Goetze served 8 months of a 1-year sentence on the handgun charge; one of his victims, rendered a quadriplegic by the shooting, was awarded US$ 43 million in a civil judgement against Goetze.
2/11/1984, Velma Barfield became the first woman to be executed in the USA since 1962.
26/7/1984, G H Gallup, US survey pioneer, died aged 82.
21/7/1984. The man who popularised jogging, James J Fixx, had a heart attack and died whilst out running in Vermont, aged 52.
1/5/1984, Reagan concluded a visit to China.
25/10/1983. 2,000 US Marines invaded Grenada to restore order after, on 19/10/1983, Grenada’s army had murdered the Prime Minister (Maurice Bishop) and taken power. Britain opposed the US invasion. The US said it had saved Grenada from becoming a Soviet-Cuban colony.
22/10/1983, The announcement by Washington that Pershing II and Cruise Missiles were to be deployed in Europe precipitated large anti-nuclear demonstrations in Britain, Germany and Italy.
4/5/1983, President Reagan affirmed his backing for the Right-wing Contras in their battle against the Sandinistas.
23/3/1983. President Reagan proposed his ‘Star Wars’ missile defence system, calling the Soviet Union an ‘evil empire’.
4/2/1983, US President Reagan condemned the violence associated with a strike of truck drivers.
2/2/1983. The US and USSR began START (Strategic Arms Reduction Talks) in Geneva.
7/12/1982, The first execution by lethal injection was carried out in the USA, in Texas, on Charles Books Jr.
2/11/1982, Democrats made large gains in US mid-term elections. The Republicans retained control of the Senate.
12/6/1982, 800,000 marched for peace in New York City.
7/6/1982, Graceland, the mansion in Memphis, Tennessee where Elvis Presley lived until his death in 1977, was opened to the public.
5/5/1982, Secretary Janet Smith in the computer science department at Vanderbilt University was injured when she opened a package from the Unabomber.
13/1/1982, An Air Florida jet crashed into the frozen Potomac River near the White House, killing 78.
30/11/1981. The US and USSR began arms talks in Geneva.
5/8/1981, President Reagan fired 11,359 striking air traffic controllers who ignored his order for them to return to work.
8/4/1981, Omar Bradley, US senior army officer, died aged 88.
30/3/1981. President Reagan, 70 years old, survived an assassination attempt by John Hinckley. He was wounded, a bullet in the left lung, outside Washington’s Hilton Hotel. The shooter, John Hinckley III, arrested at the spot, had used a .22 calibre shot; had he used a .45 the bullet, which lodged just 3 inches from Reagan’s heart, would have killed him.
22/11/1980, Mae West, American film star in the 1930s, died aged 88.
21/11/1980. The episode of Dallas in which it was revealed who shot JR broke all viewing records.
25/9/1980, Charles Henry Elston, US Representative from Ohio (born 1/1/1891) died.
7/6/1980, American novelist Henry Miller died.
7/5/1980, Paul Geidel, convicted of 2nd degree murder, was released from the Fishkill Correctional Facility (prison) in Beacon, New York, after serving 68 years and 245 days – the longest ever served by a US inmate.
2/2/1980, A 36-hour prison riot began in New Mexico Penitentiary due to overcrowding. 33 inmates died and US$ 25 million damage was done.
25/1/1980, The US ordered the deportation of Beatle Paul McCartney after keeping him in prison for 9 days following the discovery of marijuana in his luggage.
23/1/1980, President Carter initiated the Carter Doctrine – that Middle Eastern oil reserves were of strategic importance to the US and that any attempt by another power to take control in the region would be met by US military action. This Doctrine was adopted by President Reagan, leading to the Gulf War.
19/1/1980, William O Douglas, judge in the US Supreme Court and civil rights defender (born 16/10/1898 in Maine, Minnesota) died.
1/10/1979. The USA handed back control of the Canal Zone to Panama.
18/6/1979. US President Carter and USSR President Brezhnev signed the SALT 2 (Strategic Arms Limitation Treaty) in Vienna.
8/5/1979, Talcott Pars