On this day
Revisit the music, news, notable people, and historical moments connected to this date.
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The GAF Corporation announced yesterday that it intended to sell off almost half of its operations, leaving it as a producer of building materials and specialty chemicals.
WHILE the modern methods of birth control--the pill, IUD and sterilization-- have received most of the publicity about contraception during the last decade, the old-fashioned "barrier" methods have been quietly making a comeback.
Many of the parking garages in Manhattan are planning rate increases during the next few months, and garage managers say that these increases may cause most of the 3,531 garages and lots throughout the city to follow suit.
Nigeria, the second-largest foreign supplier of petroleum to the United States, has increased its oil prices by as much as $3 a barrel, to $40, or $1 less than many analysts had expected. Prices of some lower-quality crudes were raised $2.95 a barrel.
The Kennecott Corporation, in a peace overture that could mean an end to its unwelcome takeover bid for the Curtiss-Wright Corporation, offered late yesterday to pay $150 million to get back a large block of its own stock that is owned by the New Jersey aerospace company.
Music on My Birthday
The Top 50 albums for the chart week of December 31, 1980, covering December 31, 1980.
John Lennon & Yoko Ono
Barbra Streisand
Stevie Wonder
AC/DC
Pat Benatar
1980Jesse Carlson, American baseball player[†]
Jesse Craig Carlson is an American former professional baseball pitcher for the Toronto Blue Jays.
1980Matt Cross, American wrestler[†]
Matthew Capiccioni is an American professional wrestler, better known by his ring names M-Dogg 20, Matt Cross and Son of Havoc. He currently competes on the independent circuit, most notably Juggalo Championship Wrestling (JCW) where he is the JCW Heavyweight Champion in his first reign. Cross has also worked for prominent promotions such as Ring of Honor, Lucha Underground, Chikara and the short-lived Wrestling Society X. His main gimmick is that of an adherent of the straight edge lifestyle, a culture which he follows in real life. In 2011, Capiccioni joined the cast of the fifth season of WWE Tough Enough.
1980Richie McCaw, New Zealand rugby player[†]
Richard Hugh McCaw is a retired New Zealand professional rugby union player. He captained the New Zealand national team, the All Blacks, in 110 out of his 148 test matches, and won two Rugby World Cups. He has won the World Rugby Player of the Year award a joint record three times and was the most capped test rugby player of all time from August 2015 to October 2020. McCaw was awarded World Rugby player of the decade (2011–2020) in 2021. McCaw is also a winner of the New Zealand sportsman of the decade award.
1980Carsten Schlangen, German runner[†]
Carsten Schlangen is a German middle distance runner who specialises in the 1500 metres.
1980Marshall McLuhan, Canadian philosopher and theorist (born 1911)[†]
Herbert Marshall McLuhan was a Canadian philosopher whose work is among the cornerstones of the study of media theory. Raised in Winnipeg, McLuhan studied at the University of Manitoba and the University of Cambridge. He began his teaching career as a professor of English at several universities in the United States and Canada before moving to the University of Toronto in 1946, where he remained for the rest of his life. He is known as the "father of media studies".
1980Raoul Walsh, American actor, director, producer, and screenwriter (born 1887)[†]
Raoul Walsh was an American film director, actor, founding member of the Academy of Motion Picture Arts and Sciences (AMPAS), and the brother of silent cinema actor George Walsh. He was known for portraying John Wilkes Booth in the silent film The Birth of a Nation (1915) and for directing such films as the widescreen epic The Big Trail (1930) starring John Wayne in his first leading role, The Roaring Twenties starring James Cagney and Humphrey Bogart, High Sierra (1941) starring Ida Lupino and Humphrey Bogart, and White Heat (1949) starring James Cagney and Edmond O'Brien. He directed his last film in 1964. His work has been noted as influences on directors such as Rainer Werner Fassbinder, Jack Hill, and Martin Scorsese.
In 1980, the world population was approximately 4,447,606,236 people[†]