Historical Events That Occurred in the Year 1991

• Sharon Pratt Dixon is sworn in as mayor of Washington, DC becoming the first African American woman to lead a city of that size and importance.
• Linus Torvalds buys the computer which got Linux started.
• Hockey Hall of Famer Wayne Gretzky scores his 700th goal.
• Gulf War: The British government announces the expulsion of 75 Iraqis from the country.
• The Soviets storm Vilnius to stop Lithuanian independence.
• Persian Gulf War: An act of the U.S. Congress authorizes the use of military force to drive Iraq out of Kuwait.
• Soviet Union military troops attack Lithuanian independence supporters in Vilnius.
• The United Nations deadline for the withdrawal of Iraqi forces from occupied Kuwait expires, preparing the way for the start of Operation Desert Storm.
• Gulf War: United States begins bombing Iraq in Operation Desert Storm, which began following Operation Desert Shield .
• Gulf War: Operation Desert Storm began early in the morning. Iraq fires 8 Scud missiles into Israel in an unsuccessful bid to provoke Israeli retaliation.
• Harald V becomes King of Norway on the death of his father, Olav V.
• Eastern Air Lines shuts down after 62 years citing financial problems.
• Sudan's government imposes Islamic law nationwide, worsening the civil war between the country's Muslim north and Christian south.
• Mohamed Siad Barre is removed in Somalia, ending centralized government
• The Baseball Hall of Fame votes to ban Pete Rose.
• A Michigan court bars Dr. Jack Kevorkian from assisting in suicides.
• Haiti's first democratically-elected president, Jean-Bertrand Aristide, is sworn in.
• The IRA launches a mortar attack on 10 Downing Street during a cabinet meeting.
• Roger Clemens signs record $5,380,250 per year Red Sox contract.
• Voters in Lithuania vote for independence.
• UNPO, the Unrepresented Nations and Peoples Organization, forms in The Hague, Netherlands.
• Gulf War: Two laser-guided "smart bombs" destroy a bunker in Baghdad. The bunker was being used as a military communications outpost and unknown to allied forces, as a shelter for Iraqi civilians.
• The Visegrád Agreement, establishing cooperation to move toward free-market systems, is signed by the leaders of Czechoslovakia, Hungary and Poland.
• Gulf War: U.S. and U.K. war planes bomb the suburbs of Baghdad, injuring at least 11 civilians and killing three others.
• The IRA explodes bombs in the early morning at both Paddington station and Victoria station in London.
• A gigantic statue of Albania's long-time dictator, Enver Hoxha, is brought down in the Albanian capital, Tirana, by mobs of angry protesters.
• Gulf War: Ground troops cross the Saudi Arabia border and enter Iraq, thus starting the ground-phase of the war.
• In Thailand, General Sunthorn Kongsompong leads a bloodless coup d'état, deposing Prime Minister Chatichai Choonhavan.
• Gulf War: An Iraqi Scud missile hits an American military barracks in Dhahran, Saudi Arabia killing 28 U.S. Marines.
• Tim Berners-Lee introduces WorldWideWeb, the first web browser.
• Gulf War: On Baghdad Radio Iraqi leader Saddam Hussein announces the withdrawal of Iraqi troops from Kuwait.
• Gulf War: U.S. President George H. W. Bush announces that "Kuwait is liberated."
• Battle at Rumaila Oil Field brings end to the 1991 Gulf War.
• An amateur video captures the beating of Rodney King by Los Angeles police officers.
• Most primitive form of World Wide Web is put online.
• Bank of Credit and Commerce International divests itself of First American National Bank.
• The Soviet parliament in Moscow, Russia ratifies a six-nation treaty on German unification.
• In Iraq, Saddam Hussein releases 6 U.S., 3 British and 1 Italian prisoner of war.
• Sheik Saad Al-Abdallah Al-Salim Al-Sabah, the Prime Minister of Kuwait, returned to his country for the first time since Iraq's invasion.
• Iraq releases all Gulf War prisoners.
• Massive demonstrations are held against Slobodan Miloaevi in Belgrade. Two people are killed and tanks are in the streets.
• Gulf War: Operation Phase Echo - 540,000 American troops begin to leave the Persian Gulf.
• A curfew is imposed on black townships in South Africa after fighting between rival political gangs kills 49.
• The United States Justice Department announces that Exxon has agreed to pay $1 billion for the clean-up of the Exxon Valdez oil spill in Alaska.
• After 16 years in prison for allegedly bombing a pub in an Irish Republican Army attack, the "Birmingham Six" are freed when a court determines that the police fabricated evidence.
• Germany formally regains complete independence after the four post-World War II occupying powers
• Senator John Heinz of Pennsylvania and six others are killed when a helicopter collides with their plane over Merion, Pennsylvania.
• ASA Embraer EMB 120 crashes in Brunswick, Georgia, United States, killing all 23 aboard.
• Georgia declares its independence from the Soviet Union.
• Italian ferry "Moby Prince" collides with an oil tanker in dense fog off Livorno, Italy killing 140.
• A rare tropical storm develops in the Southern Hemisphere off the coast of Angola; the first of its kind to be documented by satellites.
• The Dow Jones Industrial Average closes above 3,000 for the first time ever gaining 17.58 to 3,004.46.
• Freddie Stowers is awarded the posthumous Medal of Honor for which he had been recommended in 1918.
• Seventy tornadoes break out in the central United States. Before its end, Andover, Kansas, would record the year's only F5 tornado
• A tropical cyclone hits Bangladesh killing an estimated 138,000 people.
• The Declaration of Windhoek is signed.
• A riot breaks out in the Mt. Pleasant section of Washington, DC after a Salvadoran man is shot by police.
• Edith Cresson becomes France's first female prime minister.
• Helen Sharman from Sheffield becomes the first Briton to orbit in Space
• Former Indian prime minister Rajiv Gandhi is assassinated by a female suicide bomber near Madras.
• Israel conducts Operation Solomon, evacuating Ethiopian Jews to Israel.
• Zviad Gamsakhurdia becomes the first democratically elected President of the Republic of Georgia in the post-Soviet era.
• Lauda Air Flight 004 explodes over rural Thailand, killing 223.
• The capital city of Addis Ababa, falls to the Ethiopian People's Revolutionary Democratic Front, ending both the Derg regime in Ethiopia and the Ethiopian Civil War.
• At Hankuk University in Seoul, South Korea, students throw eggs at South Korean prime minister Chung Won Shik.
• Mount Unzen erupts in Japan in Kyushu killing 43 people, all of them either researchers or journalists.
• The United Kingdom's Conservative government announces that some British regiments would disappear or be merged into othersthe largest armed forces cuts in almost twenty years.
• Colo-Colo becomes the first Chilean soccer team to win the Copa Libertadores de América.
• Mount Pinatubo explodes generating an ash column 7 km
• The congress of the Italian party Proletarian Democracy decides to merge with the Communist Refoundation Party.
• In what was dubbed "The Mother of All Parades," New York City hosts a parade welcoming back troops from Operation Desert Storm.
• Russians elect Boris Yeltsin as the president of their republic.
• Marshall Ledbetter occupies the Florida State Capitol.
• Apartheid: The South African Parliament repeals the Population Registration Act, which had required all racial classification of all South Africans at birth.
• German parliament decides to move the capital from Bonn back to Berlin.
• Sonic the Hedgehog, one of the most popular video game characters in history, makes his debut in his self-titled video game.
• Croatia and Slovenia declare their independence from Yugoslavia.
• Slovenia, after declaring independence two days previous, is invaded by Yugoslav troops, tanks, and aircraft.
• The Warsaw Pact is officially dissolved at a meeting in Prague.
• Yugoslav Wars: Brioni Agreement ended ten-day independence war in Slovenia against the rest of the Socialist Federal Republic of Yugoslavia.
• International Human Rights Federation cites human rights violations committed by police and military personnel during Oka crisis in Quebec, Canada.
• South Africa is reintroduced into the Olympic movement after 30 years of exclusion.
• Boris Yeltsin begins his 5-year term as the first elected President of Russia.
• Solar Eclipse casts darkness.
• A Nationair DC-8 crashed during an emergency landing at Jeddah, Saudi Arabia, killing 261. The Canadian charter was ferrying Hajj pilgrims on behalf of Nigeria Airways.
• Total solar eclipse in Hawaii.
• The United States Department of Defense begins airlifting supplies to Albania
• Serial killer Jeffrey Dahmer is arrested after the remains of 11 men and boys are found in his Milwaukee apartment.
• Paul Reubens, better known as Pee Wee Herman, is arrested for allegedly exposing himself at a Sarasota, Florida adult theatre.
• Sonic the Hedgehog is released for the Sega Megadrive in Japan.
• The Greek cruise ship Oceanos sinks off the coast of South Africa.
• Tim Berners-Lee - publicly released his WWW project onto the Internet
• Tim Berners-Lee releases files describing his idea for the World Wide Web.
• Doi Takako, chair of the Social Democratic Party
• Collapse of Warsaw radio mast, the tallest construction ever built
• John McCarthy, British Journalist held hostage in Lebanon for more than five years by Islamic Jihad, is released.
• Collapse of Warsaw radio mast, the tallest construction ever built
• John McCarthy, British Journalist held hostage in Lebanon for more than five years by Islamic Jihad, is released.
• The SNES
• The SNES
• Wade Frankum starts his killing spree in Strathfield, Australia, an event that was later dubbed the Strathfield Massacre.
• Wade Frankum starts his killing spree in Strathfield, Australia, an event that was later dubbed the Strathfield Massacre.
• Collapse of the Soviet Union: Soviet President Mikhail Gorbachev is put under house arrest while on holiday in the town of Foros, Crimea.
• Collapse of the Soviet Union: Soviet President Mikhail Gorbachev is put under house arrest while on holiday in the town of Foros, Crimea.
• Soviet Union President Mikhail Gorbachev is overthrown by a coup. This leads to the fall of the Soviet Union
• Soviet Union President Mikhail Gorbachev is overthrown by a coup. This leads to the fall of the Soviet Union
• Collapse of the Soviet Union: More than 100,000 people rally outside the Soviet Union's parliament building protesting the coup aiming to depose President Mikhail Gorbachev. Estonia reclaimed its independence and seceded from the Soviet Union. Estonia had
• Collapse of the Soviet Union: More than 100,000 people rally outside the Soviet Union's parliament building protesting the coup aiming to depose President Mikhail Gorbachev. Estonia reclaimed its independence and seceded from the Soviet Union. Estonia had
• Latvia declares its full independence from the Soviet Union.
• Coup attempt against Mikhail Gorbachev collapses.
• Latvia declares its full independence from the Soviet Union.
• Coup attempt against Mikhail Gorbachev collapses.
• Mikhail Gorbachev resigns as head of the Communist Party of the Soviet Union.
• Ukraine declares itself independent from the Soviet Union.
• Linus Torvalds first says in a post to the comp.os.minix newsgroup that he is working on a new free computer operating system.
• Belarus declares independence from the Soviet Union
• Michael Schumacher makes his Formula 1 debut in the Belgian Grand Prix
• The European Community recognizes the independence of the Baltic states: Estonia, Latvia and Lithuania.
• Moldova declares independence from the USSR.
• A drunk motorman speeds into the Union Square station on the No. 4 line in New York City. The train derails on the curve, killing six passengers and injuring dozens.
• Supreme Soviet suspends all activities of the Soviet Communist Party.
• Azerbaijan declares independence from the USSR.
• Mike Powell breaks 23-year-old long jump record.
• Kyrgyzstan declares its independence from the Soviet Union.
• Uzbekistan declares independence from the Soviet Union
• The United States recognizes the independence of the Baltic states: Estonia, Latvia, and Lithuania.
• In Hamlet, North Carolina, a grease fire breaks out at the Imperial Foods chicken processing plant, killing 25 people.
• The Soviet Union recognizes the independence of the Baltic states: Estonia, Latvia and Lithuania.
• The name Saint Petersburg is restored to Russia's second largest city, which had been renamed Leningrad in 1924.
• Republic of Macedonia becomes independent.
• Tajikstan gains independence from the Soviet Union.
• The trial of Panamanian "strongman" Manuel Noriega begins in the United States.
• The trial of Panamanian "strongman" Manuel Noriega begins in the United States.
• North Korea, South Korea, Estonia, Latvia, Lithuania, the Marshall Islands and Micronesia join the United Nations.
• The first version of the Linux kernel
• North Korea, South Korea, Estonia, Latvia, Lithuania, the Marshall Islands and Micronesia join the United Nations.
• The first version of the Linux kernel
• Ötzi the Iceman is discovered by a couple of German tourists.
• Ötzi the Iceman is discovered by a couple of German tourists.
• Armenia is granted independence from Soviet Union.
• Armenia is granted independence from Soviet Union.
• The Dead Sea Scrolls are made available to the public for the first time, by the Huntington Library.
• The Dead Sea Scrolls are made available to the public for the first time, by the Huntington Library.
• First Biospherians entered to live in Biosphere 2 for 2 years
• The Protocol on Environmental Protection to the Antarctic Treaty was opened for signature.
• An Indonesian military transport crashes after takeoff from Jakarta killing 137.
• The first official version of the Linux kernel, version 0.02, is released.
• Ecuador becomes a member of the Berne Convention copyright treaty.
• Askar Akayev, previously chosen President of Kyrgyzstan by republic's Supreme Soviet, is confirmed president in an uncontested poll
• Luby's massacre: George Hennard runs amok in Killeen, Texas, killing 23 and wounding 19 in Luby's Cafeteria.
• Jharkhand Chhatra Yuva Morcha is founded at a conference in Ranchi, India.
• The Oakland Hills firestorm kills 25 and destroys 3469 homes and apartments, causing more than $2 billion in damage.
• History of Slovenia: Three months after the end of the Ten-Day War, the last soldier of the Yugoslav People's Army leaves the territory of the Republic of Slovenia.
• Lori Keevil-Matthews is killed after a 485-pound umbrella slams her against a boulder in a Christo art installation.
• Turkmenistan achieved independence from the Soviet Union.
• Galileo spacecraft becomes first probe to visit an asteroid.
• The Madrid Conference for Middle East peace talks opens.
• Perfect storm hits North Atlantic
• Bartholomew I becomes the Patriarch of Constantinople.
• Fifteen people are killed in the Barrios Altos massacre in Lima, Peru.
• Basketball player Magic Johnson announces he has tested positive for the HIV virus that causes AIDS, and that he is retiring.
• Marion Barry is reelected mayor of Washington, D.C..
• Dili Massacre, Indonesian forces opened fire on a crowd of student protesters in Dili, East Timor.
• American and British authorities announce indictments against two Libyan intelligence officials in connection with the downing of the Pan Am Flight 103.
• Cambodian Prince Norodom Sihanouk returns to Phnom Penh after thirteen years of exile.
• A fired United States Postal Service employee goes on a shooting rampage, killing four and wounding five, before committing suicide.
• Shiite Muslim kidnappers in Lebanon set Anglican Church envoys Terry Waite and Thomas Sutherland free.
• After the 3-month siege, the Croatian city of Vukovar is invaded by Serbians
• "The Apple of God's Eye", an undercover investigative journalism piece exposing the fundraising practices of American televangelist Robert Tilton, airs on ABC's Primetime Live newsmagazine show for the first time.
• Freddie Mercury, lead singer of Queen, dies of AIDS at age 45.
• The United Nations Security Council adopts UN Security Council Resolution 721, leading the way to the establishment of peacekeeping operations in Yugoslavia.
• Cold War: Ukrainian voters overwhelmingly approve a referendum for independence from the Soviet Union.
• Apple release the first version of QuickTime.
• Journalist Terry Anderson is released after 7 years in captivity as a hostage in Beirut
• US airline Pan Am ends operations.
• In Croatia, forces of the Yugoslav People's Army bombard Dubrovnik after laying siege there since May.
• The leaders of Russia, Belarus and Ukraine sign an agreement dissolving the Soviet Union and establishing the Commonwealth of Independent States.
• The Romanian Constitution is adopted in a referendum.
• United Nations General Assembly: UN General Assembly Resolution 4686 revokes UN General Assembly Resolution 3379 after Israel makes revocation of resolution 3379 a condition of its participation in the Madrid Peace Conference of 1991.
• Mikhail Gorbachev resigns as president of the Soviet Union
• Supreme Soviet meets and formally dissolves the USSR.
• Mount Pinatubo erupts.
• Nine are crushed while a crowd pushes their way into a basketball game at City College of New York.
• Sonic the Hedgehog Game Gear version is released in Japan.
• The Soviet Union is officially dissolved.
• The civil war in El Salvador ends.

• Vasko Popa, Yugoslav poet
• Steve Clark, English guitarist
• Carl David Anderson, American physicist, Nobel Prize laureate
• Keye Luke, Chinese-born actor
• Olav V of Norway
• John Russell, American actor
• John M. Kelly, Irish politician and academic
• Red Grange, American football player
• Yasushi Inoue, Japanese historian
• John Bardeen, American physicist, Nobel Prize laureate
• John McIntire, American actor
• Carol Dempster, American actress
• Nancy Kulp, American actress
• Dean Jagger, American actor
• Salvador Luria, Italian-born biologist, recipient of the Nobel Prize in Physiology or Medicine
• Danny Thomas, American singer, comedian, and actor
• Robert W. Holley, American biochemist, recipient of the Nobel Prize in Physiology or Medicine
• Dame Margot Fonteyn, English ballet dancer
• John Daly, South African game show host
• George Gobel, American comedian
• Reinhard Bendix, German sociologist
• Edwin H. Land, American inventor
• Serge Gainsbourg, French singer
• Arthur Murray, American dancer and dance instructor
• Cool Papa Bell, baseball player
• Ragnar Granit, Finnish neuroscientist, recipient of the Nobel Prize in Physiology or Medicine
• Karl Münchinger, German conductor
• Howard Ashman, American lyricist
• Doc Pomus, American composer
• Leo Fender, American guitar manufacturer
• Marcel Lefebvre, French Catholic leader
• Ralph Bates, British actor
• Aldo Ray, American actor
• Lee Atwater, American politicial consultant
• Martha Graham, American dancer and choreographer
• Graham Greene, English writer
• Charles Goren, American bridge player, writer, and columnist
• Max Frisch, Swiss writer
• H. John Heinz III, U.S. Senator
• Forrest Towns, American hurdler
• John Tower, U.S. Senator from Texas
• Sonny Carter, astronaut
• Per Yngve "Dead" Ohlin, Norwegian musician
• Martin Hannett, record producer
• Kevin Peter Hall, American actor
• Natalie Schafer, American actress
• David Lean, British film director
• Steve Marriott, British musician and actor
• Don Siegel, American film director
• Willi Boskovsky, Austrian violinist and conductor
• Johnny Thunders, American musician
• Carmine Coppola, American composer and conductor
• Emily McLaughlin, American actress
• Jerzy KosiDski, Polish-born writer
• Jean Langlais, French composer and pianist
• Rudolf Serkin, Austrian pianist
• Jiang Qing, Madame Mao
• Andreas Floer, German mathematician
• Rajiv Gandhi, Prime Minister of India
• Wilhelm Kempff, German pianist and composer
• Gene Clark, American singer and songwriter
• Leopold Nowak, Austrian musicologist
• David Ruffin, American signer
• Katia Krafft, French volcanologist
• Maurice Krafft, French volcanologist
• Stan Getz, American musician and composer
• Claudio Arrau, Chilean-born pianist
• Vercors, French writer and illustrator
• Dame Peggy Ashcroft, British actress
• Arthur Lewis, British economist, Nobel Prize laureate
• Klaas Bruinsma, Dutch drug lord
• Michael Landon, American actor, director, and producer
• Lee Remick, American actress
• Dr. Victor Chang, Australian physician
• Howard Nemerov, American poet
• Thomas Lynch, English Artist.
• Bert Convy, American actor
• Robert Motherwell, American painter
• Frank Rizzo, Mayor of Philadelphia
• Earl Robinson, American singer and composer
• Isaac Bashevis Singer, Polish-born Yiddish author, Nobel Prize laureate
• Paul Brown, American football coach
• Harry Reasoner, American reporter
• James Irwin, astronaut
• James Irwin, astronaut
• Bernard Castro, Italian inventor
• Jean Tinguely, Swiss painter and sculptor
• Alfonso García Robles, Mexican diplomat and politician, recipient of the Nobel Peace Prize
• Frank Capra, American film director
• Tom Tryon, American actor and novelist
• Dottie West, American singer
• Edwin Mattison McMillan, American physicist, recipient of the Nobel Prize in Chemistry
• Zino Francescatti, French violinist
• Zino Francescatti, French violinist
• Dr. Seuss, American children's writer
• Peter Bellamy, Folk Singer
• Dr. Seuss, American children's writer
• Peter Bellamy, Folk Singer
• Miles Davis, American jazz trumpeter
• Miles Davis, American jazz trumpeter
• Leo Durocher, baseball player and manager
• Steven Jesse Bernstein, American underground poet
• Redd Foxx, American comedian and actor
• Gene Roddenberry, American television producer
• Bill Graham, German-born concert promoter
• Joseph Papp, American theatrical producer
• Fred MacMurray, American actor
• Robert Maxwell, Slovakian-born media entrepreneur
• Gene Tierney, American actress
• Yves Montand, French actor
• Gustáv Husák, President of Czechoslovakia
• Sonny Werblin, former owner of the New York Jets
• Klaus Kinski, German actor
• Freddie Mercury, Zanzibar-born singer
• Eric Carr, American drummer
• Frank Yerby, American author
• George Joseph Stigler, American economist, Bank of Sweden Prize winner
• Richard Speck, American mass murderer
• Sir Richard Stone, British economist, Nobel Prize laureate
• Greta Kempton, American artist
• Vasily Grigoryevich Zaitsev, Russian-born Soviet sniper
• George Abecassis, British Formula 1 driver
• Cassandra Harris, Australian actress

• Asuka Hinoi, Japanese singer
• Erin Sanders, American child actress
• Kara Borden, American orphan and crime victim
• Emma Roberts, American actress
• Bonnie Wright, British child actress
• Devon Werkheiser, American actor
• Brittney Wilson, Canadian actress
• Amy Bruckner, American actress
• Jamie Lynn Spears, American child actress, singer, and television show host
• Amanda Michalka
• Kristen Alderson, American child actress
• Madylin Sweeten, American actress
• Kayla, female orca at Seaworld
• Erik Per Sullivan, American actor
• Tess Gaerthé, Dutch singer and actress
• Tess Gaerthé, Dutch singer and actress
• Jordan McCoy, American Juniors Finalist
• Jordan McCoy, American Juniors Finalist
• Spencer Locke, American actress
• Spencer Locke, American actress
• Zoe Weizenbaum, American child actress
• Zoe Weizenbaum, American child actress