1984 was a big year.

• January 21 – Jackie Wilson passes away after lengthy coma, aged 49.
• January 24 – Apple Computer places the Macintosh personal computer on sale in the United States.
• February 8–19 – The 1984 Winter Olympics are held in Sarajevo, Socialist Federal Republic of Yugoslavia.
• March 16 – The United States Central Intelligence Agency station chief in Beirut, William Francis Buckley, is kidnapped by the Islamic Jihad Organization and later dies in captivity.
• April 1 – Marvin Gaye is shot to death by his father, one day before his 45th birthday.
• April 4 – U.S. President Ronald Reagan calls for an international ban on chemical weapons.
• April 23 – United States researchers announce their discovery of the AIDS virus.
• May 12 – The Louisiana World Exposition, also known as The 1984 World’s Fair, and also the New Orleans World’s Fair, and, to the locals, simply as “The Fair” or “Expo 84”, opens.
• July 28–August 12 – The 1984 Summer Olympics are held in Los Angeles, California.
• August 16 – John De Lorean is acquitted of all 8 charges of possessing and distributing cocaine.
• October 11 – Aboard the Space Shuttle Challenger, astronaut Kathryn D. Sullivan becomes the first American woman to perform a space walk.
• November 6 – United States presidential election, 1984: Ronald Reagan defeats Walter F. Mondale with 59% of the popular vote, the highest since Richard Nixon‘s 61% popular vote victoryin 1972. Reagan carries 49 states in the electoral college; Mondale wins only his home state of Minnesota by a mere 3,761 vote margin and the District of Columbia.
• November 11 – The Louisiana World Exposition, also known as The 1984 World’s Fair, and also the New Orleans World’s Fair, and, to the locals, simply as “The Fair” or “Expo 84”, closes.
• November 25 – Band Aid (assembled by Bob Geldof) records the charity single “Do They Know It’s Christmas?” in London to raise money to combat the famine in Ethiopia. It is released on December 3.^[6]
• 1983–1985 famine in Ethiopia intensifies with renewed drought by mid-year, killing a million people by the end of this year.
• Crack cocaine, a smokeable form of the drug, is first introduced into Los Angeles and soon spreads across the United States in what becomes known as the Crack epidemic.
• The Chrysler Corporation introduces the first vehicles to be officially labeled as “minivans“. They are branded as the Chrysler Town & Country, Dodge Caravan, and Plymouth Voyager.

Musically, 1984 was all about WHAM! Other people (who are big stinkin’ liars) would have you believe it was about Madonna, but no – it was Wham! Honestly, there were some pretty damn good albums released in 1984 by Julian Lennon, Paul McCartney, Tina Turner, Wang Chung, Thompson Twins, Bruce Springsteen, Huey Lewis and the News, and Psychedelic Furs. Let’s have some tunes, shall we?

1981 was aight. I had everything I needed — a Snoopy Sno-Cone Machine, crayons, stickers, and I was making mucho cash off the tooth fairy as you can see in the pic. Also, in the pic, you can’t really see it, but my cousin is wearing an eyepatch. I have more photos of her with the eyepatch, but I won’t post them because that’s kinda mean. I mean, she wasn’t even a pirate.

To the facts:

• January 19 – United States and Iranian officials sign an agreement to release 52 American hostages after 14 months of captivity.
• January 20 – Iran releases the 52 Americans held for 444 days within minutes of Ronald Reagan succeeding Jimmy Carter as the 40thPresident of the United States, ending the Iran hostage crisis.
• January 21 – The first DeLorean DMC-12 automobile, a stainless steel sports car with gull-wing doors, rolls off the production line inDunmurry, Northern Ireland.
• March 11 – Chilean military dictator Augusto Pinochet is sworn in as President of Chile for another 8-year term.
• March 30 – U.S. President Ronald Reagan is shot in the chest outside a Washington, D.C. hotel by John Hinckley, Jr.; 2 police officers and Press Secretary James Brady are also wounded.
• April 12 – The Space Shuttle program: Space Shuttle Columbia with NASA astronauts John Young and Robert Crippen launches on the STS-1mission, returning to Earth on April 14. It is the first time a manned reusable spacecraft has returned from orbit.
• June 5 – The Centers for Disease Control and Prevention report that 5 homosexual men in Los Angeles, California have a rare form of pneumonia seen only in patients with weakened immune systems (the first recognized cases of AIDS).
• July 7 – President Ronald Reagan nominates the first woman, Sandra Day O’Connor, to the Supreme Court of the United States.
• July 9 – I turned 7 AND Donkey Kong is released, marking the first Donkey Kong title and Mario title arcade smash hit game developed by Nintendo.
• July 29 – A worldwide television audience of over 700 million people watch the Wedding of Charles, Prince of Wales, and Lady Diana Spencer at St Paul’s Cathedral in London.
• August 1 – The first 24-hour video music channel MTV (Music Television) is launched.
• August 24 – Mark David Chapman is sentenced to 20 years to life in prison, after pleading guilty to murdering John Lennon in Manhattan 8 months earlier.

I remember spending the night with my Aunt Vicki and watching the wedding of Princess Diana. It was the most amazing thing I had ever seen. She was so beautiful and Prince Charles looked so old to me. I was a Disney obsessed child, so seeing a real Princess’ wedding was a Disney movie brought to life. In 1997 I would watch her funeral on television and cry.

Music in 1981 was the jam. Here’s my favorite song from that year, “Tempted” by Squeeze.

Film in 1981 was great because of On Golden Pond, Chariots of Fire, and Arthur, but here’s one of my favorites, The Fox and the Hound — the scene where Tod meets Copper and Copper says “I’m a hound dog,”

1980 was all about change. For me, for everyone. I started first grade at Claiborne Elementary Fundamental Magnet School and the country elected Ronald Reagan. John Lennon was murdered. My sister refused to wear her Halloween costume as a costume, so she was Princess Dallas Cowboy, I guess?

Here are the facts:

• January 7 – U.S. President Jimmy Carter signs legislation approving $1.5 billion in loan guarantees to bail out the Chrysler Corporation.
• January 31 – The Spanish Embassy in Guatemala is invaded and set on fire, killing 36 people. It is called “Spain’s own Tehran”, similar to the 1979–80 Iran American hostage crisis.
• February 22 – The United States Olympic Hockey Team defeats the Soviet Union in the semifinals of the Winter Olympics, in the Miracle on Ice.
• March 8 – The Soviet Union‘s first rock music festival starts.
• March 21 — U.S. President Jimmy Carter announces that the United States will boycott the 1980 Summer Olympics in Moscow.
• March 22 – The Georgia Guidestones are erected in Elbert County, Georgia.
• April 1 — The 1980 United States Census begins. There are 226,545,805 United States residents on this day.
• April 7 – The United States severs diplomatic relations with Iran and imposes economic sanctions, following the taking of American hostages on November 4, 1979.
• May 11 – Mobster Henry Hill is arrested for drug possession.
• May 18 — Mount St. Helens erupts in Washington, killing 57 and causing US$3 billion in damage.
• Ian Curtis, singer/songwriter of acclaimed post punk band Joy Division, is found hanged.
• May 21 – Star Wars Episode V: The Empire Strikes Back is released.
• June 1 – The first 24 hour news channel Cable News Network (CNN) is launched
• June 9 – In Los Angeles, comedian Richard Pryor is badly burned trying to freebase cocaine.
• November 4 – United States presidential election, 1980: Republican challenger and former Governor Ronald Reagan of California defeats incumbent Democratic President Jimmy Carter, exactly 1 year after the beginning of the Iran hostage crisis.
• December 8 – John Lennon is shot dead outside his apartment in New York City by Mark David Chapman.

Not exactly an uplifting year. And Music in 1980 was this bizarre mesh of disco, country/pop, R&B, punk, new wave, heavy metal, and soft rock all over the radio. Everything from Diana Ross to Kenny Rogers to AC/DC were being played and there was even Ska and Rockabilly, which makes 1980 the most unique year maybe in modern music history. It reflected what was going on in the world — uncertainty and change. My song for 1980 is “Love Will Tear Us Apart” by Joy Division, not just because it was their biggest song, not because it was the year Ian Curtis committed suicide, but because it has the haunting sense of “what’s next?” that the year had.

Film in 1980? This is all that matters. 9 to 5. I apologize for the crappy video, but this IS the best scene.

Thank goodness we’re almost to the 80s. In 1979, I graduated from Kindergarten and I was a pink butterfly in some stage production of something I’ve forgotten. My preschool/Kindergarten was Ingleside Baptist Church and there was a roller rink there, so I liked it. Also, for some reason a local magician would visit every once in a while because as all Baptists know, God = MAGIC. That’s not true, but it really confused me as a 5 year-old.

Let’s get to the facts:

• January 29 – Brenda Ann Spencer opens fire at a school in San Diego, killing 2 faculty members and wounding 8 students and a police officer. Her justification for the action, “I don’t like Mondays,” inspires the Boomtown Rats to make a song of the same name
• February 1 — Convicted bank robber Patty Hearst is released from prison after her sentence is commuted by U.S. President Jimmy Carter AND the Ayatollah Ruhollah Khomeini returns to Tehran, Iran after nearly 15 years of exile.
• February 2 — Former Sex Pistols bassist Sid Vicious is found dead aged 21 of a heroin overdose in New York City, the day after being released from a 55-day sentence at Rikers Island prison on bail.
• February 11 – Ayatollah Khomeini seizes power in Iran, overthrowing Mohammad Rezā Shāh Pahlavi.
• February 27 – The annual Mardi Gras celebration in New Orleans, Louisiana is cancelled due to a strike called by the New Orleans Police Department.
• March 4 – The U.S. Voyager I spaceprobe photos reveal Jupiter’s rings.
• March 8 – Philips demonstrates the Compact Disc publicly for the first time.
• March 26 – In a ceremony at the White House, President Anwar Sadat of Egypt and Prime Minister Menachem Begin of Israel sign a peace treaty.
• March 28 — America’s most serious nuclear power plant accident occurs, at Three Mile Island, Pennsylvania.
• May 4 – Counting in the previous day’s British general election shows that the Conservatives have won and Margaret Thatcher becomes the country’s first female prime minister, ending the rule of James Callaghan‘s Labour government
• May 8 — A Unabomber bomb injures Northwestern University graduate student John Harris.
• June – McDonald’s introduces the Happy Meal.
• July 1 — The Sony Walkman goes on sale for the first time in Japan.
• August 10 – Michael Jackson releases his breakthrough album Off the Wall. It sells 7 million copies in the United States alone, making it a 7x platinum album.
• November 4 – Iran hostage crisis begins: 3,000 Iranian radicals, mostly students, invade the U.S. Embassy in Tehran and take 90 hostages (53 of whom are American). They demand that the United States send the former Shah of Iran back to stand trial.
• The One Child Policy is introduced in China – it has since prevented about 400 million births. It is later loosened in 2013.
• The remains of Tsar Nicholas II and some of the Romanovs are discovered and exhumed near Sverdlovsk (now Yekaterinburg).

Music in 1979 was amazing. The Cure. Squeeze. Joe Jackson. Tom Petty. Michael Jackson. Blondie. Shut up. Punk and Post-Punk were at their height. INXS was on the way. Today we have a few videos.

All you need to know about Film in 1979 is The Jerk. One of my favorites of all time. I will watch this every time it’s on tv, because like Navin, I was also born a poor black child.

1977 was a mixed bag in 3 year-old Kerry’s world. My great-grandmother, Maw, died. She had a farm and I really liked going there. My sister was born in September, which changed everything. I saw my first real movie in a for-real drive-in, Star Wars. Even at 3, I knew it was amazing. A friend said it still holds up today, but it more than holds up. For me, it was the first of its kind – the adventure story/love story/science fiction genre. It was a space western. You can’t tell me it’s not. Luke’s the deputy, Han’s the outlaw-turned-sheriff, Vader’s the guy in the black hat, and Leia is the girl in town everyone wants.  Simple.

Ok, let’s go to the facts.

• January – The world’s first personal all-in-one computer (keyboard/screen/tape storage), the Commodore PET, is demonstrated at the Consumer Electronics Show in Chicago
• January 6 – Record company EMI sacks the controversial United Kingdom punk rock group the Sex Pistols
• January 19 —U.S. President Gerald Ford pardons Iva Toguri D’Aquino (aka “Tokyo Rose“).
• Snow falls in Miami (despite its ordinarily tropical climate) for the only time in its history. Snowfall has occurred farther south in the United States only on the high mountains of the state of Hawaii.
• January 20 – Jimmy Carter succeeds Gerald Ford as the 39th President of the United States.
• January 21 – U.S. President Jimmy Carter pardons Vietnam War draft evaders.
• February 4 – Fleetwood Mac‘s Grammy-winning album Rumours is released.
• April 21 – Residents of Dover, Massachusetts report sightings of an eerie monster.
• April 22 – Optical fiber is first used to carry live telephone traffic.
• May 25 – Star Wars opens in cinemas and later becomes the historic highest grossing film for that time.
• June 5 —A bloodless coup installs France-Albert René as President of the Seychelles.
• The first Apple II series computers go on sale.
• June 6 – 9 – Jubilee celebrations are held in the United Kingdom to celebrate 25 years of Elizabeth II‘s reign.
• June 26 — Elvis Presley holds his last concert at Market Square Arena in Indianapolis.
• August 16 — Elvis Presley, the “king of rock and roll“, dies in his home in Graceland at age 42. 75,000 fans line the streets of Memphis for his funeral
• September 11 – Atari, Inc. releases its Video Computer System in North America.
• September 29 – The modern Food Stamp Program begins when the Food Stamp Act of 1977 is enacted.
• October 14 — The Atari 2600 game system is released. HOLLA!
• October 20 – Three members of the rock band Lynyrd Skynyrd die in a charter plane crash outside Gillsburg, Mississippi, 3 days after the release of their fifth studio album Street Survivors.
• November 10 – The Bee Gees release the soundtrack to Saturday Night Fever, which will go on to become the then best selling album of all time.

1977 in Film was pretty damn amazing. I’ve already talked about Star Wars, so let’s talk about my guilty pleasure movie: Smokey and the Bandit. Oh, yeah. This is the movie that started my love of Basset Hounds, using great accents, and Jackie Gleason. It’s the best.

One of my other favorite movies from 1977 is The Rescuers, which kind of made me what I am today, a combination of Miss Bianca (Eva Gabor) and Madame Medusa, the redheaded villain of the movie. Here’s one of the sweetest clips Disney has ever animated.

Music in 1977 was a desert except for Fleetwood Mac. Here’s “Go Your Own Way.”

I’ll be 40 in 40 days, so I’m going to look back at the last 40 years. But not for long, because let’s face it, I’m getting old and 1) it can’t be THAT long until my memory goes, 2) do we really need to remember some of the years for very long? I mean, the disco years? 3) I’ve committed to 40 posts in 40 days, let’s not push it. And I’ve decided to include a photo of myself from each year, maybe.

A lot of stuff happened in 1974. I’ll be giving you the Wikipedia version followed by my personal thoughts.

• April 5 – Stephen King publishes Carrie, his first novel under his own name.
• April 15 – As “Tania”, Patty Hearst is photographed wielding an M1 carbine while robbing the Sunset District branch of the Hibernia Bank in San Francisco.
• June 26 – The Universal Product Code is scanned for the first time, to sell a package of Wrigley‘s chewing gum at the Marsh Supermarket in Troy, Ohio.
• August 8 – Watergate scandal: U.S. President Richard Nixon announces his resignation (effective August 9)
• August 9 – Vice President Gerald Rudolph Ford succeeds Richard Milhous Nixon as the 38th President of the United States of America.
• Rubik’s Cube puzzle is invented by Hungarian architecture professor Ernő Rubik.^[5]
• Dungeons & Dragons fantasy tabletop role-playing game, designed by Gary Gygax and Dave Arneson, is first released, in the United States.

 

Is it weird that Carrie came out that year and my parents named me Kerry? I think so. I think my obsession with the Watergate Scandal has a lot to do with it happening the year I was born.

For fun, here’s my favorite song of 1974:

And you probably know The Godfather Part II came out in 1974, but here’s one of my favorite clips from The Great Gatsby.