7. Assassination of President Abraham Lincoln
President Abraham Lincoln was elected in 1860, just a few months before the start of the Civil War. Lincoln was the first and only president in the U.S. to lead the country while a civil war was going on. Still, he was able to unite the country and eventually the south conceded to the north. Still, there was a lot of resentment from the south and on April 14, 1865 during a performance at Ford’s Theatre in Washington, D.C., John Wilkes Booth shot the president. This was a huge turning point in American history, especially toward racial tensions and segregation.