World Events
Population: 4.932 billion
Nobel Peace Prize: Elie Wiesel (US)
Spain and Portugal join European Economic Community (Jan. 1).
President Reagan freezes Libyan assets in US (Jan. 8). US planes attack Libyan "terrorist centers" (April 14).
Haitian President Jean-Claude Duvalier flees to France (Feb. 7).
President Ferdinand Marcos flees Philippines after ruling for 20 years; newly elected Corazon Aquino succeeds him (Feb. 26).
Union Carbide agrees to settlement with victims of Bhopal gas leak in India (March 22).
Soviet Union's Chernobyl nuclear power station experiences major meltdown (April 26 et seq.).
Ex-Navy analyst, Jonathan Jay Pollard, 31, guilty as spy for Israel (June 4).
World Court rules US broke international law in mining Nicaraguan waters (June 27).
U.S. Events
President: Ronald W. Reagan
Vice President: George Bush
Population: 240,132,887
Life expectancy: 74.7 years
Violent Crime Rate (per 1,000): 54.8
Property Crime Rate (per 1,000): 48.6
Economics
US GDP (1998 dollars): $4,422.20 billion
Federal spending: $990.34 billion
Federal debt: $2120.6 billion
Median Household Income
(current dollars): $24,897
Consumer Price Index: 109.6
Unemployment: 7.0%
Cost of a first-class stamp: $0.22
US Supreme Court bars racial bias in trial jury selection (Jan. 14).
Space shuttle Challenger explodes after launch at Cape Canaveral, Fla., killing all seven aboard (Jan. 28).
US Supreme Court reaffirms abortion rights (June 11).
Senate Judiciary Committee approves William H. Rehnquist as Chief Justice of US Supreme Court(Aug. 14).
House votes arms appropriations bill rejecting Administration's "star wars" policy (Aug. 15).
Secret initiative to send arms to Iran revealed (Nov. 6 et seq.); Reagan denies exchanging arms for hostages and halts arms sales (Nov. 19); diversion of funds from arms sales to Nicaraguan Contras revealed (Nov. 25).
Sports
Super Bowl
Chicago d. New England (46-10)
World Series
NY Mets d. Boston Red Sox (4-3)
NBA Championship
Boston d. Houston (4-2)
Stanley Cup
Montreal d. Calgary (4-1)
Wimbledon
Women: Martina Navratilova d. H. Mandlikova (7-6 6-3)
Men: Boris Becker d. I. Lendl (6-4 6-3 7-5)
Kentucky Derby Champion
Ferdinand
NCAA Basketball Championship
Louisville d. Duke (72-69)
NCAA Football Champions
Penn St. (12-0-0)
World Cup
Argentina d. W. Germany (3-2)
Entertainment
Pulitzer Prizes
Fiction: Lonesome Dove, Larry McMurtry
Music: Wind Quintet IV, George Perle
Oscars awarded in 1986
Academy Award, Best Picture: Out of Africa, Sydney Pollack, producer (Universal)
Nobel Prize for Literature: Wole Soyinka (Nigeria)
Grammy Awards
Record of the Year: We Are the World - USA for Africa
Album of the Year: No Jacket Required - Phil Collins (Atlantic)
Song of the Year: We Are the World - Michael Jackson and Lionel Richie, songwriters
Miss America: Susan Akin (MS)
Barry Diller, head of News Corp., creates Fox, the fourth television network. Fox offers 10 hours of prime-time programming a week.
The Television Bureau of Advertising announces that the average American household watches television for more than seven hours a day.
The Oprah Winfrey Show hits national television.
The Academic American Encyclopedia is available on CD-ROM. It is the first reference work published in this medium.
Nintendo video games introduced in U.S.
Movies
Platoon, Hannah and Her Sisters, The Color of Money, The Mission
Books
Kingsley Amis, The Old Devils
Alice Munro, The Progress of Love
Peter Taylor, A Summer to Memphis
Science
Nobel Prizes in Science
Chemistry: Dudley R. Herschback, Yuan T. Lee (both US), and John C. Polanyi (Canada), for their work on “reaction dynamics”.
Physics: Ernst Ruska, Gerd Binnig (both Germany), and Heinrich Rohrer (Switzerland), for work on microscopes.
Physiology or Medicine: Rita Levi-Montalcini (dual US/Italy) and Stanley Cohen (US), for their contributions to the understanding of substances that influence cell growth.
K. Alex Müller (Switzerland) and J. Georg Bednorz (Germany) discover superconductivity in a ceramic material at -397ºF, a higher temperature than ever before.
Dick Rutan and Jeana Yeager make the first nonstop flight around the world without refueling. The Voyager flew around the world (24,986 miles) from Edwards AFB, California, returning in 216 hours, 3 minutes, and 44 seconds (Dec. 14–23). Background: Famous Firsts in Aviation.
The first genetically-engineered vaccine, for hepatitis B, gains FDA approval. Background: Health & Nutrition.
The Voyager 2 probe passes Uranus in January, returning images and data on its moon, rings, atmosphere, interior, and magnetic field. Background: US Unstaffed Planetary and Lunar Programs.
Halley's comet yields information on return visit (April 10). Background: comets
Deaths
Olof Palme (Swedish politician)
Georgia O'Keeffe
Harold Macmillan
Duchess of Windsor