This chronology offers a list of selected dates related to the "How Much is Enough?" website.

• 1742
  • Benjamin Franklin's General Magazine prints the first American magazine ads.
• 1835
  • Phineas T. Barnum (1810-1891) sets the tone for American advertising when he convinces people to pay to see Joice Heth, a woman he claims is the former slave of George Washington and is 161 years old.

• 1742
  • Benjamin Franklin's General Magazine prints the first American magazine ads.
• 1835
  • Phineas T. Barnum (1810-1891) sets the tone for American advertising when he convinces people to pay to see Joice Heth, a woman he claims is the former slave of George Washington and is 161 years old.
• 1841
  • Volney Palmer opens the first American advertising agency in Philadelphia.
• 1859
  • Macy's expands from a dry-goods store to a department store.
• 1861
  • There are twenty advertising agencies in New York City.
• 1869
  • The Noble Order of the Knights of Labor is founded in Philadelphia.
  • The Massachusetts Bureau of Labor Statistics, the first bureau of labor statistics in the world, is established.
• 1870
  • Jacob Riis (1849-1914) emigrates from Denmark to the United States.
• 1870s
  • Charles E. Hires begins advertising Hires Root Beer in the Philadelphia Ledger, expanding over the next two decades into national magazines.
• 1872
  • Montgomery Ward begins mail-order business with the issue of its first catalog.
• 1875
  • 1,138 brand names and trademarks are registered with the US Patent Office.
• 1883
  • Cyrus H.K. Curtis launches Ladies' Home Journal and Life with his spouse, Louisa Knapp Curtis, as editor.
• 1884
  • United States Bureau of Labor Statistics is founded.
• 1885
  • American Economic Association is founded.
• 1886
  • The American Federation of Labor is established in Columbus, Ohio.
  • Sears, Roebuck & Company begins mail-order business.
• 1887
  • Jacob Riis begins documenting poverty through photography.
• 1888
  • Congress establishes the Department of Labor.
• 1889
  • Jane Addams and Ellen Gates Starr found Hull House in Chicago, Illinois.
• 1890
  • Approximately 23,000 children work in factories in thirteen southern states.
• 1890
  • Jacob Riis publishes How the Other Half Lives, chronicling of the lives of New York City's poor.
• 1891
  • Pope Leo XIII releases encyclical Rerum Novarum detailing the Catholic Church's position on the condition of labor.
  • Nathan Fowler, in Advertising Age, recommends that because women make most of the purchasing decisions of their households, manufacturers would profit by directing their advertising messages to them.
• 1892
  • New York Tribune publishes "American Millionaires," a list of 4,047 millionaires in the United States.
• 1894
  • Laborers in the mining, clothing, and transportation industries strike across the United States.
• 1895
  • Hull House Maps and Papers is published.
• 1898
  • Father John A. Ryan is ordained and will soon begin teaching at The Catholic University of America.
• 1900
  • The population of the U.S., at 76 million, is now almost double that of 1870.
• 1901
  • United States Steel is incorporated through the merger of ten companies. It is the world's largest industrial corporation.
• 1901
  • Coca-Cola's advertising budget is 1 million dollars.
• 1902
  • The Anthracite Coal Strike begins and lasts 5 months. The United Mine Workers' demands include union representation, wage increases of 20 %, and eight-hour workdays.
  • New York World Almanac lists 3,561 millionaires
  • The state of Maryland passes a workers' compensation law, the nation's first
  • The American Anthropological Association is founded
  • Ladies Home Journal introduces a new column on women's clothing
  • Thorstein Veblen's Theory of the Leisure Class: An Economic Study of Institutions is published. In the book he explains an extravagant and misguided consumerism of the among the upper classes as "conspicuous consumption."
• 1903
  • The Department of Commerce and Labor is created by Congress.
• 1904
  • Robert Hunter's study Poverty is published. Hunter put the nation's poverty rate at about 12%, a number that recent social scientists now believe was too low. Current estimates of poverty in 1900 put the percentage at closer to 40%.
  • The "Campbell's Kids" are created to sell Campbell's Soups.
  • Sapolio soap becomes a popular name brand and an early example of the growing influence of advertising campaigns on public consumption.
• 1905
  • The Industrial Workers of the World is established in Chicago.
  • American Sociological Association is founded.
  • Madame C. J. Walker (Sarah Breedlove) successfully markets a hair straightener to black women, making Walker a prominent businesswoman in the black community.
• 1906
  • The First Annual Advertising Show opens in New York City, initiating the "age of advertising."
• 1909
  • The "Uprising of Thirty Thousand," a garment workers' strike, erupts in New York City. It is the first female-dominated mass action, and after fourteen weeks the workers win. The victory establishes the International Ladies Garment Workers Union as a powerful force in the labor movement.
• 1910
  • John Wanamaker opens Wanamaker's, a twelve-story department store in Philadelphia, the most monumental commercial structure in the world at the time.
  • $600 million is spent on advertising by big business, representing 4% of the national income.
• 1910s
  • Modern market research begins. As a result, ads are increasingly targeted to specific audiences.
• 1911
  • The Triangle Shirtwaist Factory fire kills 145 workers in Manhattan. The factory's owners are indicted for manslaughter due to unsafe working conditions.
• 1913
  • The National Conference of Charities and Correction elects Fr. John A. Ryan to the executive committee of its national board. That same year, he launches a campaign in support of a minimum wage law.
• 1914
  • Henry Ford announces he will pay his employees a minimum of five dollars a day and inaugurate three eight-hour shifts.
• 1915
  • The first transcontinental telephone line opens for service from New York City to San Francisco.
• 1916
  • Domestic and international trade hit all time highs. Domestic commerce generates $45 billion, and exports top $8 billion.
• 1917
  • To support recruiting efforts and promote sales of war bonds and stamps during World War I, thousands of advertisers feature war themes in their campaigns while the media contribute space. By 1919, contributions total $2.5 billion.
• 1918
  • Father John A. Ryan raises the minimum annual living wage from $600 (in 1905) to $1386.
• 1914-1918
  • World War I.
• 1919
  • Since the passage of the child labor provision in the federal tax code in April, child labor is reduced by 40 %, particularly in the coal mining and canning industries.
• 1920
  • Drug, toilet, and household preparations output for domestic consumption is $765 million, up from only $40 million in 1879.
• 1923
  • Father John A. Ryan initiates the Catholic Conference on Industrial Problems.
• 1929
  • The stock market crash helps usher in the Great Depression. Advertising spending plummets as unemployment rises. From its high of $3.5 billion, ad spending sinks to $1.5 billion by 1933.
• 1936
  • Life magazine publishes its first edition. It later becomes the first magazine to carry $100 million annually in advertising.
• 1938
  • Radio surpasses magazines as a source of advertising revenue
• 1941
  • With 7,500 TV sets in New York City, NBC's WNBT begins telecasting July 1. The first TV ad spots feature a ticking Bulova watch.
• 1942
  • The War Advertising Council is organized to help prepare voluntary advertising campaigns for wartime efforts. The council garners $350 million in free public service messages. After the war it is renamed the Advertising Council.
• 1941-1945
  • World War II.
• 1940s
  • Madison Avenue begins targeting messages and products to the "teenager," as a specific consumer group.
• 1945
  • Father John A. Ryan dies.