| |
Date |
Event(s) |
| 1 | 1962 |
- 4 Jan 1962—21 Apr 1964: The first automated train in the United States begins service as part of the New York City subway system and ran until a fire destroyed some of the cars.NYCS RT62
- 20 Feb 1962: John Glenn becomes the first American to orbit the Earth.NASA USNA
- 2 Mar 1962: Wilt Chamberlain sets the NBA single-game scoring record of 100 points. NBA PennLive
- 6 May 1962: A ballistic missile with a live nuclear warhead is fired from a U. S. submarine for the first time.npr AHF
- 27 May 1962: A fire spreads from the town dump to a coal mine under Centralia, Pennsylvania and continues burning today.PennLive Ripley's
- 12 Jul 1962: The Rolling Stones give their first live performance at the Marquee Club in London.UCR WHP
- 20 Aug 1962—22 Aug 1962: The first nuclear-powered commercial ship, NS Savannah begins its maiden voyage.SSMaritime NSSavannah
- 12 Sep 1962: President John F. Kennedy, speaking at Rice University, challenges America to reach the Moon within the decade.NASA USNA
- 14 Oct 1962: The Cuban Missile Crisis begins.USState AtomArch
- 15 Oct 1962—28 Oct 1962: The Cuban Missile Crisis; CIA analysts, using photographs taken by a U2 spy plane, discover Soviet missile bases under construction in Cuba.AA GWU
|
| 2 | 1963 |
- 5 Mar 1963: The Hula-Hoop is patented.USPTO History.com
- 22 Mar 1963: The Beatles' first album is released.TIME TheBeatles
- 10 Apr 1963: USS Thresher is lost with all hands during deep diving tests.USNavy AL
- 12 Jun 1963: American civil rights activist Medgar Evers is assassinated in Jackson, Mississippi.ZEP FBI
- 16 Jun 1963: Russian cosmonaut Valentina Tereshkova is launched aboard Vostok 6 becoming the first woman to fly in space.NASA Space
- 20 Jun 1963: A "hot line" is established between Moscow and Washington.USState ACA
- 1 Jul 1963: The use of the zip code is implemented by the U. S. Post Service. USPS SI
- 28 Aug 1963: Martin Luther King Jr. delivers his "I have a dream" speech.VLib npr
- 30 Aug 1963: The hotline established between the United States and Soviet Union goes live.VOA SIMag
- 22 Nov 1963: President John Fitzgerald Kennedy is assassinated by Lee Harvey Oswald in Dallas, Texas.JFKLib USNA
- 22 Nov 1963: Lyndon Baines Johnson, Vice President, is sworn in as the 36th president of the United States of America aboard Air Force One upon the death of President John F. Kennedy, 1963 - 1969. Whitehouse UVA
- 24 Nov 1963: Jack Ruby shoots Lee Harvey Oswald during a live television broadcast.LoC UNT
- 17 Dec 1963: The Clean Air Act becomes law.MM USNA
|
| 3 | 1964 |
- 11 Jan 1964: The U. S. Surgeon General declares that cigarette smoking is bad for your health.NIH CDC
- 7 Feb 1964: The Beatles invade America.PHD TIME
- 9 Feb 1964: The Beatles appear on the Ed Sullivan Show.ES AP
- 27 Mar 1964: A great earthquake strikes Anchorage, Alaska.USGS Earth
- 17 Apr 1964: The Ford Mustang makes its debut.AH AutoMag
- 2 May 1964: BASIC (an early computer language) is invented by John George Kemeny and Tom Kurtz of Dartmouth College.W I R E D DiTH
- 2 Jul 1964: The Civil Rights Act of 1964 is signed into law prohibiting discrimination based on sex and race and more.USNA DoL
|
| 4 | 1965 |
- 28 Jan 1965: The new maple leaf national flag of Canada is officially proclaimed by Queen Elizabeth II.Canada CMoH
- 6 Apr 1965: Intelsat I, the first commercial satellite, is launched bringing the world the phrase "Live, via satellite".SN NASA
- 3 Jun 1965: Astronaut Edward White becomes the first American to walk in space.NASA Space
- 6 Aug 1965: The Voting Rights Act is signed guaranteeing African Americans the right to vote.OurDocs USNA
- 9 Nov 1965: The Northeast Blackout of 1965 is caused by human error.SIMag NEHS
- 30 Nov 1965: Ralph Nader’s “Unsafe at Any Speed” hits the bookstores.Nader SI
- 15 Dec 1965: Gemini 6, piloted by Wally Schirra and Tom Stafford, pulls within 0.3 meters (1 foot) of Gemini 7, piloted by Frank Borman and Jim Lovell, marking the first time in history that two vehicles had maneuvered to meet in space.SI NASA
|
| 5 | 1966 |
- 13 Jan 1966: Robert C. Weaver is selected to head the U. S. Department of Housing and Urban Development - the first black presidential cabinet member.NCC BHD
- 4 Mar 1966: The Beatle's John Lennon, in a statement taken out of context, proclaims they "are more popular than Jesus" causing a worldwide furor.BB BCB
- 31 Mar 1966: The Soviet Union launches the Luna 10, the first spacecraft to orbit the Moon.NASA Space
- 30 May 1966: Surveyor I, the first U. S. spacecraft to touchdown on an extraterrestrial body, is launched.NASA SFI
- 13 Jun 1966: Your Miranda Rights are established by the U. S. Supreme Court.LoC USCourts
- 1 Jul 1966: Medicare begins taking enrollments.SSA NIH
- 23 Aug 1966: The first photograph of the Earth from the Moon is taken by the Lunar Orbiter I.NASA Space
|
| 6 | 1967 |
- 14 Jan 1967: Timothy Leary, in his first San Francisco appearance, utters the sound bite of the 60s decade: "Turn On, Tune In, Drop Out.".FR FSF
- 15 Jan 1967: The Green Bay Packers beat the Kansas City Chiefs in the first Super Bowl.L I F E NFL
- Aug 1967: Amana introduces the first practical consumer microwave oven.GoogleBooks
- 30 Aug 1967: Thurgood Marshall becomes the first African American to be confirmed as a Supreme Court justice.USNA SCH
- 17 Sep 1967: The Who appear on American television for the first time.IMDb RollingStone
- 3 Oct 1967: U. S. Air Force Colonel William J. "Pete" Knight, piloting the X-15 rocket plane, achieves a world record speed of Mach 6.7.NASA
- 8 Oct 1967: Ernesto "Ché" Guevara is captured in Bolivia.WAPO PBS
- 9 Oct 1967: Ernesto "Ché" Guevara is executed by Bolivian soldiers.GWU PBS
- 20 Oct 1967: A bigfoot is filmed in northern California.OB Forbes
|
| 7 | 1968 |
- 21 Jan 1968: The Battle of Khe Sanh begins.History.com S&S
- 23 Jan 1968: North Korea attacks and seizes the USS Pueblo in international waters, holding the crew captive for 11 months.NHHC SIMag
- 31 Jan 1968: The Tet Offensive begins; North Vietnamese and Viet Cong forces attack every major city in South Vietnam after declaring a truce.SIMag USArmy
- 16 Feb 1968: The first 9-1-1 emergency call is made in Haleyville, Alabama.NENA LEM
- 17 Feb 1968: The Naismith Memorial Basketball Hall of Fame opens.HoopHall ESPN
- 16 Mar 1968: Members of Charlie Company, 11th Brigade, Americal Division enter the Vietnamese village of My Lai and begin to massacre of over 300 apparently unarmed civilians including women, children, and the elderly.PBS SIMag
- 4 Apr 1968: Martin Luther King Jr. is assassinated by James Earl Ray in Memphis, Tennessee.Stanford WAPO
- 18 Jul 1968: Noyce and Moore incorporate N M Electronics, soon to become Intel.FU CHM
- 26 Aug 1968—29 Aug 1968: The Democratic Convention takes place against a backdrop of violence between Vietnam War protesters and Chicago Police.CNN SIMag
- 14 Oct 1968: The first live telecast from a manned U. S. spacecraft is sent from Apollo 7.NASA MZTV
- 5 Nov 1968: Richard Milhous Nixon is elected 37th president of the United States of America, 1969 - 1974.USEA
- 12 Nov 1968: In a unanimous decision, the U. S. Supreme Court rules that the Arkansas statute against the teaching of evolution was to protect a particular religious view, and was therefore unconstitutional.Findlaw Justia
- 17 Nov 1968: With just 65 seconds left to play, NBC switches off an NFL game between the Oakland Raiders and New York Jets in favor of the movie Heidi.History.com
- 9 Dec 1968: Douglas C. Engelbart and a group of researchers demonstrate a working computer mouse as part of the NLS - "oN Line System".Stanford SI
|
| 8 | 1969 |
- 2 Mar 1969: The Concorde takes off on its maiden flight.B B C PHYS
- 22 Jun 1969: The Cuyahoga River catches fire because of its polluted waters.W I R E D OHC
- 16 Jul 1969: Apollo 11, the first manned mission to land on the Moon, is launched.NASA Space
- 18 Jul 1969: Ted Kennedy drives his car of a bridge at Chappaquiddick, killing Mary Jo Kopechne.AH SIMag
- 20 Jul 1969: Neil Armstrong walks on the moon.NASA Space
- 15 Aug 1969—18 Aug 1969: The Woodstock Music & Art Fair begins. Woodstock BWC
- 2 Sep 1969: The first node of the ARPANET, the first version of the internet, goes into service.npr W I R E D
- 5 Oct 1969: Monty Python's Flying Circus is aired for the first time.B B C MontyPython
- 10 Nov 1969: Sesame Street airs for the first time.TIME SI
- 12 Nov 1969: Reporter Seymour Hersh breaks a shocking story about a massacre in the South Vietnamese hamlet of My Lai.IP A-H
- 6 Dec 1969: Tragedy at the Altamont Speedway Free Music Festival brings the 60s to a close.Forbes AMF
|
| 9 | 1970 |
- 22 Jan 1970: Pan Am airlines makes the first commercial flight of the Boeing 747.PanAm PM
- 13 Feb 1970: Black Sabbath releases their self-titled, first album, what many consider to be the first heavy metal band.DisCogs PE
- 13 Apr 1970: At 10:06 pm EST, an oxygen tank aboard the Apollo 13 Service Module explodes, crippling the space craft.NASA Space
- 22 Apr 1970: Happy Earth Day! ED EPA
- 4 May 1970: Members of the Ohio National Guard fire into a crowd of Kent State University demonstrators, killing four and wounding nine.KSU ABJ
- 18 Sep 1970: Guitarist Jimi Hendrix dies after collapsing at a party in London.B B C UCR
- 5 Oct 1970: NET becomes PBS.WNET
- 17 Nov 1970: The patent for the computer mouse is granted to Doug Engelbart.SU GooglePatents
- 2 Dec 1970: The Environmental Protection Agency begins operation.EPA NF
- 15 Dec 1970: Venera 7 lands on Venus and becomes the first spacecraft to transmit data from the surface of any extraterrestrial planet.RPW NASA
|
| 10 | 1971 |
- 25 Jan 1971: All defendants from the Manson Family are found guilty in the Tate-LaBianca murder trial.LAMag LAWS
- 1 May 1971: Amtrak begins managing the United States passenger rail system.AHS OTOL
- 30 May 1971: Mariner 9, the first spacecraft to orbit another planet, is launched.NASA Space
- 13 Jun 1971: The New York Times begins publishing the Pentagon Papers.NYTimes POLITICO
- 18 Jun 1971: Federal Express Corporation is founded in Little Rock, Arkansas.CH CNN
- 30 Jun 1971: 3 Russian cosmonauts die in their Soyuz capsule after a valve fails.CoF Space
- 5 Jul 1971: The 26th amendment is signed lowering the voting age to 18.Gallup SI
- 31 Jul 1971: Apollo 15 astronauts Dave Scott and James Irwin take the first extraterrestrial ride in the Lunar Rover.A&SMag NASA
- 10 Oct 1971: London Bridge finally reopens - in Lake Havasu City, Arizona.HavasuNews GoLH
- 14 Nov 1971: Mariner 9 arrives at Mars.NASA
- 4 Dec 1971: "Some stupid with a flare gun" during a Frank Zappa concert causes the Montreux Casino to burn down inspiring the music classic Smoke on the Water by Deep Purple.AO npr
|
| 11 | 1972 |
- 17 Jun 1972: Police arrest five men for breaking into the Democratic National Committee headquarters at the Watergate Hotel Complex in Washington, D. C.USNA FBI
- 18 Oct 1972: The Clean Water Act becomes law.Scarce EPA
- 19 Dec 1972: The last Apollo lunar-landing mission ends.NASA FJ
|
| 12 | 1973 |
- 27 Jan 1973: A peace agreement between the United States and North Vietnam is signed.PBS fold3
- 27 Feb 1973: The Wounded Knee siege begins and lasts 71 days.ICT USMarshalls
- 3 Apr 1973: The first cell phone call is made.AARP GWR
- 14 May 1973: The Skylab space station is launched into orbit by a Saturn V booster.NASA Space
- 22 May 1973: The computer network standard ethernet is described by Bob Metcalfe of the Xerox Palo Alto Research Center.W I R E D CHM
- 25 Aug 1973: The first CAT scan in the United States takes place.W I R E D SMB
- 10 Oct 1973: U. S. Vice President Spiro T. Agnew resigns after pleading no contest to income tax evasion.Nation USHouse
- 17 Oct 1973: OPEC oil embargo begins.C-SPAN MW
|
| 13 | 1974 |
- 2 Jan 1974—28 Nov 1995: Due to the oil shortages and price increases caused by the OPEC embargo, President Nixon signs into law a national speed limit of 55 mph in order to force drivers to conserve fuel.History.com OSTI
- 29 Mar 1974: The terracotta army of the first Emperor of China is discovered by 3 farmers looking for water.SCMP SIMag
- 8 Aug 1974: Richard Milhous Nixon announces that he will resign from the office of President of the United States of America.Whitehouse NAF
- 9 Aug 1974—20 Jan 1975: Gerald Rudolph Ford becomes the 38th president of the United States of America, 1974 - 1977.Whitehouse GRFPL&M
- 9 Aug 1974: Nixon resigns.NAF Whitehouse
- 16 Aug 1974: The Ramones play their first public gig at CBGBs.Rhino VP
|
| 14 | 1975 |
- 2 Jan 1975: The Monarch butterfly's overwintering sites are discovered in the Mexican mountains by Ken Brugger and Catalina Aguado.TBR NWF
- 8 Jan 1975—31 Dec 1980: Ella T. Grasso, the first women elected governor in her own right in the United States, begins serving her term in office.NGA WLHS
- 4 Apr 1975: Bill Gates and Paul Allen form a new company, Microsoft, in Albuquerque, New Mexico.W I R E D CIOViews
- 30 Apr 1975: The Fall of Saigon, the United States abandons Vietnam.AFMag TIME
- 20 Jun 1975: The Talking Heads play their first gig at CBGBs, opening for the Ramones.PunkDiary CA
- 17 Jul 1975: The Apollo and Soyuz space modules link up in space.NASA SN
- 30 Jul 1975: Jimmy Hoffa disappears.TIME TMM
- 2 Aug 1975: The highest temperature in Massachusetts, 107° F, is recorded at Chester and New Bedford.NetState CW
- 2 Aug 1975: The highest temperature recorded in Rhode Island is 104°F at Providence.NetState CW
- 11 Oct 1975: Saturday Night Live premiers on NBC.IMDb NBC
|
| 15 | 1976 |
- 1 Apr 1976: Apple Computer is established.AI MO
- 20 Jul 1976: The Viking 1 Lander touches down on Mars.NASA YouTube
- 2 Nov 1976: James Earl Carter Jr. is elected the 39th president of the United States of America, 1977 - 1981.USEA
|
| 16 | 1977 |
- 19 Jan 1977: Snow falls in Miami, Florida and the Bahamas (I was in Freeport at the time), the only recorded occurrence in history.MiamiHerald NWS
- 5 Jun 1977: The first personal computer, the Apple II, goes on sale.W I R E D EDN
- 19 Jun 1977: The Trans-Alaska Pipeline begins operation.OSTI JPT
- 11 Jul 1977: The supercomputer CRAY-1A, serial number 3, is delivered to NCAR, the National Center for Atmospheric Research.CISL SketchFab
- 4 Aug 1977: The U. S. Department of Energy is established.DoE USHouse
- 23 Aug 1977: The Kremer Prize for the first sustained (mile-long) human-powered flight is claimed by the Gossamer Condor.SI CAOHP
- 20 Oct 1977: A plane carrying the band Lynyrd Skynyrd runs out of fuel and crashes in Mississippi killing 3 bandmembers.RollingStone AO
|
| 17 | 1978 |
- 18 Jan 1978: The roof of the Hartford Civic Center collapses after accumulating a large amount of snow over a 10 day period.CH Courant
- 6 Feb 1978—7 Feb 1978: A savage blizzard packing hurricane force winds hits the northeast U. S. with a major impact on Connecticut, Massachusetts and Rhode Island dumping up to four feet of snow on many places, paralyzing highways for days and tearing up the coastline.Boston.com MassMoments WWI
- 27 Jun 1978: The Gillette Company receives a patent for the erasable pen.Justia USPTO
- 25 Jul 1978: The world's first "test-tube" baby is born.RR WNYC
- 11 Aug 1978—17 Aug 1978: The first successful transatlantic crossing in a balloon, the Double Eagle II, takes place.SI
- 18 Nov 1978: Members of the People's Temple commit murder and more than 900 die by mass suicide in the jungle of Guyana.SDSU WRSP
- 27 Nov 1978: San Francisco Mayor George Moscone and Supervisor Harvey Milk are assassinated by former Supervisor Dan White.npr SFC
|
| 18 | 1979 |
- 28 Mar 1979: A partial core meltdown occurs in the unit-2 nuclear reactor at Three Mile Island.NRC NEI
- 12 Jun 1979: The Gossamer Albatross becomes the first fully human-powered aircraft to cross the English Channel.AVInc SI
- 11 Jul 1979: Skylab crashes to Earth.NASA Space
- 9 Dec 1979: Smallpox is declared eradicated by the WHO.NYAM NIH
|
| 19 | 1980 |
- 22 Feb 1980: The "Miracle on Ice" - The USA men's Olympic hockey team beats the Soviet Union 4-3.LA ESPN
- 29 Feb 1980: Gordie Howe scores his 800th goal as a Hartford Whaler.BS BiB
- 8 May 1980: Small Pox is declared eradicated by the World Health Organization.ABA CDC
- 18 May 1980: Earthquakes trigger a landslide and a cataclysmic eruption of Mount St. Helens in Washington State.USAF USGS
- 20 May 1980: In a referendum, Québec votes to secede from Canada. The motion fails to pass.CBC GNB
- 1 Jun 1980: CNN, the first 24-hour news channel, begins broadcasting.CNN MLRC
- 7 Jun 1980: The first U. S. solar power plant, located at the Natural Bridge National Monument in Utah, is dedicated.NPS SJC
- 30 Sep 1980: The specifications for the networking protocol Ethernet are published.kunbus RTA
- 10 Oct 1980: The Very Large Array (VLA) is dedicated outside of Socorro, New Mexico.AAS Harvard
- 4 Nov 1980: Ronald Wilson Reagan is elected 40th president of the United States of America, 1981 - 1989.USEA
- 8 Dec 1980: Former Beatle John Lennon is assassinated in New York City.B B C TIME
|
| 20 | 1981 |
- 12 Jan 1981: The lowest temperature in Massachusetts, -35°, is recorded at Chester.NetState Chester
- 20 Jan 1981: The Iran hostage crisis ends.USNA WHHA
- 9 Apr 1981: The complete sequence of the 16,569-base pair human mitochondrial genome is presented in the journal Nature.GoogleBooks SCIRP
- 5 Jun 1981: The first research into the epidemic AIDS, acquired immunodeficiency syndrome, is published.CDC HIV
- 7 Jul 1981: Sandra Day O'Connor is nominated by President Ronald Reagan as a U. S. Supreme Court justice and she will become the first women to hold that position.POLITICO SCOTUS
- 1 Aug 1981: MTV airs its first broadcast.BCB VH1
- 12 Aug 1981: The first IBM Personal Computer introduced.IBM ThoughtCo
- 25 Sep 1981: Sandra Day O'Connor takes her seat as U. S. Supreme Court Justice - the first woman to do so.CULaw SI
|
| 21 | 1982 |
- 8 Jan 1982: AT&T agrees to be broken up.FR Yale
- 17 Apr 1982: Canada becomes fully independent from Britain.CMoH CA
- 2 Dec 1982: Barney Clark receives the first permanent artificial heart implant, the Jarvik-7, invented by Robert K. Jarvik.NYTimes SIMag
|
| 22 | 1983 |
- 1 Jan 1983: The Internet evolves from ARPANET.W I R E D IS
- 20 May 1983: The discovery of the HIV virus that causes AIDS is first published in the journal Science.Science NIH
- 18 Jun 1983: Sally Ride becomes the first American woman in space.NASA EarthSky
- 28 Jun 1983: The northbound deck of I-95's Mianus River bridge collapses killing 3.CTPost GL
- 23 Oct 1983: U. S. and French military barracks in Beirut are attacked using massive car bombs.MCT USMarines
- 25 Oct 1983: United States Marines invade Grenada.WHO DemNOW
|
| 23 | 1984 |
- 24 Jan 1984: The Apple Macintosh, the first commercially successful computer to use a graphical interface, is introduced.LowEndMac AI
- 7 Feb 1984: Astronaut Bruce McCandless becomes the first to perform an untethered spacewalk.NASA SI
- 11 Apr 1984: Astronauts from the space shuttle Challenger retrieve and repair the Solar Max satellite while in orbit.W I R E D ESA
- 25 Nov 1984: The song "Do They Know It's Christmas" is recorded in a studio in London.RollingStone TIME
|
| 24 | 1985 |
- 19 Nov 1985: Mikail Gorbachov and Ronald Reagan meet for the first time.POLITICO USState
- 20 Nov 1985: Microsoft releases its first version of Windows.c|net PC
|
| 25 | 1986 |
- 28 Jan 1986: Just after lift-off, the space shuttle Challenger explodes, killing all aboard.NASA Space
- 26 Apr 1986: An explosion and fire release large quantities of radioactive contamination into the atmosphere at the Chernobyl Nuclear Power Plant in Ukraine.NRC LS
- 25 May 1986: Hands Across America takes place.ABCNews GoogleMaps
- 14 Dec 1986—23 Dec 1986: Dick Rutan and Jeana Yeager, in the Voyager are the first to fly around the world without stopping or refueling.SI NASA
|
| 26 | 1987 |
- 19 Jun 1987: The U. S. Supreme Court strikes down the 1981 Louisiana “Creationism Act” claiming it unconstitutionally endorses religion.Cornell NCSE
- 3 Jul 1987: In a little over a day, Richard Branson and Per Lindstrand complete the first Atlantic crossing in a hot air balloon.LT GN
|
| 27 | 1988 |
- 7 Mar 1988: The Writers Guild of America goes on strike, beginning the age of "Reality TV".WAPO History.com
- 23 Jun 1988: James Hansen of the NASA Goddard Institute for Space Studies initiates the global warming discussion.ZEP SEJ
- 8 Nov 1988: George Herbert Walker Bush is elected 41st president of the United States of America, 1989 - 1993.USEA
- 21 Dec 1988: Pan Am Flight 103 explodes over Lockerbie, Scotland, killing 270 people.SUA FBI
|
| 28 | 1989 |
- 23 Mar 1989: Martin Fleischmann and Stanley Pons announce their discovery of cold fusion, an energy production process that's never been duplicated, at the University of Utah.SIMag IE
- 24 Mar 1989: The Exxon Valdez runs aground on the Alaskan coast creating one of the worst environmental disasters.AK EPA
- 9 Nov 1989: The Berlin Wall comes down effectively uniting East and West Germany.NYTimes USState
- 17 Dec 1989: The first episode of the Simpsons airs on FOX.NME npr
- 20 Dec 1989: The U. S. invades Panama.POLITICO USArmy
|
| 29 | 1990 |
- 18 Mar 1990: Overnight, 13 works of art, worth about $300 million in total, are stolen from the Isabella Stewart Gardner Museum in Boston.SIMag ISGM
- 25 Apr 1990: The Hubble Space Telescope is deployed from the space shuttle Discovery.NASA HS
- 3 Oct 1990: East and West Germany reunite after 45 years.History.com
- 19 Nov 1990: Milli Vanilli are stripped of their Grammy after it was discovered they did none of the singing on their award winning album.GIZMODO AP
- 25 Dec 1990: The World Wide Web/Internet protocol (HTTP) and WWW language (HTML) is created by Tim Berners-Lee.UIowa SA
|
| 30 | 1991 |
- 30 Jan 1991: After 320 years, the Hudson's Bay Company gets out of the fur trade business.CBC RCI
- 6 Aug 1991: Tim Berners-Lee publishes the first website.DW CHM
- 10 Sep 1991: Nirvana releases "Smells Like Teen Spirit" ushering in the age of Grunge.Biography billboard
- 19 Sep 1991: Ötzi the Iceman is discovered entombed in a glacier in the Alps.SA
- 30 Oct 1991: The "Perfect Storm" hits the North Atlantic.NPS Weather
- 25 Dec 1991: The end of the Soviet Union.USState GWU
|
| 31 | 1992 |
- 29 Apr 1992: Riots in Los Angeles begin following the acquittal of the police officers charged with excessive force in the beating of Rodney King.SCPR SIMag
- 18 Aug 1992: Basketball player Larry Bird of the Boston Celtics retires.B-R NBA
- 3 Nov 1992: William Jefferson Clinton is elected 42nd president of the United States of America, 1993 - 2001.USNA USEA
- 23 Nov 1992: The world's first smartphone, the IBM Simon, is introduced at COMDEX in Las Vegas.Techverse ScienceInfo
|
| 32 | 1993 |
- 26 Feb 1993: A massive truck bomb explodes in the parking garage of the World Trade Center, the first attempt by Islamist extremists to destroy buildings in America.
USState FBI
|
| 33 | 1994 |
- 17 Jan 1994: A magnitude 6.7 earthquake strikes Northridge, California.SCEC USGS
- 4 Apr 1994: Netscape is founded by Marc Andreessen and Jim Clark under the name "Mosaic Communications Corporation".CH PopMech
|
| 34 | 1995 |
- 19 Apr 1995: Timothy McVeigh and Terry Nichols set off a bomb that destroys the Murrah Federal Building in Oklahoma City, killing 168 people, including 8 federal marshals and 19 children.OKCNM FBI
- 29 Jun 1995: The first U. S. space shuttle docks with the Russian space station Mir.NASA CCSSC
- 15 Jul 1995: The highest temperature recorded in Connecticut is 106° F at Danbury.NetState SF
- 12 Sep 1995: The Harlem Globetrotters lose to the Kareem Abdul-Jabbar All-Stars, breaking an 8,829 game winning streak. NWE SMH
|
| 35 | 1996 |
- 6 Feb 1996: The lowest temperature in Rhode Island, -25°F, was recorded at Greene.NetState McGillU
- 3 Apr 1996: The "Unabomber", Ted Kaczynski, is arrested by the FBI.FBI HSDL
- 5 Jul 1996: Dolly the sheep, the first successfully cloned mammal, is born.SA G&S
- 28 Jul 1996: Two men find part of a 9000 year old human skull in the Columbia River in Kennewick, Washington - Kennewick Man.BM Earth
|
| 36 | 1997 |
|
| 37 | 1998 |
|
| 38 | 1999 |
|
| 39 | 2000 |
- 27 Apr 2000: Vermont is the first state to legalize civil unions for same-sex couples.USC DN
- 13 Dec 2000: Al Gore concedes the United States presidential election to George W. Bush.CNN New Yorker
|
| 40 | 2001 |
- 6 Jan 2001: George Walker Bush is declared the 43rd president of the United States of America, 2001 - 2009.OF CNN
- 15 Feb 2001: The Human Genome Project publishes its results to date in the journal Nature.Genome Nature
- 11 Sep 2001: 11 Sep 2001 attack on New York's World Trade Center, and the Pentagon in Washington, DC.NYTimes 911Mem
- 7 Oct 2001: The U. S.-led attack on Afghanistan begins.History.com
- 27 Nov 2001: The first alien atmosphere is identified by the Hubble Telescope.NASA SI
- 22 Dec 2001: Richard Reid fails in his attempt to blow up a flight from Paris to Miami with explosive material in his shoes.CNN Flying
|
| 41 | 2002 |
|
| 42 | 2003 |
- 1 Feb 2003: Space Shuttle Columbia is destroyed upon reentry killing all on board.FBI Space
- 20 Feb 2003: A pyrotechnics display during a Great White concert sets the foam insulation on fire at the Station nightclub in West Warwick, Rhode Island, killing 100 and injuring over 200 others.NFPA WS
- 19 Mar 2003: The U. S., along with coalition forces, begins its "shock and awe" campaign against Saddam Hussein and Iraq.npr NT
- 14 Apr 2003: Human Genome Map is completed.genome.gov ORNL
- 3 May 2003: The Old Man of the Mountain collapses.Earth WMNH
- 14 Aug 2003: A major power outage darkens parts of the northeast United States and Canada.SA W I R E D
- 24 Oct 2003: Concorde completes its last commercial passenger flight, ending three decades of supersonic travel.B B C GIZMODO
|
| 43 | 2004 |
- 4 Feb 2004: Facebook is founded by Mark Zuckerberg.Facebook FV
- 17 May 2004: The first same-sex marriage in the U. S. takes place in Cambridge, Massachusetts.POLITICO CHS
- 21 Jun 2004: SpaceShipOne becomes the first privately funded spaceplane to achieve spaceflight.Space FAA
- 25 Jun 2004: The last elevated train runs in Boston.MassMoments BC
- 27 Oct 2004: The Boston Red Sox break the curse of the Bambino and win the World Series for the first time in 86 years.Boston.com SABR
- 26 Dec 2004: A magnitude 9.1 earthquake strikes off the coast of Sumatra generating a deadly tsunami.NOAA SA
|
| 44 | 2005 |
- 14 Jan 2005: The Huygens probe successfully lands on Saturn's largest moon Titan - the only landing to take place in the outer Solar System and the furthest from Earth.esa NASA
- 18 Jan 2005: The world's largest passenger plane, the Airbus A380, is unveiled in France.Airbus AW
- 3 Mar 2005: Steve Fossett completes the first non-stop, non-refueled, solo flight around the world in 67 hours and one minute in the GlobalFlyer.AAHS NASA
- 29 Aug 2005: Hurricane Katrina makes landfall in Louisiana.NOAA
- 19 Oct 2005: Saddam Hussein goes on trial for crimes against humanity.GI npr
|
| 45 | 2006 |
- 24 Aug 2006: The International Astronomical Union (IAU) revokes Pluto's planetary status. EarthSky
- 27 Nov 2006: Québec is recognized as "a nation within a unified Canada".CBC
|
| 46 | 2007 |
- 4 Jan 2007: U. S. Representative Nancy Pelosi becomes the first woman Speaker of the House.VOA USHouse
- 9 Jan 2007: Apple CEO Steve Jobs unveils the first iPhone to the world.MacWorld Apple
- 11 Mar 2007: Daylight Savings Time is extended - beginning 3 weeks earlier (2nd Sunday in March) in the year and ending 1 week (1st Sunday in November) later.TT T&D
- 29 Jun 2007: The first iPhones go on sale.Apple EDN
- 12 Oct 2007: Al Gore shares the Nobel Peace Prize for his work on climate change education.NP Science
|
| 47 | 2008 |
- 28 Sep 2008: SpaceX successfully launches the first privately-developed liquid fuel rocket, Falcon 1, into Earth orbit.Space NASA
- 4 Nov 2008: Barack Hussein Obama is elected the 44th president of the United States of America, 2009 - 2017.USSenate USNA
|
| 48 | 2009 |
- 7 Mar 2009: The Kepler Space Observatory, a spacecraft designed to search for other Earth-like planets, is launched at Cape Canaveral, Florida.NASA Space
|
| 49 | 2010 |
- 12 Jan 2010: Haiti is rocked by a huge earthquake and subsequent tsunami which kills around 300,000 people.CNN nature
- 8 Dec 2010: SpaceX successfully returns the Dragon capsule back to earth after the launch and orbit of the Falcon 9 rocket - a first for a private company.PS NASA
|
| 50 | 2011 |
- 11 Mar 2011: Northern Japan is struck by a triple disaster - a magnitude 9.0 earthquake triggers a massive tsunami which in turn causes one of the worst nuclear accidents ever to occur.NOAA USGS
- 2 May 2011: Osama bin Laden, the mastermind behind the terror attacks of 9/11, is killed in Pakistan.WhiteHouse TheAtlantic
- 8 Jul 2011: The Space Shuttle Atlantis is launched in the final mission of the U. S. Space Shuttle program.Space NASA
- 21 Jul 2011: The space shuttle program comes to a close with the final touch down of Atlantis.NASA Space
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| 51 | 2012 |
- 29 Oct 2012: Hurricane Sandy becomes Superstorm Sandy after moving up the east coast of the U. S. and takes a left turn towards shore that devastates many of the communities along the mid-Atlantic, especially New York and New Jersey.NASA LiveScience
- 14 Dec 2012: After killing his mother, Adam Lanza walks into Sandy Hook Elementary School in Newtown, Connecticut and kills 20 children and 5 adults before turning the gun on himself.CNN NYMag
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| 52 | 2013 |
- 15 Feb 2013: A large meteor explodes as it streaks through the sky over the Chelyabinsk region in Russia, shattering windows and collapsing buildings from the force of the explosion and injuring over 1000 in the process.CNN Space
- 17 Feb 2013: Danica Patrick becomes the first women in history to win the pole for NASCAR's Daytona 500.IMS NASCAR
- 15 Apr 2013: Two bombs detonate within seconds of each other at the finish line of the Boston Marathon killing 3 people and injuring more than 140.TIME DNI
- 1 Oct 2013: The Affordable Care Act goes into effect.NIH RMHP
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| 53 | 2014 |
- 25 Apr 2014: The Flint Water Crisis begins when the city of Flint, Michigan switches to the Flint River as its source of water in a cost-cutting measure.NRDC npr
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| 54 | 2015 |
- 9 Mar 2015: The Solar Impulse 2, the first aircraft to fly day and night using energy from the sun, begins its round-the-world voyage.PHYS SPW
- 26 Jun 2015: The United States Supreme Court makes the determination that gay marriage is legal in all fifty states.CNN HRW
- 13 Nov 2015: Islamic extremists attack various places in Paris killing more than 100 innocent people.B B C NYTimes
- 21 Dec 2015: SpaceX brings the first stage of its Falcon 9 rocket back to Earth for a soft touchdown at Cape Canaveral, Florida after delivering a payload of 11 commercial satellites into orbit.Space.com SA
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| 55 | 2016 |
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| 56 | 2017 |
- 25 Aug 2017: Hurricane Harvey makes landfall in Houston, Texas and drops between 40 and 61 inches of rain across the area.HHMag Weather
- 20 Sep 2017: Destructive Hurricane Maria, with winds as high as 175mph, makes landfall in Puerto Rico.NASA Weather
- 1 Oct 2017: A gunman opens fire on a crowd of concertgoers in Las Vegas, Nevada, killing 58 people and injuring 546.CBSNews JEMS
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| 57 | 2018 |
- 9 Aug 2018: The U. S. announces plans for a new branch of the military - Space Force!WAPO S&S
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| 58 | 2019 |
- 24 Sep 2019: House Speaker Nancy Pelosi announces the first formal impeachment inquiry of the 45th President of the United States.NYT CNN
- 18 Dec 2019: America WINS! The Crime Boss in the White House is IMPEACHED!CNN CBS
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| 59 | 2020 |
- 6 Feb 2020: The first U. S. death known to be from COVID-19 pandemic occurs in Santa Clara County, California.npr CNN
- 29 Feb 2020: The U. S. and the Taliban sign an agreement for ending the war in Afghanistan.VOA CNN
- 11 Aug 2020: Presidential candidate Joe Biden selects Kamala Harris as his running mate.NYT BP
- 7 Nov 2020: Joe Biden becomes the 46th president of the United States after he and Kamala Harris are declared winners of the 2020 election.CBS WAPO
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| 60 | 2021 |
- 6 Jan 2021: Insurrectionist members of the cult whose leader occupies the White House, force their way into the Capitol building in an attempt to overturn the results of the 2020 U. S. Presidential election.Vox WAPO
- 13 Jan 2021: For the first time in U. S. history, the Insurrectionist-in-Chief is impeached for the second time during his 4 year presidency.CNN NBCNews
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| 61 | 2022 |
- 24 Feb 2022: Russia launches a full-scale invasion of Ukraine - a major escalation of the Russo-Ukrainian War, which began in 2014.B B C PBS
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| 62 | 2023 |
- 30 Mar 2023: The twice impeached, former squatter of 1600 Pennsylvania Avenue adds to his criminal resumé with an indictment - another first, I might add - he received in New York City over hush money payments to a porn star. Happy days are here again!CNN npr
- 8 Jun 2023: The twice impeached, indicted, sexual abuser and former squatter of 1600 Pennsylvania Avenue again adds to his criminal resumé, this time with a federal indictment - another first - he received in Florida containing 37 charges related to classified documents found at Mar-a-lago.CNN npr
- 1 Aug 2023: The twice impeached, twice indicted, rapist and former squatter of 1600 Pennsylvania Avenue again adds another bullet to his criminal resumé - a federal indictment related to the January 6th insurrection.DoJ CBS
- 14 Aug 2023: The twice impeached, thrice indicted, rapist and former squatter of 1600 Pennsylvania Avenue again adds another bullet to his criminal resumé - this time an indictment in the state of Georgia regarding his attempt to steal the election there.AP Reuters
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| 63 | 2024 |
- 30 May 2024: Guilty on ALL 34 counts!WSJ POLITICO
- 21 Jul 2024: Joe Biden decides to end his run for re-election. He then endorses Kamala Harris as the Democratic presidential nominee.POLITICO B B C
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