100 Fun Facts About The 1980s

Which Steven Spielberg film overtook Star Wars to become the highest-grossing film of its time?

E.T. the Extra-Terrestrial took the box-office record from Star Wars in 1983 and held it until 1993, when Spielberg beat himself with Jurassic Park.

Which horror-film star delivers the spoken rap that closes Michael Jackson's 'Thriller'?

Vincent Price nailed the rap in two takes, reading lines that songwriter Rod Temperton had scribbled in a taxi on his way to the studio that day.

A bungled press conference on 9 November 1989 opened the wall that divided which European city?

Berlin. Asked when new travel rules would begin, an East German spokesman said 'immediately'; crowds massed at the crossings and the guards gave way that night.

Which handheld music device, introduced by Sony in 1979, became a 1980s phenomenon?

The Walkman began as a favour: Sony co-founder Masaru Ibuka wanted music on long flights, so engineers turned a Pressman reporter's recorder into a playback-only stereo player.

In 'Back to the Future' (1985), what speed must the DeLorean reach to travel through time?

88 mph was picked because it was easy to remember and looked good on the dash; real DeLorean speedometers stopped at 85 mph under a 1979 rule, so the crew had to build their own.

Which 1980 arcade hit did Toru Iwatani design as a non-violent game to draw women into arcades?

Pac-Man's shape is said to come from a pizza with a slice missing, a story Iwatani calls half true: he also rounded off the Japanese character for mouth.

The 1980 'Who Shot J.R.?' cliffhanger came from which primetime soap?

Dallas kept viewers guessing for eight months, with a Hollywood strike delaying the answer; some 83 million Americans watched sister-in-law Kristin Shepard unmasked that November.

Which 1980s craze was invented by a Hungarian professor of architecture?

Rubik's Cube baffled its own inventor: after Ernő Rubik first scrambled his prototype, he needed weeks to work out how to put it back.

Which U.S. president survived an assassination attempt in March 1981, just 69 days into his first term?

Ronald Reagan was shot by John Hinckley Jr. on March 30, 1981; as he was wheeled into surgery he joked to the doctors that he hoped they were all Republicans.

Which accessory became a 1980s aerobics fashion trend after 'Fame' and 'Flashdance'?

Leg warmers, originally worn by dancers to keep calf muscles warm, became street fashion after Fame (1980) and Flashdance (1983) fed the aerobics craze.

Which 1984 comedy ends with a giant marshmallow man stomping through New York?

Ghostbusters was written by Dan Aykroyd for himself and John Belushi; after Belushi died in 1982 the script was rewritten, moved to New York and filmed with Bill Murray.

What was Madonna wearing when she performed 'Like a Virgin' at the first MTV Video Music Awards?

A wedding dress: Madonna stepped off a giant wedding cake, lost a shoe, and dived to the floor to cover the slip, improvising her roll across the stage on live television.

Which nuclear plant's April 1986 reactor explosion became history's worst nuclear accident?

Chernobyl's reactor blew up during a safety test, and Moscow admitted it only two days later, after radiation alarms went off at a nuclear plant in Sweden.

Which 1980s leader was first dubbed the 'Iron Lady' by Moscow's army newspaper Red Star?

Margaret Thatcher got the name in January 1976 after a speech attacking Moscow's arms build-up; a week later she took it up herself, as 'the Iron Lady of the Western world'.

Which Boston bar "where everybody knows your name" was the setting for a hit 1980s sitcom?

Cheers ran on NBC from 1982 to 1993 and won 28 Primetime Emmys, though it narrowly escaped cancellation in its first season and took years to build an audience.

Which company's 1985 console, sold with a toy robot, revived home video games after the 1983 crash?

Nintendo packed its Entertainment System with R.O.B., a toy robot, so that stores burned by the crash would stock it as a toy rather than another video game console.

Which dolls, each with a name and adoption certificate, caused shopping frenzies in 1983?

Cabbage Patch Kids began as fabric dolls called Little People, which Xavier Roberts would not sell, only offer for adoption, at his Babyland General Hospital, where staff dressed as doctors and nurses.

Which future NBA great was taken third in the 1984 draft, after Hakeem Olajuwon and Sam Bowie?

Michael Jordan slid to the Chicago Bulls at third because Portland, which already had guard Clyde Drexler, spent the second pick on centre Sam Bowie instead.

What clothing feature defined the broad silhouette of 1980s power dressing?

Shoulder pads gave women's suits a broad outline borrowed from menswear, which was the point of power dressing: to be taken seriously in offices long run by men.

Which fighter-pilot film was the biggest US box-office hit of 1986?

Top Gun grew out of a 1983 magazine article about the Navy's fighter school at Miramar, and the Navy cashed in, posting recruiters at cinemas where it played.

Which TV show featured undercover detectives Sonny Crockett and Ricardo Tubbs?

Miami Vice ran on NBC from 1984 to 1989 with Don Johnson as Crockett and Philip Michael Thomas as Tubbs; executive producer Michael Mann banned earth tones from its pastel look.

Which 1984 Prince album doubled as the soundtrack to his film of the same name?

Purple Rain includes 'Darling Nikki', the track that so shocked Tipper Gore when her daughter played it that she co-founded the campaign behind Parental Advisory stickers.

Which Space Shuttle broke apart 73 seconds after launch on January 28, 1986?

Challenger broke apart 73 seconds after liftoff on 28 January 1986; near-freezing temperatures that morning stiffened an O-ring seal in the right solid rocket booster, a flaw engineers had flagged years earlier.

Apple's Ridley Scott-directed '1984' ad had its only US national airing during which event?

The '1984' ad aired nationally only once, in the third quarter of Super Bowl XVIII; it had already run quietly on an Idaho station on 31 December 1983 so that it could qualify for advertising awards.

Which 1985 John Hughes film has five students from different cliques spending a Saturday in detention?

The Breakfast Club ends on 'Don't You (Forget About Me)', a song Simple Minds at first refused to record; once they gave in, it went to No. 1 in America.

Which 1983 cartoon has Prince Adam raise his sword and cry 'By the power of Grayskull'?

Masters of the Universe, He-Man's show, was a Mattel toy line first; parents' groups called the cartoon a half-hour commercial, and each episode closed with a spoken moral.

Whose single-season NHL scoring mark did Wayne Gretzky shatter in 1981-82 on the way to 92 goals?

Phil Esposito's 76 goals in 1970–71 stood as the NHL record until Wayne Gretzky scored 92 in 1981–82; Esposito needed 550 shots for his 76, Gretzky 369 for his 92.

Which 1986 Bon Jovi song about the working-class couple Tommy and Gina spent four weeks at #1?

'Livin' on a Prayer' almost stayed off Slippery When Wet: Jon Bon Jovi disliked the first recording and wanted it dropped before he changed his mind.

Which 1980s series followed vigilante ex-commandos led by George Peppard's cigar-chomping colonel?

The A-Team traded gunfire and explosions week after week, yet almost no one was ever seen to die on screen.

What was the name of Michael Knight's talking car in the 1980s series 'Knight Rider'?

KITT was voiced by William Daniels, who was starring in the hospital drama St. Elsewhere at the same time and asked for his name to be left off the credits.

Which Duran Duran song had its video filmed in the jungles of Sri Lanka?

'Hungry Like the Wolf' broke Duran Duran in America: the band had made little headway there until MTV put the video into heavy rotation, and the single climbed to No. 3.

Which country's heavily favoured team did the US hockey team beat in the 1980 'Miracle on Ice'?

The Soviet Union had thrashed the same American college players 10-3 in an exhibition days before the Games; the 4-3 upset was not even the final, and the US still had to beat Finland for gold.

Which 1986 John Hughes comedy tours Wrigley Field, the Art Institute and a downtown Chicago parade?

Ferris Bueller's Day Off poured out of John Hughes in less than a week: he wrote the script in a rush just as a writers' strike was about to begin.

Which Hasbro toy line, launched in 1984, featured robots that changed into vehicles and other objects?

Transformers weren't new toys: Hasbro licensed two existing Japanese robot lines from Takara, then had Marvel Comics invent the names and the story of a robot war to sell them.

Which song opened MTV's first broadcast in August 1981?

'Video Killed the Radio Star' by The Buggles was a 1979 single when MTV opened with it at 12:01 a.m.; hardly anyone saw it, as the channel then reached only part of New Jersey.

Which band kept drummer Rick Allen after he lost his left arm in a car crash on New Year's Eve 1984?

Def Leppard waited for him: Allen relearned the drums on a custom electronic kit, playing his left arm's parts with foot pedals, and was back on stage in August 1986.

Which 1988 Tom Hanks film has a boy's Zoltar wish turn him into an adult overnight?

Big's walking-piano duet was danced for real: Tom Hanks and Robert Loggia practised on cardboard keyboards at home and never needed the dance doubles hired as backup.

What was Bob Geldof's July 1985 global charity concert for Ethiopian famine relief called?

Live Aid ran in London and Philadelphia on the same day, and Phil Collins played both: after his Wembley set he crossed the Atlantic by Concorde to perform again that evening.

Which 1982 Ridley Scott film starring Harrison Ford depicts a dystopian Los Angeles in 2019?

Blade Runner reached cinemas with a voice-over and a happy ending added after poor test screenings; Ridley Scott's Director's Cut took both out ten years later.

Which 1981 arcade game introduced the jumping hero later known as Mario?

Donkey Kong's hero was first known as Jumpman; staff at the maker's American office renamed him Mario after Mario Segale, the landlord of their warehouse.

What 1989 animated film, released by Disney, marked the beginning of the 'Disney Renaissance' era?

The Little Mermaid nearly lost 'Part of Your World': studio chief Jeffrey Katzenberg wanted the ballad cut after children grew restless at a test screening, and was talked out of it.

Which country did Argentina fight in the 1982 Falklands War?

The United Kingdom sent a naval task force to retake the islands and won in 74 days; the defeat hastened the fall of Argentina's military junta.

Which actress set off the home-workout video boom with a 1982 tape that topped the sales charts?

Jane Fonda made the tape to raise money for the Campaign for Economic Democracy, the left-wing political group of her then-husband, the activist Tom Hayden.

Whose unsold cartridges of a 1982 Spielberg-film game were buried in a New Mexico landfill?

Atari dumped truckloads of unsold cartridges in an Alamogordo landfill in September 1983; the film tie-in among them had been rushed out in about five weeks, and a 2014 dig confirmed the burial.

Which 1983 film stars Matthew Broderick as a teenage hacker who nearly sets off a nuclear launch?

WarGames alarmed the White House: after a Camp David screening, the president asked his generals whether such a break-in was possible, and was told that it was.

What was the 1985 charity single recorded by a supergroup of artists as USA for Africa?

'We Are the World' was cut in one all-night session straight after the American Music Awards, while the stars were all in Los Angeles; a sign on the studio door read 'Check your ego at the door.'

Which 1984 Apple product was the first mass-market personal computer with a GUI and mouse?

The Macintosh 128K launched on 24 January 1984 at $2,495; unlike Apple's $9,995 Lisa of 1983, it sold in volume and brought the mouse-driven graphical interface to a mass market.

In June 1989, a lone man stopped a tank column near which square?

Tiananmen Square had been cleared by the army the day before. The man, carrying two shopping bags, climbed onto the lead tank to speak to its crew, and has never been identified.

Which 1980s show featured wisecracking alien Gordon Shumway crash-landing with a suburban family?

ALF was a hand puppet worked by co-creator Paul Fusco from below, so the whole set stood on a raised platform cut with trap doors he could pop up through.

Which 1985 Dire Straits song, with the lyric 'I want my MTV', had an early computer-animated video?

'Money for Nothing' quotes a New York shop worker Mark Knopfler overheard grumbling at the rock stars on a wall of TVs tuned to MTV; he jotted the lines down in the store.

Which African country marked its independence in April 1980 with a performance by reggae star Bob Marley?

Zimbabwe had already lent its name to a track on his 1979 album Survival, one of several songs backing African liberation struggles. He was invited to play the 17 April celebration.

Which 3M product, launched across the United States in 1980, relies on a weak glue invented by accident?

Post-it Notes found their purpose when 3M's Art Fry wanted a bookmark that would stay put in his hymn book. The canary yellow was chance too: it was the scrap paper a neighbouring lab had.

Which puzzle game did Alexey Pajitnov create in his spare time at a Moscow computing centre?

Tetris joins tetra, meaning four, to tennis, its creator's favourite sport. Free copies on floppy disks spread across Moscow and then Eastern Europe.

Which animated series began in 1987 as short cartoons on the sketch show The Tracey Ullman Show?

The Simpsons made 48 of those shorts, beginning with one titled Good Night. The half-hour spin-off went on to become the longest-running American sitcom.

Which shipwreck did a team led by Jean-Louis Michel and Robert Ballard locate in September 1985?

Titanic first showed up as scattered debris on video from Argo, a camera sled towed behind the research ship. The US Navy had backed the search after the team found two lost nuclear submarines.

Which company changed its flagship drink's formula in 1985, then restored the original within three months?

Coca-Cola gave way to a wave of protest and sold the old recipe again under the name Classic. A Seattle retiree had even founded the Old Cola Drinkers of America to lobby for it.

Which disease did the World Health Organization certify as eradicated in 1980 after a global vaccination campaign?

Smallpox is the only human disease ever wiped out, with its last natural case diagnosed in October 1977. The cattle plague rinderpest became the second eradicated disease in 2011.

Which 1986 adventure game starring the hero Link has a princess named after F. Scott Fitzgerald's wife?

The Legend of Zelda took the name because designer Shigeru Miyamoto thought it sounded pleasant and significant. Its US cartridge was among the first with a battery for saving progress.

Which volcano's May 1980 eruption began with the largest landslide on land in recorded history?

Mount St. Helens lost its entire north face in the slide, and the blast that followed killed about 57 people. Among the dead was innkeeper Harry R. Truman, a World War I veteran.

Which cable channel did Ted Turner launch from Atlanta in June 1980 as the first 24-hour news network?

CNN went on air with an introduction from Turner himself, then husband-and-wife anchors David Walker and Lois Hart read its first newscast.

Which former Beatle was shot at the entrance to New York's Dakota building in December 1980?

John Lennon had signed a copy of his new album Double Fantasy for the gunman outside the same building earlier that day.

The United States led a boycott of the 1980 Moscow Olympics in protest at the invasion of which country?

Afghanistan had been invaded in December 1979, and more than 60 countries joined the boycott to some degree. Muhammad Ali visited several African countries as an envoy to win support for it.

Which actor voiced Darth Vader in the 1980 sequel The Empire Strikes Back while David Prowse wore the suit?

James Earl Jones dubbed in the twist that Vader is Luke's father; on set, only the director, the producers and Mark Hamill knew the real line.

Which US president, once a Georgia peanut farmer, lost his 1980 re-election bid in a 44-state landslide?

Jimmy Carter took just 49 electoral votes, yet rebuilt his standing afterwards: the human rights work of his Carter Center earned him the 2002 Nobel Peace Prize.

Which sport did Eric Heiden dominate at the 1980 Lake Placid Olympics, winning five individual gold medals?

Speed skating had never seen such a sweep: Heiden won all five events at one Games. He went on to help found the 7-Eleven cycling team and to become a physician.

Which Polish workers' movement, founded at Gdańsk's Lenin Shipyard in 1980, was led by electrician Lech Wałęsa?

Solidarity was the first independent labour organisation recognised by the state in a Warsaw Pact country. Three years later its leader won the Nobel Peace Prize.

Which Swede beat John McEnroe in a five-set 1980 Wimbledon final after losing a fourth-set tiebreak 18–16?

Björn Borg took the deciding set 8–6 for a fifth consecutive Wimbledon title. McEnroe had saved five championship points in that 20-minute tiebreak.

Which Stephen King novel did Stanley Kubrick film in 1980, setting it at the snowbound Overlook Hotel?

The Shining left its author unhappy: King criticised the film's departures from his book and in 1997 produced a three-part miniseries he considered more faithful.

Which rock band released Back in Black in 1980 as a tribute to their late singer Bon Scott?

AC/DC chose the all-black sleeve as a sign of mourning and put new singer Brian Johnson on vocals. The album has sold an estimated 50 million copies.

Which neighbouring country did Saddam Hussein's Iraq invade in September 1980, starting an eight-year war?

Iran held out, and the two sides fought on until a ceasefire brokered by the United Nations took effect in August 1988.

Which handheld console from Gunpei Yokoi's team used a monochrome screen to save battery life?

Game Boy buyers found four AA batteries and a pair of headphones in the box, cheap extras meant to make it look a better deal. With its colour successor, it sold about 118 million units.

Which 1981 arcade game has players dodge traffic on a busy road, then cross a river on floating logs?

Frogger gives the player five frogs to steer home, hopping across alligators' backs as well as the logs. A 1998 Seinfeld episode turned on George's old high score on the machine.

Which 1983 LaserDisc arcade game used cartoon animation by former Disney animator Don Bluth?

Dragon's Lair casts the player as Dirk the Daring, a knight out to rescue Princess Daphne from the dragon Singe. Its film-quality footage far outshone the graphics of other games of the day.

Which Will Wright computer game lets players zone land, set tax rates and build a power grid?

SimCity grew out of a helicopter game whose level editor its designer enjoyed more than the game itself. Publishers turned it down at first because it had none of the action that sold games.

Under which name was Sega's 16-bit Mega Drive console sold in North America?

Genesis was the choice of Sega's David Rosen, who disliked the original name and wanted one that stood for a new beginning for the company.

Which 1984 light-gun game, played with the Zapper, features a dog that laughs at the player's missed shots?

Duck Hunt lets a second player pick up a controller and steer the birds out of the line of fire. A separate mode swaps them for clay pigeons.

Which thief in a red fedora and trenchcoat do players chase around the globe in a 1985 Broderbund game?

Carmen Sandiego's first game came boxed with The World Almanac and Book of Facts, which players needed to follow its geography clues. She leads a gang of crooks called V.I.L.E.

Which 1986 game rewards fast players with an ending revealing that hero Samus Aran is a woman?

Metroid blends the words metro and android, and its makers called Ridley Scott's film Alien a huge influence on the game.

Which company's famous cheat code was created by a developer who found his own Gradius port too difficult?

Konami programmer Kazuhisa Hashimoto added the sequence to give himself a full set of power-ups during testing. Players later made it famous through the home version of Contra.

Which 8-bit home computer of 1982 does Guinness list as the best-selling desktop computer model ever?

Commodore 64 owners got what the name promised: 64 kilobytes of memory, a figure company boss Jack Tramiel had insisted on. Estimates of its sales run from 12.5 to 17 million.

Which 1988 action film traps New York detective John McClane in a Los Angeles skyscraper on Christmas Eve?

Die Hard was shot almost entirely in and around Fox Plaza, a real Los Angeles tower, and is based on a 1979 thriller novel by Roderick Thorp.

Which 1984 James Cameron film sends a cyborg assassin back from 2029 to kill a future rebel leader's mother?

The Terminator nearly had its star in a different part: Arnold Schwarzenegger was first approached to play Kyle Reese, the human soldier sent back to protect the target.

Which actor won the lead in Raiders of the Lost Ark but had to withdraw to film a Hawaii detective series?

Tom Selleck was bound by his contract for Magnum, P.I., so the part of the whip-cracking archaeologist went to Harrison Ford instead.

Which 1987 romance stars Patrick Swayze as Johnny Castle, an instructor at a Catskills resort in summer 1963?

Dirty Dancing was filmed far from New York's mountains, at Lake Lure in North Carolina and Mountain Lake in Virginia. Kenny Ortega choreographed its routines.

Which long-running CBS series ended in February 1983 with a finale watched by nearly 106 million Americans?

M*A*S*H outlasted its own war: the series ran for 11 seasons, while the Korean conflict it depicted lasted three years.

Which sitcom, launched on NBC in 1985, follows four older women sharing a home in Florida?

The Golden Girls cast Estelle Getty as the elderly mother of Bea Arthur's character, though Getty was in fact a year younger than her screen daughter.

Which singer scored a record seven consecutive Billboard number-one singles, passing the Beatles in 1988?

Whitney Houston set the mark in April 1988 with Where Do Broken Hearts Go. The Bee Gees had shared the old record of six.

Which rock band teamed up with hip-hop group Run-DMC for a 1986 remake of their own song Walk This Way?

Aerosmith first cut the song in 1975 for the album Toys in the Attic. Singer Steven Tyler first scribbled its words on a back stairway at the Record Plant studio in New York.

Which Norwegian band topped the US chart in 1985 with Take On Me, helped by a pencil-sketch animated video?

A-ha saw the clip win six MTV Video Music Awards in 1986. About 3,000 frames were traced by hand over filmed footage, and the video took six months to make.

Which music format, co-developed by Philips and Sony, went on sale in Japan in October 1982?

Compact disc players read a 120 mm disc with a laser, and a standard disc typically holds up to 74 minutes of audio. The two firms had built rival prototypes in the late 1970s.

Which oil tanker hit Bligh Reef in Alaska's Prince William Sound, spilling about 10.8 million gallons?

Exxon Valdez was carrying 53 million gallons, so about a fifth of its cargo escaped. The remote sound could be reached only by helicopter, plane or boat, which hampered the clean-up.

What nickname was given to 19 October 1987, when the Dow lost 22.6 percent of its value in a single session?

Black Monday's 508-point fall was the biggest one-day percentage drop the Dow had ever seen. Pressure to sell had built up before the New York Stock Exchange even opened.

Which former Arizona state senator became the first woman to sit on the US Supreme Court in 1981?

Sandra Day O'Connor had already broken ground in Arizona, where she was the first woman to serve as majority leader of any state senate. She sat on the court until 2006.

Which Egyptian president was shot dead at a Cairo military parade in 1981 after making peace with Israel?

Anwar Sadat stood to salute as the gunmen ran from a truck in the procession; his nephew later said he took them for part of the show. The parade marked Egypt's 1973 crossing of the Suez Canal.

Which footballer scored both the 'Hand of God' goal and the 'Goal of the Century' against England in 1986?

Diego Maradona scored them just four minutes apart in a World Cup quarter-final in Mexico City, the first by punching the ball past goalkeeper Peter Shilton.

Which 1987 treaty phased out the CFC chemicals blamed for a hole in the ozone layer over Antarctica?

The Montreal Protocol came two years after British Antarctic Survey scientists reported the hole, a far larger loss than anyone had predicted. It phased out the production of CFCs and halons.

Which country's People Power Revolution of 1986 ended the two-decade rule of Ferdinand Marcos?

The Philippines swore in Corazon Aquino, the widow of an assassinated opposition leader with no political experience of her own, on 25 February 1986.

Which Indian city's pesticide plant leaked toxic gas in December 1984, exposing over 500,000 people?

Bhopal's leak of methyl isocyanate is considered the world's worst industrial disaster. The plant's American parent company paid $470 million five years later to settle the lawsuits.

Which team won the 1986 World Series after a ground ball rolled through Bill Buckner's legs in Game 6?

Mets hitters were twice down to their final strike in the tenth inning before the error let the winning run score. They took Game 7 as well, extending Boston's long title drought.

Which country's yacht won the 1983 America's Cup, ending a 132-year American winning streak in the event?

Australia II fought back from 3–1 down to win four races to three, using a radical winged keel that the American defenders had tried to have ruled illegal.