50 Fun Facts About 1991

Which film supplied the Bryan Adams ballad that spent a record 16 straight weeks at UK number one?

Robin Hood: Prince of Thieves' ballad ran 16 weeks in a row at number one, beating the 11-week record Slim Whitman's 'Rose Marie' had held since 1955.

Which Queen song returned to UK number one with the same recording after Freddie Mercury died?

Bohemian Rhapsody returned to number one for five weeks at Christmas, 16 years after its first run, with the reissue's proceeds donated to an AIDS charity.

Which Nirvana album, released in September, has a cover of a naked baby swimming toward a dollar bill on a fishhook?

Nevermind was an unexpected success, replacing Michael Jackson at the top of the US Billboard 200 in January 1992 and dragging grunge into the mainstream.

Which thriller released on Valentine's Day swept the 'Big Five' Academy Awards, a feat managed only twice before?

The Silence of the Lambs began as a Gene Hackman project he meant to direct and star in, but he pulled out over its violence, leaving it to Jonathan Demme.

Which film, then the most expensive ever made, topped 1991's worldwide box office?

Terminator 2 cost an estimated $94–102 million and took around $520 million, with its liquid-metal T-1000 effects setting a new bar for computer graphics.

Which leader resigned as Soviet president on Christmas Day, a day before the union was formally dissolved?

After Mikhail Gorbachev resigned, the Soviet flag over the Kremlin was lowered for the last time that evening and replaced by Russia's tricolour.

Which Los Angeles motorist's beating by police was filmed from a balcony by bystander George Holliday on 3 March?

Rodney King's beating was seen worldwide after Holliday sent his camcorder tape to KTLA, and the officers' acquittal a year later sparked the 1992 Los Angeles riots.

Which computer scientist at CERN announced the World Wide Web on a newsgroup on 6 August?

Tim Berners-Lee never patented the web, and CERN made its protocol and code available royalty-free in April 1993, so anyone could build on it.

Which NBA team beat the Los Angeles Lakers in five games in June to win the first championship in its history?

The Chicago Bulls got there by sweeping the Detroit Pistons, who had knocked them out of the playoffs in each of the three previous seasons.

Which Los Angeles Lakers guard announced on 7 November that he had HIV and was retiring immediately?

Magic Johnson was back within a year, co-captaining the Dream Team to Olympic gold in Barcelona in 1992.

Which Sheffield-born chemist answered a radio advert to become the first Briton in space, flying to Mir in May?

Helen Sharman was chosen live on ITV from nearly 13,000 applicants to an advert reading 'Astronaut wanted. No experience necessary', and spent nearly eight days in space, mostly aboard Mir.

Which British boss nearly sank his own company with a joke mocking its products?

Gerald Ratner's name became a byword for the blunder, as in 'doing a Ratner': harming your own reputation with an ill-judged remark.

Which group of men jailed for the 1974 pub bombings that killed 21 people had their convictions quashed in March?

The Birmingham Six walked free after 16 years, and the same day the government set up a Royal Commission on Criminal Justice.

Which media tycoon was found dead in the sea off the Canary Islands in November after vanishing from his yacht?

Robert Maxwell's yacht, the Lady Ghislaine, was named after his daughter, and after his death he was found to have plundered his companies' pension funds.

Which Church of England envoy was freed in Lebanon in November after 1,763 days as a hostage, four years in solitary?

Terry Waite had gone to Beirut to negotiate for other hostages and was himself kidnapped in 1987.

Which levy did John Major's government choose to replace the hated community charge, or poll tax, from 1993?

Council Tax bands in England are still based on what each home would have sold for on 1 April 1991, the year the poll tax's abolition was announced.

Which club won a then-record eighth FA Cup in May, in the final where Paul Gascoigne tore his knee ligaments?

Tottenham Hotspur's Gascoigne, a multimillion-pound target for Lazio, scythed down Gary Charles inside the first 15 minutes and wrecked his own knee, missing a year of football.

Which club took the league title despite a two-point deduction for a brawl at Old Trafford, losing just one match?

Arsenal conceded only 18 league goals all season, and their sole defeat, 2–1 at Chelsea, came while captain Tony Adams was serving a prison sentence.

Which country beat hosts England 12–6 at Twickenham on 2 November to win the Rugby World Cup?

Australia's Wallabies had knocked out holders New Zealand in the semi-final, while David Campese spent the build-up publicly mocking England's forward-dominated style.

Which band's 1982 single 'Should I Stay or Should I Go' topped the UK chart in March thanks to a Levi's advert?

The Clash had announced their split in January 1986, so their first and only UK number one arrived five years after the band broke up.

Which Russian president climbed onto a tank outside Moscow's parliament to rally crowds against the August coup?

Boris Yeltsin's stand held: troops around the White House defected or refused orders, and within days the coup had collapsed.

Which Soviet city voted in a June referendum to take back its original name, St Petersburg?

Leningrad had been renamed Petrograd in 1914 to drop the German-sounding name, then named for Lenin days after his death in 1924; St Petersburg returned on 6 September.

In which republic's state dacha at Viskuli did three Soviet leaders sign the 8 December accord that created the CIS?

Belarus's parliament chairman Stanislav Shushkevich signed alongside the Russian and Ukrainian presidents at the state dacha near Viskuli, declaring the Soviet Union finished.

Which two Yugoslav republics declared independence on 25 June, triggering the Ten-Day War within days?

Slovenia and Croatia's declarations prompted a brief Yugoslav army campaign in Slovenia that ended with the Brioni Agreement on 7 July, while Serb forces besieged Vukovar for 87 days in the autumn.

Which Cold War military alliance was formally ended by Václav Havel at a Prague meeting on 1 July, after 36 years?

The Warsaw Pact had been created in 1955 in response to West Germany rearming inside NATO, and within 20 years every ex-member outside the USSR had joined NATO itself.

Which former Indian prime minister was killed by a Tamil Tiger suicide bomber at a rally in Sriperumbudur on 21 May?

Rajiv Gandhi was campaigning to return to office, and the Congress party won the most seats in the June election, making P. V. Narasimha Rao prime minister.

Which opposition leader, under house arrest, won the Nobel Peace Prize, her sons collecting it?

Aung San Suu Kyi could not give her Nobel lecture until June 2012, when she finally delivered it in Oslo, 21 years after the award.

Which Philippine volcano's June eruption, the century's second largest, cooled global temperatures?

Mount Pinatubo erupted as a typhoon struck, and the rain made the falling ash so heavy that thousands of roofs collapsed.

Which famous mummy did two German tourists find in the ice on the Austria–Italy border in September?

Ötzi, about 5,300 years old, was first taken for a recently dead mountaineer, and in 2001 X-rays found an arrowhead in his shoulder: he had been murdered.

Which airline, founded in 1927 and famous for its blue globe logo and 'Clipper' call signs, shut down on 4 December?

Pan Am shut down when Delta, which had bought its European routes, withdrew its support.

Which team lost Super Bowl XXV 20–19 when Scott Norwood's last-second 47-yard field goal sailed wide right?

The Buffalo Bills' fast no-huddle offense saw little of the ball, as the Giants kept possession for a Super Bowl-record 40 minutes 33 seconds.

Whose 8.95-metre leap at the Tokyo World Championships on 30 August broke Bob Beamon's long jump world record?

Mike Powell's jump ended Carl Lewis's ten-year unbeaten run in the long jump, and the world record still stood as of 2025.

Which Disney musical with songs by Alan Menken and Howard Ashman was the first animated film nominated for Best Picture?

Beauty and the Beast is dedicated to lyricist Ashman, who died of AIDS eight months before its release.

Which Ridley Scott road movie ends with its two heroines driving off a cliff near the Grand Canyon?

Thelma & Louise's canyon scenes were actually shot near Dead Horse Point in Utah.

Which Nirvana single took its title from graffiti Kathleen Hanna wrote on Kurt Cobain's wall?

Smells Like Teen Spirit's writer took 'Kurt smells like Teen Spirit' for a revolutionary slogan, and only learned it was a deodorant months after the single was out.

Doug, Rugrats and which chihuahua-and-cat cartoon premiered on 11 August as Nickelodeon's first three 'Nicktoons'?

The Ren & Stimpy Show clashed so often with Nickelodeon over content and missed deadlines that the network fired its creator, John Kricfalusi, in late September 1992.

Which Supreme Court nominee was confirmed 52–48 in October after Anita Hill testified he had sexually harassed her?

Clarence Thomas denounced the hearings as 'a high-tech lynching for uppity blacks', and he took the seat of retiring Justice Thurgood Marshall.

Which western won seven Oscars including Best Picture in March, with Kevin Costner also named Best Director?

Dances with Wolves was turned down by several studios that thought Westerns no longer paid after Heaven's Gate flopped, yet it went on to revive the genre.

Which University of Helsinki student posted to comp.os.minix on 25 August about a free operating system, 'just a hobby'?

Linus Torvalds wanted to call his kernel Freax, but the friend who ran the FTP server hosting it named the folder 'linux' without asking, and the name stuck.

Which programming language did Guido van Rossum first release, as version 0.9.0, in February?

Python is named after the BBC show Monty Python's Flying Circus, not the snake, and its documentation encourages references to the show's sketches.

Which British duo had international hits in 1991, and later burned a million pounds in cash?

The KLF quit the music business at the height of their fame in 1992, after firing machine-gun blanks into the Brit Awards audience.

Which band played its first gig at Manchester's Boardwalk club in August, watched by a roadie who would soon join it?

Oasis first offered Noel Gallagher, then an Inspiral Carpets roadie, the job of manager, but he joined the band instead and took over the songwriting.

Which Right Said Fred debut spent six weeks at UK number two behind Bryan Adams, yet topped the US Hot 100?

I'm Too Sexy's chorus was interpolated in Taylor Swift's 2017 hit 'Look What You Made Me Do', earning Right Said Fred songwriting credits.

Which Liverpool manager resigned just after his side drew 4–4 at Everton in the FA Cup?

Kenny Dalglish later blamed the stress and impact of the Hillsborough disaster for his decision to quit.

Which boxer suffered near-fatal brain injuries in his September rematch with Chris Eubank at White Hart Lane?

Michael Watson, left with lasting damage, later walked the 2003 London Marathon, and Chris Eubank, by then his friend, joined him for the final mile.

Which country won Eurovision in Rome on the contest's first-ever tie-break, after finishing level on points with France?

Sweden's Carola won with 'Fångad av en stormvind' because, with the 12-point scores level, it had collected more 10-point scores, and the contest had been moved from Sanremo to Rome because of the Gulf War.

Which Yugoslav club beat Marseille on penalties in Bari to win the European Cup as the country fell apart?

Red Star Belgrade's Darko Pančev converted the decisive penalty after Manuel Amoros missed, bringing the trophy to Yugoslavia for the first time.

Which South Carolina course hosted the Ryder Cup that Europe lost when Bernhard Langer missed a short putt?

Kiawah Island's Ocean Course saw Langer's par putt on the final green slide by, handing the United States a 14½–13½ win when a 14-all tie would have kept the cup in Europe.

Whom did François Mitterrand appoint on 15 May as France's first female prime minister?

Édith Cresson later became a European Commissioner, and the scandal over a dentist friend she hired helped bring down the whole Santer Commission in 1999.

Which publication did John Bird and Gordon Roddick launch in London in September?

The Big Issue is sold by largely homeless vendors, an idea Gordon Roddick brought back after seeing Street News on sale in New York.