Chronology year 1985

January 1985:

• The first mobile phone call in Britain is made by Ernie Wise to Vodafone.
• Thousands of Jewish refugees are airlifted from Sudan to Israel.
• Sakigake, a Japanese space probe, is launched to Halley's Comet. Sakigake was the first space probe to be launched by any country other than the USA or the Soviet Union.
• An express train derails, killing at least 428 people in Ethiopia.
• Martina Navratilova becomes the third person to win 100 tennis tournaments.
• Tencredo Neves becomes Brazil's first elected president in 21 years. He dies before taking office.
• Born in the USA is released by Bruce Springsteen and reaches number 9 in the charts.
• Ronald Reagan is sworn in as president of the United States for the second time.
• Due to the unprecedented cold in the United States, 90% of Florida's citrus crop was damaged.
• We Are the World is recorded by the supergroup USA for Africa. The group included Michael Jackson, Lionel Richie, Stevie Wonder and Cindi Lauper.
• Margaret Thatcher, Prime Minister of Great Britain, receives an honorary degree refused by the University of Oxford.
• PW Botha, the president of South Africa, offers to release Nelson Mandela if he denounces the violence.

February 1985:

• 20 countries sign the United Nations treaty prohibiting torture. The US has not signed.
• Like a Virgin, Madonna's album, has been at number one for three weeks.
• Whitney Houston's self-titled debut album is released. He went on to win Grammys for Best Pop Vocal Performance, Best Female Album and 1986 Billboard of the Year.
• Murray Haydon is the third person to receive an artificial heart.

March 1985:

• In Great Britain, the National Union of Mineworkers ends a 51-week strike.
• Mikhail Gorbachev becomes Soviet leader, replacing Konstantin Chernenko.
• Symbols.com is registered – becoming the first domain name on the Internet.
• Pope John Paul II announces the first World Youth Day.

April 1985:

• Coca Cola launched 'New Coke', a sweeter version of its original drink.
• The West German Parliament decides that it is illegal to deny the Holocaust.

May 1985:

• Ronald Reagan ends the embargo against Nicaragua.
• At Bradford City football ground, 56 die and 265 are injured in the worst fire in the history of English football.
• Crazy for You by Madonna goes to number 1.
• Michael Jordan is named NBA Rookie of the Year.
• A View to a Kill, the latest James Bond film starring Roger Moore, premieres in San Francisco.
• A cyclone hits Bangladesh, more than 10,000 die.
• Britain agrees to return Hong Kong to China in 1997.
• A tornado outbreak in Canada and the US hits 41 in Ohio, Pennslyania, New York and Ontario. 90 people are killed by these tornadoes.

June 1985:

• Coca Cola announces that it is bringing back its original formula.
• American, Brazilian and West German forensic pathologists confirm that the remains exhumed in Brazil were those of Nazi doctor Dr. Josef Mengele.
• A bomb destroys an Air India Boeing 747 in the air, near Ireland. 329 are killed.
• Route 66 is certified. The route is from Chicago to Santa Monica.

July 1985:

Andrei Gromyko is appointed president of the USSR. Back to the Future is released in the US. The film becomes a cult classic. In one of the most famous events of 1985, two Live Aid Concerts took place at Wembley Stadium in London and John F. Kennedy Stadium in Philadelphia. Christa McAuliffe is chosen to be the first teacher to fly on the space shuttle. She would later die in the Space Shuttle Challenger disaster in January 1986.

August 1985:

• Michael Jackson buys ATV Music for US$47 million. ATV Music includes all Beatles songs.
• In the second deadliest air disaster, 520 people die when Japan Airlines Flight 123 crashes in Ueno, Japan.
• Political violence begins after the funeral of Victoria Mxenge, a civil rights lawyer who was murdered. Victoria was respected and liked by the South African Student Congress.
• Mary Joe Fenandez becomes the youngest player to win the US Tennis Open. She was 14 years and 8 days old.

September 1985:

• President Reagan orders sanctions on South Africa.
• The game Super Mario Bros, created by Shigeru Miyamoto at Nintendo, is launched.
• Mexico City suffers an 8.1 earthquake, killing around 10,000 people and leaving 250,000 homeless.
• Walt Disney World celebrates its 200,000,000th guest.

October 1985:

• South Georgia and the South Sandwich Islands adopt a constitution.
• Ronald Reagan bans the import of South African Krugerrands into the USA. Krugerrands are gold coins that were minted by South Africa to promote gold in international markets. In 1980, they represented 90% of the global gold coin market.
• Intel introduces the 80386 32-bit microcomputer chip.

November 1985:

• Garry Kasparov becomes the youngest world chess champion, at 22 years old.
• The US president and the Soviet leader meet for the first time.
• release of Microsoft Windows 1.0.

December 1985:

• The Color Purple, based on the novel by Alice Walker, and directed by Stephen Spielberg, premieres in New York. Whoopi Goldberg and Danny Glover star.
• Terrorists kill 20 and injure 110 people while attacking El Al at Rome and Vienna airports. President Reagan blames Muammar Gaddafi, the leader of Libya.
• Release of IBM-PC DOS Version 3.2.