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Forrest Learns his Ancestry.
In the beginning of the film it explains that Forrest got his name due to his mother's admiration of Nathan Bedford Forrest, who was one of the initial leaders of the Ku Klux Klan. Link text -
Elvis Presley stays at Forrest's house; Forrest invented the famous dance that Elvis does.
While Elvis Presley is on the road, he stops at Forrest's house to stay a few nights. He plays the guitar and sings for Forrest, while watching Forrest dance around. Two years later, in 1956, Elvis is seen on television doing the exact same dance that Forrest was. -
Forrest meets JFK.
He, Forrest, is given an award of some sort in which JFK presented him and others with their awards. Later in the movie, Forrest speaks of JFK and RFK's assassination. Link text -
Segregation and the University of Alabama.
Segregation is slowly being beaten in the southern states, but then George Wallace tries to stop a black couple from entering the University of Alabama. Forrest is present and witnesses this. Link text -
Forrest joins the Vietnam War.
Forrest does just that. He joins the Vietnam War in 1967. While there, he becomes best friends with a black man named Bubba, who has a passion for cooking shrimp and plans to have his own shrimp boat one day. When there is a deadly explosion in the woods of Vietnam, Forrest goes in and carries all of his fellow soldiers out, including a legless Lt. Dan and a dead Bubba. Link text -
Forrest Meets Hippie Culture and Black Panther Party.
After returning from the Vietnam War, as a war veteran, Forrest meets the Hippie Culture and the Black Panther Party. He incidentally runs into Ginny while he is there. This happens between 1968 and 1969. Link text -
The Moon Landing appears on TV.
The first person to land on the moon is shown on TV. -
Forrest meets John Lennon.
Forrest is now famous for his excellent ping-pong playing skills and is going on a talk show to be interviewed about it. John Lennon is also present. It mentions that later in time John Lennon was shot 1980, approximately 9 years after he met Forrest. -
Forrest Witnesses the Watergate Scandal.
Forrest meets president Nixon due to his ping-pong fame; Nixon offers him a room at the finest hotel around, in which later Forrest looks across the street and sees that people are creeping around a dark room with flashlights. This is known as the Watergate Scandal, which is when Nixon hired some burglars to get some government documents to make sure he was elected as president again. Link text -
Nixon Resigns.
Due to the Watergate Scandal, there has been a lot of drama involving Nixon, such as him being a "fraud" for the said event. This leads to him resigning as president.
