As I was born in 1982, I don’t remember anything about it. Thus, I thought it prudent to see what else happened that year, aside from my birth. Apparently, quite a few things went down, as Wikipedia is helpful in pointing out. The Wikipedia post mostly involves world events, if you’re curious, but I picked out a few of the more interesting ones to highlight here. At least, more interesting to my generation.
A few interesting tidbits about 1982:
- Average cost of a gallon of gas: $0.91
- Price of a US Postage Stamp: $0.20
- Average Price of a New Car: $7,983.00
- Average Price of a New House: $82,200
Here’s a list of stuff that happened in 1982:
- April 17 – Canada asserts political autonomy from the United Kingdom, thus giving us the birth of “Canada Day.”
- May 2 – The Weather Channel begins its first cable broadcast.
- June 4 – Star Trek II: The Wrath of Kahn is released in theaters.
- June 7 – Graceland opens to the public.
- June 11 – E.T.: The Extra-Terrestrial is released in theaters.
- June 20 – I’m born
- June 21 – Prince William is born. Is eternally disappointed I beat him out of the womb.
- August 17 – The first compact discs debut.
- October 19 – John DeLorean gets arrested for selling cocaine.
- October 20 – The St. Louis Cardinals beat the Milwaukee Brewers in the World Series in Game 7.
- November 13 – The Vietnam Veterans Memorial is completed in Washington, D.C.
- November 30 – Michael Jackson releases Thriller
- December 3 – Dioxin is found in Times Beach, Missouri (just outside of St. Louis) at 300 times the “safe” level
- December 7 – The first execution by lethal injection is carried out in Texas.
- December 26 – The Times Magazine “Man of the Year” goes to its first non-human, The Computer.
I was looking at your baby book recently (because I’m your mom) and noticed the page titled “The world as it was…” I noted Prince Wm’s birth as being a headline of the day. Steve Martin was popular, and Harrison Ford. George Brett and Magic Johnson were the big sports names of the day – duh!! Under Best Movies of the year I listed ST II (another duh!), E.T., and On Golden Pond. Under “fads” I mentioned “video games, Pac Man, Donkey Kong, and Frogger” . Thirty years later maybe video games didn’t turn out to be a fad!! ha Happy Birthday son!
Video games were a fad?! For shame! 🙂
I had fun looking some of these up. I knew most of them (Thriller, ET, CDs), but I didn’t realize the Vietnam Memorial was that old, nor that Graceland opened up that year.
Good times!
Happy Birthday Andy! I can’t believe I’m older than you….I turned 30 on 18 April.
Thanks, Raul! You can be older. I won’t hold it against you. 🙂
Happy belated birthday, or happy birth-week (when you get older the birthday celebrating can last longer, especially for milestones. When you get REALLY old the celebrations last all year). Since I was born at the tail end of 1981 (December 5) I experienced more of 1982 in my early life than my actual birth year. I am embarrassed that I did not know that little Canuck fact about Canada Day!