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| Different Trains |
Different TrainsDifferent Trains is a famous three-movement piece for string quartet and tape written by Steve Reich in 1988. It won a Grammy Award in 1989 for Best Contemporary Classical Composition.
Steve Reich's earlier work had frequently used tape, looped and played back at different speeds; however, Different Trains was a novel experiment, using recorded speech as a source for melodies. After each melody in the piece is introduced, usually by a single instrument, a tape of the spoken phrase from which the melody derives is played. The melody is then developed for a while, with the instruments playing along with the tape of the phrase or part of the phrase. In addition to speech, the piece calls for recordings of train sirens.
Much of the recorded speech that forms the basis for Different Trains is among the first recordings made on magnetic tape. It is taken from interviews with people in the United States and Europe about the years leading up to, during, and immediately after World War II. In the first movement, America – Before the War, Americans speak about train travel in the US. American train sirens are heard in the background. In the second movement, Europe – During the War, Europeans, many being Holocaust survivors, speak about the conditions in Europe during the war, in particular how trains were used to transport millions of civilians to concentration camps, and the sirens used are European train sirens. The third movement, America – After the War, features people talking about the years immediately following World War II, and a return to the American train sirens from the first movement.
During the war years, Reich made train journeys between New York and Los Angeles to visit his parents, who had separated. Years later, he pondered that fact that, as a Jew, had he been in Europe instead of the United States at that time, he might have been travelling in very different trains.
Reich developed his 'speech melody' work further with projects such as The Cave (1993) and City Life (1995).
Reich created these works by transferring his speech recordings into a digital sampling keyboard (a Casio FZ-1). Musicians in the pop, dance and electronica fields had been using samplers for years, but this was one of the very first 'classical' works to use sampling. City Life actually used sampling keyboards in performance (rather than using a backing tape) and the samples are notated and played in exactly the same way as the conventional instruments.
Category:Compositions by Steve Reich
Movement (music)In music, a movement is a large division of a larger composition or musical form. For example, symphonies are typically divided into four movements and concertos into three. Each movement has a distinct tempo and structure. Symphonies usually contain at least one movement in sonata-allegro form.
In concerts it is customary to applaud when the entire work is completed, not between movements.
Category:Musical form
Audio tapeMagnetic tape is a non-volatile storage medium consisting of a magnetic coating on a thin plastic strip.
Nearly all recording tape is of this type, whether used for
video with a videocassette recorder, audio storage (reel-to-reel tape, compact audio cassette, digital audio tape (DAT), digital linear tape (DLT) and other formats including 8-track cartridges) or general purpose digital data storage using a computer (specialized tape formats, as well as the above-mentioned compact audio cassette, used with home computers of the 1980s, and DAT, used for backup in workstation installations of the 1990s).
Magneto-optical and optical tape storage products have been developed using many of the same concepts as magnetic storage, but have achieved little commercial success.
Magnetic tape audio storage
See:
- Sound Recording: Magnetic Recording.
- Tape recorder.
- Reel-to-reel audio tape recording.
- Compact audio cassette.
- 8-track cartridge.
- Audio tape length and thickness.
See also audio storage for a comprehensive list of formats.
Magnetic tape video storage
see Videotape
Magnetic tape data storage
Magnetic tape was first invented by Fritz Pfleumer in 1928 in Germany, based on the invention of the magnetic wire by Valdemar Poulsen in 1898.
It was not used to record data until 1951 on the Mauchly-Eckert UNIVAC I. The recording medium was a 1/2 inch (13 mm) wide thin band of nickel-plated bronze. Recording density was 128 characters per inch (198 micrometre/character) on eight tracks at a linear speed of 100 in/s (2.54 m/s), yielding a data rate of 12,800 characters per second. Making allowance for the empty space between tape blocks, the actual transfer rate was around 7,200 characters per second.
IBM computers from the 1950s used oxide-coated tape similar to that used in audio recording, and IBM's technology soon became the de facto industry standard. Magnetic tape was half an inch wide and wound on removable reels 10.5 inches (267 mm) in diameter. Different lengths were available with 2400 feet and 4800 feet (732 and 1463 m) being common. Most modern magnetic tape systems use reels that are much smaller and are fixed inside a cartridge to protect the tape and facilitate handling. Modern cartridge formats include QIC, DAT, Exabyte, DLT and LTO.
Early IBM tape drives were mechanically sophisticated floor-standing drives that used vacuum columns to buffer long u-shaped loops of tape. Between active control of powerful reel motors and vacuum control of these u-shaped tape loops, extremely rapid start and stop of the tape at the tape-to-head interface could be achieved. When active, the two tape reels thus spun in rapid, uneven, unsynchronized bursts resulting in visually-striking action. Stock shots of such vacuum-column tape drives in motion were widely used to represent "the computer" in movies and television.
LINCtape (and its derivative, DECtape) were variations on this "round tape." They were essentially a personal storage medium. They featured a fixed formatting track which, unlike standard tape, made it feasible to read and rewrite blocks repeatedly in place. LINCtapes and DECtapes had similar capacity and data transfer rate to the diskettes that displaced them, but their "seek times" were on the order of thirty seconds to a minute.
A tape drive (or "transport" or "deck") uses precisely-controlled motors to wind the tape from one reel to the other, passing a read/write head as it does.
Early tape had seven parallel tracks of data along the length of the tape allowing six bit characters plus parity written across the tape.
A typical recording density was 556 characters per inch.
The tape had reflective marks near its end which signaled beginning of tape (BOT) and end of tape (EOT) to the hardware. Since then, a multitude of tape formats have been used, but common features emerge.
In a typical format, data is written to tape in blocks with inter-block gaps between them, and each block is written in a single operation with the tape running continuously during the write.
However, since the rate at which data is written or read to the tape drive is not deterministic, a tape drive usually has to cope with a difference between the rate at which data goes on and off the tape and the rate at which data is supplied or demanded by its host.
Various methods have been used alone and in combination to cope with this difference. A large memory buffer can be used to queue the data. The tape drive can be stopped, backed up, and restarted. The host can assist this process by choosing appropriate block sizes to send to the tape drive.
There is a complex tradeoff between block size, the size of the data buffer in the record/playback deck, the percentage of tape lost on inter-block gaps, and read/write throughput.
Tape has quite a long data latency for random accesses since the deck must wind an average of 1/3 the tape length to move from one arbitrary data block to another. Most tape systems attempt to alleviate the intrinsic long latency using either indexing, whereby a separate lookup table is maintained which gives the physical tape location for a given data block number, or marking, whereby a tape mark that can be detected while winding the tape at high speed is written to the tape.
Most tape drives now include some kind of data compression.
There are several algorithms which provide similar results:
LZ (Most), IDRC (Exabyte), ALDC (IBM, QIC) and DLZ1 (DLT).
The actual compression algorithms used are not the most effective known today, and better results can usually be obtained by turning off the compression built into the device and using a software compression program instead.
Tape remains a viable alternative to disk due to its higher bit density and lower cost per bit. Tape has historically offered enough advantage in these two areas above disk storage to make it a viable product. The recent vigorous innovation in disk storage density and price, coupled with less-vigorous innovation in tape storage, has reduced the viability of tape storage products.
References
Category:Audio storage
Category:Computer storage tape media
Category:Magnetic devices
- [http://www.guitarz-for-ever.com/the-basics-of-audio-recording.html The Basics of Audio Recording]
ja:磁気テープ
1988
1988 (MCMLXXXVIII) was a leap year starting on a Friday of the Gregorian calendar.
Events
January
- January 1 - The Evangelical Lutheran Church in America comes into existence, creating the largest Lutheran denomination in the United States.
- January 2 - Georgia celebrates its bicentennial statehood.
- January 9 - Connecticut celebrates its bicentennial statehood.
- January 26 - Australia celebrates its bicentennial day.
February
- February 3 - The United States House of Representatives rejects President Ronald Reagan's request for $36.25 million to support Nicaraguan Contras.
- February 6 - Massachusetts celebrates its bicentennial statehood.
- February 11 - Anthony M. Kennedy is appointed to the Supreme Court of the United States.
- February 13 - The 1988 Winter Olympics open in Calgary, Alberta, Canada
- February 17 - US Lieutenant Colonel William R. Higgins, serving with a United Nations group monitoring a truce in southern Lebanon is kidnapped (captors later kill him)
- February 21 - On his own televangelism program being taped in Baton Rouge, Louisiana, Jimmy Swaggart confesses that he is guilty of an unspecified sin and will be temporarily leaving the pulpit. The "unspecified sin" was an affair with a prostitute.
- February 24 - The Supreme Court of the United States sides with Hustler magazine by overturning a lower court decision to award Jerry Falwell $200,000 for defamation (see Hustler Magazine v. Falwell)
- February 26 - Australia's Bicentennial year - discovered 200 years ago today
- February 28 - The 1988 Winter Olympics close.
- February 29 - Nazi document implicates Kurt Waldheim in WWII deportations
March
- March 1 - Anthony M. Frank is appointed United States Postmaster General
- March 7 - Operation Flavius - The SAS shoot dead three unarmed Irish Republican Army members in Gibraltar.
- March 8 - Two United States Army helicopters collide in Fort Campbell, Kentucky killing 17 servicemen
- March 9 - Students at Gallaudet University go on strike for the selection of a Deaf university president
- March 16 - The Halabja poison gas attack was carried out by Iraqi government forces.
- March 16 - Iran-Contra Affair: Lieutenant Colonel Oliver North and Vice Admiral John Poindexter are indicted on charges of conspiracy to defraud the United States.
- March 19 - British army Corporals Woods and Howes are killed by the IRA in the so-called "Corporals killings".
- March 24 - Israeli court sentences Mordechai Vanunu to 18 years in prison for disclosing Israel's nuclear program to The Sunday Times
- March 29 - Assassination of Dulcie September in Paris
April
Paris
- April 4 - Governor Evan Mecham of Arizona is convicted in his impeachment trial and removed from office.
- April 10 - The Great Seto Bridge opened to traffic in Japan
- April 12 - Former pop singer Sonny Bono is elected mayor of Palm Springs, California
- April 14 - In Geneva Agreement, Soviet Union commits itself to withdrawal of its forces from Afghanistan
- April 14 - USS Samuel B. Roberts (FFG-58) strikes a mine in the Persian Gulf while deployed on Operation Earnest Will
- April 16 - Israeli commandos kill PLO's Khalil Wazir (Abu Jihad) in Tunisia
- April 18 - U.S. Navy forces retaliate for the Roberts mining with Operation Praying Mantis, a day of strikes against Iranian oil platforms and naval vessels
- April 25 - In Israel John Demjanuk is sentenced to death for war crimes committed in World War II. He was accused of being a notorious guard at the Treblinka extermination camp known as "Ivan the Terrible" by survivors. Conviction overturned by Israeli Supreme Court.
- April 28 - Maryland celebrates its bicentennial statehood.
- April 28 - Aloha Flight 243 loses in flight several yards of its upper fuselage; extraordinarily, the craft lands with only one fatality.
- April 30 - World Expo '88 opens in Brisbane Queensland Australia. The exhibition runs for 6 months hosting pavilions from over
70 countries and thrusts the sleepy city of Brisbane into the international spotlight.
May
- May 15 - Soviet war in Afghanistan: After more than eight years of fighting, the Red Army begins its withdraw from Afghanistan.
- May 16 - A report by the Surgeon General C. Everett Koop states that the addictive properties of nicotine are similar to those of heroin and cocaine.
- May 16 - California v. Greenwood: In a 6-2 decision, the Supreme Court of the United States rules that police officers do not need a search warrant to search through discarded garbage.
- May 23 - South Carolina celebrates its bicentennial statehood.
- May 24 - Section 28 (outlawing promotion of homosexuality in schools) is passed as law by Parliament in the United Kingdom.
June
- June 6 - Queen Elizabeth strips jockey Lester Piggott of his OBE
- June 11 - The name of the General Public License (GPL) is mentioned first time.
- June 21 - New Hampshire celebrates its bicentennial statehood.
- June 25 - Virginia celebrates its bicentennial statehood.
- June 25 - The Netherlands defeat the Soviet Union 2-0 to win Euro 88.
- June 28 - Four workers asphyxiated at a metal-plating plant in Auburn, Indiana, in the worst confined-space industrial accident in US history. A fifth victim dies two days later.
- June 29 - United States Supreme Court upholds the law allowing special prosecutor to investigate suspected crimes by executive branch officials.
- June 30 - Roman Catholic Archbishop Marcel Lefebvre consecrated four bishops at Ecône for his apostolate along with Bishop Antonio de Castro Mayer without a Papal mandate.
July
- July 1 - Bologna, Italy: Quartetto Cetra's last concert after over forty years' musical career.
- July 3 - Iran Air Flight 655 shot down by missiles launched from the USS Vincennes ship
- July 6 - The Piper Alpha drilling platform in the North Sea is destroyed by explosions and fires killing 165 oil workers and 2 rescue mariners.
- July 26 - New York celebrates its bicentennial statehood.
- July 30¨- Antonio Gomes dos Santos stands motionless in a Lisbon, Portugal shopping center for 15 hours, 2 minutes and 55 seconds
August
- August 6–7 - "Police riot" in New York City's Tompkins Square Park
- August 8 - Thousands of protestors in Burma (Myanmar) killed during demonstrations against the government.
- August 9 - Wayne Gretzky is traded from the Edmonton Oilers to the Los Angeles Kings in one of the most controversial transactions in hockey history.
- August 17 - Pakistan President Muhammad Zia-ul-Haq and US Ambassador Arnold Raphel are killed in a plane crash.
- August 19 - Ceasefire begins in the Iran-Iraq war
- August 20 - Iran-Iraq war finished, costing an estimated 1 million lives
- August 26 - Merhan Karimi Nasseri ends up stuck in the Charles De Gaulle Airport in Paris
- August 28 - A fire destroys part of Chiado quarter, in Lisbon's historical center.
September
Lisbon.]]
- September 1- Acacia pycnantha proclamed Australia's national floral emblem
- September 3- Federal referendums on 4-year terms, recognition of local Government and other issues is defeated in Australia
- September 5 - With US$2 billion in federal aid, the Robert M. Bass Group agrees to buy the United States's largest thrift, American Savings and Loan Association
- September 12 - Hurricane Gilbert devastated Jamaica, it turns towards Mexico's Yucatan Peninsula two days later causing an estimated $5 billion in damage.
- September 17 - Summer Olympic Games in Seoul, South Korea open
- September 22 - Ocean Odyssey drilling rig suffers a blowout and fire in the North Sea. (See also July 6)
- September 29 - NASA resumes space shuttle flights, grounded after the Challenger disaster
October
- October 5 - Thousands riots in Algiers, Algeria against the government of National Liberation Front - by October 10 army has killed and tortured about 500 people in crushing the riots
- October 5 - Chilean dictator Augusto Pinochet is defeated in a national plebiscite that sought to renew his mandate.
- October 11 - Women are allowed to study at Magdalene College, Cambridge, for the first time. Male students wear black armbands and the porter flies a black flag
- October 12 - two officers of the Victoria Police are gunned down executional style in the Walsh Street police shootings in Australia
- October 19 - United Kingdom bans broadcast interviews with IRA members. BBC gets around this by using actors' voices.
- October 28 - Abortion: 48 hours after announcing it was abandoning RU-486, French manufacturer Roussel Uclaf states that it would resume distribution of the drug, bowing to pressure from the government of France
- October 30 - Philip Morris buys Kraft Foods for US$13.1 billion.
- October 30 - Expo '88 in Brisbane Australia draws to a close after a 6 month spectacular.
November
- November 8 - U.S. presidential election, 1988: George Herbert Walker Bush is elected over Michael Dukakis.
- November 11 - In Sacramento, California, police find a body buried in the lawn of 60-year-old boardinghouse landlady Dorothea Puente (seven bodies were eventually found and Puente was convicted of three murders and sentenced to life in prison)
- November 15 - In the Soviet Union, the uncrewed Shuttle Buran is launched by an Energia rocket on her maiden orbital spaceflight (this was the first and last space flight for the shuttle)
- November 15 - Israeli-Palestinian Conflict: An independent State of Palestine is proclaimed by the Palestinian National Council meeting in Algiers, by a vote of 253 to 46
- November 16 - The Supreme Soviet of the Estonian SSR declares that Estonia is "sovereign" but stops short of declaring independence
- November 16 - In the first open election in more than a decade, voters in Pakistan choose populist candidate Benazir Bhutto to be Prime Minister
- November 17 - The Netherlands becomes the second country to get connected to the Internet
- November 18 - War on Drugs: US President Ronald Reagan signs a bill into law providing the death penalty for murderous drug traffickers
- November 21 - Canadian Federal Election: Brian Mulroney and the Progressive Conservative Party win a second majority government
- November 22 - In Palmdale, California, the first prototype B-2 Spirit stealth bomber is revealed
- November 30 - Kohlberg Kravis Roberts & Co. buys RJR Nabisco for US$25.07 billion.
December
RJR Nabisco
- December 2 - Benazir Bhutto is sworn in as Prime Minister of Pakistan, becoming the first woman to head the government of an Islam-dominated state.
- December 2 - Cyclone in Bangladesh leaves 5 million homeless - thousands dead
- December 7 - In Armenia an earthquake 6.9 on the Richter scale killed nearly 25,000, injured 15,000 and left 400,000 persons homeless.
- December 12 - The Clapham Junction rail crash kills 35 and injures 132.
- December 19 - The Consumer Product Safety Commission bans the sale of lawn darts following the deaths of three children.
- December 20 - The United Nations Convention Against Illicit Traffic in Narcotic Drugs and Psychotropic Substances is signed at Vienna.
- December 21 - Pan Am flight 103 is blown up by Libyan terrorists over Lockerbie, Scotland, killing 259 on board and 11 on the ground.
- December 22 - Assassination of Brazilian union and environmental activist Chico Mendes.
Environmental change
- Zebra mussels found in the Great lakes
Unknown dates
- Dave Barry won the Pulitzer Prize for commentary.
- Singer Fish leaves the band Marillion to pursue a solo career.
- Mickey Sadoff elected president of Mothers Against Drunk Driving.
Births
- January 17 - Nikki Reed, American actress
- February 4 - Carly Patterson, American gymnast
- February 7 - Ai Kago, Japanese singer
- February 8 - Ryan Pinkston, American actor
- February 18 - Rihanna, Barbadian R&B singer
- February 27 - JD Natasha, Latin music artist
- March 25 - Erik Knudsen, Canadian actor
- March 27 - Brenda Song, American actress
- March 28 - Lacey Turner, English actress
- April 10 - Haley Joel Osment, American actor
- May 2 - Brooke Hogan, American singer
- June 1 - Nami Tamaki, Japanese singer
- June 7 - Michael Cera, Canadian actor
- June 27 - Kate Ziegler, American swimmer
- August 8 - Princess Beatrice of York
- August 23 - Niki Leinso, Croatian singer and songwriter
- August 24 - Rupert Grint, English actor
- August 27 - Alexa Vega, American actress
- August 31 - Megan McCauley, American singer
- September 24 - Kyle Sullivan, American actor
- September 26 - Marina Kuroki, Japanese actress
- October 5 - Bobby Edner, American actor
- October 23 - Caleigh Peters, American singer
- November 15 - Zena Grey, American actress
- November 21 - Jamie Mahoney, American actor and rapper
- November 28 - Scarlett Pomers, American actress
- December 7 - Emily Browning, Australian actress
Deaths
- January 2 - Edmund Brisco Ford, British geneticist (b. 1901)
- January 5 - Pete Maravich, American basketball player (b. 1947)
- January 7 - Trevor Howard, British actor (b. 1913)
- January 11 - Pappy Boyington, American pilot (b. 1912)
- January 13 - Chiang Ching-kuo, President of the Republic of China (b. 1910)
- January 14 - Georgi Malenkov, First Secretary of the Central Committee of the Soviet Communist Party (b. 1902)
- January 15 - Seán MacBride, Irish Republican Army leader, recipient of the Nobel Peace Prize (b. 1904)
- January 16 - Ballard Berkeley, British actor (b. 1904)
- January 20 - Philippe de Rothschild, French vineyard owner (b. 1902)
- January 22 - Parker Fennelly, American comedian and actor (b. 1891)
- February 1 - Heather O'Rourke, American actress (b. 1975)
- February 15 - Richard Feynman, American physicist, Nobel Prize laureate (b. 1918)
- February 19 - René Char, French poet (b. 1907)
- February 19 - André Frédéric Cournand, French-born physician, recipient of the Nobel Prize in Physiology or Medicine (b. 1895)
- March 1 - Joe Besser, American actor and comedian (b. 1907)
- March 5 - Alberto Olmedo, Argentine comedian and actor (b. 1933)
- March 7 - Divine, American actor (b. 1945)
- March 8 - Henryk Szeryng, Polish-born violinist (b. 1918)
- March 9 - Kurt Georg Kiesinger, third Chancellor of Germany (b. 1904)
- March 10 - Andy Gibb, Australian singer (Bee Gees) (b. 1958)
- March 31 - William McMahon, twentieth Prime Minister of Australia (b. 1908)
- April 3 - Milt Caniff, American cartoonist (b. 1907)
- April 15 - Kenneth Williams, English actor and raconteur (b. 1926)
- April 23 - Michael Ramsey, Archbishop of Canterbury (b. 1904)
- April 26 - James McCracken, American tenor (b. 1926)
- May 3 - Lev Semenovich Pontryagin, Russian mathematician (b. 1908)
- May 8 - Robert A. Heinlein, American science fiction author (b. 1907)
- May 11 - Kim Philby, British spy (b. 1912)
- May 12 - Chet Baker, American jazz trumpeter (b. 1929)
- May 16 - Charles Keeping, British illustrator (b. 1924)
- May 18 - Daws Butler, voice actor (b. 1916)
- May 21 - Sammy Davis, Sr., American dancer (b. 1900)
- May 25 - Ernst Ruska, German physicist, Nobel Prize laureate (b. 1906)
- June 25 - Hillel Slovak, Israeli-born guitarist (Red Hot Chili Peppers) (b. 1962)
- July 8 - Ray Barbuti, American athlete (b. 1905)
- July 27 - Frank Zamboni, American inventor (b. 1901)
- August 8 - Ramon Valdez, Mexican actor (b. 1923)
- August 11 - Anne Ramsey, American actress (b. 1929)
- August 17 - Franklin Delano Roosevelt, Jr., American lawyer and politician (b. 1914)
- August 17 - Muhammad Zia-ul-Haq, leader of Pakistan (b. 1924)
- August 27 - William Sargant, British psychiatrist (b. 1907)
- September 1 - Luis Alvarez, American physicist, Nobel Prize laureate (b. 1911)
- September 5 - Gert Fröbe, German actor (b. 1913)
- September 28 - Charles Addams, American cartoonist (b. 1912)
- October 1 - Sacheverell Sitwell, English writer (b. 1897)
- October 15 - Kaikhosru Shapurji Sorabji, English composer and pianist (b. 1892)
- October 19 - Son House, American musician (b. 1902)
- October 22 - Henry Armstrong, American boxer (b. 1912)
- October 31 - John Houseman, Romanian-born actor and producer (b. 1902)
- November 9 - John N. Mitchell, U.S. Attorney General and convicted Watergate criminal (b. 1913)
- November 13 - Antal Dorati, Hungarian conductor (b. 1906)
- November 19 - Christina Onassis, American shipping magnate (b. 1950)
- December 2 - Tata Giacobetti, Italian singer and lyricist (Quartetto Cetra) (b. 1922)
- December 6 - Roy Orbison, American singer (b. 1936)
- December 21 - Nikolaas Tinbergen, Dutch ornithologist, recipient of the Nobel Prize in Physiology or Medicine (b. 1907)
Nobel Prizes
- Physics - Leon M. Lederman, Melvin Schwartz, Jack Steinberger
- Chemistry - Johann Deisenhofer, Robert Huber, Hartmut Michel
- Medicine - Sir James W. Black, Gertrude B. Elion, George H. Hitchings
- Literature - Naguib Mahfouz
- Peace - The United Nations Peace-Keeping Forces.
- The Bank of Sweden Prize in Economic Sciences in Memory of Alfred Nobel - Maurice Allais
- Dr. Inamullah Khan
- International Rehabilitation and Research Centre for Torture Victims / Dr. Inge Kemp Genefke
- José Lutzenberger
- John F. Charlewood Turner
- Sahabat Alam Malaysia / Mohamed Idris, Harrison Ngau, the Penan people.
Fictional references
- The 2001 movie Donnie Darko is set in October 1988
Category:1988
als:1988
ko:1988년
ja:1988年
simple:1988
th:พ.ศ. 2531
1989
1989 (MCMLXXXIX) is a common year starting on Sunday of the Gregorian calendar. The world population growth in absolute numbers is believed to have been the highest ever around this time. [http://www.census.gov/ipc/www/worldpop.html]
Events
January
-
- January 8 - the Kegworth Air Disaster - A British Midland Boeing 737 crashes on approach to East Midlands Airport - 44 dead
January 16-18 - Race riots in Overtown, Miami
- January 10 - Cuban troops begin withdrawing from Angola
- January 10 - Assistant Australian Federal Police commissioner Colin Winchester is shot dead in the driveway of his Canberra home
- January 17 - A gunman kills 5 children, wounds 30 and then shoots himself in Stockton, California
January 7 - Akihito becomes Emperor of Japan following the death of Hirohito. The Heisei period begins
- January 20 - George Herbert Walker Bush succeeds Ronald Wilson Reagan as President of the United States of America
- January 24 - Serial killer Ted Bundy is executed in Florida's electric chair
- January 30 - American Olympic medalist Bruce Kimball is sentenced to 17 years in prison for killing two teenagers in a drunk driving accident
February
- February 1 - Joan Kirner becomes Victoria's 1st female Deputy Premier after resignation of Robert Fordham, over VEDC (Victorian Economic Development Co-operation) Crisis
- February 2 - Soviet war in Afghanistan: The last Soviet Union armored column leaves Kabul ending nine years of military occupation
- February 3 - Military coup overthrows Alfredo Stroessner, dictator of Paraguay
- February 3 - After a stroke, P.W. Botha resigns party leadership and the presidency of South Africa
- February 10 - Ron Brown is elected chairman of the Democratic National Committee becoming the first African American to lead a major American political party
- February 11 - Barbara Clementine Harris is consecrated first female bishop in the Episcopal Church (United States of America)
- February 14 - Union Carbide agrees to pay USD $470 million to the Indian government for damages it caused in the 1984 Bhopal Disaster
- February 14 - Iranian leader Ruhollah Khomeini encourages Muslims to kill the author of The Satanic Verses, Salman Rushdie
- February 14 - The first of 24 satellites of the Global Positioning System is placed into orbit
- February 15 - Soviet war in Afghanistan: The Soviet Union officially announces that all of its troops had left Afghanistan
- February 16 - Pan Am flight 103: Investigators announce that the cause of the crash was a bomb hidden inside a radio-cassette player
- February 24 - Ayatollah Ruhollah Khomeini places a three-million-US dollar bounty for the death of The Satanic Verses author Salman Rushdie
- February 24 - A United Airlines Boeing 747 bound to New Zealand from Honolulu, Hawaii rips open during flight, sucking 9 passengers and crew out of the first class section. Luckily most passengers and crew were still belted to their seats at the time
- February 27 - Venezuela is rocked by the Caracazo.
March
Caracazo
- March 1 - The Berne Convention is ratified and enters into force with regard to the United States
- March 1 - A curfew is imposed in Kosovo where protests continue at the alleged intimidation of the Serb minority
- March 1 - Louis Wade Sullivan starts his term of office as U.S. Secretary of Commerce, serving under President George H. W. Bush
- March 1 - James D. Watkins starts his term of office as U.S. Secretary of Energy, serving under President George H. W. Bush
- March 1 - The Politieke Partij Radicalen, Pacifistisch Socialistische Partij, Communistische Partij Nederland and the Evangelische Volks Partij amalgamate to form Netherlands political party the GroenLinks (GL, GreenLeft)
- March 2 - 12 European Community nations agree to ban the production of all chlorofluorocarbons (CFCs) by the end century
- March 4 - Time, Inc. and Warner Communications announce plans for a merger, forming Time Warner
- March 4 - The Purley rail crash - 5 dead, 94 injured
- March 4 - First ACT (Australian Capital Territory) elections held
- March 7 - Iran breaks off diplomatic relations with United Kingdom over Salman Rushdie's "The Satanic Verses"
- March 9 - A strike forces financially-troubled Eastern Airlines into bankruptcy
- March 12 - Musician Billy was born
- March 14 - Gun control: President George H. W. Bush bans the importation of assault rifles into the United States
- March 14 - Christian General Michel Aoun declares a 'War of Liberation' to rid Lebanon of Syrian forces and their allies.
- March 15 - Surgeon Bimal Ghosh removes a huge gallbladder weighing 10.4 kg (23 lbs) at the National Naval Medical Center in Bethesda, Maryland, USA
- March 18 - In Egypt, a 4,400-year-old mummy is found in the Great Pyramid of Giza
- March 20 - Australian Prime Minister Bob Hawke weeps on national television as he admits marital infidelity.
- March 23 - Stanley Pons and Martin Fleischmann announce cold fusion at the University of Utah
- March 23 - A 300m (1,000 ft) diameter Near-Earth asteroid misses the Earth by 500,000 km (400,000 miles)
- March 24 - Exxon Valdez oil spill: In Alaska's Prince William Sound the Exxon Valdez spills 240,000 barrels (11 million gallons) of oil after running aground
- March 27 - The first free elections for the Soviet parliament go against the Communist Party.
April-May
- April 4 - Richard M. Daley elected mayor of Chicago, Illinois
- April 6 - National Safety Council of Australia chief executive John Friedrich is arrested after defrauding investors to the tune of $235 million
- April 7 - Soviet submarine Komsomolets sinks in the Barents Sea - 41 dead
- April 9 - Massacre of Georgian demonstrators by Red Army soldiers in Tbilisi's central square during a peaceful rally; 20 citizens are killed (most of them young women), many injured. The use of toxic gas by the Soviets was alleged. [http://www.phrusa.org/research/health_effects/humsov.html]
- April 15 - Hillsborough disaster, one of the biggest tragedies in European football, takes place
- April 19 - Gun turret explodes on the US battleship Iowa - 47 dead
- April 20 - NATO debates modernising short range missiles; although the US and UK are in favour, West German chancellor Helmut Kohl obtains a concession defering a decision.
- April 21 - Tiananmen Square protests of 1989: Students in Beijing, Shanghai, Xian, Nanjing started to strike.
- April 25 - End of term for Baginda Almutawakkil Alallah Sultan Iskandar Al-Haj ibni Almarhum Sultan Ismail as the 8th Yang di-Pertuan Agong of Malaysia
- April 26 - Sultan Azlan Muhibbudin Shah ibni Almarhum Sultan Yusuff Izzudin Shah Ghafarullahu-lahu, Sultan of Perak, becomes the 9th Yang di-Pertuan Agong of Malaysia
- May 2 - Hungary dismantles 150 miles of barbed wire fencing, opening its border to Western Europe.
- May 9 - Andrew Peacock deposes John Howard as Federal Opposition Leader
- May 11 - ACT (Australian Capital Territory) Legislative Assembly meets for 1st time
- May 12 - a Southern Pacific Railroad freight train crashes on Duffy Street in San Bernadino, California
- May 14 - Mikhail Gorbachev visited China, he was the first Soviet leader to visit China since the 1960s.
- May 15 Australia's 1st Private tertiary institution Bond University Opens On the Gold Coast
- May 15 - Jackie Mann, a 74-year-old former Battle of Britain pilot, is abducted in Beirut
- May 19 - Tiananmen Square protests of 1989: Zhao Ziyang met the demonstrators in Tiananmen Square.
- May 20 - Tiananmen Square protests of 1989: The Chinese government declared martial law in Beijing.
- May 30 - Tiananmen Square protests of 1989: The 10 m (33 ft) high "Goddess of Democracy" statue is unveiled in Tiananmen Square by student demonstrators
- May 30 Ananda Marga Member Tim Anderson is arrested on charges related to the 1978 Hilton Bombing
June
May 30.
- June 1 - The SkyDome stadium is opened in Toronto
- June 3 - The Ayatollah Khomeini dies
- June 4 - The Tiananmen Square massacre takes place in Beijing and is covered live on television
- June 4 - Solidarity's victory in the first partly free parliamentary elections in post-war Poland spark off a succession of peaceful anti-communist revolutions in Eastern Europe.
- June 4 - Train disaster: A natural gas explosion near Ufa, Russia kills 645 as two trains passing each other throw sparks near a leaky pipeline
- June 8 - Kurt Waldheim elected president of Austria
- June 13 - The wreck of the German battleship Bismarck, which was sunk in 1941, is located 600 miles west of Brest, France
- June 14 - Actress Zsa Zsa Gabor is arrested in Beverly Hills, California after slapping a motorcycle police officer. [http://www.mugshots.net/zsa_zsa_gabor/]
- June 21 - British police arrest 250 citizens for celebrating the summer solstice at Stonehenge
- June 22 - Ireland's first universities established since independence in 1922 are set up:Dublin City University and University of Limerick
July
- July 2 - Andreas Papandreou, Prime Minister of Greece resigns. New government formed under Tzannis Tzannetakis
- July 5 - The television show Seinfeld premiers.
- July 6 - At 01:23:45 AM the time and date by British reckoning was 01:23:45 6/7/89. This was also true 12 hours later excepting 24-hour time.
- July 19 - A Douglas DC-10 carrying United Airlines flight 232 crashes in Sioux City, Iowa killing 112 but due to extraordinary efforts by the pilot and his crew, 184 on board survive
- July 19 - The BBC programme "Panorama" accuses Lady Porter Tory Leader of Westminster City Council of "gerrymandering"
- July 20 - Burmese opposition leader Aung San Suu Kyi placed under house arrest
- July 26 - A federal grand jury indicts Cornell University student Robert Tappan Morris, Jr. for releasing a computer virus, making him the first person to be prosecuted under the 1986 Computer Fraud and Abuse Act
August
- August 6 - The comic strip Bloom County ends.
- August 7 - US Congressman Mickey Leland (D-TX), and 15 others die in a plane crash in Ethiopia.
- August 8 - STS-28: The Space Shuttle Columbia takes off on a secret five-day military mission.
- August 9 The asteroid 4769 Castalia is the first asteroid directly imaged, by radar from Arecibo.
- August 13 - 13 people die in hot air balloon accident near Alice Springs NT.
- August 18 - Leading presidential hopeful Luis Carlos Galán is assassinated near Bogotá in Colombia.
- August 19 - Polish president Wojciech Jaruzelski nominates Solidarity activist Tadeusz Mazowiecki to be Prime Minister, thus becoming the first non-communist in power in 42 years.
- August 20 - In Beverly Hills, California, Lyle and Erik Menendez shoot their wealthy parents to death in their family's den.
- August 20 - 51 people die when the Marchioness pleasure boat collides with a barge on the River Thames adjacent to Southwark Bridge.
- August 23 - Baltic Way, uninterrupted 600 kilometre human chain, in which two million indigenous people of Estonia, Latvia and Lithuania, then still occupied by the Soviet Union, joined hands to demand freedom and independence.
- August 23 - Hungary removes border restrictions with Austria.
- August 23 - All of Australia's 1,645 domestic airline pilots resign over an airline's move to sack and sue them over a dispute.
- August 24 - Indonesia's first privately-owned television station, Rajawali Citra Televisi Indonesia, (RCTI) begins broadcasting.
- August 25 - Voyager II passes the planet Neptune and its moon Triton.
- August 29 - Yusef Hawkins shot in Bensonhurst section of Brooklyn, New York, sparking racial tensions between African Americans and Italian Americans.
September
- September 5 - President George Bush holds up a bag of cocaine purchased across the street at Lafayette Park in his first televised speech to the nation.
- September 10 - The Hungarian government opens the country's western borders to refugees from the German Democratic Republic.
- September 21 - Hurricane Hugo makes landfall in South Carolina, causing 7 billion dollars in damage.
- September 22 - Deal barracks bombing: IRA bomb explodes at the Royal Marine School of Music in Deal, United Kingdom - 11 dead, 22 injured
October
- October 5 - US TV Evangelist Jim Bakker is found guilty of embezzlement of $158 million
- October 9 - An official news agency in the Soviet Union reports the landing of a UFO in Voronezh.
- October 9 - In Leipzig, East Germany protesters demand the legalization of opposition groups and democratic reforms
- October 17 - The Loma Prieta earthquake, measuring 7.1 on the richter scale, strikes the San Francisco-Oakland-San Jose and Santa Cruz areas in the American state of California, killing 63.
- October 19 - The Guildford Four are freed after 14 years
- October 30 - The qualification for the 1990 Football World Cup ends.
November
1990 Football World Cup
- November 4 - Typhoon Gay devastates the Thai province of Chumphon.
- November 7 - Douglas Wilder wins the governor's seat in Virginia and becomes the first elected African American governor in the United States.
- November 7 - Cold War: The Communist government of East Germany resigns, although SED leader Egon Krenz remains head of state.
- November 7 - David Dinkins becomes the first African American mayor of New York City.
- November 7 - In California, convicted murderer Richard Ramirez (the "Night Stalker") is sentenced to death.
- November 9 - Cold War: East Germany opens checkpoints in the Berlin Wall, allowing its citizens to freely travel to West Germany for the first time in decades (the next day celebrating Germans began to tear the wall down).
- November 10 - After 45 years of Communist rule in Bulgaria, Bulgarian Communist Party leader Todor Zhivkov is replaced by Foreign Minister Petar Mladenov, who changes the party's name to the Bulgarian Socialist Party.
- November 10 - Gaby Kennard becomes the first Australian woman to fly non-stop around the world.
- November 12 - Brazil holds its first free presidential election since 1960
- November 16 - Six Jesuit priests, their housekeeper and her teenage daughter are shot in San Salvador, El Salvador
- November 16 - South African President FW de Klerk announces scrapping of Separate Amenities Act
- November 17 - Cold War: Velvet Revolution begins - In Czechoslovakia a peaceful student demonstration in Prague is severely beaten back by riot police. This sparks a revolution aimed at overthrowing the Communist government (it succeeded on December 29)
- November 20 - Cold War: Velvet Revolution - The number of peaceful protesters assembled in Prague, Czechoslovakia swells from 200,000 the day before to an estimated half-million.
- Tuesday, November 21, 1989 - North Carolina celebrates its bicentennial statehood.
- November 22 - In west Beirut, a bomb explodes near the motorcade of Lebanese President Rene Moawad and kills him.
- November 26-27 night - Group of Bob Denard's mercenaries ousts Ahmed Abdullah Abderemane in the Comoros. Said Mohammed Djohor becomes interim president
- November 28 - Cold War: Velvet Revolution - With other Communist regimes falling all around it and with growing street protests, the Communist Party of Czechoslovakia announces they will give up their monopoly on political power (elections held in December brought the first non-communist government to Czechoslovakia in more than 40 years)
- November 30 - Deutsche Bank board member Alfred Herrhausen is killed by a terrorist's bomb (the Red Army Faction claimed responsibility of the murder)
- November 30 - A storeowner in Palm Harbor, Florida named Richard Mallory takes a ride with Aileen Wuornos and is seen for the last time. Mallory became the first of seven people killed by the female serial killer over the next year.
December
- December 1 - Cold War: East Germany's parliament abolishes the constitutional provision granting the Communist-dominated SED its monopoly on power. Egon Krenz, the Politburo and the Central Committee resign two days later.
- December 3 - Cold War: In a meeting off the coast of Malta, US President George Herbert Walker Bush and Soviet leader Mikhail Gorbachev release statements indicating that the Cold War between their nations may be coming to an end.
- December 6 - The École Polytechnique Massacre (or Montreal Massacre): Marc Lépine, an anti-feminist gunman, murders fourteen young women at the École Polytechnique in Montreal.
- December 14 - Chile holds its first free election in 16 years.
- December 15 - Drug baron Jose Gonzalo Rodriquez Gacha is killed by Colombian police
- December 17 - Romania - Timişoara: The start of the uprising that toppled the communist regime in Romania.
- December 17 - Brazil holds its first free election in 29 years. Fernando Collor de Mello wins the election.
- December 20 - United States invades Panama (Operation Just Cause) to overthrow Manuel Noriega - he takes refuge in the Vatican mission until January 3 1990.
- December 22 - After a week of bloody demonstrations, Ion Iliescu takes over as president of Romania, ending Nicolae Ceauşescu's communist dictatorship.
- December 22 - Two tourist coaches collide on the Pacific highway north of Kempsey, Australia, 35 killed and 39 injured.
- December 25 - Nicolae Ceauşescu and his wife Elena are executed.
- December 25 - Bank of Japan governors announce a major interest rate hike, eventually leading to the peak and fall of the "bubble economy".
- December 28 - A magnitude 5.6 earthquake hits Newcastle, New South Wales, Australia, killing 13 people.
- December 29 - Václav Havel elected the president of Czechoslovakia - a big victory of the Velvet Revolution.
- December 29 - Riots break-out after Hong Kong decides to forcibly repatriate Vietnamese refugees.
Unknown Dates
- Alan Bond's Bond Corporation goes into receivership with the largest debt in Australian history
- Homosexual Acts between consenting adults decriminalized in Western Australia
- Rice University celebrates the demisesquicentennial anniversary of its founding
- Kamchatka opened to Russian civilian visitors
- Retirement of the Alize propeller-driven anti-submarine planes from carrier service in the French Navy
- The first national park, in Schiermonnikoog, is established in The Netherlands
- Soviet submarine K-173, Chelyabinsk, commissioned
- The wreck of the Lady Elgin discovered off Highland Park, Illinois by Harry Zych
- Margaret Rey establishes the Curious George Foundation to help creative children and prevent cruelty to animals
- Veikko "Jammu" Siltavuori abducts and murders two 8 year old girls in Myllypuro suburb in Helsinki, Finland
- Richard C. Duncan introduces the Olduvai theory, about the collapse of the Industrial Civilization
- The Museum of Jurassic Technology, is founded in Culver City, California by David and Diana Wilson
- The unknown Swede Marcus Schenkenberg is discovered by a photographer when rollerskating on Venice Beach, California
- 1,000,000th Ford Taurus sold
Births
- Marina Golbahari, Afghani actress
- January 29 - Charlotte and Margaret Baughman, American twin actresses
- February 2 - Anna Sundstrand, Swedish singer
- February 5 - Jeremy Sumpter, American actor
- March 5 - Jake Lloyd, American actor
- March 25 - Alyson Michalka, American actress, singer, and songwriter
- April 23 - Nicole Vaidisova, Czech tennis player
- May 5 - Chris Brown, American R&B singer
- May 29 - Riley Keough, American model
- June 2 - Freddy Adu, Ghanaian-born footballer
- June 13 - Sayumi Michishige, Japanese singer
- July 5 - Ronald MacDonald, British musician and composer
- July 23 - Daniel Radcliffe, British actor
- August 9 - Stefano Okaka Chuka, Italian football player
- August 15 - Belinda Peregrin, Mexican entertainer
- August 19 - Percy Romeo Miller, American entertainer
- August 21 - Hayden Panettiere, American actress
- October 11 - Michelle Wie, American golf player
- November 11 - Reina Tanaka, Japanese singer
- December 18 - Ashley Benson, American actress
- December 27 - Kateryna Lahno, Ukrainian chess player
- December 30 - Ryan Sheckler, American skateboarder
Deaths
January to April
- January 3 - Robert Banks, American chemist (b. 1921)
- January 7 - Frank Adams, British mathematician (b. 1930)
- January 7 - Hirohito, Emperor of Japan (b. 1901)
- January 21 - Billy Tipton, American musician (b. 1914)
- January 23 - Salvador Dalí, Spanish artist (b. 1904)
- January 24 - Ted Bundy, American serial killer (executed) (b. 1946)
- February 1 - Elaine de Kooning, American artist (b. 1919)
- February 3 - John Cassavetes, American actor and author (b. 1929)
- February 6 - Roy Eldridge, American musician (b. 1911)
- February 6 - Barbara W. Tuchman, American historian (b. 1912)
- February 9 - Osamu Tezuka, Japanese artist (b. 1928)
- February 11 - George O'Hanlon, American actor and director (b. 1912)
- February 24 - Sparky Adams, American baseball player (b. 1894)
- February 27 - Paul Oswald Ahnert, German astronomer (b. 1897)
- February 27 - Konrad Lorenz, Austrian zoologist, recipient of the Nobel Prize in Physiology or Medicine (b. 1903)
- March 6 - Harry Andrews, British actor (b. 1911)
- March 8 - Carl Stuart Hamblen, American musician (b. 1908)
- March 9 - Robert Mapplethorpe, American photographer (b. 1946)
- March 14 - Edward Abbey, American author and environmentalist (b. 1927)
- March 14 - Stephen D. Bechtel, Sr., American businessman (b. 1900)
- March 19 - Alan Civil, English French horn player (b. 1929)
- March 27 - Malcolm Cowley, American author (b. 1898)
- March 27 - Jack Starrett, American actor and director (b. 1936)
- April 1 - Ace Bailey, Canadian hockey player (b. 1903)
- April 12 - Gerald Flood, British actor (b. 1927)
- April 15 - Hu Yaobang, General Secretary of the Communist Party of China (b. 1915)
- April 16 - Jocko Conlan, baseball player and umpire (b. 1899)
- April 21 - Princess D | | |
