-
Comedian Richard Pryor
after several days of freebasing cocaine, he lit himself on fire in a suicide attempt. It was initially reported as an accident, but he later admitted in his autobiography that he had done it on purpose in a drug haze. -
US attempt at rescue of Hostages in Tehran
Operation Eagle Claw, known as Operation Tabas in Iran, was a United States Armed Forces operation ordered by U.S. President Jimmy Carter to attempt to end the Iran hostage crisis by rescuing 52 embassy staff held captive at the Embassy of the United States, Tehran on 24 April 1980. -
Pac-Man
is an arcade game designed by Toru Iwatani and published by Namco and Midway Games. -
CNN
On June 1, 1980, CNN aired its first news broadcast anchored by the husband and wife team of David Walker and Lois Hart. -
Death of John Lennon
the English musician John Lennon, formerly of the Beatles, was shot and killed in the archway of the Dakota, his residence in New York City. -
Assassination Attempt on Reagan
President Ronald Reagan and three others were shot and wounded by John Hinckley Jr. in Washington, D.C., as they were leaving a speaking engagement at the Washington Hilton Hotel. -
MS-DOS released
Although MS-DOS and PC DOS were initially developed in parallel by Microsoft and IBM, the two products diverged after twelve years, in 1993, with recognizable differences in compatibility, syntax, and capabilities. -
first U.S. IVF baby
Elizabeth Jordan Carr (born December 28, 1981 at 7:46 am) is the United States' first baby born from the in-vitro fertilization procedure and the 15th in the world. -
Michael Jackson “Thriller”
It explores genres similar to Jackson's previous album, Off the Wall (1979), including pop, post-disco, rock and funk. Recording took place from April to November 1982 at Westlake Recording Studios in Los Angeles, with a production budget of $750,000. -
“We Are the World”
is a charity single originally recorded by the supergroup United Support of Artists (USA) for Africa in 1985. -
NIKE releases Air Jordan 1
Air Jordan 1 Original White/Black-Red in 1985, that’s when the sneaker game would change forever. The Air Jordan 1 OG known as the “Chicago” Away are one of the most iconic sneakers in the game. -
Gorbachev calls for “Glasnost” and “Perestroika”
was a political movement for reformation within the Communist Party of the Soviet Union during the 1980s and 1990s and is widely associated with Soviet leader Mikhail Gorbachev and his glasnost policy reform. -
Ryan White
The Ryan White HIV/AIDS Program was named for a courageous young man named Ryan White who was diagnosed with AIDS following a blood transfusion in December 1984. -
Chernobyl
The Chernobyl disaster, also referred to as the Chernobyl accident, was a catastrophic nuclear accident that occurred on 25–26 April 1986 in the No. 4 nuclear reactor of the Chernobyl Nuclear Power Plant, near the now-abandoned city of Pripyat, in northern Ukrainian SSR. -
Hands Across America
was a public event on Sunday, May 25, 1986, in which approximately 6.5 million people held hands for fifteen minutes in an attempt to form a continuous human chain across the contiguous United States. -
Soviet Troops withdraw from Afghanistan
The final and complete withdrawal of Soviet combatant forces from Afghanistan began on 15 May 1988 and ended on 15 February 1989 under the leadership of Colonel-General Boris Gromov. -
The Central Park Five.
The brutal assault of the 28-year-old white investment banker, who had been out for a jog the night before, led to widespread public outcry and the quick arrest and subsequent conviction of five black and Latino teens,Antron McCray, 15, Kevin Richardson, 15, Yusef Salaam, 15, Raymond Santana, 14, and Korey Wise, 16, who came to be known as the Central Park Five. -
Simpsons Debut
The family debuted as shorts on The Tracey Ullman Show on April 19, 1987. After a three-season run, the sketch was developed into a half-hour prime time show called The Simpsons, which debuted on December 17, 1989.
