The Year 1982

• John W. Hinckley, Jr. found not guilty because of insanity in shooting of President Reagan (June 21).
  
  
• Alexander M. Haig, Jr., resigns as Secretary of State (June 25).
  
  
• Equal Rights Amendment fails ratification (June 30)

US GDP (1998 dollars): $3,242.10 billion
Federal spending: $745.76 billion
Federal debt: $1137.3 billion
Median Household Income
(current dollars): $20,171
Consumer Price Index: 96.5
Unemployment: 9.7%
Cost of a first-class stamp: $0.20

• Michael Jackson releases Thriller, which sells more than 25 million copies, becoming the biggest-selling album in history.
• John Belushi dies of a drug overdose at age 33.
• Cats opens on Broadway. Becomes Broadway's longest-running play.

• Movies

• E.T. – the Extra-Terrestrial, Tootsie, Gandhi, The Verdict

Books

• Thomas Keneally, Schindler's List
• Alice Walker, The Color Purple

Sirius/Eye In The Sky has to have been one of the most played songs of the summer of 1982 on the radio. Everywhere I went I heard it! My cousin and I spent the month of August at Myrtle Beach and heard it while we were down there...over and over. To this day whenever we hear it, we are instantly transported back to 1982...sun and sand....smell of suntan lotion...and those blond beach boys that we fell in love with that year.