2008 Pop Culture History

Quick Facts from 2008:

• Beer: During a worldwide hop shortage in 2008, The Sam Adams Brewing Company sold craft brewers their hops at cost to keep them in business and even gave cash loans to small breweries, helping the entire micro-brew industry.
• The Top Song was Low by Flo Rida with T-Pain
• Influential Songs include: Foundations by Kate Nash, Fifteen by Taylor Swift, The Prayer by Celine Dion and Josh Groban, Leavin’ by Jesse McCartney, and Forever by Chris Brown
• The Movies to Watch include WALL-E, Tropic Thunder, Iron Man, Slumdog Millionaire, and The Dark Knight
• The Most Famous Person in America was probably Usain Bolt
• People Magazine’s Sexiest Man Alive: Hugh Jackman
• Notable books include: The Hunger Games by Suzanne Collins
• Price of a postage stamp in 2008: 42 cents
  Zune 120 released: $249.95
  Xbox 360 game system: $279.99
• The Funny Guy was: Louis C.K.
  The Funny Late Night Host: Jay Leno
• Olympic Gold Medalist and World Record Holder Usain Bolt ate 100 chicken nuggets a day (1,000 total) and still managed to win three gold medals while competing and staying in Beijing, China.
• Michael Jackson tried to hang out casually at a club and people watch and was surprised when he heard the DJ play remixes of his songs and said “Wow, I didn’t know that they still played my music [in 2008]”.
• The Movie Question: How did they get so many talented actors to join the cast of Mamma Mia?

The Scandals:
John Edwards (D)  admitted having an affair with campaign videographer Rielle Hunter

The 2008 Chinese milk scandal was a food safety incident in the People’s Republic of China, involving milk and infant formula, and other food materials and components, contaminated with melamine. China reported an estimated 300,000 victims.

Democrat New York governor Eliot Spitzer (aka Client #9) had a scandalous, ongoing tryst with escort Ashley Alexandra Dupre.

Pop Culture Facts & History:
A 2008 study of the British authorities’ Convict Transportation Registers from 1788 to 1868 estimated that 22 percent of living Australians had a convict ancestor.

DNA tests were made available to the public.

The Large Hadron Collider went online September 10, 2008.

Cost of a Super Bowl ad in 2008: $2,700,000

East End Show – Jersey Boys (Musical) Opened on March 18, 2008 and closed on March 26, 2017

Broadway Show – In the Heights (Musical) Opened on March 30, 2008 and closed on January 9, 2011

Broadway Show – Billy Elliot the Musical (Musical) Opened on November 13, 2008 and closed on January 8, 2012

2008 Entries to The National Film Registry:
The 7th Voyage of Sinbad (released in 1958)
The Asphalt Jungle (released in 1950)
Deliverance (released in 1972)
Disneyland Dream (released in 1956)
A Face in the Crowd (released in 1957)
Flower Drum Song (released in 1961)
Foolish Wives (released in 1922)
Free Radicals (released in 1979)
George Stevens’ World War II Footage (released in 1943/1946)
Hallelujah! (released in 1929)
In Cold Blood (released in 1967)
The Invisible Man (released in 1933)
Johnny Guitar (released in 1954)
The Killers (released in 1946)
The March (released in 1964)
No Lies (released in 1973)
On the Bowery (released in 1957)
One Week (released in 1920)
The Pawnbroker (released in 1965)
The Perils of Pauline (released in 1914)
Sergeant York (released in 1941)
So’s Your Old Man (released in 1926)
The Terminator (released in 1984)
Water and Power (released in 1989)
White Fawn’s Devotion (released in 1910)

1. The Dark Knight
2. Iron Man
3. Indiana Jones and the Kingdom of the Crystal Skull
4. Hancock
5. WALL-E
6. Kung Fu Panda
7. Twilight
8. Madagascar: Escape 2 Africa
9. Quantum of Solace
10. Dr. Seuss’ Horton Hears a Who!