1981

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Centuries:	19th century - 20th century - 21st century
Decades:	1950s 1960s 1970s - 1980s - 1990s 2000s 2010s
Years:	1978 1979 1980 - 1981 - 1982 1983 1984

1981 by topic:
Arts
Architecture - Art - Film - Home video - Literature Music (Country) - Television
Science and technology
Archaeology - Aviation Meteorology - Rail transport - Science
By country
Australia - Canada - India Ireland - Malaysia - New Zealand - Pakistan - Singapore - South Africa - UK - Wales - Zimbabwe
Other topics
Awards - Sport - Law - State leaders - Sovereign states - Religious leaders - Video gaming
Birth and death categories
Births - Deaths
Establishments and disestablishments categories
Establishments - Disestablishments
Works category
Works

1981 (MCMLXXXI) was a common year starting on Thursday of the Gregorian calendar.

[edit] Events

[edit] January

January - The subterranean Sarawak chamber is discovered in Borneo.
January 1 - Greece enters the European Community, which later becomes the European Union.
January 1 - Palau becomes self-governing.
January 4 - Sheffield police arrest Peter Sutcliffe, the Yorkshire Ripper.
January 5 - Margaret Thatcher carried out a Cabinet reshuffle, sacking Norman St. John-Stevas.
January 13 - Donna Griffiths, a schoolgirl in Pershore, Worcestershire, UK, begins an uncontrollable series of sneezes that end September 16, 1983 - after 978 days.
January 16 - Protestant gunmen shoot and wound Bernadette Devlin McAliskey and her husband.
January 18 - The historic Ottawa Wine Tasting of 1981 confirms that superior wines can be made outside of France.

January 20: Iran releases hostages.

January 19 - United States and Iranian officials sign an agreement to release 52 American hostages after 14 months of captivity.

January 20 - Ronald Reagan succeeds Jimmy Carter, becoming the 40th President of the United States. Minutes later, Iran releases 52 Americans held 444 days, the Iran hostage crisis ends in secret trades, leading to the Iran-Contra hearings.

January 21: New car: De Lorean DMC-12

January 21 - The first De Lorean DMC-12 automobile, a stainless steel sportscar with gull-wing doors, rolls off the production line in Dunmurry, Northern Ireland.
January 22 - Fowzi Nejad, sole survivor of the terrorists from the Iranian Embassy siege in London, pleaded guilty to manslaughter of two hostages and was jailed for life.

January 24 - The British Labour Party special conference at Wembley decides that leadership elections should be by electoral college.
January 25 - Four former Labour cabinet ministers (Roy Jenkins, Shirley Williams, William Rodgers and David Owen) announce the formation of the Council for Social Democracy.
January 25 - Chiang Ching ('Madame Mao') was sentenced to death in China.

[edit] February

February 24: Earthquake in Greece.

February 4 - Gro Harlem Brundtland becomes the Prime Minister of Norway.
February 8 - Twenty fans of the Greek Olympiacos FC are killed and 54 injured after a stampede at the Karaiskaki Stadium in Pireus. The deadly incident most likely occurred because Gate 7 of the stadium did not open immediately after the end of the game.
February 9 - Polish Prime Minister Józef Pinkowski resigns and is replaced by General Wojciech Jaruzelski.
February 10 - A fire at the Las Vegas Hilton hotel-casino kills 8 and injures 198.
February 13 - Rupert Murdoch buys The Times and The Sunday Times for £12 million.
February 14 - Australia withdraws recognition of the Pol Pot regime in Cambodia.
February 23 - Antonio Tejero, with members of the Guardia Civil, enters the Spanish Congress of Deputies and stops the session where Leopoldo Calvo Sotelo is about to be named president of the government. The coup d'état fails thanks to King Juan Carlos.
February 24 - Shortly before 11 p.m. local time, a powerful 6.7 magnitude earthquake hits Athens, killing 16 people, most of whom die because of related heart attacks. The quake's epicentre is located in the eastern Corinthian Gulf, near the tiny Alkyonides Islands, approximately 60 km west of the city. Dozens of buildings collapse in the nearby towns of Loutraki, Kiato and Xylocastro. A 6.4 magnitude aftershock, that strikes at 4:30 a.m local time, damages more buildings in those towns.

[edit] March

March 1 - Bobby Sands, an Irish Republican Army member, begins a hunger strike for political status in Long Kesh prison (he dies May 5, the first of 10 men).

March 6 - After 19 years hosting the CBS Evening News, Walter Cronkite signs off for the last time.
March 10 - Sir Geoffrey Howe announces the British budget, which raises taxes in the middle of a recession.
March 11 - Chilean President Augusto Pinochet is sworn in for another 8-year term.
March 19 - Three workers are killed and 5 injured during a test of the Space Shuttle Columbia.
March 26 - The British Social Democratic Party was launched at the Connaught Rooms in London.

March 30 - U.S. President Ronald Reagan is shot in the chest outside a Washington, D.C. hotel by John Hinckley, Jr.. Two police officers and Press Secretary James Brady are also wounded.

[edit] April

April 1 - Daylight saving time is introduced in the USSR.
April 2 - Tony Benn announces that he will challenge Denis Healey for the Deputy Leadership of the British Labour Party.
April 4 - Bucks Fizz wins the Eurovision Song Contest 1981 with the song, Making Your Mind Up.
April 10 - IRA hunger-striker Bobby Sands wins the Fermanagh and South Tyrone byelection.
April 11 - Brixton riot (1981): Rioters in South London throw petrol bombs, attack police and loot shops.
April 12 - The Space Shuttle program: Space Shuttle Columbia (John Young, Robert Crippen) launches on the STS-1 mission, returning to Earth on April 14.

April 12: First STS launch: Columbia.

April 15 - The Australian Foreign Minister Andrew Peacock resigns from the cabinet, accusing Prime Minister Fraser of gross disloyalty.

April 18 - A Minor League baseball game between the Rochester Red Wings and the Pawtucket Red Sox at McCoy Stadium in Pawtucket, Rhode Island, becomes the longest professional baseball game in history: 8 hours and 25 minutes/33 innings (the 33rd inning is not played until June 23).

April 18 - The rock band Yes splits up (regrouping in 1983).

April 24 - French presidential election, 1981: A first-round runoff results between Valery Giscard d'Estaing and François Mitterrand.

[edit] May

May - Daniel K. Ludwig abandons the Jari project in the Amazon Basin.
May 6 - A jury of architects and sculptors unanimously selects Maya Lin's design for the Vietnam Veterans Memorial from 1,421 other entries.
May 7 - The Greater London Council election results in a small Labour majority. On May 8, Ken Livingstone becomes Leader of the Council.
May 10 - In the second round of the presidential elections in France, François Mitterrand beats Valéry Giscard d'Estaing.
May 13 - Pope John Paul II is shot and nearly killed by Mehmet Ali Ağca, a Turkish gunman, as he enters St. Peter's Square in Rome to address a general audience (2 days after Christmas in 1983, Pope John Paul goes to the prison to meet and forgive his would-be assassin).
May 15 - Donna Payant is murdered by serial killer Lemuel Smith - the first time a female prison officer has been killed on-duty in the United States.
May 21 - In France, Socialist François Mitterrand becomes President.
May 22 - Peter Sutcliffe, the Yorkshire Ripper, is imprisoned for life for 13 counts of murder.
May 24 - Indianapolis 500: Bobby Unser wins for a third time for both he as a driver and Roger Penske as a car owner, but the race sanctioning-body USAC temporarily strips him of victory over an accusation of illegally passing other cars under a caution period (see racing flags). After the team's appeal, Unser's win is reinstated on October 8.
May 25 - In Riyadh, the Gulf Cooperation Council is created between Bahrain, Kuwait, Oman, Qatar, Saudi Arabia and the United Arab Emirates.
May 26 - The Italian government resigns over its links to the fascist Masonic cell Propaganda Due.
May 30 - Bangladesh President Ziaur Rahman is assassinated in Chittagong.

[edit] June

June 5 - The Centers for Disease Control and Prevention report that 5 homosexual men in Los Angeles, California have a rare form of pneumonia seen only in patients with weakened immune systems (the first recognized cases of AIDS).
June 6 - Bihar train disaster: Seven coaches of an overcrowded passenger train fall off the tracks into the River Kosi in Bihar, India; about 800 die.
June 7 - The Israeli Air Force destroys Iraq's Osirak nuclear reactor.

June 5: Rare pneumonia is first seen.

June 12 - Major League Baseball goes on strike, forcing the cancellation of 38 percent of the schedule.
June 13 - At the Trooping the Colour ceremony in London, Marcus Sarjeant fires six blank shots at Queen Elizabeth II of the United Kingdom.

June 7: Osirak nuclear reactor.

June 21 - Wayne Williams, a 28-year-old African American, is arrested and charged with the murders of 2 other African Americans. He will later be suspected of 28 others, in the Atlanta child murders.
June 22 - Hamas attacks a travel agency in Greece, killing 2.
June 22 - Iranian president Abolhassan Banisadr is deposed.
June 29 - Morris Edwin Robert, armed with a machine gun, holds hostages in the FBI section at the Atlanta, Georgia Federal Building. After 3 hours the hostages are rescued and Robert is shot (dead?).

[edit] July

July 8 - California Governor Jerry Brown, faced with a Mediterranean fruit fly infestation, chooses to delay the aerial spraying of malathion, in favor of continuing ground-based eradication efforts.
July 10 - Mahathir bin Mohamad became the 4th prime minister of Malaysia.
July 17 - Hyatt Regency walkway collapse: Two skywalks filled with people at the Hyatt Regency Hotel in Kansas City, Missouri collapse into a crowded atrium lobby, killing 114.

July 29: The newlywed Prince & Princess of Wales return to Buckingham Palace after wedding watched by over 1 billion people.

July 17 - Israeli bombers destroy the PLO headquarters in Beirut.

July 19 - The 1981 Springbok Tour commences in New Zealand, amid controversy over the support of Apartheid.

July 27 - The Wheel of Fortune TV show premiers in Australia on the Seven Network.

July 29 - Lady Diana Spencer marries Charles, Prince of Wales.

[edit] August

August 1 - MTV (Music Television) is launched.
August 3 - The Professional Air Traffic Controllers Organization goes on strike.
August 5 - Ronald Reagan fires 11,359 striking air-traffic controllers who ignored his order for them to return to work.
August 7 - The Washington Star ceases all operations after 128 years of publication.
August 9 - Major League Baseball resumes from strike with the All-Star Game in Cleveland's Municipal Stadium.
August 11 - The original Model 5150 IBM PC with a 4.77 MHz Intel 8088 processor was released in the United States at a base price of $1,565.
August 19 - Gulf of Sidra incident (1981): Libyan leader Muammar al-Gaddafi sends 2 Sukhoi Su-22 fighter jets to intercept 2 U.S. fighters over the Gulf of Sidra. The American jets destroy the Libyan fighters.
August 19 - U.S. President Ronald Reagan appoints the first female U.S. Supreme Court Justice, Sandra Day O'Connor.
August 19 - Neil Tennant and Chris Lowe, aka the pop duo Pet Shop Boys, meet for the first time by chance in an electronics shop in Chelsea, London.
August 24 - Mark David Chapman was sentenced to 20 years to life imprisonment for the murder of John Lennon.
August 28 - South African troops invade Angola.
August 31 - A bomb explodes at the U.S. Army base in Ramstein, West Germany, injuring 20 people.

[edit] September

September 4 - An explosion at a mine in Zalizin, Czechoslovakia, kills 65.
September 10 - Picasso's painting "Guernica" is moved from New York to Madrid.
September 14 - Margaret Thatcher appoints Cecil Parkinson as Chairman of the Conservative Party.
September 15 - The John Bull becomes the oldest operable steam locomotive in the world, at 150 years old, when it operates under its own power outside Washington, DC.
September 16 - In Britain, the Liberal Party Assembly votes for an electoral pact with the new Social Democratic Party.
September 18 - France abolishes capital punishment.
September 19 - The second Wranslide occurs in New South Wales, with the Wran government re-elected for a third term with an increased majority, and reducing the Liberal Party of Australia to just 14 members in the Legislative Assembly.
September 19 - Simon and Garfunkel perform The Concert in Central Park, a free concert in New York in front of approximately a half a million people.
September 20 - Belize became independent.
September 21 - Sandra Day O'Connor takes her seat as the first female justice of the U.S. Supreme Court.
September 27 - TGV high speed rail service between Paris and Lyon, France begins.
September 27 - Denis Healey retained the post of Deputy Leader of the Labour Party, beating Tony Benn by 50.426% to 49.574%.

[edit] October

October 6 - Egyptian president Anwar Sadat is assassinated during a parade by army members who were part of the Egyptian Islamic Jihad organization; they opposed his negotiations with Israel.

October 6: Anwar Sadat is assassinated.

October 10 - The Ministry for Education of Japan issues the jōyō kanji.
October 10 - A Provisional IRA bomb at Chelsea Barracks in London kills a woman pensioner.
October 13 - James Tobin wins the Bank of Sweden Prize in Economic Sciences in Memory of Alfred Nobel.
October 14 - Vice President Hosni Mubarak is elected President of Egypt 1 week after Anwar Sadat's assassination.
October 15 - The heavy metal band Metallica forms.
October 21 - Andreas Papandreou becomes Prime Minister of Greece.
October 22 - The founding congress of the Nepal Workers and Peasants Organization faction led by Hareram Sharma and D.P. Singh begins.
October 22 - Liberal candidate Bill Pitt wins the Croydon North West byelection, the first election win by the Liberal-S.D.P. Alliance.
October 26 - An IRA bomb in a Wimpy Bar in Oxford Street, London, kills a bomb disposal expert.
October 27 - A Soviet submarine runs aground oustide the Karlskrona, Sweden military base.

[edit] November

Nov. 1: Flag of Antigua & Barbuda.

November 1 - Antigua and Barbuda gain independence from the United Kingdom.
November 9 - Edict No 81-234 abolishes slavery in Mauritania.
November 12 - STS-2: Space Shuttle Columbia, piloted by Joe Engle and Richard Truly, lifts off for its second mission.
November 12 - The Church of England General Synod voted to admit women to holy orders.
November 13 - The first Friday the 13th event is held by motorcyclists in Port Dover, Ontario, Canada.
November 23 - Iran-Contra scandal: Ronald Reagan signs the top secret National Security Decision Directive 17 (NSDD-17), giving the Central Intelligence Agency the authority to recruit and support Contra rebels in Nicaragua.
November 25-November 26 - A group of mercenaries led by Mike Hoare take over Mahe airport in the Seychelles in a coup attempt. Most of the mercenaries escape by a commandeered Air India passenger jet; 6 are later arrested.
November 26 - Former cabinet minister Shirley Williams won the Crosby byelection, becoming the first elected S.D.P. MP.
November 30 - Cold War: In Geneva, representatives from the United States and the Soviet Union begin to negotiate intermediate-range nuclear weapon reductions in Europe (the meetings end inconclusively on Thursday, December 17).

[edit] December

December 1 - A Yugoslavian DC-9 crashes into a mountain while approaching Ajaccio Airport in Corsica, killing 178.
December 4 - South Africa grants "homeland" Ciskei independence (not recognized outside South Africa).
December 8 - The No. 21 Mine explosion in Whitwell, Tennessee kills 13.
December 8 - Arthur Scargill became President-elect of the National Union of Mineworkers.
December 9 - Philadelphia, Pennsylvania police officer Daniel Faulkner is shot and killed during a routine traffic stop of a vehicle driven by William Cook, Mumia Abu-Jamal's younger brother.
December 11 - El Mozote massacre: In El Salvador, army units kill 900 civilians.
December 13 - Wojciech Jaruzelski declares martial law in Poland, to prevent the dismantling of the communist system by Solidarity.
December 15 - A car bomb destroys the Iraqi Embassy in Beirut, Lebanon, killing 61 people. This is the first modern suicide bombing. Syrian intelligence is blamed.
December 20 - The Penlee lifeboat disaster occurs off the coast of South-West Cornwall.
December 28 - The first American test-tube baby, Elizabeth Jordan Carr, is born in Norfolk, Virginia.

[edit] Unknown Dates

Millennium Renactment of the translation of Saint Edward the Martyr's relics from Wareham to Shaftesbury
Public funding of election Campaigns introduced in New South Wales, Australia
The State Council of the People's Republic of China listed the four cities (Beijing, Hangzhou, Suzhou and Guilin) as where the protection of historical and cultural heritage as well as natural scenery should be treated as a priority project.
Cuba suffers a major outbreak of Dengue fever, with 344,203 cases. [1]

[edit] Births

**1981 in other calendars**
Gregorian calendar	1981 MCMLXXXI
Ab urbe condita	2734
Armenian calendar	1430 ԹՎ ՌՆԼ
Chinese calendar	4617/4677-11-26 (庚申年十一月廿六日) — to — 4618/4678-12-6 (辛酉年十二月初六日)
Ethiopian calendar	1973 – 1974
Hebrew calendar	5741 – 5742
Hindu calendars
- Vikram Samvat	2036 – 2037
- Shaka Samvat	1903 – 1904
- Kali Yuga	5082 – 5083
Iranian calendar	1359 – 1360
Islamic calendar	1401 – 1403
Japanese calendar	Shōwa 56 (昭和56年)
- Imperial Year	Kōki 2641 (皇紀2641年)
- Jōmon Era	11981
Thai solar calendar	2524