1999

1999

Events

Teletubbies Tinky Winky is outed starting controversy for the BBC, PBS and Jerry Falwell.
Kosovo War
Former child star Gary Coleman files for bankruptcy
Y2K preparation was a major event in 1999 both in actual events and in media over-reporting.
January 1- Euro currency introduced.
January 1 - An avalanche destroys a school gymnasium during New Years' celebrations in Kangiqsualujjuaq in far northern Quebec, killing 9.
January 4 - Gunmen open fire on Shiite Muslims worshipping in an Islamabad mosque killing 16 people injuring 25.
January 6 - Bob Newhart receives a star on the Hollywood Walk of Fame.
January 20 - The China News Service announces new government restrictions on Internet use aimed especially at Internet bars.
January 21 - War on Drugs: In one of the one of the largest drug busts in American history, the United States Coast Guard intercepts a ship with over 9,500 pounds of cocaine aboard. The ship was headed to Houston, Texas.
January 25 - A 6.0 Richter scale earthquake hits western Columbia killing at least 1,000
February 4 - Hugo Chávez Frías, Venezuelan military and politician, is elected President of Venezuela.
February 4 - Unarmed West African immigrant Amadou Diallo is shot dead by four plainclothes New York City police officers on an unrelated stake-out, enflaming race-relations in the city.
February 5 - Mike Tyson is sentenced to a year's imprisonment, fined $5,000, and ordered to serve 2 years probation and perform 200 hours of community service for the August 31, 1998 assault on two people after a car accident.
February 10 - Avalanches in the French Alps near Geneva kill at least 10.
February 12 - President Bill Clinton is acquitted by the United States Senate in his impeachment trial
February 16 - In Uzbekistan a bomb explodes and gunfire is heard at the government headquarters in an apparent assassination attempt against President Islam Karimov
February 16 - Across Europe, Kurdish rebels take over embassies and hold hostages after Turkey arrested one of their rebel leaders, Abdullah Ocalan.
February 16 - In Jasper, Texas, testimony begins in the trial of John William King who is accused of dragging African American James Byrd Jr. to death in an apparent hate crime. King was later convicted and sentenced to the death penalty.
February 19 - Dennis Franz receives a star on the Hollywood Walk of Fame.
February 22 - Moderate Iraqi Shiite cleric Mohammad Sadeq al-Sadr is assassinated.
February 23 - Kurdish rebel leader Abdullah Ocalan is charged with treason in Ankara, Turkey.
February 23 - White supremacist John William King is found guilty of kidnapping and killing African American James Byrd Jr by dragging him behind a truck for two miles.
February 24 - LaGrand Case: The State of Arizona executes Karl LaGrand, a German national involved in an armed robbery that led to a death. Karl's brother Walter is executed a week later, in spite of Germany's legal action in the International Court of Justice to attempt to save him.
February 27 - While trying to circumnavigate the world in a hot air balloon, Colin Prescot and Andy Elson set a new endurance record after being in a hot air balloon for 233 hours and 55 minutes.
February 27 - Olusegun Obasanjo becomes Nigeria's first elected president since mid-1983.
March 1 - One of four bombs detonated in Lusaka, Zambia, destroys the Angolan Embassy.
March 1 - Hutu rebels kill eight tourists in Uganda.
March 3 - LaGrand case: The State of Arizona executes Walter LaGrand, a German national involved in an armed robbery that led to a death. Walter's brother Karl had been executed a week earlier; Germany had initiated legal action in the International Court of Justice to attempt to save Walter.
March 3 - Bertrand Piccard and Brian Jones begin their attempt to circumnavigate the world in a hot air balloon without stopping. Their journey ended in success on March 20.
March 4 - Monica Lewinsky's book detailing her affair with Bill Clinton goes on sale in the United States
March 4 - In a military court, Captain Richard Ashby of the United States Marines is acquitted of the charge of reckless flying which resulted in the deaths of 20 skiers in the Italian Alps when his low-flying jet hit a gondola cable.
March 8 - Oklahoma City bombing: The Supreme Court of the United States upholds the murder convictions of Timothy McVeigh.
March 21 - Bertrand Piccard and Brian Jones become the first to circumnavigate the Earth in a hot air balloon
March 23 - Gunmen assassinate Paraguay's Vice President Luis Maria Argana.
March 24 - NATO launches air strikes in Yugoslavia which was refusing to sign a peace treaty. This marks the first time NATO attacked a sovereign country.
March 26 - The Melissa worm attacks the Internet.
March 26 - A jury in Michigan finds Dr. Jack Kevorkian guilty of second-degree murder for administering a lethal injection to a terminally ill man (the incident was videotaped and aired on September 17, 1998 edition of 60 Minutes).
March 29 - The Dow Jones Industrial Average closes at 10006.78 which is the first time the indice closed above the 10,000 mark.
April 1 - Nunavut, an Inuit homeland, part of the Northwest Territories becomes Canada's third territory.
April 5 - Two Libyans suspected of bringing down Pan Am flight 103 in 1988 are handed over for eventual trial in the Netherlands.
April 5 - In Laramie, Wyoming, Russell Henderson pleads guilty to kidnapping and felony murder in order to avoid a possible death penalty conviction for the apparent hate crime killing of Matthew Shepard.
April 7 - Kosovo War: Kosovo's main border crossings are closed by Serbian forces to prevent ethnic Albanians from leaving.
April 20 - Two Littleton, Colorado teenagers open fire on their teachers and fellow students. The teenagers killed 12 students, 1 teacher and then turned their guns on themselves. See Columbine High School massacre.
May 6 - In New York, a parole board votes to release Amy Fisher who had been in prison for 7 years for shooting her lover's wife.
May 7 - A jury finds The Jenny Jones Show and Warner Bros liable in the shooting death of Scott Amedure after the show purposely deceived Jonathan Schmitz to appear on a secret same-sex crush episode. Shmitz later killed Amedure and the jury awarded Amedure's family US$25 million.
May 7 - Kosovo War: In Yugoslavia, three Chinese embassy workers are killed and 20 wounded when a NATO aircraft mistakenly bombs the Chinese embassy in Belgrade.
May 7 - In Guinea-Bissau, President João Bernardo Vieira is ousted in a military coup.
May 13 - in Italy Carlo Azeglio Ciampi is elected President of the republic
July 31 - Mark O. Barton kills 9 in Atlanta, Georgia
August - An earthquake in Turkey kills 13,000
August 10 - Buford O. Furrow, Jr. attempts a mass murder in Los Angeles
Thiomargarita namibiensis largest bacteria ever discovered
October - NASA loses one of its Mars probes, the Climate Orbiter.
November 20 - China launches the first Shenzhou spacecraft
December - NASA loses a second Mars probe, the Polar Lander.
December - The town council of Halfway, Oregon accepts an offer from the dot-com startup half.com to adopt the company name as its own.
December 17 - Iraq disarmament crisis: The United Nations Monitoring, Verification and Inspection Commission (Unmovic) is created to replace UNSCOM. The U.N. Security council once again orders Iraq to allow inspections teams immediate and unconditional access to any weapons sites and facilities. Iraq rejects the resolution.
December 24 - An Indian Airlines jetliner from Nepal to Kandahar, Afghanistan was hijacked.
December 29 - Former Beatle George Harrison is stabbed several times in the chest by an unknown assailant, who had broke into Harrison's home. Harrison's wife wrestled the knife out the assailant's hand before the police arrived. The man apparently believed that Harrison was the devil.
December 31 - Boris Yeltsin resigns as President of Russia, to be replaced by Vladimir Putin
December 31 - Five hijackers, who had been holding 155 hostages on an Indian Airlines plane, leave the plane with with two Islamic clerics that they had demanded be freed.
Fire in the Mont Blanc Tunnel kills 39 people closing the tunnel for 3 years.

Top Grossing Films of the Year

Star Wars, Episode I - The Phantom Menace
The Sixth Sense, starring Bruce Willis and Haley Joel Osment
Toy Story 2
Austin Powers: The Spy Who Shagged Me, starring Mike Myers
The Matrix
Tarzan
The Mummy
Runaway Bride, starring Richard Gerre and Julia Roberts
The Blair Witch Project
Stuart Little