Banana Slug Student Vote
26. In 1986, University of California, Santa Cruz students voted for the school’s official mascot to be the Banana Slug. The chancellor would not accept the outcome and instead surveyed only student-athletes about it, and they also voted overwhelmingly in favor of the Banana Slug.
27. In 1986, a nurse named Sandra Clarke was unable to remain with a patient who asked her to stay because of her busy schedule. When she came back, the patient had died alone. In 2001, she helped launch a program called ‘No One Dies Alone’, in which volunteers sit with terminal patients who have no one else.
28. During the AIDS epidemic of the 1980s, education about the disease was restricted for political reasons. Surgeon General C. Everett Koop ended up angering members of both parties after he ordered that every home in America be mailed a letter explaining what AIDS was and how to protect themselves from it.
29. In 1985, a doctor named John Story in Lovell, Wyoming was convicted of sexually assaulting patients for over 25 years. One reason he was able to keep doing it for so long was that many of his victims were strict Mormons and did not know what a proper pelvic exam, or even sex, felt like.
30. In 1985, John Fogerty of the ‘Creedence Clearwater Revival’ band was sued for sounding like himself in his solo music album. The cost was $1.1 million in legal fees. He took the case to the Supreme Court to challenge the double standard that defendants are not awarded the fees and won, establishing a precedent that protects artists from corporate sabotage.
31. In 1983, an Alabama school attempted to ban “The Diary of A Young Girl” by Anne Frank because, according to the board’s records, it was “a real downer.”
32. In 1983, Cliff Young, a 61-year-old potato farmer, won a 544 mile endurance race because he kept running through the night while the younger “professional” athletes were asleep.
33. In 1985, American teenager Ryan White was denied re-entry to his school because he had AIDS. 117 Parents and 50 teachers petitioned for his ban. People even cancelled their subscriptions because White was the paperboy and they thought they could be infected through newsprint.
34. In 1984, Michael Larson appeared on “Press Your Luck”. By using the stop-motion feature on his VCR, he realized that the supposedly random patterns on the game board were not actually random and memorized the sequences. He won 45 consecutive spins and collected a total of $110,237 in cash and prizes.
35. On 23 August 1989, about 2 million people linked hands in a human chain that extended 600 kilometres across the 3 Baltic countries, Latvia, Lithuania, and Estonia. They did this to protest their countries’ forced inclusion in the Soviet Union.
Stewart Defends Classic Films
36. In 1988, actor Jimmy Stewart appealed in Congressional hearings against Ted Turner’s choice to “colorize” classic black and white films, including “It’s a Wonderful Life”, saying “It’s morally and artistically wrong and these profiteers should leave our film industry alone.”
37. In 1987, a man named Arthur Shawcross, who was convicted of raping and murdering both a 10-year-boy, and an 8-year-old girl, was released from prison after only 12 years served for “good behavior.” He went on to commit 12 more murders.
38. In 1986, Scott Weiland met bassist Robert DeLeo at a Black Flag concert in Long Beach, California. The two were talking about their love interests when they discovered they were both dating the same girl. They formed a bond over the incident and later created their rock band ‘Stone Temple Pilots.’.
39. After a waitress named Phyllis Penzo at a pizzeria helped a customer choose the numbers for a winning lottery ticket in 1984, he ‘tipped’ her $3,000,000, which was half of his $6,000,000 prize money.
40. In 1981, Harvard professor Roger Fisher suggested implanting nuclear launch codes in a volunteer so that the President would have to kill an innocent person before beginning the impersonal killing of millions. The Pentagon rejected the idea, fearing the President would not go through with it even if it was necessary.
41. In 1987, in Brazil, a ship that was carrying 22 tons of weed in 3lb cans dumped every bit of it into the sea after Brazilian authorities chased it. The cans were washed to the coastline by the tides, and most were later found and used by locals. This incident became known as “The Summer of the Cans.”
42. On April Fools Day in 1989, billionaire Richard Branson built a hot air balloon to resemble a UFO, and he hired a dwarf wearing an E.T. costume to appear and frighten anyone nearby when it landed.
43. In 1987, a man named Mike Hayes persuaded 2.8 million people to mail him a penny each for his college education.
44. In 1986, the United Way launched 1.5 million balloons in Cleveland as a publicity stunt. It blocked the land and waterways of North East Ohio, closed an airport runway, and made the Coast Guard stop a search and rescue operation for 2 men who later drowned.
45. In 1981, Ronald Reagan dismissed 11,345 air traffic controllers after they refused to end their strike, and he then banned them from federal service for life.
Auto-Calling Falwell’s Number
46. In 1985, Edward Johnson set his computer to dial Jerry Falwell’s (American Pastor) toll-free number every 30 seconds and then disconnect. Altogether, he ran up more than $500,000 in phone bills for Falwell’s organization.
47. During the 1988 purges in Iran, women were lashed for missing their daily prayers. When one woman died after 22 days and 550 lashes, the authorities certified her death as suicide because it was “she who had made the decision not to pray”.
48. In 1987, Corona sales dropped sharply when a rumor circulated that their workers were peeing in their beer. The company traced the rumor’s source back to Heineken, whom Corona sued for $3 million in damages, but their reputation still suffered and their product was called “Mexican piss water” for years.
49. Ronald Reagan was 3,761 votes short, in Minnesota, of winning every state in the 1984 Presidential Election.
50. The Soviet Union cancelled history exams in 1988 because increased government transparency had revealed that the textbooks were filled with lies.
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