INSPIRING!!!...SEE Biography Of NELSON MANDELA .... The Anti-Apartheid Fighter Who Went To Prison For The Cause

1918 July 18: Rolihlahla Dalibhunga Mandela is born a member of the Madiba clan in Eastern Cape of South Africa. His tribal name, 'Rolihalah', means 'troublemaker'. He is later given his English name, Nelson, by a teacher at his school

1919 His father is dispossessed of his land and money on the orders of a white magistrate

1927 His father dies and the the acting chief of the Thembu clan, Jongintaba Dalindyebo becomes his guardian.

1937 Moves to Healdtown, attending the Wesleyan college in Fort Beaufort.
Starts at Fort Hare University where meets his lifelong friend and future fellow activist Oliver Tambo

1939 He is asked to leave Fort Hare due to his involvement in a boycott of the Students' Representative Council against the university policies.
He then moves to Johannesburg to escape an arranged marriage and suffers his first experiences of the system of apartheid.
He spent the next few years working as a guard at a mine and then a clerk at a law firm before continuing his studies

1943 Joins the African National Congress (ANC) as an activist.

1944 Forms the Youth League of the ANC with Oliver Tambo and Walter Sislu
Later that year he gets married for the first time, to Evelyn Ntoko Mase, with whom he has three children

1948 The apartheid policy is introduced across the country the ruling Afrikaner-dominated National Party

1952 Mandela opens the first black legal firm in South Africa with Oliver Tambo providing free or low-cost legal counsel to many blacks who would otherwise have been without legal representation.

1955 Freedom Charter adopted at the Congress of the People calling for equal rights and a program of the anti-apartheid cause

1956 December 5: Accused of conspiring to overthrow the South African state by violent means with 155 other political activists and charged with high treason. The Treason Trial of 1956–61 follows and all were acquitted

1957 His marriage of 13 years to his first wife Evelyn Ntoko Mase breaks up
The same year he marries Nomzamo 'Winnie' Madikizela, a social worker, and the couple have two children.

1959 Parliament passes new laws extending racial segregation by creating separate homelands for major black groups in South Africa

1960 69 peaceful protesters are killed by police in the Sharpeville Massacre; in the aftermath the ANC is banned, prompting Mandela to go into hiding. While in hiding he forms an underground military group with armed resistance

1962 After living on the run for seventeen months he is arrested on August 5 and imprisoned in the Johannesburg Fort. On October 25 he is sentenced to five years in prison but again goes on the run

1964 On June 12 Mandela is captured and convicted of sabotage and treason. He is sentenced to life imprisonment at the age of 46, initially on Robben island where he would be kept for 18 years

1968 His mother dies and his eldest son is killed in a car crash but he is not allowed to attend either of the funerals

1980 The exiled Oliver Tambo launches an international campaign for the release of his friend

1986 Sanctions against South Africa are tightened, costing millions in revenue

1990 On February 11, Nelson Mandela is released from prison after 27 years. He had served the last part of his sentence in Victor Verster Prison in Paarl.
President De Klerk lifts the ban on the African National Congress (ANC). The ANC and the white National Party begin talks on forming a multi-racial democracy for South Africa.

1991 Mandela becomes President of the ANC. The International Olympic Committee lift a 21-year ban on South African athletes competing in the Olympic Games.

1992 He separates from Winnie Mandela after she is convicted of kidnapping and being an accessory to assault. The following March they divorce.

1993 Nelson Mandela and Mr de Klerk are awarded the Nobel Peace Prize

1994 April 26 Free Elections where black South Africans are allowed to vote for the first time.
Nelson Mandela runs for President and the ANC win 252 of the 400 seats in the national assembly
May Mandela is inaugurated as the first black president of South Africa. He appoints de Klerk as deputy president and forms the racially mixed Government of National Unity.

1995 South Africa hosts the 1995 Rugby World Cup and South Africa wins. Nelson Mandela wears a Springbok shirt when he presents the trophy to Afrikaner captain Francois Pienaar. This gesture was seen as a major step in the reconciliation of white and black South Africans.

1998 Marries Graca Machel, the widow of the former president of Mozambique, on his 80th birthday.

1999 Relinquishes presidency in favour of Thabo Mbeki, who was nominated ANC president in 1997.

2001 Nelson Mandela was diagnosed and treated for prostate cancer

2004 June: Nelson Mandela announced that he would be retiring from public life at the age of 85

2005 His son, Makgatho Mandela died of AIDS

2010 Mandela makes a rare public appearance at the football World Cup in South Africa 2012 An increasingly frail Mandela is admitted to hospital twice in February and December

Source: www.history-timelines.org.uk