1992 Trivia, History, and Fun Facts

In 1992, Bill Clinton played saxophone on The Arsenio Hall Show, said he didn’t inhale, and won the presidency anyway. The LA riots erupted after four officers who beat Rodney King on camera were acquitted, killing 63 people and causing over a billion dollars in damage. The 1992 Olympic Dream Team won by an average of 44 points per game and was so dominant that opposing players asked for autographs before games. Whitney Houston sang a Dolly Parton song and it spent fourteen weeks at number one. Japan acquired a new word meaning “to vomit in public.” It was, as years go by, an eventful one.

Quick Facts from 1992

• The New Word: Bushusuru entered the Japanese language after President George H.W. Bush vomited on Japanese Prime Minister Kiichi Miyazawa at a formal state dinner in Tokyo, then fainted. The word means “to do the Bush thing” or simply “to vomit in public.”
• Top Song: I Will Always Love You by Whitney Houston, the best-performing single of the year on the Billboard Year-End Hot 100, spending 14 weeks at number one
• Must-See Movies: A League of Their Own, The Bodyguard, A Few Good Men, Unforgiven, Sister Act, Aladdin, and Wayne’s World
• Most Famous Person in America: Bill Clinton, who went from relative obscurity as the Governor of Arkansas to President-elect in less than a year
• Notable Books: The Bridges of Madison County by Robert James Waller and Dr. Atkins’s New Diet Revolution by Robert Atkins
• Price of a CD: $11.98
• Cost of a Daily Newspaper: 25 cents
• Skippy Peanut Butter, 64 oz: $5.99
• The Funny Late Night Host: Johnny Carson, who retired May 22, 1992, after 30 years hosting The Tonight Show, handing the desk to Jay Leno
• Chinese Zodiac: Year of the Monkey, associated with intelligence, curiosity, and mischief — all of which were well represented in 1992
• The Habit: Reading The Bridges of Madison County and arguing about whether it was actually good
• The Conversation: Did you see the riots? And can you believe Clinton won?

Top Ten Baby Names of 1992

Girls: Ashley, Jessica, Amanda, Brittany, Sarah Boys: Michael, Christopher, Matthew, Joshua, Andrew

Ashley had climbed to the top spot for girls, a name that had been essentially unused for girls before the 1970s and had risen to dominance in under two decades. Michael retained its hold on the top spot for boys. Christopher had been climbing steadily since the 1950s.

Fashion Icons and Sex Symbols of 1992

Elle Macpherson, known in the Australian press as “The Body,” was among the most recognizable models in the world in 1992, having appeared on the cover of the Sports Illustrated Swimsuit Issue five times.

The Heartthrobs of 1992

Antonio Sabàto Jr., Mark “Marky Mark” Wahlberg, Fabio

Mark Wahlberg’s Calvin Klein underwear campaign produced one of the most discussed advertising images of the early 1990s. Fabio, the Italian model whose long blond hair and chiseled physique had made him the face of romance novel covers throughout the late 1980s, was at the peak of his cultural visibility. Antonio Sabàto Jr. was appearing on General Hospital and had recently launched his own Calvin Klein campaign. The early 1990s were a good time to have well-defined abdominal muscles.

The Quotes

“You can’t handle the truth!” — Jack Nicholson as Colonel Jessup in A Few Good Men, a line delivered in a courtroom scene so forceful that it became one of the most referenced in American movie history, particularly in contexts where someone is about to deliver news they have decided the listener cannot handle

“There’s no crying in baseball!” — Tom Hanks as Jimmy Dugan in A League of Their Own, responding to a player’s tears during a game; the line became shorthand for a broader cultural attitude about emotion in professional athletics that the film was actually critiquing

“It’s the economy, stupid.” / “I didn’t inhale.” — Bill Clinton, the first from his campaign’s internal messaging strategy and the second from his explanation of his college marijuana use, both of which became permanent parts of American political vocabulary

“Giant sucking sound.” — Ross Perot, describing what he predicted NAFTA would do to American jobs; Perot won 19 percent of the popular vote as an independent candidate, the best performance by a third-party presidential candidate since Theodore Roosevelt in 1912

“Can we all just get along?” — Rodney King, on May 1, 1992, at the height of the Los Angeles riots that had broken out in response to the acquittal of the officers who had beaten him on camera; the question was rhetorical, immediate, and has not been fully answered

Time Magazine’s Man of the Year

Bill Clinton, for winning the presidency as a political outsider from Arkansas who had survived a series of personal scandals during the campaign — allegations of extramarital affairs, the marijuana admission, questions about his draft record — defeated an incumbent president whose approval ratings had been near 90 percent after the Gulf War and had collapsed as the economy weakened. Clinton’s campaign message, “It’s the economy, stupid,” reduced the election to its essential axis.

Miss America and Miss USA

Miss America: Carolyn Sapp, Honolulu, Hawaii
Miss USA: Shannon Marketic, California

We Lost in 1992

Sam Kinison, the stand-up comedian whose screaming, confrontational style and material about religion, relationships, and substance abuse had made him one of the most distinctive voices in American comedy, died April 10, 1992, at age 38, when the car he was driving was struck head-on by a drunk driver on a Nevada highway. Witnesses reported that after the collision, Kinison appeared to be having a conversation with an unseen presence before dying. His younger brother, who was in the car with him, survived.

America in 1992 — The Context

The presidential election of 1992 was a three-way race between incumbent President George H.W. Bush, Democratic challenger Bill Clinton, and independent Ross Perot. Bush had entered the year with approval ratings above 70 percent following the Gulf War victory. The recession of 1990-91 had steadily eroded that standing. Clinton’s campaign identified the economic anxiety of middle-class voters as the central issue and focused on it with unusual discipline.

Perot, the Texas billionaire, entered the race in February, withdrew in July, citing what he claimed was a Republican dirty-tricks campaign against his family, and re-entered in October, all of which generated the kind of press coverage that money could not buy and that his advertising budget did not need to. He received 19 percent of the popular vote on election day — zero electoral votes, but a share of the popular vote that had not been matched by a third-party candidate in 80 years.

Clinton won with 43 percent of the popular vote and 370 electoral votes. Bush received 37 percent. The election was widely interpreted as a generational shift in American politics.

The Los Angeles Riots

On March 3, 1991, Rodney King had been beaten by officers of the Los Angeles Police Department following a traffic stop, with the beating recorded on video by a bystander and broadcast widely on television. Four officers were charged. On April 29, 1992, a jury in Simi Valley — from which Black jurors had been largely excluded — acquitted all four on all but one count, on which the jury deadlocked. Within hours of the verdict, riots erupted across Los Angeles.

The riots lasted six days. Sixty-three people were killed, more than 2,000 were injured, and approximately 12,000 were arrested. An estimated $1 billion in property damage occurred. The National Guard and federal troops were eventually deployed to restore order. On May 1, Rodney King made a public appearance asking, “Can we all just get along?” The question was asked without apparent irony. The four officers were later retried on federal civil rights charges; two were convicted and two were acquitted.

The Scandals

Woody Allen’s relationship with Soon-Yi Previn — the adopted daughter of his longtime partner Mia Farrow, then 21 years old — became public in January 1992 when Farrow discovered photographs. Allen and Farrow were not married but had been partners for 12 years and had children together. The ensuing public argument included Farrow’s allegations of sexual abuse of their adopted daughter, Dylan, which Allen denied. The relationship and its legal and personal aftermath have continued to generate controversy for decades. Allen and Previn married in 1997.

Amy Fisher, a 17-year-old from Long Island, shot Mary Jo Buttafuoco in the face on May 19, 1992, at the Buttafuoco home in Massapequa. Mary Jo survived. Fisher had been involved with Mary Jo’s husband, Joey Buttafuoco, who claimed he was unaware that Fisher had planned the shooting. Fisher pleaded guilty to aggravated assault and served seven years in prison. Joey Buttafuoco was convicted of statutory rape. The story generated three separate television movies before the year was out, which remains a record of some kind.

Princess Diana and Prince Charles separated formally in December 1992, following months of speculation and the publication of a biography that included damaging accounts of the marriage. Their divorce was finalized in 1996. Charles’s relationship with Camilla Parker Bowles had been publicly known for years; a recorded private phone call between them, obtained and published by the tabloid press in 1993, removed any remaining ambiguity.

Sinéad O’Connor tore up a photograph of Pope John Paul II on Saturday Night Live on October 3, 1992, following her a cappella performance of Bob Marley’s War, and said: “Fight the real enemy.” The gesture, which O’Connor said was a protest against child abuse within the Catholic Church, was met with immediate and sustained public backlash. NBC apologized. The next time she appeared on a major broadcast stage, she was booed for four minutes before singing a Bob Marley song unaccompanied. She did not apologize. The abuse she was protesting was confirmed as systematic and institutional by Church investigations conducted over the following decades.

Pop Culture Facts and History

The Dream Team — the United States men’s basketball team assembled for the 1992 Summer Olympics in Barcelona — is widely considered the greatest collection of athletes ever assembled on a single sports team. The roster included Michael Jordan, Magic Johnson, Larry Bird, Charles Barkley, Karl Malone, John Stockton, Scottie Pippen, Clyde Drexler, Patrick Ewing, Chris Mullin, David Robinson, and Christian Laettner, who was the only college player selected. The team won by an average of 44 points per game and defeated Croatia 117-85 in the gold medal final. Magic Johnson, who had announced he was HIV-positive the previous November, was named co-captain. Opposing players famously asked for photographs and autographs before games. The Croatian team, which included future NBA players Toni Kukoč, Dražen Petrović, and Krešimir Ćosić, was the closest any opponent came to competing — they lost by 32.

Aladdin, Disney’s animated film loosely based on the story from One Thousand and One Nights, was released on November 25, 1992, and became the highest-grossing film of the year. Robin Williams’s improvisational performance as the Genie — much of which was unscripted — set a new standard for voice acting in animation. Alan Menken won two Academy Awards for the score and the song A Whole New World.

A League of Their Own, directed by Penny Marshall and starring Tom Hanks, Geena Davis, Lori Petty, and Madonna, told the story of the All-American Girls Professional Baseball League, which had operated during World War II when male players were serving overseas. The film was a significant commercial success and introduced the history of women’s professional baseball to a generation that had not known it existed.

The Bodyguard, pairing Whitney Houston with Kevin Costner, was released on November 25, 1992, and became one of the highest-grossing films of the year. The soundtrack, featuring Houston’s recording of “I Will Always Love You” — a song written and originally recorded by Dolly Parton in 1973 — became one of the best-selling albums in history. Houston’s version of the song was recorded in a single continuous note that climbed more than an octave without pause, a performance that music critics have been attempting to describe in adequately astonished terms for three decades.

Clint Eastwood’s Unforgiven, released August 7, 1992, won Best Picture at the Academy Awards, joining a small list of Westerns to receive that recognition. Eastwood won Best Director. The film was dedicated to Sergio Leone and Don Siegel, Eastwood’s primary directorial influences.

Wayne’s World, based on the Saturday Night Live sketch, opened February 14, 1992, and grossed $183 million on an $8 million budget, becoming one of the most profitable SNL adaptations ever made. Mike Myers and Dana Carvey’s performances were considered natural extensions of their characters, and the film’s casual fourth-wall breaking — including a fake ending, followed by a better fake ending, followed by the actual ending — demonstrated that comedy could be self-aware without becoming exhausting.

The first SMS text message in history was sent on December 3, 1992, by 22-year-old engineer Neil Papworth from his computer to the mobile phone of Richard Jarvis, a Vodafone executive, at a company Christmas party. The message read “Merry Christmas.” Papworth has since noted that because mobile phones could not yet send texts, only receive them, Jarvis was unable to reply.

MTV’s The Real World premiered on May 21, 1992, with the first season set in New York City. The show placed seven strangers in a house together and filmed their interactions — the first American reality series of its kind and the template for a format that would eventually produce hundreds of imitators. Before The Real World, MTV had primarily shown music videos. After it, the network’s programming began the long drift away from music that has continued to this day.

Sonic the Hedgehog 2 was launched globally on November 24, 1992, in what Sega called “Sonic 2sday” — the first coordinated simultaneous worldwide video game release. Before this, new games arrived at different stores on different dates. The Tuesday release day, now the industry standard for video games, traces directly to this event.

The 27th Amendment to the United States Constitution was ratified on May 7, 1992. The amendment, which prevents Congress from granting itself a pay raise that takes effect during the current session, was proposed by James Madison in 1789 as part of the original Bill of Rights. It had sat unratified for 203 years before a college student named Gregory Watson discovered it for a political science paper, received a C on the assignment, and spent the next decade campaigning for its ratification as a personal crusade.

After the Soviet Union’s breakup, Lithuania could not afford to send its men’s basketball team to the 1992 Barcelona Olympics. The Grateful Dead, informed of the situation, provided the team with tie-dye warm-up uniforms in the colors of the Lithuanian flag. Lithuania won the bronze medal, defeating the Unified Team from the former Soviet Union in the third-place game. Players wore the tie-dye uniforms during warm-ups throughout the tournament.

Nike’s Super Bowl commercial featuring Michael Jordan playing basketball with an animated Bugs Bunny was so well-received that Warner Brothers used it as the basis for a full feature film. Space Jam went into production immediately and was released in 1996.

Disney founded the Anaheim Mighty Ducks hockey franchise in 1992, directly inspired by the film The Mighty Ducks released the same year. It was the first — and, for a long time, only — professional sports team founded by a movie studio. The team was renamed the Anaheim Ducks in 2006, when Disney sold the franchise.

A container of 28,800 plastic bath toys — including yellow ducks, blue turtles, red beavers, and green frogs — fell from a cargo ship in the North Pacific on January 10, 1992. The toys have since washed ashore on beaches across Alaska, Hawaii, Washington State, Japan, Indonesia, Australia, and, after circumnavigating the Arctic, in the United Kingdom. Oceanographers have tracked them as an accidental study in Pacific current patterns for over 30 years.

Hurricane Andrew struck South Florida on August 24, 1992, as a Category 5 hurricane, killing 65 people and causing $27 billion in damage — the costliest natural disaster in American history at that time. The storm destroyed a Burmese python breeding facility near Homestead, releasing an unknown number of snakes into the Everglades ecosystem. The subsequent establishment of Burmese pythons as an invasive species in South Florida is one of the more consequential unintended consequences of a natural disaster in recent ecological history.

Antarctica banned sled dogs in 1992 under the terms of the Protocol on Environmental Protection to the Antarctic Treaty. Dogs had been used for exploration since the earliest expeditions at the turn of the 20th century. The ban was imposed over concerns that the dogs might transmit canine distemper to the seal population.

Nobel Prize Winners in 1992

Physics was awarded to Georges Charpak of France for his invention and development of particle detectors, specifically the multiwire proportional chamber, which enabled tracking of the paths of charged particles with unprecedented precision and has since been used extensively in medical imaging and cancer treatment.

Chemistry was awarded to Rudolph Marcus for his contributions to the theory of electron transfer reactions in chemical systems — mathematical work that explained how electrons move between molecules, with applications in photosynthesis, atmospheric chemistry, and battery chemistry.

Physiology or Medicine was awarded to Edmond Fischer and Edwin Krebs for their discoveries concerning reversible protein phosphorylation as a biological regulatory mechanism — essentially, the molecular on/off switches that control cellular processes and whose malfunction underlies many cancers and other diseases.

Literature went to Derek Walcott of Saint Lucia, for a poetic oeuvre of great luminosity, sustained by a historical vision, the outcome of a multicultural commitment. Walcott’s Omeros, an epic poem retelling Homer through the lens of Caribbean history, was his defining work.

Peace was awarded to Rigoberta Menchú Tum of Guatemala, in recognition of her work for social justice and ethno-cultural reconciliation based on respect for the rights of indigenous peoples. Menchú had been a prominent activist in Guatemala’s civil rights movement during a brutal civil war.

Economics owes much to Gary Becker for extending the domain of microeconomic analysis to a wide range of human behavior and interaction, including systematic analyses of discrimination, crime, and the family as economic institutions.

1992 Toys and Christmas Gifts

Troll Dolls — the round-faced, wild-haired plastic figures that had originally been popular in the 1960s — enjoyed a major revival in 1992. The Super Soaker 100 was the must-have outdoor toy, having launched the Super Soaker category and established a standard for water gun performance that previous products had not approached. The original Super Soaker was invented by Lonnie Johnson, a NASA engineer, while experimenting with a heat pump in his bathroom.

Broadway in 1992

Crazy for You, a new musical built around the Gershwin catalog, opened February 19, 1992, at the Shubert Theatre and ran until January 7, 1996. It won the Tony Award for Best Musical, with Susan Stroman’s choreography particularly cited. The show was a lavish celebration of classic American musical comedy, demonstrating the form’s continued vitality when handled by people who genuinely loved it.

Guys and Dolls, the revival of Frank Loesser’s 1950 musical, opened April 14, 1992, at the Martin Beck Theatre starring Nathan Lane and Faith Prince, and ran until January 8, 1995. It won four Tony Awards, including Best Revival.

Best Film Oscar Winner

The Silence of the Lambs, directed by Jonathan Demme and starring Anthony Hopkins and Jodie Foster, won Best Picture at the 64th Academy Awards on March 30, 1992, for the 1991 film year. It was the third film in history — after It Happened One Night in 1934 and One Flew Over the Cuckoo’s Nest in 1975 — to win all five major Oscar categories: Best Picture, Best Director, Best Actor, Best Actress, and Best Adapted Screenplay. Anthony Hopkins appeared on screen for approximately 16 minutes of a film that ran 118. He won Best Actor.

1992 Entries to the National Film Registry

Adam’s Rib (1949)
Annie Hall (1977)
Bonnie and Clyde (1967)
The Birth of a Nation (1915)
Carmen Jones (1954)
Detour (1945)
Double Indemnity (1944)
The Gold Rush (1925)
Nashville (1975)
The Night of the Hunter (1955)
Paths of Glory (1957)
Psycho (1960)
Salt of the Earth (1954)
What’s Opera, Doc? (1957)

Top Movies of 1992

1. Aladdin
2. Home Alone 2: Lost in New York
3. Batman Returns
4. Lethal Weapon 3
5. A Few Good Men
6. Sister Act
7. The Bodyguard
8. Wayne’s World
9. Basic Instinct
10. A League of Their Own

Aladdin and Home Alone 2 were the year’s commercial leaders; the Home Alone franchise remained the highest-grossing Christmas film series in American box office history. Batman Returns, Tim Burton’s darker and more eccentric sequel, divided audiences who had loved the more crowd-pleasing 1989 original, and was commercially successful despite the division. Basic Instinct, directed by Paul Verhoeven and starring Sharon Stone and Michael Douglas, generated enormous discussion over a single scene involving a police interrogation and the absence of undergarments, which is probably the most effective use of a chair in the history of cinema.

Most Popular TV Shows of 1992

1. 60 Minutes (CBS)
2. Roseanne (ABC)
3. Home Improvement (ABC)
4. Murphy Brown (CBS)
5. Murder, She Wrote (CBS)
6. Coach (ABC)
7. Cheers (NBC)
8. Full House (ABC)
9. Northern Exposure (CBS)
10. Rescue 911 (CBS)

Roseanne was at the peak of its cultural influence, engaging with working-class economic anxiety in ways that few network sitcoms had attempted. Cheers was in its tenth and penultimate season and remained one of the most consistently written comedies on American television. Murphy Brown, whose lead character became a single mother, was cited by Vice President Dan Quayle in a speech about family values and the decline of traditional family structures, generating press coverage that the show’s writers incorporated into the following season with considerable relish. The Tonight Show with Johnny Carson ended its 30-year run on May 22, 1992, with a final episode watched by approximately 50 million people and, characteristically, ended with Carson speaking directly to his audience without a guest or a comedian, simply saying goodbye.

1992 Billboard Number One Hits

December 7, 1991 – January 24, 1992: Black or White — Michael Jackson (carryover from late 1991)
January 25 – January 31: All 4 Love — Color Me Badd
February 1 – February 7: Don’t Let the Sun Go Down on Me — George Michael and Elton John
February 8 – February 28: I’m Too Sexy — Right Said Fred
February 29 – March 20: To Be with You — Mr. Big
March 21 – April 24: Save the Best for Last — Vanessa Williams
April 25 – June 19: Jump — Kris Kross (8 weeks)
June 20 – July 3: I’ll Be There — Mariah Carey
July 4 – August 7: Baby Got Back — Sir Mix-a-Lot
August 8 – August 14: This Used to Be My Playground — Madonna
August 15 – November 13: End of the Road — Boyz II Men (13 weeks)
November 14 – November 28: How Do You Talk to an Angel — The Heights
November 29, 1992 – March 5, 1993: I Will Always Love You — Whitney Houston (carrying into 1993)

End of the Road by Boyz II Men spent 13 consecutive weeks at number one, breaking the record previously held by Elvis Presley and tied by several artists. The record stood until 1995, when Boyz II Men broke it again with One Sweet Day. Kris Kross — two 13-year-olds from Atlanta named Chris Smith and Chris Kelly, who wore their clothes backward — spent eight weeks at number one with Jump. Baby Got Back by Sir Mix-A-Lot spent five weeks at number one and was censored by several television networks, which did not prevent it from becoming one of the most recognized recordings of the decade. Whitney Houston’s I Will Always Love You arrived in November and ran well into 1993, becoming the best-selling single of the year.

Sports Champions of 1992

World Series: The Toronto Blue Jays defeated the Atlanta Braves four games to two, becoming the first non-American team to win the World Series. The series was decided in six games, with Toronto winning Games 5 and 6 after trailing in both. Dave Winfield, 40 years old and in the final stage of his career, delivered a two-run double in the 11th inning of Game 6 to secure the championship.

Super Bowl XXVI: The Washington Football Team — then still called the Redskins, a name the franchise retired in 2020 — defeated the Buffalo Bills 37-24 on January 26, 1992, in Minneapolis. It was Buffalo’s second consecutive Super Bowl loss and the beginning of what would become four consecutive Super Bowl defeats, a record no team has matched. Mark Rypien was named MVP.

NBA Champions: The Chicago Bulls defeated the Portland Trail Blazers four games to two, winning their second consecutive championship. Michael Jordan was named Finals MVP for the second consecutive year, averaging 35.8 points per game in the series. Jordan’s performance in Game 1, in which he scored 35 points in the first half and shrugged at the television camera after hitting his sixth consecutive three-pointer, has become one of the most referenced moments in Finals history.

Stanley Cup: The Pittsburgh Penguins defeated the Chicago Blackhawks four games to none, their second consecutive championship. Mario Lemieux missed the first half of the playoffs due to injury and returned to lead the team to the title. Ron Francis and Jaromir Jagr were the supporting cast for one of the most talented rosters in the league’s history.

U.S. Open Golf: Tom Kite won his first and only major at Pebble Beach Golf Links in Pacific Grove, California, at age 42. Kite had been one of the most consistent players on the PGA Tour for nearly two decades without winning a major. He finished at three under par in difficult, windy conditions that caused most of the field to collapse.

U.S. Open Tennis: Stefan Edberg of Sweden won the men’s title, and Monica Seles won the women’s title, her third consecutive U.S. Open. Seles had dominated women’s tennis since the age of 16 and was the clear world number one. In April 1993, she would be stabbed on court by a deranged fan of Steffi Graf; she returned to competition in 1995 but never fully reclaimed her dominance.

Wimbledon: Andre Agassi won his first Grand Slam title, and Steffi Graf won the women’s. Agassi, who had previously declined to play at Wimbledon due to the all-white clothing requirement, entered as a wild card and defeated Goran Ivanisevic in five sets. He had previously been considered a baseline clay-court specialist; his Wimbledon victory demonstrated that he was something considerably more complete.

NCAA Football: Alabama defeated Miami 34-13 in the Sugar Bowl, winning the national championship for the 1992 season. It was Alabama’s first national title since 1979 and the beginning of a dynasty under coach Gene Stallings that would define the SEC for the following decade.

NCAA Basketball: Duke defeated Michigan 71-51 in the national championship game in Minneapolis, repeating as champion. Christian Laettner, who had hit the most famous shot in college basketball history — a buzzer-beating turnaround jumper against Kentucky in the regional final — was named Most Outstanding Player. The Michigan “Fab Five” — five freshman starters, including Jalen Rose and Chris Webber — reached the final in their first college season, the only team to do so with five freshmen starters.

Kentucky Derby: Lil E. Tee, a 16-1 longshot trained by Lynn Whiting, won the Kentucky Derby in a mild upset. Favorite Arazi, a French horse that had dazzled observers with a brilliant performance in the previous year’s Breeders’ Cup Juvenile, faded badly and finished eighth, one of the most disappointing favorites’ performances in recent Derby history.

Frequently Asked Questions About 1992

Q: What caused the Los Angeles riots? A: On April 29, 1992, four LAPD officers were acquitted of all but one charge in the beating of Rodney King, despite the incident having been captured on videotape that had been broadcast nationally. The acquittal sparked immediate riots that lasted six days, killed 63 people, injured more than 2,000, and caused approximately $1 billion in property damage. The National Guard and federal troops were deployed to restore order.

Q: Why is Whitney Houston’s I Will Always Love You so significant?
A: I Will Always Love You was written and originally recorded by Dolly Parton in 1973. Houston’s version, recorded for The Bodyguard soundtrack in 1992, transformed it into a showcase for her extraordinary vocal range, particularly a sustained note that climaxes the second chorus and spans more than an octave. It spent 14 weeks at number one, won the Grammy for Record of the Year, and became one of the best-selling singles in history.

Q: What was the Dream Team?
A: The 1992 U.S. Olympic men’s basketball team, which competed at the Barcelona Games, was the first American Olympic team to include active NBA players. The roster included Michael Jordan, Magic Johnson, Larry Bird, Charles Barkley, Karl Malone, John Stockton, Scottie Pippen, Clyde Drexler, Patrick Ewing, Chris Mullin, David Robinson, and Christian Laettner. The team averaged 44 points per game and won the gold medal. Opposing players requested photographs and autographs before games.

Q: What was the 27th Amendment, and why did it take so long?
A: The 27th Amendment prevents Congress from giving itself a pay raise effective during the current congressional session. It was proposed by James Madison in 1789 but never ratified. It sat dormant until 1982, when a University of Texas student named Gregory Watson received a C on a paper arguing for its ratification, decided the professor was wrong, and spent the next decade organizing a campaign that ultimately succeeded in getting enough states to ratify it by 1992, 203 years after it was proposed.

Q: When did Johnny Carson retire?
A: Johnny Carson hosted The Tonight Show for the last time on May 22, 1992, ending a 30-year run that had made him the dominant figure in American late-night television. His final episode was watched by approximately 50 million people. He gave no interviews after retiring, made no public appearances, and lived quietly in Malibu until his death in 2005. Jay Leno succeeded him.

Q: What happened with Sinéad O’Connor on Saturday Night Live?
A: On October 3, 1992, O’Connor tore up a photograph of Pope John Paul II at the end of her performance on SNL, saying, “Fight the real enemy.” The gesture was a protest against child sexual abuse within the Catholic Church. The public reaction was immediately and overwhelmingly negative. She was booed at the next major event she attended. The institutional abuse she was protesting was later documented extensively by Church investigations and government inquiries.

In a year that gave the world a new Japanese word for vomiting in public, saw the greatest basketball team ever assembled win by 44 points a game, and ended with Whitney Houston holding a note that seemed to defy what the human voice could do, 1992 made its arguments loudly and left its marks deeply. The riots, the election, the scandals, the sports — all of it happened in twelve months. The Bridges of Madison County spent all year on the bestseller list. People argued about whether it was good. Some things never change.

More 1992 Facts and History Resources:

Most Popular Baby Names (BabyCenter.com)
Popular and Notable Books (popculture.us)
Broadway Shows that Opened in 1992X
1992 Calendar, courtesy of Time and Date.com
1992 Facts For Kids
Fact Monster
Hurricane Andrew
1990s, Infoplease.com World History
Millennial Generation (1981-1996)
1992 in Movies (according to IMDB)
1992 Top Movies (according to BoxOfficeMojo)
The People’s History
1992 Presidential Election
Retrowaste Vintage Culture
80s and 90s Classic NES Games (1985-1994)
Wikipedia 1992
Breakup of Yugoslavia 1990-1992