1988

1988 (MCMLXXXVIII) was a leap year starting on Friday of the Gregorian calendar. It is the year in the 20th century that has the most Roman numerals (11).

[edit] Events

[edit] January

• January 1 - The Soviet Union begins its program of economic restructuring (perestroika) with legislation initiated by Premier Mikhail Gorbachev.
• January 1 - The Evangelical Lutheran Church in America is established, creating the largest Lutheran denomination in the United States.
• January 8 - The Dow Jones Industrial Average falls 140.58 points, or 6.85%, to close at 1,911.31 in a mini-crash.
• January 13 - Taiwan President Chiang Ching-kuo dies in Taipei; Vice-President Lee Teng-hui becomes president.
• January 15 - In Jerusalem, Israeli police and Palestinian protestors clash at the Dome of the Rock; several police and at least 70 Arabs are injured.
• January 25 - U.S. Vice President George H.W. Bush and CBS News anchor Dan Rather clash over Bush's role in the Iran-Contra scandal, during a contentious television interview.
• January 26 - Australia celebrates its bicentenary (1788).
• January 29 - The Midwest Classic Conference, a U.S. college athletic conference, is formed.

[edit] February

• February 3 - The Democratic-controlled United States House of Representatives rejects President Ronald Reagan's request for $36.25 million to support the Nicaraguan Contras.
• February 11 - Anthony M. Kennedy is appointed to the Supreme Court of the United States.
• February 13-February 28 - The 1988 Winter Olympics are held in Calgary, Alberta, Canada.
• February 17 - U.S. Lieutenant Colonel William R. Higgins, serving with a United Nations group monitoring a truce in southern Lebanon, is kidnapped (he is later killed by his captors).
• February 21 - On his television show in Baton Rouge, Louisiana, televangelist Jimmy Swaggart confesses to an unspecified sin (an affair with prostitute Debra Murphree, as it turns out) and announces he will temporarily leave the pulpit.
• February 24 - Hustler Magazine v. Falwell: The Supreme Court of the United States sides with Hustler magazine by overturning a lower court decision to award Jerry Falwell $200,000 for defamation.
• February 29 - A Nazi document implicates Kurt Waldheim in W.W. II deportations.

[edit] March

• March 6 - Students at Gallaudet University go on strike for the selection of a deaf university president.
• March 7 - Operation Flavius: The Special Air Services fatally shoot 3 unarmed Irish Republican Army members in Gibraltar.
• March 8 - Two U.S. Army helicopters collide in Fort Campbell, Kentucky, killing 17 servicemen.
• March 8 - U.S. presidential candidate George Herbert Walker Bush defeats Robert Dole in numerous Republican primaries and caucuses on "Super Tuesday." The bipartisan primary/caucus calendar, designed by Democrats to help solidify their own nominee early, backfires when none of the 6 competing candidates are able to break out of the pack in the day's Democratic contests. Jesse Jackson, however, wins several Southern state primaries.
• March 16 - The Halabja poison gas attack is carried out by Iraqi government forces.
• March 16 - Iran-Contra Affair: Lieutenant Colonel Oliver North and Vice Admiral John Poindexter are indicted on charges of conspiracy to defraud the United States.
• March 17 - A Colombian Boeing 727 jetliner, Avianca Flight 410, crashes into the side of the mountains near the Venezuelan border killing 143.
• March 19 - British Army Corporals Woods and Howes are killed by the IRA in the so-called "Corporals killings".
• March 24 - An Israeli court sentences Mordechai Vanunu to 18 years in prison for disclosing Israel's nuclear program to The Sunday Times.
• March 25 - The Candle Demonstration in Bratislava, Slovakia is the first mass demonstration of the 1980s against the communist regime in Czechoslovakia.
• March 26 - U.S. presidential candidate Jesse Jackson defeats Michael Dukakis in the Michigan Democratic caucuses, becoming the temporary front-runner for the party's nomination. Richard Gephardt withdraws his candidacy after his campaign speeches against imported automobiles fail to earn him much support in Detroit.
• March 29 - African National Congress representative Dulcie September is assassinated in Paris.

[edit] April

The Iranian Frigate, IS Alvand, attacked by US Navy forces during Operation Praying Mantis.

• April 4 - Governor Evan Mecham of Arizona is convicted in his impeachment trial and removed from office.
• April 5 - Massachusetts Governor Michael Dukakis wins the Wisconsin Democratic presidential primary.
• April 10 - The Ojari Camp Disaster occurs in Islamabad.
• April 10 - The Great Seto Bridge opens to traffic in Japan.
• April 11 - The Last Emperor (directed by Bernardo Bertolucci) wins 9 Oscars.
• April 12 - Former pop singer Sonny Bono is elected mayor of Palm Springs, California.
• April 14 - In the Geneva accords, the Soviet Union commits itself to withdrawal of its forces from Afghanistan.
  • The USS Samuel B. Roberts (FFG-58) strikes a naval mine in the Persian Gulf, while deployed on Operation Earnest Will during the Tanker War phase of the Iran-Iraq War.
• April 16 - Israeli commandos kill the PLO's Abu Jihad in Tunisia.
• April 16 - In Forlì, Italy, the Red Brigades kill Senator Roberto Ruffilli, an advisor of Prime Minister Ciriaco de Mita.
• April 18 - United States Navy forces retaliate for the Roberts mining with Operation Praying Mantis, in a day of strikes against Iranian oil platforms and naval vessels.
• April 25 - In Israel, John Demjanjuk is sentenced to death for war crimes committed in World War II. He was accused by survivors of being the notorious guard at the Treblinka extermination camp known as "Ivan the Terrible". The conviction is later overturned by the Israeli Supreme Court.
• April 28 - Aloha Flight 243 loses several yards of its upper fuselage while in flight; extraordinarily, the craft lands with only 1 fatality.
• April 30 - World Expo '88 opens in Brisbane Queensland, Australia. The exhibition runs for 6 months, hosting pavilions from over 70 countries and thrusting the city of Brisbane into the international spotlight.

[edit] May

• May 8 - PEPCON disaster in Henderson, Nevada: A major explosion at an industrial solid-fuel rocket plant causes damage extending up to 10 miles away, including Las Vegas's McCarran International Airport.
• May 14 - Bus disaster near Carrollton, Kentucky: A drunk driver going the wrong way on Interstate 71, hits a converted school bus carrying a church youth group from Radcliff, Kentucky. The resulting fire kills 27.
• May 14 - Wimbledon wins the English FA Cup after beating Liverpool 1-0 at Wembley. The south-west Londoners had pulled off one of the greatest upsets in the history of English football, as they had been top division members for just 2 years and had joined the Football League only 11 years earlier. Liverpool, meanwhile, had won a total of 30 major trophies including 17 league titles.
• May 15 - Soviet war in Afghanistan: After more than 8 years of fighting, the Red Army begins withdrawing from Afghanistan.
• May 16 - A report by U.S. Surgeon General C. Everett Koop states that the addictive properties of nicotine are similar to those of heroin and cocaine.
• May 16 - California v. Greenwood: The U.S. Supreme Court rules that police officers do not need a search warrant to search through discarded garbage.
• May 24 - Section 28 (outlawing promotion of homosexuality in schools) is passed as law by Parliament in the United Kingdom.
• May 31 - U.S. President Ronald Reagan addresses 600 Moscow State University students, during his visit to the Soviet Union.

[edit] June

• June 6 - Elizabeth II of the United Kingdom strips jockey Lester Piggott of his Order of the British Empire.
• June 11 - The name of the General Public License (GPL) is mentioned for the first time.
• June 25 - The Netherlands defeats the Soviet Union 2-0 to win Euro 88.
• June 28 - Four workers are asphyxiated at a metal-plating plant in Auburn, Indiana, in the worst confined-space industrial accident in U.S. history (a fifth victim dies 2 days later).
• June 29 - Morrison v. Olson: The United States Supreme Court upholds the law allowing special prosecutors to investigate suspected crimes by executive branch officials.
• June 30 - Roman Catholic Archbishop Marcel Lefebvre consecrates 4 bishops at Ecône, Switzerland for his apostolate, along with Bishop Antonio de Castro Mayer, without a papal mandate.

[edit] July

• July 3 - Iran Air Flight 655 is accidentally shot down by missiles launched from the USS Vincennes.
• July 6 - The Piper Alpha drilling platform in the North Sea is destroyed by explosions and fires, killing 165 oil workers and 2 rescue mariners.
• July 6 - The first reported medical waste on beaches in the Greater New York area (including hypodermic needles and syringes possibly infected with the AIDS virus) washes ashore on Long Island. Subsequent medical waste discoveries on beaches in Coney Island and in Monmouth County, New Jersey force the closure of numerous New York-area beaches in the middle of one of the hottest summers in the American Northeast on record.
• July 14 - Volkswagen closes its Westmoreland County, Pennsylvania plant after 10 years of operation (the first factory built by a non-American automaker in the U.S.).
• July 20 - The Democratic National Convention in Atlanta, Georgia nominates Michael Dukakis for U.S. President and Lloyd Bentsen for Vice President.
• July 31 - Thirty-two people are killed and 1,674 injured when a bridge at the Sultan Abdul Halim Ferry terminal collapses in Butterworth, Malaysia.

[edit] August

• August 5 - The 1988 Malaysian constitutional crisis culminates in the sacking of the Lord President of Malaysia, Salleh Abas.
• August 6-August 7 - Tompkins Square Park Police Riot in New York City: A riot erupts in Tompkins Square Park when police brutally attempt to enforce a newly-passed curfew for the park. Bystanders, artists, residents, homeless people and political activists are caught up in the police action that takes place on the night of August 6th and the early morning of August 7th.
• August 8 - The Chicago Cubs play their first ever night game at home in Wrigley Field.
• August 8 - 8888 Uprising: Thousands of protestors in Burma (now Myanmar) are killed during anti-government demonstrations.
• August 9 - Wayne Gretzky is traded from the Edmonton Oilers to the Los Angeles Kings, in one of the most controversial transactions in ice hockey history.
• August 17 - Pakistan President Muhammad Zia-ul-Haq and U.S. Ambassador Arnold Raphel are killed in a plane crash near Bhawalpur.
• August 18 - The Republican National Convention in New Orleans, Louisiana nominates George H.W. Bush for U.S. President and Dan Quayle for Vice President.
• August 18 - Pakistan's General Rahimuddin Khan resigns from his post as Governor of Sindh.
• August 19 - A ceasefire begins in the Iran-Iraq war.
• August 20 - The Iran-Iraq war ends, with an estimated 1 million lives lost.
• August 26 - Merhan Karimi Nasseri ("The terminal man") is stuck in the De Gaulle Airport in Paris, where he continues to reside until August 1, 2006.
• August 28 - Sixty-seven people are killed and 346 injured in one of the worst airshow disasters in history at Germany's Ramstein Air Base, when 3 jets from the Italian air demonstration team, Frecce Tricolori, collide, sending 1 jet crashing into the crowd.
• August 28 - A fire destroys part of Chiado quarter, in Lisbon's historical center.
• August 29 - The first World Wrestling Entertainment (WWE) (WWF at the time) SummerSlam main event, featuring Hulk "Hulkamania" Hogan and "Macho Man" Randy Savage versus André the Giant and "Million Dollar Man" Ted DiBiase, is held in