1983

Decades: 1930s 1940s 1950s 1960s 1970s - 1980s - 1990s 2000s 2010s 2020s 2030s

Years: 1978 1979 1980 1981 1982 - 1983 - 1984 1985 1986 1987 1988

Events

• January 1 - the ARPANET officially changes to use the Internet Protocol, creating the Internet.
• January 2 - The musical Annie is performed for the last time after 2,377 shows (Uris Theatre on Broadway, New York City).
• January 19 - Klaus Barbie, Nazi war criminal, is arrested in Bolivia.
• January 19 - The Apple Lisa personal computer is announced.
• January 22 - Bjorn Borg retires from tennis after winning 5 consecutive Wimbledon championships.
• January 26 - Lotus 1-2-3 is released.
• February 16 - The Ash Wednesday bushfires in Victoria and South Australia claim the lives of 71 people in Australia's worst ever fires.
• February 23 - The Environmental Protection Agency announces its intent to buy out and evacuate the dioxin-contaminated community of Times Beach, Missouri.
• February 24 - A special commission of the United States Congress releases a report critical of the practice of Japanese internment during World War II.
• March 8 - President Reagan calls the Soviet Union an "Evil Empire."
• March 23 - Strategic Defense Initiative: President Ronald Reagan makes his initial proposal to develop technology to intercept enemy missiles. The media dub this plan "Star Wars."
• April 7 - During STS-6, astronauts Story Musgrave and Don Peterson perform the first space shuttle spacewalk (duration: 4 hours, 10 minutes).
• April 25 - Maine schoolgirl Samantha Smith is invited to visit the Soviet Union by its leader Yuri Andropov after he read her letter in which she expressed fears about nuclear war.
• May 17 - Lebanon, Israel, and the United States sign an agreement on Israeli withdrawal from Lebanon.
• June 18 - Sally Ride becomes first American woman in space on the Space Shuttle Challenger.
• July 7 - Samantha Smith flies to the Soviet Union (see April 25).
• July 23 - Gimli Glider: Air Canada flight 143 crash-lands in Gimli, Manitoba.
• August 4 - Thomas Sankara become President in Upper Volta.
• August 18 - Hurricane Alicia hits the Texas coast, killing 22 and causing over US$1 billion in damage (1983 dollars).
• August 21 - Benigno Aquino, Jr., Philippines opposition leader, assassinated in Manila.
• September 1 - Cold War: Korean Air Flight KAL-007 is shot down by a Soviet jet fighter when the commercial aircraft entered Soviet airspace. All 269 on board die.
• September 6 - The Soviet Union admits to shooting down Korean Air Flight KAL-007, stating that the pilots did not know it was a civilian aircraft when it violated Soviet airspace.
• October 12 - Japan's ex Prime Minister Tanaka Kakuei found guilty of taking a $2 million bribe from Lockheed and sentenced to 4 years in jail.
• October 23 - United States Marine Corps barracks in Beirut destroyed by suicide bomber, killing 241.
• October 25 - United States invades Grenada.
• October 27 - Pope John Paul II visits Mehmet Ali Agca in prison to forgive him. Ali Agca is a Turkish gunman, who attempted to kill Pope John Paul II in 1981.
• October 30 - The first democratic elections in Argentina after seven years of military rule are held.
• November 2 - Martin Luther King Day: At the White House Rose Garden, US President Ronald Reagan signs a bill creating a federal holiday on the third Monday of every January to honor American civil rights leader Martin Luther King Jr.
• November 17 - The Zapatista Army of National Liberation founded.
• November 26 - Brinks Mat robbery: In London, 6,800 gold bars worth nearly UK£26 million are taken from the Brinks Mat vault at Heathrow Airport (only a fraction of the gold was ever recovered, and only two men were convicted of the crime). [1]
• Barbara McClintock receives Nobel Prize in Medicine for discovery of the first transposons in maize in 1940.
• The U.S Embassy is bombed in Beirut, killing 40 people.
• Internet Domain Name System invented by Paul Mockapetris.
• Democratic reform in power in Argentina.
• American Public Radio founded; changes its name to the current Public Radio International in 1994
• IBM announces the IBM PC XT

Year in topic

• 1983 in film
  • May 25 - Return of the Jedi
  • Terms of Endearment
  • The Big Chill
  • The Right Stuff
• 1983 in literature
• 1983 in music
• 1983 in sports
  • March 6 - The United States Football League begins its first year of competition
• 1983 in television
  • February 28 - Over 125 million Americans tune in to watch the final episode of M*A*S*H
  • March 7 - The Nashville Network (TNN) begins broadcasting.

Births

• January 18 - Utada Hikaru, Japanese-American R&B singer
• March 14 - Taylor Hanson, musician
• May 2 - Rose Falcon, actress/singer
• May 27 - Bobby Convey, American soccer player
• November 18 - Jon Johansen, programmer
• December 30 - Lauren Priest, dietrician/dancer

Deaths

• January 11 - Shri Ghanshyam Das Birla, Indian industrialist, Gandhian and educationist
• January 15 - Meyer Lansky, mobster
• January 23 - George Cukor, director
• February 4 - Karen Carpenter, singer, dies of anorexia nervosa
• February 12 - Eubie Blake, musician, songwriter
• February 25 - Tennessee Williams, playwright
• March 3 - Herge, Belgian comics creator
• March 8 - William Walton, composer
• March 15 - Rebecca West, writer
• March 23 - Barney Clark, first artificial heart recipient
• April 4 - Gloria Swanson, actress
• April 22 - Earl 'Fatha' Hines, musician
• May 15 - Meyer Lansky, gangster
• May 18 - Frank Aiken, Irish Foreign Minister (1959-1969)
• May 19 - Jean Rey, President of the European Commission
• June 12 - Norma Shearer, Academy Award winning actress
• July 23 - Georges Auric, composer, member of Les Six
• July 29 - Raymond Massey, actor
• August 21 - Benigno Aquino Jr., Philippine opposition leader
• September 25 - Leopold III of Belgium
• October 28 - Otto Messmer, creator of Felix the Cat
• November 7 - Germaine Tailleferre, composer
• December 2 - Fifi D'Orsay, actress
• December 25 - Joan Miro, surrealist painter
• Buckminster Fuller, American architect
• Stan Rogers, Canadian musician

Nobel Prizes

• Physics - Subrahmanyan Chandrasekhar, William Alfred Fowler
• Chemistry - Henry Taube
• Medicine - Barbara McClintock
• Literature -William Golding
• Peace - Lech Walesa
• Economics - Gerard Debreu

Fictional References to the Year

• "1983...(A Merman I Should Turn To Be)", by Jimi Hendrix, from his album Electric Ladyland (1968)

Referenced By