September 1957 - Kevin born to Albert and Margaret Rudd in Nambour, Queensland.
1962 - Five-year old Rudd contracts rheumatic fever, permanently damaging his heart.
1968 - Albert Rudd dies and the family is forced to leave their farm.
1972 - Kevin Rudd joins the Labor Party, aged 15.
1975 - Rudd studies Arts at the Australian National University, graduating with First Class Honours in Asian Studies. He majored in Chinese history and learnt to speak Mandarin, a skill that later helped him build ties with Beijing a Prime Minister.
1981 - Rudd joined the Department of Foreign Affairs as a diplomat. He says with the department for seven years, and in this time is posted to Stockholm and Beijing. Also this year, Rudd marries his long-time girlfriend Therese Rein.
1984 - Kevin Rudd and Therese Rein's first child, Jessica, is born. They go on to have two more children, Nicholas (born in 1986) and Marcus (born 1993).
1988 - After leaving DFAT, Rudd becomes Chief of Staff for Queensland's then Labor Opposition Leader, Wayne Goss.
1996 - Rudd unsuccessfully campaigns for the Queensland seat of Griffith.
1998 - Rudd wins Griffith at the federal election.
2001 - Rudd becomes Shadow Minister for Foreign Affairs.
2005 - Rudd adds Shadow Minister for Trade to his foreign affairs portfolio.
2006 - Kevin Rudd beats Kim Beazley to take leadership of the federal Labor Party. Julia Gillard is elected unopposed as his Deputy.
2007 - ALP and Kevin Rudd wins landslide victory at the federal election. One of his first acts as PM is to ratify the Kyoto Protocol.
2008 - Kevin Rudd apologises to the so-called Stolen Generation in federal parliament.
2009 - Utegate scandal rocks faith in the PM until it is revealed the emails on which the scandal are based are fake. Later this year, ETS is defeated in parliament, and the ALP suffers a major setback as the Copenhagen climate change summit fails to reach consensus on carbon trading.
2010 - ALP's slide in the polls results in speculation around Kevin Rudd's leadership.
June 2010 - Gillard challenges Rudd to a leadership spill.
