1980s facts for kids
| Millennium: | 2nd millennium |
| Centuries: | 19th century – 20th century – 21st century |
| Decades: | 1950s 1960s 1970s – 1980s – 1990s 2000s 2010s |
| Years: | 1980 1981 1982 1983 1984 1985 1986 1987 1988 1989 |
| Categories: | Births – Deaths – Architecture Establishments – Disestablishments |
The 1980s was the decade that started on January 1, 1980 and ended on December 31, 1989.
This decade (group of ten years) is sometimes called the "Greed decade" in English speaking countries. Unlike the 1960s and 1970s, this is when the word yuppie was used to describe "young urban professionals" – young adults who lived in cities and started to get good jobs. This was also the rise of a more conservative period in these countries – Ronald Reagan was president for most of this time in the United States, Margaret Thatcher was the Prime Minister of the United Kingdom, and Brian Mulroney was Prime Minister of Canada.
This decade also saw the Soviet Union fight a war that seemed endless in Afghanistan, civil war in Ethiopia, and the fall of the Berlin Wall which started the end of the Cold War and of Communism in Eastern Europe.
The "eighties" are also well known for their extreme fashions, such as "big hair", New Wave, punk rock, funk, or preppies. Rap music first started to get big in the 80s, and often went with breakdancing in what is now called the "old school" days. Many developments were also made in computer technology during these years, and video games became popular.
In sports, Italy and Argentina won the FIFA World Cup. The Philadelphia Phillies, Los Angeles Dodgers, St. Louis Cardinals, Baltimore Orioles, Detroit Tigers, Kansas City Royals, New York Mets, Minnesota Twins and Oakland Athletics won the World Series. The Pittsburgh Steelers, Oakland Raiders, San Francisco 49ers, Washington Redskins, Los Angeles Raiders, Chicago Bears and New York Giants won the Super Bowl. Finally, the Los Angeles Lakers dominated the NBA, with only the Houston Rockets winning a title.
Important events
- Iran-Iraq War
- Solidarity movement in Poland
- Glasnost and Perestroika reforms in the Soviet Union
- 1981 – AIDS is discovered for the first time.
- 1981 – Assassination attempts are made on Ronald Reagan and Pope John Paul II.
- 1982 – Falklands War between Argentina and the United Kingdom.
- Soviet-Afghan War
- 1984 - Sikh Genocide
- 1986 – Prime Minister Olof Palme is assassinated
- 1986 – The Space Shuttle Challenger explodes.
- 1986 – End of Marcos regime in the Philippines
- 1986 – The Chernobyl accident happens in Ukraine because of a test that went wrong. It is the second-largest known nuclear accident, after the Mayak accident in 1957. It is also one of the biggest disasters for the environment. Many people died.
- 1987 – President Ronald Reagan travels to Berlin to deliver his "Tear down this wall!" speech.
- 1989 – Japanese Emperor Hirohito dies.
- 1989 – Tiananmen Square massacre
- 1989 – The Berlin Wall is torn down.
Important people
- Pope John Paul II, Pope in the 1980s
- Elizabeth II, British queen since 1952
- Hirohito, Emperor of Japan from 1926 to 1989
- Akihito, Emperor of Japan since 1989
- Kim Il-Sung, dictator of North Korea
- Deng Xiaoping, leader in China from 1978 to 1990
- Jimmy Carter, President of the United States from 1977 to 1981
- Ronald Reagan, President of the USA from 1981 to 1989
- Margaret Thatcher, British Prime Minister from 1979 to 1990
- Helmut Schmidt, German chancellor until 1982
- Helmut Kohl, German chancellor from 1982 to 1998
- François Mitterrand, French President from 1981 to 1995
- Saddam Hussein, President of Iraq
- Muammar al-Gaddafi, Libyan dictator
- Hosni Mubarak, President of Egypt
- Yitzhak Shamir, Prime minister of Israel
- Yasser Arafat, Palestinian leader
- Arnold Schwarzenegger, Austrian actor
- Sylvester Stallone, American actor
- Michael Jordan, American basketball-player
- Tom Cruise, American actor
- Eddie Murphy, American actor
- Duran Duran, English band
- Eurythmics, music band
- Prince, American singer
- Madonna, American singer
- Michael Jackson, American singer
- Bob Geldof, musician and fundraiser
- Iron Maiden, British heavy metal band
- N.W.A, hip hop group
- Ferdinand Marcos, President of the Philippines
- Corazon Aquino, President of the Philippines
- Indira Gandhi, prime minister of India until 1984
- Rajiv Gandhi, prime minister of India from 1984 until 1989
- Fidel Castro, leader of Cuba
- Augusto Pinochet, Chilean dictator
- Jorge Rafael Videla, dictator of Argentina until 1981
- Leopoldo Galtieri, dictator of Argentina from 1981 to 1982
- Nicolae Ceaușescu, Romanian dictator until 1989
- Wojciech Jaruzelski, Polish communist leader
- Lech Walesa, leader of Polish Solidarity movement
- Ayatollah Khomeini, leader of Iran
- Mikhail Gorbachev, the last chairman of the communist party of the Soviet Union.
- Sandra Day O'Connor, the first woman on the Supreme Court, from Arizona.
- Terry Fox, running across most of Canada in his Marathon of Hope.
- Hulk Hogan, American pro-wrestler and actor
Images for kids
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Invasion of Grenada, October 1983
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The Israeli Air Force F-16A Netz '243' that was flown by Colonel Ilan Ramon during Operation Opera
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U.S. President Reagan and Soviet General Secretary Gorbachev signing the INF Treaty, 1987
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The fall of the Berlin Wall in 1989 marked the beginning of German reunification
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The Space Shuttle Columbia seconds after engine ignition, 1981
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Michael Jackson was considered one of the most successful male pop and R&B artists of the 1980s.
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Stage view of the Live Aid concert at Philadelphia's JFK Stadium in the United States in 1985. The concert was a major global international effort by musicians and activists to sponsor action to send aid to the people of Ethiopia who were suffering from a major famine.
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The highest-grossing film of the decade was E.T. the Extra-Terrestrial (1982)
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The Nintendo Entertainment System (NES) was released in the mid-1980s and became the best-selling gaming console of its time
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A German couple in 1985.
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The Nintendo Entertainment System's Control Deck.
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Atari 7800 System (PAL system with Joypad controller).
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Mega Drive, known as the Genesis in North America, succeeded the Master System.
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In 1984, the Motorola DynaTAC 8000X becomes the first commercially available mobile phone model
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During the decade the standardization of Group 3 facsimile terminals by the International Telecommunication Union contributed to the significant spread of the fax machine.
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Hayes's Smartmodem
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The most basic CD was first introduced in October 1982 for the purpose of distribution and listening to digital audio
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In 1981, Microsoft introduced the MS-DOS operating system, which would become the world's most widely used operating system in the 1980s and first half of the 1990s.
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In 1989, the British computer scientist Tim Berners-Lee first proposed the World Wide Web, which he would develop in the coming years
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The popular 1980s arcade game Donkey Kong
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Game & Watch was the popular mobile game during the decade until it was replaced in the early 1990s with more advanced Game Boy.
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The game Pac-Man (1980) became immensely popular and an icon of 1980s popular culture
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Tom Bailey of the Thompson Twins in 1986 with the trendy Big hair style achieved with liberal applications of mousse and hairspray.
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Ray-Ban sunglasses
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Trendy 1980s pleated acid-washed jeans
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