What Happened The Year You Were Born?

[Guest Donna Jean]

.

Ok, Trans issues aside for a minute....

Here is a really cool little site that tells you what happened the year you were born.

Just put in your birth year and sit back and watch....

http://whathappenedinmybirthyear.com/

Have fun!

Huggs!

Donna Jean

[Guest miss kindheart]

In 1958, the world was a different place.

There was no Google yet. Or Yahoo. Or Lauras-playground, for that matter.

In 1958, the year of your birth, the top selling movie was South Pacific. People buying the popcorn in the cinema lobby had glazing eyes when looking at the poster.

Remember, that was before there were DVDs. Heck, even before there was VHS. People were indeed watching movies in the cinema, and not downloading them online. Imagine the packed seats, the laughter, the excitement, the novelty. And mostly all of that without 3D computer effects.

Do you know who won the Oscars that year? The academy award for the best movie went to Gigi. The Oscar for best foreign movie that year went to My Uncle. The top actor was David Niven for his role as Major Angus Pollock in Separate Tables. The top actress was Susan Hayward for her role as Barbara Graham in I Want to Live!. The best director? Vincente Minnelli for Gigi.

In the year 1958, the time when you arrived on this planet, books were still popularly read on paper, not on digital devices. Trees were felled to get the word out. The number one US bestseller of the time was Doctor Zhivago by Boris Pasternak. Oh, that's many years ago. Have you read that book? Have you heard of it?

In 1958... Egypt and Syria unite to form the United Arab Republic. The word Aerospace is coined, from the words Aircraft and Spacecraft, taking into consideration that the Earth's atmosphere and outerspace is to be one, or a single realm. Gamel Abdel Nasser is nominated as the first president of the United Arab Republic. Pope Pius XII declares Saint Clare the patron saint of television. A test rocket explodes at Cape Canaveral. A peace symbol is designed and completed by Gerald Holtom, commissioned by the Campaign for Nuclear Disarmament, in protest against the Atomic Weapons Research Establishment. A British team led by Sir Vivian Fuchs completes the first crossing of the Antarctic in Snow-cat caterpillar tractors and dogsled teams in 99 days. King Baudouin of Belgium officially opens the World Fair in Brussels, also known as Expo '58. The satellite Sputnik 2 disintegrates in space after several orbits. The U.S. Army inducts Elvis Presley, transforming The King Of Rock & Roll into U.S. private #53310761.

That was the world you were born into. Since then, you and others have changed it.

The Nobel prize for Literature that year went to Boris Pasternak. The Nobel Peace prize went to Georges Pire. The Nobel prize for physics went to Pavel Alekseyevich Cherenkov, Il'ya Frank and Igor Yevgenyevich Tamm from Soviet Union for the discovery and the interpretation of the Cherenkov effect. The sensation this created was big. But it didn't stop the planets from spinning, on and on, year by year. Years in which you would grow bigger, older, smarter, and, if you were lucky, sometimes wiser. Years in which you also lost some things. Possessions got misplaced. Memories faded. Friends parted ways. The best friends, you tried to hold on. This is what counts in life, isn't it?

The 1950s were indeed a special decade. The American economy is on the upswing. The cold war betwen the US and the Soviet Union is playing out throughout the whole decade. Anti-communism prevails in the United States and leads to the Red Scare and accompanying Congressional hearings. Africa begins to become decolonized. The Korean war takes place. The Vietnam War starts. The Suez Crisis war is fought on Egyptian territory. Fidel Castro, Che Guevara and others overthrow authorities to create a communist government on Cuba. Funded by the US, reconstructions in Japan continue. In Japan, film maker Akira Kurosawa creates the movies Rashomon and Seven Samurai. The FIFA World Cups are won by Uruguay, then West Germany, then Brazil.

Do you remember the movie that was all the rage when you were 15? Paper Moon. Do you still remember the songs playing on the radio when you were 15? Maybe it was Bad, Bad Leroy Brown by Jim Croce. Were you in love? Who were you in love with, do you remember?

In 1958, 15 years earlier, a long time ago, the year when you were born, the song All I Have To Do Is Dream by Everly Brothers topped the US charts. Do you know the lyrics? Do you know the tune? Sing along.

When I want you in my arms

When I want you and all your charms

Whenever I want you, all I have to do is

Drea-ea-ea-ea-eam, dream, dream, dream

...

There's a kid outside, shouting, playing. It doesn't care about time. It doesn't know about time. It shouts and it plays and thinks time is forever. You were once that kid.

When you were 8, there was The Man Called Flintstone.

6, 5, 4, 3, 2, 1... it's 1958. There's TV noise coming from the second floor. Someone turned up the volume way too high. The sun is burning from above. These were different times. The show playing on TV is The Donna Reed Show. The sun goes down. Someone switches channels. There's The Voice of Firestone on now. That's the world you were born in.

Progress, year after year. Do you wonder where the world is heading towards? The technology available today would have blown your mind in 1958. Do you know what was invented in the year you were born? The Integrated Circuit. The Communications Satellite. The Implantable Pacemaker.

I rolled off the line

In Detroit back in 1958

Spent three days in the showroom

That's all I had to wait

...

That's from the song Rusty Old American Dream by David Wilcox.

In 1958, a new character entered the world of comic books: Mr. Freeze. Bang! Boom! But that's just fiction, right? In the real world, in 1958, Andie MacDowell was born. And Belinda Carlisle. Madonna, too. And you, of course. Everyone an individual. Everyone special. Everyone taking a different path through life.

It's 2010.

The world is a different place.

What path have you taken?

Now I know

vanna

[Guest Pól]

Loads of stuff happened the year I was born, but the most significant were probably the fall of the Berlin Wall and Tiananmen Square.

...I was impatient waiting for that site to load one letter at a time, so I went and googled instead

[JJ]

What did they use to take those pictures of cavemen? Such nostalgia. Stone tablets. Mastodon steaks on Saturday night and sabertooth roast every Sunday.

Talk about communication-the old stick on hollow tree drum had it's limitations but dropped calls were seldom a problem. And no one ever dropped the tree and broke it.

Styles were so much simpler too -the Sunday stripped hide or the everyday brown hairy. Being forced to twist that bone in my hair rather than wear it through my nose as my true gender dictated WAS painful but still.

What memories!

Love

JJ

[Guest NatashaJade]

The only really important thing that happened in 1970 was the formal break-up of the Beatles.

luv

Gin

[JJ]

Okay I couldn't resist the caveman thing-but It is a really good site and fun to use.

Thanks Dee Jay

JJ

[Guest ASHLEY 598]

the lion king came out when i was born i never knew that

[Guest Donna Jean]

Okay I couldn't resist the caveman thing-but It is a really good site and fun to use.

Thanks Dee Jay

JJ

Well, you scared me to death....

You and I are about the same age and I didn't remember any of that stuff!

Donna Jay

[Guest nelo]

...why does that site specifically mention Laura's Playground? o_o

[Guest Donna Jean]

...why does that site specifically mention Laura's Playground? o_o

What do you mean, Hon?

Donna Jean

[Guest vertigo]

Yeah, everytime I hear that "The Piano" and "Schindler's List" came out the year I was born, I get a weird happy feeling.

It sounded like a really busy year, actually - the invention of the Blue LED and GPS, Nelson Mandela and Frederik Willem won the Nobel Peace prize, the European Community eliminates trade barriers and creates a European single market... I was also surprised that "Walker, Texas Ranger" and "Beavis and Butt-head" are really THAT old... Interesting.

[Milly]

Besides me being born? Um well, a shuttle went boom and it was really sad >.< I know that on may 18th 1980 Mount St Helens pwned the better portion of Washington. May 18th being the day I was born. Not 1980 >.> Not really much I can think of other than sad stuff :|

[Guest Evan_J]

The year I was born?

It was in headline news.....

• Anti Vietnam War protests throughout the western world
  
• North Vietnam and Viet Cong troops launch the Tet offensive
  
• President Lyndon Johnson orders an end to the bombing of North Vietnam
  
• Assassination of Martin Luther King Jr. -Leader of Negro Civil Rights Movement is killed by James Earl Ray which leads to Violence and Race Riots in US Cities
  
• Following the Assassination of Martin Luther King Jr. President Lyndon Johnson signed the Civil Rights Act
  
• RMS Queen Elizabeth - retired from service
  
• China celebrates 20 years of communist rule by Mao Tse-tung
  
• Senator Robert Kennedy is assassinated by Sirhan Sirhan at the Ambassador Hotel in Los Angeles
  
• Aristotle Onassis and Jacqueline Kennedy marry
  

Technology

• Boeing 747 made its maiden flight.
  
• NASA launches Apollo 7, the first manned Apollo mission
  
• Air Bags , Allen K Breed invents an air bag that deploys and inflates automatically on violent impact using nitrogen gas.
  
• pollo 8 orbits the Moon, becoming the first manned space mission to achieve the feat.
  
• Dr. Christian Barnard performs the first successful heart transplant.
  
• US Explodes experimental hydrogen Bomb.
  
• The Emergency 911 Telephone service is started in the USA which provides a single number for reporting emergencies and is manned 24 hrs per day 365 days per year
  
• ATM First Philadelphia Bank installs the first automated teller machine in the U.S.
  

Less Dramatic?

The first Big Mac was sold at McDonalds. It cost 49¢

Important event that those of you living were yet to be aware of?

Evan J came here

[Guest nelo]

What do you mean, Hon?

Donna Jean

"In 1991, the world was a different place.

There was no Google yet. Or Yahoo. Or Lauras-playground, for that matter."

Though now I realize it was just seeing what site I was coming from, I guess. Feel sort of stupid now, lol.

[Guest Donna Jean]

"In 1991, the world was a different place.

There was no Google yet. Or Yahoo. Or Lauras-playground, for that matter."

Though now I realize it was just seeing what site I was coming from, I guess. Feel sort of stupid now, lol.

LOL....OK...

You scared me to death!

I was wondering what the heqq was going on....

Thanks for clearing that up!

Huggs

Donna Jean

[Carolyn Marie]

Interesting site, Dee Jay. Thanks for posting the link.

As it turns out, about the only things really interesting during my birth year was launch of the USS Nautilus, the completion of the movie The Seven Samurai, and the first hydrogen bomb test on Bikini Atoll. Well, one out of three was a good thing, anyway.

Carolyn Marie

[Guest jrm]

In 1992, the world was a different place.

There was no Google yet. Or Yahoo. Or Lauras-playground, for that matter.

In 1992, the year of your birth, the top selling movie was Aladdin. People buying the popcorn in the cinema lobby had glazing eyes when looking at the poster.

Remember, that was before there were DVDs. People were indeed watching movies in the cinema, and not downloading them online. Imagine the packed seats, the laughter, the excitement, the novelty.

Do you know who won the Oscars that year? The academy award for the best movie went to Unforgiven. The Oscar for best foreign movie that year went to Indochine. The top actor was Al Pacino for his role as Lieutenant Colonel Frank Slade in Scent of a Woman. The top actress was Emma Thompson for her role as Margaret Schlegel in Howards End. The best director? Clint Eastwood for Unforgiven.

In the year 1992, the time when you arrived on this planet, books were still popularly read on paper, not on digital devices. Trees were felled to get the word out. The number one US bestseller of the time was Dolores Claiborne by Stephen King. Oh, that's many years ago. Have you read that book? Have you heard of it? Look at the cover!

In 1992... George H. W. Bush is televised falling violently ill at a state dinner in Japan, vomiting into the lap of Prime Minister Kiichi Miyazawa and fainting. The second round of Algeria's general elections is cancelled when the first round is favorable to the Islamic Salvation Front. Rebel forces occupy Zaire's national radio station in Kinshasa and broadcast a demand for the government's resignation. Deng Xiaoping accelerates market reforms to establish a socialist market economy in the People's Republic of China. Microsoft releases Windows 3.1. U.S. military forces land in Somalia. The Genoa Expo '92 World's Fair opens in Genoa, Italy. The Kentucky Supreme Court, in Kentucky v. Wasson, holds that laws criminalizing same-sex sodomy are unconstitutional, and accurately predicts that other state and the nation will eventually rule the same way. Yoshihiro Hattori, a 16-year-old Japanese exchange student, mistakes the address of a party and is shot dead after knocking on the wrong door in Baton Rouge, Louisiana. The shooter, Rodney Peairs, is later acquitted, sparking outrage in Japan. Four nuclear missiles are launched into the Pacific Ocean. Two skeletons excavated in Yekaterinburg are identified as Czar Nicholas II of Russia and Tsarina Alexandra. Mafia boss John Gotti is sentenced to life in prison, after being found guilty of conspiracy to commit murder and racketeering. The video game of the day was Mortal Kombat.

That was the world you were born into. Since then, you and others have changed it.

The Nobel prize for Literature that year went to Derek Walcott. The Nobel Peace prize went to Rigoberta Menchú Tum. The Nobel prize for physics went to Georges Charpak from France for his invention and development of particle detectors, in particular the multiwire proportional chamber. The sensation this created was big. But it didn't stop the planets from spinning, on and on, year by year. Years in which you would grow bigger, older, smarter, and, if you were lucky, sometimes wiser. Years in which you also lost some things. Possessions got misplaced. Memories faded. Friends parted ways. The best friends, you tried to hold on. This is what counts in life, isn't it?

The 1990s were indeed a special decade. The Nineties saw the beginnings of the World Wide Web, originating at CERN. Email becomes popular. The Soviet Union dissolved. Living standards in East Asia and Europe generally improved. The Cold War ends. Iraqi forces invade Kuwait. A UN coalition force led by the US was sent to the Persian Gulf, and aerial bombing of Iraq began. The Kosovo War took place. The Ethiopian Civil War ends. Dolly, a sheep, is cloned. The Global Positioning System GPS becomes fully operational. Genetically engineered crops are developed for commercial use. Intel develops the Pentium processor. The Java programming language is created. Microsoft released Windows 95. In Los Angeles, riots occur after the police brutality case involving Rodney King. Great Britain hands sovereignty of Hong Kong to China. East Timor breaks away from Indonesian control. US president Bill Clinton was involved in the Lewinsky scandal. Dogme 95 becomes an important artistic movement in European film. Teen soap Beverly Hills 90210 has its long run. Baywatch becomes the most watched show in history. On MTV, reality television makes its beginning. Nelson Mandela is elected president of South Africa. Germany was reunified. The prediction of computer bug Y2K spreads fear.

Do you know what was on the cover of Life that year?

There's a kid outside, shouting, playing. It doesn't care about time. It doesn't know about time. It shouts and it plays and thinks time is forever. You were once that kid.

When you were 9, the movie The Lord of the Rings: The Fellowship of the Ring was playing. When you were 8, there was The Little Vampire. When you were 7, there was a Disney movie out called The Emperor's New Groove. Does this ring a bell?

6, 5, 4, 3, 2, 1... it's 1992. There's TV noise coming from the second floor. Someone turned up the volume way too high. The sun is burning from above. These were different times. The show playing on TV is Goof Troop. The sun goes down. Someone switches channels. There's California Dreams on now. That's the world you were born in.

Progress, year after year. Do you wonder where the world is heading towards? The technology available today would have blown your mind in 1992. Do you know what was invented in the year you were born? The Plasma Colour Display.

I remember you back in 1992

When they were putting us down

Trying to tramp us into the ground

You exploded like a flame in the night

With a righteous indignation

Told us "everything gonna be alright"

...

That's from the song Change by Black 47.

It's 2010.

The world is a different place.

What path have you taken?

[Guest Larson]

1990

The World Wide Web was launched the year I was born. So cool. I never knew that.

One of my favorite poets, Octavio Paz, won the Nobel Prize for Poetry and Mikhail Gorbachev (a favorite historical figure of mine) won the Nobel Peace Prize.

One huge accomplishment: Homosexuality was removed from the WHO list of diseases.

Nelson Mandela became president of South Africa.

West Germany won the World Cup (but more importantly, England scraped up fourth place!).

Another big accomplishment: The Americans With Disabilities Act was signed.

East and West Germany unified.

Apparently, IMDB.Com was started. This surprises me.

Margaret Thatcher left office!