Potemkin - A Russian field marshall who played an important role in the conquest and annexation of the Crimea from the Ottoman Empire in 1783
Sun Yat-sen - Father of the Chinese Revolution, founder of the Chinese Nationalist Party (or Kuomintang) and first provisional president of China after the Manchu dynasty collapsed in 1911
The works of Joseph Campbell, Pale Blue Dot by Carl Sagan, The Population Explosion by Paul and Anne Ehrlich, The Decline and Fall of the Roman Empire by Edward Gibbon and the following resources were also influential and/or inspirational:
- A population calculator
- General timeline of history to the present
- Timeline of conflict in the mideast
- Information on stars within 50 light years of Sol
- Methods of terraforming Mars
- Nanotechnology
- History, belief and practices of Christian Reconstructionism
Other speculative histories:
- Orion's Arm - Encyclopaedia Galactica
- Speculative timeline of future technology and social change
- Wired Magazine's fictional Museum of Nano-Technology
- A humorous future news feed