1877 allows the teacher to tell them about the rise of big business and why that was a bad thing, and tell of the heroic struggles of union organizers. But 1954 would be better--start US history with the Brown decision and the Birmingham bus boycott. Then to the Little Rock desegregation story, the sit-ins, the civil rights marches, the horrors of Vietnam, Watergate, and the Reagan revolution, the unrealized dreams of the Clinton years, the horrors of the Cheney-Bush Regime, the wonderful new era of Hope and Change with Obama, etc.
After all, government schools have the duty to indoctrinate their students so they will become reliable supporters of the government party, and immune to anything they may hear from the hatemongers on Fox...
Oops, that should have been the Montgomery bus boycott. Right state anyway—close enough for government work.