News and Events of 1984

World Events

• Syria frees captured US Navy pilot, Lieut. Robert C. Goodman, Jr. (Jan. 3).
  
  
• US and Vatican exchange diplomats after 116-year hiatus (Jan. 10).
  
  
• Reagan orders US Marines withdrawn from Beirut international peacekeeping force (Feb. 7).
  
  
• Yuri V. Andropov dies at 69; Konstantin U. Chernenko, 72, named Soviet leader (Feb. 9). Background: Rulers of Russia since 1533
  
  
• Italy and Vatican agree to end Roman Catholicism as state religion (Feb. 18).
  
  
• Soviet Union withdraws from summer Olympic games in US, and other bloc nations follow (May 7 et seq.).
  
  
• José Napoleón Duarte, moderate, elected president of El Salvador (May 11).
  
  
• Three hundred slain as Indian Army occupies Sikh Golden Temple in Amritsar (June 6).
  
  
• Indian Prime Minister Indira Gandhi assassinated by two Sikh bodyguards; 1,000 killed in anti-Sikh riots; son Rajiv succeeds her (Oct. 31).
  
  
• Toxic gas leaks from Union Carbide plant in Bhopal, India, killing 2,000 and injuring 150,000 (Dec. 3).
  
  

U.S. Events

• Bell System broken up (Jan. 1).
  
  
• Congress rebukes President Reagan on use of federal funds for mining Nicaraguan harbors (April 10).
  
  
• Thirty-ninth Democratic National Convention, nominates Walter F. Mondale and Geraldine A. Ferraro (July 16–19).
  
  
• Thirty-third Republican National Convention renominates President Reagan and Vice President Bush (Aug. 20-25).
  
  
• President Reagan re-elected in landslide with 59% of vote (Nov. 7).
  
  

Economics

Sports

Super Bowl

World Series

NBA Championship

Stanley Cup

Wimbledon

Kentucky Derby Champion

NCAA Basketball Championship

NCAA Football Champions

1984 Summer Olympics

1984 Winter Olympics

Entertainment

Events

• The Cosby Show debuts on NBC. The sitcom is widely considered the most popular show of the 1980s.
• The Supreme Court rules that taping television shows at home on VCRs does not violate copyright law.
• Led by Bob Geldof, the band Band Aid releases "Do They Know It's Christmas," with proceeds of the single going to feed the starving in Africa.

Movies

• Amadeus, The Killing Fields, A Passage to India, The Pope of Greenwich Village

Books

• Anita Brookner, Hotel du Lac, Alison Lurie, Foreign Affairs

Science

• Joe W. Kittinger makes the first solo transatlantic balloon flight in the helium-filled Rosie O'Grady's Balloon of Peace. He travels 3,535 miles from Caribou, Maine to Savona, Italy. Background: Famous Firsts in Aviation
• Apple introduces the user-friendly Macintosh personal computer. Background: Computers and Internet

Deaths

• Indira Gandhi
  
  
• Francois Truffaut
  
  
• Truman Capote
  
  
• Count Basie
  
  

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