1983 - Definition and Overview

1983 is an integer and composite number that represents a common year starting on Saturday of the Gregorian calendar.

Events

January

• January 1 - Beat Raaflaub became Basel Boys Choir's new conductor
• January 1 - the ARPANET officially changes to use the Internet Protocol, creating the Internet.
• January 1 - compulsory wearing of seat belts becomes law in the UK.
• January 2 - The musical Annie is performed for the last time after 2,377 shows (Uris Theatre on Broadway, New York City).
• January 8 - Riot in the Sing Sing prison
• January 19 - Klaus Barbie, Nazi war criminal, is arrested in Bolivia.
• January 19 - The Apple Lisa personal computer is announced.
• January 22 - Björn Borg retires from tennis after winning 5 consecutive Wimbledon championships.
• January 24 - 25 members of the Red Brigades are sentenced to life imprisonment for the murder of Aldo Moro
• January 26 - Lotus 1-2-3 is released.

February

• February 7 - Iran opens an invasion in the southeast of Iraq.
• February 16 - The Ash Wednesday bushfires in Victoria and South Australia claim the lives of 71 people in Australia's worst ever fires.
• February 23 - The Environmental Protection Agency announces its intent to buy out and evacuate the dioxin-contaminated community of Times Beach, Missouri.
• February 24 - A special commission of the U.S. Congress releases a report critical of the practice of Japanese internment during World War II.

March

• March 1 - Balearic Islands and Madrid become autonomous communities of Spain
• March 1 - Swatch introduce their first timepieces
• March 1 - Duran Duran's album Rio goes gold
• March 8 - President Ronald Wilson Reagan calls the Soviet Union an "evil empire."
• March 23 - Strategic Defense Initiative: President Ronald Reagan makes his initial proposal to develop technology to intercept enemy missiles. The media dub this plan "Star Wars."
• March 25 - Pop singer Michael Jackson performs his Moonwalk dance maneuver for the first time during his performance of Billie Jean on the Motown 25 TV special, which would air nationally on NBC on May 16.

April

• April 7 - During STS-6, astronauts Story Musgrave and Don Peterson perform the first space shuttle spacewalk (duration: 4 hours, 10 minutes).
• April 15 - American Public Radio founded; changes its name to the current Public Radio International in 1994
• April 18 - The U.S Embassy is bombed in Beirut, killing 63 people.
• April 25 - Maine 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

• May 6 - Stern magazine publishes "Hitler Diaries" (later found to be forgeries).
• May 16 - London police begin the use of wheel clamps on illegally-parked vehicles.
• May 17 - Lebanon, Israel, and the United States sign an agreement on Israeli withdrawal from Lebanon.

June

• Shipbreaking begins on the beach at Alang in Gujarat.
• June 13 - Pioneer 10 becomes the first manmade object to leave the solar system.
• June 18 - Sally Ride becomes first American woman in space on the Space Shuttle Challenger.
• June 27 - The Internet Domain Name System was invented by Paul Mockapetris.
• June 27 - The conception of the MSX Home Computer System.

July

• July 1 - A North Korean Ilyushin Il-62M jet en route to Conakry Airport in Guinea crashed into the Fouta Djall Mountains in Guinea-Bissau, killing all 23 people on board.
• July 7 - Samantha Smith flies to the Soviet Union.
• July 20 - Government of Poland announces end of the martial law and amnesty for political prisoners.
• July 23 - Gimli Glider: Air Canada flight 143 crash-lands in Gimli, Manitoba.

August

• August 4 - Thomas Sankara become President in Upper Volta.
• August 18 - Hurricane Alicia hits the Texas coast, killing 22 and causing over US$1 billion in damage (1983 dollars).
• August 21 - Benigno Aquino, Jr., Philippines opposition leader, assassinated in Manila.

September

• September 1 - Cold War: Korean Air Flight KAL-007 is shot down by a Soviet jet fighter when the commercial aircraft entered Soviet airspace. All 269 on board die.
• September 6 - The Soviet Union admits to shooting down Korean Air Flight KAL-007, stating that the pilots did not know it was a civilian aircraft when it violated Soviet airspace
• September 23 - Mass outbreak in Maze prison - 38 prisoners hijack a lorry and crash out of the gate - one guard dead, 5 injured. 19 of the prisoners are later apprehended.
• September 23 - Barbara Turnbull, a Canadian 18 year old girl, was shot into the neck and became paralyzed for life during a store robbery in Mississauga, Canada.
• September 25 - September 26 - Soviet military officer Stanislav Petrov averts a worldwide nuclear war.

October

• October 2 - Neil Kinnock is elected leader of the British Labour Party.
• October 7 - Plan to abolish Greater London Council announced.
• October 12 - Japan's ex Prime Minister Tanaka Kakuei found guilty of taking a $2 million bribe from Lockheed and sentenced to 4 years in jail.
• October 19 - President of Grenada, Maurice Bishop and 40 others are shot in a military coup
• October 23 - United States Marine Corps barracks in Beirut destroyed by suicide bomber, killing 241.
• October 23 - A suicide truck-bombing at Beirut International airport in Lebanon kills 241 US soldiers
• October 24 - Arthur Hutchinson kills three members of Laitner family and rape their daughter in the Sheffield suburb of Dore.
• October 25 - United States invades Grenada.
• October 27 - Pope John Paul II visits Mehmet Ali Agca in prison to forgive him. Ali Agca is a Turkish gunman, who attempted to kill Pope John Paul II in 1981
• October 30 - The first democratic elections in Argentina after seven years of military rule are held.

November

• November 2 - Martin Luther King Day: At the White House Rose Garden, United States President Ronald Wilson Reagan signs a bill creating a federal holiday on the third Monday of every January to honor American civil rights leader Martin Luther King Jr.
• November 13 - The first US cruise missiles arrive at Greenham Common airbase in England amid protests from peace campaigners.
• November 15 - The Turkish part of Cyprus declares independence.
• November 16 - A jury in Gretna, Louisiana acquits Ginny Foat of the murder of Argentine businessman Moses Chaiyo.
• November 17 - The Zapatista Army of National Liberation founded.
• November 26 - Brinks Mat robbery: In London, 6,800 gold bars worth nearly UK£26 million are taken from the Brinks Mat vault at Heathrow Airport. Only a fraction of the gold was ever recovered, and only two men were convicted of the crime.

December

• December 12 - The Australian Dollar is Floated. Under the old flexible peg system, the Reserve bank bought and sold all Australian dollars and cleared the market at the end of the day. This initiative was taken by the government of Bob Hawke.
• December 17 - A fire at a discotheque in Madrid, Spain, kills 83 people.
• December 17 - IRA car bomb kills six Christmas shoppers outside Harrods in London.
• December 31 - Brunei gains independence from United Kingdom.
• December 31 - Two bombs explode in Marseilles. One on the Paris train kills 3 and injures 19. Other at Marseilles station kills 2 and injures 34.

Unknown dates

• Democratic reform in power in Argentina.
• IBM announces the IBM PC XT
• McDonald's introduces the McNugget
• Roxanne Pulitzer divorces Herbert Pulitzer
• Gerard Debreu wins the Bank of Sweden Prize in Economic Sciences in Memory of Alfred Nobel

• Leopold Kohr, the people of Belau, Amory and Hunter Lovins / Rocky Mountain Institute and Manfred Max-Neef / CEPAUR win the Right Livelihood Award

Year in topic

• 1983 in film
  • Wednesday, May 25, 1983 - Return of the Jedi
  • Wednesday, November 23, 1983 - Terms of Endearment
  • The Big Chill
  • The Right Stuff
• 1983 in literature
• 1983 in music
• 1983 in rail transport
• 1983 in sports
  • Sunday, March 6, 1983 - The United States Football League begins its first year of competition
• 1983 in television
  • Monday, February 28, 1983 - Over 125 million Americans tune in to watch the final episode of M*A*S*H
  • Monday, March 7, 1983 - The Nashville Network (TNN) begins broadcasting.

Births

January-March

• January 11 - Siti Nurhaliza, Malaysian R&B singer
• January 18 - Utada Hikaru, Japanese-American R&B singer
• February 8 - Jim Verraros, American Idol singer
• March 14 - Taylor Hanson, musician

April-June

• April 13 - Schalk Burger, South African rugby player
• April 15 - Ilya Kovalchuk, Russian NHL player
• April 17 - Miguel Cabrera, Major League Baseball All-Star
• April 22 - Sean Muir, American Playwright
• May 2 - Rose Falcon, actress/singer
• May 11 - Matt Leinart, Heisman Trophy-winning football quarterback
• May 27 - Bobby Convey, American soccer player
• June 6 - Joe Rokocoko, New Zealand rugby player

July-September

• July 2 - Michelle Branch, pop singer
• July 11 - Marie Eleonor Sernehlot, oldest of the A-Teens
• July 13 - Liu Xiang, Chinese hurdling athlete
• July 21 - Kellen Winslow Jr., American football player
• July 23 - Aaron Peirsol, competitive swimmer
• August 19 - Tammin Sursok, Australian actress
• August 24 - Christopher Parker, actor
• September 17 - Jennifer Peña, Tejano singer

October-December

• October 29 - Amit Sebastian Paul, member of A-Teens
• November 16 - Fallon Bowman, exguitarist of Kittie
• November 18 - Jon Johansen, programmer
• December 12 - Katrina Elam, Country singer

Deaths

January-March

• January 11 - Shri Ghanshyam Das Birla, Indian industrialist, Gandhian and educationist
• January 15 - Meyer Lansky, mobster
• January 23 - George Cukor, director
• January 28 - Frank Forde, fifteenth Prime Minister of Australia
• February 4 - Karen Carpenter, singer, dies of anorexia nervosa
• February 12 - Eubie Blake, musician, songwriter
• February 14 - Lina Radke, German athlete
• February 22 - Sir Adrien Boult, English conductor (b. 1889)
• February 25 - Tennessee Williams, playwright
• March 3 - Hergé, Belgian comics creator
• March 8 - William Walton, composer
• March 15 - Rebecca West, writer
• March 23 - Barney Clark, first artificial heart recipient
• March 30 - Eilius Eques, photojournalist

April-June

• April 4 - Gloria Swanson, actress
• April 22 - Earl 'Fatha' Hines, musician (b. 1903)
• May 8 - Frank Aiken, Irish Foreign Minister (1959-1969)
• May 19 - Jean Rey, President of the European Commission
• June 2 - Stan Rogers, Canadian musician
• June 12 - Norma Shearer, Academy Award winning actress
• June 18 - Marianne Brandt, industrial designer and Bauhaus participant

July-September

• July 1 - Buckminster Fuller, American architect
• July 4 - John Bodkin Adams, alleged British murderer
• July 7 - Vicki Morgan, fashion model
• July 23 - Georges Auric, French composer
• July 29 - Raymond Massey, actor
• August 16 - Earl Averill, Baseball Hall of Famer (b. 1902)
• August 21 - Benigno Aquino Jr., Philippine opposition leader
• September 25 - Leopold III of Belgium
• September 26 - Tino Rossi, Corsican singer

October-December

• October 6 - Terence Cardinal Cooke, tenth bishop (seventh archbishop) of the Roman Catholic diocese of New York (b. 1921)
• October 8 - Joan Hackett, actress
• October 18 - Willie Jones, Major League Baseball player (b. 1925)
• October 28 - Otto Messmer, creator of Felix the Cat
• November 7 - Germaine Tailleferre, French composer
• December 2 - Fifi D'Orsay, actress
• December 6 - Lucienne Boyer, French singer
• December 21 - Renee Dupree, Professional Wrestler
• December 25 - Joan Miró, surrealist painter

Nobel Prizes

• Physics - Subrahmanyan Chandrasekhar, William Alfred Fowler
• Chemistry - Henry Taube
• Medicine - Barbara McClintock
• Literature -William Golding
• Peace - Lech Walesa