1982 Trivia, History, and Fun Facts

In 1982, Michael Jackson released Thriller and changed the music industry’s understanding of what an album could sell. E.T. arrived in theaters and became the highest-grossing film in history. The Commodore 64 made home computing affordable for the first time. Cats opened on Broadway and ran for 18 years. The Tylenol murders changed how every food and medicine product in America was packaged. Johnny Carson was still on The Tonight Show, David Letterman had just started his late-night run, and Valley Girls were declaring things totally gnarly from the San Fernando Valley. It was, fer shur, a year.

Quick Facts from 1982

• World-Changing Event: The Commodore 64 home computer launched in August 1982 at $595, bringing personal computing within reach of ordinary households for the first time at scale; Michael Jackson’s Thriller was released on November 30, eventually becoming the best-selling album in recorded history
• Top Song: Physical by Olivia Newton-John was the best-performing single of the year on the Billboard Year-End Hot 100, spending 10 weeks at number one; I Love Rock ‘n Roll by Joan Jett and the Blackhearts spent 7 weeks at number one and defined the year’s rock moment
• Must-See Movies: E.T. the Extra-Terrestrial, Tootsie, An Officer and a Gentleman, Rocky III, Fast Times at Ridgemont High, Poltergeist, Sophie’s Choice, and 48 Hrs.
• Most Famous Person in America: Diana, Princess of Wales, who had married Prince Charles in July 1981 and whose pregnancy, fashion choices, and public appearances generated continuous worldwide attention throughout 1982
• Notable Books: The Death of Captain Marvel by Jim Starlin, Space by James A. Michener, The Indian in the Cupboard by Lynne Reid Banks, and The Color Purple by Alice Walker
• Price of a Schwinn Bicycle: $202.00
• Price of a Sony Walkman: $129.00
• The Comeback Funny Guys: Richard Pryor and Bill Cosby
• The Funny Late Night Host: Johnny Carson
• The Funny Later Late Night Host: David Letterman, who launched Late Night with David Letterman on NBC on February 1, 1982
• Chinese Zodiac: Year of the Dog, associated with loyalty, honesty, and a tendency to worry — qualities that were distributed unevenly across 1982
• The Habits: Listening to Thriller, playing Ms. Pac-Man and Q*bert, break dancing, watching E.T., exercising with Jane Fonda’s workout videotape, wearing Deely Bobbers
• The Conversation: Have you seen E.T. yet? And did you hear that new Michael Jackson record?

Top Ten Baby Names of 1982

Girls: Jennifer, Jessica, Amanda, Sarah, Melissa Boys: Michael, Christopher, Matthew, Jason, David

Jennifer had held the top spot for girls through most of the 1970s and into the early 1980s, a run that made it one of the defining names of a generation. Michael retained its hold on boys. Jason had climbed into the top five, reflecting the name’s popularity in the post-Friday the 13th era, though it seems unlikely that parents were consciously naming their sons after a fictional masked killer.

The Sex Symbols, Hotties, and Fashion Icons of 1982

Loni Anderson, Carol Alt, Barbara Bach, Catherine Bach, Kim Basinger, Phoebe Cates, Joan Collins, Lydia Cornell, Sybil Danning, Linda Evans, Morgan Fairchild, Farrah Fawcett, Jane Fonda, Daryl Hannah, Debbie Harry, Marilu Henner, Goldie Hawn, Lauren Hutton, Grace Jones, Nastassja Kinski, Jessica Lange, Heather Locklear, Olivia Newton-John, Stevie Nicks, Dolly Parton, Victoria Principal, Tanya Roberts, Brooke Shields, Suzanne Somers, Heather Thomas, Sean Young

The breadth of this list reflects the particular moment in American popular culture when prime-time soap operas, music videos, and mainstream cinema all competed for the same attention. Joan Collins was Dynasty. Farrah Fawcett was still Farrah Fawcett. Jane Fonda was simultaneously a political figure, an Oscar-winning actress, and the reason millions of Americans bought VHS players.

Hollywood Hunks and Leading Men of 1982

Michael Jackson, Richard Gere, Harrison Ford, Mel Gibson, Christopher Reeve, Burt Reynolds

Richard Gere had An Officer and a Gentleman. Harrison Ford had just finished Raiders of the Lost Ark the year before and was about to begin Return of the Jedi. Michael Jackson was in a category that resisted easy classification: the most famous musician in the world at the moment his most famous album arrived.

The Quotes

“E.T. phone home.” — E.T. in E.T. the Extra-Terrestrial, a line delivered in a voice created by combining recordings of a respiratory patient and an elderly woman, which Steven Spielberg felt captured something essential about yearning and distance that a conventional alien voice could not

“They’re here.” — Heather O’Rourke as Carol Anne Freeling in Poltergeist, delivered in a tone of calm curiosity that made it considerably more unsettling than a scream would have

“When it absolutely, positively has to be there overnight.” — FedEx, in a slogan that conveyed both a promise and an implicit acknowledgment that the alternative was unacceptable

“RAID kills bugs dead.” — a grammatical anomaly that worked better than correct English would have

Time Magazine’s Machine of the Year

The Computer — specifically the personal computer, which Time designated in place of the traditional Person of the Year for the first and only time in the magazine’s history. The selection acknowledged that the personal computer had moved from a hobbyist’s tool to a household and business presence with extraordinary speed, and that its implications for work, communication, and culture were already apparent. The Commodore 64, launched at $595 in August 1982, and the IBM PC, launched in August 1981, had made the category accessible. Time’s editors suggested, with considerable understatement, that computers might change how people live and work.

Miss America and Miss USA

Miss America: Elizabeth Ward, Russellville, Arkansas
Miss USA: Terri Utley, Arkansas — making 1982 the only year in which both Miss America and Miss USA came from the same state

We Lost in 1982

John Belushi, the comedian whose eruptions of physical energy and anarchic commitment had made him one of the defining cast members of the original Saturday Night Live and whose film career had included Animal House and The Blues Brothers, died March 5, 1982, at age 33, of an accidental cocaine and heroin overdose at the Chateau Marmont hotel in Los Angeles. His death generated an outpouring of grief from the entertainment community and a national conversation about drug use in Hollywood. He had been working on a new film project at the time of his death.

Randy Rhoads, the guitarist for Ozzy Osbourne whose technical brilliance and classical training had distinguished him as one of the most gifted rock musicians of his generation, died March 19, 1982, at age 25, in a plane crash near Leesburg, Florida. He had been on tour with Osbourne’s band. The small plane he was riding in struck the tour bus three times before crashing. Osbourne later described Rhoads as the best musician he ever worked with.

Henry Fonda, the actor whose career had spanned five decades and included The Grapes of Wrath, 12 Angry Men, Once Upon a Time in the West, and On Golden Pond, died August 12, 1982, at age 77, of heart disease. He had won the Academy Award for Best Actor for On Golden Pond in March 1982, just months before his death. His daughter Jane accepted the award on his behalf; he was too ill to attend.

Grace Kelly, the actress who had won the Academy Award for Best Actress for The Country Girl in 1954, starred in three Hitchcock films, and subsequently became Princess of Monaco upon her marriage to Prince Rainier III in 1956, died September 14, 1982, at age 52, of injuries sustained in a car crash on a mountain road near Monaco the previous day. She had suffered a stroke while driving. Her daughter, Princess Stéphanie, was in the car and survived.

America in 1982 — The Context

The United States was in a severe recession in 1982, the worst since the Great Depression by several measures. Unemployment peaked at 10.8 percent in November — the highest rate since 1940. The recession was partly a consequence of the Federal Reserve’s aggressive interest rate increases under Chairman Paul Volcker, intended to break the inflationary spiral of the late 1970s. The medicine worked, eventually, but the patient had a difficult 1982.

The Reagan administration’s economic program — tax cuts combined with increased defense spending — was generating its first significant political opposition as the deficit widened. Democrats gained 26 seats in the House in the November midterm elections. Reagan remained personally popular; his policies remained contested.

The Falklands War between Britain and Argentina was fought from April to June 1982, ending in a British military victory after Argentina’s military government invaded and occupied the Falkland Islands in April. Prime Minister Margaret Thatcher’s decision to respond militarily was considered a significant gamble and produced a decisive victory that transformed her political position at home. The Argentine military government fell the following year.

The Lebanon War began in June 1982 when Israel invaded Lebanon in response to PLO attacks, eventually reaching Beirut. The Sabra and Shatila massacre of Palestinian refugees in September, carried out by Lebanese Christian militias while Israeli forces controlled the perimeter, resulted in the deaths of hundreds to thousands of civilians and generated international condemnation. An Israeli government commission found that Defense Minister Ariel Sharon bore personal responsibility for the events.

The Tylenol Murders

In late September and early October 1982, seven people in the Chicago area died after taking Extra-Strength Tylenol capsules that had been laced with potassium cyanide. The perpetrator had purchased bottles, contaminated the capsules, and returned them to store shelves. Johnson and Johnson recalled approximately 31 million bottles and reformulated the product in tamper-evident packaging. The event led directly to the Federal Anti-Tampering Act of 1983 and to the tamper-evident seals and packaging that are now standard on all food and over-the-counter medicine products. The case has never been solved. No one has ever been charged.

Pop Culture Facts and History

E.T. the Extra-Terrestrial, directed by Steven Spielberg and released June 11, 1982, became the highest-grossing film in history at that time, earning $435 million in the United States and $793 million worldwide. It held the domestic record until Jurassic Park surpassed it in 1993. The film’s central relationship between Elliott and the stranded alien was written by Melissa Mathison, based on Spielberg’s own feelings of loneliness after his parents’ divorce. The sound of E.T.’s voice was created by sound designer Ben Burtt by combining recordings of a respiratory patient, Pat Welsh, with recordings of other individuals. Spielberg deliberately avoided merchandising the film until after its initial theatrical run, on the theory that premature commercial saturation would diminish the emotional experience.

Michael Jackson’s Thriller, produced by Quincy Jones and released on November 30, 1982, is the best-selling album in recorded history, with verified worldwide sales of approximately 66-70 million copies. It produced seven Billboard Hot 100 top-ten singles from a single album, a record that has never been broken. The accompanying short film for the title track, directed by John Landis and running 14 minutes, was the most expensive music video ever made at the time and is considered the most influential music video in the history of the format. Jackson had sought out Vincent Price to deliver the spoken-word passage because he felt the genre was not complete without Price’s voice.

The Commodore 64, released in August 1982 at a retail price of $595, eventually became the best-selling single computer model in history, with estimates ranging from 12 to 17 million units sold. Its combination of color graphics, sound capabilities, and relatively accessible price point made it the dominant home computer of the 1980s. The name referred to its 64 kilobytes of RAM, a figure that seemed enormous in 1982.

Cats, Andrew Lloyd Webber’s musical based on T.S. Eliot’s Old Possum’s Book of Practical Cats, opened on Broadway at the Winter Garden Theatre on October 7, 1982, and ran for 7,485 performances, closing September 10, 2000 — 18 years, making it the longest-running show in Broadway history until The Phantom of the Opera surpassed it. The show’s staging — an enormous junkyard set, cats performing acrobatically in leg warmers, the sung recitative “Memory” — was unlike anything Broadway had previously produced. Audiences either found it enchanting or baffling, with very little middle ground.

Fast Times at Ridgemont High, directed by Amy Heckerling and based on Cameron Crowe’s journalism about a year he had spent undercover as a student at a San Diego high school, launched the careers of Sean Penn, Jennifer Jason Leigh, Phoebe Cates, Nicolas Cage, and Forest Whitaker simultaneously. Penn’s performance as Jeff Spicoli established the archetypal slacker character template that influenced American comedy for the following decade. The film’s frank treatment of teenage sex and drug use generated an R rating and significant controversy and has since been recognized as one of the most culturally accurate depictions of American high school life in cinema.

Valley Girls — young women from the San Fernando Valley whose distinctive speech patterns and consumer culture had become a national phenomenon — peaked as a pop culture subject in 1982. Frank Zappa and his daughter, Moon Unit, released the song Valley Girl, in which Moon Unit performed an extended monologue in Valley Girl speak over a rock track, and it became a top-40 hit. Films including Valley Girl (1983) and Fast Times at Ridgemont High documented the vocabulary and lifestyle. Terms such as “like,” “whatever,” “oh my god,” “totally,” and “grody” entered mainstream American usage and have remained there.

Newman’s Own, the food company founded by Paul Newman and A.E. Hotchner in 1982, donated all after-tax profits to charity from its first year of operation. Newman reportedly started the venture as a joke — bottling salad dressing for Christmas gifts — and was surprised when it became commercially viable. The company has since donated over $570 million to thousands of charities. Newman insisted that the entire enterprise be treated with deliberate unpretentiousness, including using his own face on every label, with the motto “shameless exploitation in pursuit of the common good.”

Adobe Systems was founded in December 1982 by Charles Geschke and John Warnock after they left Xerox PARC, where they had been developing the PostScript language. Adobe’s software — PostScript, Photoshop, Illustrator, Acrobat, and others — eventually became foundational tools for graphic design, publishing, and digital document management worldwide. The company was named after Adobe Creek, which ran behind Warnock’s home in Los Altos, California.

Electronic Arts was founded in May 1982 by Trip Hawkins, having left Apple Computer to start the company. The original vision was to treat game developers as artists deserving of recognition and royalties, similar to musicians. Early EA game packaging featured photographs of the development team on the back cover, like album liner notes. The company grew into one of the world’s largest video game publishers, though its relationship with the “artists” concept has been the subject of industry discussion for decades.

The Dolby Surround Sound system was introduced for home use in 1982, bringing the theater audio experience to home video for the first time. The technology encoded four audio channels into two-channel stereo, which could be decoded by a Dolby Surround receiver to produce front, center, and rear audio. It became a standard feature of home theater systems and a marketing point for VHS releases throughout the decade.

Israel Kamakawiwoʻole, the Hawaiian musician whose distinctive falsetto voice and ukulele playing would later become internationally recognized, called a recording studio in Honolulu late at night sometime in the early-to-mid 1980s — the precise date is variously reported — asking if he could come record an idea. The owner agreed. Twenty minutes after arriving, Kamakawiwoʻole recorded his medley of Somewhere Over the Rainbow and What a Wonderful World in a single take. The recording circulated quietly for years before reaching global audiences through its use in film and television in the 1990s.

Michael Jackson took the vocal hook “Mama-se, mama-sa, ma-ma-ko-ssa” from Cameroonian musician Manu Dibango’s 1972 afrobeat recording Soul Makossa and used it in Wanna Be Startin’ Somethin’. Dibango sued, and the case was settled out of court. Rihanna subsequently used the same sample in Don’t Stop the Music in 2007, prompting Dibango to sue again. The hook has now appeared in three of the most commercially successful recordings of the past fifty years.

Nobel Prize Winners in 1982

Physics was awarded to Kenneth Wilson for his theory of critical phenomena in connection with phase transitions — mathematical work that explained what happens at the precise moment when a substance changes state, such as when water becomes steam, with applications across physics, chemistry, and materials science.

Chemistry went to Aaron Klug for his development of crystallographic electron microscopy and his structural elucidation of biologically important nucleic acid-protein complexes. Klug’s techniques allowed scientists to determine the three-dimensional structure of molecules that could not be examined by conventional X-ray crystallography.

Physiology or Medicine was awarded to Sune Bergström, Bengt Samuelsson, and John Vane for their discoveries concerning prostaglandins and related biologically active substances — work that explained how the body produces inflammation and pain signals and led directly to understanding how aspirin works.

Literature went to Gabriel García Márquez of Colombia, the author of One Hundred Years of Solitude, for his novels and short stories, in which the fantastic and the realistic are combined in a richly composed world of imagination, reflecting a continent’s life and conflicts. García Márquez, a longtime friend of Fidel Castro, used the occasion of his Nobel lecture to deliver a meditation on Latin American history and the persistence of magical realism as a literary mode.

Peace was awarded to Alva Myrdal of Sweden and Alfonso García Robles of Mexico for their efforts in nuclear disarmament negotiations. Myrdal, who had served as Sweden’s minister for disarmament, had published The Game of Disarmament in 1976, a scathing critique of the superpowers’ bad faith in arms control negotiations.

Economics went to George Stigler for his seminal studies of industrial structures, functioning of markets, and causes and effects of public regulation — work that included the theory of regulatory capture, which describes how regulatory agencies tend to be influenced or controlled by the industries they are supposed to regulate.

1982 Toys and Christmas Gifts

Strawberry Shortcake, Smurfs, My Little Pony, BMX bikes, Trivial Pursuit, and Sequence all made their Christmas debut or significant commercial push in 1982. Trivial Pursuit, created by Canadian journalists Chris Haney and Scott Abbott in 1979, slowly built distribution and became one of the best-selling games in history over the following two years. My Little Pony launched as a toy line from Hasbro and grew into one of the most commercially durable franchises in toy history.

Broadway in 1982

Cats opened on October 7, 1982, and ran for 18 years.

Torch Song Trilogy, Harvey Fierstein’s play about a gay drag performer and his relationships, opened June 10, 1982, at the Little Theatre and ran until May 19, 1985. It won the Tony Award for Best Play and Best Actor. The play addressed gay identity, family acceptance, and AIDS with a directness and emotional honesty that was unusual on Broadway at the time.

Best Film Oscar Winner

Chariots of Fire, the British film about two runners competing in the 1924 Olympics, won Best Picture at the 54th Academy Awards on March 29, 1982, for the 1981 film year. Vangelis won Best Original Score for the synthesizer-driven theme that became one of the most recognizable pieces of music associated with slow-motion athletic achievement. The film’s victory over Raiders of the Lost Ark was considered a significant surprise by those who felt that a British period drama about running was a less deserving choice than a globally successful adventure film. The Academy has not been without controversy since.

Top Movies of 1982

1. E.T. the Extra-Terrestrial
2. Tootsie
3. An Officer and a Gentleman
4. Rocky III
5. Porky’s
6. Star Trek II: The Wrath of Khan
7. 48 Hrs.
8. Poltergeist
9. The Best Little Whorehouse in Texas
10. Annie

E.T. was so far ahead of everything else at the box office that the year’s second-highest-grossing film earned roughly a third of its total. Tootsie, in which Dustin Hoffman plays an actor who disguises himself as a woman to get a soap-opera role, was a genuine comedy with insightful observations about gender politics that most comedies would not attempt for another decade. Star Trek II: The Wrath of Khan remains the high point of the film franchise for most of its devotees, largely because of Ricardo Montalbán’s performance and the handling of Spock’s death. Poltergeist, produced by Steven Spielberg and directed by Tobe Hooper, offered a vision of suburban horror that inverted E.T.‘s suburban wonder with unusual effectiveness; it was released the same summer.

Most Popular TV Shows of 1982

1. 60 Minutes (CBS)
2. Dallas (CBS)
3. M*A*S*H (CBS)
4. Magnum, P.I. (CBS)
5. Dynasty (ABC)
6. Three’s Company (ABC)
7. Simon and Simon (CBS)
8. Falcon Crest (CBS)
9. The Love Boat (ABC)
10. The A-Team (NBC)

M*A*S*H was in its tenth and final season — its February 28, 1983, finale drew 106 million viewers, a record for a single television broadcast that stood for 27 years. Dallas and Dynasty represented the peak of the prime-time soap opera format, with their combination of oil money, infidelity, and shoulder pads generating more cultural discussion per episode than almost any other programming. The A-Team premiered on January 23, 1983, having been announced in 1982, and was the beginning of NBC’s return to competitive prime-time programming after years of low ratings.

1982 Billboard Number One Hits

November 21, 1981 – January 29, 1982: Physical — Olivia Newton-John (carryover from late 1981, 10 weeks total)
January 30 – February 5: I Can’t Go for That (No Can Do) — Daryl Hall and John Oates
February 6 – March 19: Centerfold — J. Geils Band (6 weeks)
March 20 – May 7: I Love Rock ‘n Roll — Joan Jett and the Blackhearts (7 weeks)
May 8 – May 14: Chariots of Fire — Vangelis
May 15 – July 2: Ebony and Ivory — Paul McCartney and Stevie Wonder (7 weeks)
July 3 – July 23: Don’t You Want Me — The Human League (3 weeks)
July 24 – September 3: Eye of the Tiger — Survivor (6 weeks)
September 4 – September 17: Abracadabra — The Steve Miller Band
September 18 – October 1: Hard to Say I’m Sorry — Chicago
October 2 – October 29: Jack and Diane — John Mellencamp (4 weeks)
October 30 – November 5: Who Can It Be Now? — Men at Work November
6 – November 26: Up Where We Belong — Joe Cocker and Jennifer Warnes
November 27 – December 10: Truly — Lionel Richie
December 11 – December 17: Mickey — Toni Basil
December 18, 1982 – January 14, 1983: Maneater — Hall and Oates (carrying into 1983)

Physical by Olivia Newton-John was the best-performing single on the Billboard Year-End chart, spending 10 weeks at number one across the turn of the year. I Love Rock ‘n Roll and Ebony and Ivory each spent seven weeks at the top. Eye of the Tiger, written for Rocky III after Survivor was asked to provide something more contemporary than Another One Bites the Dust, which the producers had originally wanted, spent six weeks at number one and has appeared in approximately one training montage every eighteen months since. Centerfold by the J. Geils Band, featuring a rotating riff over a minor-key descending bass line, spent six weeks at number one and introduced many listeners to the concept of a centerfold in a context they had not previously considered.

Sports Champions of 1982

World Series: The St. Louis Cardinals defeated the Milwaukee Brewers four games to three. Joaquin Andujar won two games as a starter. Darrell Porter was named Series MVP. It was the Cardinals’ first World Series championship since 1967.

Super Bowl XVI: The San Francisco 49ers defeated the Cincinnati Bengals 26-21 on January 24, 1982, in Pontiac, Michigan. Joe Montana was named MVP. The game featured what became known as “The Drive” — a 92-yard touchdown drive in the second half that gave San Francisco its lead. It was the first of what would become five Super Bowl victories for the 49ers over the following decade.

NBA Champions: The Los Angeles Lakers defeated the Philadelphia 76ers four games to two. Magic Johnson was named Finals MVP. It was the second championship for the Showtime Lakers under coach Pat Riley.

Stanley Cup: The New York Islanders defeated the Vancouver Canucks four games to none, winning their third consecutive championship. Mike Bossy, Bryan Trottier, and Denis Potvin anchored a dynasty that would win four consecutive Cups from 1980 to 1983.

U.S. Open Golf: Tom Watson won at Pebble Beach Golf Links, defeating Jack Nicklaus with a chip-in birdie on the 17th hole on the final day, which remains one of the most celebrated shots in major championship history. Watson was at the peak of his career and went on to win The Open Championship later that summer.

U.S. Open Tennis: Jimmy Connors won the men’s title and Chris Evert won the women’s. Connors, at age 30, defeated Ivan Lendl in a five-set final that became one of the more celebrated of his career. Evert’s victory was her sixth U.S. Open title.

Wimbledon: Jimmy Connors won the men’s title and Martina Navratilova won the women’s. Connors defeated John McEnroe in a five-set final that many consider one of the greatest Wimbledon men’s finals ever played. Navratilova was beginning her period of Wimbledon dominance that would eventually produce nine titles.

NCAA Football: Penn State won the national championship for the 1982 season, defeating Georgia 27-23 in the Sugar Bowl. Todd Blackledge quarterbacked the Nittany Lions. It was Joe Paterno’s second national title.

NCAA Basketball: North Carolina defeated Georgetown 63-62 in the national championship game in New Orleans. A freshman named Michael Jordan hit the winning jump shot with 15 seconds remaining. Georgetown’s Fred Brown infamously passed to North Carolina’s James Worthy in the final seconds, apparently mistaking him for a teammate. Both of those things happened in the same game.

Kentucky Derby: Gato Del Sol won at odds of 21-1, one of the bigger longshot victories in recent Derby history, trained by Edwin Gregson and ridden by Eddie Delahoussaye.

Frequently Asked Questions About 1982

Q: Why is food packaged so securely today?
A: The 1982 Tylenol murders in the Chicago area, in which seven people died after taking cyanide-laced capsules that had been tampered with and returned to store shelves, prompted Johnson and Johnson to recall 31 million bottles and the federal government to pass the Anti-Tampering Act of 1983. Tamper-evident packaging became mandatory for over-the-counter medicines and food products. The murders have never been solved.

Q: How many copies did Thriller sell?
A: Verified worldwide sales of Michael Jackson’s Thriller are generally cited at approximately 66-70 million copies, making it the best-selling album in recorded history. Some estimates have placed the total higher, but 66-70 million is the figure most commonly cited by the Recording Industry Association of America and equivalent bodies worldwide.

Q: What was the Commodore 64?
A: The Commodore 64, released in August 1982 at $595, was a home computer with 64 kilobytes of RAM, color graphics, and three-channel sound. It became the best-selling single computer model in history, with estimated sales of 12-17 million units. Its relatively accessible price and strong software library made it the dominant home computer through the mid-1980s.

Q: Why did Chariots of Fire win Best Picture over E.T.?
A: E.T. was not eligible for the ceremony held in March 1982, which honored 1981 films. Chariots of Fire defeated Raiders of the Lost Ark, On Golden Pond, Reds, and Atlantic City. E.T. competed at the following year’s ceremony, where it lost to Gandhi. Both losses are regularly revisited by those who follow Academy Awards history.

Q: What was Valley Girl speak?
A: A dialect associated with young women from the San Fernando Valley in Southern California, characterized by heavy use of “like” as an interjection, “totally” and “fer shur” as agreements, “grody” for gross, “bitchin'” for excellent, and “whatever” as a dismissal. The dialect was popularized nationally by Frank and Moon Unit Zappa’s 1982 song Valley Girl and by films including Fast Times at Ridgemont High. Most of its vocabulary has been absorbed into general American informal speech.

Q: What shot did Michael Jordan hit in the 1982 NCAA Championship?
A: With North Carolina trailing Georgetown 62-61 and approximately 15 seconds remaining, freshman Michael Jordan hit a jump shot from the left wing to give North Carolina a 63-62 lead. Georgetown had the ball with time for a final possession, but Fred Brown passed it directly to North Carolina’s James Worthy, apparently mistaking him for a teammate. North Carolina won the national championship. It was the first significant moment in Jordan’s public career.

In a year when Thriller arrived, E.T. went home, Cats settled in for an 18-year run, the Tylenol murders changed how America packaged its medicine, and a freshman at North Carolina hit a jump shot that nobody who saw it forgot, 1982 managed to be simultaneously a year of great commercial culture and genuine human difficulty. The recession was real. The music was extraordinary. The Commodore 64 cost $595 and changed everything anyway.