What Happened in ...? (1990s edition) Quiz

Answer: Commit suicide with Jack Kevorkian's help

Dr. Jack Kevorkian assisted Janet Adkins in her suicide with his 'suicide machine'--a device that allowed her to push a button and release deadly chemicals into her bloodstream. "Dr. Death" lost his medical license in 1991, but continued to assist people who wanted to end their lives, usually in the back of his van, and in 1999 he went to jail for second-degree murder.

He was paroled in 2007.

Answer: Johnson

Earvin "Magic" Johnson, a basketball player for the Los Angeles Lakers, won five championships in his professional career and is considered one of the best players of all time. He announced his health status in November of 1991 and retired, but he came back for the All-Star Game in 1992 (winning the MVP award) and he played for the American team at the 1992 Olympics in Barcelona.

Answer: Creation of the European Union

The treaty was signed in Maastricht, the Netherlands, and went into effect in 1993. It set up the Euro as the EU currency, and erected three pillars of the EU: the European Communities pillar (economic, social and environmental policies), the Common Foreign and Security Policy (military) and the Justice and Home Affairs pillar (criminal matters).

Some countries, in particular the UK, secured 'opt-outs' from some provisions of the treaty, for example, the common currency. (The European Union was established on the foundation of the European Community, which had had a continuous existence - in slightly different forms - since 1950s).

Answer: Beanie Babies

Ty Warner, Inc. eventually became just Ty Inc. When the first nine toys came out (including Legs the Frog and Chocolate the Moose), they were modest sellers. They really became a phenomenon later in the decade, and sales of the cute little suckers became a $6 billion industry.

The most desired Beanie Baby is the dark blue edition of Peanut the Elephant--not many of them were made (the color was supposed to be light blue), and some have sold for over $4000.

Answer: Carlos the Jackal

Sánchez, a Venezuelan terrorist, had been on the Most Wanted lists since 1975, when he'd taken over the OPEC headquarters in Vienna, killing three people and receiving in the neighborhood of $20 million from an unnamed 'Arab President'. In 1994 he underwent surgery in Sudan, and while he was recovering he was snatched by his own bodyguards and sold to the French, who tried him and sentenced him to life imprisonment.

Answer: The Grateful Dead

Bandmember Jerry Garcia died in August of 1995, and the remaining members of the Grateful Dead decided to break up the band (though many of them have participated in reunions and revivals, they've never used the name). The name "Grateful Dead" came from the Funk & Wagnalls Folklore Dictionary, and meant a spirit that thanks the human or humans that arranged its burial.

The band had only one #1 hit (1987's "Touch of Grey").

Answer: Won a chess game against the World Champion

Deep Blue was a chess-playing computer developed by IBM, and on February 10th it played--and beat--champion Garry Kasparov. Kasparov eventually won the match 4 games to 2. The next year, the new and improved Deep Blue (called 'Deeper Blue') won the rematch with the human, 3.5 games to 2.5 games. Kasparov was not pleased--he maintained that the computer had had human help (he said he could detect 'intelligence and creativity' in Deep Blue's play).

BTW--it was Skynet that would become self-aware, but not until 1997.

Answer: Princess Diana and Mother Teresa

Princess Diana died as the result of injuries suffered in an automobile accident in Paris on August 31, and Mother Theresa died of heart failure in India on September 5. Diana's funeral was watched by two billion people worldwide.

Fitzgerald and Leakey died in '96, Rogers and Turner in '95, and Onassis and Tandy in '94.

Answer: The National Rifle Association

Heston held the presidency of the NRA until 2003, and became a large voice for gun rights, declaring in 2000 that if Al Gore became President of the United States the 2nd Amendment would be threatened. In 2001, Heston made a cameo appearance in Tim Burton's remake of "The Planet of the Apes" (he'd starred in the 1968 original), in which he made a little speech about guns: "What you hold in your hand is the proof of their power - their power of invention, their power of technology. Against this, our strength means nothing.

This has the power of a thousand spears." Heston died in 2008.

Answer: Littleton, Colorado

Harris and Klebold killed 12 students and one teacher, then killed themselves at Columbine High School in the deadliest high school massacre in 20th-century America. In the aftermath, people sought to blame the students' actions on video games (both boys played "Doom"), music (Marilyn Manson, for one), lax gun laws (they'd acquired their weapons through a friend at a gun show) and the Internet--but in the end, no one really knows why they did what they did.