1990's

3/15/16

Year: 1992

• President George H. W. Bush is televised falling violently ill at a state dinner in Japan, vomiting into the lap of Prime Minister Kiichi Miyazawa and fainting.
• Russian leader Boris Yeltsin announces that Russia will stop targeting United States cities with nuclear weapons.

• In New York, Mafia boss John Gotti is convicted of the murder of mob boss Paul Castellano and of racketeering, and is later sentenced to life in prison.
• Former tennis player Arthur Ashe announces that he is suffering from the AIDS virus, which he contracted from a blood transfusion during heart surgery in 1983. He was diagnosed with HIV more than three years ago.
• In April, a Miami, Florida jury convicts former Panamanian ruler Manuel Noriega of assisting Colombia's cocaine cartel. In July, he was sentenced to 40 years in prison on drug and racketeering crimes. 
• Alabama ratifies a 202-year-old proposed amendment to the United States Constitution making the 27th Amendment law. This amendment bars the U.S. Congress from giving itself a midterm or retroactive pay raise.
• Space Shuttle Endeavour lands safely after a successful maiden voyage.

• After 30 years, Johnny Carson retires as host of NBC's The Tonight Show.
• During a spelling bee at a Trenton, New Jersey elementary school, U.S. Vice President Dan Quayle erroneously corrects a student's spelling of the word potato, indicating it should have an e at the end.

• The largest shopping mall in the US, Minnesota's Mall of America is constructed on 78 acres. This mall has over 500 stores and 27 rides including a roller coaster! 

• Hurricane Andrew hits south Florida causing 65 deaths and over $26.5 billion in damages.
• In September, Dr. Mae Jemison becomes the first African American woman to travel into space, aboard the Space Shuttle Endeavour.
• After a 17-year gap since its last mission to the red planet, the United States launched Mars Observer on September 25, 1992. The spacecraft was based on a commercial Earth-orbiting communications satellite that had been converted into an orbiter for Mars.
• After performing a song protesting alleged child abuse by the Catholic Church, Sinéad O'Connor rips up a photo of Pope John Paul II on Saturday Night Live, causing huge controversy, leading the switchboards at NBC to ring off the hook.
• A 29-pound meteorite lands in the driveway of the Knapp residence in Peekskill, New York, destroying the family's Chevrolet Malibu. It becomes known as the Peekskill Meteorite.

• Events at Ruby Ridge, Idaho are sparked by a Federal Marshal surveillance team, resulting in the death of a Marshal, Sam Weaver and his dog and the next day the wounding of Randy Weaver, the death of his wife Vicki and the wounding of Kevin Harris.