99 Fun Facts About Gen X

Gen X is generally defined as people born between which years?

Pew's 1965-1980 range is the most widely used; the cohort numbered tens of millions of Americans in 2019.

Gen X sits between which two generations?

Gen X sits between the baby boomers (born 1946-1964) and millennials (born 1981-1996) in the Pew scheme, which places Gen X at 1965-1980.

Why were Gen X children nicknamed 'latchkey' kids?

Rising divorce rates and more working mothers, before widespread childcare, meant many let themselves in after school.

As teens and young adults, Xers were dubbed the what, after a cable music channel?

Gen X were dubbed the MTV Generation after the music channel that launched in August 1981, when the oldest Xers were in their mid-teens; they were also stereotyped as slackers.

What is the nationality of Douglas Coupland, author of the 1991 novel Generation X?

Douglas Coupland is Canadian: born on a Canadian air base in West Germany and raised in Vancouver, where he is also known as a visual artist.

Coupland took the 'X' from the final chapter of which book, not from Billy Idol's band?

Fussell's 'X' category were people who wanted off the merry-go-round of status and money.

Which photographer first used the phrase 'Gen X' in full as the title of a 1950s photo-essay?

Robert Capa titled a 1953 Magnum photo-essay 'Generation X', about young people coming of age just after World War II, the cohort now called the Silent Generation.

Authors Strauss and Howe split Gen X into two waves named after what?

In 13th Gen (1993) Strauss and Howe split their 1961-1981 cohort into an Atari wave (born 1961-1971) and a Nintendo wave (1972-1981), after the consoles each half grew up with.

Which nickname covers people born on the generational cusp, roughly 1977 to 1983?

Xennials, a blend of Gen X and millennials, covers those born roughly 1977-1983; Generation Jones is the name for late boomers of the late 1950s and early 1960s.

What was the first clip ever aired on MTV when it launched on 1 August 1981?

'Video Killed the Radio Star' by the Buggles went out at 12:01 a.m. on a channel launched by Warner-Amex and hosted by VJs.

How many teenagers from different cliques serve the Saturday detention in The Breakfast Club (1985)?

Five: a nerd, a jock, a loner, a popular girl and a delinquent, at Shermer High in Illinois.

Where was The Breakfast Club entirely filmed?

The Breakfast Club was shot entirely at the closed Maine North High School in Des Plaines, Illinois, in spring 1984; the library set was built inside the school's gymnasium.

Which of these was NOT directed by John Hughes?

Amy Heckerling directed Fast Times; Hughes did write Home Alone though.

Reality Bites, the 1994 Gen X touchstone, was the directing debut of whom?

Reality Bites was Ben Stiller's feature directing debut; he also plays the slick TV executive Michael, while Winona Ryder's Lelaina films a documentary about her disenchanted friends.

Nirvana's Nevermind knocked which album off the top of the US chart in January 1992?

Nevermind replaced Michael Jackson's Dangerous at No. 1 on the Billboard 200 for the chart dated 11 January 1992, bringing grunge into the mainstream and hastening the end of hair metal.

What is on the cover of Nevermind?

The cover shows a naked baby, Spencer Elden, swimming toward a dollar bill on a fishhook; Cobain got the idea watching a TV programme about water births.

Which city's Sub Pop label was the centre of the early grunge scene?

Green River, the Melvins and Mudhoney came first; the term 'grunge' was used in a 1988 Sub Pop catalogue.

Kurt Cobain was born in which Washington town?

Kurt Cobain was born in Aberdeen, Washington, a logging town on Grays Harbor, on 20 February 1967; he died in Seattle in April 1994, aged 27.

Richard Linklater's 1990 film Slacker, which gave the era its label, was shot in which city?

Slacker was shot in Austin, Texas, Linklater's home city, for about $23,000; it drifts from one misfit to the next over a single day.

Which fictional grunge band does Matt Dillon front in Cameron Crowe's 1992 film Singles?

In Singles, Matt Dillon's Cliff Poncier fronts Citizen Dick, with Pearl Jam's Eddie Vedder, Stone Gossard and Jeff Ament as his bandmates; Stillwater is the band in Crowe's Almost Famous.

What was Atari's 1977 console originally called?

Atari's 1977 console launched as the Video Computer System (VCS) and was renamed the Atari 2600 in 1982; codenamed Stella, it shipped with joysticks, paddles and the game Combat.

The NES was released in Japan under what name?

In Japan the console launched in July 1983 as the Family Computer, or Famicom; the redesigned NES reached US test markets in October 1985, after the 1983 video game crash.

For Western markets the NES was redesigned to resemble what household object?

Designer Lance Barr styled the NES as a grey, front-loading box resembling a video cassette recorder, so retailers burned by the 1983 crash would see an entertainment appliance rather than a video game console.

Which company launched the Walkman portable cassette player in 1979?

Sony launched the Walkman (model TPS-L2) in Japan on 1 July 1979; it grew out of Sony's 'Pressman' recorder used by journalists, and 'Walkman' entered the OED in 1986.

The Space Shuttle Challenger broke apart how many seconds into its flight on 28 January 1986?

Challenger broke apart 73 seconds after liftoff on 28 January 1986; millions of schoolchildren watched live because teacher Christa McAuliffe was aboard.

What component failed and caused the Challenger disaster?

O-ring seals in the right solid rocket booster failed: record-low temperatures on launch morning had stiffened the rubber, letting hot gas burn through to the external tank.

On what date did the Berlin Wall fall?

The Wall opened on the night of 9 November 1989 after Günter Schabowski's botched press conference implied new travel rules applied immediately; 3 October 1990 is reunification day.

The Rubik's Cube was invented in 1974 by an architecture professor from which country?

Hungary's Ernő Rubik called it the Magic Cube; it went international in 1980.

Beverly Hills, 90210 followed twins Brandon and Brenda Walsh, who had moved from which city?

Brandon and Brenda Walsh moved with their parents from Minneapolis to Beverly Hills; Darren Star's series premiered in October 1990 and only took off during a special summer run in 1991.

Which network aired Beverly Hills, 90210?

Fox ran it for ten seasons; producer Aaron Spelling's daughter Tori was one of only four cast members to last the whole run.

What was Pac-Man called on its original 1980 Japanese release?

Pac-Man debuted in Japan as Puck Man (from 'paku-paku', the sound of munching); Midway renamed it for the US in case vandals altered the P. Designer Toru Iwatani wanted a game that appealed to women too.

Which company mass-produced Cabbage Patch Kids from 1983, sparking Christmas store frenzies?

Coleco licensed the dolls in 1982 and mass-produced them from 1983, sparking that Christmas's store riots; they grew out of Xavier Roberts' hand-made Little People, sold at Babyland General Hospital in Cleveland, Georgia.

Nickelodeon launched nationally on 1 April 1979 as what?

Nickelodeon launched on 1 April 1979 as the first cable channel for kids; it had begun as Pinwheel, a December 1977 test on Warner's QUBE cable system in Columbus, Ohio.

The 1985 version of The Oregon Trail, the classroom game, was made for which computer?

MECC's 1985 The Oregon Trail was written for the Apple II, the computer that dominated US classrooms; it re-imagined a text game written in 1971 for an eighth-grade history class.

The Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles began in 1984 as what?

The Turtles began as a 1984 comic book, a parody of Daredevil and Frank Miller's Ronin; Kevin Eastman and Peter Laird published the first issue through their own Mirage Studios.

The 1984 Transformers toy line was rebranded from which Japanese company's toys?

Hasbro licensed Takara's Diaclone and Micro Change toys in 1984 and rebranded them as Autobots and Decepticons for Western markets, with Marvel supplying the back-story.

What was the population of Gen X in the United States in 2019, by Census projections?

Census Bureau projections put Gen X at 65.2 million Americans in 2019, behind millennials (72.1 million) and boomers (71.6 million), the year millennials overtook boomers as the largest adult generation.

Which touring festival did Perry Farrell launch in 1991 as a Jane's Addiction farewell tour?

Lollapalooza began in 1991 as a farewell tour for Perry Farrell's Jane's Addiction and toured annually through 1997, mixing alternative rock, hip-hop and industrial acts; Warped Tour and Ozzfest followed in 1995 and 1996.

Which US president was shot outside the Washington Hilton on 30 March 1981?

Ronald Reagan was shot by John Hinckley Jr. outside the Washington Hilton on 30 March 1981, 69 days into his presidency, and recovered after surgery at George Washington University Hospital.

When did the NES get its full nationwide US launch?

After a New York test market in October 1985 and Los Angeles in early 1986, the NES went on sale nationwide in September 1986; the Super NES reached the US in August 1991.

Who produced Nevermind, giving Nirvana its polished, radio-friendly sound?

Butch Vig produced Nevermind at Sound City in Van Nuys in spring 1991, with Andy Wallace mixing; it was Dave Grohl's first Nirvana release, and Steve Albini produced the rawer In Utero.

What was the budget for recording Nevermind?

Nevermind was recorded on a budget of about $65,000 in May 1991; the band played Seattle's OK Hotel in April to earn gas money for the drive to Los Angeles.

Which of these was one of the four founding cast members to appear in every season of 90210?

Ian Ziering (Steve Sanders) stayed for all ten seasons, 1990-2000, alongside Jennie Garth, Tori Spelling and Brian Austin Green; Doherty left in 1994, Perry in 1995 and Priestley in 1998.

The Atari 2600's swappable cartridge format had first been used by which 1976 console?

The Fairchild Channel F, released in November 1976, was the first home console with swappable ROM cartridges; Atari's console followed in 1977, also sold by Sears as the Tele-Games Video Arcade.

Which 1994 Kevin Smith debut was made for about $27,000, financed partly on credit cards?

Clerks, Kevin Smith's 1994 debut, was shot in black and white at the Quick Stop in Leonardo, New Jersey, where he worked, for $27,575, partly funded by maxed-out credit cards.

In 1999 The New York Times dubbed entrepreneurial Gen Xers 'Generation' what?

Generation 1099: the Times' 1999 tag referred to IRS Form 1099, which reports self-employed income, rather than the W-2 wage form of salaried employees.

In which magazine did the phrase 'Generation X' first appear in print, in December 1952?

Holiday's December 1952 issue announced the coming photo-essay on youth growing up just after the Second World War that gave the phrase its first print appearance; the essay itself ran in 1953.

In 2019, Pew projected that Gen X would outnumber US baby boomers in which year?

2028 was Pew's projection: Gen X, born 1965 to 1980, was still smaller than the boomer cohort in 2019 but closing the gap as boomers aged, while millennials had already overtaken boomers that year.

Who wrote the 1964 book Generation X about British youth culture?

Jane Deverson's 1964 interviews with British teenagers, co-written with Charles Hamblett, became the book Generation X; Billy Idol later took its title for his punk band, and Coupland's 1991 novel revived it.

Nirvana's breakthrough single Smells Like Teen Spirit took its title from a brand of which everyday product?

Deodorant inspired the title: Kathleen Hanna wrote on Kurt Cobain's wall that he smelled of Teen Spirit, and he mistook the brand name for a revolutionary slogan.

Which candy lures the alien in E.T. the Extra-Terrestrial, a role that the makers of M&M's had turned down?

Reese's Pieces sales soared after the 1982 release, though Hershey paid nothing for the scene: it agreed to promote the film with $1 million of advertising instead.

Which reformulated cola did Coca-Cola launch in April 1985, only to bring back the original recipe 79 days later?

New Coke had beaten the old recipe in taste tests, but the company took more than 40,000 angry calls and letters before the original returned as Coca-Cola Classic.

Which band's 1981 hit Start Me Up did Microsoft use to launch Windows 95, in a nod to the Start button?

The Rolling Stones soundtracked a launch so hyped that the Empire State Building in New York was lit up in the colours of the Windows logo.

Which 1975 Queen single climbed to number two in the US in 1992 after a head-banging car scene in Wayne's World?

Bohemian Rhapsody had stalled at number nine in America in 1976, so a comedy about two public-access metalheads took it seven places higher.

Which drummer played Live Aid in both London and Philadelphia on one day in 1985 by flying Concorde?

Phil Collins sang at Wembley, flew from Heathrow to New York, then drummed in Philadelphia for Eric Clapton and the surviving members of Led Zeppelin.

Which movie-rental chain, founded in Dallas in 1985, turned down a chance to buy Netflix for $50 million in 2000?

Blockbuster ran more than 9,000 stores at its 2004 peak, yet it filed for bankruptcy protection in 2010 as the mail-order upstart it had declined kept growing.

Tetris, the falling-block puzzle that hooked Gen X, was created in the mid-1980s by a researcher in which country?

Soviet Union researcher Alexey Pajitnov built Tetris in his spare time at an Academy of Sciences computing centre, naming it after 'tetra' and his favourite sport, tennis.

In June 1994, around 95 million viewers watched police slowly pursue O.J. Simpson in which white vehicle?

Ford Bronco footage pulled TV stations away from a game of the NBA Finals, as Al Cowlings drove Simpson back to his Brentwood estate.

Which 1975 craze, dreamed up in a bar by ad man Gary Dahl, came in a ventilated box with straw bedding?

Pet Rock buyers got nothing but an ordinary stone, yet Dahl sold nearly 1.5 million of them at just under $4 each and became a millionaire.

Douglas Coupland's novel Generation X popularised which slang word for low-paid, dead-end service work?

McJob made it into the Oxford English Dictionary, and in 2007 the UK arm of McDonald's planned a public petition to get the unflattering definition changed.

Which sitcom gave the 1990s 'The Rachel', a layered haircut that stylist Chris McMillan created for one of its leads?

Friends actress Jennifer Aniston debuted the cut in the first season, yet she has said she dislikes it because it was so hard to maintain without her stylist.

The Simpsons began in 1987 as a run of animated shorts on which sketch comedy series?

The Tracey Ullman Show carried 48 Simpsons shorts over three seasons before the characters were given a half-hour prime-time series of their own.

Which gull-winged sports car, built in Northern Ireland, became Doc Brown's time machine in Back to the Future?

DeLorean panels were left as unpainted brushed stainless steel, a choice made mainly to get round a problem with painting the body.

KITT, the talking car David Hasselhoff drove in Knight Rider, was a modified 1982 model of which car?

Pontiac Trans Am bodywork gave KITT its sleek black look, and the name was short for Knight Industries Two Thousand.

Which rock band teamed up with Run-DMC to remake its own 1975 song Walk This Way as a rap crossover hit?

Aerosmith's singer and lead guitarist both performed on the remake, which reached number four and outcharted the original's peak of number ten.

Which 1983 cartoon about Prince Adam of Eternia did Mattel commission to promote a toy line it already sold?

He-Man reached television only after US regulators relaxed a ban on toy-based children's programming, and it became the first syndicated show based on a toy.

Which director proposed the PG-13 rating after his 1984 adventure Temple of Doom drew complaints about violence?

Steven Spielberg was also executive producer of Gremlins that summer, and the first film released with the new in-between rating was the war drama Red Dawn.

Which actress fuelled the 1980s aerobics craze with a best-selling Workout tape and her ballet-style leg warmers?

Jane Fonda's 1982 tape was the first non-theatrical home release to top sales charts, and her exercise series went on to sell 17 million copies.

Which company unveiled Sonic the Hedgehog in 1991 as a speedy mascot to rival Mario?

Sega held an in-house contest to find its mascot, and programmer Yuji Naka, a Super Mario Bros. fan, built the game around speed because he wanted something faster.

Which pop duo had their 1990 Best New Artist Grammy revoked after it emerged that they never sang on their records?

Milli Vanilli were the faces for studio singers hired by producer Frank Farian, whose earlier act Boney M also had a frontman miming to another voice.

Which Saturday-morning series of animated musical shorts taught American kids grammar, maths and civics from 1973?

Schoolhouse Rock! began when an advertising executive noticed that his son could memorise pop lyrics but struggled with his multiplication tables.

Which Sesame Street shopkeeper's death was explained to Big Bird in a landmark episode shown on Thanksgiving Day 1983?

Mr. Hooper actor Will Lee had died in 1982, and the producers took expert advice on telling young viewers instead of dropping the character without explanation.

Which Beatles recording returned to the US chart in 1986 after Ferris Bueller mimed it on a Chicago parade float?

Twist and Shout climbed to number 23 on the Hot 100, helped by a second comedy, Back to School, in which Rodney Dangerfield sang it as well.

Whose song In Your Eyes plays from the boombox John Cusack holds above his head in Say Anything...?

Peter Gabriel's ballad was a late replacement for a Fishbone track, and Cusack at first refused to film the pose because he found it too theatrical.

Which nickname did a 1985 magazine cover story give young film actors such as Emilio Estevez and Rob Lowe?

Brat Pack headlined a story by writer David Blum, who set out to profile Emilio Estevez alone and widened the piece after a night out with him and other young actors.

Which painkiller brand was recalled in 1982 after cyanide-laced capsules fatally poisoned seven people near Chicago?

Tylenol's poisoning scare ended powder-filled capsules for over-the-counter medicines and led to packaging reforms and federal anti-tampering laws.

Which fantasy role-playing game, created by Gary Gygax and Dave Arneson, was linked to Satanism in a 1980s moral panic?

Dungeons & Dragons was accused of encouraging devil worship and suicide, and its fans faced social ostracism regardless of their actual beliefs.

Which skateboarder landed the first documented 900, two and a half mid-air spins, at the 1999 X Games?

Tony Hawk landed it after the contest's regulation time had already run out, and he pulled the trick off again in 2016 at the age of 48.

Which company sold the DynaTAC 8000X, the 1983 'brick' that was the first commercial handheld mobile phone?

Motorola's Martin Cooper led the team behind the handset, and in 1973 he made the first public handheld call from a Manhattan sidewalk to his rival at Bell Labs.

Britain's Generation X has been dubbed the 'children' of which prime minister, in office from 1979 to 1990?

Margaret Thatcher was the 20th century's longest-serving British prime minister, and a UK research council used the label for a cohort raised amid social flux.

Germany's Gen X is sometimes called Generation Golf, after a bestseller named for which carmaker's hatchback?

Volkswagen built the Golf that this cohort was expected to buy model after model, and author Florian Illies cast them as apolitical, brand-conscious consumers.

Which label did commentator Jonathan Pontell coin for the in-between cohort born just ahead of Gen X?

Generation Jones plays on keeping up with the Joneses and on the slang 'jonesing', a craving, for a cohort raised on big expectations that soured in the 1970s.

Authors William Strauss and Neil Howe gave Gen X which numbered name, counting generations since American independence?

13th Generation was shortened to '13ers' in the pair's 1993 book about the cohort, whose members were then teenagers and young adults.

Which US state passed the first no-fault divorce law in 1969, just as Gen X children were being born?

California's new law took effect on New Year's Day 1970, and Gen X grew up as American divorce rates kept climbing toward a peak.

Complaining that pollsters overlook Generation X, a 2014 Pew Research report called it America's neglected what?

Middle child fitted, Pew argued, because Gen X is bookended by two much larger cohorts and forms a low-key bridge between them on most measures.

At which European physics laboratory was Tim Berners-Lee working when he invented the World Wide Web?

CERN drew physicists from around the world who needed to share data without common machines or software, the problem the web was built to solve.

Which trading-card company launched Garbage Pail Kids in 1985 as a gross-out send-up of Cabbage Patch Kids?

Topps consultant Art Spiegelman, the cartoonist, dreamed up the stickers, and the owners of the dolls sued for trademark infringement in 1986.

Which toy company, caught short by Star Wars in 1977, sold mail-in certificates for action figures at Christmas instead?

Kenner signed its licence too late to stock shelves, so its Early Bird Certificate Package could be mailed in and redeemed for four figures.

France's early Gen Xers are nicknamed Génération Bof, after a French interjection that roughly means what in English?

Whatever is the usual translation of the shrugging 'bof', and in France the label Generation X itself is not as widely known or used.

Which senator's wife co-founded the Parents Music Resource Center, whose 1985 campaign put warning labels on albums?

Tipper Gore and three other 'Washington Wives' founded the group, and Frank Zappa, Dee Snider and John Denver all testified at the Senate hearing it prompted.

Which band's 1985 album Brothers in Arms was the first to sell a million copies on compact disc?

Dire Straits made it as a full digital recording when most pop was still taped on analogue gear, and its CD went on to outsell its LP version.

In the Dallas cliffhanger resolved in front of 83 million American viewers, who was revealed to have shot J.R. Ewing?

Kristin Shepard, his sister-in-law and mistress, pulled the trigger, and about three in four American televisions in use that night were tuned to the reveal.

Which 1983 TV film showing a nuclear strike on Kansas drew roughly 100 million American viewers on its first broadcast?

The Day After reached nearly 39 million households on ABC, a record audience for a made-for-TV movie, with much of its action set in the college town of Lawrence.

Which short-lived 1994 soft drink did Coca-Cola aim at a cynical Generation X with deliberately downbeat advertising?

OK Soda courted the cohort with neo-noir can designs, chain letters and deliberately negative publicity, but the drink was soon discontinued.

Pearl Jam first performed under the name of which NBA point guard, before being forced to change it?

Mookie Blaylock stayed part of the band's story after the rename, because the debut album Ten was titled after his jersey number.

Douglas Coupland's novel Generation X follows three young storytellers living in which desert resort city?

Palm Springs sits in the Coachella Valley, where narrator Andy lives alongside Dag and Claire and tends bar for a living.

Which singer's Reality Bites soundtrack hit Stay made her the first artist to top the US chart without a record deal?

Lisa Loeb got her break because her neighbour, the actor Ethan Hawke, passed a tape of the song to the director while the film was being made.

Which author's debut novel Less than Zero, about jaded Los Angeles rich kids, is named after an Elvis Costello song?

Bret Easton Ellis published it as a 21-year-old student at Bennington College, and its narrator Clay is home from college for the winter break.

Which company did Gen Xers Larry Page and Sergey Brin incorporate in a rented Menlo Park garage in 1998?

Google paid $1,700 a month for the garage, whose owner Susan Wojcicki went on to become chief executive of YouTube.