1998 (MCMXCVIII) was a common year starting on Thursday of the Gregorian calendar. It was the 9th year of the 1990s decade, the 98th year of the 20th century and the 998th year of the 2nd millennium.
Events
January
Frozen trees during the
winter storm
- January 1 – Smoking is banned in all California bars and restaurants.
- January 2 - Russia begins to circulate new rubles to stem inflation and promote confidence.
- January 2 - A gunman shoots Antario Teodoro Filho, Brazilian politician and radio presenter, in the middle of his broadcast.
- January 4-10 - A massive ice storm, caused by El Nino, strikes New England, southern Ontario and Quebec, resulting in widespread power failures, severe damage to forests, and a number of deaths.
- January 4 – Wilaya of Relizane massacres of 4 January 1998 in Algeria; over 170 killed in three remote villages.
- January 6 – The Lunar Prospector spacecraft is launched into orbit around the Moon and later found evidence for frozen water on the moon's surface.
- January 8 - Ramzi Yousef is sentenced to life in prison for planning the World Trade Center bombing.
- January 8 - Cosmologists announce that the expansion rate of the universe is increasing.
- January 11 – Sidi-Hamed massacre in Algeria; over 100 people killed.
- January 12 – 19 European nations agree to forbid human cloning.
- January 14 – Researchers in Dallas, Texas present findings about an enzyme that slows aging and cell death (apoptosis).
- January 15 – The stalker of Howard Stern, Lance Carvin, is sentenced to 2 1/2 years for threatening to kill Stern and his family.
- January 16 – NASA announces that John Glenn will return to space when Space Shuttle Discovery blasts off in October 1998.
- January 22 – Suspected "Unabomber" Theodore Kaczynski pleads guilty and accepts a sentence of life without the possibility of parole.
- January 26 - Compaq buys Digital Equipment Corporation.
- January 27 – American First Lady Hillary Rodham Clinton appears on the Today show calling the attacks against her husband part of a "vast right-wing conspiracy."
- January 28 - Ford Motor Company announces the buyout of Volvo Cars for $6.45 billion.
- January 28 - Gunmen hold at least 400 children and teachers hostage for several hours at an elementary school in Manila, Philippines.
- January 29 – In Birmingham, Alabama a bomb explodes at an abortion clinic killing one and severely wounding another. Serial bomber Eric Rudolph is suspected as the culprit.
February
March
April
May
June
July
The
US Embassy in
Kenya after the bombing
August
September
Vessels searching for Swissair Flight 111 off
Nova Scotia
October
November
December
Births
- January 28 - Ariel Winter, American actress
- February 25 – Brendon Baerg, American actor
- April 9 – Elle Fanning, American actress
- April 24 - Ryan Newman, American actress
- April 28 - Byron Ward, American Basketball Player
- June 15 – Rachel Covey, American actress
- July 1 - Hollie Steel, English singer
- July 8 - Jaden Smith, American actor
- August 8 - Ronan Parke, English singer
- September 21 – Lorenzo Brino, American actor
- September 21 – Myrinda Brino, American actress
- September 21 – Nikolas Brino, American actor
- September 21 – Zachary Brino, American actor
- October 6 - Mia-Sophie Wellenbrink, German actress and singer
- November 23 - Bradley Steven Perry, American actor and singer
Deaths
January
Vladimir Prelog 1906-1998
- January 1 - Helen Wills Moody, American tennis player (born 1905)
- January 5 - Sonny Bono, American singer, actor and politician (born 1935)
- January 7 - Vladimir Prelog, Croatian chemist (born 1906)
- January 8 - Michael Tippett, English composer (born 1905)
- January 9 - Kenichi Fukui, Japanese chemist (born 1918)
- January 11 - Klaus Tennstedt, German conductor (born 1926)
- January 19 - Carl Perkins, American guitarist (born 1932)
- January 21 - Jack Lord, American actor (born 1920)
- January 23 - Alfredo Ormando, Italian writer (born 1958)
- January 28 - Shotari Ishinomari, Japanese manga artist (born 1938)
February
March
- March 3 - Fred W. Friendly, American television journalist and executive (born 1915)
- March 10 - Lloyd Bridges, American actor (born 1913)
- March 12 - Judge Dread, English musician (born 1945)
- March 12 - Beatrice Wood, American artist and ceramicist (born 1893)
- March 12 - Jozef Kroner, Slovakian actor (born 1924)
- March 15 - Benjamin Spock, American athlete, pediatrician and writer (born 1903)
- March 16 - Derek Harold Richard Barton, British chemist (born 1918)
- March 21 - Galina Ulanova, Russian ballerina (born 1910)
- March 25 - Daniel Massey, British actor (born 1933)
- March 27 - Ferdinand Anton Ernst Porsche, Austrian automobile designer and businessman (born 1909)
- March 31 - Bella Abzug, American politician (born 1920)
April
- April 1 - Gene Evans, American actor (born 1920)
- April 2 - Rob Pilatus, member of the pop group Milli Vanilli (born 1965)
- April 6 - Tammy Wynette, American singer (born 1942)
- April 15 - Pol Pot, Cambodian dictator (born 1925)
- April 16 - Marie-Louise Meilleur, Canadian supercentenarian (born 1880)
- April 17 - Linda McCartney, American photographer and musician (born 1941)
- April 19 - Octavio Paz, Mexican writer (born 1914)
- April 23 - Constantine Karamanlis, Greek politician (born 1907)
- April 23 - James Earl Ray, convicted assassin of Martin Luther King, Jr. (born 1928)
- April 25 - Christian Mortensen, Danish-born American supercentenarian (born 1882)
- April 27 - Carlos Castaneda, Peruvian-American anthropologist and writer (born 1925)
May
- May 1 - Eldridge Cleaver, American activist (born 1935)
- May 2 - Hide, Japanese musician (born 1964)
- May 2 - Justin Fashanu, English footballer (born 1961)
- May 7 - Allan McLeod Cormack, South African-born physicist (born 1924)
- May 14 - Frank Sinatra, American singer and entertainer (born 1915)
- May 19 - Sosuke Uno, Prime Minister of Japan (born 1922)
- May 22 - John Derek, American actor and movie director (born 1926)
- May 28 - Phil Hartman, Canadian-born American artist, writer, actor and comedian (born 1948)
- May 29 - Barry Goldwater, American politician (born 1909)
June
July
August
Frederick Reines 1918-1998
September
- September 2 - Allen Drury, American writer (born 1918)
- September 5 - Leo Penn, American actor and director (born 1921)
- September 6 - Akira Kurosawa, Japanese screenwriter, producer and director (born 1910)
- September 13 - George Wallace, American politician (born 1919)
- September 14 - Yang Shangkun, Chinese politician (born 1907)
- September 21 - Florence Griffith-Joyner, American athlete (born 1959)
- September 26 - Betty Carter, American singer (born 1929)
- September 29 - Tom Bradley, American politician, Mayor of Los Angeles, California (born 1917)
October
November
December
Nobel Prizes
Movies released
- Saving Private Ryan
- Armageddon
- There's Something About Mary
- A Bug's Life
- Doctor Dolittle
- Rush Hour
- Deep Impact
- Godzilla
- Patch Adams
- Antz
- The Big Lebowski
- Blade
- Chairman of the Board
- Dark City
- Elizabeth
- Fear and Loathing in Las Vegas
- Human Remains
- Hurlyburly
- Lethal Weapon 4
- Lost in Space
- The Mask of Zorro
- Mulan
- The Negotiator
- Pi
- Pleasantville
- Rushmore
- Shakespeare in Love
- Six Days Seven Nights
- Small Soldiers
- The Thin Red Line
- Very Bad Things
- The Waterboy
- The Wedding Singer
- The Parent Trap
Hit songs
New books
- QED: The Strange Theory of Light and Matter
1998 Facts for Kids.
Kiddle Encyclopedia.