Today is
August 1.
There are 152 days remaining in 2017.
There are 145 days until Christmas.
Today is
World Scout Scarf Day, so wear it if ya got it.
The year was
1983.
The number one movie this week in 1983 was National Lampoon's Vacation, starring Chevy Chase, Beverly D'Angelo, Randy Quaid (before the Star Whackers got after him), and Christie Brinkley
:
The number one single was "Every Breath You Take" by The Police:
1983
Ronald Reagan was POTUS.
January 1 – The migration of the ARPANET to TCP/IP is officially completed (this is considered to be the beginning of the true Internet).
January 3 – Kīlauea begins slowly erupting on the Big Island of Hawaii and is still flowing as of 2016.
January 19 – High-ranking Nazi war criminal Klaus Barbie is arrested in Bolivia.
January 30 – Washington Redskins beat the Miami Dolphins in Super Bowl XVII.
February 16 – The Ash Wednesday bushfires in Victoria and South Australia claim the lives of 75 people, in one of Australia's worst bushfire disasters.
February 20 – Cale Yarborough Wins the 25th running of the Daytona 500.
February 23 - The automatic shut-down fails at Salem Nuclear Power Plant, New Jersey, USA.
February 28 – The final episode of M*A*S*H airs, setting a record for most watched television episode and reaching a total audience estimated at 125 million.
March 23 – Strategic Defense Initiative: U.S. President Ronald Reagan makes his initial proposal to develop technology to intercept enemy missiles. The media dub this plan "Star Wars".
March 25 – Motown celebrates its 25th anniversary with the television special Motown 25: Yesterday, Today, Forever, during which Michael Jackson performs "Billie Jean" and introduces the moonwalk.
April 4 – The Space Shuttle Challenger is launched on its maiden voyage: STS-6.
April 25 – Manchester, Maine, US, 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 25 – Return of the Jedi opens in theatres.
June 9 – Britain's Conservative government, led by Margaret Thatcher, is re-elected by a landslide majority.
June 18 - Sally Ride becomes the first American woman in space aboard Space Shuttle Challenger on the STS-7 mission.
July 21 – The lowest temperature on Earth is recorded in Vostok Station, Antarctica with −89.2 °C (−128.6 °F).
July 23 -
Gimli Glider: Out of fuel, Air Canada Flight 143 glides in to land in Gimli, Manitoba.
August 18 - Hurricane Alicia hits the Texas coast, killing 22 and causing over US$3.8 billion (2005 dollars) in damage.
August 24 – The Old Philadelphia Arena is destroyed by arson.
September 1 – Cold War: Korean Air Lines Flight 007 is shot down by Soviet Union Air Force Su-15 Flagon pilot Major Gennadi Osipovich near Moneron Island when the commercial aircraft enters Soviet airspace. All 269 on board are killed including U.S. Congressman Larry McDonald.
September 4 – Six men walk underwater across Sydney Harbour – 82.9 km in 48 hours.
September 6 – The Soviet Union admits to shooting down Korean Air Lines Flight 007, stating that the pilots did not know it was a civilian aircraft when it violated Soviet airspace.
September 16 – President Ronald Reagan announces that the Global Positioning System (GPS) will be made available for civilian use.
September 17 – Vanessa L. Williams becomes the first African American to be crowned Miss America, in Atlantic City, New Jersey.
September 18 – U.S. heavy metal band Kiss officially appears in public without makeup for the first time on MTV.
September 25 – Maze Prison escape: 38 Provisional Irish Republican Army prisoners, armed with 6 handguns, hijack a prison lorry and smash their way out of HM Prison Maze in Northern Ireland, in the largest prison escape since World War II and in British history.
September 26 - 1983 Soviet nuclear false alarm incident: Soviet military officer Stanislav Petrov averts a worldwide nuclear war by correctly identifying a warning of attack by U.S. missiles as a false alarm.
September 27 – The GNU Project is announced publicly on the net.unix-wizards and net.usoft newsgroups.
October 4 – British entrepreneur Richard Noble sets a new land speed record of 633.468 mph (1,019.468 km/h), driving Thrust2 at the Black Rock Desert, Nevada.
October 4 – The first Hooters opened in Clearwater, Florida.
October 23 – Beirut barracks bombing: Simultaneous suicide truck-bombings destroy both the French Army and United States Marine Corps barracks in Beirut, killing 241 U.S. servicemen, 58 French paratroopers and 6 Lebanese civilians.
October 25 – Invasion of Grenada by United States troops at the behest of Eugenia Charles of Dominica, a member of the Organization of American States.
November 2 - Chrysler introduces the Dodge Caravan, the first "minivan".
November 5 – Byford Dolphin rig diving bell accident: Off the coast of Norway, 5 divers are killed and one severely wounded in an explosive decompression accident.
November 13 – The first United States cruise missiles arrive at RAF Greenham Common in England amid protests from peace campaigners.
November 18 – A Christmas Story is released.
November 26 – Brink's-Mat robbery: In London, 6,800 gold bars worth nearly UK£26 million are taken from the Brink's-Mat vault at Heathrow Airport. Only a fraction of the gold is ever recovered, and only 2 men are convicted of the crime.
December 2 – Michael Jackson's Thriller video is aired on MTV for the first time.
December 4 - Solar eclipse of December 4, 1983.