A Look Back at 1989 Trivia Quiz

Answer: Girl You Know It's True

Milli Vanilli's "Girl, You Know It's True" was the most popular of their four songs that made the list of 100 top-selling singles of the year. They went on to win a Grammy as the "Best New Artist" of 1989, an award that was later revoked when it was discovered that they didn't actually sing their own recorded songs, and that they lip-synched in concert. Milli Vanilli's Rob Pilatus died of an alcohol and drug overdose in 1998; Fab Morvan, the other half of the group, pursued a solo career, this time doing his own singing.

Answer: Statue of Liberty

Chinese students, protesting the corruption of their govenment, and hoping for a more democratic nation, began congregating in Tiananmen Square in May. Late that month, they built a 30-foot-high statue out of papier maché and styrofoam. The statue, "Goddess of Democracy," resembled the Statue of Liberty in that the woman was using two hands to hold a torch over her head, and was built to help symbolize the protests for the many television cameras broadcasting the images around the globe.

The statue was destroyed on June 4 when the Chinese army crushed the protests.

Answer: He died

Giamatti, who had become commissioner earlier in 1989 after serving as president of baseball's National League, and before that had been president of Yale University, died of a heart attack at age 51 on September 1, 1989.

Answer: Invalidated the election results, then had the election winners severely beaten

Although never "President" of Panama, General Manuel Noriega wielded enormous power in running the country from 1983 to 1989. When opposition candidates Guillermo Endara and Guillermo Ford seemed to have won between 55% and 75% of the vote in the election (exit poll results varied widely, but all suggested the opposition had won handily), Noriega invalidated the results and installed a high school friend as the winner.

When Endara and Ford led a protest, Noriega had them pulled from the protest by his goons and beaten bloody with clubs and sticks. An invasion by the United States later in the year installed Endara and Ford and arrested Noriega.

Answer: Was "sentenced to death" by Iran's Ayatollah Khomeini

Upon his publication of "The Satanic Verses," novelist Salman Rushdie was the subject of a "fatwa", literally "sentenced to death", as Khomeini urged/ruled that all Muslims to try to kill Rushdie. Khomeini had been offended by the novel's questioning the infallibility of the Koran, and by its humanized portrayal of the prophet Muhammad.

Answer: Czechoslovakian politics

The Velvet Revolution was the name given to a series of peaceful student demonstrations in Prague, Czechoslovakia. The Czech police crushed the demonstrations on November 17, but the uproar that followed led to a revolution deposing the Communist government in a matter of weeks. Onetime dissident Vaclav Havel became the country's first democratically elected president.

Answer: An earthquake disrupted play for almost two weeks

Baseball fans in the San Francisco Bay area thought their dream had come true in 1989: both of its hometown teams, the San Francisco Giants and Oakland A's, played in the World Series. The A's won the first two games on their home field, the teams took a "travel day," and prepared for Game Three in San Francisco. That night, half an hour before game time, and with a live television broadcast going on from San Francisco's Candlestick Park, a major earthquake (7.1 on the Richter Scale) struck the city, even collapsing lanes of the Bay Bridge between San Francisco and Oakland.

The Series did not resume play until October 27, ten days later. Oakland continued its winning ways that night and the next, sweeping the Giants four games to none.

Answer: East German government resigns, wall falls, Germany reunites

East German president Erich Honecker was forced to resign on October 18. Two weeks later, on November 4, most of the remaining principal members of the government resigned. The new government liberalized the restrictions on traveling between East and West Berlin. On November 9, a government official was asked when the new travel laws took effect and replied, "Well, as far as I can see, ... straightaway, immediately." Within a few hours, thousands were freely crossing the borders, and in a matter of two days, most of the wall had been physically demolished by Berliners. East and West Germany reunited on October 3, 1990.

Answer: It ran aground on a reef

The waters of Prince William Sound, pristine up until that point, were sullied by what a judge later called "man-made destruction that probably has not been equaled since Hiroshima," when the Exxon Valdez ran aground on a reef on the evening of March 24, under the hands of an inexperienced crew member. Joseph Hazelwood, the Valdez's captain, had an exemplary record as a sea captain, but had been drinking on the night of the accident before turning control of the ship over to the less-experienced person. Hazelwood was eventually convicted of a minor misdemeanor and allowed to keep his sea license, but he never worked as a captain again.

The Valdez was renamed the "SeaRiver Mediterranean" and later was used briefly onscreen in the film "Waterworld."

Answer: Actress Kim Basinger bought it for $20 million

Basinger headed an investment group that bought Braselton for $20 million. Four years later, she declared bankruptcy and sold her share of the town for far less money.